Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Status Report Type Post!

Some days I feel like the two office monkeys in the picture too busy checking progress to make any actual progress. All the training plans and ISK making plans and plans for how to fly through dangerous space and plans on what to buy/sell for trading. I swear some days the status of each plan and making sure that the project is on track is why EVE has corporations as groups of players. It’s seriously more work than my real life job tracking each and every project. Spreadsheets in Space might be a mocking term used to describe EVE but well with all the moving parts to track. A lot of the time I feel the need to create spreadsheets to track aspects of my EVE time. As such I have many spreadsheets on one of my gaming rigs at home.

To make matters worse this week my RL job has me in Atlanta Georgia whipping a remote data center into shape. I am away from my comfortable gaming sanctuary with all its raw power and vast screen resolutions playing on a laptop. While I have at night more free time to play EVE this laptop can just render the pilot portraits. That’s on the highest performance settings, plugged into an over sized power brick, with a gun held to its CPU. So let’s just say PvP is not happening, in fact the letters P v P lag out when I type them in MS Word on this pocket calculator. Anyhow I have all this time on my hands and about the only things I can do with it are trade, mine, or finish moving my P.I. colonies.

OK so I am not at home where I have all my spreadsheets that I use to calculate this, that, or the other. So as I redesign my P.I. colonies and hunt about for things to trade I find that I am missing the little table I have at home that I update from market feeds from Jita etc. I am missing the exact daily inputs for my production colony. THEN zombienutz announces that he has room in his training queue via capsuleer on my iPhone. I don’t have EVEMON installed and begin to hyperventilate trying to remember what skill is next in the plan. Traveling and playing EVE without your army of external EVE resources is a right royal pain in the balls.

What if EVE had some capacity to build training plans and store them much like EVEMON? What if also P.I. had some sense of flow charts (there is a nice picture on the schematic) that could be used to track colony input and output ratios then tie them to profits. Why must I maintain a spreadsheet of all the markets I choose to trade in (yeah I know there are community web sites) in an environment where conscience can be captured and dumped into another body. To me EVE and the concept of corporations scream better corporate like tracking tools. Not going to talk about the horrid corporation management tools because really there are NONE to talk about.

Anyhow! I have all the time in the world for the next few nights to play EVE. Sadly PvP is out on this 1990’s cell phone of a laptop. So it’s ISK making activities for me. I just wish there was more integrated tools to manage it all.

Cheers

EVE SOB

Friday, September 24, 2010

SOB, you are NOT supposed to mine anymore!

So yesterday I lost not just one but two hulks. Even at today's reduced markets that's 280M ISK that is now at best some tangled wires and perhaps a armor plate. So what exactly was I doing to loose 2 hulks?!

See I am moving my P.I. farm to a nice little pocket of 0.5 space that is tucked away behind a few 0.4 systems. So far I've moved 50% of my P.I. farm and I and making 25% more stuff. Happy times. The only downer is I need to fly all my badger MK1's through there. Sounds like a pain in the ass. I know why not just move my un-loved hulk and some BPO's over there and mine me up some rocks to make a small fleet of badgers. The first light bulb should have went off right here. Lets risk a 150M ISK ship that takes 20 second to align and warp so I can use it to build a fleet of ships worth 2-3M ISK. Back story done. /facepalm

OK so I grabbed a retriever fitted for ice mining. I scouted in a shuttle with my alt and made it through the 2 LowSec systems with no other pilots in local. Time was short so I shuttled back with my main and started on my way through with my hulk. First gate into LowSec I JUST get pointed by a drake. When I say JUST, he must have been sitting there for about 15 seconds before he decided to lock me. Literally as I aligned and built speed and was at 1/2 speed he started to lock and just got the scram on literally as the speed bar was hitting 3/4. Nuff said. All right so I have a tank on the hulk and some T2 drones. Might as well try and get back to the gate and see how my drones do (yeah I was done, but hey might as well make them work for it). So I reproach the gate, activate the tank and launch my 5 Hobgoblin IIs. So lets just say this I lasted 12 volleys from said Drake before I was liberated to my fast pod. He did good bumping me off the gate and my drones did get him down to half Shields. I typed a ":)" in local as I warped out and my wallet flashed for a HUGE 32M ISK insurance. Yeap SOB, you are dumb! Moving on.

