Discussing the New Sov Mechanics

Well you've GOT to have an opinion.
Vincent Vega - Pulp Fiction

Costs

It will cost at least 2 billion a month to keep sovereignty in a fully upgraded system. That seems like the most important change. It will force 0.0 alliances to shrink their empires. This can only be good. More unclaimed space means more alliances will take that space. They may not fully upgrade it, but they'll own it and use it.

If you're willing to skimp on the extras(Cyno Jammers and Jump Bridges) you can hold sov for less than a billion a month. This is a much more feasible concept. If you just want to claim a system and that's all, it's only 600 million a month.

These are easily attainable numbers for small but active alliances. Even moreso once they've taken a system and have started to use it. The numbers are not concrete either, and I would wager they'll go down before the go up.

So the empires shrink, and more people crowd into more systems. Negative effects of course include cloakers(like myself) AFKing in a system and putting a hundred people out of work for a while.

Cool.

Upgrades

So now you can upgrade a system. You'll see more mining sites, hacking sites, archaeology sites, gas sites, DED Plexes, Anomalies, and even wormholes when you upgrade your system. I predict the prices on quite a few things will crash over the next year as the items begin to flood the market. I won't mind.

Also included in this is "forced activity". If you're not using your upgrades fully, you lose them. This is a great idea in theory, but it mainly means you won't be wasting money on upgrades you're not using.

Conclusion

I believe alliances that are used to owning multiple regions will be most opposed to this change. Obviously they'd be interested in keeping costs down. To those of us that are not in sovereignty holding alliances though, this is a boon the likes of which we will never get again. I hope to make good use of it. What about you?

Sov Mechanics Dev Blog

This is a pretty full read. I'll discuss it tomorrow after reading some of your comments on it.

Do you have an opinion? Worse, better? Post here.

CVA: Disbanded and Restored

Could turn out to be talking out my ass, but I'm hearing down the grapevine that CVA will be restored after downtime today. For those of you that missed it, CVA was disbanded today by a director of their executor alliance.

I maintain that if the person disbanding the alliance was the owner of the account, it should remain dead. However if the person that disbanded the alliance was not the owner of the account, and was instead some random person who figured out a password, then the Alliance should be restored. It's that simple.

You're going to hear a lot of people soon say that CCP has a double standard between BoB and CVA. That's wrong, as it's two different situations. We all know for damn sure if BoB had been disbanded by someone hacking an account, it would've been restored. It was instead disbanded under existing mechanics by a player who was unhappy with his place in the alliance. If CVA is restored, and it's because an account was hacked, I say good job CCP.

That being said, can someone, anyone really start really pushing CCP to fix this problem(the ease in which an alliance is disbanded)? It's not wrong to use the mechanics as they are currently, but god they're broken.

I leave you with this update from RIGHT NOW:

Boppi - CCP has reacted to CVAs petition, the official answer is in their internal forums.

CVA will be restored before downtime.

Hardin- While this is what we have been led to believe it would be unwise of us (or anyone) to count any chickens at this stage.

Whether the 'restore' happens or not I would from a personal perspective like to thank everyone who has expressed their support either in these forums, other forums or in game. It is sometimes hard to be enthused about RPing 'Amarrian space police' particularly when confronted with a never ending stream of diplomatic headaches and whinage, so it is really cool to see that some people actually appreciate what CVA has tried to build in Provi (even if from our perspective some of it is for the wrong reasons - 'you are good target practice'

Anyway, while I know this is CAOD (and as such this is kind of a stupid request), I would suggest people dial down the speculation for a bit. We will make another statement when we are 100% sure on what has happened and what CCP is (or isnt) doing to correct things.

Thanks.

Not gonna lie, they ARE good target practice.


Update: CVA is indeed restored. Kudos to CCP.

Look at a Star

Stay free, where no walls divide you
You're free as the roaring tide
So there's no need to hide
Matt Monro - Born Free

I don't know why, but I'm having trouble writing lately. My dad used to call it feeling "out of pocket,". Still not sure what in the hell that means, but I think my problem is focus. I'm doing a lot of killing these days, you know? I sometimes wonder if there's some peace in dying for those people. The fear melts away like snow on an outstretched hand.

You know that fear right? You're flying through space in your ship, expensive or no. You want to get somewhere. You want to do something. You want to live. Down I swoop, down my friends come. You're stuck, there's nothing to do. We peel away the rinds, shields, armor, structure. We're just trying to get you out of there, but you don't want to come out.

