Ahahaha just kidding moongoo is completely broken and we’re going to fix that starting in Inferno 1.2.

Disclaimer: Everything in this dev blog (just like every game change we make) is open to being changed at any point. If you dump all your isk into speculation around this blog and lose it all because we changed something again, you have only yourself to blame. Always speculate at your own risk.

Note: The details of the reactions have changed since the blog was originally published, see below for the most up to date numbers as of the release of Inferno 1.2

So by way of introduction, I’m CCP Fozzie the new game designer here at CCP. I’ve been playing EVE for years and am very excited for the chance to work alongside the great team here and in partnership with all you passionate players to make Eve Online: A Progressively Improving Game.

For those of you who are interested in how I look, I have included a picture of myself below:

Now if I’ve learned anything about prison from television (and who hasn’t), it’s that the first thing you should do when you arrive is find the biggest guy around and beat the living daylights out of him so everyone knows not to mess with you. Since I figure most imaginary prison advice should be fairly transferrable I came in here looking to find a big game problem and smack it around a bit.

Many of you will be familiar with this graph:

Over the past several months the price of the moon mineral Technetium has risen sharply, bringing some pre-existing game design issues into sharper relief. The value of these moons combined with the fact that they exist completely in one distinct region of the game has caused wealth transfers that are simply too large for the effort and risk involved. So we are going to kick Technetium in the balls.

There are more problems with our current system of moon mining and tech two production than just the price of Technetium, which is why we now have a comprehensive plan to address these issues over multiple releases. The end goal is for the materials for tech two production to come from player activities that require group gameplay and risk taking, and that provide appropriate rewards. This will eventually involve changes to both resource collection and the build requirements for construction of tech two materials and items. A responsible first step in this plan is to ensure that as much as possible the tech two components market is shielded from unnecessary price shocks.

Those of you who have been playing for a while may remember that there was a system introduced in 2008 for this exact purpose called Alchemy. It allows players to replace one moon mineral type with another in a reaction; simulating the innovation that occurs in the real world when supply of a resource is tight (the fuel conservation innovation that resulted from the 1970s oil crisis springs to mind). The details of the system are available at CCP Greyscale’s original alchemy devblog for those who are interested.

Our first step in fixing the moon mineral and tech two production economies is to expand alchemy to every applicable reaction. You will soon be able to create Platinum Technite without using Technetium if you so desire.

Most of these reactions will sit unused at any given time, and that is by design. Alchemy will kick in as a pressure valve in case prices of any moon mineral spike. As long as prices remain low there is no need to bypass the original mineral.

Since enterprising individuals will soon be able to find the details of the reactions from test patches, I’ll give the technical details of the reactions below for your perusal. Like I said above, speculating on these changes is to be done at your own risk as we reserve the right to change anything anytime should we see a good reason. You will notice that we are starting these reactions at the same conversion rate as the original alchemy instead of the conversion rate of current boosted alchemy. These ratios can and likely will change over subsequent releases as we adjust the system.

I will also repeat that this change is only the first step in our plan to revamp the methods by which the materials for tech two ships and modules are collected and used. We will be taking the time we need to do it right, but that process starts very soon in Inferno 1.2 with these alchemy changes.

If you aren’t interested in the gory details feel free to skip this next part, but for those of you who have skipped over the whole blog looking for numbers here are the most recent set of planned reactions for your mathematical enjoyment:

These reactions were adjusted on July 24th 2012 and therefore have changed since this blog was originally published.

100 Titanium	and	100 Vanadium	reacts into	1 Unrefined Vanadium Hafnite	refines into	20 Vanadium Hafnite	and	90 Vanadium
100 Cobalt	and	100 Platinum	reacts into	1 Unrefined Platinum Technite	refines into	20 Platinum Technite	and	90 Platinum
100 Scandium	and	100 Chromium	reacts into	1 Unrefined Solerium	refines into	20 Solerium	and	90 Chromium
100 Scandium	and	100 Cadmium	reacts into	1 Unrefined Caesarium Cadmide	refines into	20 Caesarium Cadmide	and	90 Cadmium
100 Evaporite Deposits	and	100 Atmospheric Gases	reacts into	1 Unrefined Hexite	refines into	20 Hexite	–	–
100 Atmospheric Gases	and	100 Tungsten	reacts into	1 Unrefined Rolled Tungsten Alloy	refines into	20 Rolled Tungsten Alloy	and	90 Tungsten
100 Evaporite Deposits	and	100 Titanium	reacts into	1 Unrefined Titanium Chromide	refines into	20 Titanium Chromide	and	90 Titanium
100 Hydrocarbons	and	100 Scandium	reacts into	1 Unrefined Fernite Alloy	refines into	20 Fernite Alloy	and	90 Scandium
100 Silicates	and	100 Cobalt	reacts into	1 Unrefined Crystallite Alloy	refines into	20 Crystallite Alloy	and	90 Cobalt

Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoy this and all the other changes we have planned for Inferno 1.2.

CCP Fozzie

P.S. If you like this change you should click the link to the comment thread at the top of this page, find my first post in the thread and hit like.