So I warped back over to my new pocket and for grins looked to see if there were any hulks for sale. Yeap, 1 hop in highsec from where I was trying to get there was a hulk for sale for 138M ISK. After banging my head on the desk for about 5 mins it was time to start work. I bought the hulk and logged off.

OK flash forward a work day. It's 5:30PM and the last few hours of work have been slow. So I close down the work stuff and log in to EVE for a bit. I grab my Covert Ops (Yeah I know, Scout first you ass) and fly out to my main corp. Office and then Jita to get the replacement fit for the new Hulk. Out there and back no incident. Click warp too, MWD, Cloak. Happy times. I get to my new pocket office. Jump in the pod, get the hulk. OK back at the new office ready to fit. I fit from saved and add a nice new flight of hobgoblin II's. Spiffy and clean. I un-dock to go survey the local rock belts for stuff to mine. Mid warp the cell goes off. It's work and on answering there is a server fire that needs me. At this point I was lost in the situation and forgot about my 150M ISK hulks landing in belt whatever planet who the f**k cares. Anyhow, flash forward 45 mins and I wiggle the mouse on my gaming rig to see my pod floating next to a wreck with the name of my new hulk. It took a while to register what had happened, but 0.5 belt rats with thorn rockets had killed my hulk, which landed with it's active tank off. I was not mad at this point in time. It was just a stellar reminder why EVE is not an AFK sport and requires some focus. It also set a firm message that I should NOT be mining. I had not turned on a mining laser in the last 3 months why should I start now to build 2 badgers.

Anyhow after 260M ISK lost in exhumers in a day. I bought 5 badger MK1's and 2 Iteron I's and flew them through the short LowSec pipe with out a single sight of another ship. I even flew one filled with Advanced Command centers while I scouted with my Covert Ops with out incident.

It will be a long cold day in hell before I see another asteroid belt in a mining ship.

Cheers

EVE SOB

P.S. I welcome all the flames and dumbass comments.

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Winter Expansion: Incursion - Early thoughts.

So if you have not read it yet check out the announcement for Incursion the 2010 EVE winter expansion here http://www.eveonline.com/incursion/

Some highlights:
· Sansha attacks are back for some more PvE fun – Hints of motherships and LP rewards
· CSM suggested improvements – Well \o/ rock on CSM!
· Hardware upgrades – JITA nodes for all please (aka the ‘double wide’ IBM blade)
· Software upgrades – Does this mean client min specs upgrades?
· Game and fleet performance – AMEN!
· CCP’s Carbon Character technology – we all just got a lot sexier (incarna is coming)
· Noctis – salvage ship saving the prime hull
· Amazing New visuals – more sparkle on our sparklies!
· Dynamic and simplified system for P.I. – NO MORE BILLION CLICKS A DAY!!!

Not much else in there at this point in time. Sounds like another PvE focused expansion with some tweaks to the big boy PvP stuff. The carebear in me is happy, and well my PvP side is sleepy and unloved. So I guess it’s a win. Be interesting to see how much carbon we get. How much less lag there is. If we suddenly need a PC with an APEX card to get decent eye candy at performance.

You excited yet kiddies?

Cheers

EVE SOB

Monday, September 20, 2010

Blood Sugar Tea.

Streams of hot water flowed across her body washing away the sins of the night before. The heat and steam of the shower acting as her absolution as she allowed it to erode away her thoughts. She smiled as the fluids swirled at her feet before gurgling down the drain taking with them the last evidence of her crimes. The thought of him still on her mind and his smell was still clear even now as his blood was completely washed away. Perhaps it was time to shed this clone and all its subtle memories for something fresh. Perhaps this time she would have blond hair not the dirty red she had become bored with. The soft chime of temple bells interrupted, someone was paging her. She strode from the shower, wrapped herself in a towel and heading for her office. The shower shut off and began the first of several sanitizing cycles thus ending any links from her back to “him”.

“Good Morning my child!” greeted the old Gallente man as his image came into focus before her.
“Good Morning Sir!” she returned bowing slightly allowing her towel to slip a little knowing it always caused him some discomfort. Yet today his misshapen eyes took on sharp gaze sending an uneasy feeling to her core. She repositioned her towel and crossed her arms across her chest. There was an uneasy pause in time before he spoke.
“Juliette I need you to check on Janice before 21:00 hours. I feel her duties are weighing heavily upon her.” He said softening his gaze and smiling softly before adding. “The company of your guiltless soul is needed to help her release her fears.”
A curt smile formed as Juliette replied “So my “sister” needs to lighten up. Did you ask her to haul your Exotic Dancers again?”
He chuckled softly for a moment if only to be polite. “No, I’ve asked her to fuel Station-1. So please be kind to your sister.” The image snapped shut and he was gone.
“Shit!” cursed Juliette as she turned to her wardrobe. Today she would wear that damn uniform she hated and go prepare Janice to die.