Away your consciousness goes into some forgotten clone far away. You sputter some curse as you climb out of the vats. But the fear's gone. It's uncomfortable as hell, but at least you're safe. I'm gone.

Far away again, I reach out to someone, and I'm not even sure of what I want to find.

But it's fucking cold out here.

Spoken Of

I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.
Robert Oppenheimer

When I was seven years old, my mother went to work for this Jovian Librarian on New Caldari Prime. I went to work with her a lot, and that man was full of stories. He'd talk about history, he'd tell me fairy tales. Sometimes he'd talk about space, and the joys of flying in it.

Now I'd seen the holo's. And I though it was something I might want to do. After a few weeks of his stories I was sold. As soon as I was old enough, I enlisted in the Military, and I was one of the lucky ones. I was a capsuleer, and the holo's had prepared me. Money, Fame, Power... Only it wasn't like that. You grow up and it's not like that.

I've been a capsuleer for years, I've got no fear of death. I'm rich beyond imagining. My name is feared. I am a capsuleer, a god among men. I'm exactly where I wanted to be when I was a child and looked from my home world to the stars.

It's funny though, I pass by planets all the time. Some of them are as populated as New Caldari was, but I never give them a second glance. Concord put all these rules on us with regards to what we can do planet side. I prefer stations and ships.

Then a couple of days ago, I saw this news story on the Scope. Apparently Concord is rescinding the ban on Capsuleer run Planetary Governments. There was a lot of talk after the announcement from the news people about the possible impact of such a change. Alliance warfare. Faction warfare. War. Everyone's going to be fighting for a piece of the pie, and millions of people will be caught between us and what we want.

It reminded me of a fairy tale that old Jovian librarian told me once. There was this king and a god. and the god transformed into his true form to convince the king to do what he wanted. The god sprouted extra arms and grew tall. In each of his hands were instruments of war. The god looked down at the man and said, "Now I am become death, destroyer of worlds,"

I also recorded an audio version.

Back at Work and a Discussion

Our integrity sells for so little, but it is all we really have. It is the very last inch of us, but within that inch, we are free.
Valerie - V for Vendetta

And so I'm back at work. I'm hoping to put my blog back on a regular schedule(Monday, Tuesdays and Fridays again).

I've joined Noir., a mercenary corp of some renown. It should be a fun ride.

As for you dear reader, I would like to ask you for a bit of help. I'd like to start a discussion on this blog on the morality of piracy in Eve. State your opinions, reply to others or just rant a bit, I'm curious as to what everyone thinks. I'll be using the discussion in a project I'm working on. Don't disappoint me.

Good Day.

Let The Glory Out

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.
Maya Angelou - Still I Rise

I imagine the replying comm chatter was pretty calm at this point.

"Just point him and try to kill him, he's been doing this all day. He'll make it to the gate and go through."

_____________________________

I really had been doing it all day. GIS started the shenanigans with a couple of ships sitting on our station. A Nightmare and a Drake. Ships with tanks that could easily hold up until the cavalry arrived. We refused to engage them, but I decided to try some shenanigans of my own.

I darted through the Arnher gate, saw a GIS gate camp on the other side and warped away. None of them were small enough ships to point me, and I counted that as a good thing. I then followed through to Egmar when I spotted a new unaffiliated gate camp. Some corp named Shrodingers Question was camping the Egmar side of the Egmar/Arnher gate.

I almost felt like throwing out a warning, but decided against it. It probably didn't matter, they must've figured I was a part of the GIS squad, because they jumped through when I uncloaked. They continued on into the meat grinder at the other gate, and both sides lost a couple of ships. The engagement was short and to the point.

I warped back to the gate and into Arnher and started to play games. I initially wasn't willing to chance reapproaching on the heavily camped side, but the other side had only an Ishtar. The thing could easily kill me, but not before I made it back to the gate. So I started to see-saw back and forth. Each time they locked me and fired. After about twenty minutes they brought in two interceptors, so I began to reapproach instead of warping on that side as well.

After about thirty minutes I started to hear murmering of tech two frigates camping the Egmar/Arnher gate. I had a funny thought.

I headed to the other gate, and started to repeat my insanity. No one came to the aid of the two frigates on the other side, they'd point me, I'd go through. A couple of our guys got into place on their own, and finally I changed my plans.

