The Turtle Beats the Rabbits

Past few days have been for the most part uneventful. I think the most entertainment I had was flying my cov-ops 30 jumps through 0.0 to meet up with a corp mate. He was wanting to get his Dominix class battleship out of the w-system...but the only exit they were finding was deep in AAA territory. So I hopped in the trusty frigate, Dare U2 Blink, and headed out. It was around 65 jumps from my nearest clone and again, roughly 30 of that through nullsec. I had no problems getting to him and fortunately, most of the trip was quiet. We really had no confrontations up until the last system, HED-GP. This is the last 0.0 system in the Catch region before you jump straight into high security space in the Khanid region. As expected, it was a very busy, and very heavily camped system.

My corpmate however was already feeling a bit frisky. He was bored out of his mind in the w-system and really wanted out so it had been either pod himself, make a suicide run through nullsec in his battleship, or chance the possibility of actually making it all the way to empire with me scouting. Given he'd almost gone with one of the first two choices, he didn't really care too much if he lost his ship. And then again, he was given the nickname "Leroy" by the corp directors....

Anyway...jumping into HED, I initially saw a Crow interceptor as well as a Rook on my overview. Fortunately, the bubble nearby was set up to snare anybody that escaped the camp at the high sec gate, so I was well out of its reach. I shoved the ships engines into gear and hit the cloak before aligning to a planet and punching the warp to 0 button. Not the smartest thing I realize but I was in a jump clone, in a ship I'd bought with full expectation of losing and little care for my own life. As I exited warp at the planet, I was a tad shocked to see I'd landed right at the edge of another warp bubble. These guys certainly weren't playing any games! It's fortunate my cloak held, because it was only a second after I exited warp, the crow exited about 4km off my starboard. Seems I'd aligned perhaps a bit too soon and given away my direction. Ah well. I burned away from the bubble and warped back to the safe spot I'd created immediately after entering warp from the gate.

From this point, it became a waiting game. For some time, my corp mate sat in the emptiness of space at his own safe spot a short distance away from the gate in the other system. In the meantime, I spammed the scanner, keeping an eye on any ships coming and going at the gate from my side. The system was fairly small so it hadn't taken me long to realize the situation we were in.

Sitting at the gate to high sec were about 20 interceptors and a handful of slightly heavier hitters. This was going to be difficult. Trying to get a battleship through the gate and into warp before the interceptors could arrive and lock him down....oye vay! The timing had to be just right. Believe it or not that moment came when I believe someone else somehow got past their camp and they'd all rushed to the gate I was sitting near to, hoping to catch their prey. Whether they killed it or not I don't know or if that wasn't the case, why they'd come rushing to the gate in the first place I just don't know. Either way, they all lingered at the gate for a bit before they finally one by one went back to their original camp. At this point, all I could pick up on my own scanner was the Rook and one interceptor towards the direction of the gate. This time, I decided to move in for a closer look and warped in to the gate at 100km cloaked. Surprisingly, all that was actually there was the rook! The interceptor must be sitting just off grid somewhere....but it appeared to be just the window we needed.

Quickly, I punched the comm button and ordered my mate into action. "Go! Now! Now! Now," I nearly screamed into the comm, knowing this might be his best chance. Within moments he was jumping in, immediately breaking gate cloak to align for a warp out. Of course, only a moment after his arrival, the interceptor appeared but he was too far and too late. Before it could get a scram on him, my mate was in warp, his ship disappearing into the distance. The interceptor immediately gave chase and I don't know how my corp mate did it but after going to a planet himself, he was able to turn his ship about and get back into warp barely half a second before the interceptor landed at his location.

So with nerves still on fire, I took a moment to calm myself and him as well before making my way to the exit gate for part two. It seemed luck was still on our side though. Amongst all the wreckage the interceptor wolf pack had created (and believe me there was a lot of it), not a single warp bubble was still in place. To top it all off, the pack of interceptors had moved off for some reason or other, leaving the entire gate clear! Once again, I urged my companion into warp and within moments he landed at the gate, quickly activating it and with a poof of light, he was free.

So....strike one up for good scouting on my part, good reaction time on my battleship flying corp mate, a little bit of luck or.... well...possibly just some horrible AAA interceptor pilots.

-ML-

Empty Space

Throughout the past week or two, my corpmates who have already made the move to this wormhole system and been mining the gas clouds as well as asteroid belts have begun to take notice of what they began to think a potential problem. As time went on, and they continued to mine out the various sites found via probing, the amount of "dots" found with the probes were lessening. Blame it on a lack of forethought on our part as well as the simple fact none of us really pay much attention to the forum discussions, we never really considered that a w-system could depleted of all it's resources. It was simply assumed that more would be consistently found with each day's passing.

It seems however, we were wrong.

I don't have the link at the current moment while I write this but a discussion was brought up in the forum by a member of another corporation who stated the same thing we were just beginning to discover. Just like the mechanics of the exploration sites in k-space, once the harvestable sites in a system have been depleted, that's it. There is no more. At least not until they, by chance, cycle back around to our system after they've been depleted elsewhere in another w-space system. Given the number of w-systems, and ultimately, the true lack of people willing to venture into systems of the same class as the one we're currently in, I think it's acceptable to say that we may have and been fighting for what will soon be in essence, an empty pocket of w-space.

So we're starting to contemplate the question, "What do we do now?" Do we maintain our POS in this system and simply use it as a base of operations for the other endeavors we intended to use the system for? Do we maintain the POS and harvest any other w-systems that randomly link up to our own? (Which by the way does seem to happen quite regularly in this system. In fact, one of our latest exits involved probing/traveling through 2 other w-systems just to get back to k-space.) Do we pack up, leave and give up on the whole w-space harvesting and instead return to our previous medial tasks of mission running and high sec mining? Or do we gather together the isk we've made from this initial endeavor and invest it in the ships and gear to become basically a roaming nomadic corporation. Moving from one w-system to the next, depleting the resources as we go.

In theory, this last option is a very good possibility. We have the capabilities, equipment and means to make this possible, it's just a question of should we. In fact, I'd be curious to know what other people's thoughts are on what it would take to become such a corporation.

At present, my corporation currently maintains a few carriers, a few Orcas, and a Rorqual as well as having the ability to utilize dreadnoughts, though I don't believe we own any at present as we've never seen the need for them....and I doubt will ever see the need for it in w-space. So with those ships and the necessary support vessels in mind, I think it's feasibly possible. The most difficult aspect would be getting the harvested materials out of the wormhole as we would have no real loading platform to dump all the stuff in a freighter with us. However, I'm still learning about the capabilities of cap ships so feel free to correct me on anything I say here. The other larger aspect would be having these ships in a null security space with little in the way of protection. There would be no POS shield for the Rorqual or Orcas to hide behind when faced with venturous pirates. We could theoretically bring a small POS tower along with us as we go, but the time it takes to set up and break down might nullify the logistical use of such a venture.

So with that in mind, it does seem to be perhaps a lot of effort....nearly too much. But such a critic would have to take into account the amount of isk that can be made from one good quality system such as the one we've nearly depleted. I mean, seriously, I'm talking in the billions here. However, other systems may only net perhaps a couple hundred mil.

Some other people would argue, "the risk is too great versus the rewards." I can't disagree on that more. Though "smarter", these sleepers are still just "rats". They're not invincible. It just takes the right setups and the right tactics as it would with any other mission targets offered by the numerous agents out there. It's just a bit different than what most have become accustomed to after so many years of dealing with the same crap over and over again. Basically, it's the PVE'ers turn to adapt or die.

So anyways, as we come close to the end of all harvestable resources within the w-system, our time to make a decision comes nearer as well. Being the low man on the totem pole, I really can only wait and see.

-ML-

Politics and War

In light of the war my corporation is undergoing over the wormhole system and the continuously ongoing war between the nullsec alliances, the empire faction wars and any other current corporate wars in Eve, at any given time, one can't help but think about the political arena that surrounds the Eve universe.

I've always been one that takes little interest in politics. The aspect of coalitions, alliances, and such were never something I thought I'd be all that interested in when I first became a pod pilot. All I wanted to do was make lots of isk and blow stuff up. As long as there was a place for me to do that, I thought I would be content to just live my life out in Eve, caring little for what transpired beyond my own personal concerns. For the first few months, I was completely naive to just how much politics plays a role in Eve. However, that mentality at some nonspecific point, did a complete 180.

I've now realized that in Eve, there really is no real possibility of ignoring politics. Even if you make no attempt to be actively involved in such things, it will eventually force you to be so. I suppose one way to avoid such things is by staying within the empire corporations, never joining one of the hundreds of independent corporations that attempt to stake there claim in the universe but the possibility of truly getting ahead in anything will be seriously hindered. It's almost a necessity to become involved if one is wanting to survive and thrive in this universe.

