I’ve recently decided to firmly cement my Eve-addiction by acquiring another character for use in various schemes and general mischief. While he’s languishing in an NPC corp until I find a suitable home for him, I couldn’t resist kicking things off right:
…its the little things 
.
o7
-Aiden
The other night, a mixed group of enterprising fun-loving criminals from a collection of corps including Suddenly Ninjas, Honorless Internet Jerks, Ex Obscuritas, Alarm Clock Corp, and Defner.org, pooled their collective talents and scheming to pull off one of the best high-sec suicide-ganks I’ve ever seen.
Solarius’s fully officer and faction-fit Paladin has been modestly priced at around 34 billion isk with around 20bil of that dropping as loot (eat your heart out PLEX-Kestral). For the full story on how this awesome-sauce got stirred, Arden Elenduil has a full write-up on his blog “Ninja Hijinx”.
The lesson here? Consequences to your actions. In this case, the action was flying around running missions in a ridiculously expensive ship, and the consequence was attracting a LOT of unwanted attention to your giant bulls-eye of a ship. This is not to say that the definite reaction to your action of flying a pricey ship is that you will get ganked; Eve is not a perfect physics equation. But what this does mean is that you are not anonymous in Eve; there are lots of other players out there, and more than a few of them will want to kill you. Give them enough of a reason or possible reward, and something like system security won’t stop them.
Cheers to the guys who pulled this one off; well-played sirs.
o7
-Aiden
Infiltration alts come in two flavors: active and passive. The active ones are the toons you grind time with, work your way into a corps trust with, achieve director rights with, and eventually eviscerate corp-wide isk and assets with. Active infiltration alts can take a lot of time and energy, but with the right mind-set can obviously seriously pay off.
Passive alts though, can almost be more fun (if they work that is), with the sheer lack of effort it can take to achieve similar end results; call it the lazy-man’s con if you want, or the slacker-heist maybe.
Over the past 6 months or so, I’ve had one such passive alt parked in a mining corp and I just managed to walk away, UN-burned and UN-suspected, with about 750mil isk.
This alt had:
Actually, over the course of the past 5 months, I logged this alt in a grand total of 3 times, simply to empty the corporate hanger and log off again. I never even actually left the station where the corporate hanger was located, but every 45 days or so, sure enough, that hanger would be full of un-secured junk and crappy t1 ships prime for the yoinking.
That’s right, the same corp. Three times. Thats just…whats the word?….embarrassing. Completely embarrassing.
I do however feel that I need to emphasize that 90% of what I stole was complete crap. It just happened to be a around 750mil isk worth of complete crap (which is a lot of crap). Among some of my favorite stand-out items of the theft, purely for their total WTF-factor:
Some of the tastier bits did include 10 Coveters, a shit-ton of salvage materials, and about 200,000 m3 of random high-sec ore. \o/
But lets get back to that “un-burned and un-suspected” bit. Today, I decided to log in the alt and see if I could rack up a 4th consecutive theft (I’ve come to think of this corp in crop-harvesting terms). But wait! This is not my house! This is not my beautiful wife! I found myself not in my usual harvester-corp, but in an NPC corp with my mailbox blinking. Figuring the jig was (finally) up, I opened my mailbox full of 200+ corp mails that I’ve never read and found one from the current CEO:
Wut.
Inactivity. Nothing in the way of “every single time you logged in seemed to coincide with us loosing all our crap and terribad fail-ships” or hell, a “hey, who are you, and why have I never seen you in corp, ever?” And if you’re wondering about the censored names, having just walked away scott-free from the piggy bank with 3/4 of a bil, I don’t really see a reason to burn this legitimate looking and incident and burn-free alt now.
So I realize this is in no way an Alliance-crippling, multi-billion isk theft that will rock the foundations of this game, but 750mil isk for doing absolutely nothing? Yes please.
o7,
-Aiden
In hoping around the Heimetar region yesterday, I decided to make a pit stop in Illinfrik, home to TEARS corp Sect Or, and a place I haven’t stopped in to in a while.
