I was excited about the Incarna expansion to EVE Online, now, not so much.

I've been playing EVE Online since 2007. I like EVE. The Incarna expansion was going to be the start of something that I have been waiting to see for quite some time. Finally, characters were going to be able to exit their ships. I played with and previewed Incarna on the test server, the new Captain's Quarters is every bit as cool as I heard and expected. I think it does a fine job of paving the way to the long time goal of walking in stations. I do have to say this, while it was slow and choppy (hopefully only because it was on the test server), it looked just top notch. Here's a few screenshots-

Now on to what I don't like, take a look at this recent dev blog.

Short version, they are adding a new store for "vanity items" and with it a new currency that is derived from PLEX.

I went on a bit of a rant in the EVE Forum.

Well if it has not been said, griefers are going to love this.

I was playing around with Incarna on duality. I like the Captain's Quarters, I really think CCP did a fine job. However, I did take a PLEX and convert it to Aurum. Let's take a look at a few things concerning that.

1 PLEX = 3500 Aurum

PLEX is currently selling for 406 million ISK in Dodixie.

406,000,000 / 3,500 = 116,000

I bought a pair of goggles in the store for my character in the store for 1 AUR. So I paid 116,000 ISK for a pair of goggles. That's a pretty average price for a pretty average frigate, making these one expensive pair of goggles.

Over the last month the price of PLEX on the market has been on an upward spike. If this trend continues, PLEX will be over 500 million ISK by the time Incarna goes live. I suspect after the release it will continue on more of an upward trend. This means the value of AUR and the items purchased with it will increase as well.

I don't think it is unreasonable to foresee a market value of store items going in to the millions of ISK. I also don't think it is unreasonable to foresee the market value of PLEX increasing as well, even approaching a billion ISK.

That being said, soon one can buy 2 PLEX and make a billion ISK without even really playing the game. In a few months, it will just take 1 PLEX. This will drive up the cost of everything on the market.

Thanks CCP, you did us a real solid.

And, getting back to what I opened with, the only way I see to put on your new clothing items is to go through the character customisation. Which means you have to take a new picture for the change to take. Which means if you buy anything that shows in the picture, you are advertising that you have expensive items on you that are going to be destroyed if you get podded. Makes it easier for greifers to know who to get the best ransoms from. Or the most tears.

I really feel CCP has totally ruined the market in EVE with this new currency. PLEX was a bad idea to begin with, Aurum has only made it worse.

Just my 0.02 ISK, the clothing items should be able to be produced by players using blueprints (patterns?) and resources from Planetary Interaction. Not only does this make more sense, it encourages more use of PI and does not greatly impact the market or the value of ISK.