-

Station-1 quietly reported having 20 days of fuel left to its owners. It then ran a self auto check. Ammunition levels in all turrets were at 98%. All warp scram and web arrays were online and undamaged. Moon extraction cycles were operational and silo capacity was at 50%. The manticore was fueled and loaded in its hanger array. The last dock was 8 days, 12 hours, 7 minutes, and 47 seconds ago. Last hostile contact had been 8 days, 12 hours, 8 minutes, and 15 seconds ago. The aggressing ship, a rifter, was eliminated by array #3. A date was added to the report and Station-1 returned to passive mode as it monitored the 300KM bubble of space it called home. An incoming transmission flickered across the empty control deck indicating the ETA of 22:00 for a refueling craft. With a hiss the stations life support systems prepared for living inhabitants. An old antique bubbled and gurgled as it brewed coffee the way it was made 300 years ago. Then Station-1 returned to passive state and resumed scanning its bubble.

Nine astral units away another machine scanned its surroundings. Yet this machine was not compiled of circuits and power grids like stations-1. It was sinew and blood suspended in an amber fluid deep within the bowels of a Hurricane Battle cruiser. It was posed 15KM from the jump gate flashing and shimmering radiantly as the sensor boosters probed for the next kill. The machine watched and waited for the flash of a gate to fire. It’s persona far colder than any POS.

-

With her usual long powerful strides Janice arrived outside the entrance to the Prime Cadet. It was an officer’s bar in the upper levels of the station that was frequented with capsuleers with strong moral standards and clean records. Janice came here often during her down time, but today she was not looking forward to her visit. The last time she met Juliette for lunch it involved a seedy nameless tavern in the stations underbelly with lunch ending to the sounds of blaster fire. The fact that Juliette had chosen the ‘Cadet was like a Brutor asking for a napkin. With a sigh she pushed on the door.

“Welcome back Janice!” bubbled the perky hostess “Juliette is waiting for you in room #7 and asked we direct you to her on arrival!”
“Great, thanks!” replied Janice as she brushed past and headed to room #7. “Time to get this over with.” She muttered under her breath.
“Enjoy your lunch captain!” the hostess called after her in a chirpy voice.

As Janice entered room #7 Juliette stood and greeted her with a Caldari officers salute. She was dressed in a Caldari Captains uniform that was neat but only adequately prepared. Janice was uneasy now as she knew Juliette hated to wear uniform and the whole situation smelt all wrong.
“OK! I am really freaked out Juliette. First this bar and now you in uniform saluting me!”Janice barked
“Well Hello to you too Janice.” Juliette replied with a coy smile.”What did you expect dirty coveralls or a skin tight cat suit?”
“Sister if I was wearing a blaster right now, I’d have shot you for an imposter!” Janice looked Juliette right in the eye as said it. Her cold eyes showing no sign she was joking.
“Look! The boss chased me out of the shower this morning and told me to check in on you. Then he told me he is sending you up to refuel station-1” shot back Juliette “Oh and if you want to talk about freaked out, he did not look away when I slipped with my towel today.” Juliette shivered a little as the words left her lips.
“He look at you with that creepy stare?” Janice softened a little with the question.
“Oh yeah! Still feel like I have a hole in me. Christ I need a drink.” Juliette rolled her eyes and made a vomiting motion as she replied. Janice chuckled and gave Juliette a big hug.
“The boss is one creepy old bastard but he pays us well!” Janice smiled as she said it but as she held onto Juliette her gaze turned cold. She tightened her hug on Juliette as a tears fell down her cheeks.
“Sis, your cracking my ribs!” gasped Juliette as she struggled free, and then saw the tears. “Oh shit, stop that sis. We all have to say goodbye to a clone now and then. We are immortal remember.” As she said it she brushed the tears from one of Janice’s cheeks.
“You know this is not a clone Juliette, this is my real body. What about the crew!? They don’t have clones.” Janice looked through Juliette as she said it.
“I lost my real body 5 days after I left POD school. The clone was just like my “real” body but it did not have any of the old scares. No twisted right leg from where I broke it when I was 5. No knife scars from my teen adventures. I have to say I don’t miss that body at all now.” Juliette said softly. “As for the crew they chose to sign up and I am sure each one of them has paid their insurance. Folks don’t come to space to live forever.”
“I think I need that Drink now!” Janice said as she tapped on the menu. She ordered a round of Caldari ale, a strong brewed beverage with a kick like a mule. The sisters spent the next hour or so washing away any fears Janice had. As they parted ways Janice had her uniform unbuttoned and Juliette was missing her jacket and her shirt was unbuttoned to her navel. They sang rowdy Caldari cadet drinking songs down the corridors without a care in the world. The time was 19:00 hours.