My first scan of Illinfrik got me a couple of hits, including a very, very tasty looking Armageddon Navy Issue. My eyes lit up. Warping into the ANI’s gate-less mission, I found he was running it with a Rokh and Drake, all three from the same corp. Ignoring caution, I immediately set about looting and salvage at will in my rupture. All three immediately locked me up, but sadly no shots were fired. So, I decided to poke around a bit more, orbiting, bumping, and generally harassing them, before moving on.
I popped around to a few more hits, but I just kept coming back to the ILM guys because that Navy Geddon was such a tempting target. There’s one goal that’s been eluding me in Eve, which is to take down a faction battleship. I’ve had a couple “almosts” (including an officer fit nightmare that somehow while fighting I manged to desync from and find myself at his optimal =/ ), but never a solid faction-shiny kill. Industrial Laser Mining, however, was about to change that for me.
Finally, after about the 4th time party-crashing their mission…success! Amazingly, the Navy Geddon was the first one to go red, and I immediately pointed him and started laying down the pew. Of course, soon after both the Drake and the Rokh went red too, and although pretty far away from me, sent their drones out. I had both my medium armor reppers going full steam but I soon realized there was just no way a single cruiser was going to take out 2 battleships and a Drake. Luckily, no one in this party had fitted any points, so I recalled drones and bailed.
Through the whole thing though, I’d been talking to Sarkor Nafaar, Sect Or’s CEO, and he pipped up that he had an alt handy with an Onieros. Perfect. I immediately repped up and headed back to the mission.
Quite surprisingly actually, they were ALL still there, including the Navy Geddon. Calm and composed, I very cooly asked for armor rep assistance:
Aiden Mourn > bring on the rr and warp to me
Aiden Mourn > now
Aiden Mourn > now
Aiden Mourn > nownownow?
Aiden Mourn > naaaooww?
Aiden Mourn > prease?
Sarkor Nafaar > otw
BM Dublyoo > lol, i’m otw too more for moral support
You see? Cool as a freaking cucumber sometimes. Just call me Paul Newman.
BM Dublyoo decided to come along too seeing as he was in the area, with a Cyclone fitted out with 1 shield transfer, purely for aggro-grabbing assistance. As I pointed the ANI, Sarkor’s alt in an Onieros, Sarkor himself in a RR Phoon, and BM with the shield transfer of doom all landed and started reps on my little Rupture; really completely overkill in the rr department, but hilarious.
I was pounding on the ANI but it became apparent soon that there was no way I was going to crack his tank with my DPS. Suddenly though, BM started getting shot at by the Rokh, who he quickly locked up. I kept point on the ANI but sent my drones to assist and two of us made surprisingly short work of the Rokh (was that tank even on?).
For some reason, the Drake was still around, doing absolutely no damage to me, and in no way assisting his friend. Sgi, the ANI pilot, decided he would take matters into his own hands however, and somehow decided that shooting BM’s Cyclone was the next step in liberating himself from the situation, which only resulted in BM now shooting him as well.
Tears started to flow in local:
Sgi > come on guys I gotta go to work
Sgi > can we pick this up later
Sounds legit to me, right? I opened a convo to see about getting some cash out of this pressed-for-time bear:
Sgi > can we pick this up later I have to go to work
Aiden Mourn > i guess we could work something out
Aiden Mourn > like you turning off your reppers and making this go faster
Sgi > lets do somethin you guys can have the salvage I gotta bolt
Aiden Mourn > hmm
Aiden Mourn > salvage
Aiden Mourn > or geddon navy issue
Aiden Mourn > tough chioce dude
Aiden Mourn > can I think about it?
Sgi > I can tank you guys all day , lets just fight later , I gotta go
Aiden Mourn > ok cya
Sgi > I will tell my guys to back off ok
Because they were such a boon to his defense “strategy”. Sgi continued to not get it, and kept offering to “let me” have his mission salvage :p .
Aiden Mourn > ok
Sgi > ok ?
Aiden Mourn > and then you either pay me
Aiden Mourn > or turn your reppers off
Aiden Mourn > I hate to tell you, buts thats the only way this is going to play out
Sgi > take the loot , thats what started all this
Aiden Mourn > funny how things escalate
Aiden Mourn > the way i see it though, ANI loot is way better than pleasure hub loot
Aiden Mourn > agreed?
