The Search for the Holy Grail.... of PvP

"He who is valiant and pure of spirit may find the Holy Grail in the Castle of..... aaaarrggghhhhhh" 

The Last Words of Joseph of Aramathea.

Are we asking too much? Does what we want actually exist in Eve Online? To be honest I don't know.

What do we want? We want a fight! But an equal fight, a good fight. Not a fight were we engage an Amarr militia fleet and suddenly there are hundreds of them coming out of the woodwork from seemingly nowhere (seriously, where do they all come from?). Not a fight verses one of the big pirate alliances where 2 minutes into the battle they light a cyno and titan bridge reinforcements onto our heads. Not a fight where if you deploy carriers you can expect 52 super-carriers to land 24 seconds later and melt them all in a swarm of fighter-bombers.

We had the "ideal" two years ago in the Gallente/Caldari faction warzone. After a period of Caldari dominance the tide was turning. The formation of the MDP had given the Gallente a force to be reckoned with. There was plenty of small to medium gang warfare. At times it was as high as 100 vs 100. Soloing was always an option in Black Rise. It was a great time. Then the wheel turned and the Gallente had dominance. We were getting some great fights but soon this was moving into a period of wiping the Caldari fleets with the greatest of ease. Caldari activity dropped off. To make things worse some of their better FC's went to 0.0 or worst of all, swapped sides, accelerating the decline of the Caldari Militia. From early summer 2010 onwards, some might say it started before that, we saw a slow death for the Gallente/Caldari warzone in our opinion.

There WAS a Squid There

So Shadows of the Federation started looking elsewhere. We had a short-term move down to NPC 0.0 space to help some friends who were being attacked. A potential for some proper PvP! This was also seen as a dual-opportunity, we hoped with us not around in Black Rise the Caldari might start getting a foothold back in FW. We thought it might have been an issue with us living at that time only 2 jumps from their hi-sec staging area of Nourv, it might tempt them out more if we left for a bit. That month in NPC 0.0 space should have been fun. The "Faction war noobs" verses big, scary 0.0 alliances. We thought that we'd need to up our game as many of us ventured into the unknown area of scary null-sec. But no, we didn't need to "up" anything. We were vastly disappointed in the PvP abilities of those we found in Syndicate. Our killboard efficiency in the campaigns was higher than we'd ever got in Faction War. Every time I log on there is always some Eve mails or notifications to deal with. The "surrender mails" for corps dropping from those alliances started making up half of the daily clear out back then.

It was clear to us that Syndicate was not for us. The alliances were generally carebears and couldn't compete with us, the "Faction War Noobs".

As we were wondering what to do next, the Caldari had not taken the opportunity to advance in Black Rise, we got an offer from R.A.G.E. alliance who were part of the NC. Plenty of action was promised, our own system, we could build a station and PvP was everywhere. So we packed up and moved over to Vale of Silence. We ratted, we ran complexes and we sat in POS shields for hours staring at a titan being told "Any minute now...." only to get blue-balled and disband. There was no medium PvP. It was either fairly rare solo fights or small gangs plus the usual 900 man blob/lag fest whilst shooting a station/iHub/SBU/POS etc. However, I did get the "kill mail" on a station! For those of you who have never experienced attacking a 0.0 station, 1 - be glad, 2 - it takes ages and 3 - the corp of the person who lands the "final blow" gets control of the station. But it was clear 0.0 sov-holding-megablob-warfare wasn't for us. So we packed up, sold our station to another corp and moved back to faction war... which was still pretty dead.

I feel a useful and integrated part of this iHub shoot op.... in my little BS!

Next we tried an alliance with Wolfsbrigade and headed into a new area of low-sec. We had some active war decs and limited piracy (sec status cap of -1.9) and basically cleared the area. The alliances we were deccing simply moved out after a few weeks of fighting. To be fair we were doing 20 v 20 engagements and not losing a ship on our side and killing 90% of them. So we moved again to the Amamake area and dropped the sec status cap. The Amamake area was well known as a PvP hotspot. And as pirates in the middle of that, surely we'd get what we're looking for. It got a bit better, but differences of opinions and play-styles between the two corps ended the fledging Alliance.

Which brings us up to where we are now.

The trouble with being a ebil piwat is that everyone shoots you. So here we are, sat between the Amarr Militia and the Minmatar Militia. Having both sides gang up on us, Rooks and Kings dropping us and being generally outnumbered (especially after the split with WBR).... but never out-gunned. The other night was a good example. We were having a small fight (3v2) and my Hurricane got popped, I reshipped in the next system but before I got back the Amarr had quadrupled their numbers and we had some Minmatar militia hovering at a pounce hoping to shoot some ebil piwats!

Why are we having issues currently? There are a few reasons. Firstly because everyone wants to shoot a piwat (which is not always a bad thing). Secondly, it's also summer so many of our members are doing more fun stuff and getting tans (we generally recruited casual gamers in the past, not hardcore gamers). Thirdly we've been losing numbers slowly with all the moving and switching directions during the last 7/8 months seeking the "grail". Also some people just don't want to go -5 or lower. So our current 10-20 man fleets (down from 30-50) are engaging other 10-20 man fleets only to have the opposing fleet double in size within a minute of the engagement starting.

So what can we do? Apparently Gallente/Caldari FW is dead and full of mission runners in Manticores. There is some action on the Amarr/Minmatar side, but is it really enough? Piracy can be a PITA to be honest and being in an active area means small gang and solo is difficult. Low-sec wardecs don't appear to work as the otherside just moves on. Our experience of 0.0 is its either lag-fest-mega-blob-warfare or carebears who think they are vastly superior to the "Faction war noobs" but soon find out no, they are not.

It would be nice to have FW "fixed" because let’s face it; it's not working properly is it? It's full of mission runners in cloaky ships and not enough PvP players. Plexing and capturing systems is worthwhile because it gives you.... erm.... OK it's not worthwhile in the slightest unless you want to grind faction standings, that one time. If it was fixed more people would use it. PvP corps would return and once you have the critical mass of players on each side, you've got it sorted!

A few ideas to revamp FW and attract people to it:-

- FW missions. Make it so you cannot cash in those missioning LP's without sufficient kills of the opposing militia. You get LP for killing other players so can we separate the "missioning in a cloaky ship" LP's and the LP's for "killing opposing militia members"? Two types of LP and to buy items in the LP store and you need a certain amount of both. No point joining the militia to just run missions then, you've got to do some PvP! 250,000 missioning LP plus 1000 LP from killing opposing milita to get your Navy Domi?