I reapproached the gate again, the Crusader and Ishkur approached me at high speed. They hoped to hit a double web I suppose, but this time I approached the Crusader as well and activated a scram and web of my own. RodneyStar began to warp to me. He landed and piled on the damage.

I know the Crusader pilot is screaming to his mates camping the other gate, his mates in space, his mates docked up in system, and his mates in Evati to help him.

I imagine the replying comm chatter was pretty calm at this point.

"Just point him and try to kill him, he's been doing this all day. He'll make it to the gate and go through."

For a few long seconds, no one showed up. I kept applying damage as long as I could. Finally I died. I warped my pod away and did my best to remain silent as I eagerly awaited an update from Rodney.

"Crusader is down, I'm burning away from the Ishkur," Short and oh so sweet, and followed quickly by "I made it, but a huge fleet landed just as I warped away,"

I laughed, alot. I warped my pod back through the gate, both gatecamps in fact. I docked up and stared at a new Rifter with a smug smile on my face.

Under the nose of over twenty GIS and ComStar pilots, in their own system, we traded a Rifter for a Crusader. I call that a win.

Good Day.

April Fools

And I don't want the world to see me
Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am
Goo Goo Dolls - Iris

I set up a base in some rather unpopulated 0.0. I'm not going to quit the game or stop posting here, but I'm done with PvP apparently.

I'll be ratting up my sec status and writing here in the mean time. My apologies to most of my readership who come here for the piratey stories.

On to a little bit of actual content. CCP's apparently working on rebalancing ECM and Stealth Bombers.

Falcon Discussion.

Stealth Bomber Discussion.

See you guys on Friday.

Super-Special-Awesome

Whose eyes am I behind
I don’t recognize anything that I see
Whose skin is this design
I don’t want this to be the way that you see me

I don’t understand anything anymore
And this web that I’m tied up
Is taking me right up these walls
That I climb up
To get to your story
It’s anything but ordinary
Train - Ordinary

I don't intend to be average. I never have and never will. The recent updates to Eve have been alot of fun for me. There's always a downside to things. For me that's graphical.

I'm still not sure why they need to do anything special to "support" low end graphics. Give me an option to turn textures off, give me an option to show nothing but the basic rendering of objects in space. It's in there, underneath the fancy textures, right?

Long story short, I'm nothing but an ordinary pilot right now, and it stinks. I lag on entry to belts, I lag anytime I undock, I lag anytime a new system loads, I lag sometimes just when bringing up new menus. Not a little bit of lag, like a couple of seconds, but thirty seconds to a minute. Group work is fine, but I can't solo anymore. There's a distinct possibility that if things don't change, and quickly, that I'll be ratting up my security status and going back to high security space.

I'm taking a semi-sorta break from Eve right now(doing mostly PvE stuff if anything). Hopefully my frustration subsides. In the mean time, you'll still get regular updates from me.

Good Day.

The Girls Are Pretty

Rags to riches or so they say
Ya gotta-keep pushin'
for the fortune and fame
It's all a gamble
When it's just a game
Ya treat it like a capital crime
Everybody's doin' their time
Guns 'n Roses - Paradise City

What is it about Evati that's so appealing to me? Kaalikoata is such a boring station. Standard Caldari architecture. We've got the Hub, and I've got the By Jove there, but bars don't make the place a home.

I've lived alot of places in my time as a Capusleer. I've lived in the heart of Heimatar, near Rens. I've lived near Jita. I've lived out in Vitrauze, in Gusandall, even spent a bit of time populating Amamake. No where have I had as much fun as I've had in Evati.

The Bastards live there, but that isn't it. It's just... I just can't put my finger on it.

I guess I'll just have to go ask the Hellcats, maybe they can come up with something.

We Were Free

When you get to where you wanna go
And you know the things you wanna know
You're smiling
When you said what you wanna say
And you know the way you wanna play
You'll be so high you'll be flying
She's the One - World Party

Are you having fun?

The roam. It's an integral part of not being bored out of your mind in Eve as a pirate. You pick a destination and just kinda start going there. There's never much of a goal in your mind except to have fun. Well, that's if you want to have fun.

There are actually quite a few different kinds of roams, depending on how your Fleet Commander likes to run things.