Sgi > yeah it is , just wanted to get a mi9ssion in before work , we dont want a war over this and you dont eather, not with my alliance
Uhoh….do I smell a dec-threat? Indeed! I could also begin to smell Sgi’s desperation due to his time-constraint, and I kept pressing him for isk.
Aiden Mourn > a terrifying thought to be sure
Aiden Mourn > for real though
Aiden Mourn > turn the reppers off
Sgi > notice I am not even firing on you
Aiden Mourn > and this will be over soon
Aiden Mourn > ok, youre ging to die here
Aiden Mourn > 450mil
Aiden Mourn > and that changes
Sgi continues to be obstinate though, and I decide on a new plan. Seeing as both BM and I had aggro on him at this point, I left BM to scram him while I warped out to change for bigger pew. Apparently I had a random, and very oddly fit nano-shield-kiting-sort-of Hurricane sitting in a station in Illinfrik, so I decided that would do and grabbed it. Returning with bigger boom-boom power, Sgi really started to melt, and the tears really started flowing:
Sgi > you kill this ship we go to war
Aiden Mourn > sounds like a deal
As Sgi’s tank slowly started to fail, he apparently decided it wasn’t failing fast enough and decided to shoot Sarkor’s RR Phoon. The ANI’s tank bombed at that point and a very shiny explosion ensued.
As Sarkor snagged the loot, BM and I both realized that the Drake pilot was STILL THERE, and proceeded to very quickly lock and dispatch him as well. I returned to my convo with Sgi for more tears:
Aiden Mourn > so….its a date then?
Aiden Mourn > =P
Sgi > oh yeah , the rest of the pvp alliance is going to have some fun with you guys
Aiden Mourn > should i bring something?
Aiden Mourn > wine?
Aiden Mourn > mich ultra?
Sgi > yes please
Aiden Mourn > awesome
Aiden Mourn > well, gf
Aiden Mourn > you actually did ok until you all started shooting everyone
Sgi > that was my best mission ship you know
Aiden Mourn > I would assume so
Aiden Mourn > was hoping for some better drops
Aiden Mourn > but it’ll do
Aiden Mourn > http://tears.evekb.co.uk/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=1545705
Aiden Mourn > so when should i be expecting this wardec exactly?
Sgi > soon
Aiden Mourn > soon as in, “you’re on it right now”? or soon like “you really have no say in these types of matters but youre going to bitch and whine to your CEO and directors about deccing us”
Aiden Mourn > Cause I’ve gotta say, im leaning towards door number 2
Sgi > I have full rights , just talking to the other corps atm
Aiden Mourn > of course
To add complete and utter insult to injury, Orions Lord in corp chat pointed out that beyond the 1.14 billion isk loss on ILM’s part, it appears Sgi dropped his damsel in distress as well.
Aiden Mourn > so hey
Aiden Mourn > while we’re talking business
Sgi > ?
Aiden Mourn > would you like your damsel?
Aiden Mourn > =)
Aiden Mourn > she seems to have dropped when your big shiny expensive ship went poof
Sgi > keep it . dont act like that was easy . it took 3 of you to take me down
lol.
Aiden Mourn > well, it took 2
Aiden Mourn > the phoon was just overkill
Aiden Mourn > but anyways
Aiden Mourn > potatoes potahtoes I guess.
Aiden Mourn > So…is that a no on the damsel?
Sgi > later I have to go to work
Aiden Mourn > have a super day!
So final tally for ILM stands at 1.14bil in losses (including my much sought-after faction BS trophy), a damsel in distress (and I’m assuming a failed mission now as well), a fail-threat, and a very nice bucket of delicious tears. Also its now been 24 hrs now, and I’m still waiting for that war-dec notification, so if anyone from ILM or Crimson Coalition Alliance is reading this, you might want to drop Sgi a line and see what the holdup is.
Much thanks to BM Dublyoo and Sarkor for the assistance and help. Remember kids, the best ship in eve is friendship (particularly the kind that come with Onieroses )
o7,
-Aiden
This was originally going to be two separate posts: one a funny little interchange with a butt-hurt mission runner who’s Domi I popped, and another as a commentary on the recently brought to light allegations of CCP reimbursing peoples mission ships who lose them to stupidity. However, seeing as they fit together so well on the gray-area subject of aggro-refreshing, I thought they’d play nice together.