- Increase LP rewards for player kills. There is a huge disparity between LP's awarded for PvP and those awarded for mission running. Surely taking down several enemy capsuleers in expensive ships is worthy of more than what we are given currently? If I was to solo a Titan belonging to a rank 10 member of an opposing militia I'd only get slightly more than I used to get running a single mission. Soloing a Marauder or Black-Ops piloted by a rank 10 member of the opposing militia I get 2000 LP's. I used to easy get 12x that from a single mission from a good agent. To put it another way, I'd need to solo 50 t1 battleships piloted by people who didn't Plex to get the same LP's as a single decent mission. Turn it around, FW should reward PVP not missioning in cloaky ships! (*these calculations are based from a year ago when I was in militia, with the agent quality changes I'm not sure how close they are now)

- PLEXing. If you are in a militia and your militia occupies the system you get buffs. Have the Command Bunker give some bonus' like a warfare linked Command Ship. Reduced POS fuel requirements for those POS' owned by militia corps when the system occupation is yours. Reduced prices for militia pilots for repairs at stations in systems controlled by your militia. Make owning a system worthwhile and not just for spamming in local "na-nanana-na we captured your system! ha-ha-ha-ha!!".

- Stop Fighter-Bombers in low-sec. Bring back cap warfare without the fear of being wtfpwn by super carriers. A Titans DD device won't work in low-sec. For the same ISK investment, are the fighter-bombers from 4 or 5 SC's so different in terms of melting capitals?

- Fix the faction hit when repping a GCC/-0.5. When you are in militia and you rep a corp/militia mate who is GCC/-0.5 you take a standings hit to the faction. Seriously, after all this time WHY IS THIS STILL HERE?

However, who knows if FW will ever get some loving. Doubtful it'll be in the short term as 0.0 is getting some next, again. How many 0.0 revamps has there been since FW was introduced. Three? Oh well, I guess we'll just have to keep on looking for that grail of ours.

The 100,000,000 ISK question is, where in New Eden can we find a place where:-

• 20-30 man gangs are roaming the area most nights (EU TZ).
• Plenty of small gang action.
• Where you can solo PvP.
• Where you can make a bit of ISK to replace those ships you have lost in PvP.

 Anyone out there know.....?

Monday Night DIAF Fleets

Due to the time of year, I'm on reduced hours for the next month. Therefore I get an hour and a half in bed extra. Suddenly evening roams with my corpies are now a possibility as opposed to me having to log in some backwater system halfway through. I can now stay up until the EU guys and gals are going to bed.

Problem. It's summer and we're quiet in corp. We've got 2/3 primary FC's active currently. Only one thing for it. I'LL have to FC!

But you said you hate FC'ing Drackarn! What about your blog Confessions of a FC'ing Hater.

Yes. I hate FC'ing, but if it's the only way I can get in a fleet when I want a roam, then I'll do it.

So we form up in some BC's and the like. I asked for something fast with a bit of range. Nano-Arty Canes were popular. We head out and soon we get stuck in Tannakan. Our +1 finds a camp in Sahtogas on the Tannakan gate, a battleship fleet with a couple of logistics and at least one T3. I quickly get us to a pounce and consult the maps. No way around, the alternative would take us through high-sec. And as we are "-10 flashy ebil piwats that go G'aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar" that is a bit of an issue. So I opt for the Reverse-Reverse Brave Sir Robin tactic. We jump into them and I wing warp us to the out-gate. Assuming that the T3 and Logi don't have points and the BS would be too slow in locking us. We all land safely on the outgate and jump out. We make a few quick jumps to put some distance between us and then slow it down again.

Why CCP? Why? Why did you name these systems like this? How do you pronounce Schoorasana when you've had a drink? Just please never, ever name a system called "Owtgayt". That will really screw up my gate calling!

Our +1 finds a Drake off gate in Gratesier. He gets a warp in and we land smack bang on top of him. Surprise!

http://gallente.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10283633

We warp to the out-gate and suddenly a 'Geddon jumps into us. Before he can warp off he's pointed and webbed. He red boxes us! No lasers? A full neuting Armageddon. He tries to milk us dry so he can warp off but he cannot do us all before he goes down.

http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10283649

And podded. Erm Mr CEO, what was the fine for podding and not ransoming? CEO - "It wasn't me!", FC - "Really, I saw lasers and your the only one in a Amarrian ship?", CEO - "Oh yeah, that was me!".

Next up we find a lone Scorpion in Mormelot..... A lone Scorpion? Really? Ah, there are his 4 battlecruiser mates. We have a bit of a stand off. They camp gate with drones out. Now this is the big question for me for the night. "Should I have engaged?" We had 5 BC and a recon (non-jammy). They had 4 BC and a Scorpion. If we'd jumped in, primaried the Scorpion and took it down before it jammed too many of us, could we have won? It was a very close call. If we hadn't taken the Scorpion down then he'd have easily jammed half of us and we'd have all died in a fire! They didn't camp long and whilst I was still debating what to do, they warped off.

So off we toddle. Get to Ladistier and of course the "...always pays his debts" comment is made!

Whoa! 50 in Old Man Star! Big group of Russians, neut gang, and Gallente Militia blob. The neut gang lands on the Lad gate and we bounce to a planet and warp back at range. Mrymidon has jumped in. Obvious bait is obvious. Our scout is watching the rest of their gang on the other side of the gate at 0. But we're slightly at range from the gate. We start shooting the Mrym. We're aligned, I'm ready to wing warp us out when their gang jumps in... any second.... any second now..... erm, that Mrym is dying fast.... they'll be jumping aaaaaaaany second. Pop!

http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10284198

Worst... bait... ever. As he dies his mates FINALLY decide to jump in and we warp. They chase but we're too fast and safed up. I wonder if that Mrym pilot has been messing around with their FC's wife?

We enter OMS and it's busy. We wave to passing Gallente Militia blob with some familiar old faces. They land on the gate, we're at a on-grid pounce. They have five times our numbers and send some 'ceptors our way. This was my second "Should I have...." for the night. I assume everyone has seen the CCP Eve promo video "I Was There". Posted here just in case...

I warped us off as the 'ceptors approached. But would a few canes have insta-popped those 'ceptors? In the promo video the 'ceptors burn 200km and get the Gallente fleet the warp-in on the sniping enemy. In real Eve, would a few 720mm shells have smashed them to bits? What if I'd called it and we hadn't popped them. What if they got points on us and the 30 man blob warped onto our heads and killed us all? We could pop them couldn't we....? I took the "safe" option and we lived. But could we have got a couple more kills with the risky option?

It's 00:10 for me and 21:10 back in the UK. We're 18 jumps from home. Time to head back.

We reach the out-gate in Ladistier when our +1 reports a Omen Navy Issue jumped into us, POP!

http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10285105

Our CEO may have had a couple of cans too many at this point, he overtakes the cloaky eyes and goes +1 in his Zealot. This is pointed out as a bad idea however he says not to worry as he's in "The Paper Thin Zealot of DOOM", apparently!

The Fleet starts getting like alliance name as we all burn home. System after system is deserted.