The soft whistling of the kettle pulled him away from the screen he was watching. He shuffled across the worn wooden floors to the black stove and lifted the kettle from the flame. He let his gaze shift out the window across the wheat fields as they swayed in the soft breeze. Pouring the hot water over the strong bitter tea leaves nestled in the fine porcelain pot he returned his focus to his screen. Two young Caldari women stumbled from a bar singing rowdy songs.
“Good work my child!” the old man muttered as he poured tea into 3 ornate iron cups. He put a knife to his finger tip making a small cut. He allowed his blood to drip into a small bowel of sugar before wrapping the wound with a clean patch of cotton. He stirred the blood into the sugar until it stained it all a deep crimson. Then he place equal amounts of the blood sugar into each cup of tea ritualistically stirring it in. He placed two of the cups in special shipping containers and placed them in a small orbital launch system. As he sent them on their way, he sipped from the third cup.

The unique taste of the bitter tea combined with the salty sweetness of the blood and sugar sent him back to his childhood. Before him his mother was preparing the blood tea a ritual. I was customary in his culture when family members left for war thus sending them away with a piece of you. His father sat at the table in full battle gear his face painted grey and black. His mother wept silently as she served the tea and took the first sip. He and his father drank next draining the cup. His father rose silently, as was custom, turned and walked out the door. He next saw his father dead and lifeless as his body was burned in a ceremony for the honored dead.

He drifted back to the present with soft tears falling down his face as he finished the cup. At least with this goodbye his family would only loose a body and not the soul as well.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Well this is part 2 of my little fiction writing experiment. If you like it post a comment, if you hate it post a comment. Heck if you read it and don't care either way let me know.

Cheers

EVE SOB

Friday, September 17, 2010

*BLINK* there goes a week…

So my last post on Monday was a little update on P.I. and how P1 products are all the rage in the market. While I’d still maintain this is true for the most part. Certain activities this week has lead me to believe that the RIGHT P2-3 products are more profitable. I am not going to bore you to death with details, but after hauling ISK300M worth of stockpiled P1 products to Jita one day this week. I spent a great deal of time on the market looking at what my little manufacturing planet can do to help me make less trips to Jita and more ISK. This lead to a complete re-work of several of my colonies, and a brand new spreadsheet. RIVITING STUFF, but I now make ~320M ISK a month for 30 minutes a day. Once I can stockpile some capital, time to start funding my second account with plex. WOOT!

Datacores are good things and while I am currently funding all invention jobs with farmed passive datacores on the ranch. I could be doing a lot better if I had some increased standings with the R&D corps. I need to go out there and just do it to unlock level 4 R&D agents. This means more missions running and perhaps taking a vacation in other regions with better agents. One might consider this a grind, but well I don’t HAVE to do it.

I bumped into wamphyrri for a quick convo this week as well. We were discussing ratting Battleships and trying to find a date to shoot each in the face with EMP S in rifters. I was online trying to get hold of my 0.0 corp. CEO to get the low down on some cheap drakes down those parts. So at least I spent some time online talking about PvP I guess. Sadly no time this week fling anything as ZombiNutz. Actually this week my carebear main fired more rounds at other players (well ECM drones) than my PvP pilot. Sad SOB!

If you took a moment to read the short chunk of fiction I wrote and then the recent post of smart peoples help for T2 haulers. You might click that my fleet of badgers are not in line with my current hauling needs. This is not just for supply in 0.0 but goes a little deeper in my general EVE life. I am not going to let too many cats out of the bag at the moment. Let’s just say my operations for carebearing are no longer bound to highsec and leave it at that. Oh and before you start camping LowSec entry gates, I’ve got some days of training left.

