As a guess, based on them implementing BPCs, we might see the requirement that all dropsuits be manufactured. In other words, you wouldn't be able to fit a blueprint, only an actual suit - that you would manufacture from blueprints (copies or originals).

This is how it works in Eve, and I expect at some point, this is how it will work in Dust.

Especially with the giveaways in April, with what sounds like a tidal wave of blueprints coming on the market...

Actually there are BPOs and BPCs

Both have blueprint in the name...

What is this tidal wave that you speak of?

I'm pretty tired so maybe I'm missing something but I don't see how any of the CCP info is actually a change or pointing to one.
There have been both BPOs and BPCs in Dust for longer than I've been playing, the terms are just applied to items which function differently than their EVE side equivalents.

If in my currently muddled state I've missed somenew and different information from CCP can someone please direct me to it? (yes I've read the link in the post above mine).

Cheers,
Cross

TL;DR: Manufacturing of items from BPs before combat is needed for market integration with Eve. How will this work?

In Dust we have blueprints for all of our gear: Dropsuits, weapons, modules, equipment, vehicles, etc. When we purchase these from the markets we're buying either a BPO (blueprint original) which allows unlimited uses, or a BPC (blueprint copy), which has limited use (1 per BPC in Dust).

So far as this goes, we're in line with the way Eve Online works. Capsuleers also buy BPOs and BPCs from NPC markets or from each other and they also allow unlimited use for BPOs and limited use from BPCs (BPCs are actually made using BPOs, allowing someone with a BPO to create and sell BPCs).

However, in Eve, there is another step required before you can take the shiny ship you bought the blueprint for out for a spin: manufacturing. You must gather or purchase the required materials needed to manufacture the item, put it in a factory (located for Eve pilots on NPC stations or Player Owned Structures), and wait a certain period before the item is ready to use. For really large items, such as outposts and Titans, the components must be manufactured then taken to a structure in space where they are then turned into the final product (assuming they are not blown up by other pilots. New Eden is a harsh place).

This process is the cornerstone of the much-vaunted Eve economy: Each stage of this process has value: Minerals must be collected and people are willing to pay to have them collected for them; The minerals must be refined and transported; manufacturing must occur. Skills in Eve make some players more efficient at these than others, so there is a profit margin at each stage. A combat player without industrial skills can collect, refine, and transport the materials, then take the blueprint and manufacture the item themselves, but it is a) boring for combat pilots (industrialists love it), b) time consuming, and c) potentially more expensive than just buying the item off of the market.

In order to have true market integration with Eve, Dust will need some sort of manufacturing. But what? We can't collect minerals, so we'd be dependent on Eve for them (not ideal), and in any case, a lot of our gear (basically everything except equipment) is manufactured on the battlefield as needed (at least, I assume that's what's happening, since I can spawn at A or B or C and not have to worry where I left my assault rifles). Vehicles are transported from off-map, so that is probably something that needs manufacturing.

If the spawn process was changed to an orbital drop, then manufacturing makes more sense. Items are manufactured and stored on the warbarge, then you wake up in a clone, suit up, and drop. But that doesn't answer how we're going to get the materials needed to build the stuff in the first place. I'm also an Eve pilot, so I know they can't be trusted

How should this work? Should we be able to access minerals from the Eve market? Should PC districts produce minerals? ideas? comments?

To reiterate, there would be NO manufacturing time. If you had the materials and the blueprints you could make a 'copy package' instantaneously. However, it would take time to research your BPO to the point where you could make a profit selling your copies for cheaper than NPCs.

Why not? I mean, I don't think it should be a long time, especially for simple items, but NO time? That seems off.

Tl;dr-
Imagine that 'copies' are like buying both a Betty Crocker cake mix and the recipe together at the store. You still have to make the cake at some point.

'Blueprints' are like having the recipe with the right or permission to go to any cake store and make the cake there at no extra cost as long as you eat it there. The cake store is like pub matches. Or you can take the recipe and make it for your friends but you have to buy the ingredients first. This latter part is like PC or corp battles.

So in the game there are two types of equipment, blueprints and copies. With the blueprints you can get unlimited uses of this equipment and with the copies, you use it until the equipment is destroyed.

Especially with the giveaways in April, with what sounds like a tidal wave of blueprints coming on the market, it is making me wonder about how blueprints will be used in the future as opposed to copies. **Edit: CCP Unicorn confirmed giveaways are copies not blueprints**

Here are my thoughts...

Both blueprints and copies can be seen technically as licenses to use the prescribed technology. With a copy (as with Eve) you know ahead of time how much material is used for the given equipment. The efficiency of the manufacturing instructions is a part of the copy.

With a blueprint, you are getting just the unlimited basic manufacturing instructions. In Eve blueprints can be improved into copies that are more efficient that the blueprint when it comes to materials, but are nonetheless limited.

I'm guessing that when we get a Marketplace 2.0, blueprints will become licenses for 'free' equipment in public/FW matches where most of the raw materials for battle are provided for you.

Copies will be like limited use licenses with the physical material already factored into the license. So in a way, using copies in public matches means you are paying significantly more for special equipment that you could get for free. You are being 'taxed' for fighting with upgraded gear.

Conversely, corporation/ planetary conquest will require carrying all of your materials with you into battle. This way, if you would like to use a blueprint, you would have to manufacture it on the spot, from materials you bring with you. Copies on the other hand can easily be brought with you as they contain the necessary goods for battle already as part of their package.

In other words, blueprints will be free to use in highsec and maybe FW, but in lowsec/PC/nullsec they will require some other material. This source of material will somehow have to be preloaded prior to battle, possibly on the MCC, or in Supply Depot installations. This shouldn't be as significant of an economic impact as it sounds however, because the use of these materials probably won't be that different. FW/PC battles probably wont be using nearly as much MLT/ blueprint equipment as public matches.



Either way...at the end there will be cake...

...that you can have or eat...but not both...

Please read carefully. Your lead time would come from resynching/researching the BPO. They would be unusable during this process. This mechanic would throttle how many things everyone could manufacture on a daily basis.

So if each BPO could have a max of 100 runs before they degraded back to an unusable efficiency then you'd set them all to research right before you log off. Then when you get back in, you could make 100 runs of each item from the BPO but any additional you'd want to make would be cost prohibative, so you'd start the research over.

Over time it would be the same effect. In my scheme the waiting time is done by the producer not the purchaser. Either way it prevents the market from balooning with goods because there is no time to produce at all.

Expect CCP to implement an exact copy of Eve's system, or a simplification of it. I doubt research will be a part of it for a long time, maybe never.

Please read carefully. Your lead time would come from resynching/researching the BPO. They would be unusable during this process. This mechanic would throttle how many things everyone could manufacture on a daily basis.