Laughing Out Loud:
If you shoot at ninjas, bad things happen. I know this little mantra has been a bit over-played over the years, but this is an eventuality, not a possibility, and solid proof of this came the other night.
Getting bored in Emol without finding much, I popped next door to Ammold to see what sort of trouble I could get into. I tried antagonizing a raven and then a Vargur without much success, and then managed to liberate the ships crew from a Navy Domi and a very belligerent Drake pilot who ended up canceling his own mission rather than pay my modest finders fee for the return of his M.O. Tisk tisk. Fun, but no pew.
Finally, I dropped in on a Dominix, finished with his first room and heading towards the gate to the second one. I zipped over to the last non-looted wreck in the room and snagged a piece of ammo before heading towards the gate. Domi yellow-boxed, popped drones, and then very predictably, went flashy red. Bingo. In my salvage Ruppy, I got my disruptor running, deployed my warrior IIs, and started taking out his drones.
The plan WAS, to bring in the Orca for some fancy re-fitting on the fly, but due to getting THREE convo requests and a phone-call all in the span of about 30 seconds, I managed to warp my Orca to the wrong BM and watched as my Rupure went down kicking and screaming to Kubwa’s drones. Crap.
After that, he of course warped before I could bring in the Orca for real this time. Double-crap. So instead, I settled into a long bout of aggro refreshing hijinx. I’d refresh, then swap to a CovOps and try to find some more unwilling playmates, before swapping into another Ruppy and refreshing again.
Finally though, after about 45 minutes, this was starting to get old and I was starting to lose interest. Pissed, I docked up to take a little food break.
However, in docking at the only station in Ammold, I realized that the Domi wasn’t there, despite still showing in system. I did a quick dscan with my alt still parked in his mission and found nothing. This could only mean one thing: safe spot.
Grinning, I swapped back for a CovOps and sent out probes. When scanning for victims , I always name BMed hits as the ship type as well as the ship’s scan ID. This was coming in very handy at the moment, as I could do a large-probe system scan for a specific ID and then narrow it in. Roughly 25 seconds after deploying probes, I was en route in a cloaked covops to Kubwa’s not-so-safe spot.
My grin turned into full on laughing out loud as I saw Kubwa’s flashy red Domi appear on my overview as I exited warp. Giggling, I BMed the spot and immediately went back to the Orca for the Rupture. Pumped, slightly drunk, and still giggling like a schoolgirl, I warped back to my new friend.
What I hadn’t accounted for however, was that the Domi was moving through this safe spot, so when I came out of warp 50km from him, I panicked. Going for broke, I overheated my AB and started powering towards him anyways.
As the seconds painfully ticked by, I began to realize a little detail that immediately brought a shit-eating grin back to my face: Kubwa was AFK.
Astoundingly enough, Kubwa had apparently walked away from his computer with his ship out in space with a glaring aggro timer staring at him. As I entered disruptor range, I locked him up, sent out my drones, and set into a nice tight orbit. Kubwa’s active tank wasn’t much help with no one actually activating it, and the Domi went down hard.
I sat there clutching my sides from laughing through the whole thing and realized that Kubwa was STILL AFK, his pod just sitting there. I started sending out requests through Corp and Alliance chat for a pod-suicider in the area when my new friend suddenly came back to life:
Kubwa > hrm….interesting? how am i still aggroed to you?
Aiden Mourn > wierd
Aiden Mourn > magic I guess
Aiden Mourn > nice safe spot
Aiden Mourn > =p
Kubwa > wasn’t a safe spot
Kubwa > i left to go pick up my wife
Aiden Mourn > I’d blame her for this then
Kubwa > nah. think this is petition worthy
Kubwa > seeing as how much longer than 15 mins past since i killed you
Aiden Mourn > not if youre looking for a worth-while response
Kubwa > i’ll get my ship back
Aiden Mourn > no you wont
Kubwa > there’s no debating it
Aiden Mourn > but you might get a well-worded response telling you why you wont
Aggro mechanics are a bitch my friend, but go easy on the old lady for this one.
