It’s time for more delicious brain implants. After downtime on Dec 12^th and running through Dec 21^st , you will find  the Genolution CA-2 available via the redemption system. Be sure to log in and redeem yours, the set bonus is pretty darn nice overall.

As an added bonus, we will also be unveiling the 2011 Holiday Gift during the same period. This will work just a bit differently than prior holiday gifts. There will be a list of items in your Account Management queue. You can choose one, and only one, gift from the list. That gift will then be made available in the redemption system on Dec 22^nd.

So, to be 100% clear, you can get your CA-2 only between Dec 12^th and Dec 21^st.

You can select your Holiday Gift during the same time.

Your implant appears in your hangar as soon as you redeem it, but your Holiday Gift won’t  appear until Dec 22^nd.

Implant 2: Hardwiring – Genolution Core Augmentation CA-2

• Slot 4
• Boost intelligence by 3
• Provides +1.5% CPU bonus
• Provides +1.5% capacitor recharge
• Implant set bonus: 50%

This is the second half of the Core Augmentation implant set, delivered by Genolution as a follow-up to the CA-1 just months after their first demonstration of new augmentation techniques shook up the often-stagnant industry.

The CA-2 picks up where its predecessor left off, providing a dual boost via frontal lobe enhancements and a neocortical modification that complements the CA-1′s focus on a captain’s ship-fitting ingenuity. The end result is an increase to intelligence, coupled with improved CPU output and capacitor recharge rate. Additionally, when combined the CA-1 and the CA-2 supplement each other, providing a significant increase in their overall net effect.

Item description:

Concurrent with the release of the CA-2, Genolution offered up the implant’s schematics for public inspection. They claimed the move was designed not only to allay any lingering fears about the technology – now widespread amongst the capsuleer class – but also to provide a foundation for future advances in the field.

Our goal was to mobilize a sizeable fleet of devs that would be tough enough to not be wiped out in minutes, but eventually we hoped to attract enough attention to be overpowered and killed. We wanted to give people a fight to remember and we hope we did just that.

Click to enlarge (screenshot courtesy of throughnewbeyes.wordpress.com)

In total, CCP destroyed 430 capsuleer vessels belonging to 316 different characters. Included in this are three characters who were accidentally pod killed by the CCP horde, all of which have been reimbursed their losses (fun fact: One of them was Darius III of the CSM). To quote the infamous TomB, the pod he destroyed was because of “Lag!”. Sure, Tom…we all believe you .

In total, 2,009 ship/capsule losses were recorded in the Tama system yesterday, a rather considerable jump from the daily average of just 56 per day from the November 1^st to November 22^nd period.

CCP lost the following ship types in the engagement:

The totals for ship losses in the system seem to suggest that CCP employees have a strange tendency for firing upon rookie frigates when they see them, though many larger ships were also destroyed:

Lots of assorted parties joined the fray once word got out. The majority of ships destroyed were destroyed by characters who were not a member of any alliance, with CCP (thankfully!) coming in at the top spot for the alliances.

Our congratulations to the players who made it on to the list of top 25 killers in Tama yesterday, alongside eight developers. This list excludes capsules, rookie ships and shuttles that were killed (because come on, that’s not really sporting, is it chaps).

Additional props to Beastoria for landing the final blow on four CCP ships, with Fattymcbutterpants (a name which had the CCP fleet unified in laughter when called out as primary on EVE voice) and another character who should probably be renamed, both achieving three final blows each. We’re also happy to report that whilst NPCs did indeed manage to destroy 13 ships in Tama yesterday, no CCP ships were lost to NPCs. And that’s despite CCP Sreeg’s Nanobot Accelerator rigged buffer tank.

After the last CCP pilot was blasted full of holes and sent on his merry way via the clone express, players kept fighting in the system for almost four hours.

We had our backend tool construct a word cloud from the biggest thread discussing the event, and judging by that, fun was had.

Many thanks to everyone who took part and had fun with us, all of us here at CCP who were able to be there had an absolute blast. I’m certain that this is far from being the last time a fleet is spotted leaving Polaris.

If you have any tips or feedback for us for future events, or want to make fun of our fits, please visit the comments thread for this blog.

Several times a year, the CSM enlists the aid of the community in helping us prioritize the issues that CSM has raised with CCP. The results of this crowdsourcing effort helps guide the CSM’s efforts during not only our regular summit meetings, but also the all-important CCP release planning process. This is your chance to tell us which CSM issues you think are the most important and deserving of CCP’s attention.

