Greedy Goblin

Friday, January 17, 2014

The RvB failure

This escalated quickly. The alliance I help founding (and funding) was created 5 days ago. The Goons noticed that crying 18 pages won't stop the alliance from rather fast growth or hilarious ISK efficiency. So they activated their newly found highsec pets, RvB. Both Blue Republic and Red Federation joined as allies to Goons.

Well, this quickly answered the question "will this project fail to start up"? No matter how this will end, it's already huge. The largest and "most powerful" nullsec alliance needed the the help of the 2 largest highsec alliances to defend itself from the "random failure of the publord who doesn't get EVE". 70 vs 18700.

However it's pretty easy to tell how it will end. Unless Lemmings failcascade on their own because of some management drama, RvB already lost this war. Why?

For the same reason Nulli and TEST came out of lowsec even weaker than they entered: players join an alliance to play the way the alliance use to. Nulli and TEST members joined for nullsec Sov war and not lowsec play. It's not that lowsec play is inferior, it's just that those who like it picked lowsec corps. J4LP went the other way with very limited success. Swiftly changing the focus of the alliance make members pretty disinterested and demotivated.

RvB members joined for ... the RvB war. The ability to participate instant, no-consequence PvP. The RvB ruleset guarantees just that. You can find any kind of fight and others must not spoil it (rule#4: honor arranged fights, rule#3: no ECM, rule#6: no neutral boosting, rule#8: no smacktalk, rule#9: no picking out FCs). In the meantime you can go on with your life: safely in your pod (rule#1: no podding) you can go shopping (rule#2: no PvP in Jita) and you can form up safely (rule#5: no big ships in enemy staging system). RvB was made especially for players who don't enjoy the metagame, don't want to form on timers just to stand down or go home after the enemy stood down, don't want to sit ECMed, don't want to be trolled on local. They want instant, fun PvP.

The war Red Federation and Blue Republic is starting against Lemmings now is anything but a "fun friendly fight". There will be timers. There will be outnumbered situations where one sides stands down. There will be trolling. There will be ECM, podding, Jita undock camping, offgrind boosters and all the crap they wanted to get away from. Nullsec is full of it. They could join (and maybe on other pilots are joined) a nullsec alliance. They came RvB exactly to avoid this. And now they get it into their face. I can't see how would it be good for RvB.

What we see is a shift in the goals of the management. Mangala and others have seen the POCO income and wanted it. They want to shift RvB from being Red versus Blue into a purple blob that grabs POCOs for them. A "highsec Sov holder" alliance. I have no idea why they aligned with Goons, as GSF has nothing to give to them. My best guess is that they believed that Goons could take away their POCOs, so it's better to be pets than enemies (Lemmings are proving that it's not true).

One question remains: why did GSF need to ask for help? Because they lost this war before it started. They are unable to maintain continuous, significant presence in highsec, they took their POCOs with a bluff: no one dares to challenge them. RvB believed the myth of Goon strength and signed a treaty with them, despite they could take the Goon POCOs easily. Now that the bluff is called on, they panicked and mobilized their newfound pet. It's only time before RvB either gets defeated or successfully reorganizes into a permanent purple highsec Sov holder. That case they'll sooner or later ask why are they helping Goons. Either way, the Goons will lose.

Anyway, those who joined Lemmings to be able to shoot war targets without restrictions and without the friendly "goodfight" aspect of RvB, got their paycheck multiplied: RvB will provide much more targets. If you are in the highsec PvP scene or want to be there, or just has some free time and an alt to use, Lemmings is the place you need to be for fights.

Unrealated industry-PI note: visit this CCP survey if interested in more efficient PI, research and industry.

40 comments:

Stabs said...

You could probably accelerate the process by encouraging people to do the kinds of nefarious nullsec skullduggery that is popular in null but which RvB isn't used to.

Their forums are open. http://rvbeve.com/forums/index.php/topic/6798-new-fc-incentive-program-where-our-poco-income-is-going/?p=106181 looks like a good point to start dissension. Find regular line members who are complaining and post in support of them on a dummy account.

Joining RvB, leading fleets badly is another option. Warp their members into hideous traps.

Awoxing is also a fine technique.

