EVE Journey

Been awhile since my last update. Every character is basically now in Empire and with a rather small mining fleet, that’s what’s mostly occupies the time when I choose to login. However, mining is rather boring even if it allows multi-tasking to catch up on reading or re-watching BSG.  Mining fleet essentially makes up of maxed-Mining Director with Orca and 3 Mackinaws (Hulks with tiny cargo-holds don’t work well now).

As for rest of activities:

• Mission grinding is a bore when there is no new mechanics there
• Wormholes isn’t too suitable with limited time
• Null-sec is pretty much not the right environment when you have 2-3 hours per week.

So, when I saw this post EVE Online Development Strategy (CSM Public), it seemed like the CSM is discussing points which are very valid on getting subs more engaged.

The competitive advantage of EVE is the enduring community of players CCP has earned over the past decade, whose ambitions, successes, setbacks, betrayals, and battles provide infinitely more content and headlines than giant-panda-themed dungeon bosses. CCP’s challenge is to maintain this advantage by keeping existing subscribers engaged while steadily attracting new players.

Agree fully with the sentiment here. CCP seems to have gone full-on “iteration” mode and forgotten the need for new incremental content. While it’s great to see ships being re-balanced, UI issues being fixed, there needs to be growth in the gameplay. They seem to swing wildly from lots of new fluffy stuff (which is forgotten) or lots of good work on the existing game. Perhaps a better balance is needed to attract the vets.

For the time being, with 4 subs, I’ll still continue to support the game (as there is nothing like EVE Online) but with games like Star Citizen, Elite: Dangerous and X-Rebirth coming up, sure seems there is going to be many pull factors to focus attention on them instead.

Mica recently got REALLY bored and decided to try out all the T3 cruisers (except for the Proteus since it feels like a Deimos). He’s just about to hit 50mil skill points and is really into spaceships. I can’t say I share the passion but have willingly contributed some ISK since he has helped the corp a lot with security duty.

Proteus: Freedom is liquid, supple, mellifluous. It surrounds us, engulfs our bodies, drowns our fear. We plumb freedom’s depths and consume the nourishment within. From these waters, we are born; when we die, we shall return to those waters.

Out there, among the stars, are the waters, freedom incarnate. That dark, endless void is our destiny, our path, our goal. We must not fear it, nor should we control it. Rather, we should embrace it, trust it, love it. Its ever-changing face, its protean existence, is our very essence. We are those stars, the void, the awesome waters of space: ancient, forever, free.

- Jinsente Parmen, The Gallente in New Eden

Tengu: When we first saw the flock, we were surrounded, caught in a spectacle of stimuli. Brilliant colors, dancing lights, beautiful cacophonies, wafting ambrosia. Those birds surrounded us, each one a different shape, an altered species, a new wonder. I tried to follow a single bird, but my efforts were futile: Transformation is natural to their existence. Imagine it: an undulating mass, a changing mob, all those beasts partaking in wonderful transmogrification.

These were our augurs, our deliverers, our saviors. Standing amidst the flock, we should have feared their glory; instead, we drew hope. This moment is the first time I understood what it meant to be Caldari: Divinity in the flock, delivery in flux, one being, many changes.

- Janto Sitarbe, The Legendary Flock

I spent some time in the Tengu with the cross training to missiles/shields and have found it an excellent ship. Interestingly, the mechanics decided to play a trick on Tengu owners one day and installed the propulsion modules backwards. I can imagine Jita having interesting day when Tengu owners undocked.

Legion: Revelation burrows through the material world, devours creation’s soil, digests the thoughtless void, and produces significance with God’s grace. From emptiness comes meaning, essence from existence, soul from matter.

Is God through the wormhole? Did God grant us this boon, this new technology, a revelation from on high? These weapons are God’s new prophecy, domain, and blessing. Let us use God’s grace and prepare New Eden. We are God’s soldiers, weapons, glory. Our people are God’s army. Together, we are the legion.

-The Heresies of Hinketsu

With it’s sleek lines, the Legion is definitely pleasing on the eyes and Mica is warming to the idea of lasers instead of drones providing DPS. It’s oddly satisfying to see the lasers carve through space and instapop rats.

Loki: For many Minmatar, the high mountains of Matar hold wonders unknown to the rest of New Eden: hidden glens, beautiful creatures, buried customs. Not surprisingly, the Krusual tribe lay claim to these mountains, their home for generations and base to their machinations.

Krusual elders whisper ancient tales among their huddled tribes, describing the glory of heroes past and enigmatic prophecies of old. On the darkest day, at the most hopeless moments, an elder may speak of loki, in reverent tones and excited hushes. In the ancient tongue, the loki are the crux of Krusual thought. There is no direct translation for this word; in fact, loki translates differently among the elders. It can mean “hidden wonder” or “secret passage”, “changing mask” or “unseen dagger”. Regardless of its context, loki has one meaning common to all its tales across all the elders: “hope”.

