What ‘He’ Said….

~or “A Gathering of Blathering…”

I rarely visit the EVE Forums… if you ever want to find a reason to stop playing EVE, spend a few hours reading the forums… you will find enough pure puerile crap there to put you off the EVE playerbase forever.

But… one must keep in mind the forums are not representative of all the players. They, for the most part... not all... attract a certain kind of player. The whiner, the crybaby… those who don’t want to DO anything they just sit around and backseat-drive-CCP ‘cause they sooooo much smarter than ervybody else… and cannot wait to tell you all about how they are. Yuch.

However, if one is willing to wade hip deep through the mental swill you will find a few nuggets of real thought, an occasional post made by someone who is intelligent (not just thinks he is) and who actually cares about the game and realizes that the vast cesspool of :words: in the forums are at least skimmed by CCP Devs and it is one fairly effective way to reach them with a thought you had that actually makes sense.

In that light, for the very first time I read, or at least skimmed (due to the occasional ‘I threw up in my mouth a little at that one’) all of the current 31 pages of the Comments for the recent Dev Blog on the New Structures… SHAKE MY CITADEL 2015-05-12 17:50 By CCP Ytterbium.

I was looking for those gems, those rare nuggets of wisdom and insight… and I gave up. One can swallow but so much sewage before thowing up… turns out our minds work the same way…  one can read but so much crap until you just fukkin can’t bear it anymore… at least I can’t. But I did find something I had not expected which was to be my, and this posts, salvation… screw what the assholes who post on the forums say… what do the Devs say? Now THAT was a cat of a different color!

So from that point on I skimmed blithely through the pages and pages of posts… ignoring most of the bile easily… and in the end actually finding a post or two worth a read… and lo and behold most of them, the good, well written and well thought out posts were also noticed by CCP and that was where I found the Dev replies… kinda makes sense huh?

It was fun and informative. I simply skimmed until I hit a Dev post, read it, read back to see what prompted it and I found myself enjoying the forums for a change… will miracles never cease? I may have to make this a ‘thing’ I do here from time to time.

So… I have collected for your edification gentle reader, a snippet here and a quote in whole there of about 99% of the Dev responses in the comments thread on the Citadel Structure Dev Blog… a lot of very cool tidbits it too… makes for some interesting reading if I do say so myself…

First let me say that CCP Ytterbium seems really fond of bulleted or numbered lists of quick, to the point questions. If you are really interested in getting answers, try a clear list of questions, but…

1) don’t ask anything already asked-n-answered and

2) make your questions something that can BE answered… not “WAA! WAA!  Why You Suck at EVE??”

So I basically grabbed every list of questions and his list of answers… they are all the end of this post… That said, here is what I found…

FORCEFIELD:

…creating a replacement for force fields which works better (tm) and looks cooler. You will have a lot of the same benefits that the force field provides.

...docking puts you inside and safe, but you still see the grid outside the station.

The invulnerability link (we need a new name for this, taking suggestions) provides security while you are undocked and mobile around the structure.

Also yes docking games suck, so do force field games. We're accepting input on how we can setup the docking / invuln link to improve this, for all of space not just WH.

…it's going to be a new docked state, like a cross between docking in a station and sitting inside a POS shield.

ANCHORING/PERSONAL/CORP/DEPLOYMENT/ETC:

… we plan on allowing personal anchoring but you must be a player corporation, not NPC (so you can be wardecced).

We aware of the concern of invaders setting up a beach head, and are discussing with the CSM various options for changing anchoring behavior in wormholes to help with this.

…want most of those structures to be available in W-space, but with some special restrictions if need be.

There will be deployment restrictions, yes.

Mainly to avoid people to be insta-omg-BBQ-blapped when coming out of warp / stations, to avoid having space where structure defenses overlap or have them hidden inside landmarks or other anomaly sites.

STRUCTURES:

No definite price checks yet, but building an XL should have the same level of commitment as an outpost.

However, upgrading the thing with rigs is going to cost much more, since they're going to take over outpost upgrades / improvements.

Building and upgrading smaller structures will require far much less commitment and resources.

Small structures are going to be the old deployables (like containers, mobile tractor unit, bubbles etc...). But they won't be able to be fitted and won't have most of the advanced mechanics tied with M, L, X-L. They're deployables after all and are supposed to be very entry level to use.

So, technically, your "small citadel" would be a mobile depot, even if it doesn't really earn that title to be honest.

Storage, security and fitting service will be on the hull.

Corp offices, market, industry, clones etc will all be modules that have to be added and fueled.

…the amount of fuel will depend on the fittings, and they will remain online without fuel (the services will go offline though).

Ideally we want the structures to have the same SKIN system than ships.