However as we start nearing the last few jumps it starts to get a bit more blobby. Two of us land on gate (which was reported as clear 20 seconds before) the same time as a decent sized Amarr gang. They are jumping on contact so we about turn and warp off pretty smartish, they camp us for a bit, jump back in to us, warp off, and we sneak past. Another small blob is found right at the end, we sneak past and dock up.

Fantastic job from our "up" scout and our "down" scout (no, I'm not naming names on a public site). Excellent webbing and a good fleet all round. A few kills, no loses! Well done guys.

Fleet Summary:-

Kills - 4
Killed Pods - 2
ISK made from Ransoms - ZERO (because....)
Number of times our CEO insta popped the pod even though HE introduced a fine for doing that - 2
Number of drink cans opened in front of an open mic for "ka-tish" effect - 3
Losses to players - 0
Losses to NPC's - 0
Losses to wife aggro - Technically one as he had to dock up half way though ;)
Should have I done that?'s by the FC - 2
Pictures linked n fleet chat that everyone agreed they wanted to trade in their current wife for that one - 1
Rating of Online Interactions (I'll do it if PEGI won't) - 15 (it wasn't THAT bad for a change. Defo not 18)

My Favourite Eve Videos

I wish I was artistic. I really do. Unfortunately I've been cursed with, as per the Captain Edmund Blackadder quote, "...all the artistic talent of a cluster of colour-blind hedgehogs..... in a bag". I can do the odd half decent pic once in a blue moon (the dancer in the captains quarters in a previous blog turned out better than I expected but that was more luck than talent) but generally I'm not the "arty" type. I'd love to do videos. I've even had a go, but they are not up to scratch. So I am relegated to watching Eve videos on YouTube and muttering "I wish I could do that!".

The Eve Online community at large has this amazing ability to create Eve related "art" which is uncommon compared to other games. Why does Eve have this when many other games don't. I've run a few picture competitions in corp in the past. One category for serious "artistic" Eve screenshots/pictures and one for funny Eve pictures. Obviously the funny category was the most popular and we got some truly amazing entries. Many were just slightly edited Eve shots with a caption referring to an in-corp joke (like the 8-year veteran CEO who kept getting podded as he didn't know about the "warp to 0" button in the top right and was always busy right clicking the context menu to try and warp out) and some were lovingly crafted Fail/demotivational/your doing it wrong style master-pieces.

Before I show some of my favorite videos I'd like to throw some ideas out there to why we have so many people in the Eve community who can make these things.

The Eve Online Learning Curve of DOOM - Eve is not (or was not) an easy game to get into. CCP have been putting a lot of time and effort into making the "New Player Experience" better. However, I found it, and I'm sure many others found it, to be a challenging game to get into (then again that was a few years ago, I hope it's better now). I remember my first experiences of PvP. I was in my pod more than a combat ship! Eve is also a harsh gaming world where your hard work can be lost in an instant. People who can stick at this game and get their head around the mechanics obviously can use the same attributes in other areas of their life. Eve takes work and a little dedication to get into and art definitely requires the same attributes.

Maturity - I'm talking age here, not actually maturity. I mean log onto voice comms for Shadows of the Federation sometimes and you'd think we're a bunch of teenagers, not mostly a collection of late 20's and 30-something people many with families! It is said the human male gets to the age of twelve and suddenly they are interested in cars and boobies and basically don't move on from there. However the average physical age in Eve is 31. We oldies tend to have attention spans superior to your average cat.... or teenage gamer!

Sci-Fi Geeks - Come on, everyone who plays Eve has a little Sci-Fi geek inside them. And we Sci-Fi geeks can be creative... with Sci-Fi obviously! When you think of fan fiction, fan art and the like are you thinking about games like Call of Duty? No? Battlefield: Bad Company 2? Portal? Minecraft? Civilisation V? No, no, no and no. You're either thinking sci-fi with aliens and spaceships or fantasy with wizards and dragons etc.

Eve Online as a Hobby - Generally a lot of players see Eve more than just a computer game. Its a hobby, its an addiction, its more than just gaming. For a start you are reading this Eve blog! I'm writing it. This weekend there are people in Las Vega's attending a mini-fanfest. Yes, Eve is so much more than just a run-of-the-mill computer game.

Anyway, here are a few of my favourite Eve Online videos which make me smile whilst also muttering "I wish I could do that..."


This is War.
I love this song so any video that uses it gets my vote! The author has taken CCP promo video extracts and edited them together to the tune from 30 Seconds from Mars. The finished article looks and sounds great....

I love New Eden.
If anyone has Sky TV in the UK you must have seen this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nC1yLD7R0ZU advert for the Discovery Channel (I read on Wikipedia it was a worldwide campaign so you may have seen it elsewere). It was on every 10 minutes before I left the UK and was driving me completely and utterly "bum-de-ar-da"! The Test Alliance parody always makes me smile :)

CCP - HTFU
So CCP got some flak about making a rap video rather than fixing bugs. Seriously guys, erm, HTFU? Can you ever imagine Blizzard doing one of these? Warning - not safe for work or little ones!

CCP - The Butterfly Effect
OK, so we all know this has never happened in game and is one of those "Well... it could.... technically......" but I feel it's a great advert for the game and gives people who don't play Eve a perspective of how big this game actually is. I use it when chatting to people who have never heard of Eve to give them a very quick introduction. The latest one from CCP, I Was There, is also good, but doesn't portray the sheer vastness of the game like this one does. Oh and the reference to chaos theory makes it all the more geeky ;)

Clear Skies I, II and III
What can I say. Absolutely fantastic! A film set in the Eve universe using the Eve-O client for the in-space bits and the Halflife Engine to do the "in person" bits with the two merging in places using some blue-screen tech. The main website is www.clearskiesthemovie.com and the video linked below is the trailer for part III. OK it's not a Hollywood blockbuster, but the fact that a guy was able to make this series at home is mind boggling. Download the HD version of III and watch it on a 42" HDTV. I did, much to the annoyance of the wife! And remember.... IT'S HOTDROP O'Clooooooooooooooooooock!

Any of the Eve "Downfall" Parodies.
In case you haven't seen it, I haven't, "Downfall" is a movie about the end of World War II. There is a scene where the German leadership are in the bunker and Hitler learns that, well, he's fracked. And thus starts a quality emo-rage in German. There have been many parodies of this, just simply adding subtitles, from Usan Bolt breaking the 100m record to the Eve Online speed nerf. Oh and I've also got to add another more recent one. This is obviously from the same movie but a different scene. "CCP" try to batphone in another DoS attack to stop the "NeX/P2W/monocle riots". Warning - Probably only funny if you don't speak German. Also subtitles are a bit mature with some Effin and Jeffin.

SoTF Recruitment 2011
Made by the fair hand of our very own Eelis Kiy. I think one of our corpies summed it up best... She captured SoTF in a nutshell. Drink and explosions!

Please post comments below linking your favorite Eve video's if you think I'm made some glaring ommisions! I'd love to see them.

