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The first days in COSMOS

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January 7, 2022

I joined COSMOS with Karen Sokarad two days after the gank in Alakgur. The day after the gank by Gay Pride Boooom a second Gank attempt happened. I received the recruitment email almost right after this second Gank attempt. It wasn’t long until I was in a recruitment channel with Karen chatting to Chase Smackem about the corporation. The first thing he said to me in chat was that they were a mature bunch of players and real life comes first. This was a fundamental condition for me as I can get overloaded in real life with work. The last thing I need is a game starting to feel like a job!

The image is of the left half of a male face. His right eye has a monocle.
Chase Smackem, COSMOS Collective.

In all honesty I was looking for more from the game and COSMOS had a really nice infrastructure to get into. At this stage I wasn’t 100% sure I would extend my subs and was thinking I might not actually keep playing the game, ganking seemed to mean that it the game wasn’t going to be played that casually and there was a lot of hostility on the forums to miners. But Eve is a Sandbox and my sense was that it was worth trying COSMOS out. Chase did say they were in a relatively quiet part space and that ganking rarely happened. I thought “What the hell! What could possibly go wrong?”

I think it was practically within 12 hours that I had moved Karen to Eldjaerin the home of COSMOS. The whole thing was very complicated to my brain at the time. The chat logs show that I had no idea about Player Owned Structures in empire and so it took me a while to figure out where the Athanor was located. But once that was sorted I was up and running. I immediately got back out in a new Retriever and started mining. I still had little or no idea about the way different mining ships had changed, no idea that CCP had adjusted the roles and even less of an idea about the variations in tanking ability. Even worse – I knew nothing about other changes CCP had made to the game. The most important of these was the generation of new PVE content and the Forward Operating Base in particular.

The image displays the tall elongated structure of a Blood Raiders Forward Operating base. It has a rustic look and sit forlorn against the background of space.
Forward Operating Base.

I was merrily mining away and blogging on this site when some rats appeared. It took Karen a while to pop them – she basically had zero tanking ability and her drone skills were poor. Like anyone playing eve as a miner I had sacrificed tank and defence over mining yield. After all that is why she was there – to make ISK as reliably as possible!

So anyway I popped a few belt rats and unbeknownst to me a Blood Raider Forward Operating base had appeared in local. I wasn’t using D-Scan (I was mining after all!) just playing the game on one screen and writing on the other. Within a few minutes of killing the belt rats a load of NPC ships appeared, webbed scrambled and Ganked the Retriever. You can see some of my surprise at this in the following chat log from back then.

> Cannot believe that – a second retriever lost in two days – this time to some weird NPC Gank squad. I think I need a proper tank for this ship.
> Is there a FOB in system?
> What is that?
> Forward operating base for npc,s. sends out tougher npcs than u normally get
> Ahhh there is one at distance…. I think….. heading back now. It was brutal – webbed scrambled and basically killed really quickly. …..Ahh well you live and learn 🙂
> We try.
> Yeh, I wouldn’t mine if theres a FOB in system u will die all the time.
> Yeah – will move system – does it depop or does it have to be killed?
> Needs to be killed I think.
> OK thanks for the info 🙂

It’s weird isn’t it – Even the NPCs hate miners! Basically this was a second shock to the system in two days and the effect it had was quite profound. I started having a chat in Corp about this ‘new’ problem and it was apparent that this was by design. In other words it is what CCP wanted, I just had missed the memo!

> Rats are getting more deadly in Erl. was one that had 57,000 bounty that was taking out my Mining Drone II’s. Good thing I was watching or may have lost them and my Retriever.
Karen Sokarad > I was ganked in Eld earlier by Blood Raiders. Skilling up for a proper tank now. Does anyone have a decent tank fit for a Retriever?
> Not sure you can have a Retriever tanked much. Procurer is much better tank but less ore hold.
Karen Sokarad > I can’t seem to get much on with the CPU. Only small modules.
> Desk11 is mine. not much of a tank. I always watch when mining with this. Only afk when absolutely need to.
> https://www.eveworkbench.com/fitting/search?q= can search on there.
Karen Sokarad > ty
> welcome
Karen Sokarad > Tanky Retriever. Karen Sokarad …Really an anti solo gank but hey
> Not bad
Karen Sokarad > The lack of a scanner can be a bit of a pain but I do think the security is an improvement on where I am right now (Smiles).
> Yeah….. Scanner is nice when your using mining crystals so you don’t waste them on small rocks.
Karen Sokarad > Definitely.
> Speaking of scanner, I think I will go and get Survey Scanner II this one later.
Karen Sokarad > Very handy I bought the wrong one when I replaced this ship earlier (face palm moment) 🙂