To make your voice heard, look at the list of issues on the Prioritization Wiki Page and then cast your votes in the associated Assembly Hall thread. Complete instructions on how to vote are available in both places.

Please help us push for more improvements by voting for what you think is important. We greatly appreciate your time and attention.

Sincerely,
The Members of the 6th Council of Stellar Management

Jita, The Forge - Capsuleers involved in trade have been offered a dedicated sub-system channel to discuss all matters related to New Eden’s markets.

The channel, named “SCC-Lounge”, was created by Caleb Ayrania. He revealed what goes on inside the channel: “A lot of rather serious talks about New Eden’s market often go on, and we do try to offer a lot of help to upcoming merchants when they decide to try their legs in ‘the seas of maritime’ trading.”

Caleb also told of his future plans for the channel, indicating that he wants to make it an “actual physical location within New Eden”, enabling “capsuleers to come and hang and talk market business”.

Chevalleis, a regular visitor to the channel, described a friendly atmosphere within: “There are a lot of other traders here, and we can exchange ideas… it’s useful to hear older opinions.”

CSM Intro

Team BFF and the ‘Little Things’

EVE: Flying in Space

EVE Future

The EVE-Dust link

EVE Marketing

Quality Assurance

Game Masters – Policies, Petitions and Large Fleet Lag

EVE Security Task Force

Team Gridlock – The War on Lag

ISD and Community Matters

EVE User Interface Issues

Starbase Issues

Feature Abandonment

Nullsec Industrialization

Incarna and the NPE

EVE Art

Meeting with Hilmar

EVE Economics

Ship Balancing

We understand that there is a lot of information in one document and there are sure to be a lot of comments from players on many of the issues. We would ask that you place your comments in this thread as it will be actively monitored by the CSM and CCP.

BREAKING NEWS - Sansha Nation vessels under the command of Slave Ation09 are currently attempting to invade the system of Altrinur.

At approximately 19:15 New Eden time, Slave Ation09, piloting a Revenant Nation super carrier, invaded the solar system with a fleet of supporting Sansha Nation battleships and cruisers.

At 20:00 in New Eden, a fleet of over 40 capsuleers warped to the hostile vessels and engaged the Sansha forces.

More than 100 capsuleers and rising from across New Eden are forming up in fleets in an attempt to destroy the hostile Sansha forces. Slave Ation09 mocked the capsuleers as they arrived in the system: “It’s going to take more than a fleet of half a dozen pods to challenge me.”

Capsuleer Ammzi, who is currently fighting the Sansha forces in Altrinur seems upbeat about their chances of victory: “We have gained experience from previous attempts, we will do our best…”

At the time of publishing the battle is still ongoing.

Brapelille, Sinq Laison - 40 capsuleers that entered a fiction writing competition hosted by Max Torps have since had their stories published for all of New Eden to read.

The competition asked capsuleers to look at a provided image from New Eden and write a short story on how they interpreted the picture.

Max Torps explained why he organised the competition: “I’d seen some competitions before but felt that they focused more on capsuleer thoughts, opinions and feelings. I wanted to see another aspect to their creativity, their fiction writing.”

Max also revealed his delight at the number of entries he received: “What really made it take off was when it was announced on the New Eden News Network… 117 capsuleers took the time to sit down and write a story based on one image. I felt rather humbled but also very excited. It also made me determined to see the project through. I spent days reading each entry, many of them I read more than once!”

With permission granted from 40 authors to use their story, he is seeking permission from the remainding 77 as he believes that “it’s only fair to allow those that have been out of touch a chance to be published too”.

Arcana Mortis, author of “Inspiration Strikes”, one of the 40 so far published, expressed her delight at having the piece published: “It’s pretty awesome, if I’d known that was going to happen I probably would have written something better though!”

Kail Toronus, author of “Inner Thoughts of a Vanquished Soul”, another of the 40, revealed the need to submit his story: “I just love to write, I’ve been writing fiction stories for a long time now. So, when I saw the competition I knew I wanted to submit something.”

The winners of the competition were:

1st prize of 100 million ISK and 2 PLEX – Ichikhan for his story “On Rails of Golden Fire”.
2nd prize of 75 million ISK and 1 PLEX – Lady Ariona for her story “Freedom and Slavery”.
3rd prize of 50 million ISK and 1 PLEX – Neologia for her story “Concientious Objector”.

On the back of the success, Max Torps also wished to announce that a similar competition will be revealed in the coming weeks, with the winner receiving two Pilot Licence Extensions, and one for each capsuleer who wins 2nd 3rd and 4th places.

GalNet References

Original competition
Stories published so far