There are three types of players in Eve: Soloer, Drone and corp member. What you are depends on where you fit into your corporation, or more importantly what you are happy to get out of the game. Take the soloer for instance; they are happy getting on with it on their own. They may be in their newbie corp still, their own corp of one or more players who feel the same or even in a large corp that just acts like a very loose coalition of players. There's nothing wrong with wanting to play like this and to be honest it's how I've played over the last three years. The only thing is that you're missing out on the bigger game and so you're not having the experience that you could be.
Next up comes drones. Everybody knows about the corporations out there that prey on newbies and get them mining for the good of the corp. They have high staff turnover because it's so dull and the newbies never feel like they're actually working towards a greater good for themselves. It doesn't have to be mining, any corporation where you're just there to fill up the numbers and make cash/resources that don't directly benefit you means you're a drone. Take the example of a large hundred man corporation that has a 10 man squad of über PvPers and 90 people who mine and run missions in order to keep them equipped so that they can fight. Those 90 are just drones (odds are in real life you're just a drone as well) because the corporation couldn't support 100 PvPers and odds are they don't all have the skills required to survive anyway. Most people in the game are probably drones, and most people probably get fed up with it after so long and move on to something better.
Finally we have what I'm calling, because I can't think of a better name, corporation members. These are people who have the goals of the corp in mind at all times and their actions are always liked to it. The high ups in any corp, even if they employ drones, com under this category. If you're a valued member of your corporation and directly benefit from the success of the corporation as a whole then you come under this heading, but beware because it's in the interests of anybody who employs drones to make them think that they are this instead. 10 man PvP corporations come under this, as can hundred man corporations that do everything.
So what are you? More importantly are you happy where you are? If you solo then you probably do it for a reason and not many corporations want proper members who only play for an hour or two a week. You may be happy being a drone because your fellow drones are quite nice and make it an enjoyable experience. You may even be in charge of a corporation and wish that you were a drone so that you actually had time to play. The important thing is to be happy.
For the record, I've stopped soloing and have no plans of being or ever employing drones. Watch this space.
posted @ Monday, May 01, 2006 12:36 PM