CCP analyses Eve Online "Burn Jita" event
"It was a pretty big deal."
CCP Games gave its blessing to the player-driven attempt to destroy sci-fi MMO Eve Online's economy - and now that the dust has settled on the event, it's analysed what happened.
On Friday members of the Goonswarm alliance led an assault on the Jita trade hub, used for the sale and transfer of virtual goods by many players. Thousands of ships entered the space, attacking everything and anything that moved. The kill heat map, below, is the result of that action.
"Starting last Friday, it was on fire," CCP software director Erlendur S. Þorsteinsson wrote on the Eve Online website.
"Actually, Jita itself wasn't on fire, but thousands of players who normally find it a safe haven of trade and economic gameplay found their ships on fire - everything from a lonely hauler on up to the simply massive, highly-armoured freighters moving thousands of USD equivalents of ships and goods."
Each dot on the heatmap represents one of the 5431 solar systems in Eve's virtual universe. "It was a pretty big deal," Þorsteinsson said. "And it all happened because a few players wanted to make it happen and then, after convincing thousands of others to join them from around the world, they made it happen."
So, what, exactly, happened? In CCP's own words: "Player fleets comprised of high-damage-dealing ships began to destroy high-value industrial ships during a sustained campaign with single, coordinated volleys, sacrificing themselves in waves because the in-game 'police' warps in almost immediately with harsh, reprimanding justice.
"Amidst this orchestrated chaos, opportunistic salvagers profited from the wrecks left behind and Eve's deep, talented player community began blogging about, filming, screenshotting, livestreaming and celebrating/decrying the event. Some opposing fleets rose up to fight the invading hordes as well - to mixed success.
"As developers we watched in awe at another amazing thing our players brought to the universe we created."
The total damage inflicted over the three day event amounted to 45,117,952 hit points delivered in 249,021 distinct hits. As you'd expect, market orders placed in Jita fell through the floor for the duration. "So while many ships were destroyed this weekend, it sure feels good to be the hosts of such massive amounts of spaceship carnage," Þorsteinsson concluded. "We'll always be prepping for the next big event our players throw at us."