By the same token of course DL will be full of Goons doing the same thing to you so some risk mitigation strategies are in order - like not using Legions
http://eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=21419968

Anonymous said...

Just FYI, goons and RvB have an agreement regarding POCOs around Jita where they will defend each others interests in exchange for a NAP. It's been pretty well publicised, suprised you didn't know.

Anonymous said...

RvB joined the fight? More pew,pew targets. Good.

Anonymous said...

I just purged 14 players (about 40 characters) from my Corp, for their rvb history. It is really sad that I can't trust those people anymore, because they spent time within a formerly well respected group.
It's especially sad looking at two of them who I had sent to rub to learn more about pvp when they first came up to me to be recruited.
Sometimes it is hard to do the right thing in this game, but being responsible for a Corp of over 300 players I can not have people I'm uncertain about around, especially not if there is any chance they are aligned with a group as malicious as goons.

maxim said...

I wonder what kind of "corporate culture" is going to evolve in the Lemmings.

It ought to be a pretty lax one, but you can't have 50+ people together doing same thing without having tacitly agree on at least some unspoken rules.

Anonymous said...

@Anon 8:17 - what? why purge RvB people for having a strategic alliance with goons? Aside from "sworn enemies", almost every major entity in the game has at some point had a strategic alliance with the goons.

Also the goons/malicious swipe shows an incredible short sightedness and bias.

Finally, your 14 memebers were PREVIOUSLY part of RvB, PRIOR to RvB's LEADERSHIP making a decision to join the goons. Kicking them out is...hilariously stupid.

bandsaw1961 said...

When I was in RvB the best fleets were always the purple ones going after war targets, so I bet they are looking forward to this. Just because people join RvB for instant PVP without consequences, that doesn't mean that the ones that stay don't know how to fight in highsec with alts etc.

Anonymous said...

In nullsec alliances spies are pretty much a given, coalitions don't even bother, their pings and voice comms are as private as they are public. There WILL be spies in DL, nothing you can do about it.

Honestly, knowing a bit about the CFC they dont even care about this, goons dying in highsec are prolly drunk and are in it for the lulz. If they did care I doubt any DL member would be able to even undock.
I can understand you are trying to market DL on your blog but you are exaggerating the DL success greatly.

RvB are joining only to honor the POCO agreement, they are most certainly not pets.

Anonymous said...

if lemmings want to hit on rvb-morale hard - permacamp nomaa.

Anonymous said...

NO!
Man! research. read. apply.

RvB ruleset
http://rvbeve.com/forums/index.php?app=forums&module=extras&section=boardrules

the ruleset you refere. is only between the Red and Blue! they have third party COE since ever.

here is the part that applies to your DL alliance. they do join forces against none RvBs! that is nothing NEW! has nothing to do with DL.

1. Third Party War Targets.
Do whatever you want to them. Pod them, use ECM on them, do whatever you can to make them as miserable as possible. Set up your overview to distinguish between Reds/Blues (-4 Bad Standing) and 3rd Party WTs (-10 Horrible Standings). Both are war targets ("Pilot is at war with your corporation/alliance), but you can use the standings to distinguish them, and color them however you like.

Gevlon said...

Don't be dumb! Of course they fight with war targets. But the purpose they joined RvB is participating the "fun war". Instead, they now have to participate in an all-out real war.

Babar said...

Do they really have to? As in, if I join RvB, do I have to go defend poco's?

Anonymous said...

Gevlon, you seem to think you are bringing "all out real war" to people who never have it?

The killboard looks just like any other marmite, goons, 0rphanage etc war.

59% Isk efficiency, 3.3b destroyed to 2.3b lost.

Most kills in Jita and along the route.

What happened to the high goal of "destroy all pocos"?

Now, nothing is wrong is just shooting each other in high sec, but that is what marmite and goons and RvB have always done, and those that were there before them.

There have always been groups which guaranteed you targets whenever you undocked. Darwins Lemmings is no different than Marmite, but now carebears think they are not joining someone they hate.

Ask the carebears if they would join Marmite. In fact, why have you not joined Marmite, and just gotten them to permadec goons

Provi Miner said...

