The lure of the carebear

Y114.09.27

Police state
Thinking about some time out of null to catch up on a few hisec things such as repairing Minmatar status, Incursions and the quicker training times of a better clone. Maybe wait until Logi V is complete, finish the Tengu plan and hook up with an old ex-corpie to shoot the shit, share some finest Gallentean herb and have some exploration fun and games. Might even get some bling out of it.

Incursions
Those in the know tell me that the best resources for anything Incursion are How to Run Incursions and the Nexsoft fitting guides and let’s face it, any one who uses the following statement has got to know what they are talking about –

Please take care while running incursions of any size immediately after Escalation is released. CCP have of course never failed to deliver high-quality bug-free content, but just in case they do keep half an eye on the screen which isn’t playing cartoons about ponies.

I will probably wait until T2 large projectiles and / or blasters have been queued & cooked before carrying on with incursions, but watch this space.

Chewing
A more pressing thing than keeping the slaves happy is picking the indy side of things up a bit. I have come to terms with the fact that I [and indeed one] cannot create the perfect PI set up that produces all resources equally, but I have a setup that makes me a worthwhile profit for minimal work and I have just realised that the storage area in the CO’s is plenty large enough to hold any overstocks of tier 1 or 2 resources that may be produced and at least the import/export taxes go straight to the Alliance and not Interbus. When they are getting full, I can clear out the overstocks and either haul direct to market or allow the factories to run down and use them up. More hauling vs. less profit – this will be highly dependant on the ‘be arsed’ factor at the time.

I should be able to get a barge and a basic PVP ship JF’d to the indy staging area for some boosted mining ops, so short term plan is to get them bought, fitted and into the pickup location. Then chew some rocks for a bit between reshipping to repel boarders. Must speak to those that know mining for barge types & fits first, as it is all new to me – biggest thing I have mined in is a Navitas. Which reminds me of this little gem – Mining with Planks.

Quote of the day
FC of the Alliance birthday roam declared local chat open for abuse, then promptly trumped all comers by immediately posting this reply to the first red who posted -
[ 2012.09.22 19:48:27 ] red > was that ur hero or what?
[ 2012.09.22 19:48:36 ] FC > stfu bitch
Maybe you had to be there.

And absolutely nothing to do with carebearing, but I want [and some might say, need] one of these

Training
Logi V, 3 weeks. The things I do for the Alliance.

Fly safe

o7

Pop, null & plants

Y114.09.19

Pop
Tooling about the other night, doing something we probably shouldn’t, somewhere we probably shouldn’t and taking far too long about it, resulted in us getting being well smartied, losing a couple of ships and camped in system while looking for a safe exit. Local spiked further and we stayed still a bit too long, allowing them to get a warp in on us. The anchor warped off to a safe and the command to warp to him was given. Most of the fleet made it out but I was left in the well deployed red bubble to be locked & pointed and have all the EWAR in the world put on me - I couldn’t even lock anything to shoot back. Man, a swarm of those pesky EC-300’s does the job - the only module I could burn out was the I-Field and I don’t think I did that properly either.

The reds graciously offered me a 20mil ransom and kept me everythinged for ever to think about it before getting bored and finishing me off, pod n’all. 51 on the KM, which is some kind of Corp record, I believe. I managed to get home with less hassle than the surviving fleet though. Sorry, rambling.

Protip, kids – STAY ALIGNED and warp early when trouble comes in. If you are not engaging the incoming OPFOR, of course. I know this and even worse than that, I do it all the time but obviously needed the reminder. Don’t wait blindly for fleet orders for the most basic stuff you should be doing anyway.

Some good came out of it though, the rest of the fleet got away, I refused to pay them pesky piwates any money just for them to blow me up anyway and I politely declined the kind offer the CEO made to reimburse the loss. I’ll keep it in the bank for later ;)

The emptiness of null
Fleet went out recently to pastures new [for me] looking for some bots to pop, but apart from a couple of pilots unfortunate enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, it was empty, really empty. [Sorry about the trousers, Mr Tengu – not dry clean only I hope]. CTA then came via FC to return home to help with a problem there, but that had waned away too. At least it gave me some to get the replacement ship in and move some of that bastard PI about. I say bastard, but it paid for the ship I lost. Little bastard, then.

Useful implants
In EFT, fits are often worked out using ‘All skills level V’ making some of the fits quite tight if you don’t have all the required fitting skills to V. The most common problem I have found comes with the power grid and it is the most easily sorted with a cheap implant. The Inherent Implants ‘Squire’ Engineering EG-601 gives you 1% more PG to play with and means you don’t necessarily need to wait 3 weeks to train Advanced Weapons Upgrades from the IV you all have, to the V you wish you all had, to fit that 7th T2 heavy launcher on your Drake. Not that it will matter when they nerf missiles this winter. However, as someone who knows far more than me said - 'Battleships should be the king, not Battlecruisers'.

Another useful implant which I have just discovered is the Zainou ‘Gypsy’ Signature Analysis SA-701 which yep you guessed it, gives a 1% bonus to scan resolution, reducing lock times and enabling more KM whoring. Not that I advocate that.

While working out if it would fit in my head with the EG-601, I have realised that the implant codes have all been redone to make them understandable by the idiot, sorry, layman. Ignore the ‘Inherent Implants ‘Squire’’ malarkey and just look at the code EG-601 – EG = energy grid [what it affects], 6 = slot 6 [where it goes in yer loaf], 01 = the percentage increase it gives [1% in this case]. If I had paid attention to this,  I would have known already.