We haven’t had much time with the Loki after the build and Klen has had more time on it after he eagerly jumped into it when we first brought it back from Jita. We’ve not seen him since .. the sly fella.

Long time associates who have been providing blueprint research & copy services have decided to call it quits after 2+ years. It was founded on 2009.05.04 on the back of several dramas as we moved from Providence to Outer Ring.

A few of us recruited some junior researchers and till now have at least 5 active researchers constantly seeking to provide us with copies for T2 invention. With 27 T2 batch runs completed, this has contributed to 7480 T2 modules (62 unique items), 20 T2 ships, 580 T2 drones and a quite a few ammo for pew pew.

The POS was named “Unknown System J100145” after the wormhole system which I spent a fair amount of time while exploring the new phenomenon.

With the researchers slowly spending less and less time on the work at hand, running the POS (a Shadow Control Tower) at almost 265mil/30 days in POS fuel costs is slowly grinding away the wallet.

Should I create another smaller POS?

30 x research agents (Core Complexion, CreoDron, Duvolle, Roden, Lai Dai)
30 x manufacturing slots (with 10 more to come)
40 x research/copy/invent slots

One can do a lot with this resources.

AMARR MASS PROTEST – NO MT IN EVE!, a photo by Jar Calhoun on Flickr.

Amarr local @ 552

MASS PROTEST – NO MT IN EVE!, a photo by Jar Calhoun on Flickr.

Jita Local @ 1529

Join in-game “MASS-PROTEST”

Huge fan of Ian Chisholm’s work on Clear Skies and his latest production “Clear Skies 3″ is out!

http://www.clearskiesthemovie.com/default.htm

CPP should just hire the whole crew who delivered this great trilogy and get a whole tv series out!

Incursion’s new character creator finally arrived! With that characters would get a chance to look more realistic with the new Carbon technology and eventual Incarna release. Took 2 nights to run through 9 characters but it was quite enjoyable to see the results come out pretty well. The new engine really captures the essence of the old portraits although I wish there were more options to add on to truly differentiate from the countless characters being generated.

Old vs New Characters

It’s been a long hiatus from Eve. Reestablished contacts and have since managed to get some industrial activity spinning again in my high-sec bases. It’s been slow going but will have to take time to re-learn and get in touch with people again.

Dominion went by and some significant changes were made to system sovereignty. Catching up on news channels, seems that the first 0.0 region I used to call home in Catch/Providence has since been conquered by AAA and friends (Ushra’khan,etc). It seems they are planning to establish NRDS again so that will be interesting.

Mica’s brief time in Fountain with Sons of Tangra also saw the region change hands. Thus is the volatility of 0.0 space. Makes me miss the good times now that I’ve logged almost 1 year in high-sec since leaving 0.0.

Tyrannis was recently announced and with that the land rush begins. We’re finally able to do something with the gorgeous planets that will slowly take away our reliance on the npc corps which have for so long provided us with essential goods. I’ve taken a good look at POS fuel manufacturing and have asked an associate to begin studies and trials on how we can benefit from this asap.

Eve University has also rather generously created some tutorials on the subject which you may find useful.

CCP’s introduction is also worth a watch.

Eight months! That’s how long since I’ve last played EVE on a consistent basis. Other than the occasional logging in to switch skills, RL has occupied most of my time as well as a new MMORPG called “Aion”

The characters in EVE are progressing nicely with capital skills being trained slowly (EVE has the unique? system of learning new skills in real-time). Jar is counting the days till the next big mining op while Mica is currently stuck with a shit-load of assets in Fountain after he was booted out of the corp for being away for too long. Bad timing to get busy IRL when living in active 0.0!

Came across a post today that illustrates the real world cost when a ship is created and lost in PvP. Sobering to note I’ll soon be able to fly 100USD ships and getting them blown up!

I’m now part of “The Scope”, a small sized corporation with global extent. The new corp chat shows 258 present but I’m just another person joining the ranks. Finally took the plunge to drop from TGIND as I’m not able to devote the energy and time necessary to get things working again. There are many things to fix and I wish Page well in rebuilding the corp.

Since I had roles, the action of dropping roles actually requires a 24 hour standby period. Interestingly Nova got war dec’d by OuterRim Jobs and fighting could legally start before I could quit so I helped out by talking to locater agents to find the “scumbugs” who declared war on us. Level 4 locator agents allow you to query a person on his whereabouts. Within 10 minutes, an evemail is sent indicating their location. There is a 15minutes interval before you can use them again so its worth going to a region where you can use a few locator agents at one time. Eve-agents.com has a great database of all possible agents you can work with.

2009.06.05 22:52
The sleazebag is currently at Nourvukaiken II – Moon 1 – Modern Finances Investment Bank station in the Nourvukaiken system, Okela constellation of Lonetrek region.

Mica has already moved to the forward base and I heard he had an interesting encounter but he’ll also be moving on after the war dec. Hope we get back to 0.0 soon.