======
The Elephant In the Room:
Apparently, aggro mechanics are proving to be a bit more of an elephant in the room than can be ignored any longer, with the staggering recent reimbursment by CCP to a carebear who lost his CNR due to aggro-refresh techniques by a ninja he’d shot at.
Aggro-refreshing, for those not in the know, has always been a bit of a gray-area in the Ninja’s arsenal of tricks in hunting mission runners that involves literally refreshing the original aggro timer on the carebear who shot at your salvage ship before docking, by aggressing items in space that belong to them: i.e. wrecks. I do want to make it clear that this has NEVER been deemed an exploit officially by CCP, nor do we at SN endorse using actual exploits in Eve.
In light of this event, Paul from My Loot, Your Tears made an inquiry with a senior GM who confirmed that refreshing aggro is NOT considered an exploit. The GM followed it up though by saying that CCP “reserves the right” to change this feature later.
And thats where the problem lies. In making this a case-by-case deliberation, CCP only brings the aggro-refresh bug to the surface without addressing any real solution to the problem.
Aggro-refreshing is not a perfect system either; its bugged to hell and works like a malfunctioning appliance at best: sometimes you need to change sessions (docking/undocking) between refreshing, and somtimes you don’t. Sometimes the timer resets itself, or even disappears completely and other times its stays visible. And other times, you get the random “GCC bug”, which despite the lack of CONCORD warning, flags you with a GCC timer, at which point you can neither dock or change ships for 15 minutes without getting blown to bits. So there’s no denying that its a flawed tool and I would seriously doubt that its a “working as intended” game mechanic. But that’s where my biggest problem with it is.
What I would like to see is a solid answer, a yes or no response, from CCP. Pick a side, and follow through with it. If refreshing aggro via a wreck or can is a viable and fully intended game mechanic, then fix it and get rid of the bugs. And if IS a bug or exploit that’s resulting in reimbursed ships, then just call it that and we can be done with it. Aggro-refreshing is hardly the only trick up a ninja’s sleeve, but I for one would appreciate a straight answer.
Because as Paul also mentioned on his blog, the real concern in this is “how often DOES this happen?” This particular event has been blown into the public spectrum due the mission runner in question posting about it on his blog, but how many others who’ve shot at ninjas, then ignored aggro timer warnings and been killed have had their ships replaced as well? Seeing as I spend the majority of my time in Eve separating people from their ships, isk, and assets, its an issue that rings pretty close to me, and I’d like to know if its all a waste.
o7
-Aiden
A few days ago, in some miraculous alignment of the stars, karma, and pure comedy, a certain aystra cemented his place in the annals of Eve by managing to lose 74 PLEXs at once while trying to move them all together out of Jita. With the recent changes to PLEX, something hilarious like this had to happen at some point sooner or later, but seeing it at this scale is absolutely mind-blowing. Current in-game prices have PLEX trading at around 320 mil each, making this a loss in the range of 23 billion isk.
Lets just all take a moment and collectively say in our most humble gamer-lingo what we’re all thinking: “lolz”.
While I would normally be more than content to sit back, sip a cocktail, and enjoy the sweet and tangy tears flowing freely, the sheer amount of ridiculous feedback on this one makes me feel compelled to respond.
The biggest complainers (those fun-hating naysayers, downers, and general party-poopers) have essentially said that in allowing aystra to lose his 23bil isk ($1,200, or six years of game time!) without compensation or reimbursement, CCP have in fact been paid for a service they did not in any way actually provide. This is definitely a debatable point, but take into account the game we’re talking about here. Eve is the cruel bitch-mistress of the MMO world; the place where literally years worth of time and effort can be lost or taken in moments. So, fun-haters, I see your pseudo-point and raise you one “welcome to Eve”.
You can cry all you want about broken game mechanics and CCP greed (no really, keep crying), but this ultimately comes down to pure, unbridled stupidity. Go ahead and ask yourself what state of complete brain disconnection you’d have to be in to undock 23 billion isk in an untanked frigate. In Jita. WHILE AT WAR. Exactly. I’m honestly having trouble coming up with a dumber move.
Of course, this highly amusing turn of events also begs a larger question: are PLEX worth more than simply the 320mil or so isk they trade for in game? Well, yes and no.