Since my "enlightenment", I've begun to take more and more notice in what's happening beyond the borders of empire space. The battles over sovereignty in nullsec, the espionage and corporate infiltrations, all the offensive and defensive moves on the chessboard....it's all really begun to intrigue me to no end. My corporation at one point talked about eventually staking their own claim in nullsec. Whether it be aligning with one of the major alliances or attempting to make our own name was still in the air of unsureties but it was a goal either way. Now, with the appearance of wormholes and the possibility of basically "owning" a wormhole system, the corporate directives have changed.

So why am I bringing this up? Well to be honest, this wormhole move has left me wondering. Is this something I really want to get involved in? Is this the direction where I want my career in Eve to go? For awhile now, from when I first really started getting interested in nullsec politics, I started to sort of dream of getting involved. I figured best method was to find a good corporation that would eventually make the move as a whole to nullsec and find myself riding along with, ready and willing to join in on the action and entertainment.

My first corporation was, and forgive me for saying this to any that read this and were in it, but we were a complete noob corporation. Every single one of us, from the CEO and down, were fresh out of the academy. We knew little about what it took to make a good, strong corporation and were far from having the resources to do it. So we joined an alliance. At first I thought this was great but as time went on, I began to see the holes the alliance had, the too soft mentality, and the lack of real skill in combat ops. And then some events happened from which the alliance started falling apart. By then, if you've followed my writings, I had become the XO of my corporation which put me in a better position to see just how things were working....and it was then I realized they weren't working at all. So when a fellow alliance mate told me of another corporation he was intending to join and what they offered, what their abilities were and all....well..I was quick to hop on the bus and join up.

So now I'm in my second real corporation and things have been great. We were growing steadily, were running numerous ops that would impress most empire based corporations, and showed a lot of promise for what I was beginning to make my ultimate goal. Living in nullsec. However, the appearance of wormholes changed all that.

In a few ways, w-space isn't all that different than nullsec. There is no Concord. There is lots of minerals and gases to be harvested with big rats to go up against. Though there is no actual sovereignty by the books, corporations and alliances can still basically stake their claim. Take for instance my current corporation who has placed a POS at nearly every moon in system (excluding of course the moon where our intruding POS owners set up at). We have in essence, secured the system as our own and have the ability to maintain that. Only thing lacking is some sort of beacon or something to make that aspect known to any who randomly venture in.

The question is, is this what I really want? Do I really want to live in a place that is essentially cut off from the rest of Eve? A place where, once the intruders are eradicated, there will likely be no politics, no real war, little chance of ever experiencing the grand, epic battles between capitol ships? Possibly never having the chance of seeing my first Titan? (A sight I've been craving to see since nearly day one...though hopefully not right before I die. hehe)

The other question is, if I were to decide to leave this corp, to continue on with my journey to eventually live in nullsec, at what level should I be before I consider myself ready? What level should I be before others would consider me? How do I find a corporation that is already based in nullsec without actually venturing out into their territories unannounced? A lot of people say, "check the forums." Well I don't think those people have been on the forums lately. Most of what you see is Empire corporations claiming to have 0.0 access. 0.0 access?? I don't even need to be in a corporation to "access" nullsec. And I don't want just "access". I want to live in nullsec. The other corporations I see demand you to have at least like 10mil skillpoints (which I don't have even after like 5 or 6 months of being a pod pilot) or know somebody personally from outside of the pod (aka, real life, of which i don't know anybody). So is there no place for me there yet?

For now, I'll just keep trudging on. Pulling my agent missions, hacking and salvaging the hidden sights, mining the high sec ores, maybe venture into the wormhole space my corporation has claimed and make a few iskies. But someday....hopefully sooner than later....someday the local channels of nullsec will see a new face flying around...and that face will bear the name of Mikolan Lutrova.

-ML-

Giving 'em The Squeeze

The battle over the wormhole system has been a rather quiet one. It appears there is still one other pilot, their corporate CEO, left in system and as of now, he seems fixated on remaining. Understandable I suppose since they have a fairly decent sized POS still in system. But with our continued efforts, at this point I'd say he'd be better off just cutting his losses and if able to find a way out that we haven't found already, get out...otherwise, the other, quicker method would suffice too. >:) What ships he flies is still not entirely sure as all we ever see him in is a Falcon.

I'm not sure why he doesn't just leave though. I mean, they obviously don't have any sort of substantial force to even come and aid them. They obviously are pure carebears through and through given when attacked, all they did was beg to befriend us and work together with us. With our presence in system and them not having the capability of dealing with us, as well as having the knowledge by now that we will attack them at any given chance, they have no ability to harvest any of the system's gases, asteroids, or Sleeper sites. With us constantly camping the wormholes as well, they have effectively cut off any ability for them to bring in or out goods as well. So as time goes on, we slowly pick them apart, bit by bit. And it won't be much longer before they'll be totally eradicated.

In fact, yesterday, we actually attacked the POS. It seems this intruding corporation is lacking a bit in proper POS management. Although the POS appeared to be online, not once did it shoot back at us or even target. By the end of the evening yesterday, we had destroyed a few of the web stasis towers, all the warp scramblers, and all of the missile and weapons turrets. We've already sent word to them to leave the w-system or else but as of yet had not received any word back in return. We've also noticed a number of their pilots leaving their corp. Glancing at the public sections of their forums, seems they're going through some internal corporate turmoil. Not sure exactly what's going on with that but it's obviously poor timing when they're POS is being slowly eradicated.

From this point, we're considering whether or not blast our way through the POS shield or just leave it till it runs out of fuel. Problem with waiting is that we have no idea how much fuel the damn thing has so it could be months upon months before it finally runs out. So we're considering just bringing in more cap ships to deal with it. We'll see..

So I think at this point, anybody following this might be curious as to why this system seems to be so important. I think we pretty much have all the stats on this system accounted for and will do a posting of it either later tonight or tomorrow. Let's just say that the resists and targeting systems of our ships are so unbelievably effected, with the right setups, just a few handful of battleships could easily protect this system against any force not properly prepared to come in. Yes, the sleeper's here are top of the line. We've already lost a few good ships to their immense strength. However, the rewards are phenomenal. Already the amount of goods we've harvested from this system is somewhere in the billions and it continuously replenishes itself. For instance, a few guys ran a magnometric site Saturday and from that site alone, raked in nearly one billion. (Although in the process, I believe they lost two Nighthawks. Like I said...the Sleepers here are vicious)

Oh, and yes, I am actually speaking of this from outside the wormhole. I did some thinking and came to the conclusion that I'm not really financially prepared enough yet to make the move myself. Yes, I'll be making a ton as well once I get there myself....but moving into w-space isn't the cheapest endeavor. One of those situations where it takes money to make money. For instance, I need to build a small fleet of ships to bring with me in the event of losing one here and there whether from Sleepers or from intruders. This includes all the riggings, the modules (including gas cloud harvesters which aren't cheap), and the ammo. Also need to help pay for the fuel for the jump freighter to get from Jita to wherever the wormhole entrance happens to be. So I've decided to wait a bit more before going in myself to build up my wallet and assets. Hopefully it won't take me too long.

-ML-

Is There Honor In War?

Back in 1998, I joined the United States Marine Corps where I served four years serving my country in defending it's right, freedoms, and beliefs....and well as fighting for the freedom of others (i.e., Iraq). The core values, a part of their creed, is honor, courage, and commitment. Those things are ingraned in you from the moment you put your feet on the yellow footprints when you arrive at basic training. To break any one of those three values can bring drastic punishment.

The reason I say all this is to sort of convince you that I truly know a thing or two about war. I know the tactics, the horrors, the order amongst the chaos. I know what it's like to make difficult decisions that on any other day, in any other place, you would be appalled to even consider the possibility of doing such a thing.

Let me also say that I don't give a damn what anybody says. War is war. There is no rules. There's no such thing as fighting honorably. There are certain rules of engagement, created by lofty beauricratics in there comfy little homes far from the frontlines. Far from the blood and horrors and sweat. But these rules must be abided by and so we do....but in the areas the rules don't prevent us, it's open game.

As it is in life, so it is in Eve.

Last nights events I was unfortunately not a part of as I had some business to attend to back in Solitude. My plan was not to head out to the wormhole until probably this weekend. Now I almost wish I hadn't just so I could get in on the "fun" that transpired last night. So without seeing it first hand, forgive me if I error in a few of the details.