Here is the thing I think you your missing you post a lot of words, you say a lot things, you mention so much stuff thta the core message is getting obscured.

JOIN DL and KILL GOONS

Once that is said then add all the stuff

Other Variations

JOIN DL BATHE IN GOON TEARS

JOIN DL "we are not here to ruin the game, we are here just to ruin the GOONS game"

well you get the idea you have a great tag line, you have a product to sell yet you try and obscure to sound like a logical well reasoned well meaning effort. By hook or crook get DL to pew pew then give them the "Logical" reasons and have fun.

Anonymous said...

you're probably right.
they have some POS cleanups in their history. for "fun"? I don't know. But with POCOs "now" and holding them adds the need to defend them. Instead of the occasionally POS cleanup job. ok. the rules don't reflect structure grind, only that you have to listen to the leaders (and that can be anything. from singing to posting kpop girlband pictures).
But how do they have SOV. That is real war, isn't it?

Gevlon said...

@Babar: there is two possibilities: RvB leadership can make their members shoot/rep POCOs or they lose the mentioned POCOs. Now it is possible that there are enough volunteers in RvB to do it. If not, they have to make a CTA rule. In RvB...

@Anonymous: Marmite is an "Elite PvP" alliance who cares about killboard efficiency. I couldn't join Marmite as I couldn't uphold good efficiency. Lemmings are called lemmings for a reason: anyone is invited, if you go and lose a Legion in Jita, no one gives a damn. So it's Marmite in goals but not in recruitment.

Anonymous said...

ohh they have "fun" defending POCOs. arangement with goons.

http://themittani.com/features/morning-forge-poco-deregulation-and-rvb?page=0%2C1

Well ok. Gevlon you have brought the "real war" to them. if it is really their only source of ISK.
congratulations!

professor clio said...

Couple mis conceptions I'd like to clear. Goons didn't ask for rvbs help, its laughable to think they'd need us to keep their pocos from dying to you. We joined in because we had been without a good third party war for a while and it keeps us sharp and entertained to have one going.

As for POCO defense its never mandatory but the last time we had one come out of reinforced (when marmite+dark home world+Noir. Got together to attack them) we asked for volunteers and got 150 guys to show up and no offense but that group of wartarget was rather more formidable that yours.

So far the wars been great. Our guys have killed expensive lemming ships and they're relearning the important "Dont go to jita" fact of life.

We'll probably get bored of it and withdraw the ally after two weeks and I'm sure you'll take that to mean that you've somehow defeated us but you simply Dont understand what motivates rvb line members.

Gevlon said...

@Professor clio: you just wanted a random third party war and for that you picked a 5 days old alliance.

TOTALLY believable.

Professor Clio said...

Not random, of course not. One that could provide entertaining forum banter and would be active in the area (we're kinda lazy that way).

So far it's been good, I haven't been able to get on any kills yet but there's been good ones. The guy who managed to lose a legion to 3 RvB members is especially funny.

Anyway, believe what you will.

Anonymous said...

Professor Clio > for us it was simple, we knew the goons wanted highsec POCOs and we figured we could either shoot each other for weeks losing isk on both sides or split up The Forge and both profit.

this would be a massive fight. maybe good fights. goons are careless anyway. so why not take highsec RvB? it is all yours. skill > numbers.
but instead you split the space between yourself and goons? not even trying to engage in a fight with them. are you that afraid?

you want fights but than don't want to fight goons. someone please make sense.

Anonymous said...

you want fights but than don't want to fight goons. someone please make sense.

It's called politics. Goons and RvB hammered out a diplomatic arrangement to form a POCO cartel in The Forge. It allows them, for the first time in their history, to generate passive income for their alliance which goes to fund SRP and fun enabling financial projects.

Goons and RvB realized they both could not hold the region's pocos from one and other - so rather than getting mired in a forever-war (a real one..not a lol forever-war that already existed that Marmite have brilliantly convinced gevlon is a great idea and gotten him to fund their fun) they decided it better to work together, drop a bunch of pocos, fix the tax rate and split the income.

This has some nice mutually beneficial knock on effects. Highsec publords shoot pocos, and RvB and goons get pubbies to shoot at all day long. Tears and forum porn are also aplenty. It is totally win win.

they have no reason to shoot each other. They are not ideologically opposed in this venture.

