Unfortunately, that was me.

You see, a couple nights ago, I was showing my friend Jimmy EVE Online. He thought it was cool, and asked me about all the things you could do. I told him about mining, since that’s what I do, and when he kept looking at me with a blank face, I moved on to something a little more exciting.

Diverging into piracy, his eyes lit up. Killing people? Stealing their stuff? Ransom payment? And it’s a viable way of LIFE? Yes. Yes it is. Unfortunately, I know absolutely NOTHING about piracy in EVE. That didn’t stop us from dreaming, however. We got to talking about our little two man group, roaming the galaxy of New Eden, holding hostages, blowing up ships, being ruffians…  it was exciting.

Earlier today, he texts me, and reminds me to send him the buddy program invite, so that he can start downloading EVE while he was on a date with his girlfriend Chelsea (they just got together IT IS SO CUTE TEEHEE). I don’t know if he ever got around to it.

Either way, I decided to do a little PvP practice with a new character Adainy Gwanwyn today. Being sick, it gave me the perfect excuse to stay on my laptop all day and do nothing but stare at a monitor and hack up phlegm and ache and have diarrhea. I made a new character on my alt account, and spent the day doing the combat career advancement quest line. I stopped in Arnon, shortly before the Servant Sisters of Eve epic. This is where the fun begins.

So as to not bore you with details, I’ll only mention the highlights:

1) Arnon was populated by young miners. This was beneficial.

2) I had moved my main to Arnon for support. This was convenient after the somewhat lengthy trip.

3) I had been following a player for a while now on Adainy. This was also convenient.

4) I had no experience in PvP. This was not convenient, nor beneficial.

A little backstory:

Whenever I play PvP in ANY game that is not Halo 2 or 3 or COD: MW, I get a huge adrenaline rush. I get so amped up. It’s horrible. It makes me not able to do anything right, and I usually just end up looking like a ‘tard. You can imagine my nerves while planning this.

With that in mind, you might be asking yourself this totally unrelated question; “Why in the world is he attacking somebody in a 0.6 system?”

I know it seems crazy, but listen. I KNEW I would get Concordokkened. I KNEW the guy would not die. I KNEW I would get instapopped. But I HAVE to do SOMETHING to get the edge off my nerves. Suicide farting on somebody is the way to do that.

The second I aggressed, I was gone. Both Adainy and August were out. The guy didn’t say anything. He just kept mining. Probably just thought a small rock hit his ship or something.

But me… oh man, was I ever excited. My girlfriend was watching the entire hours-long process to get to the point of actually targeting the guy (which in my opinion is the hardest part, mentally). I was so excited after my T1 frigs were destroyed. She rolled her eyes. I felt stupid.

But in all seriousness, even that little bit of action was great. Sure, there was a security drop. Sure, it was retarded. But man! It was exciting. It makes me anxious for the day when I have Adainy trained up enough to actually do this. Now, all I have to do is move from idiocy to can flipping. That’ll be awesome.

******************************

So, with everything that’s been going on with CK’s blog pack debacle, I thought I would throw my two cents in.

I totally agree with Ga’len’s entire post.  Read it, digest it, poo it out and inspect it. It makes many good points, and contains links to other relevant posts (including Roc’s for all of you fellow Capsuleer users out there). I fully support the position of Ga’len, Casiella, and fully support Alexia Morgan’s portal.

While I do understand the benefits of a larger and smaller aggregation of blogs, and while I don’t think CK did anything to intentionally promote the “popular” blogs instead of the best of the best, it is my opinion that the audience would never have chosen them. By asking for what the readers wanted, CK was effectively opening the floodgates. In a democratic setting, you won’t get the best of the best, but rather the most popular.

I think it was Socrates who thought democracy was the worst form of government. I’m inclined to agree.

Decided to leave TIFA, who I have been with since I first set out as a pilot in New Eden.  Now I’m in with the Sinister Elite corp, and in the Raining Doom alliance.