Basically, a number of corp mates were in the process of moving gear into the wormhole space. Seems an entrance had opened up only 10 jumps away from Jita. I'd like to pause a moment here and tell you that although it was a low sec system, the low sec system connected to the high sec systems surrounding Jita. Why does that matter? Because this same wormhole space can and does open fairly regularly deep in 0.0 space. So it was an opportunity that definitly needed to be taken advantage of.

Seems our unwanted neighbors felt the same. However, it seems the intelligence level of their corporation is a bit lacking.

As we're moving gear through, a Buzzard class covert ops appears at the wormhole. It sort of catches the group unawares but with the Buzzard now in k-space, his wereabouts become a bit easier to track. Quickly the w-space team scrambles their pilots.

This isn't just any buzzard. This Buzzard just happens to be piloted by what we believe to be their strongest and most skilled prober. It was this pilot who showed up in the w-space first and this very same pilot who'd been there pretty much ever since. The possibility of him being out and about, and even better outside of the wormhole, was an opportunity that just couldn't be missed.

So quickly a cov-ops killer was thrown together along with a few other ships piloted by the various members in the wormhole space, to include a drone boat and the freighter being forced to rush back from a nearby station in k-space where he was offloading salvage and ore while loading needed supplies and gear for our w-space operation. For awhile, the pilot stayed in the k-system that contained the wormhole but after a bit, left system headed to other parts of space. From there on, it became a sort of race to see who would arrive first, the buzzard pilot in attempt to return back to the w-system or our freighter pilot.

Unfortunately, our freighter pilot was far from being ready and even once he was under way.....well....I'm sure most are aware how getting anywhere quickly, just doesn't happen in a freighter. So as expected, it was the buzzard pilot who returned first. Unfortunate for him...we we're ready. Cloaked just outside the wormhole, our scout gave the news the pilot had arrived just as he passed through the wormhole. On the other side, he found his worse nightmare.

Drones swarmed everywhere. A giant warp disruption bubble in place. And even worse, a ship yielding smart bombs. Obviously the pilot couldn't stay in one place for long as the smartbombing ship orbited the area. So far he'd remained unscathed, sitting here cloaked, but if he waited too long, the bombs might be in range.. So with little thought and like a scared rabbit, he bolted, throwing his afterburners in full gear and jamming the cloak command only to be alerted of drones within the safe 2000m distance. Like angry bees, the drones swarmed his ship and made very short work of it. And to solidify the matter, and perhaps slow any attempt at returning, we were quick to dispatch the pod as well, sending him on his merry way back to the clone vat.

*Note: At this point I'd like to make note that wormhole space seems to cause a few anomolies in the killboards. One, the KB is unable to recognize the wormhole system, thus the mail having to be changed to a known system, in this case we just chose Jita. Second, the buzzard was fitted with sisters probe launchers and a large amount of sister core probes which do not appear as it seems they are not registered in the killboards inventory and thus does not show up when viewed*

Finally the freighter arrived. It was surprisingly able to jump through the wormhole without collapsing it. Quickly the goods were offloaded, more ore and salvaged loaded up to be taken and sold and off it went. Just as expected, as it exited, the wormhole immediantly collapsed behind it. Now it was just a matter of seeing how many were still left in system...and more specifically, how many probers they had in system. And as the night played out, we've learned it might very likely be possible we have already successfully broken their operations.

About an hour had gone by when scanners picked up movement within the enemy POS. A pod was moving about though what he was up to it wasn't sure until suddenly, one of our members received a communication request. Seems the pilot was requesting assistance from one of our members to leave the w-space. Claimed he wanted no part in the affairs but was incapable of finding a way out himself. Several offers were made to him including him offlining their POS but all offers by our member were for the most part ignored. After some time had passed, it was decided that one of our pilots open a line with the stranded pilot and see if he could tempt him instead.

[ 2009.03.27 01:15:57 ] Lambda Minion > sorry
[ 2009.03.27 01:15:59 ] Promephius > hi again
[ 2009.03.27 01:16:00 ] Lambda Minion > desinc
[ 2009.03.27 01:16:14 ] Lambda Minion > desync to be right
[ 2009.03.27 01:16:37 ] Promephius > Well I have a offer......... I have a exit for you
[ 2009.03.27 01:16:55 ] Promephius > 25 million isk and Ill fleet you and get you out... if you dont mind going through low sec
[ 2009.03.27 01:17:47 ] Lambda Minion > I do not mind.
[ 2009.03.27 01:18:04 ] Promephius > you do not mind?
[ 2009.03.27 01:18:20 ] Lambda Minion > minute
[ 2009.03.27 01:18:44 ] Promephius > i feel sorry for you but it has to cost you
[ 2009.03.27 01:18:44 ] Lambda Minion > exit to tush murcone is gone?
[ 2009.03.27 01:19:07 ] Promephius > I have another exit .... I cannot tell you where
[ 2009.03.27 01:19:20 ] Lambda Minion > sure. I understand
[ 2009.03.27 01:19:34 ] Promephius > so do we have a deal?
[ 2009.03.27 01:20:04 ] Promephius > I do sympathise
[ 2009.03.27 01:20:13 ] Promephius > I think its a bit hard what my guys have done to you
[ 2009.03.27 01:20:25 ] Lambda Minion > no really
[ 2009.03.27 01:20:38 ] Lambda Minion > I understand this rush of... what?
[ 2009.03.27 01:20:48 ] Lambda Minion > money, feeling you won?
[ 2009.03.27 01:21:07 ] Promephius > if you want out of the worm hole I want isk to give you the location
[ 2009.03.27 01:21:26 ] Lambda Minion > I allready sent them
[ 2009.03.27 01:21:29 ] Lambda Minion > check
[ 2009.03.27 01:22:03 ] Promephius > one second
[ 2009.03.27 01:22:56 ] Promephius > safe to warp to me
[ 2009.03.27 01:23:07 ] Lambda Minion > 0km?
[ 2009.03.27 01:23:11 ] Promephius > yes
[ 2009.03.27 01:23:19 ] Lambda Minion > in warp

Little did this pilot realize until it was too late....but he had just voluntarily warped to our own POS. Needless to say, he didn't last long. Now, we are a so-called carebear corporation, so we couldn't be totally evil, so yes, we did provide him a way out. Via the clone vat express! Hey...Prom never said that the way out wasn't a wormhole...

Now some of you may be screaming "Foul! He paid the ransom! You give a bad name to piracy with what you did!" However, before you get your feathers ruffled too much, I want you consider a few points on this.

One, we are not pirates. We do not fly around killing anything that moves and attempting to make our isk over the loss of other's. The only time you should be concerned with our presence is if you are a neutral and we meet you in nullsec, we do live by the common NBSI rule. As for lowsec, we live by the NRDS rules of engagement unless of course engaged first.

Two, though no official war was declared, we were in essence at war with this group. Yes, they have tried to open diplomatic relations with us and attempt to get blue settings between us, but this was one particular occasion when the request was quickly denied. He knew this. I mean....come'on. We just killed one of his corp mates!

Three, if we had simply offered to show him the way out, would he have been so willing to be tricked into thinking we'd safely escort him out? By demanding payment, it was a method of getting him to believe our intentions, though harsh, were to help him leave. Yes, consideration has been made to give him back the money...but looking at his ship fittings and the stuff in his cargo hold, we're lead to believe he wasn't in any serious need of the isk. Plus the entire incident will be a good lesson for him for future endeavors.

Fourth and final point. We could not truly show him the way out. What if his intentions were of trickery as well? What if, after we showed him a pathway in and out, he relayed this to his corpmates and we would quickly find ourselves back to square one. Sure, we could have theoretically closed that one behind him as well, but that would require a lot of danger and time we were not willing to spare.

So is the war over? Have we completely cleared the area of their corporation? Only time will tell as we can not be sure yet that someone isn't still present, just offline. Hopefully in the next few days we'll know and we'll also continue keeping an eye on their POS. An entire POS going offline when the fuel runs out? Yummy!

-ML-

Ready...Set....GO!

"Mik....what'cha doin?"

"Nothing really. Just pokin my nose around in the cov-ops, seein what hidden treats I can find," I replied to Promephius's message.

"You interested in going on a roam? Got a small fleet together looking to go get some action."

"Yeah. Sure. Where y'all headin?"

"Not sure yet. We're just forming up. Thinking of going and taking a peek in Sarline to see what UFO is up to and then possibly 0.0 or just a local security roam throughout Solitude."

"Sounds good. What ship type you need me to bring?"

"Bring the Buzzard. We could use a scout. In fact, why don't you head over now to Sarline and poke your nose in there, see if UFO is up and about."

"Not a problem, mate. Already en route," I smiled as my ship entered warp.