Kate 'On said...

Convince rvb to join. Tell them they can have all the pocos.

Between that, null, and you guys. He'll, even test screwing around up there. Cfc can't be everywhere all at once

Random McNally said...

As a former RVB member, I can pretty much confirm what Clio said, at least from the prospective of what I've seen. RVB is still very much about the "forever war" between themselves, but having steak every night can get a little tedious. Sometimes, you need a little something else. Variety of life and all that.

Back when Zerg Overmind was propagating the war dec's, RVB was loving the fact that they had war targets and could break from the Red versus Blue and form purple. Those that chose to participate in war target hunting got their wishes filled, those that didn't could carry on with the forever war. The only time when the forever war got put on hold, was when war targets were in system. It just meant that there were more volunteers. Often times, they even waited until the war targets got on grid!

I cannot speak of any deals that may, or may not have occured between Goons and RVB, but I can certainly see Goons asking if RVB wants a piece of DL and Marmite, and them saying "sure".

If your comments are any indication, Marmite is missing out by booting previous RVB members. Thats some good information that their passing up.

Telemachus Rheade - RvB Director said...

So does the OP not understand RvB or something? We shoot each other, as well as everything else. Saying having more targets to shoot is bad for RvB members is kind of silly, because shooting targets is all they do, all day, everyday. Confirming that RvB decced for the pure tears and conspiracy theories that this Goblin guy was gonna spew on the interwebs. Thanks for the free content, in game and out ;).

Gevlon said...

@Telemachus Rheade: you forget that the "RvBee pact" was done long before Lemmings were created. Or you made that because you knew that a few months later I'll make an alliance?

Anonymous said...

The fascinating thing about Gevlon's projects are not the short-term impact, but instead the long-term changes in playstyles. Cornering the WoW glyph market via "deep undercutting", pointing out how Wargaming's matchmaker can subtly influence matches via starting placement, and now this.

I agree with Professor Clio -- that RvB is in it for the goodfights and will drop after a short number of weeks. Why? Because the RvB membership doesn't want to be locked out of Jita for that long. So...

What will GSF do then when RvB fails to live up to the terms of their agreement? Wardec RvB? Go after All The POCOs themselves? Because now that RvB has supped the sweet, sweet nectar of passive income, there's no going back. HiSec has changed forever.

Unless CCP changes the rules again.

Anonymous said...

RvB has been in numerous wars with 3rd party, notably Marmite. Your notion that Jita is safe for RvB members is wrong, it often is quite risky, due to such wars.

I have been made a bit sad by the notion that people are getting kicked for past RvB associations. RvB is working with the goons a bit but remains neutral. The temptation to troll grr goons conspiracists is strong, but it is all that it is.

RvB welcomes everyone: N3 members, goons, carebears, pirates, we don't care. We have fun shooting each other and 3rd party targets. You want to learn PvP by jumping in the fire and not be judged for losing 10 frigates in a row? Join us. Tired of hunting for hours in lowsec or WH for a fight that might not happen? Join us. Tired of massive tdi battles? Join us.

LR , RvB recruiter.

Powers said...

We form voltron with RVB for all wardecs witrh stated objectives relating to our shared POCO empire. Hope that helps.

Anonymous said...

I just purged 14 players (about 40 characters) from my Corp, for their rvb history. It is really sad that I can't trust those people anymore, because they spent time within a formerly well respected group.

Oh, wow, that's aggressively dumb.

That's exactly why Goons win wars. They don't care about "goodfights." They don't even care about "carebear tears." They care about doing their own things, and letting everyone else do the hand-wringing about their antics.

Sure, they've made some enemies along the way, but they've made friends, too. They didn't beat CCP... err... I mean... BoB by themselves. There were capital ships of many different alliances there, some "elite" some "not."

I find it funny that you think RvB "failed." I also enjoy the fact that you didn't just join Marmite because they're "elite." Scorn with words (because after all, they should be ganking miners if they want to be elite), and keep handing them ISK for the dec, I suppose.