EDIT -

Damn you Eelis! Damn you......

SoTF Open's it's Doors!

Back when we were in it, we found that spying and meta-gaming in faction war was rife. In fact I'm convinced that in the militia's there are more spy alts on some times than actually true militia members. Of course a spy in your corp during faction war is a PITA. Whatever fleet you have out, they'll be able to counter it if they know your ship types, tactics and any backup plan. We've had spies in our fleet whilst we've had spies in their fleet. It just becomes like something out of the Pink Panther!

However we are now out of faction war and just shooting anything that moves. So for the the first time that I can remember, Shadows of the Federation has opened recruitment.

Here's the official announcement from the Eve-O forums...

......PRESS RELEASE START.......

Having just celebrated our 3rd Birthday and recently published as the 9th top EVE PVP corporation according to EON magazine (from December 2010 to Feburary 2011) SoTF has opened its doors to look for potential new recruits to join in the fun/madness with us.

Firstly our killboard stats can be found here.

We are looking at potential corps to join the alliance as well as taking on new members into the SoTF fold.

And now a little about us -

We recently formed our own alliance “Drunk ‘n’ Disorderly” and we have very few blues which means lots of targets, we currently reside in the Kamela area of space which is a hotbed of pirate / FW activity.

What are we looking for? Well how to sum that up in a short paragraph is going to be difficult. We've always used the term "Shadowy" within corp to describe our members. However, outside of corp that will mean F all to most people.

The typical "Shadowy" person is a social animal. They tend not to be hard-core gamers, all about the win, who take their serious internet spaceships REALLY, REALLY seriously. They want to log on, shoot some people in the face, have a laugh and joke whilst doing it with a great bunch of people and log off. No CTA's, no PoS bashing, no alarm-clock ops. The organised and advertised Corp events are usually PvP roams which would be great if you can make it, but if you've got a hot date not a problem. Give her one from all of us! Photo's on the forum an added bonus!

Topics of conversation during roams tend to be R rated and generally WTF? (However as soon as "Check-check" or "Battle comms" is heard you are expected to shut up as it's fight time!). Drinking is a sport in SoTF and the drunken lolz fleets are some of the best fun we have.

SoTF has an older-player base. I don't think we've got any teenagers and generally late-20's to mid-30's is the age range of the vast majority of our player-base, we have pilots ranging from 10 mil sp upto 120 mil sp players.

If your a super serious eleventy million sp Eve player who goes emo and screams on comms if someone makes a mistake in fleet. Sorry, tbh you'll hate it.

Only got 20m SP's but fly something useful (T2 fitted - logi, recons, BC, HAC, BS are our usual staple) or are a good scout etc? Do your mates decribe you as a cross between Barny Gumble and Glen Quagmire? You'll fit in fantasitcally well.

If you're looking for a fun, no pressure, Mainly EU TZ, PvP corp, contact either the CEO (me!) Gallactica or Drackarn for further discussion.

What we offer:

Excellent fleet compositions (BC, Nano HAC/CS/T3 gangs with logi + Bhaalgorns/Machariels, etc)

Supporting cap fleets

Logistics (able to move large quantities of assets)

Corp shop (web based and can get you anything you need delivered to our base of operations)

Friendly community
Target rich environments
Vent server, forums, website, etc.

What We need -

The main toon and not an alt.

Has good PvP experience especially in fleets (i.e. knows what to do in a fleet roam/camp and knows FC commands etc)

10mil Skillpoint minimum requirements,

Moderately active (online at least three times a week with RL exceptions of course)

Able to use voice comms and speak in English

18 years or older (our conversations can sometimes be a little on the 'mature' side)

Any timezone (we're mostly Euro but have people from everywhere)

Outgoing players, no anti-socials

Dont have a problem being -10, we are pirates

Please note that your full API will be required upon applying. You can cycle the key once you are either accepted or rejected, but we MUST have your full API for a thorough check. This is none negotiable. If you are not prepared to do this, please do not apply.

......PRESS RELEASE ENDS.......

So there you go. If you are looking for a drunken bunch of pirates for care-free PvP drop Gallactica or myself a line in-game and we'll have a chat.

Oh and Gallactica wouldn't let me post the recruitment poster that Eelis Kiy, of Where the Frack is My Ship, made for us. 

Oh I forgot! That should have been on the "What we offer" list on the post. Not only do we have a Vent server, but WHEN Eelis comes back to game we'll have her sultry tones back on there. You can check them out on this podcast!

Anyway back to the recruitment poster! He didn't want THAT photo of him on the Eve Online forums. However he said I was OK to post it on my blog which makes a lot of sense. Gall, you do know this is a public blog visited by Eve players don't you?

And yes, that really is our great and glorious CEO, Gallactica, in the bottom panel! The mind just boggles!

Mmmmmm, Nice Gate Camp! Oh *$£&!!!!

Made a note in my diary on the way here, simply says: "Bugger"

- Captain Darling

The good people at Uppers N Downers are a bit busy making boosters to supply the yearning masses of New Eden. Hopefully "Boosters - Part 2" will be up at the weekend. In the mean time..... I jumped slap bang into a gate-camp a couple of days ago whilst soloing in my Hurricane. I'm sure everyone who has played Eve has had a "Oh Bugger!" moment like that. But what would it be like through the eyes of the character.....

"Well that's a bit of a shit!" thought Drackarn.

He'd just jumped through the stargate and could see half a dozen battlecruisers plus interceptor support set around the gate. As a outlawed pirate he doubted they'd hesitate for a micro-second before attacking him. The cloaking field from the stargate gave him a limited time to assess the situation.

Fight? No chance. Totally outnumbered and outgunned.

Suicide it? Nothing really small enough to destroy before they would destroy me. Might get that interceptor if lucky, but 720mm howitzers are not designed for hitting small, manoeuvrable ships.

Tank it and call for support? No time. The cloak would be down soon and it would take five minutes for anyone to get here. He was on his own. His tank couldn't stand up to that gangs fire power for more than 20-30 seconds.

Run? Drackarn looked at any celestial that his warp drive could lock onto without too much manoeuvring. There was a planet ahead, but it was a good few degrees off his current alignment. His ship would need time to align and the chances are someone would be able to lock him and engage him with a warp disrupter.

Burn back to the gate? An option, but an obvious manoeuvre. They'd probably hold some ships from agressing and jump them through to catch him the other side of the gate. However, if they all did agress....

Time was almost up. His cloak would end in a few seconds. His decision would literally be life or death to the hundreds of men and women aboard his ship.

Just before the cloak faded, Drackarn selected the planet in front and willed his ship to warp. His cloak dropped and he instantly saw all the surrounding ships targeting him. Yellow threat indicators where everywhere. His velocity was picking up as his warpdrive spun up, he was nearly aligned and then at that point his ship would warp. Suddenly his speed rapidly decreased, one of the ships had managed to lock him and get a warp distributor on him. The gravaton beam had hit the warp core and there was no way he'd be able to warp off now.

