The future of EVE Online has been revealed after pieces of the puzzle were slowly revealed and the dark dangerous nature of it all has been laid bare, and to be honest I don’t think we’re ready for what lies ahead.
The ARK is the new mothership produced by the Triglavian Collective over the last few months. It’s been spotted in abyssal sites as players entered and explored the Abyss. We’ve seen the construction from a small yard to now almost-finished construction and it is ready to be unleashed upon the masses of EVE Online. But what will be its target?
My prediction is that we will see the might of the Collective unleashed to lay siege to the known space of Eve online, affecting the gates and even the stars themselves.
One of the pushbacks that we have seen from players in relation to citadels is the overpopulation of them. In some cases, grids have upwards of 30 of them stacked together playing no major role apart from just being there as a buffer. CCP has let players place as many as they want without restrictions for number per system. There’s been no major updates to making them easier to kill. So, was it CCP’s plan all along to allow such a build up so that there was more for the collective to burn down, more damage to cause?
With the advanced diamond NPC AI, they are fully capable of taking down structures by themselves. I saw a swarm destroying jump bridges and assaulting Fortizars first-hand. If that power was unleashed in High Security space, many structures would burn. In Null-Sec, alliances would be besieged and made weaker, and thus a riper target for other groups to assault them.
On May 4, CCP released the name of the upcoming expansion, as well as its launch date of May 28. It should be noted that it’s a few days after the EVE Down Under leg of the tour, where we can expect to see final information.
While the dev post did not confirm much, it does, however, give us some amazing artwork as well as confirming that we’re getting two new mulitplasmids for both the Damage Control Unit and its assault version, both expected to be used by players to help push their resists up higher. There’s also changes to faction subcapital weapons, which will now be able to use T2 ammo, as well as the new Triglavian ships and a new update to the UI for the agency. Patch notes are expected to be released in the week prior to the update.
Some new information that was provided earlier this week is how the invasion will set up. There will be four tiers of system invasion: Scout, Vanguard, Assault and the mysterious “WW”. These will affect the level of Triglavian attacks you can expect, with Scouts seemingly soloable while others will need a full fleet. Rifts are also going to be present, with news on a new type of ore caused by these invasions. Finally, the ARK itself will sit in the core system of the invasion and features a wide defence network. The ARK has an incorporated conduit gate, allowing for the flow of more Collective ships.
Whoever leads the first fleet to take down the ARK will need to have a grand understanding of the Collective, as well as a command on the battlefield. Personally, I can’t wait to see the invasion first hand as we’re entering a very exciting time in EVE Online, and this is a chance for new danger and threats. I, for one, can’t wait to watch the world burn.