Either way this week was a blur both in EVE and mostly in RL. Colder weather and shorter days still don’t have the mini-clones settling to bed any sooner and Mrs. SOB has been lonely of late and demanding more of my time (not a bad thing *wink*). Makes the 30 mins a day of ISK making easy to sustain, but I want more time to shoot stuff one way or another.

Cheers

EVE SOB

P.S. Seems like people read my making free ISK articles as well. I might have to write another once I find a nice easy way to make ISK with little effort. I tried some trading and made 20% back on my investments, but ended up hauling stuff more than I would like. Damn skills!

Monday, September 13, 2010

P.I. Update

All right the official word right now according to me is P1 products are worth about 15% more than P2-P4 products based on JITA 4-4 buy orders. I net about 170M ISK a month from 14 Highsec making some select P2-P3 products. If I take the same base P1 products and sell them for the current buy orders I’d make 200M ISK a month.

Having said that, hauling vast volumes of P1 products into JITA has a fair amount of RISK and TIME associated to it. So for me the extra 15% is not so much worth the chance to lose a small chunk of it hauling it into Jita, or the extra hours a week it takes to do so.

On a side note I’ve found that I can build all of the products I am currently building on one planet. So I have 13 extracting planets now and 1 very busy manufacturing planet. This allowed me to set up a Highsec Oceanic planet that nets me 2M ISK a day for about 28 double clicks.

If the winter expansion beings the “master” extractor to the UI allowing folks to restart an entire planets extractors with just a few clicks. Then I might have to see how managing 20 planets goes. Right now I am at my daily click quota. So far for the time invested I am happy with the ISK it returns.

Cheers

EVE SOB

P.S. If you are set up to run 23 hour extractor cycles, but can find 1 day a week to run 5 hour cycles. It adds a ton of potential to P1 product harvesting. Just be sure to boost any links as 5 hour cycles push a lot more stuff. I can pretty much not log in for a few days on most of my planets now and know they will be producing P1 products. Happy times.

All right smart people: Help me with lowsec/nullsec hauling!

So one of the biggest things that bug me about 0.0 is supply, yeah shock and horror I know. Having a stack of interceptors 4 hops from Jita, with all the fittings and rigs ready to bolt together does not help me much in southern providence. While we do have Jump Freighters available war tends to limit their movement. As attrition starts to set in local builders get taxed and start to build what command wants built. Meaning variety of ships decrease and my interceptors are hard to find and more so fit.

So the solution is for me to start flying T2 haulers in the forms of cloaky or fast/tanked/+2 warp strength. The issue I have is not wanting to burn too many of these on gate camps and etc while I figure out which one works best. I am leaning towards the Bustard as ¾ of my pilots are Caldari and the idea of being able to bust through the bubbles and one tackle (assuming a single point each) while taking some pain sounds best. I’ve gate camped stealth bombers and know how fast they die if you decloak them. Just as I’ve lost a few ravens fitted with warp core stabs (jerks).

So what I need from all you smart people is your preference/opinions when it comes to the T2 haulers. Cloaky or warp core strength/Speed/tank?

Cheers

EVE SOB

Friday, September 10, 2010

Ebb and Flow

The general label of EVE as a SANDBOX based MMOG is something I feel is a little too flat. To me EVE is more like a shoreline with beaches, estuaries, and cliffs that are subject to effects of the water that is its players.

When I first started to play EVE if found myself like waves crashing against a cliff face. Each action returned little to no gain but every once and a while a chunk of the cliff fell off. I was relentless yet futile in my plight to beat down those cliffs.

In time the flow of the game took me to the beach. I still crashed onto the shore with fury but with every return came a little of the beach too. Every time I pushed forward a little of the beach also came back with me and together we shaped the beach. The force of my waves collided with other waves and the layout of the sands changed and churned.

I’ve moved past the beach now to the estuaries where things move in great swirls. Actions take longer and it’s much harder to influence things alone. With the steady filling and draining that is the combined movement of so many as a single body of water. The estuaries change slowly but dramatically as one body of water is pushed out, surges back, and then drains allowing another to flow in. It’s an easy place to feel cramped yet alone, but when returns come they are staggering.

Sometimes I simply enjoy the ocean and the lack of any shore to interact with. The objective is more about how my movements change the ebb and flow of other volumes of water in a much smaller scale. In times like this the shore has no meaning and there are no gains other than the knowledge of movement.