I haven't really had any real experience or time in the buzzard frigate when it comes to combat but with the up-coming war, I was more than willing to gain some experience before it became truly necessary. Unfortunately, on the roam, I learned one very noticeable lack in my skills. I've gotten pretty proficient at tracking down the various exploration sights with the new probing system but it seems I still require a LOT of skill training to effectively use recon probes.

As an example, I had narrowed down to a 15 degree radius with my directional scanner a ship sitting in a safe spot somewhere between one and two AU away from me. Given that information, I launched recon probes in that direction to try and get a lock on his location. However, even with him never seeming to move, I still couldn't even pick up his signature with my probes. Oye vay, definitely something I need to work on and fast.

On the other hand, I got a lot of time in yesterday practicing sneaking up on targets that I did find. (without the aid of the probes.) This is something I definitely wanted a bit of practice on before the war really got started as its been discussed me assisting in keeping watch on all known wormholes in the w-space region we intend to secure.

As most can imagine, securing a w-space system is a bit different than securing a piece of nullsec. With the constantly shifting entrances and exits, getting the proper ships in to neutralize the intruders and their POS is proving to be quite a task. It's being done, but it's a slow process. For obvious reasons, at this time I can not disclose to public knowledge how we intend to do this or what we're using to do it but again I refer back to my previously written statement, the invaders are in for a very harsh lesson...

The other aspect is that with the entrances also constantly shifting, it can be a chore to keep an eye on what's coming in and out of the system. It's not like your normal nullsec system where you might have one or a few known gates that you could easily camp. And given no subspace communications beacons telling you who and how many are in system, intel gathering is a tad more difficult. Instead your forced to completely rely on your directional scanners.

But either way, right now, it's almost like a race. They know we're there. They know about our POS just as we know about theirs. I'm sure they also understand the rarity of this particular system and they already know from a couple small skirmishes some of our guys already in system had with them, that we mean business. So now it's a matter of who can get their stuff properly secured before the other. As of right now, all we've seen is a few industrials, a couple falcons, a few battleships and some other small toys. Let's just say, for a system of this value, they'd better have something else up their sleeve or be willing to lose a lot.

It'll most likely be this weekend or so that I begin moving some of my own gear into the system. Come the following week, it'll be more preparations. However, for myself it will mostly be taking pleasure in harassing them. Camping any discovered entrances/exits. Attempting to cut off their supplies by destroying any industrial haulers. Making hit and run attacks on any of their ships attempting to mine the belts or gas clouds. POSSIBLY aiding the sleepers during any combat activities they attempt.

Basically, the system and its resources aren't going anywhere. So until the other corporation is obliterated or at least withdrawn, it's to be our number one priority.

For now though, it's just a matter of winning the race.

There Will Be Blood

I've yet to read about it from any other place so who knows. Perhaps we'll be the first?

Basically what I'm talking about is declaring war on another corporation/alliance over a particular w-space we've set up shop in. Whether we have this war officially sanctioned by Concord or not is still up in the air but likely we won't as this is over W-space. Not K-space. Let them do what they want in K-space. And Concord has no jurisdiction here so why should we care about that aspect. All wormhole passages lead to seriously under managed systems so engaging them outside the W-space will likely not be too much of a problem either if it comes to that.

The reason for this war is simple. This particular w-space has shown lots of potential since its discovery as we've been able to mine nearly every type of asteroid known to the eve universe as well as some of the most elite and rarest of gas clouds. Sleepers there are very tough admittedly but the ship bonuses from the nearby spatial anomalies have been astronomical. This could be perhaps a very rare find and we intend to protect it. However, it seems a Russian corporation has found the w-space as well and has already started setting up shop with their own POS.

Needless to say, when your talking a wormhole that could easily rake in billions for the corporation, someone else setting up there just isn't acceptable. So war it is. And as of right now, from what we're seeing....the intruders are in for a very harsh lesson.

-ML-

P.S. Before you say it, yes i do still feel bad for the Sleepers but at the same time....money talks. :)

Solitude Isn't So Solitary Since Apocs Systems Start

Haha, I made a tongue twister! Say that 5 times fast! :)

Anyways, there is a point to my journal entry title. Ever since the appearance of wormholes, and the system wide changes to the probe and scanning computers on board all of Eve, traffic in solitude has really begun to pick up. I've been hearing news from other pilots across New Eden about how their areas, once busy have now started to grow quiet. They may wonder why when network wide systems report 40 to over 50 thousand pilots online quite regularly now.

Well I'll tell you why.

Ever since the appearance of wormholes, yes, pilots have been spending more and more time in them. I almost feel sorry for this sleeper race as it seems not just one or two factions have turned their eyes towards them, declaring war and mercilessly slaughtering them. Instead, it's nearly the entire population of Eve! Every race, every corporation nearly, from Solitude to Molden Heathe and the systems between and beyond, have been rushing head first into wormhole space. Some to mass murder the once nearly unknown Sleeper race, others to strip their systems of all it's ore, minerals, and gases. It's the human population at its prime. Like locusts, they swarm. Consuming every valuable resource in their path before moving on to fresh grounds and doing it all over again. Again, my heart goes out to these "Sleepers". Maybe someday someone will step up to defend them.

On that note, the appearance of wormholes forced the aura network to make some changes to the original scanning/probing system. And since then, the term explorer has begun to lose it's meaning. Now, nearly everyone is capable of becoming one in a very short period of time. For this reason, finding a radar site or a magnetrometric site that hasn't already been pillaged and looted is becoming more and more difficult. Especially in Empire. So where do all these people go once they realize how immense their competition is?

Perhaps you guessed it. Solitude.

Okay, perhaps not just Solitude but basically any pockets of generally untraveled space, like Solitude, has become awash with immigrants. When my corporation first moved to Solitude, there were systems where I could (and did) sit and mine for hours without ever seeing a single soul. I could travel through areas of space, often 5 or 6 jumps or more before seeing more than one other person on the local communications network.

Now....well now I might as well be living in Empire again. Low sec is still not quite as active as many of the Empire systems but I think that's only because the low sec denizens haven't caught on yet to whats happening just beyond their normal prowling grounds. I couldn't begin to describe the number of times now I've passed through the low sec systems with 3 or 4 mining barges or exhumers on scan, doing a mining operation in some hidden asteroid belt. Or ships running around in the belts with setups purely designed to take down the local "rats", not too worried about other capsuleer ships. The only real threat is the United For Order alliance which is really just a nuisance than a threat. At least to my corporation. Many other corporations I see in the area have little to no combat skills and run at the first sight of a UFO pilot in low sec local. But UFO has perhaps pushed a few too many buttons.....

So anyways, yes, I have appeared to have hopped on the exploration bandwagon myself. I've gone in wormhole space a number of times now, solo even, but mostly just to look around, take photos, that sort of thing. I've also been mining, salvaging, and very shortly hacking various other sites I'm able to scan down. Unfortunately, to say I was seriously considering turning explorer before news of the scanner changes started spreading would only fall on deaf ears now. Mining was just becoming so mind numbing and now that I'm in the Hulk with most high sec ore t2 crystals, all I need is transports and freighter skills and I'll be done as far as I'm concerned with my mining skills. After that I intended to turn explorer and start finding the hidden sites. You know, be the "prospector" that I was trained to be by the academy!

Oye...I think I'm done ranting now.

-ML-

I Found One! ...wha....Damnit!

So yesterday evening, things were rather slow around the home base. A lot of the corp mates were just finishing up with some corp ops and although I generally mine every Wednesday evening as a part of my own contribution to the corp, I just didn't have it in me. I'd spent so much time at the desk earlier that day, doing paperwork and other menial tasks that I just needed to do something entertaining. So in my pondering, I overheard a few people talking on the blogger channel about probing and so that got me thinking. Here I am with a few decent probing skills, a launcher, and a hefty load of probes.....and I have yet to even track me down one of these elusive wormholes that have been appearing as of late all over New Eden. I currently have the skill to fly a covert ops ship but still have a couple days before I'm able to actually fit the cloaking device. Because of that, I haven't actually purchased a covert ops frig so instead just headed out in a Probe frigate. Sides, I wasn't actually planning on going in....I just wanted to find one.

The new probing system I must say can be a bit confusing. In some ways its exciting and I love the fact that scanning is SOOO much faster as well as being able to recall my probes. I'm going to have to do some research into the skills though because currently, I'm not clear on what use it would be to train any skills further in terms of probing. I did have some difficulty tracking things down but it was more of just learning how to manipulate and comprehend the results from the scans. As well as figuring out the best method to narrow things down.

It seems that as long as you recall your probes, they can be used over and over again. They don't appear to be like the mining crystals where after some use, they eventually expire completely. With this in mind, I generally was sending out about 4 or 5 probes. And recalling them when needed. And yes, I did have to recall them a couple times as it took me more then the roughly hour long time period to scan things down.