Of course, implants are destroyed when you are podded, but meh. Just cash some of the squintillion LP’s you earned when you were a carebear and get more.

Quote of the day
Alliance member getting his priorities right for a recent daytime CTA -
[21:41:59] Alliance member #1 > I'm off to bed. Gotta be up early to phone in sick :P
[21:43:01] Alliance member #2 > now that's dedication

Training
2 days to LRT V.

Fly safe

o7

The Drake is a lie

Y114.09.13

Blah
Apart from the odd ninja session, RL has conspired to reduce my EVE opportunities to a mere twice or thrice a week, so all that jump clone malarkey will probably come in handy for nipping between the appropriate regions to tool around with me muckers, which lets face it, is what it’s all about. That and the KB stats, of course.

Enjoying my last 40-odd days of KM whoring before Logi V completes and I feel duty bound to cleric allies rather than shoot enemies. Not that there have been any suitably sized gangs of enemies to engage recently – 2, maybe 3 roams and 1 Arazu to show for it. Different day / TZ corpies are also having this problem – the rucks are there, but never when I’m on! Least I’ve got a new ship fitted and started to repair the damage that too many Amarr missions have done for my Matar standings.

Quote of the week
A 2006 Corpie on the ignominy of being reduced to buying and flying a Drake for the first time after many years in game

[ 2012.08.24 18:35:23 ] Corpie > I bought a Drake for the 1st time
[ 2012.08.24 18:35:28 ] Corpie > feel dirty
[ 2012.08.24 18:36:12 ] Caisman > and rightly so
[ 2012.08.24 18:37:33 ] Caisman > i now have half my kills with drakes :(
[ 2012.08.24 18:37:43 ] Corpie > ewww
[ 2012.08.24 18:37:57 ] Caisman > never even chucked a missile before
[ 2012.08.24 18:38:13 ] Caisman > i now fly them in a hair shirt
[ 2012.08.24 18:39:39 ] Corpie > kind of hope i lose it on the way in

Training
LRT V.

Fly safe

o7

Vile Rat

Y114.09.12

RIP Sean Smith, aka Vile Rat off the Goons. Fly safe o7

Clones and tings

Y114.09.12

Preparation
Spent an entire night running around fitting a new BS for some full-on PVP action just to have the op moved forward a day rendering me unable to fleet up. Up yours, spais! The Hunger Games is a good movie, though.

Next thing to prepare is a ratting BS to leave in null and bin the PVP long enough to use it. Hmmm… Domi? ‘Pest? Citroën C4 Grand Picasso VTRi?

Jump Clones
Managed to get a jump clone out to slave space to do some anoms the Corpies seem to be doing well out of, then came the call for BS [above] and a need for a fresh clone, so move to a suitable station and install another JC. Eh? [Quick, petition CCP and ask for them to remove it and take all my ISK for cheating]. I only have Infomorph Psychology III but I created another clone. How does that work? Ah, because the sleeve I’m in [1 unit of spirits to the first to identify the reference], doesn’t count. Obvious really, otherwise you would need Infomorph I just to exist and you don’t. Think I understand now. No matter how many you have they are always in the wrong place or you are waiting out the bloody cooldown and I have now come to terms with the fact that if I want to PVP I will be training slower. Sod hisec PVE, it’s dull and for girls – I’d rather sell my children’s toys for PLEX and donate some to corp. Slightly sun-bleached red Little Tikes car anyone?

Quote of the week
An Alliance mate on the difficulties of distributing rewards for allied mining ops - 'It's not all smokin' bowls n' reggae!'

Training
Minmatar Cruiser V. Haha, tricked you - it’s finished, praise be to Jamyl. Now 10 days to Long Range Targeting V.

In my bid to become accepted by the true Amarr, I really must stop training for slave ships and train for a true ship other than our Shuttle. I renounce Jacus Roden and plead piety at the feet of our glorious leader and know she will inspire me – AMARR VICTOR!!!!

Endnote
Forget it, I’m keeping it.

Fly safe

o7

Propaganda

Y114.09.08

Crikey
I have just managed not to log into EVE for several days and no, the PC isn’t broken. The first was the hardest, seeing it SITTING THERE, WINKING, TEMPTING ME. But I persevered and made it through my self imposed EVE ban and have managed to clear the growing list of stuff to do that doesn’t involve spaceships. Of course, blogs, EVEgate, Alliance forums and checking how many days left ‘til Minnie bloody Cruiser V completes via Aura don’t count as not playing EVE. Back in the saddle tonight though :D

Ah yes, Aura is a great little Android application for offline API monitoring of yer EVE characters - it does other stuff as well – database, fitting tool etc but not really explored these yet. Legend has it that there’s something similar for i-Things too.

Learn
Before I started EVE, I did a fair bit of ‘research’ on the ol’ interweb to check what I was getting into. So many things caught my interest, but none more than the following two and I apologize for not linking them sooner. If you haven’t already, check them out – utter genius and I will say no more about them other than watch and read the Clear Skies machinima series and INNOMINATE NIGHTMARE’s EVE Online 0.0 Experiment
Fly safe INNO, wherever you may be o7

Training
Take a wild guess, go on.

Endnote
No-one want that mil, then?

Fly safe

o7