Anonymous said...

much blah.
Elephant in the room points to the obvious -> thanks to ccp POCO change, Goons are highsec carebears now. with a heated passion.
I never thought I would see that day. And what ever trollbrain at CCP had the e-balls/tits to pull this of. I thank you /bow.

Anonymous said...

The logic behind this whole thing is flawed to the core. Its ludicrous to assume that you can build an alliance of people so frothing with hate for Goons that they are willing to put up with a war that is so "un-fun" to turn away a 3000-person alliance of pure PVPers from a fight.

I guess the other option is to just get enough numbers to blob RvB into submission which at point the promise of a good fight will probably draw the goons out from null sec. Good luck with it.

Anonymous said...

I removed those members from my Corp, since goons can not be trusted. Everyone working with goons is a good by association. Goons don't just side with their "partners" they usually have a good amount of goons join the "partners", and overtake them culturally.
I can not and will not take the risk of having someone of dodgy loyalty in my Corp. I can not have someone talk to an rvb buddy who then feeds Intel about us to the largest menace in new eden.
That's sad but the reality we play in.

Anonymous said...

> I agree with Professor Clio -- that RvB is in it for the goodfights and will drop after a short number of weeks. Why? Because the RvB membership doesn't want to be locked out of Jita for that long. So...

RvB leadership has every incentive to keep RvB locked out of Jita (as they do a lot of the HQ market seeding) and RvB membership has grown used to it long ago.

Anonymous said...

I removed those members from my Corp, since goons can not be trusted.
Goons have a very good record of being trusted on political and diplomatic matters. Sure individual goons can't be trusted but the goon organization has very strict rules about the group being trustworthy. If they couldn't be trustworthy, they couldn't wield the political might they currently do.

Everyone working with goons is a good by association. Goons don't just side with their "partners" they usually have a good amount of goons join the "partners", and overtake them culturally.

Lol. If this is your thinking you have to exclude pretty much anyone in eve. Most people have in one way or another associated with goons. As for overtaking culturally - this absolutely does not happen. The CFC is made up of many many cultures (some of them in direct conflict with goon culture).

I can not and will not take the risk of having someone of dodgy loyalty in my Corp. I can not have someone talk to an rvb buddy who then feeds Intel about us to the largest menace in new eden.

A few problems here. Firstly the people you have kicked out had no decision making power here. They were not even in RvB when the RvBees as worked out.

Secondly you seem to believe you actually HAVE intel worth passing on to goons.

That's sad but the reality we play in.


Only if your goonhate is so strong that you make silly decisions.

Anonymous said...

I can not have someone talk to an rvb buddy who then feeds Intel about us to the largest menace in new eden.
That's sad but the reality we play in.


1. DON'T trust anybody. EVER!
2. DON'T fly what you can't afford.

please read up on OPSEC and apply it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operations_security

you don't need loyality if you (as lead) yourself can keep you mouth/info/chat/forum shut.

therefore

3. what ever you disclose, WILL be used against you.

Smith said...

I actually find a bit laughable that the RvB party line is something along the lines of "we join for the good fights" and not to "honor our pact with Goons" while saying Goons need no help. If that was the case there are a shit-load of wars to join in on. I had RvB pinned as much more in it for the fun and not giving a crap for poletics. Dissapoint.

Anonymous said...

This is the wrong narrative. The correct narrative is that Lemmings now offer a lot more easy targets in high sec. So if people want to join a corp that offers easily available small gang and solo pvp, join Lemmings. The corp just got a lot more fun.

daniel said...

have u considered calling out a bounty for specific things?
like first lemming taking down a goon poco receives x (not too much to avoid goons killing their own pocos) isk.
and other stuff.

Anonymous said...

To the ex-RvB member corp kicker: You do not understand the nature of the relationship between RvB and the goons, *at all*.

You may be aware that this Saturday, while the HED battle raged, a second large scale battle happened, for Ganked 100. RvB and friends showed up with capitals and hundreds of subcap for a "roam". At one point, about 1200 people were in system.

Once this was over, you know what the remnant of the fleet did? They headed to HED and blew up *CFC* dominixes, just for fun. Does this sound like the RvB and Goons are allies? No, we have an understanding, that is all.

LR