In theory, no, PLEX are in-game items that may be bought or sold or lost like any other. You can at any point turn that PLEX (like for instance a piece of faction loot) into isk, which in turn can buy you a shiny new ship, which you can of course, lose. The one distinction that PLEX have over other items is that whatever state the market is in, you can be sure that they are ALWAYS good for one thing: 30 days of paid game-time.
However, at some point, someone, somewhere, payed actual money for this “game item”, beyond their basic monthly subscription. So yes, in allowing PLEX to become a trade-able, move-able item, CCP has in fact created a middle zone, a gray area of “RL worth”. This makes getting a PLEX blown out of your ship, theoretically, a RL monetary hit. $14.95 is a 1/2 tank of gas, a new record, or a bus ticket to see a friend, and the fact that CCP has just opened the floodgates for people of extreme stupidity to actually lose real life money in a game is in my opinion, totally awesome.
Obviously, to a certain degree, I’m a little biased. I’m inclined to see gigantic losses in this game due to stupidity as highly entertaining. It’s my nature, and its the nature of the way I play this game. Also, PLEX have no real bearing on my game as I don’t use them at all. Beyond my monthly subscription, I see no reason to spend real money on in-game currencies, and as an adult with a full-time job (well, two actually), $15 a month for each of my accounts isn’t really bank breaking, and I would much rather sit on large piles of ill-begotten isk than spend it on game time.
So let the tears flow I say! “Broken game mechanic”? “Receiving payment for services NOT rendered”? Please. CCP, I thank and tip my cap to you for imposing the most hilarious Darwin-threshold on a game that I’ve ever even heard of. Bravo.
o7,
-Aiden
p.s. pardon the post title, it was just too obvious a pun to ignore
UPDATE:
I just want to say a very special thank you to Crazy Kinux for linking this new project on his blog. The original post will remain below, but new Ninja Blogs will be updated and added to the list as they come to my attention. Thanks for all the support so far; hope you enjoy the smorgasbord of tears.
-Aiden
=======
In catching up on a bunch of Eve-blogs, I’ve noticed that more than a few other Eve Blog Pack writers have been touting their fellow corpmates’ blogs, and with good reason. The Bastards and The Python Cartel have more fantastic bloggers than a pirates got booty, and Astral from Astral’s Eve Trial By Fire has a ton of links to fellow White Rabbits with blogs multiplying like, well, rabbits.
So in saying that, I feel like I should direct your attention to the right (painstakingly copied below for you fellow Capsuleer users) at the (hopefully?) current and up-to-date Ninja Blog Pack. With a whopping 25 active ninja blogs, TWENTY are current members of TEARS, including one entirely in German (mmm …. Deutsch Tränen gehen gut mit Bier).
Some you may be familiar with, and some might be new reads, but all of these are some seriously talented blogs that I highly recommend adding to your own reading lists for that extra dosage of ninja fun, shenanigans, and sweet delicious bear tears.
Ninja Blog Pack:
If you’ve got an Eve ninja-salvaging related blog and I’ve missed you, please drop me a line and let me know and I’d love to add you to the list. Happy reading (*yoink*, there goes your free time tonight )
o7,
-Aiden
We here at SN have been saying this for years, so its about time everyone else caught up. Not only are tears sweet, savory, and excellent fuel for your spaceship, it would appear that they are in fact good for you.
Selfless, really, the things we do for you ungrateful little mission bears .
o7,
-Aiden
Every now and then, I actually start to feel a twinge that perhaps the Eve player-base at large is actually becoming smarter. Well, make that “less dumb”, but either way, it stings. Luckily enough, I’m usually immediately put back at ease by some absurdly brainless action I witness or hear about in Eve and all is right with the world again. Deadspace-fitted t1 tackle-dessies, someone buying a “Navy” Dominix via station trade (honestly?), a Rorqual getting a beatdown by pirates after attempting to jump via a gate; these are all heart-warming reminders to me that common sense is typically left at the door in Eve.
I was just getting read to log last night when I saw something in corp chat that makes every ninja’s heart a-flutter.