His shields started dropping at the same time as the rest of the fleet opened fire.

"Only one thing for it, I got a need for speed!"

Drackarn willed his battlecruiser back around towards the startgate and activated his microwarp drive. His velocity shot up as he started to cover the 12km back to the gate. At 2.5km he could jump. He was approaching 1200m/s. 8 or 9 long seconds of travel under relentless firepower. He disabled the thermal cut-offs to his MWD and shield modules. They'd take some damage being overloaded like that, but not as much if the damn ship blew up!

Drackarn's body was serene, floating in the hydrostatic pod. His calm body was in stark contrast to the rest of the ship. In gunnery people held onto bulkheads as the ship lurched under heavy fire. The sirens and alarms blaring out that the ship was under attack made if difficult to hear. Down in engineering it was chaos. Smoke filled the air as the modules were overloaded and the crew desperately tied to squeeze every bit of extra power to the shields that they could. The warp core hissed and spat behind it's shielding as the enemy gravton beam disrupted it. Power conduits were blowing out due to the damage from the attackers and the overloading of the shields. Several engineers had been overcome by the smoke and had collapsed on the floor unconscious.

Suddenly the ship lurched and the speed dropped again. Someone had got him with a warp scrambler and the MWD had gone offline. 5km. The ship then slowed even more, checking the threats engaging him Drackarn saw one ship had activated a stasis webbifer. The gravity weapon was substantially slowing his ship. Less than 3km. So close yet now crawling. The low shield alarm was sounding. His battlecruiser didn't have very much armour, it was fitted with shield reinforcement modules not additional armour plates. He'd not last long after the shields died.

Drackarn reassessed the attacking fleet, it looked like he might get into jump range. Were they all agressed? Stargates systems would not let anyone jump who had activated aggressive modules in the last 60 seconds. Providing they hadn't already had someone jump back through to set up on the other side of the gate and they were all agressed he could actually make it. Another check of the enemy fleet. A yellow flashing box on an Amarrian Interceptor stood out. The pilot had not agressed. He was waiting to see if Drackarn would go down in this system and he could get a final shot in to officially record his share of the pirate kill, or if Drackarn jumped, he'd jump with him and do what interceptor ships are designed for. Snagging and holding other ships until the fleet catches up.

Drackarn's armour was failing. A few more seconds and the ship would be lost, he was in jump range. He held off activating the gate. Hoping the interceptor would think he was going down and fire upon him.

The low armour alarm went off. Drackarn had no choice. And activated the stargate. His battlecruiser vanished into the artificial wormhole.

There was no time for assessments, no time to think. The interceptor must have followed him and if he didn't get away immediately he'd have to fight the interceptor and kill it before their fleet was able to jump through. However, his 720mm artillery cannons were not designed to hit something as small or as fast as an interceptor. He need either to get away fast or he'd need to be one lucky son-of-a-bitch and get a fluke hit on the interceptor if it grabbed him.

When jumping through stargates, it takes time for the ship systems to re-engage properly. That is why all gates provide a short-duration cloaking field. To give anyone using them a chance to recover from the jump. The cloak lasts 30 seconds but the ship recovery time can take anything from 1 second to over 20 seconds.

Drackarn smiled for the first time in a while as his systems came online almost instantly after the jump. He saw a planet in a good alignment and hit warp. His lumbering battlecruiser started aligning and spinning up the warp drive. The interceptor decloaked. He was in range to tackle Drackarn. He started yellow boxing but Drackarn's battlecruiser slipped into warp before the interceptor could achieve a target lock.

At last some good news, but things were not over yet. He was heading to a planet and unless the interceptor pilot was blind he'd follow. Interceptors warped faster than battlecruisers and also aligned much faster, so even though Drackarn had entered warp first, that interceptor would be close behind if not overtaking him. A quick sweep on the ships directional scanner showed that he was indeed following. Now all Drackarn needed was a little bit of luck. Did the interceptor warp directly to the planet, or did he select some range.

The warp tunnel collapsed and the planet loomed in front of Drackarn. He immediately selected a station and engaged warp. For the forth time since this began the battlecruiser started is painfully slow alignment. The interceptor appeared on Drackarn's overview. He was here..... 100km away and much nearer to the planet! Drackarn had set his warp drive to take him 100km from the planets warp in point. The interceptor pilot had assumed he'd gone to zero.

Trailing smoke and fire from the damaged sections of the ship, Drackarn's battlecruiser slipped into warp and docked in the safety of the station hanger.

"I need a drink!" thought Drackarn as his docking request was accepted.

Boosters - Part 1 - The Quick Guide

Part 1 - A Quick Guide to Combat Boosters in Eve Online

 

I've recently got into using boosters since I threw the law book out of the airlock and became a ebil piwat. So I thought I write a quick mini guide and ask some shady people about booster production and some of the interesting things that might be on the horizon from reading the CSM minutes. First a quick guide for those like me who have spent years of Eve without using boosters and never really looked into them.

 

Basically, boosters are drugs a capsuleer can take that boost certain abilities of your ship such as active tanking or turret tracking. There are eight types of booster out there and each come in four different strengths. To use a booster all you need to do is open your cargo hold.... you did put them in your ship before you undocked right? Right-click and select consume. The buff, any debuff and their countdowns (they last 30 minutes) can be found in the "Augmentations" section of your character sheet.

Gall what are you doing with a teapot? Oh, sorry Miss. Thought you were my CEO

Types of Combat Boosters.

Blue pill - percentage increase to shield boost amount.
Exile - percentage increase to armour reppers.

Mindflood - Percentage increase to capacitor capacity.

X-Instinct - Percentage reduction to signature radius.

Drop - Percentage increase to tracking speed of turrets.

Frentix - Percentage increace to optimal range.

Sooth Sayer - Percentage increace to drop off for turrrets.

Crash - Percentage reduction to missile explosion radius.

Strength, Legality and Side-Effects of Combat Boosters.

There are four stengths of each booster. Synth 3%, Standard 20%, Improved 25% and Strong 30%. These are rough numbers as different boosters have different strengths, for example strong drop is up at 37.5% and stong X-Instinct is only 15%, but give you a rough idea of the differences between them.

 

Also worth noting that Synth is the the only strength of booster legal in hi-sec. If you are caught by the NPC's in 0.5 or higher sec with them in your cargo hold you'll get a fine, standings hit and have the boosters confiscated. You don't get caught having them in your "bodily system" already. So drugged up pilots - OK, drugs in the spaceships cargo hold - not OK. Synth is also the only one which has no chance of any side-effects.