Reality is I should have just gone and read up on what my fellow writers have written about the new probe system but was determined to figure it out on my own. Sometimes its just the best way I learn things. (Plus it keeps my hyperactive mind occupied)

So after a few rather unsuccessful attempts, I finally managed to figure out how narrow down the scan to give me the accuracy of 100%. Unfortunately, it landed me at a ladar sight being called a Glass Nebula. Really it was nothing more than an abandon research facility. Okay, possibly useful to others but not to me. So moving on.

Next item I scanned down ended up being some ruins of...well...something. Drones had ravaged the place and it was really nothing more than a pile of floating space debris. There was a lone rogue drone hanging about that attempted to attack me but I restrained myself from ending his seemingly lonesome misery, as something in my gut was just screaming bait. Besides, I really wasn't carrying any serious offensive systems anyways.

So moving on again. I'm now in my third system. I send out a single probe with full scan range set. Bam! Four unknown hits. Certainly one of these has to be a wormhole! With this in mind, I now launch three other probes and send them out in various directions, with mediocre scan ranges, but close enough to each other to overlap. I did this until eventually I narrowed down one of the signatures. Lost it a few times but would easily reacquire it and try again. I couldn't begin to describe how excited I was when it popped up on my scanner "Unstable Wormhole".

Quickly, I warped to it and immediately sent out word to my fellow corpmates. Seems I'm the first within the corp to have actually found one. Quickly a couple other guys hop in their ships and as soon as we're fleeted up and sitting near to the wormhole, we give the signal to enter.

I know...I know... I wasn't planning on actually going through it but I could almost see temptation in the depths of that wormhole, motioning with her finger to come to her. Sides, we were just too excited by the possibilities...as well as being the first in our corp to say we were in w-space. So...with an immense feeling of both excitement and nervousness, in we went!

*Wormhole cleared. Checking navigation systems......*
.........
........
.......
......
.....
....
...
..
.
.
.

*Region: Aridia*
*Solar system: Pahineh*
*Security Level: 0.7*

What?!?

Yep. That's right. We travelled through a wormhole from a high security system in Solitude to a small pocket of high security in the Aridia region. Basically right next door to Solitude! I honestly didn't even realize the wormholes would do that. But guess that proved that wrong. So with a slight damper to our excitement we jumped back through the wormhole and headed home. So it wasn't to w-space....but hell, I still found and had my first wormhole experience and I can definitely say, they look wicked as hell. (although my corp mate said it looked like the butt hole of the universe......hmm......)

-ML-

A Whole New World

So I got home yesterday and logged on Vent. A lot of my corp mates were on and told me they were already logged into Eve. Cheers to CCP for actually being on time! On the downside, it was then I learned how enormous the download was for the patch. However, taking me back to the upside, my computer downloaded it faster than I've ever seen it go, averaging about 1.5mb/s. Go speedracer! Go! :) I think the actually installation of that patch took longer than it did to download. But finally, perhaps no more than 30 minutes after getting home, I was logging in.

At this point, after having gotten my first impressions of this new update, I have to say wow! The whole aspect of flying Tech 3 ships doesn't really interest me at this point, and the travels into wormhole space will come soon enough (still got a few more days of training on covert ops) but all in all this was a real visual desert. The planets, the asteroids, the various ship module effects, the warp bubble, the stargate jumps....I could keep going on and on. In some ways I really did feel like I was playing an entirely new game. All of the visual upgrades being absolutely a huge step up from previous graphics.

The new fitting screen - absolutely gorgeous. The ability to save fittings is a huge plus for the game as well as the skill queue which I think everybody is in agreement on. Seems if you have the role within the corp, you can save the fittings as well to share with the corp which is great when preparing for fleet ops. It would often take us forever to get everyone setup so the fleets are well structured, having to read off and wait for the other person to fit it.

Also, they made some changes to the way the notifications appear on your screen. Changes I feel make it SO much easier to track. I'm specifically referring to the weapon damage taken and given out. It's much easier to read as well as once I get used to the colors, I won't have to watch it so closely to know roughly how much damage I inflicted.

Okay, so negatives.

First, I honestly wasn't that entirely impressed with the visual look of the warp tunnel. The squiggly lines to me look a bit cartoonish. It's not really bad, just think it could have been made to look just a little better.

Second, whatever happened to all the stuff I'd been hearing about being able to readjust your attributes every 6 months? Seems either I was hearing it wrong or they made a last minute change and its now set to where you can only change them every 12 months. To me that renders that tool almost completely worthless. I mean seriously, 12 months of game time really is an extensively long period. I don't see it as a complete fail, but fairly close to it. Yes, I still used it of course. When I'd joined Eve, I knew absolutely nothing about what the attributes meant, what good where they and which ones would be more important to me than the others. So my attribute points where spread out almost completely even between all the attributes. By the time I'd gotten it all figured out, I'd gotten far enough into the game with this character, I just didn't feel like starting over completely. With the skill points readjusted, this will open up a whole new world of possibilities. It made a drastic change on my evemon plan times! Now it might actually be more feasible for me to train up a few decent combat skills with this character whereas before, doing so meant incredible amounts of time that seriously take away from training industrial skills. Also, industrial skills have gotten significant improvements in training time as well. That Orca and freighter I've been wanting to trained for? By readjusting attributes, I've cut so much time off it was astounding.

That's all I have for now but I truly look forward to getting home from work again this evening and seeing what else I can discover. Might just take the probes out and see if I can track down myself one of these wormholes. (not that i have any intention of going in yet but still curious to see one plus see how well my character can probe with what skills I have.)

-ML-

Home Sweet Home?

In writing my last posting, I came up with a thought.


Figured I'd just throw out a topic for the journalistic pilots of New Eden. I think it'd be interesting to hear people tell about the region they live in and more specifically why they and/or their corp have chosen to live there. I realize some may not be able to go into much detail for security purposes on an open journal like this, but I'm sure telling of what region you live in won't hurt. We have pilots from all over Eve, and as I've learned even in my short time as a pod pilot, life can be quite different from one region to the next.

So fire away! :)

A Life of Solitude

So I apologize for not having wrote anything in what could be construed as a rather lengthy bit of time. Things within the corp have been quite busy and I've been spending a lot of evenings in the belts around Solitude, pulling in the ore to raise money for various goals in regards to wanted/needed ships and modules. To add in on top of that, the corp itself has been quite active in running a lot of mining ops, low sec (and even 0.0) ops, and mission ops. We're currently seeking out other corporations and alliances around the Solitude region to create a sort of larger network both for shared intel as well as to create a strong group that will both help and back each other in actually putting the region of Solitude on the map. The corp directors really have some brilliant ideas that are starting to see light of day and may well create a viable market in the region.

Up until now, the purchasing of many goods was as nearly as expensive as buying goods in nullsec. We hope to change that. No, things will not nor never will be as cheap as you would find them in Jita or perhaps even some of the other major trade hubs but that's just something that isn't logistically possible. Jita is for the most part surrounded by high sec empire space. You can travel to and from most places in empire without ever crossing into unsecured low sec or even worse nullsec. With the thousands upon thousands of pilots located and operating in empire, the supply of goods is always there. However, with so many being scared to traverse long distances through lowsec, places like Solitude will never become heavily populated until something can be done to make lowsec passage less intimidating. And we both know that of course will never happen. In addition to that, the academies are all in empire, constantly spitting out new pilots nearly every day. So basically, empire will never be the empty void that Solitude is.

Let me give you a brief description of Solitude.

Solitude is its own little set of high sec systems surrounded by a turbulent area of space. Within only a couple jumps, one could easily find themselves in Syndicate even, a very dangerous section of nullsec filled with gate camps from numerous alliances and corporations. Due to its sovereignty being held by none other than The Syndicate, it is not exactly a place of interest for the larger nullsec alliances like Goonswarm and the former BoB alliance (now known as Kenny or something like that I believe). So instead, its left to the smaller groups to set up shop and perhaps get some nullsec practice in or just reap the benefits of being able to kill anything that moves, without taking hits on their empire security status.

However, even if one is to avoid nullsec, getting to Solitude can still be a very dangerous journey. Although you won't have to worry about a gate camp involving warp bubbles like you would in nullsec, gate camps along the route are still a major problem. The journey to Solitude without traveling through nullsec takes you down a lengthy pipeline of about 15 to 20 jumps I believe with numerous choke points. Fortunately at this time the pirate population is relatively minimal but in lowsec, every individual whose path you cross is a potential pirate, even if they aren't tagged by Concord as such. So flying your standard freighter or hauler through is definitely dangerous, if not utterly suicidal.