If anything this conversation demonstrated the importance of getting into a Corporation in Eve, finding people who can help. But most of all it demonstrated to me at the time that I really should not be getting frustrated at losing ships. I still had a decent amount of ISK available and whilst losing two Retrievers was a blow, it was not the end of the world. The point of Eve is that it is as much about the Journey you are on than anything else. It is not about ‘winning the game’. The whole point of this blog from the outset was to write about that Journey.

The initial days in COSMOS were a revelation, there was so much I had forgotten and even more I had to learn. The game had changed beyond recognition. It was more complicated, yes. But so many changes made it so much more fun. I will come to those in future posts. After all I was still playing with Moriarity in factional warfare. But right now I started to enjoy the challenge in front of me – I had been mining and not realising that the ship was extremely vulnerable. Now both Gay Pride Boooom and CCP had taught me a lesson. Even an industrial character needed some means for self defence and really ought to be paying attention to they were doing or more losses would follow.

So, first things first. I needed to do a few things. Pay more attention in local whilst using D-Scan for mining. I also needed to drop that survey scanner if I was going to be using the Retriever, either that or get a Procurer with it’s tiny cargo hold. You can imagine that the latter wasn’t really an option for me, I prefer to stay on the belt for as long as possible and hate too much ‘piddling around’ unloading. It is just a choice I made at the time. One thing I resolved, was that I wasn’t going to lose another ship anytime soon. So I started training towards a better tank on Karen.

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The ‘Gank’ and Joining COSMOS Industrial

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December 31, 2021

I guess it was inevitable that my alt Karen Sokarad would eventually get ‘ganked’ in high sec. The game had changed so much since I had played it previously. Ganking was always there but it had become a whole subculture in the game. I really had not been aware of that at the time and so when it happened I was mildly surprised and of course feeling a bit violated. I mean lets face it – the last thing you expect when eating a bowl of porridge and listening to the morning news is to see your ship melting.

Gay Pride BOOOOOM for CSM 16 From: Gay Pride BOOOOOM Sent: 2021.05.21 08:08 To: Karen Sokarad, Kill: Karen Sokarad (Retriever) Kill: Karen Sokarad (Capsule) Good Fight miner. You have earned the right to vote for Gay Pride BOOOOOM in the CSM 16 election held on 8-15 June! Your vote will help miners such as yourself continue to enjoy an orderly, secure highsec protected from lazy capsuleers by elite agents. Learn more about this amazing candidate and share your thoughts in Gay Pride's thread here: https://forums.eveonline.com/t/gay-pride-booooom-for-csm-16-highsec-first/310900 (constructive feedback only - no whining allowed) You also now qualify to purchase a mining permit! Refer to the salt channel for more information. Remember, no permit, no ship! EXPLAIN YOURSELF MINER
“Good Fight miner.”

It was though quite funny, the character in game was ‘Gay Pride Booooom’ (with five ‘o’s’ don’t settle for a poor copy) and his ganking was in effect part of his campaign to join the CSM. He eve mailed me a really funny message demanding that I explain myself. As you can see the message drips with irony and is very tongue in cheek if slightly ‘barmy’. This is Eve after all!

I looked through the links and was completely bewildered, where on earth did all of this stuff come from? Who on earth were CODE? And what were they doing? None of this made any sense to me at the time. I had a lot of learning to do and clearly the game had changed a lot since I was last playing. The link at the bottom of ‘Gay Pride Booooom’s’ email takes you into an in game channel. Where you can of course explain yourself and demand compensation. I actually didn’t bother posting in the channel – I was on my way to work. I simply filed the email and headed off for the day.

