Inferno, Missiles, and Smedley’s Drake

Things that make you go, “Hrmmm?”

John Smedley.  In a Drake.  In EVE Online.

Many Drakes

I mean, sure, it isn’t like he said he had a titan or anything.  And Drakes are pretty common.  But you still don’t get one in a day.  You have to play the game a bit.

It is one of those things… I know he says he loves online games.  But he runs the online game division for Sony, so he would be foolish to say anything different.

And I know he says he loves SOE’s games… especially PlanetSide.  But again, that is one of his products, he would be a fool to say otherwise.

But he appears to know what a Drake is and that its main business is shooting missiles.   It is not an obvious aspect of the game.  I bet Bhagpuss, who has skimmed many a post here about Drakes, couldn’t have made the “Drake = missiles” association. Not because he isn’t paying attention, but because he hasn’t played EVE.

It implies that Smed might really play online games… games besides Free Realms.

That is somewhat reassuring.

In the mean time, it is Inferno launch day… which is where the whole missile thing got started.

Direct link here.

I will most definitely be firing some missiles tonight.

Gates of Discord Vote Fails Again on Fippy Darkpaw

I figured out why the GoD vote on Flippy keeps failing, it’s the DPS classes, they fear the Berserkers massive DPS!

Alendi, in the EQ Forums

Another vote came and went, Monday morning rolled around, and the Gates of Discord expansion on the Fippy Darkpaw time locked progression server remained closed.

Nobody Loves Me

Now some on the forums are trying to figure out why, with the usual lack of success.  Click on the link at the top of the post for examples.

Meanwhile, there was a request to find out what the actual results of the poll were.  Piestro did not have the results to hand.  It apparently requires a developer to go in and extract results from polls.  In response to the inevitable “why don’t you just show the results by default?” Piestro answered:

The voting system is intended for more than just TLP votes, so making that change would mean every vote would be displayed. That’s not necissarily desirable.

And, of course, he is right.

When SOE is adding in things like health, power, and self resurrection potions based on simple majorities in polls,  they certainly do not want to give anybody opposing adding a potentially lucrative item to their cash shop any leverage by letting them know anything beyond vague details.  55% in favor sounds good, but if you knew what percentage of the actual playing population voted… and we don’t know that number… the percentage of ‘Yes’ votes might sound considerably less impressive.

Anyway, on the Fippy Darkpaw Time Locked Progression server, the times seem to be favoring “locked” over “progression.”  The next vote will come up in a week, but Gates of Discord won’t be unlocked until June at the earliest.

Addendum:  Piestro posted the voting result percentages.

Vote to open Gates of Discord on Fippy Darkpaw – Yes: 40% No: 58%  Ron Paul: 2%

Oddly, this second vote on Fippy Darkpaw ran concurrently with the first vote on Vulak, which ALSO failed to pass.

Vote to open Gates of Discord on Vulak – Yes: 42%  No:  56%  Harold Stassen: 2%

More on this as it slowly ceases to develop.