Eve is in many ways a strange game. And wormholespace even more so. You are handed some toys and then just told to go and play. There is very little mentoring and guiding and used to be even less. When I started playing Eve in december 2004 I was shown how to active mining lazer and the gun and then just thrown out into the world. But during one of my first days, while running a very important mission for the master gallente race (being intaki I felt somewhat like an outsider), I recieved a convo from this very nice person who wanted me to join their corp. Not having any friends in Eve yet I happily accepted. And the following days, usually when I logged on, I was greated and asked if I wanted to join in on a mining op. My agent told me there was important stuff that needed to be done. Serpentis had captured a damsel. But for me the damsel was no longer a priority. I was off to mine. In a cruiser. With mining lazers. This was the good old days of mining. Everyone clustered up in a belt and mined into a can. Our dedicated hauler then came with the iteron 5 and picked it up. Good old times.
Living in a wormhole is different. Yet it isn't. There is a similarity that is vital. When you log on to play and hear that voice on coms that say "hey, we are doing X. Grab a ship and come join" thats Eve. Thats the very essence of gameplay in Eve. Sure you have it in other games aswell, but none of them gives the same meaning to it as Eve. Mainly because you know that without it everyone is pretty much just doing their own thing and soon dont log on as often. Now for a lot of people its not natural to be the guy that actually say it. Some force themself to, others dont. But for some players its what they enjoy. These players are called content creators.
One of the traits most leaders often have is this ability to drive content. You might have seen the corp ads that promise daily fleet ops and ready content whenever you log on. Our corp doesn't, but many do. Its a way to attract members who are content consumers to your corp, while having maybe 2-3 content creators that drive the content. If the content creators go afg (away from game) then the corp dies. Often these corp/alliances have a charismatic leader that people flock around and are drawn to. Its not unusual and happen a lot in real life too. Charismatic people draw other people to them. But the moment this person is gone whatever was built around them falls apart.
In the beginning of our adventures in our 5-2 leaders in corp often did this. Because it came natural to us. But as a result not that much happened when we were offline. And also all the scanning fell on us. When we moved on we made sure to 'let' other people shine in this role. And some did.
Now finding someone in a system without them knowing your sitting next to them is a art that is one of the reason I love wormholespace. I really dont care what ship they are in. But uncloaking next to someone in a safe or site is a feeling that is a reward in itself.
So creating content yourself is all well and good. But how do you find potential members who can do the same? In our recruitment interviews we have one question that every time nails what kind of player people are. We ask them "if you log on and find yourself to be the only person online. What do you do". Assuming they answer truthfully this question tells everything you need to know about them as a pilot and what they want to do. What a man does when he is alone say alot about his character. And the character of the person applying has always been our main condition when choosing applicants.
What is your experience with content creators? Are you one yourself or know some especially good ones in eve?