CODE

As an old player coming back to the game this was all a bit of a shock. and this is the thing about Eve online – the sandbox is more than simply what you can do in game. It is what others are doing in game around you that generates a very particular ecosystem. One that really does suck you in. The best way to describe it is that it is like a spider diagram. You follow one rabbit hole after another and start to see that what you are sitting in is really quite remarkable.

I was certainly frustrated and a little bit angry at the gank. But this is the game and you have to accept it can do this to you. The thing I wasn’t prepared for however was the degree to which this had become a part of the game META. When I delved into some of the initial posts I could see some merit in what the Gankers were saying, at least initially. For a start there was my fit.

Image displays a Retriever Mining Barge fit. With one Survey Scanner II in the mid slot. No shield modules and fitted for high yield.
Tragic Retriever fit.

No tank, and the doom module (Survey Scanner II) in place of any kind of shield. Just embarrassing. I mean this ship would struggle in a 0.5 system against NPCs, let alone against a ganker. I wasn’t usuing anything I had learned whilst playing Moriarity on Karen. Almost like I had assumed the game was different in high sec when really it isn’t. I did sit down at this point and start to think carefully about my training programme. I was focussing on Karen’s reprocessing skills and realised after a bit of looking around that she was going to need a much better tank than what she had. This meant adjusting her training queue to accommodate a proper tank.

Within less than a week Karen faced another gank attempt. This time she survived because she had a bit of a tank fitted. The ganker was a new player who had no idea what they were doing (thankfully). The effect of this second attempt was quite profound though. I knew that her tank was not yet complete and when I did the maths it was obvious she was vulnerable. I found myself reading local and constantly checking ‘D-Scan’ something I had learned to use when on Moriarity. This however really did impact on my enjoyment of the game, I couldn’t chill out whilst playing, it made it very difficult to write this blog and play at the same time.

It was at this precise moment that I received a recruitment message from COSMOS Industrial.

I was having a bit of a rough time. I knew that staying in Alakgur was not viable. It was too close to Hek and so was always going to be a bit jittery. Gone were the days when you would be able to just chill out and play casually whilst doing a bit of browsing. Eve had changed beyond recognition and as this message very sensibly indicated. There was a lot to be gained from joining a player corporation. So I joined their recruitment channel and from that point everything started to change once more.

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The question of an alt

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December 13, 2021

Up to now I had spent a lot of time on my main character playing in low security space learning a lot about PvP and doing what I could to survive. But that style of playing Eve is very demanding. You need to be fully alert and focused 100% of the time and lets be honest. There are times when low sec can be very quiet with not a lot happening. I found myself wandering around some evenings seeing nothing and certainly not being able to engage in a lot of fights because I just did not have the tools at hand to do so.  I started Sisters of Eve missions in low sec which was fun and helped make a little bit of ISK on the side and living out of one ship eventually became my focus.  I could not afford to throw ships away too much and whilst I could make enough ISK to stay afloat I had to be careful. Eventually I began to think about starting an ALT.

Now when I am talking about an ALT we are not talking about something that was going to make the game a job. I have always felt that far too many people play Eve like it is a second job. I wanted to start and ALT and play the game in a very different way.  Something that was almost the diagrammatical opposite of what I was used to playing. So I started a mining ALT.

Just to clarify, this ALT was started back in 2012. Back then mining was just as legitimate as any other profession in Eve. Since then, in my time away from the game, something has changed.  I had no idea mining would become something that was hated by a section of the player base. I still have no idea why this happened but back then I just wanted to experience another aspect of the ‘sandbox’ that is Eve.

Since that time a small but very vocal section of the player base, seems to have grown to really dislike mining. Although I am not entirely sure that is even true. But nonetheless if you like to read a lot like me then you would be forgiven, if you follow the forum hype alongside some of the stuff that you see on the internet (You Tube etc.). Reading all of that stuff you might be forgiven for thinking that mining is at the bottom of some sort of food chain. That it should be discouraged at all costs.