Cheers

EVE SOB

The Grind: A MEME of sorts

Tobold, Ecliptic Rift, and Morphisat have all posted a bit about “The Grind” as it relates to EVE. Reading a few recent blogs about plateaus and reformed pirates rebuilding security Status there are some aspects of EVE that can be considered a Grind I guess.

Having spent 4 long years in WoW grinding not only one of each class of character to max level, but also grinding out gold for this, standings for that, and Tier gear sets. I look at EVE and the many measures in a slightly different light. You see in EVE there is no path to follow. No ultimate NPC bad guy of the month to slay for your sparklies. If you don’t have faction with a corporation the world does not end. Even if you are so hard of luck (or brain dead) that you end up with NO ISK and NO SHIP. EVE gives you both as many times as you choose to bounce your head of the bottom of the barrel.

Progression in EVE is pretty much based on self created goals. That’s right you fail at EVE because YOU decide to do something that you are not ready to do. Did the game tell you that you HAD to fly out to that gate camp in providence where you lost your ship? Was the pirate who is now ransoming your pod required to do it by EVE? Did EVE make you mine veldspar for 3945678 Hours of your life? The answer to all is a resounding NO!

What EVE does demand is patience and a might bit of imagination. The patience is so you can build skills which in this game are accrued via real life hours spent training for them realized as Skill Points. They tick away indefinitely so long as you have a skill set to train in your skill queue. Sure you can speed up the rate at which they tick, but at some point all skill training requires patience. This is not so much what we can call a grind; as well you personally are not being forced to repeat a process over and over. The imagination part comes into play when deciding what to do while you wait for the skills to tick. Sure you might want to be the next pirate or 0.0 evangelists but you cannot fly for a damn and you surly will die. Finding things to do with what you can fly that make ISK is where imagination shines.

OK now let’s talk of ISK shall we in the realm of grinds. Yes it is true that in EVE ISK is the catalyst for greater things when mixed with skills. I’d also say it takes some ISK to make some ISK and by this I mean the more ISK you have to invest into your EVE pilots. The more earning potential these pilots have. An example of this might be trading. Where with limited skills and ISK you can make money buying goods on one side of the universe and trucking them to better markets to sell them for profit. As skills and ISK increase you truck less and manipulate the market more to gain profits. The bottom line is making ISK can become passive in that you don’t need to do much more than buy and sell, or harvest and sell items to acquire ISK. I recently posted some very low level ideas on making free ISK that are just the tip of the iceberg in each area.

So really there is no grind in EVE. The game is about using ones imagination to create cause and effect with the twist of how other player’s actions impact you. SANDBOX BABY, there is no bad guy you must kill to reach the next level. You decide what the next level is…

Cheers

EVE SOB

Thursday, September 9, 2010

I feel a wind a blowin'

Every once and a while in EVE waters need to be tested and positions on the beach re-evaluated. real life can be a bear to us all and stomp on our EVE time. PvP takes dedicated time and I am not one to commit to anything that I know will only get 50% of my effort. I type this at 10am having all ready worked 11 hours before taking a cat nap to go back to the grinding wheel for 6+ more hours. Oh and my kids will surly want me to be awake and a dad when they get home from school. Not complaining I have a good life, but I cannot be a jump on at any moment for a 4 hour fleet op person.

Either way changes might be coming to my PvP life, or my PvP life might give way to some carebear vacation time while I get things scheduled and find the right fit in a corp. Then again I might just stay right where I am and figure it out. That's the thing with change, it's not always by the books.

I am working on some more detail around the P.I. farm I run and what it does and/or does not do well. I am still venturing out now and then in a rifter and I do have some 1v1's I need to get too. Be patient with me please. In good time I will get to it all.

Cheers

EVE SOB

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Cutting a lily

The soft golden light of the artificial sun rose across the biosphere filtering into the small yet lavish apartment windows. It overlooked private well kept gardens with many species of flowering plants which had been grafted from terrestrial planets from one end of the universe to the other. It was a sight not often seen in the cold calculated stations about the Caldari Empire and one often only enjoyed by the wealthy. The apartment itself was above the standings of the industrial pilot who lived there. It had been a gift from the CEO for graduating with such high marks from the capsuleer academy. Standing at the window sipping a cup of coffee Janice gazed a moment at a white lily as it opened to meet the morning rays. It was one of the few times in her day she would be allowed to simply enjoy what she saw without having to make a decision that could cost the lives of her crew. Today she allowed herself a few extra moments of peace with the lily before she dressed and set about her duties.