Haven’t done much since joining, other than trying to run the gauntlet into 0.0, and getting killed in a random system, thanks to a good ol’ gatecamp.  The only fun thing I’ve done other than fitting out a PvP rifter, is jettisoning 16 shuttles at Jita 4-4’s undocking ramp, which was funny enough.  Had some people telling me to shoot somebody, so a CONCORD would come in and create a lagfest of also tearing apart all of the shuttles. I thought on it, but thought better, and decided to move my lowsec hauler back to its rightful place (was doing a couple couriers in high sec) and moving my PvP rifter close to my POS staging area.

Also, tried to kill a retriever in a 0.5 system just now, but CONCORD scrammed my sensors right before my finishing volley. How lame :/

Ah, well. Time to power down for the night and rest.

Welcome to the ninth installment of the EVE Blog Banter and its first contest, the monthly EVE Online blogging extravaganza created by CrazyKinux. The EVE Blog Banter involves an enthusiastic group of gaming bloggers, a common topic within the realm of EVE Online, and a week to post articles pertaining to the said topic. The resulting articles can either be short or quite extensive, either funny or dead serious, but are always a great fun to read! Any questions about the EVE Blog Banter should be directed here. Check out other EVE Blog Banter articles at the bottom of this post!

“Last month Ga’len asked us which game mechanic we would most like to see added to EVE. This month Keith “WebMandrill” Neilson proposes to reverse the question and ask what may be a controversial question: Which game mechanic would you most like to see removed completely from EVE and why?

——-

I was approached one day at a hole in the wall at CBD Corporation Storage in TEW by homely wench that offered to buy me a Gallente Brew of some sort.  Her interest in me was puzzling as I still wore my post-pod jumpsuit and really wasn’t in the mood for company.  I accepted the drink with a nod and mumbled a thanks.  I was still pissed at a near miss engagement I had with a Merlin a few systems away.

She was insistent on speaking with me.  She asked me my name.  We always had to watch for spies and being in an Amarr system made it even more important to do so.  I was gruff with her, but polite.  We may be freedom fighters to some, but in these systems we are terrorists to many and conversation is usually done in a dark corner away from prying ears.

I looked at her again.  She was Minmatar and attractive and I was in a station far from home.  Ahh, what the hell….

Following a few hours of conversation and more than a few drinks she got up the nerve to ask me what I was so pissed off about.

Aggression timer on gates!  I slammed my fist down on the table nearly spilling our drinks.

This has got to be the most insanely stupid thing in all of EVE (yes I know others will argue differently). There you are, in space by a gate, a War Target comes to the gate and yellow boxes you. You return the favour and as you’re alliance/corp has been decced by his or you decced them (distinction inconsequential) the need/want to keeeeel each other is mutual…. Or so you would think.

Reality is that your WT just baited you to agress so that that he (and/or his buddies) can jump through and not be followed by you for a short while giving them ample time to go run and hide in stations or jump to another gate. Sure he took some hits and you may have had him halfway through armor but he used you and you feel cheap. Yes, I’m stupid. I should have know he was going to do this, but I thought “this time” would be different … DOH!

We are at war with several entities at the moment and try as we might, they won’t engage in small numbers. They prefer safety in numbers despite the fact that some of them actually have skills to take us on. The Sir Robin affliction is so ingrained in to them by their alliance/corp that fleeing is just another tactic in war.  WTs should be treated differently when it comes to aggression in Empire space!

This Agression Timer just needs to go away and let us go about the business of war. We’ve paid CONCORD their bribe money and we should be allowed to go about the business of killing slavers without getting penalized by gate wardens that feel the need to protect the cowardly.

Turns out, she understood what I was talking about.   She was a transport pilot for a large corp moving equipment to and from the larger market hubs.  She’s used this little trick herself but can see where it would be detrimental to the war effort in my situation.

My outburst had attracted a little attention but as most people in the bar were scum I chose to ignore them.  She suggested we retire to some place more private where our conversations wouldn’t be listened to.

Life as a pod pilot’s not so bad at all.