 

Whoa! What? Side-effects??? Yup, standards and the stronger boosters have a percentage chance of a side effect. Take the Blue Pill for instance, my favourite. There is a 20% chance that when using it you'll get a side effect. That could be one, some, or if you are really unlucky, all of the following -20% to Shield capacity, -20% to Turret optimal range, -20% to missile explosion velocity and -20% to capacitor capacity. You still get your positive effect, you just also get the negative effects too. Each booster has it's own side-effects so Crash will have different debuffs to Blue Pill.

 

Booster Slots

There are three booster "slots" for your character and you can have three boosters in effect at the same time. However there are groups which restrict which ones you can have going at the same time.

 

The first four in the list at the top are clearly defensive in nature and you can only have one in effect at each time.

The next three are turret buffers, again you can only have one at a time

The last one is for missiles and takes it's own slot.

Skill Requirements 

You need biology and science to use boosters. Which is fine if you stick to Synths. If you are using standard or improved you really need to train Neurotoxin Recovery and Nanite Control. The first reduces the chance you'll get a side-effect and the second will reduce the percentage amount "debuffs you". I have both trained to 4 so I have a 20% less chance of getting a side-effect and if I do get one the debuff is 20% less.

That's it basically. There are more complete guides out there. I just wanted to write this short one for people who don't use them currently. They can be VERY helpful! 

Part 2 coming soon.....

Which leads nicely onto part 2 where I chat with booster production corp "Uppers N Downers" about boosters and will removing the NPC customs officials on gates and getting players to enforce the law in hi-sec really work?

Holidays and Friday Fun

Summer is traditionally a quiet time for Shadows. Whilst us out here in the Middle East hide indoors from the blistering heat, the European members are out having BBQ's, lounging in beer gardens, going on holiday and generally doing other stuff that playing Eve Online. Also at this usually quiet time of the year there has been a few other issues relating to people logging on. We've got some members on Incarna related emo-rage-breaks. To be honest you cannot blame them especially when you are not ISK rich and you are losing ships to the "Black Screen of Nothingness" or the "Warp! Warp!!!!! WARP FFS!!!!!" issues. There are also the hardware issues, the lack of ship spinning (I am assured by some this is a reason for not logging on) and other things that have just arsed people off about the game. Also at a corp level, our decision to go -10 flashy pie has also had an impact on some of our players. But the main reason I think is that our army of pasty white geeks are emerging from their normal habitats and venturing into the sun to have fun and go on holiday!

However there were a few of us about last night so we jumped into Nano-BC, HACs and Recons and went for a mooch. Our fleet of 10 set off from Kamela and decided to visit our old stomping ground of Black Rise again. Same route we took last Friday with Tekitha's birthday roam.

First action we found was a BS sat on a station. I was asked to warp in at range and stick a few rounds into him and see what he did. He got a dozen of his mates to undock. Geddons, Ravens, a Drake. So we moved on.

Some how the conversation on Vent got onto vasectomy. No idea how that happened! A couple of the Shadow's have been "deactivated" and why that is a good topic of conversation I have no idea!!!

Anyway, before it got too bad, our +1 found a Cane and Atron in FW mission. We didn't hold out much hope of them still being there after we jumped in, warped to the mission gate, activated gate, arrived in mission and burnt over to try and point them. But you've got to give it a go haven't you? http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10215075 and http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10211528. Assume he was dual boxing and not paying attention to local spiking.

We land on the Schoorasana gate, looks like we missed a big fight. Plenty of wrecks and abandoned drones. Nothing to shoot though.

We pass through Ladistier.... and of course someone has to mention "who always pays his debts" (which is usually me). Yes it's Lannister not Ladistier but as that system is about 20 jumps from home, so whenever we get there we are usually drunk enough for it not to matter that much! Anyway that leads onto some Game of Thrones banter. Good series that. Glen Quagmire would approve. Giggity!

We find a bunch of T3's in OMS but when probbed down we find them all sat in two different PoS's.

So we decide to sit on the Villore gate for a while, but before we land our scout has found an Apoc on Heyd. We turn around and catch him on gate. http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10211802. As we finish that a Helios jumps through, Annie points and pops.

On to Kedama and we find a Drake on Tama gate, jumps into Tama and docks after being bashed. Nothing mush about and it's getting late so we head back.

I DC due to a BSoD and the others snag a Drake on a gate. I log in and catch up with the fleet and find someone called Faye Valintein was not a happy bunny. Moaning in local about their dead Drake.

Unfortunatly one of our guys in a HAC didn't quite make it off the gate in time and the gate guns take him down. Again for a second week running our only loss of the night is to NPC's! When asked if the Vaga loss was worth the Drake kill our CEO responded diplomatically....

Faye Valintein > was that vaga worth my drake kill?

Faye Valintein > i hope so

Gallactica > yup

Siko Senpai > totally

Gallactica > just to see you moan like a girl in local :)

I'm not in fleet so had to jump ahead to Vitrauce as I was getting gate gun aggro... only find a frigate (I know, I'm a bully!) sat on gate -  http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10212218 and pod him. Sec status is almost -10 now!

And finally we find a lone Thrasher in Sadiusairos - http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10212572

Again, another 50 jump roam and no sign of any other fleet other than those BS we encountered earlier on. This is EU prime-time and all we're finding is singles to gank. I know it's summer but still.......

Summary:-

Losses to NPC's - 1

Losses to Players - 0

Bottles drunk - A fair few

Kills - 7 (excluding Pods, our KB's playing silly buggers ATM)

Fleets engaged - 0, again

Total jumps - 50+

CEO Bottles of Red - ONLY 1!!!!

Lolz had - Sufficient

Kills resulting in moaning in local - 1

10 minute long discussions on "The Snip" - 1

10 minute long discussions on the "filth" in Game of Thrones - 1

No Sex Please, We're Capsuleers????

"Sweat baby, sweat baby, sex is a Texas drought, me and you do the kind of stuff that only Prince would sing about, so put your hands down my pants and I'll bet you'll feel nuts..."

- The Bloodhound Gang, The Bad Touch.

Do you ever pay any real attention to those pop-up style adverts you sometimes get when logging into Eve Online? Usually for Eon Magazine or some offer in the Eve Online store? "This Eve Related Promotion will only Display Once". Cannot say I pay a lot of attention, the reason I'm on the log in screen is that I want to log into Eve and fly some spaceships... NOW! However, a recent advert for the Noble Exchange aka NeX Store aka Nob Shop caught my eye. Why? It was a picture of a female toon laying on her front with her legs bent back. The picture was shot down her back showing the back of the head but focusing on the skirt and boots she was wearing. Two of my favorite things, Eve Online and a good pair of legs in high-heeled FMB's (F*** me boots). OK I accept it was just pixels, but in the words of Dave Lister from Red Dwarf "Yeah, but WHAT pixels". I may have given the advert a small mental "Giggity" and went on to playing important internet spaceships. The advert in question is below for either your viewing pleasure....