The hangers were buzzing along at their normal frequency. A small army of workers dressed in coveralls smeared with coolant and nanite paste scurried about their tasks preparing ships for various capsuleers and crews. While technology ruled every inch of the hangers. It was living flesh that seemed to be the most common moving thing. One might have expected robots to be doing all the work while a few fat supervisors checked schematics and tweaked work flows. I guess there was something to be said for the quality of workmanship and ability to improvise that only meat could deliver. This morning there seemed to be an extra detail of workers attending one of the badger class industrials. Sparks flew from multiple points about its hull as the crew went about stripping back structure to boost the agility of the lumbering craft. One of the crew chiefs whistled as a new propulsion device was craned into place. Inside the flight crew was getting used to the tighter corridors and extra equipment. Grumbling as they cracked their heads on new protrusions about the craft. To the trained eye this badger was being prepared for speed and agility both qualities for which the badger class industrial was not renowned.

A tall Caldari woman stepped out into the midst of the hanger and instantly all activity stopped. Her uniform was immaculate down to the last button and crease. Her dark straight hair framed her pale face in a way that amplified the cold gaze her eyes held. Sister Janice’s image could have been one from a holomanual in the hands of a cadet at the Caldari capusleer academy. The way she conducted herself in the presence of the crew and the hanger staff was like watching an instructor demonstrate the task. Yet each and every chunk of meat in that bay looked at her with respect and an unusual fondness that came from service over time with a great captain. Quite unusual considering this badger pilot was just three months out of POD school.

“Sister, your craft has been refit per your request.” Reported Tiny a 240cm tall tower of a man who carried his 150kg well. His coveralls those of a hanger boss with slightly less grime covering the name patch on his chest and a high end datapad in his hands.

“So I take it this old crate will be a little livelier then?”She replied eyeing him over with her cold trade mark gaze.

Tiny let out a bellowing laugh. “Even with your horrible Nav skills Janice, this tub will turn and warp like a frigate today!” he said with a huge grin. A few of the newer crew physically winced at the remark anticipating a sudden flash of temper to erupt from the Captain. Janice took a quick step at the big crew chief and socked him playfully on the arm before nodding towards the crew.

“I sure hope so for their sake.” She shot back with the smallest hint of a smile.

The reaction once again had everybody looking at her, but this time a puzzled stupefied look fell across each face. Janice never joked with anyone about anything, and she most certainly never smiled. The awkward moment was short lived.

“I want this boat hot and ready to depart when I get back at 21:00 hours or I’ll trade you all to the service ZombiNutz!” Erupted Janice as the cold composed captain’s demur returned unpausing the bustle of activity as she strode with long strides off the deck. With the slightest pause she looked over her shoulder at a long scar across the badgers’ hull. Then she breached the door into the corridors beyond and was gone.

Tiny glanced at the first mate and barked “You heard her get this tub fueled and warm or you’ll be loading Barrage S into a rifters autocannons by the end of tomorrow! “ As Tiny turned to his datapad the big man paused, a look of concern settling on his mug. The captain had never smiled and more so she had not looked at the “scar” in months. Where was she headed at 21:00 hours that had her so nervous? A loud hiss from the ship snapped him back to his tasks and the thought was gone.

An old Gallente man in simple robes of white cotton reached into the flowerbed clipping the white lily with a perfect CLIP from his antique metal sheers. He lifted the flower to his face and regarded it with his deformed misshapen eyes before gently touching it to his nose. The sweet smell reminded his of his childhood as a common boy in the jungles of his home world. He gently placed the flower into an ornate glass case that emitted a small hiss as it closed and preserved the blossom for the next 200 years.

“Let us hope you return today my child so I might give you this gift!” he said peering at the young pilots’ empty quarters. “The task I have given you will test everything you have learned and perhaps the quality of your clone as well.”Chuckling softly to himself, like a grandfather might to his grandchildren, he limped from the garden.

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I am not a writer by any stretch of the imagination. Yet fiction seems to go with blogging about EVE. So please humbly accept my first attempt at EVE fiction. Be kind but honest with any comments, as through critique one can improve.

Cheers

EVE SOB

Frigate Cage Fight: UPDATE!

Thanks to all the people who took a moment to comment or tag me in game about the Frigate Cage Fight. Based on the interest I'll be doing the event some time in October/November this year. Right now I am getting my Drakes lined up before launching the event.