Now yes, a lot of the combat pilots in my corp do go hunting in the lowsec areas surrounding Solitude. And yes, they often come back saying they didn't find a damn thing to kill... but at the same time, unless they're in a decent sized fleet, they still for the most part avoid certain systems in the route to empire. (unless of course they're feeling rather frisky....or really bored...)

Either way, my point is that logistically, if you're a corporation made up of "younger" pilots, or pilots with only a small amount of experience, then like nullsec, Solitude is not for you. If your like our corporation with a varied mix of younger and older pilots than it becomes possible as the older pilots can form the basis for the logistics of living in Solitude, supplying or helping the younger pilots get their gear and ships from empire to the high security space of Solitude safely. Though in truth its still slightly uncommon to find a fresh pilot out of the academy in Solitude.....definitely not in the mass numbers you'd see flying around the space lanes of Empire.

What all this is saying is that I like Solitude. I like the fact that I can sit in a high security system for hours and never see another pod pilot. Not even on the local system comms. I like the fact that here, we can actually make use of the standings system much like you would in lowsec or nullsec but it not actually being either of those. I like being able to easily glance at the people in system and know whether they are a friendly or known enemy, for as time goes on, the list of neutrals to in the region goes down....unless of course a new alliance or corp moves into the area. Basically for the corps objectives, its a great place to make home and stage our operations out of.

-ML-

OOC: I Actually Like Surveys!

Well I haven't written anything in a bit because quite frankly...there hasn't been anything to write about. Been working on grinding out missions to get my standings up just so i can do higher level missions which means more money which means better toys. And so the ball continues rolling.

Speaking of money, I never did get around to buying a Hulk. Sometime perhaps but instead I spent a large portion of my money on a battleship with already installed riggings for the protege. Got offered a really good deal on it from a corp mate and couldn't resist. Sides, if the protege is able to get up to doing level 4 missions, i'll be making more with that per hour than the amount i'd be making per hour mining in high sec. Good aspect is the way our corp's ship program is set up. Being if I continue to provide minerals to the corp than I'll be able to purchase battleships and other tech1 ships at a very low price.

Other than that, skill training is nearing completion to fly covert ops. I'm a little hesitant about going forward with my skills for probing given the expected changes coming up with the new system patch. Need to do some research I guess to see what people's thoughts are on what skills to focus the training on.

But now for some fun. A few of the other journalists have been filling out this fun little survey started by psychdriver and given how much I actually enjoy filling them out, figured I'd go with the flow. So here it is!

1. Can you cook?
Does putting things in the microwave count as cooking??

2. What was your dream growing up?
To be a fighter jet pilot. Guess Eve's about as close as I got.

3. What talent do you wish you had?
to be an amazing guitarist. Actually....perhaps just being able to do anything more than pluck random strings would be nice.

4. Favorite place?
South Carolina (sweet sweet home)

5. Favorite vegetable?
Sweet Potatoes

6. What was the last book you read?
Anne Rice - Tale of a Body Thief

7. What zodiac sign are you ?
Cancer

8. Any Tattoos and/or Piercings?
Yep. Have basically a black and white painted canvas on my back. Used to have ears pierced but job didn't like that too much. punks....

9. Worst Habit?
biting my nails. horrible horrible habit especially when you got an itch and no nails to scratch it with!

10. Do we know each other outside of blogging?
Depends on who reads this but most likely nope....unless i shot at you in-game. oops.

11. What is your favorite sport?
I surf. 'nough said. :)

12. Negative or Optimistic attitude?
Generally optimistic....or at least do my best to be

13. What would you do if you were stuck in an elevator with me?
Hope I have ear plugs

14. Worst thing to ever happen to you?
get dumped by the ex-fiance right before we're supposed to get married.

15. Tell me one weird fact about you:
I rock climb quite regularly but am absolutely afraid of heights. Should I mention I'm not too bright sometimes. :)

16. Do you have any pets?
Yep, greatest dog in the world named Lyric, a husky/german shephard mix (with the energy of a jack russell.....)

17. Do you know how to do the macarena?
sadly.....

18. What time is it where you are now?
about noonish

19. Do you think clowns are cute or scary?
i wouldn't say scary but definitly not cute. annoying is more like it. best clown i ever saw was a picture on a punching bag. (okay....so it wasn't actually a picture....and...well...it wasn't a punching bag either.....but it still felt good to hit!)

20. If you could change one thing about how you look, what would it be?
bigger mooscles. :)

21. Would you be my crime partner or my conscience?
Depends how well I know ya :P

22. What color eyes do you have?
blue

23. Ever been arrested?
honestly yes. but not for anything evil or such so don't be given me no crap. :P

24. Favorite fictional character of all time?
Batman. So many cool toys...i'm jealous!

25. If you won $10,000 dollars today, what would you do with it?
that's it??? cheap skate. I guess maybe pay off my car.

26. If you could have one superpower, what would it be?
Ever seen the movie "Jumper"? Now THAT would be cool.

27. What’s your favorite hangout?
I'm a big home-town coffee shop nut. There was a really nifty little place in Savannah, Georgia where it was a coffee shop that had live musicians in there all the time. loved it.

28. Do you believe in ghosts?
Yep...and piss me off enough I'll be one of the ghosts haunting you eventually!

29. Favorite thing to do in your spare time?
Play Eve or work on the car.

30. Do you swear a lot?
I'm a prior-service U.S. Marine....so you tell me. :)

31. Biggest pet peeve?
That annoying neighbor in my apartment complex who lets his dog shit right outside the entryway to the apartment

32. In one word, how would you describe yourself?
Asshole (least that's what all the friends call me...)

33. Will you repost this so I can fill it out and do the same for you?
Duh. :)

Your Right. I'm Getting Used to War

Well the so-called "war" with the one-man corp came to an end yesterday as it seems he didn't want to pay the bill to keep it going either. No surprise really and no surprise as well that nobody from my corp had the desire really to go after the guy. We really do have much more important matters to attend to than traveling all the way back to Empire just to beat up on some foolish kid. HOWEVER.....our days of war may not be over...

It seems a new threat has arisen that may have to be dealt with. No war has been declared as of yet but if the offending corp holds true to its threat, we will soon be receiving yet another war dec. This time by an alliance who has tried to claim that anybody living in this little high sec pocket cut off from the rest of empire, is required to pay them, I believe, 50 million isk a month in order to stay there. If the corporation doesn't pay, they get war dec'd. Well hats off to y'all and good luck cuz we sure as hell aren't paying. In fact, if they do take us to war, we've been discussing possibly the only way it will end is either them leaving the region all-together or them paying us 100 million a month to reside there. And we're not alone. An alliance in the region has recently gone from reds to blues as it seems they were threatened as well. The guys in my corp are certainly not ones to be taken for granted and, from what I'm gathering on this alliance that is now turned blue to us, neither are they. If this wanna-be-mob alliance does war dec either our new blue friends or our corp, it might be worked out that both groups will go to war with them.

Good lord these politics can be mind-spinning... I don't even want to imagine what it must be like in nullsec. I mean....can perhaps somebody tell me again what's so great about living in and holding a system in nullsec?? However, I gotta admit, this IS all rather amusing and definitely keeps high sec living interesting.

A bit of irony to that comment though....my protege has actually been spending a lot of her time in low-sec. Running missions mostly but at the same time seeing if she can find and pick a fight with some random pirate in a tech 1 frigate vs. frigate battle. As far as skill training goes, she's turned her attention towards training now to pilot an assault frig as she's accomplished being able to fly every tech 1 gallante ship available. Being a good pilot is a different story but she can definitely pilot a frigate ship well so I figure it's time to start training for a tech 2 frigate. Then I'll build up her skills to fly tech 1 cruisers well and once that's accomplished, get her into a tech 2 cruiser and so on and so forth. This would include a lot of what might be considered "base skills" such as those in engineering, electronics, and mechanics. Either way, I know for awhile she'll be feeling perhaps a little inefficient and unable to be a useful participant within the corporation for perhaps a few more months. However, eventually I think it will payout and will be happy it went that route. When she can fly a tech 1 cruiser better than people older than her in their tech 2 cruisers, then they'll stop doubting her abilities. Hmm...maybe have to make note to prove that someday...

-ML-

OOC: With those thoughts in mind, thinking about tech 1 and tech 2. I think, after reading the recent information released about tech3 ships and such, that for a newer player like myself, tech 3 is and will be a long way out. Especially for PVP use. When your a newer player, every minute of every hour counts as you try to get your skill points up to a level where you can effectively compete within the universe of Eve. To waste time on skills learned just to fly some new, fancy ship, skills that you will lose if your fancy ship is destroyed, well....it just seems....dumb, to put it bluntly. As taught to me from almost the beginning (especially when getting blown up my very first day in my rookie ship) , never undock in anything you're not willing to lose. To the newer players, like myself, everything you have, especially that small amount of skill point base, is a very precious commodity. And everything you lose hurts.