Most roams start with a bunch of ships in one system, and send a ship ahead one system to scout out targets and get initial tackle. Once the scout has a target nailed down, the rest of you jump in and the target gets to panic as he tries vainly to kill the dogged Rifter that's keeping a point on him. Your fleet comes down around him and suddenly he's ready to die, or not. Sometimes they fight back hard, get their own backup or run like hell.

Sometimes a roam just takes you somewhere that no matter what numbers you bring, you're bound to get some action. "Set course for Amamake," and fly. Kill until you're full of loot or you're dead, and go home. Rinse, lather repeat. Simple stuff.

But there are different strategies for battlship roams, battlecruiser roams, and frigate roams. Tech one cruiser roams are different from Heavy Assault Cruiser roams by several miles.

If you want to make sure everyone has fun, you'll want to learn your fleet commander, and learn what he wants. Learn what strategies he uses and adapt to do them before he has to ask. If he wants more ECM boats, and you want to fly with him, train up ECM. If he likes frigates, keep working on that. But if you're not having fun regularly on these things, drop the FC like a bad habit.

If you are the FC don't take yourself too seriously. Enjoying yourself is the easiest way to make sure people come along next time. Those serious minded types that pay for this game so they can work will stay behind next time.

Most of all, try to enjoy yourself.

Good Day.

Holey Crap

In a way, I need a change
From this burnout scene
Another time, another town
Another everything
But it’s always back to you
Of A Revolution - Shattered

Apocrypha is out, and I'm still able to play. That's a win.

You guys're going to notice(hopefully) a much more regular updating schedule from me. Monday's, Tuesdays, and Fridays. Like today, the between days will be on and off. Sometimes you'll see one and sometimes you won't.

I spent most of today and yesterday probing. After an initial bit of frustration I found it extremely easy. Those of you with poor spacial reasoning will have just as much trouble with it as you do with scanning. It's not that big a deal.

Killed some Sleepers inside a wormhole in my Caracal solo. There is easily soloable content in there, but these guys do hit damn hard.

Next week I'll go into a bit more detail on my experiences.

Oh, and this is my 100th post. Go me.

Good Day.

Do Overs

Steady hands, just take the wheel...
Every glance is killing me,
Time to make one last appeal ,
For the life I lead.

Stop and stare,
I think I'm moving but I go nowhere,
Yeah I know that everyone gets scared,
But I've become what I can't be.

Stop and stare,
You start to wonder why you're here not there,
And you'd give anything to get what's fair,
But fair ain't what you really need,
Oh, can you see what I see.
One Republic - Stop and Stare

The cloning companies tell you that you don't die. I'm not so sure about that. I mean, if anything we just die more than the average person. I don't know if non-capsuleers can understand.

How do you get used to the terror? There's something ingrained in each of our brains that says when you're dying to do everything in your power to stop it. The one time I've lost a clone, I was struggling inside my grave for twenty seconds before it finally popped.

The pod itself kills you, ironically enough. As soon as the hull of the capsule is breached for any reason it copies your brain and transmits it to the new clone. Design wise it makes sense, but it doesn't alleviate the fear you feel every time you drop down and jack in.

So what does that mean to you? A lot of capsuleers tell me that their biggest worry is the price of the implants in their heads. I've known people to lose a billion or more with their bodies.

I know I might die every time I fly, but if you're not prepared to lose your life, you're not prepared to be a pod pilot.

I suppose that's something they looked for when they did my training.

What I do know is that the threat of death didn't stop me from solo tackling a Vagabond until my friends could arrive to take it down.

It also didn't stop me from coming to the aid of another crazy corpmate who tackled a Hurricane alone in his Rifter, with my Rifter as his nearest backup. I'm glad I went.

So I guess what I'm saying is, if they tested me for it, I passed.

Pass the Ammunition

This guy's walking down the street when he falls in a hole. The walls are so steep he can't get out.

A doctor passes by and the guy shouts up, "Hey you. Can you help me out?" The doctor writes a prescription, throws it down in the hole and moves on.

"Then a priest comes along and the guy shouts up, 'Father, I'm down in this hole can you help me out?' The priest writes out a prayer, throws it down in the hole and moves on.

"Then a friend walks by, 'Hey, Joe, it's me can you help me out?' And the friend jumps in the hole. Our guy says, 'Are you stupid? Now we're both down here.' The friend says, 'Yeah, but I've been down here before and I know the way out.'"