KarenSo I rolled another Minmatar character of the name Karen Sokarad and started training mining barges with a major focus on lasers and eventually crystals. First up at that time the big choice was choosing a barge that suited my style of play.  I was working on this blog and so I wanted something I could play on one screen whilst composing my posts. The obvious choice at the time was the Retriever with the larger ore hold. I did not want to have to do fiddly stuff with a hauler. Don’t forget Moriarity was in low sec and to be frank I needed downtime from worrying about always paying attention to the game.

I settled on skilling into a Retriever and found a home called Alakgur which is where I started mining. Back then everything was simpler, you could skill into a Barge like the Retriever relatively easily. Within a few days I would be out on the belts mining, blogging and reading about eve. The eventual changes to mining barges were released and I thought this was a great change to the game. Allowing more choice as well as freedom. This was before I decided to quit Eve because of real life. orefrigate6

It was when I got back – everything had changed. Miners seemed to be some sort of hated figure for sections of the player base. Something to be frowned at and looked down on. I had no idea what exactly had happened. That could be a good topic for another post maybe.

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Pliction: Re-birth

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December 7, 2021

The alarm rang throughout the ship, as it shuddered. The shields had melted within seconds. There was a brief pause before the hull crumpled ending the lives of four hundred souls. No chance, no time to respond. What should have been a brief mining trip ended in disaster. Outside the wreckage of the ship a pod sat still in space. Inside the pilot lay paralyzed. ‘What had just happened?’ She looked at her readouts trying to think, she should be doing something. ‘A gate, get to a gate!’ The pod ripped open and another life ended with a scream…..

….back in the station a clone slid to the ground, released from the stasis chamber, a pilot reborn. She lay on the floor head spinning, vomiting New Eden’s amniotic fluid onto the floor. She rolled onto her side, her eyes stinging in the cold light of the chamber. As she caught her breath she sobbed. ‘So this is what it means to be ‘ganked’?’

Alakgur had been a quiet system up to then. She and her crew had been able to mine without interruption amongst the belts. Everything was relatively safe, after all this was really her first venture into space. Her sizeable inheritance had been spent escaping her previous life in Alakgur IV and she joined the capsuleer race with all the naïve hope that brings. It ended that morning. Her naivety that is, along with the lives of four hundred souls. She cried and cried and cried.

She would never see them again. Johnny with his stupid oily grin as he came back from fixing yet another broken relay circuit in the mining array. She had not quite mastered power management yet and the result was a ship that often creaked and groaned at the edge of her skills. Gone was Scarlet with her red cheeks, strutting around the bridge analysing the mining yield, planning Karen’s next training, checking prices in Jita, Rens and Tash-Murkon. It had never occurred to Karen as she looked down on them from her pod that everyone was so vulnerable. It was her fault this had happened. She had read the stories of ganks in high security space, ‘you’re never safe in New Eden!’ Boy did she know that now and the cost. Four hundred souls gone in the blink of an eye.

She rolled over and slowly got up, a little unsteady.

‘Breathe Karen, Breathe.’

She stood on the wet floor, stasis fluid rapidly cooling, clone skin tingling with cold. Shivering she slowly walked across the room. Stood under the shower and turned it on. Cold freezing cold. She braced against the wall as the cold water blasted her skin. Closing her eyes she slowly collapsed against the tiles and curled up into a ball on the floor the water running over her new born skin, everything went foggy as the steam rose around her.

After an indeterminable while she emerged from the steam turned the shower off, got dried and put on the robe provided for her by Cromeaux Inc. The company had expanded into New Eden with the advent of cloning technology. The capsuleers had kept them busy. The sterility of the room belied everything that had just happened out on the belt. It seemed wrong that she should be here and the others gone.

_________________________

Later, down in the station, Karen settled into a chair at one of the stations many bars. A new clone is always starving with hunger. But to get the clone working properly you have to slowly introduce food, or risk making yourself ill. You can also, if you are careful, introduce the right food and the right amount, and the clone will adapt. This way you can keep it slim and ‘even fitting’. At least that is what the Cromeaux Inc brochure had said in that kind of cheerful corporate language.

