They always drop a new ship the first day and the event starts off with DRAKE. I'd assume yes.
There are multiple rumors running around about a new ship. Could be that DRAKE cutter or that manufacturing ship. Looks like the medical Pisces is a thing too. They usually offer some sort of LTI token so I also wonder if the Pisces will have LTI as it is a new variant....
Well, They've announced that the Corsair will be in patch 3.17.4 which will be a short patch as they "hope" for 3.18 a month later, so unless they do something unusual and have 2 unrelated ships from the same manufacturer release together in a single patch (with another ship from the same manufacturer the following patch\shortly after - Vulture in 3.18), I'd expect that the Drake ship is the Corsair.
If they follow last year's schedules with a day between new ships releases and\or announcements of upcoming (large\capitol class) ships, and the rumours going around are true, we could possibly expect:
Day 1 - New ship - Probably the Corsair, which was confirmed as coming in the patch.
Day 3 - New ship - Aegis, so likely yet another fighter of some variety (or a new bomber based on last year's ship voting options).
Day 5 - New ship - Anvil, so probably the Medical Pisces based on rumour and the preview video for the event.
Day 7 - New Ship\Vehicle - Crusader or Tumbril. I'd guess a ground vehicle of some type from Tumbril (A different Tank would be nice, for some variety in ground battles), as we've just had the Spirit concept release from Crusader.
Day 9 - "Announcement" - Something from RSI: Possibly related to either the winning vote for the manufacturer of the new mining ship (With only a small number of options available for people to vote for, it seems likely there was concept art prepared for each of the options, so we may see what we were blindly voting on), or less likely, to the MCV - I expect that the MCV will be waiting to release once Cargo Refactor comes out as well, given the "output" would need to be transported from the manufacturer to somewhere for transport\sale.
There probably should (based on last year's event) be a WB CCU for one ship\vehicle for each of the days, as well as WB CCU's for the final 4 BIS ships and likely any new releases during the event. Unfortunately, a WB CCU for the Pisces would be a $5 discount ($40 Pisces, requiring a $35 or lower priced ship to apply it to), so you wouldn't be able to apply one to an LTI STV - Last year's referral MPUV Cargo would be fair game, however...
I don't expect the Pisces medical variant to be priced to allow a minimum cost ($5) WB CCU from the base Pisces either, so I'd expect it would likely be an STV LTI friendly $45 WB ($50 or $55 credit price)... $50 WB would allow direct ($5) chain to $45 Pisces, and $55 WB (or higher) would put the ship in the $60-$65+ range which seems a little high to me for what I imagine it will be: There is a small chance it may end up with a $40 WB price ($45/$50 credit price) depending on how the "medical" function works and what you sacrifice (cargo, etc.) to fit it in.