Now don't get me wrong. I'm all about going into the unknown. I'm just as excited as the next guy about the idea of true exploration. About going through a wormhole and getting "Lost in space". About going up against NPC's that will supposedly fight more like real players (though as intimidating as that is for me as a newer player...) Or seeing and helping to gather the resources for this new tech 3 gear. But as for actually using it....I think I'll just settle with becoming more familiar with the already available tech 2 gear first. And I highly suggest to all other newer players to do the same. Unfortunately, as seems usual, I'm sure a lot of em will always want the biggest, baddest toys and waste their time on the skills to fly em and forget the basics... Ah well....just means more ship kills for me. :)

1 Man Against 50

So the war with the larger of the two corporations has ended. Seems they didn't want to pay the bill any longer to keep it going. Now that just leaves one corporation remaining. The solo man and his lonely corp. If it wasn't for the fact that it'd probably be a complete waste of time, I'd try and hunt this man to the very end! But as I said, it'd likely be nothing more than wasted time as he'd probably hide in a station somewhere.

Otherwise nothing too much of interest to report. Spent my time yesterday running to the outskirts of empire to pick up some mining crystals. Silly me forgot to grab a bunch of em before having my gear shipped out to our main base of operations. I really want to get the skills trained up for flying a covert ops frigate as well as better probing skills but after that, I definitely need to look towards getting myself in that blockade runner, the Prowler, and eventually a jump freighter. The area where I reside is seriously delinquent in market goods and what is available is way over priced compared to what you'd find in Jita. Fortunately, the corp is already mulling that aspect over and had some pretty interesting ideas on how to deal with that.

Otherwise tonight I will finally be able to pilot a Hulk! I'm really happy about that prospect and the thought of how much more isk I can make. Just need to get my protege up to a level of being able to pilot a decent sized hauler and I could then be pulling in some serious dough.

On that note, I've been watching the news reels on the great upset in the south. Seems the largest and perhaps most powerful alliance in all of Eve known as BoB, short for Band of Brothers, has crumbled literally over night. This of course has basically created a sort of gold rush as every smaller corporation and alliance sweeps in like vultures, pilfering and killing in an attempt to claim a piece of what remains of their grand, so-called, nullsec empire. I won't deny my base of operations isn't too far from there but without question, I have absolutely no desire to even go near that area for the time being. I imagine it's nothing more than death and destruction really. Would be awesome though if your gutsy enough as a ninja salvager. Hmm.....

Only aspect about all this is my concern over the market prices. As much as people disliked BoB and is glad to see them gone (even if temporarily) one can't deny they had a huge impact on the market and their demise could mean utter market chaos for all those in Empire as well. That remains to be seen of course but I wouldn't be too surprised. I mean, the discovery of some silos only a short time back that were mysteriously producing moon materials was considered to be a huge affair. Now, it's all but forgotten in the shadow of this newer event. But as with most other things in life...only time will tell...

-ML-

Oopsie

So it seems me keeping my journal on a low profile has ended. Myself and my protege's journals have been discovered by a rather popular journalist, a sort of registrar of public journals if you will. My protege was also previously discovered by another popular registrar who I'd also like to give credit to. First, I've mentioned him before but I'll do so again because if you haven't visited his pages, your definitely missing out on a very good source of information. Not only that but he keeps a long list of other pod pilot journals that are publicly available such as mine. This list is formally called The EVE Player Blogroll. Other than scribbling my stuff into the journal, I haven't really familiarized myself on how to put anything extra on the page but perhaps later today I'll see what I can do to make a link to his pages more permanent.

The other person I want to mention because she added my protege is Alexia Morgan and her journal entitled Punishment. Her style is a bit different than Mr. Kinux, in that she likes to do interviews with pod pilots as well as asking those in her listings to fill out and send in a questionnaire to give readers a little better perspective on the person behind the words they read. Eventually I'll get around to forcing the protege to fill one out perhaps.

Hmm....what else? Oh yes.

I need to make a correction on my previous entry. It was not a Megathron class battleship that was destroyed in our engagement at the gate but instead an Armaggedon class battleship. Either way, still a good kill with no losses. I also learned that my fleet destroyed another Armaggedon from Veto corporation shortly after I broke off from the fleet. I haven't really gotten the full details on that engagement but given I'm used to seeing Veto flying around in gangs, I assume it probably wasn't much different than our first Armaggedon kill.

Other than that, just been spending some time mining as I need to build up the bank account a bit to buy that Hulk I'm so close to being able to operate. Only a couple more days. I did run into a little snag though that I'm going to have to ask around and see what can be done. The area where I mine is very much cut off from the rest of empire. Now in some aspects, this is good as it means less trouble, less traffic and thus better mining. On the other hand, the buy orders in the area for minerals are at best... absolutely horrible. Roughly about 2.80 to 3.00 per unit of tritanium. That's nothing compared to what I could sell it for in Jita at about 4.10 to 4.16. Now this may not sound like a huge difference to some but when your talking multiple millions of units at over a 1.00 isk difference....yeah. That's a big hit to take.

There is some low sec regions nearby that are actually buying it higher than what Jita pays but....well...it's low sec and having to make numerous trips through such systems in a Mammoth class industrial hauler isn't exactly what I'd consider logistically sound. We're talking as of right now about 7 million units of tritanium. I'll probably be doing even more mining tonight which will mean probably another 3 or 4 million units of tritanium. For the uneducated, 1 million units is equivalent to about 10,000m3. Given my Mammoth can only carry a little over 1.7 million units of the stuff....well...like I said, numerous trips. Hopefully, speaking to the other guys, they'll be able to help me figure something out. Either that or I'll just try creating a sell order for once and see how well that would work. I'm just concerned about how long that would take to sell so I can get the Hulk. Like I said, I'll have to talk it over with the corp mates.

-ML-

Bringing the War to Them

This weekend has definitely been interesting for me.

As suspected, so far I haven't been a real part or active participant in fighting this war we're in. Not for lack of want but more for lack of skill really. All of the members that are a part of this corporation who have war dec'd us are roughly around a year to two years old. There is 5 of them in their corp, though a second, one man corp, who we know to be friends with them, submitted a war dec yesterday also. Guess they realized they were going to need a bit of help. We've done the research on them through various channels and have learned they're pretty much your standard griefers. High sec goons (not a part of the infamous Goonswarm mind you) who just like to bully other corps. They seem to have a particular fetish towards attacking mostly defenseless ships. In the one engagement we've had so far, we tracked them to their HQ and we ended up camping it outside the station while they hid in their docking bays. We were able to down one of their Megathrons but also lost a Drake. Blasted space trash kept playing docking games! I say y'all started it, now you bring it! (so ends my one moment of cockiness)

Well that engagement I believe was either Thursday or Friday. On Saturday we decided to go on a little roam through low sec in a fleet of about 10 or 12 of us. I'm really impressed by our senior staff's efficiency and skill. They definitely know what they are doing and do it with a skill that truly shows their experience level.

This roam was quite a bit different from what I'm used to. Generally with the old alliance, we would move into a system and keeping to safespots, trying to hunt down or probe out enemy combatants. If the system was dead, we would move elsewhere and hunt around there instead. With these guys, we were almost constantly moving from system to system. We had one or two covert ops scouts staying a system or two ahead of the bulk of the fleet. We had a few near engagements but for the most part, people seemed to flee at first site of us. If we came across another group assessed to be too strong for us, we would move on, keep to a safe spot or retreat back. Most of the time though, the groups we saw were simply passing through.

When we'd reached nearly the end of the roam with no real contact, we then decided to hold short and see if we could bait a few pirates our scouts had spotted. We placed one battleship on the side of the gate in the system where the pirate forces were lurking, while we hugged the gate on the other. Sure enough, it didn't take long before a pirate Megathron class battleship moved in to have a go at our Dominix class battleship. As hard as it was for us all, we held short and glad we did. Only moments after the two battleships were engaged, the rest of the pirate fleet moved in to assist their friend. That was when we activated the jump gate.