——-

List of Participants:

1. Diary of a Space Jockey, Blog Banter: BE GONE!
2. EVE Newb, (EVE) Remove You
3. Miner With Fangs, Blog Banter – It’s the Scotch
4. The Eden Explorer, Blog Banter: The Map! The Map!
5. The Wandering Druid of Tranquility, “Beacons, beacons, beacons, beacons, beacons, mushroom, MUSHROOM!!!”
6. Inner Sanctum of the Ninveah, Kill the Rats
7. Mercspector @ EVE, Scotty
8. EVE’s Weekend Warrior, EVE Blog Banter #9
9. A Merry Life and a Short One, Eve Blog Banter #9: Why Won’t You Die?
10. Into the unknown with gun and camera, Blog Banter – The Hokey Cokey
11. The Flightless Geek, EVE Blog Banter #9: Remove a Game Mechanic
12. Sweet Little Bad Girl, Blog Banter 9: Who is Nibbling at My House?
13. One Man and His Spaceship, Blog Banter 9: What could you do without?
14. Life in Low Sec, EVE Blog Banter #9: Stop Tarnishing My Halo
15. Cle Demaari: Citizen, Blog Banter #9: Training for all my men!
16. A Mule in EVE, He who giveth, also taketh away?
17. Dense Veldspar, Blog Banter 9
18. Morphisat’s Blog, Blog Banter #9 – Randomness Be Gone !
19. Facepalm’s Blog, EVE Blog Banter #9: What a new pilot could do without
20. Memoires of New Eden, You’re Fired
21. Kyle Langdon’s Journeys in EVE, EVE Blog Banter #9 Titans? What’s a Titan?
22. Achernar, The gates! The gates are down!
23. Speed Fairy, EVE Blog Banter #9: Down with Downtime!
24. I am Keith Neilson, EVE Blog Banter #9-F**K Da Police
25. Ripe Lacunae, The UI… Where do I begin… (Eve Blog Banter #9)
26. Clown Punchers, EvE Blogs: What game mechanic would you get rid of?
27. Estel Arador Corp Services, You’ve got mail
28. Epic Slant, Let Mom and Pop Play: EVE Blog Banter #9
29. Deaf Plasma’s EVE Musings, Blog Banter #9 – Removal of Anchoring Delay of POS modules
30. Podded Once Again, Blog Banter #9 – Do we really need to go AFK?
31. Postcards from EVE, 2009.07.02.00.29.06
32. Harbinger Zero, Blog Banter #9 – War Declarations & Sec Status
33. Warp Scrammed, Blog Banter 9 – Never Too Fast
34. Ecaf Ersa (EVE Mag), Can a Tractor Tractor a Can?
35. Thoughts from an Accidental Minmatar Revolutionary, EVE Blog Banter #9 – Aggression timers, WTs and Stargates
36. Mike Azariah, I don’t put much stock in it…
37. Rettic’s Log, Blog Banter: Overview Overload
38. A Sebiestor Scholar, [OOC] EVE Blog Banter #9: Slaves
39. Diary of a pod pilot, [OOC] EVE blog banter #9: Because of Falcon
40. Roc’s Ramblings, Blog Banter #9 – Taking Things Slow

Sarkos - 2005

Taking a break for a short moment, Bad Harlequin, or BH as he’s known, sat in the hanger and looked around. He picked up a piece of heavy duty, but thin rope and wondered why it was there. Looking at the end, he noted it had been cut nicely, clean cut, a real sharp knife.

With the first *CLICK*, four heads turned as one to see the wheel moving by itself. ‘RUN!’ By the second one, all were mid run, headed back to the safty of the magnetic bubble. At the *GREEN LIGHT*, the massive doors hissed, then began to open.

