What's in MY Hanger you ask?

Over at Evoganda Rixx asked us "What is in your hanger?"

Well, technically Rixx also asked us if we had a specific naming convention so I'll skip the boring "no" answer and get to the important part.

Sadly, I also have a very boring hanger.

Catalyst - "Repoman" used for salvaging with 4 tractor beams and 4 salvagers
Hulk - "Pendereski" used for mining (duh) and named after a Polish composer, I'm a music major
Myrmidon - "Monkey Lover" used for mission running, I chew through L2 and I can't wait to have enough standing to try my hand at some L3s.
Gallente Shuttle - "Puddle Jumper" "Run Rabbit Run" used for what shuttles are used for, quickly getting from one homebase to another
Orca - "Mobile Meth Lab" is a name that I inherited when I bought the ship off a corpmate, he asked me to keep the name and I said sure.
Obelisk - "Footlocker" is my move all my shit from here to there.

I think I have another couple small vessels, but that is my overall hanger. Nothing that impressive, I was very proud when I bought my Orca and my Obelisk though. I am currently training up for a Hyperion and while I can fly a Megathron I'm thinking the Hyperion might be a better choice. If you have an opinion on Hyperion vs. Megathron or if you want to suggest a name for either vessel hit me up in the comments.

Abyssus in Terra

This entry is written for the contest posted on CrazyKinux's site found here. I wrote it before looking at any other submissions and was relieved to see that I was not the only one writing fiction. I tried to make my fiction reflect the realities of both what this will mean for game play and for what it will mean for the Eve Universe as game setting. My apologies if any of my tech or in game mechanics seem fudges as I am a relatively new player, though I will tell you that I broke out EFT for Part 3. I hope you enjoy.

Chatting it up with Celebrates

I'm sitting here listening to The Drone Bay podcast, checking out Eve Blogs on Capusleer, and now posting on my own blog. If my mother could see me now I don't think pride would be the first thing that comes through her head, quite the opposite. I would make a big deal about The Drone Bay being back, but I've never knew about them before. I just heard about them in the Eve Blogger channel in game last night and started to check it out. I probably won't do them justice, since I won't be going back and listening to the old episodes, and I'm sure that means I'll miss out on some of the inside jokes, but I have enough trouble keeping up on my blogs and real life without having to find time for over 20 hours of old Eve News. I will say that the show that went up last night was informative and entertaining, so a great job to Kinux, Crovan, Alsedrech, and Maeve.

It was fun hanging out in the Eve Blogger channel last night. I've lurked for a bit in the past, but last night I chatted a little. I don't really know the people yet so I kinda feel like that guy who shows up when you are eating with your friends and takes the one empty seat at the table because there is no other room and then tries to interject themselves into your conversation. I hate that guy, I hate being that guy. I did realize something though, when it finally donned on me that Crovan was posting about the podcast as self promotion, not just as a junkie who was glad the crack dealer was back in town, it brought home how cool the single server experience of Eve is.

Other web celebrates play MMORPGs, both the creators of Ctrl+Atl+Delete Comics and Penny Arcade Comics have WoW Guilds. But if you wanted to play the game with them you'd have to first be on their server, then you'd probably have to be in their guild, or you'd have to be in the same general area as they are. Since Eve is a single server and allows for server wide channels it is completely conceivable that I could chat with Kinux or Kirith. Hell, last night I was chatting with Maeve and Crovan. Just another reason Eve is cool.

I have a lot of blog post ideas brewing, so stay tuned. Hopefully I'll be able to get my submission done in time for Kinux's contest.

Burnt Offerings and other terrible metaphors

I like games. I've played CCG (Collectible Card Games), Tabletop RPGs (more systems than I'm willing to list), board games (both American and "German" style), video games on systems dating back to ColecoVision, MMORPGS in limited varieties, FPS games, Turn Based Strategy, Tabletop Wargames (if I never paint another stinking Eldar I can die a happy man), I've even LARPed (if you don't know what LARP is I'm not going to explain it and if you do know about it you can't laugh because you are probably as pathetic a soul a me. So when I say "I like games" I am not just talking about one small corner of the genre. And while this is an Eve Blog please indulge my brief moment of exposition on gaming in general (or just don't read the post, it isn't like I'll know the difference.)

There are three main reasons I enjoy playing a game. They are as follows:

1. The story latches onto me like a pitbull convinced I'm smuggling prime rib in my trousers.
2. There is some element of social interaction that just makes the game compelling to play, in essence the game is merely a vehicle for me and my friends to have a good time.
3. The intellectual puzzle the game provides gives me hours of endless amusement, either a puzzle I must master on my own or a chance for me to grind my brain against an opponents till one of use emerges victorious.
4. Or there is an element of prowess, either through hand eye coordination, effective use of real time strategy, or some other measurable skill that exists in the moment
   
   (the main difference between 2 and 3 is the immediacy of 3. I'm allowed to mull over a move in Scrabble or a turn of Civilization for a long time, or at least until my opponent brains me. But I can't ponder the mysteries of a Zerg rush and live, its is a matter of skillful reaction.)

Everyone does it once...

At least I'm going to tell myself that is the case. If I am deluding myself, well, let me have my delusions.

We all know the advice that everyone tells us. "Check your flight route, don't use autopilot in or around low-sec, make sure your route isn't going through low sec, etc." And this is a practice that I live by pretty rigidly... except for yesterday. I was busy flying around fitting up my Myrm for missioning - something that I've been waiting to do for a while now. I browse the market for cheap mods in a close general area, set up my way points, undock, hit AP and then go to change my sons diaper.