‘Welcome to your new clone! We at Cromeaux Inc take pride in providing you with the very best in clone technology. In order for you and your new clone to get along there are a few things we would like to advise……

And on and on. She leafed through the brochure whilst she was sitting at the bar. She was ravenously hungry, when her mailbox blinked.

She looked at the mail stunned. CSM? What is that? Whatever it was she was never going to vote for someone who was nothing more than a low life terrorist. Gay Pride Boom’s ship would have been destroyed shortly after the gank by CONCORD. He had also killed hundred’s of people, and to what end? In seconds she received a request to open a chat channel with Gay Pride BOOM. She declined. What motivates someone to do this? Why be so outrageously hostile? She bit her lip in cold fury, and just like that she had got knocked sideways.

It was right at this moment that she saw him. Sitting at the end of the bar.

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Where to Restart?

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May 30, 2021

So I was off out into New Eden. Where was the best place to start? I thought I might as well go back to low sec. I still had a small bounty on my head because of that over excited ‘podding’ all of those years ago. I headed back through Ammamake in my ‘Susan Black’s Thrasher’. I had that rush that you get when you anticipate a gate camp. But when I landed it was quiet. Eerily quiet. I had not really seen it this quiet before. After this I zipped about in low sec for about half an hour. Still not sure exactly how everything worked but growing back into the game. I noticed a lot of Tribal Liberation around.

“Good Factional Warfare is still going strong.”

It dawned on me the best way forward was to go back to Rens and sign up. I zipped back through low sec into Rens and re-joined the TLF. This brought me back into several chat channels all flashing from time to time with various stuff. OK this is good I have interaction again. For the first time in years I had other players to interact with. A few hours alter and I was back to figuring out how the faction warfare was running. Amarr were pushing hard at the moment and there was plenty to do.

I spent time looking at the fit I had setup 9 years previously. It seemed to work OK and so well. ‘What the hell. What could possibly go wrong right?”

The fit is as follows:

[Thrasher, Moriarity Kanenald’s Thrasher]
Gyrostabilizer II
Reactor Control Unit II

5MN Y-T8 Compact Microwarpdrive
J5 Enduring Warp Disruptor
Medium Shield Extender II

250mm Light Artillery Cannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S
250mm Light Artillery Cannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S
250mm Light Artillery Cannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S
250mm Light Artillery Cannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S
250mm Light Artillery Cannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S
250mm Light Artillery Cannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S
250mm Light Artillery Cannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S

Small Auxiliary Thrusters I
Small Core Defense Field Extender I
Small EM Shield Reinforcer I

It had served me well in the final days of my previous stint in eve so it was a case of ‘hey ho!’ I headed back to low sec. The whole thing so unfamiliar to me. Warping through system after system. Then I remembered about plexes and that is where the action might be. It took me around 30mins to locate the directional scanner and another 15 to get it working. I went into Floseswin warped to the Small Outpost and as I was sitting on the gate a Worm landed. Within seconds I was tangled up in the gate, trying to align out, no stuck on the gate quite literally rolling along voer the top of it like some sort of lost slug. By now my shields had gone and I was deep into armour I started to load some ammo and boom! Gone.

“GF” in Local.

“Yeah, right.”

I was right back into eve and as it had been doing previously it was handing me a new one!

https://zkillboard.com/kill/92667842/

I only wish I could have fired back at least! I was going to need a bit of support to relearn the game – otherwise this wasn’t going to go so well!

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Reborn

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So I am reborn, a new member of New Eden’s Demi-Gods.  A play boy of the brave New Eden.  And I have yet to figure out how to fly a ship!  I spend most of my time sleeping while my cognitive functions are growing, most of the time I am awake I feel tired.  Most of the time I sleep I am awake, algorithms fly through my consciousness.  I wake fitfully, sleep restlessly.  I long for home but gone are the days when I walked Terra Firms.  Already I have been rejected.  Spat out onto the face of a brave New Eden.

