Rubicon Is Go!

The new expansion, due on the 19th of November 2013 will be called Rubicon!

From this expansion CCP are introducing a longer term plan which will introduce space colonisation.

Capsuleers will start gaining new powers in New Eden, they may not be bound by the established ways as the expansions progress over time.

This expansion is the start of that journey.

Almost certainly it will be shortened to Ruby or Rubi by future commentators.

Customs offices will change in high security space, capsuleers can destroy the existing office, replace with their own, set tax rates, etc. Previously this was only available in low and null security space.

Personable deployable structures, four new types. One is a siphon module which can be placed near a starbase and steal resources. Access will be open so anybody could take resources from the siphon module. The next one is a home base, ship fitting will be available, cargo capacity, harder to kill though. Another one is a deployable tractor beam device that will transfer the loot into a central hold, assuming you “own” the wrecks. The final one is a deployable short range cyno jammer, 100km is the expected range, but it will be a single use device.

Warp acceleration changes. Acceleration and deceleration will now be more influenced by the mass of the ship. T3 cruisers are the benchmark, so small ships will progress into full warp speed faster and larger ones will do this slower.

Interceptors are among many ship balance changes, across twenty four ships, including bubble immunity for the Interceptors. Watch the threads and dev blogs for more information.

Mauraders are now getting a mode called Bastion will puts the ship into a type of siege mode, and then the ships do this the graphics will show a transformation of the ships configuration. A fast cycle, e-war immunity, a large tank and a reduced Micro Jump Drive timer are some of the features mentioned.

Interdictors, Flycatcher etc will be receiving some changes to help their balance.

Electronic Attack Ships will also be receiving the balance treatment to help bring them back into use.

New missile launchers, rapid launchers for Battleships and Cruisers.

New ships from the Sisters of Eve, similar to pirate faction ships, designed to be long range, with a large drone bay, but can also fight if required.

Certificates will be removed for a new system which is better organised.

Also a new display of the ships available in game is being created to help all players see the progression tree of ships that are available.

The character selection screen will receive some changes to help make it easier to redeem items, character information, etc.

Twitch TV will be integrated into the Eve client to help facilitate the creation of videos, live streaming, etc. I can see this being a problem with the typical Australian upload bandwidth.

Valkyrie is now in high resolution, at E3 it wasn't.

They gave a plug for the second Eve Downunder which is nice.

Finally here is the URL for the Rubicon video - www.twitch.tv/ccp/b/465203586

Keep a close eye on the dev blogs in the near future as they start fleshing out the details of this new expansion.

My thoughts?

This does seem to be a true expansion rather than an update, but I'm concerned they are stretching out the content over several years and will use the carrot of "future plans" and "the five year plan will be completed in four years" to keep people invested.  If you've ever played Tropico you may know what I mean.

However I like the look of what I've seen so far, but the changes to high sec customs offices will be a pain, but also a great conflict generator.    I'm concerned that a large power bloc could destroy all the customs offices in high sec, replace them with their own, raise the tax while also causing a shortage of PI material in the market.  It's what I'd do if I was in their situation, but I'm not so launching cans into space instead of using the launchpad may become the new black.

I'd say the wormhole guys would be happy with this expansion as it will make living there much easier

New ships I can take or leave, often they duplicate existing designs, though we have had spectacular exceptions to this like the Noctis.  Yes it was the same as a salvage Catalyst or Hurricane but it does the job in a far superior way.

To sum up, I'm cautiously optimistic about this expansion, and it's only six weeks away!