Leo Thomas McGarry - The West Wing

We live by the gun. Those we trust, those we respect, our friends, and our corpmates all lead us inevitably from death to life. Sometimes all four are the same person, sometimes not.

What makes us band together and fight?

On the 16th of April, 1746, on the moors of Culloden, seven thousand Scottish Highlanders threw aside their kilts and charged straight into the cannon and musket fire of waiting British troops. There was no question in their mind, they fought alongside their friends and brethren for their way of life.

You follow your orders, because you trusted your leaders the moment you joined the gang.

Between August and September 480 BC, three hundred Spartans held off two hundred thousand to two million Persian troops. Were any of them questioning their leadership as the battle was joined?

You trust the man next to you, and when he needs help you do whatever you can.

Twenty riflemen were ambushed in the Solomons by a machine gun nest on July 31st 1943. Roger Young crawled on his stomach towards the machine gun nest and threw grenades until he was killed. He did what he could to save his squadmates. They survived and he did not. He didn't care.

I fly with some of the best and brightest Eve has to offer. I know they have my back, every time. I know they're on their way, every time. I know I can trust them every time.

And every time I fleet up with a Bastard or a Hellcat I'm proud and honored. I've chosen to only fly with people I trust.

Who do you fly with?

This Is Where We Fight.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley'd & thunder'd;
Storm'd at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell.
Alfred Tennyson- The Charge Of The Light Brigade

My name is Hallan Turrek.

There are people out there that think I'm just a number. They think I'm just a nuisance. They think if they throw some resources at me I'll go away. I won't cost them anything, just redistribute a bit of force and out I'll go. X force applied at Y time for Z result. To them I'm just a number.

A bit ago, a group of Mercenaries moved into Egmar. They didn't talk, they didn't care, they just started killing things. Lots of things. Things we wanted to kill. We avoided them like the plague and operated normally, because we knew who they were.

They'd bait with unaffiliated pilots and bring twenty man gangs down on a single cruiser. They started to camp the Egmar gate in multiple sensor boosted Interceptors. There started to be a Falcon around every corner. To them, we were just a number. Another small bump in the road to them getting what they wanted. Finally we'd had enough.

Concord has sanctioned our war against them. With every advantage they stack the deck with, it's nice to take away a few. Gateguns won't shoot us if we attack them. We can camp them into stations. We can show them what a few good pilots can do, and beat the hordes back.

If we're going to be a number we can be the number of ships they've lost, the total cash they've had to spend to eradicate us. The truth though, is that we're anything but a number.

My name is Hallan Turrek, and we're the fucking Bastards.

Get used to it.

Trouble Can't Find Me

We're going off tonight,
To kick out every light,
To get anything that we want,
To drink everything in sight,
We're going till the world stops turning,
While we burn it to the ground tonight.
Nickelback - Burn It To The Ground

Space is a vast expanse of nothingness, with little specks of death scattered throughout it.

The Caldari, Gallente, Amarr, and Minmatar each control a swath of space near the central portion of the galaxy map. There are two areas of space closely associated with the Amarr empire, the Khanid Empire and Ammatar Mandate.

The Caldari and Gallente came back from the brink of extinction in the same solar system. They worked together to reach the stars, then went their separate ways in a war that brought unbelievable death and destruction. Caldari Prime was given to the Gallente in return for peace. The current war involves the retaking and occupation of Caldari Prime. Both empires see it as their planet and will kill for it.

The Khanid Empire formed before the Minmatar rebelled. It was a somewhat peaceful secession and the Amarr and Khanid still work together in trade.

The Minmatar had an extremly developed culture and in many ways surpassed the other empires in technology when they were found and subjugated by the Amarr. Over the centuries, the Amarr broke down the Minmatar and turned them into slaves.

When the Amarr met the Gallente for the first time, they'd met their match for the first time in their history. They wisely avoided conflict, but when the Amarr learned of the existence of the Jovians, they felt it was their duty to bring them under their empire. One ill fated military campaign later, and while the Amarr bled, the Minmatar rose up and fought for their freedom. Supported by the Gallente, the Minmatar eventually created an empire of their own. They are in constant conflict with the Amarr.

The Ammatar Mandate is simply sovereign space granted as a reward to those Minmatar that remained loyal to the Amarr. It is economically defunct.