Set Shwayo > need orca pilot in mirliene for theft
Apparently, Set and new recruit Kyle Shephard had discovered a flaming beacon of naivete; someone using their UNPILOTED Orca as a jetcan while they mined in a hulk (remember what I was saying about leaving common sense at the door). It appears that despite countless C&P posts, blogs, and youtube videos canvasing the subject, a certain Ezekiel Oto had somehow missed the memo that an unpiloted ship sitting in space is a ship you are going to lose.
Kyle Shephard > srsly
Set Shwayo > got an unmanned one
Kyle Shephard > I just found him in a belt
Set Shwayo > need a pilot 
Aiden Mourn > wtf
Aiden Mourn > hang on
Aiden Mourn > i know someone
Set Shwayo > ‘i know a guy’ is how all great capers are SUPPOSED to start
All too true Set, and as luck would have it, I really did know someone who I’d just seen in passing in Emol. As I’ve said before, it pays to have secretly pro-ninja carebear friends, as in this case I’d already logged my alt off due to a combination of hot weather, a crappy AC, and an overheating computer that was struggling to dual-client. I dropped my acquaintance a convo, explained the situation, and grinned at the response: we had our pilot. At the request of said carebear-friend, for the purposes of their own security, Set, Kyle, and I agreed to a certain amount of discretion involving our Ringer’s name appearing on blog posts, so from here on out they will be lovingly referred to as “SecretBear”.
As SecretBear made the 20-odd jumps to Mirilene, we assessed the situation. Kyle was dscaning the belt from a nearby planet and reported that our friend seemed to be switching between the Hulk and the Orca. They’d both appear on scan, and then just the Orca for a few minutes, and then both would magically reappear on dscan. Not wanting to spook our mark, we waited until SecretBear could get into system and into a cloaky covops to jump into the belt and give eyes on the situation.
Apparently, Ezekiel was mining into his Orca, then switching to it, scooping the hulk, and moving to new roids in the belt to repeat the process. Now normally in a situation as ridiculous as this, one needs to bump the Hulk pilot away from the Orca in order to board it. The reasoning behind this is that a ship, even an unpiloted one, is un-boardable while it is being targeted (by anyone, not just the owner/friendly). We scrambled to come up with a way to bump the hulk without spooking him the second we land on belt. The problem was, he was sitting right next to the Orca, so the fear was he would simply insta switch the second we started bumping. SecretBear could fly both ships however, so we figured on getting at least a Hulk out of the deal.
After a dicey moment when the mark warped out, we realized he was simply moving to the next belt, and SB followed to wait. The minutes dragged by while we waited for intel. Finally:
SecretBear > he’s in the orca still
SecretBear > Hulk poped out!
Kyle Shephard > YESYESYES
SB got into position to have an unblocked shot at the Orca and began a slow, cloaked approach. Still pondering the bumping dilemma, we realized that a) the boarding range for a ship is 6500 m, while b) the decloaking range is only 2500 m. We couldn’t wait any more, and gave SB the go-ahead and collectively held our breaths.
SecretBear > ok
SecretBear > creeeping up!
SecretBear > I can’t while cloaked
SecretBear > this will be touch and go
Kyle Shephard > cant board?
SecretBear > While cloaked
SecretBear > i think hes afk guys
Kyle Shephard > omg
Aiden Mourn > do it!!
Set Shwayo > roll them dice
We waited…until:
SecretBear > NEW ORCA
Kyle Shephard > OMFG
Set Shwayo > WIN
SecretBear > LOL
Aiden Mourn > WIIIIIIINNNN
SecretBear > lol, that is maybe the most fun I’ve ever had in eve
Kyle Shephard > HAHAHAHA
Astoundingly, the Hulk hadn’t been targeted the Orca at all and SecretBear was able to jump right in. SB scooped the exited covops and scooted off to station while we all did a jig. Sadly, the Orca was completely empty save for a handful of salvage and some t1 cargo rigs
SecretBear > this is one ghetto orca
As I tried unsuccessfully for probably the 4th time to recruit SecretBear into SN, Set sent our newly Orca-less friend Ezekiel a summons for collection of dues due to improper Orca parking and related towing fees and charges 
.