At this point, things got a little crazy. Forgive me if I don't get the details right but I believe the Megathron was backed by two more battleships, a couple Falcons, a Rifter, and a Blackbird. For security purposes, given we're currently at war, I won't write at this time what all we had or how exactly we operated, but lets just say in the end, we didn't lose a single ship while the Megathron was destroyed and the remaining pirate forces retreated, another of their battleships deep into armor. For my part, given i was in a light and fast frigate, I went after the blackbird about a 100km out, closing the distance quickly and engaging him more in the hope of driving at least one of their ECM ships out of the fray. The DPS on that little frigate was actually quite impressive. I'll definitely be using it more often. Unfortunately, with his mates pulling out, he was able to get a weapons scramble on me, thus breaking my warp disruptor and was able to flee.

After that, we docked up at a station to calm our nerves from such a large engagement. I think our Dominix pilot, Promephius, had to clean his drawers as well after coming so close to losing his battleship. Though it was rather impressive that he came out alive after having been engaged by I believe the three battleships at the same time.

From that point, I had to withdraw from the fleet and headed back to high sec where I docked up for the evening. I only intended to lay down until the drugs kicked in as a monster of a headache was starting to get to me but ended up passing out for the rest of the night.

The next day, though not quite as exciting was still a bit entertaining to me.

A few of the members in my corp own carriers and were transporting ships for the new corp members, such as myself, to our main base of operations. Again, I won't say where at the moment because of the war, but I will say by all means, I would love to just see these fools try and get to us. Most likely they'll be dead before they make it half way. I loaded up my Mammoth with the few ships I intended to bring to the HQ and headed to the rendezvous point. From there, I handed everything, including the Mammoth over to our carrier pilot's crew they quickly loaded it all on the ship.

I have to say, that was my first time ever seeing a carrier in person rather than just seeing pictures of em. But yesterday I had the luck of seeing not just one carrier but two different types as they undocked from the station. And yet another first (wish I'd had my camera ready), I got to observe them both using jump drives at the same time to jump out of the system to the drop off point. After I get the hulk, I intend to turn my training towards covert ops. As I understand it, with that I'll be able to tag along with another pilot in the corp who is able to use a covert ops jump drive. I'd be REALLY interested to see that.

So anyways, I made the long journey in a frigate to the new base of operations, picked up my ships and gear from the carriers drop off point and went and did a little bit of looking around the area of this new home. I can already see it really is an excellent place to set up operations at. Lots of good mining, quiet, and plenty of places for my protege to hunt in or do assignments for the local agents. Yeah, it's definitely a good place to be.

-ML-

FINISHED!!

So yesterday I finally gave myself a good swift kick in the behind and spent the numerous hours finishing my move from my old corporation's headquarters to the new corporation's staging area. It became perhaps a necessity to do it as we've just been war dec'd. I swear. Do war dec's really happen this often?? Or am I just that unlucky. I mean...what? This will be my third war dec experience in the roughly 3 or 4 months I've been a pilot. I mean, I can understand it if I was living in nullsec. Wars happen all the time down there, or so I hear. But in High Sec?

I don't know. Either way it appears to be another band of misfits called Live or Let Die that just want to get what they probably believe to be some easy kills. Silly boys. Trix are for kids. But with this corp....we're willing to play. And we've got some pretty, fun toys to bring into the game.
Plus it will give all of us a chance to see what our corp is made of as a whole. Unfortunately, with me being on a different sleep cycle than most of them, I have a good feeling I'm going to miss a large majority of the fleet action. Ah well....both myself personally and my protege still need some more training to be what I'd consider up to par for these sort of engagements. But I wouldn't underestimate my protege either. She can already pack a pretty serious punch when needed.

Either way, with all my gear now out of the area where we believe they operate quite regularly, I shouldn't have too much problems.

On the note of moving all my stuff...I really gotta open my mouth more and ask for help. I'm such a loner sometimes, and stubborn as well in asking people for favors. Last night, a corp mate, Frank, who also came over from the old alliance, helped me out significantly with his freighter. Saved me what would have been three more round trips consisting of nearly 40 jumps per round trip, to move the last remaining ships and some gear.

So now that the weekend is here and everything is staged and ready to be moved to the corporation's HQ, it means I have lots of time to go out and play. I was planning on doing a bit of mining to fill the pocket book a bit more as I will be needing it when the time comes to buy the Hulk...instead, maybe I'll just send the protege out for a little solo hunting in the low sec regions around the new HQ and see what things are like there. Hopefully lots of pirates to kill. But of course, I need to tie a string around my finger so I can remember to go visit with Kieran and hopefully make it to her and her business partners store's debut fashion show. Guess I better dig around the hanger and find that old formal jacket...

-ML-

Completely Uneventful

I haven't gotten to spend too much time lately in the ship as paperwork and other non-piloting activities have consumed my time. I've been trying to make regular visits to see my "partner", Kieran, planetside on a more regular occasion to avoid being berated for coming by so rarely. I'm actually really impressed with all that she's accomplished with her budding jewelry business. Unfortunately, I don't think she fully agrees with me that it was good of me to be away so much, otherwise she wouldn't be where she is today if I was around all the time. Ah well...women never do listen to us guys anyways...

As for logging flight time, most of its been transporting gear from one station to the other. A very tedious task but one that will benefit me in the long run. Especially when most of my stuff would be 15 jumps away otherwise. I sold off or reprocessed the stuff I could easily afford to buy later and other trash I'd picked up throughout time that I'd likely never use. It's amazing really what you find when you look around your own hangers. The most time consuming aspect has been in the movement of ships. My mammoth class hauler, even with as much cargo capacity as it has, still struggles at carrying more than one or two ships. And sometimes, with the hauler being as slow as it is, i can almost make two round trips faster in my pod alone than one trip in the hauler. It also doesn't help as well that some of the ships are insured and repackaging them would nullify my insurance contract. Oh well. It'll be done soon enough.

In other aspects, I've found one minor problem with the new corporation. And I repeat its just a minor thing because I'm actually seeing it as a bit of a positive too. I hopped on the comms last night when I dropped by the hanger to make sure all my business was still in order and took notice of who was online. Surprisingly, not a single soul. Doh! I didn't take into account that most of my new corporation is on different sleep cycles than myself. When that realization dawned on me, i had a moment where I questioned whether or not I'd made the right decision in joining up. But then, as per my usual, I began to see a brighter side to it.

It meant I had the absolute freedom to handle personal business more regularly without the normal pressures of corporate responsibilities. Sure, I work for them and will do what I can for the intent of building the corp to make it even stronger...but at the same time, I will have the luxury of doing my own thing as well. Of course my protege is always on the same time frame as me but it will give her the ability to run missions freely for her agents as well as force her to get out and get comfortable with doing a little solo hunting in lowsec.

So in the end, as I said, I still feel this was a good decision.

-ML-

Trouble and changes

So I decided to go out with some friends the other evening planet side in Jita and have a few drinks. Really didn't drink that much but when I left the little bar we were at, a local concord officer observed us leaving and taking off in our vehicle. Needless to say that although I passed the field sobriety test with flying colors, i failed the breathalyzer and got to spend a night in jail. So I guess this means I'm grounded from driving a planet side vehicle for a short while. However, they have no jurisdiction to ground me from flying my ship for an infraction in a terrain vessel. Thank god...

Anyways, on to the more important stuff!

I left my corporation.

Yep, I said and I did it. I had a conversation the other evening with an alliance mate and we both came to the conclusion that things within the alliance were falling apart. Piece by fragile piece. So perhaps it was time to move on. Fortunately, my alliance mate had already done his research and found a great corporation looking for some fresh faces. They are all very heavily experienced pilots from which I'm sure I'll learn a lot from. They also own a bit of space in nullsec, which i will soon be going to see, so that is definitely some added value to this new corporation as well. In the meantime I've been gathering up all my and my protege's stuff and moving it to the designated station from which one of the corp members will transfer via, I believe, a jump freighter. I'm most likely just going to move a few of my rifters, some gear for them, and maybe a couple other ships. I'll most likely leave the Retriever behind in high sec as one, I'm not sure it would hold up well against nullsec rats and two, I'm really only a few days away from being able to pilot a hulk class exhumer. The hulk is a much sturdier mining ship and should do fine against any rats that come into the belts where I would be mining. For my protege, I will be bringing her vexor, thorax, a couple frigates and any necessary fittings for them as well.

I won't deny I feel a bit bad about leaving my now former corporation. So much so to where i just left without even saying a word to anyone. Figured it'd just be better that way. I do however owe an apology to one of my planet side friends because with this move to a new corp, I had to spend a large amount of time gathering gear, selling what i don't need, buying what I do, as well as showing support to the new corp by attending and participating in the frigate tournament we had this past weekend. (which by the way was a lot of fun though i lost my 1 on 1 match...damn nos, didn't see that coming... and was the first to be called primary by the other team in the 4 on 4 match we did at the end.)

So yeah....definitely been a long weekend.

-ML-