The Jovian empire control an area of space out in nullsec that is currently unreachable. There are thankfully no conflicts in Jove space. The Jovian's gave the rest of the galaxy cloning technology and capusleer technology. It's speculated that the Jovian's never actually experienced any crash after the Eve Gate closed. It's also surmised that their culture has directly evolved from whatever colony they were before that event.

The Angel Cartel, Guristas Pirates, Serpentis Corp, Sansha's Nation, The Blood Raiders, and The Thukker Trive all control a somewhat smaller amount of space in nullsec as well.

Each criminal enterprise also has an established presence in each of the empires, killing, stealing and carving out a place to live.

There are twenty two alliances with enough power in nullsec to control an entire constellation. Some of these, like Band of Brothers, Goonswarm, or Tau Ceti Federation control such large portions of space that they rival the empires in size. These huge Alliances fight back and forth. Sometimes thousands of capsuleers fight for just one system.

Smaller groups (sometimes just a single corporation) control certain (sometimes just one) systems, or at least attempt to extend their control. Sometimes the fights are small, but sometimes they are almost as large as the Alliance and Empire battles.

But despite the fact that this Galaxy is in effect a giant meat grinder - I went on a roam tonight and couldn't find a thing to kill.

Goddamnit.

OOC: Updates #1

Been walking my mind to an easy time,
My back turned towards the sun,
Lord knows when the cold wind blows it'll turn your head around,
Well, there's hours of time on the telephone line,
To talk about things to come,
Sweet dreams and flying machines in pieces on the ground.
James Taylor - Fire and Rain

Thinking I need a consistent name for these informational updates, so there you go. Creative, I know.

Lets start with the latest showing by the Bastards in the alliance tournament.



As you can see, a severe case of rock, paper, scissors. Rock doesn't beat paper apparently. With that loss, we're out of the tourney, but I think the Bastards did a wonderful job and have got a bit of experience under their belts for next year. Be afraid.

Next up? I made it into the blog pack. That's a collection of blogs that meet a certain criteria of quality and updates. If you look under the "I Recommend" links, there's a new section called "Eve Blog Pack" that'll keep you updated.

Which probably brings you to wonder about the "I Recommend" bit. I changed the link listing up a bit and included on it are all of the blogs I personally read on a regular basis. The criteria for "me reading it" is this: It's primarily eve based, it's good, and I like it. I remove any blog that takes more than two weeks to update. It'll show the last update time, and give you the name of the latest update. I think the list is a good one. It's how I navigate blogs really, just load up my own and check for updates there. It's how you can do it too. Come here. Heh.

I'm back at work as well, so my time to blog and play are going to be a bit less. I don't think I'll break from my every two days average, but it's possible.

On the horizon, but far enough off that I'm not sticking myself into a corner, I plan to get a directional scanning guide done. I also have a podcast concept that's been banging around in my head for a couple of months. I'm getting to the point where I think I'll just make due with a sub-par microphone and do it anyhow.

Oh, and Killswitch will be continuing on, despite my vacating Guristas space ingame. I've got enough information to continue a story. Still annoyed I didn't get my faction higher. You can keep up with that story on the right, between the followers and the blog archive.

One last thing, follow this blog. If you read this regularly let me know by clicking the follow button. It'll put me in a good mood, I promise.

See ya in space.

The Horror

You don't understand. I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am.
Marlon Brando - On The Waterfront

Why in the hell do you care? Is there something you're not sharing? Something about your ship, your implants, or your statistics that's important to you?

Give it up.

I don't understand people who don't just live in low-sec, but make their living there and are afraid to die. What in the hell is wrong with you? Did you miss the memo about being a pirate? You don't have to care.

I go on roams with people that refuse to engage, I hear people talk about how they don't wanna lose their ships. Those of you that talk like that, think like that, or work like that are idiots. You forget yourselves.

What do you hope to achieve? You fly with pirates, you give the finger to the law. You laugh in the face of danger. You achieve greatness.

I swear to you, that isn't going to happen while you are cowering inside a station, no matter how expensive your ship is.

Put away your insecurities, put away your fears, put away your misguided notions of profit, put away everything. Become primal. There are primordial instincts. Bring that to the table. You can be that person. Know where you are. Know where they are. Use all your skills.

If money is an issue, fly only what you can afford to lose. When it's all said and done, just have fun.

Glory follows.