My first hours were spent trying to work a new body.  A skin I can mould and change as I see fit. It feels strange.  Am I really alive?  Or just the walking dead waiting to be reborn, a constant state of watching for rebirth?

This is a strange experiment.  I have paid a high price in the name of this science. But it keeps coming for me drawing me closer and pushing me on toward new achievements. New heights.

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The Evolution of Eve Online

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May 28, 2021

Coming back to Eve has been a good decision. The game has evolved to the point where it is now a pleasure to play. Gone are all of the old gripes I had about the game and there have been a host of developments that really just make this such a nice game to play for new people.

The first thing I noticed when logging in was this mad busy ‘The Agency’ Screen listing a whole range of things to do from Agents and Missions, Encounters (New!), Exploration, Resource harvesting, Fleet up and a help section (this virtually did not exist before). Its got stuff I knew about and a load of new stuff I knew absolutely nothing about. Immediately it was just a sense that things were so much better than before.

This is the image of the Agency showing each of the features including Agents and Missions, Encounters (New!), Exploration, Resource harvesting, Fleet up and a help section.

You click on the encounters section and ping there is sitting in front of you a whole range of things to do. The Encounters tab opens to Show the various kinds of agents and encounters you might want to do. Click on Mission agents and you are taken to a really straight forward screen where all of the types of mission are sitting waiting to be completed (Security, Distribution, Mining, R&D and Locator Agents).

This image summarises the various missions one can do from Agents through to Epic Arcs, Storyline agents and Career Agents.

Encounters Opens up a new window that includes the Stargate Trailblazers, Incursions, Faction Warfare, Pirate Strongholds and Abyssal Deadspace. I had no idea what half of these were. Mori was sitting in Rens in a Thrasher along with his negative sec status. I couldn’t remember what that meant. I could not locate how to fit the ship and I had no idea what stuff was worth anymore! But it felt good to be back. The last nine years I have tinkered with a few MMO’s but mostly just played solo offline games. All of which has been great – but I have really missed the interaction that comes with a great MMO and Eve Online is a truly great MMO.

Sure I have kept up with the history. I knew there had been a few great wars along with the game hitting global news from time to time over the last nine years. I had missed it and it was good to be back – even if I had no idea how anything worked anymore. The first thing I did was undock to have a look around. Rens was how I had remembered it. Busy with ships coming and going. The usual local spam but for stuff that made no sense to me anymore. My “Susan Black’s Thrasher” drifted along for a bit. I got excited but stuck “How do I fly this thing?”

I double clicked. OK good the ship responded. Flew around the station and then OK how to I go to a gate? I docked up, looked on YouTube and before I knew it I was able to hit the gate jump through and poof I was gone. Back into New Eden.

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Real life

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May 8, 2021

Sorry its been such a long time away from the game that I barely recognise this blog and the character it is about. Have played so many games that I have forgotten about Eve and yet always missed the game, the pathos, the sounds and the general aura of it all. If I am being honest at the time of writing this blog I had recently lost a very close work friend. I was sad and very very lonely in my working life. The game gave me some space to do something else.

I also think the other character was a bit of a waste of time – too little focus on what I liked about the game and too much in the way of distractions. Once you have to spend so much time servicing a game it starts to feel like work and really this is not what I wanted to do with my time. It’s a game right?

Then came the book. It all started shortly after this ended and I lost my time, I have literally been swamped by work and of course I have a family that all needs support. But 9 years is a very long time away. If I am honest I cannot really explain why this took so long. But I have plexed up and re-subscribed. I have flown into low sec again, shot a few rats and become familiar with the old names Abudban, Rens, Dodixie. More later!

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Apologies for the downtime

Filed under: Day to Day Blog — 1 Comment
August 26, 2012

Well its been a while since I updated this blog.  Real life work and the fact I have been doing other things in Eve has meant I have not really had a lot to say about the game recently.  I am still in there playing but focussing on the development of another character.  More about that in good time.

Anyway, this has meant a bit of downtime away from Moriarity and invariably less to talk about.  Moriarity is still developing his skills and floating around different parts of FW.  Its my alt that I have been studying. The truth is I have been mining!  Since the recent changes to mining barges this has become a much more interesting profession.