Looking up at the yell to run, BH came to the sudden, and very shocking realization that he was holding the end of Hippey’s tether rope. ‘FREK!’ Bad Harlequen jumped up as the light went green. ‘GRAB ALL THE TETHER ROPES’ he shouted, as he wrapped his rope about himself and braced. All across the hanger floor, people looked in bewilderment at the shouted order, fatigue dulling most sences. Click here to read more.. »

Generally I tend to run missions for the Caldari Navy, much like many of the other capsuleers in the Citadel. Now I don’t really have a problem with the Caldari Navy or anything, but I fancied a change so I looked up a list of agents from, shall we say, a less than reputable source. This list featured agents from CONCORD and the idea of working for CONCORD appealed to me.

So I grabbed my cyclone and off I set. I was informed of a Level 2 agent 10 Jumps away from my home in Venilien in the solar system of Hatakani. Hatakani’s blue nebula was refreshing to see especially after all the red and pink nebulas in and around Venilien and I was looking forward to spending some time here.

So I approached the Ammar Station that looms above Hatakani VI, an interesting looking planet with a huge ring formation around it and requested permission to dock. Once docked I checked to see which agents were at the station, however the station was deserted.

It turns out CONCORD stopped offering missions some years ago, something to do with pirates running missions for them in order to build up their standing high enough to be able to fly safely through high sec.

So a bit of a wasted trip, but I did get to see part of Caldari space I had not seen before and it’s always fun to explore ^_^

//StarScream

Welcome to the eighth installment of the EVE Blog Banter , the monthly EVE Online blogging extravaganza created by CrazyKinux. The EVE Blog Banter involves an enthusiastic group of gaming bloggers, a common topic within the realm of EVE Online, and a week to post articles pertaining to the said topic. The resulting articles can either be short or quite extensive, either funny or dead serious, but are always a great fun to read! Any questions about the EVE Blog Banter should be directed here . Check out otherEVE Blog Banter articles at the bottom of this post!

Log entry: stardate…. <blip> *Damn Minmatar technology* Now where did I put that duct tape…..

Dreams last night where disturbing. Factional War had broken between the Minmatar tribes and the Amarr in the borderlands and the heroes of the republic were being kept from joining their brethren by a large conga line of CONCORD Battle Cruisers, Capitals and a strange looking (very phallic shaped) Titan. They had ships stationed at all gates coming from 0.0 space forbidding all access to the war front.

If I hadn’t been in my pod, I would probably be sweating. I mean, who has ever heard of anyone forbidding anyone from participating in action that directly affects their Tribal brethren. Slavery is wrong and all free citizens of New Eden should have the opportunity to act upon this direct act of aggression by the slavers. The Republic wouldn’t stand for it and neither would we.

It’s a bit fuzzy, as dreams sometimes are, but I seem to recall a CONCORD statement about allowing individual corporations but not alliances. But that can’t be right. Alliances such as Ushra’Khan and Electus Matari are on the forefront of the struggle. The battles would be epic. The Glory Great! The absolute Defeat of the enemy would be inevitable!

Our voices will be heard!

But it was just a dream ….  wasn’t it?

BLOOD FOR FREEDOM.

WE COME FOR OUR PEOPLE.

List of Participants:

Standing in the dark observation room of the Curse Watchtower a figure moved.

His eyes peering out into the vastness of space. The lines on his face a history of the revolutionary struggle and yet a reflection of serenity that comes from many lifetimes of understanding why it had to be done.

His mind wandered carelessly through mental images of his physical life wondering what / where his soul would take him. His tribe had taught him that once his physical shell was given back to space his soul would enter the great halls of the Elders. If chosen, the warrior would join the others, the heroes of the seven tribes, in the greatest place of them all “Valhall”.  At the head of the table will sit the Elders of the great tribes and they will sit in judgment of his actions in this world.

The scrolls described this place of many homes in the otherwold.  His mind went over some of the verses he still remembered from when he was a child:

Sökkvabekk is the fourth, | where cool waves flow,
And amid their murmur it stands;
There daily do the Elders| and Warriors drink
In gladness from cups of gold.

The fifth is Glathsheim, | and gold-bright there
Stands Valhall stretching wide;
And there do the Elders | each day choose
The men who have fallen in fight.

Click here to read more.. »