Hard to Capture

Homicide's illegal and death is the penalty
What justifies the homicide, when he dies?
In his own iniquity
Wu Tang Clan - Da Mystery of Chessboxin'

I've been pirating for months now, and I've come to a conclusion: I like to kill people. I know I've gone into detail on this before but it's more true than I let on. I really enjoy sending people back to the clone vats. I really enjoy making a ship explode. My first reaction upon jumping a target is not to ask for a ransom, it's to kill them.

This can be problematic for a pirate. It comes with the territory that I should be ransoming people. Getting folks to give me money to go free. I've had a couple of successful ransoms. Nothing spectacular. Maybe forty million total, including group work. We killed a drake today, then we podded the guy. We asked for a ransom and he didn't answer. Turned out he had nice implants in that clone. Sucks to be him.

I don't know why, but I seem to attract kills from people who just won't pay me. Sometimes they won't even talk to me. They probably think they're doing their friends a favor, making themselves less of a target next time. Making me less likely to attack them or their buds in the future. They fail to understand a very important point. I like killing people.

Over the last couple of weeks I've turned my first profit as a pirate. I'm up about a hundred million now compared to a couple of weeks ago. I'm pretty happy about that. Profit in piracy can be an elusive thing. A lot of folks have alternate methods of cash generation. I have one at my disposal right now, in that I can find hidden computer systems. The various pirate factions have alot of hidden bases out there.

The one site I did with a partner yielded about fifty million. Twenty five of that went to me, and has helped me on the way to sustainability. Hopefully this is the solution I've been searching for.

I dunno if piracy will remain a profitable venture for me, but I do know this:

I love my job.

Good Day.

Lead Your Shots

I want to glide down over Mulholland

I want to write her name in the sky
I'm gonna freefall out into nothing
Gonna leave this world for a while
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers - Freefalling

So tonight I had quite an adventure trying to track a friend down and do someone a favor. Lets cover how it all began.

First I decided to head out to Vitrauze to sell off my belongings there. The ten million I made will be of much use to me elsewhere. After docking I went to check out a bar in the Federal Navy Academy. There was a particular waitress, who of course wasn't there tonight, who I'd been wanting to see again. She found me.

A ragged shell of a girl came up to me in that dingy bar and asked me if I could track someone down. She looked so helpless that I found it hard to refuse. I got her cleaned up, fed, and welcomed her aboard my ship. It was a mistake and wasted my time, but I'd do it again.

The person I was looking for was actually a friend of mine. She operated out of Evati just the same as I did, but was on a holiday. I had to find her.

Her last communication was from Dead End, and I figured that'd be a good place to start. Upon arriving there I found no trace of her, and moved back towards Vitrauze. As I did, a bit of intel came filtering in. A place out in null-sec called C9N-GC. I've barely ever ventured into null-sec, but I was determined not to dissapoint the girl that was surely pacing my ship at that very moment. Until a few jumps in, it was a fairly uneventful passage. Then instead of dropping out of warp at the gate, I was fifteen clicks away. I kicked on my microwarp drive and was jumping out as a single volley smashed into my shields. The ship barely rocked.

I passed by some Smuggler Gates along the way. They're of interesting design.

The remainder of the trip was completly uneventful until I arrived in C9N-GC. The system was completely deserted, and I keyed up a bit more info. In fifty jumps it had taken me to arrive she'd moved back to Evati. I cursed but discovered the wreck of a titan in system. I visited it.




In AZN-DZ, which was an unavoidable obstacle on my trip home, I noted a larger number of kills and pilots on the galaxy traffic maps. When I warped in, I discovered a huge camp on the gate I needed to travel through. I cloaked up and waited. Shortly the fleet moved, and I passed through. It was a simple waiting game. The path was clear for the rest of my trip back to Evati until the final piece of null-sec.

As I came out of warp on the Paala gate in LXQZ-T, I was almost seventy kilometers from the gate. I kicked on the microwarp drive and burned hard for the gate. A Manticore and Crow locked me and managed to place a warp disruptor on me. From what I understand these folks are more used to people cloaking when they run into trouble, and were probably better prepared for that instance. I was burning over thirty-five hundred meters a second towards the gate and actually jumped out just as their first volley passed through where my ship would've been and smacked off the gate. They were likely angry as my lowly rifter ran their gamut.

The trip back to Evati was alot more subdued and finally I was docked. I told the girl to go on her way, that she could find my friend in that station any time now. She thanked me and walked away.

A hundred and twenty jumps to end up back where I started.

Good day.