I failed to check my flightpath, I think it was because I was sticking to the general area that I know very well. But as it happened I mixed up two similarly named systems in my head. One is .6, the other is .4. Guess where I ended up? By the time I returned from the aforementioned diaper change had ended up back at my clone station staring at the clone tutorial. All said and done it was probably a 100mil ISK lesson to learn, but I learned it the hard way and now I'm better for it.

So I will repeat the oft heard advice: "Don't autopilot through or to lowsec. Always check your flight path before you hit that auto-pilot button."

But most importantly, don't worry about it too much when you fuck up and learn the lesson the hard way. I think we all have to do it at least once.

OMG IT'S FULL OF STARS!!!

I was again overwhelmed by the sheer massiveness of Eve Online yet again today. As I mentioned in an earlier post, some friends and I are looking to expand into running a POS. Again, I am not sure what the endgame of all of this is going to play out to be, but it gives us something to do. I've started looking into just the basic information and I find myself flooded with issues like Faction, Charters, Fuel, Configuration, Skills, and so forth. Even just getting a handle on one miner/minor (pun intended) aspect of the game is rather awe inspiring. I will say there are some aspects of the game that don't play out as evenly as other games more concerned about 'balance' would need. However, in Eve you don't need entirely balanced game play in order to create a vibrant world. In fact I would argue that the world is more vibrant because it isn't balanced. Yes, I have a friend who is essentially and Eve day trader. He spends most of his time as a dock walker managing buy and sell orders. He has more ISK that is healthy and will probably be the primary bankroll to our POS adventure. I don't make nearly as much of him with mining and in many ways my role takes a bit more attention. But this is okay, because in the end not everyone in a world has to earn the same amount of ISK to enjoy the game.

In a related note, my alt is almost maxed out as a Mining Director/support character. He also has a plethora of combat skills, so I'm now looking to start him running some missions while my main plays Salvage monkey. That way both can start to sweep up some reputation and the benefits that brings. The universe is truly full of starts, and I'm going to enjoy picking one and hitting my jump drive.

NERD RAGE GO!

Okay, bit a nerd rage moment here. Downloading the update for Heavy Rain so I can play. This is a 226MB upload, not a huge download, but something that takes more than a minute or two. Halfway through the download my internet burps. I'm signed out of the PS network and the download fails. Go back in, it starts AT THE BEGINNING and gets 71% done before giving me a repeat performance.

Why is it that the PS3 can't use a BitTorrentesque download structure so failed downloads can be resumed? Yes, grand total I probably lost less than 15 minutes of my life to this annoyance, but it is an avoidable one.

Oh well.

Life and such

So, being a stay at home father has not translated directly into the amount of Eve time I thought it might. This isn't so much because the needs of the baby but because I'm looking to put my house on the market and the needed repairs and cleaning are monumental. That aside, I have been getting back into Eve and a few friends of mine are looking to set up our own POS - a huge undertaking, but something new and fun for us.

Hopefully I'll be able to blog a bit more about that undertaking and how it is going but right now I'm going to go try to slide through some of Heavy Rain.

Epic Fail

I've fallen drastically behind on my posting due to a large influx of real life. In the past month I have done the following:

• Witnessed the birth of my first child
• Survived the holiday madness including transporting said child to several family gatherings
• Gotten back into Eve as mining makes for a good profession while waiting for a baby to cry
• Managed to avoid joining the ranks of the many unemployed for now

So with my return to Eve I can say fairly certainly that not too much has changed for me with the release of Apocrypha. Mining wasn't touched too much by the last expansion, though since I stick to high-sec I also haven't seen the changes that have been brought about by sovereignty. I have, however, reached many of my short term goals for both of my accounts. So now I get to start to head down some new paths.

Before I begin to venture too aggressively into the world of potentially doing low-sec mining I think I'm going to explore missioning. Fortunately one of my characters is already well on his way to being able to handle some serious missioning. The other character is going to work on raising his drone skills and exploring some more defensive skill sets. I have seen some pretty impressive examples of what a properly fitted Hulk can withstand. I need to explore this more before taking my baby into risky waters.

All in all I'm looking forward to a good year in Eve. It will probably be vastly different from my past year.

From a Carebear to all Assholes

You know, I'm sick of hearing people shit on "Carebears" and talk about them in such a derogatory term. The vast majority of human society is made up of "carebears" if you take the standard PvP definition. Because I don't enjoy hunting down people who are minding their own business, perhaps missioning or mining, and blowing them up or stealing their crap I'm a "carebear."

Since when is not being a dick a bad thing? Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there aren't people who whine and complain far too much in the game. If your Orca or your Hulk gets blown up you are undoubtedly going to be pissed, and yes, chances are the guy who just popped you is a raging asshole. Venting a bit and complaining about how much that asshole is an ass does not, in my opinion, make you a overly cuddly person. People, however, take it to far and fail to realize that ship loss and PvP are part of the game.

But, on the other hand, there are a fair number of "pirates" who are just childish assholes in the game. Suicide ganking a hulk just to piss someone off? You are an asshole. Flying around popping people in newbie ships just because they are a fun target? You are an asshole. If you fly around baiting people merely so you can blow up their ship, you are an asshole.

I have no problem with pirates who make piracy their way of life. They do it for salvage, they do it for cargo, they do it for ransom, they do it for whatever reason they want, that is fine. But people who log on just to be a dick to other players in the game are assholes. Remind me to call you a "carebear" next time someone beats you to a pulp for being an asshole and you go complaining to the police.

(Note - this isn't a response to http://alexiamorgan.blogspot.com/2009/09/carebears-need-to-harden-fuck-up.html and while the post by Alexia was meant more as Satire than as opinion it unleashed my Carebear Rage)