.... or for you to start to moan about CCP being sexist. What? Yes that was the reaction on the Eve-O forums from some of the community. Not sure if it just wasn't some humungous troll but there were some who were complaining CCP was being sexist. Now stangely enough being a 35 year-old red blooded male, I don't agree. Rule number 1 in advertising. Sex sells. Turn on MTV, let me know if you find a pop music video with a really fat and ugly artist, male or female. Can only beautiful people sing well? Of course not, but sex sells. And that thread got me thinking, and if you've read my previous posts whenever I get thinking a blog appears!

I asked Eelis Kiy, SoTF member, lady gamer and author of Where the Frack is My Ship, what she thought about the advert.

"I don't find anything in games offensive in a sexist way tbh - when you've spent 10 years surrounded by men who fawn all over you the second they realise you have boobies and don't look like the back end of a bus - combined with spending all your time in games where the women have ridiculously unrealistic figures and outfits - well you just accept it all as "make-believe" rather than anything to be offended by. Imo! (PS my sister brought me a Lara Croft action figure for my birthday one year lol)"

So what about sex in Eve Online? It is already there, if you look closely, but is more coming?

Go to the official Eve Online Wiki and look up Gallente. The first picture you get is a thin woman with long flowing black hair wearing very little and her modesty is vaguely protected by what can be only described as two over-sized Janet Jackson nipple rings from THAT superbowl (no I'm not American or watch their football but that incident a few years ago was very funny to the rest of the world, not the nipple ring but the reaction and lawsuits).

Earlier this year, Shadows of the Federation built our own station in 2DWM-2 in Vale of the Silent. We might have since sold it on when we found 0.0 NC Sov holding wasn't for us (approximately 2 weeks before the Russians stomped through there and captured it), but that is OUR station and always will be, no matter if we sold it or if PL or RDF are sat in it currently. We built it through blood, sweat, tears, ISK and capital reps, it's ours! Ever looked closely at a 0.0 player built Minmatar outpost? Here is a screenshot I took after our egg became a station and we were furiously repping it. Yes, that is a neon "Girls" sign on the station!

Now look at the items in game that you can fill your cargo hold with. You have exotic dancers, you have prostitutes. These are all linked to missions, some involving pleasure domes or pleasure gardens or pleasure palaces or something along those lines. I think we can all imagine what is supposed to go on in them. Please CCP, when you properly release Incarna rather than a 3D walking station menu, can we dock at those structures, pleeeeeease... :)

However sex in Eve is all fairly low-key. Some might say appropraite for a game with a PEGI 12 cert like Eve Online. Of course "Online interactions" are not covered in that cert and if you looked at SoTF's corp chat you'd probably go for a R18 rating. However, does a game with an average player age of 31 need a PEGI 12 cert? Some movies have been know to have been re-edited when they sent it in for classification and they felt the classification awarded was too low and wanted the 18 certificate for it. So they made it a bit more naughty and sent it back. Why? Because the "18" certificate will sell more copies than a "15" certificate when targetting certain audiences.

Have you read the Eve novels? Eve: The Empyrean Age has Zero-G bonking and of course that Amarrian Chamberlain who is a perverted as they come. Eve: The Burning Life has some low key references and tongue action. All in all, very low key again.

So generally CCP, in my honest opinion, has not expoited sex for sales.... the silly sods!

Have other games? Absolutely. So why not Eve? Is Iceland a prudish nation? Think of some of the games that have sex or use sex to sell copies of the game...

• Who has played Mass Effect and after seeing the "sex scene" replayed the game as the female Commander Sheppard just to get back to that part for some girl-on-girl action? (I didn't, I just YouTube'd it when I heard about it)
• Anyone played the original EverQuest? Remember the box cover (remember when games came in cardboard boxes?) of the Ruins of Kunark. Partically dressed female Elf in chains!
• Age of Conan. Well that certainly has plenty of, erm, plenty. From the character costumes to running quests for the local brothel complete with "proffesional" ladies!
• Any Japanese styled fighting game - Dead or Alive, Bayonetta etc etc
• Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. Need I say anything?
• Lara Croft!!!

From what I can tell I'm pretty average in game. 35 years old (4 years above the actually average age of an Eve Online player), male, married etc. So why doesn't CCP pander to our two-track minds? Two-track? Yes, Eve players (males anyway) have two-track minds. Your average male has a mind like a railway at a coal fired power plant, one-track and dirty. Your average male Eve player also thinks about Eve a lot during the day too!

Sex and Sci Fi go together, they always have. Whilst there are some lovely ladies out there who enjoy sci-fi (come back Eelis!!!) it is a male dominated genre. Think of the movies and series.

• The 1968 sci-fi movie "Barberella". Look it up ;)
• How about Princess Leia in Return of the Jedi in THAT bikini?
• Flash Gordon and then of course Flesh Gordon!
• How many Star Trek fans instanainiously combusted during DS9 when Jadzia Dax  swapped spit with Dr. Lenara Kahn (I did have to Google that, not such a Trekie I knew her name)
• Lexx - A sci-fi series not only named after a corp mate in SoTF who gets so much of the subject matter he doesn't get to play Eve much, but also, according to Wikipedia, a sci-fi series with so much of the subject matter in it's unsuitable for Americans??? "Not originally produced for a US network, the series features more sexual innuendo and nudity than audiences in the United States are generally accustomed to seeing in non-premium programming. The Sci Fi Channel purchased the series....."
• Six in Battlestar Gallactica
• Seven of Nine in Voyager
• Mila Jovovich in The Fifth Element
• Natasha Henstridge in Species
• Leela and Amy Wong in Fururama
• Jamie Bamber in BSG (Eelis Kiy INSISTED this was included)

To be honest I could go on forever. Think about how many sci-fi films and shows feature more sex than Eve Online. I mean even the original Star Trek series has more. Kirk was either shooting the aliens or kissing them.

So what can CCP do? What will they do?

• Will they sex-up the NeX store? To be honest I personally feel those skirts are way too long and those heels way too short!
• Will we get see-through stuff. See the quality of our graphics engine! ;)
• Lingerie! Will underwear be availible on the NeX store. Why not? TBH I garrentee they'll sell more sets of stockings and suspenders than monocles!
• Will we get Glenn Quagmire inspired furniture for the CQ? Personally I want a heart-shaped waterbed with leopard print sheets! Bow-chica-wow-wow.

But most of all I hope we get that bloody door open and get down to the bar in Minmatar and Gallente stations. We want podium and pole dancers!!!!

OK that's just me thinking aloud, and might be a bit too much. But I think there is a middle ground and I'm sure CCP are looking into it. In the CSM minutes it was noted that there was call for feti...., erm, specialist clothing, in Incarna.

I have CQ turned off currently. I turned it on for 10 minutes yesterday to take some screenshots but that was the first time since about 2 days after launch. All the CQ is currently is a good looking, but inefficient, station menu.