There is something zen like about mining.  You sit in a very unusual position in eve, at the base of a pyramid of makers generating the minerals that will eventually form the basis of ships, charges and modules.  There is something fascinating about that.  Much is made about pew pew and about going out to grief and irritate others in Eve.  People often sing about the glories of player led events like Hulkageddon.  But there is very little said about those who just quietly get on with the task of harvesting and building.

Having studied this side of eve for some time I am now beginning to see that this kind of thing takes a lot of time to get into.  From the outset it has been a slow process understanding efficiency and how different skills combine to provide you with a meaningful yield.  I have spent days bewildered at how slow output can be and then as my skills have kicked in I am now beginning to see that mining can be very lucrative.

The reason for doing this was quite clear.  I hate missions.  I need a source of income that will allow Moriarity to fly something a bit more than a rifer.  With Mr Miner I can see that is now a real possibility.

 

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War and Attrition

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June 22, 2012

The thing that you can discover about Eve, something a lot of veterans already know is that it can be played almost entirely as a PvP game.  You can indeed make enough ISK in Factional Warfare to cover your losses.  If you stay smart I am pretty sure you can make a tidy profit.

The leitmotiv of all PvPers is without doubt do not fly what you cannot afford to lose.  Sticking to this leitmotiv is quite easy,  in factional warfare all you need to do is jump into a Rifter or some other frigate and get yourself busy fighting, looting and salvaging on the field.  The latter in particular is essential to cover losses.  Especially when those T3 wrecks appear.

Let me take you through the figures.  This period of time involves the fate of one Destroyer, two Rifters and One pod.  It starts with an invitation to join a bunch of crazy pirates going out looking for fights flying my destroyer.  We killed a few boats but the inevitable happened I lost the destroyer.  Destroyers seem to be very squishy, very much an early target because they chuck out a lot of DPS and relatively easy to kill.  Of all the ships I have flown they are the most expensive ship and they invariably end up in some sort of loss.

Alright so here are the figures:

Losses

  • Pod loss 17,987,038 ISK
  • Rifter  9,747,030 ISK
  • Thrasher 15,200,536 ISK

Total Cost 42,934,604 ISK

ISK made from Kills and loot: 52,000,345 ISK

So a small profit of around 10million ISK in the time period which was around two to three weeks steady playing time, I still have one Rifter left and I hope to hold onto that for a short while longer.  This is not the whole picture by any means.  By plexing I have made 18,638 loyalty points to the Minmatar Milita which is close to the value of a Stabber Fleet Issue which are currently selling for around 55million in Rens.  This means that with a few more nights out, if I can stay alive in my brawler tackler, then I should be showing a nice PvP profit.  Not billions of ISK by any means but bear in mind I haven’t needed to PvE at all – bar shooting the odd belt rat if the target looks worthwhile.

Clearly to achieve this I have been forced to shift my playstyle.  I now find myself rarely soloing, I miss that, but the changes in Factional Warfare through Inferno have been very positive. Factional Warfare is very active and there is plenty going on in the field.  I find myself tackling and trying to catch the Amarr or any hostile pilots we come across.  It has been good to snag a few but most of all it has been really good to discover how to try and survive better whilst playing an active role in fleets.  I think I will write about that in a later post.

My losses have been my own fault.  The Thrasher loss was something I expected. It didn’t bother me at all.  Although the grid seemed to load very late at the time, it was a loss I was happy to swallow especially for the experience of running with those pirates for the evening.  The rifter loss could have been avoided.  I was in a plex trying to engage some Amarr when Ropf came in I managed to overheat out of scramble range but was heading nowhere having failed to align.  So when I switched to align he snagged me again and that was it – Pop!  Props to Ropf he was certainly quick enough to target and pop the pod.

So it has been a blast and at the lower tiers Factional Warfare – I am very pleased to say is a great spot for new players to get straight into the action and learn how to work in a fleet.  The important thing to realise however is that whilst this might bag you some ISK and you will have lots of fun you will not learn as much about PvP and how to fly your ship as you will when soloing.

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