Of course, we all had visions of faction modules and t3 ships packed into the Orca, but I think lifting Ezekiel’s giant thieve-able jet can right in front of him is payment enough to make up for that shortcoming. Seeing as I was really only along for the commentary, I told Kyle, Set, and SecretBear to split the loot and logged for some much needed sleep. Again, a huge thanks to Set and Kyle (not a bad 1st day in corp sir ), and of course to SecretBear for the amazing work.
o7,
-Aiden
Its funny how things change as you grow up. Remember when you were a kid and summer-time meant a complete absence of anything even slightly resembling responsibilities? Exactly. Now how come no one ever told me that by the time you’re 26, that ideal is completely turned upside down? I feel like a firm but well-intended lesson in the the notion of “semi-permanence” concerning the future of my carefree summers at the age of say, 10, may have gone a long way. Folks, don’t let your children grow up without this knowledge of the impending doom of their free time. Personally, I recommend and endorse the following product:
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Comings and Goings:
As it happens in the ever-changing and expanding world of Eve, sometimes people need change from routine and seek new horizons and new paths to explore. July sadly saw the departure of a couple of our top-notch ninjas who felt that urge to explore something new.
Llyan, Meccros, Wee Girl, Bel’Sham, Lars Foolsbane, and relative new-comer Arden Elenduil have made names for themselves in Eve as fearsome and well-versed members of Suddenly Ninjas and its a truly sad thing to see them leave. Flying with you gentlemen has been an honor and a whole lot of fun, and I wish all of you the very best in your travels and adventures.
Recruitment numbers are way up though, and we’ve seen a steady stream of eager new shinobi ready to take the plunge into the intricate and high-stress (read: fairly simple and enjoyably laid-back) world of high-sec mission-griefing and ninjaing.
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Happenings:
Velocity Prime, intrepid ninja-warrior, fearsome blogger, and my old boss, has started a new corp, and they’re looking for a few good men. Misfit Toys is recruiting like-minded pvpers, ass-hats, villians, bastards, and miscreants for fun, adventure, and hardly-masked homo-erotica (hah!), so check out VP’s blog for more info.
—
A huge, huge round of applause to those brave and danger-flirting ner-do-wells and overall douchebags who selflessly burned their security status into the ground in the name of Hulkageddon III, which has just wrapped up. So far the tally rests at 1719 exhumers, 717 barges, 29 orcas and 1 rorqual with a staggering damage estimate at over 288 billion isk!
Prizes are still being distributed, and the TEARS panel is still deliberating, but so far the over-all hands down winner of HGIII looks to be a certain Sir Phil Macmannon. I don’t know who this God amongst men is or what pool of nuclear mutant powers and giant cahones he crawled out of, but this destroyer of worlds single-handedly won the individual and corp prizes, as well as ALL FOUR regional prizes.
In addition to the harem of virgins and endless supply of cigars and fine cognac that is I’m sure awaiting him in the afterlife, Phil is enjoying his prize pool of (get ready for it): 6 billion ISK, 1 revelation, 1 naglfar with skillbooks, 2 panthers, 1 gila, 1 cynabal, 1 faction fit Bhaalgorn, 1 firetail, 1 ishtar, 1 phobos, a navy dominix and an exclusive hulkageddon t-shirt, courtesy of Azishkr’elhykai Mizamel. Sir Phil, I think I speak for all of us here at TEARS when I say, “you just won Eve”. Congratulations.
—
And lastly, we’re at War! It seems war-deccing TEARS is the new black in the world of “has-been but sort of trying to get back on their feet” merc-corps, with The 0rphange setting their sights on your favorite ninja-salvagers this time. With the exception of a few slightly embarrassing “woopsie” losses (the “I’ve-been-out-of-game-for-2-months-and-decided-to-undock-for-a-Jita-run-in-a-fully-loaded-hauler-during-war” type of woopsie), we haven’t lost much more than a couple of throw-away frigates and cruisers. Remember kids, deccing ninjas is about as fun pewing large POSs. We’re like the mining-op of pvp-experiences.
And that, I believe, wraps up this poorly laid-out, ad-hoc, al-la-carte type post. I’m happy to report that I’ve been working like a mad person trying to get caught up with work after my vacation so I should be back in game more often soon. Belay that; new edit: “Back in game more often soon flying my new Sleipnir, Loki, AND Gaurdian (alt)“. Giggidy.
o7,
-Aiden
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