With that a new blog has been created for the event EVE CAGE FIGHT. Check it out for future updates to the event. Like wise folks with ideas, prize donation, and such can contact ZombiNutz in game via EVE Mail or email eve DOT cage DOT fight AT gmail DOT com.

Cheers

EVE SOB

Friday, September 3, 2010

New Banner

Well all this awesome banner artwork by Rixx javix at Eveoganda left me hating my old banner and picture. I hit up Mrs. SOB for some art and got told that she would do me some thing in the future. This translates into some time in the next decade.

So I broke out photoshop and spent about 30 mins hacking together the new temporary banner. While my lack of skill is apparent, it will have to do until a real artist can do the work. I think it's a step up from crappy text and a incursus BPO drawing... Even if I do say so myself!

***EDIT*** All right FINE, I messed with the whole site a bit!

Cheers

EVE SOB

Where in the universe is EVE SOB – September 2010

It is time for this month’s “Where in the Universe is EVE SOB” post where every month I summarize where I am at in EVE. I also throw in some real world stuff and the top CNN headline of the day for a historical WTF was the world doing back then element.

Where am I?

The month of August was a busy month in many ways. Real life moves along at the blur that has become the norm. I’ve seen some more hours for EVE as well and changed a lot of what we do on the “ranch”. I also have changed where I try and find my PvP.

Perhaps the biggest thing that comes to mind from August EVE wise is the EVENTS. The Death Race ran and all that took place screamed of a fun time with many thanks for Rixx javix of EVEOGANDA. I was unable to make the race this time but it’s added some new life to an old idea of mine. Hence my post about a Frigate Cage Match went out to the folks for a sanity check. The response I got was VERY positive and I still have to follow up with a few folks here and there. It’s is clear that the Cage Match will happen, but it might be a few months out while I get it organized. So for now I’ll just thank all those that took the time to plug, comment, or contact me about the event.

How’s building stuff doing?

The ranch has shifted gears a bit from T2 Assault Frigate and Interceptor production. We are starting to focus more on passive income. The Planetary side of the ranch now manages 14 planets in Highsec and has the ability to make pretty much any P1-4 product. Right now though the focus is what makes us the most cash for 30 minutes of clicking a day. The addition of 2 Alts, who I refer to as the Nuns, has enabled a lot more passive income and depth to the P.I. farm. I’ve also been training them in select science skills such that all invention jobs on the T2 side are entirely supported by R&D Agent provided datacores.

There are some other short term plans for the ranch, but for now those will remain news for next month.

How’s shooting stuff doing?

I might be in the market for a new corp. soon here. While Top Gear ventures are great people and delivered the promise of heading out to null. I have become a stranger to the corp. through a combination of time constraints and discontent with NULL life. It’s nothing to reflect on the corp. but gate camping and Sov structure bashing in terms of PvP is not my idea of thrilling.

So I’ve been trying my hand at LowSec solo PvP and for those that read this blog you know that this is going slow for me. I have received some in game mails from folks about hooking up to roam or 1 v 1 that I plan to honor as time allows. Just as I plan to do no more 0.0 PvP until I have lost 5 rifters (completing a tale of 5 dead rifters) in LowSec space.

What Skills am I training?

SonOfBraben: The drone skills have grown and I am mixing my skill time between finishing those out and furthering my science skills. There might be a few other skills in the mix for “other” things as well. :)

Zombinutz: The supporting ‘captor skills are getting done. I might be taking a deviation here shortly to return to Battle cruisers and perhaps some battle ship skills depending on what I find myself drifting towards for PvP.

Sister Janice (Nun Alt): Rocket Science to level 4, then it’s a cloaky hauler for her.

Sister Juliette (Nun Alt): Undecided right now. She has P.I. and Science for datacores now. Might add cloaky scout/scanning to her list.

In the pesky real world:

The mini-clones are back in school and the summer air in North Eastern USA is starting to take on a cooler mood at night. Some leaves are turning and we are entering one of my favorite times of year – FALL! Fall to me is my most productive outdoor month where I tend to do more nature oriented thinks like hiking and fishing. It’s also Halloween which is a blast with the mini-clones. Apple picking season always brings out some great home baked pies from Mrs. SOB. Also the days get shorter and as a result my gaming time tends to open up, meaning more time for EVE.

CNN headline for Today:

http://us.cnn.com/2010/US/09/03/tropical.weather/index.html?hpt=T1

(this one is close to home)

Cheers

EVE SOB