However, put the right clothing in the NeX store, open up the stations and give us access to the bars, put some entertainment NPC's in there, and I might very well turn it back on! Of course, blowing up peoples ships will always be my number 1 priority in game. But whilst waiting for the fleet to form or just after it disbands for the night, or may be even whilst waiting out a GCC timer... I'd go for a bit of T&A down the station bar!

Don't force us to use Incarna CCP, give us some bloody good reasons to!

/Signed Drackarn.
Red Blooded Male and Proud of It ;)

Tek's Shiny Birthday Roam

Last night we had a birthday roam for one of our directors in Shadows of the Federation, Tekitha.

Tek is not only one of our Directors but also a foul-mouthed FC. Think "Bricktop" from Snatch. I really do expect him to add "Feed 'em to the pigs Errol" after each order!

Anyway, the drink is flowing, we are forming up and having a laugh on comms when out CEO presents a birthday present for Tek. A nice new Machariel that we all chipped in for to say thanks for all Tek's hard work. Suddenly the HAC/Recon gang is out of the window and we've got half a dozen Mac's, T3's, Logi's, HAC's and Recons ready for the off. A rather expensive fleet for a drunken roam....

We head out and Tek needs to go AFK 1 minute to visit the little capsuleers room so docks up leaving us on a gate. A solo Machariel jumps into us. Half the fleet aggress' and the other half jump through the gate as the Mac burns back including me. We point him the other side and he burns back to gate again. He manages to jump out in low structure. AHHHHHHH! The half the fleet that aggressed him on the otherside finish him off.

http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10161315

Tek comes back just having missed the Mac kill.

So we head on. Unfortunately one of our members who shall remain nameless, suffers major wife/girlfriend aggro. He's in a pickle as no station in system and in his Mac when GCC. He jumps nextdoor where he see's there is a station. Unfortunately it's a 0.5 security status :( So that's the second expensive ship lost due to wife-aggro this week. Anyway his drunken corp mates help by suggesting way's she could make it up to him involving him, her and her female best friend. The "specialist movie" producer, Ben Dover, has been in contact and has offered 3 SoTF mates contracts as writers on his next production after reading the fleet chat log!

Next few jumps we pop a frigate and a Assault Ship.

Next we find a small gate camp in Angatalie. A Nighthawk with a few BC. We try and get them but they warp off. No station in system so we "Benny Hill" after the command ship. We cannot catch him after several attempts so form up on the out-gate. He lands at the location 50km off. Now usually he'd be OK, however when the fleet was upgraded from "Normal" to "Hideously Expensive" I swapped into a Tengu and decided to stick a faction point on it. With a booster in fleet, faction point and overheat - 50km is nicely doable. He burns but we are all faster than a Nighthawk. He's neuted dry and everyone comes to whore on the killmail.

http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10161738

A Catalyst gets in our way next and is alpha'd by Tek's Mac.

We check the usually busy systems of Heydieles and Old Man Star which are very quiet. Tek passes the time by holding mini competitions giving 10m ISK prizes to the best boobie pic or best arse pic posted in fleet chat in one minute time frames. I cannot click any of them, it's soooooooo unfair.

We did have a bit of a discussion about "Why is Old Man Star called Old Man Star?". I pointed out to the corp that most should remember as that was a puzzle in my own birthday roam I did a few years ago. Then Gallactica started going on about the disco at my wedding (yes, my CEO came to my wedding!). Slightly off track Gall. Anyway, want to know why OMS is called OMS? Check the story here, it is a good read.

In Tama we find a Hurricane to pop and then in Hirri we bump into our old adversary from the Caldari Militia Gunnyt31. Now usually it would be "Point that 'Cane" but for an old friend like Gunny it was "IT'S GUNNY POINT HIM! POINT HIM! SOMEONE ***** GET HIM!!!!!!"

http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10162063

Sorry Gunny ;)

Our scout finds a few in Hallenen looking like they want to play including a Pilgrim and Proteus on the station. Tek gets them agressed, we warp in just as Tek is starting to move from "Erm, I'm getting slightly worried here guys" to "HELP MEEEEEEEEEE!" We land, pop the Pilgrim, primary the Proteus and they undock an Archon. Sorry guys.... just a little too late in undocking that carrier!

http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10162202 and the Proteus http://sotf.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10162207

A covert ops and a stealth bomber also say hello to "our little friend" in the same system. Bad time to undock TBH.

By this time it's late. It's after 3am for me, 2am for Lock in Eastern Europe, 1am for our Western Europe chums and midnight for the UK contingent. SoTF is about 60% ish UK, 30% Europe and a few scattered across the planet. So Tek asks who needs to log off in the next hour and most the fleet X's.

After some moaning, we head back towards home. Unfortunately the fleet gets a bit split up and a Mac decides to go it alone and jumps into an Amarr gate camp. Our only loss of the night :(

On the return journey a couple of Hurricanes choose the wrong time to be in our path but we never saw a single decent fleet all night.

However what we did get on the way back is the most ironic chat I think I've ever had. Our CEO was taking some flak as he needed to go to bed as the kids would be jumping on him early. What followed was a deep and meaningful "conversation" why he was a pussy and the average man lives for 75 years and as most of us are already half-way there you should enjoy yourself, live everyday as if it was your last and make the absolute most of your time on Earth. Oh and kids get in the way of that. A huge drunken debate was then held between the "Live everyday as if it was your last and party hard" brigade verses the "Home and Family" lot.

In the same way as I believe those playing Eve should be able to play how they like, I also believe people should live the way they like. Me and the wife don't have kids and are not planning any. That's our choice, but I never have a go at anyone who does. And the drunken "argument" was hilarious to me. I say argument, it was a drunken conversation really last all the way home. I finally logged just before 4am. Just hearing in corp chat as I write this that the convo went on for hours.

Sorry Lock, but you lost the argument as I logged. I'm calling it.

Your argument was "enjoy yourself to the MAX, live everyday as if it was your last and make the absolute most of your time on Earth and kids get in the way of that". Yes, normally someone could make a great argument for that cause, but, and it is a HUGE but..... you yourself are at home...... on a Friday night...... playing pretend internet spaceships with the rest of us sad geeks until the early hours. :)

Summary:-

Losses to NPC's - 1

Losses to Players - 1

Bottles drunk - Lots

Kills - 17

Fleets engaged - 0

Old "Friends" Popped - 1

Total jumps - 50+

Distance from eye to screen of our CEO after 3 bottles of red - 2 inches

Open eyes on CEO after those 3 bottles - 1

Lolz had - Many

30 minute long discussions on lifestyle choices - 1

All-in-all a good little roam, no real epic battle but excellent banter on comms, good drink and some kills.

Thanks to Tek for FC'ing, to Gall for getting so drunk to add as constant source of comedy, same props to Lock out and the rest of SoTF who turned out in force in a fleet of pure awesome-sauce.

Oh, and happy birthday Tek!