Ultimately, it will depend on which kind of Service Module you fit on those structures. Want to do reactions? Fit the reactor module. May not be the best use of a Citadel though, since structures will have bonuses to specific fields, like ships, and Citadels will be bonuses towards defense, office and markets.

As mentioned in the previous blog and Fanfest presentation, we will most likely not replace outposts with those new structures. We will most likely reimburse outpost improvements and upgrades though

…new structures will use a completely new set of blueprints. We'll get rid of the old starbase structure modules (and reimburse them somehow) otherwise it's going to be a mess.

We thought about upgrading smaller sizes into bigger ones, but it adds extra complexity and doesn't really make sense. Should you be able to upgrade a frigate into a battleship if you put enough money into it? :P Both are built for different needs and purposes.

No factional variation. You won't have an Amarr, Caldari, Gallente or Minmatar variations. We want types to exist if they have a good role by themselves, not to fit some factional flavor. That doesn't mean they won't be influenced by some specific NPC corporation or faction, but they will not mandate structure number themselves.

Our current plan is to have a maximum limit of 8 high, 8 medium, 8 low, 8 service and 3 rig slots yes. That doesn't mean all of them will available at once (just like on ships) though.

Yes our current thinking is that you can access personal storage from the structure by being within docking range, same as POS.

Yes all these structures will get personal hangars.

DEFENSES/ENTOSIS/ETC.:

We are considering showing all structures on the on board scanner / sensor overlay allowing you to either warp directly to them or at least show you that structures are anchored in system so you can probe them down.

We are leaning towards just showing everything on the system overlay / onboard scanner with the ability to warp to them, or at the very least showing you how many structures of each size exist in system. They will show on the overview if you have access to them.

Unlike existing Starbases, you won't need multiple guys to operate the weapons. Those structures will be like ships, so you will only need one guy to control them all. The Starbase Defense Management skill will be reworked into something else or refunded when Starbases are removed.

We have been discussing the idea of a module that recruits pirate spawns to defend against people entosis linking your structure, but ultimately how customizable the timezone mechanics are will be the key here.

You would not rely in NPC defense at all, it would be a mild deterrent against a lone ship at best, the point is to show up for your timers and defend.

Like I said, it depends a lot on the timers and I'm assuming if you're solo you are in high sec, so in part wardec mechanics too. Fortunately the asset safety means although you lose your structure, you won't lose everything inside it.

If you cannot defend your structure though, you won't be able to keep it, but we want to give you every reasonable chance to defend it including the more casual players.

Vulnerability windows for structures will not necessarily be everyday, and the time to capture will vary depending on the structure and where it is anchored. We are very aware of the concerns of small groups having fewer people online to defend.

We're considering letting you scan who is docked inside these structures.

You won't be required to defend these everyday like sov, and the structure will drop fittings, fuel maybe in progress industry jobs etc.

You would protect a structure by using the Entosis module to prevent the opposing party to attack it during its vulnerability window. Or you would use the defenses fitted to kill them all while laughing like a maniac.

Accidental killings are a tricky business. We may either want to forbid you from locking and shooting neutrals in high-sec (permanent safety mechanic), or, if we can do it, allow you to do so but have CONCORD show up and destroy your structure if you commit an act of aggression. Depends on technical and design difficulties, too early to say so far. In all cases AoE weapons will not be allowed in high-sec for obvious reasons.

It's too early to say how NPC stations will be affected. We want those structures to be more efficient than NPC stations though, which either means boosting them or nerfing NPC stations.

Q’s and A’s

A FEW Q’s:

1. Larges; if we can’t dock caps in them then how will we keep them in WH space especially since it seems that XL's are going to replace stations and hence won’t really be allowed in WH's, plus they are supposed to be very expensive.

2. Vulnerability window; how will that work in WH space where we can’t claim SOV to boost our indices to reduce our vulnerability timer.

3. Will the office, cloning, and market functions work in WH space.

4. How will these structures accommodate or replace the current practice in WH's to have Squad POS's with members of each POS having a specific corp hanger division assigned to them and their alts.

EX: 10 members are living in a WH, each with multiple alts, there are two towers with 5 members assigned to each with secret passwords to restrict access to those assigned. In tower 1 Scott is assigned division 5 and the other members are assigned the remainder. Scott has 4 alts and each of them have the same hanger division assigned allowing for easy consolidation of modules and items such as PI and minerals/Ore. Will this functionality be preserved?

5. How will ship storage be maintained, will it be similar to the current SMA mechanics or will it be more like stations with hangers divided restricted to each character. Maybe a combination of each allow you the option to set up shared hangers?

A FEW A’s:

1. You would still have the invulnerability link, but yes, you are right, that's one of the arguments in favor to allow capitals in the Large Citadels.

2. What we are thinking so far is to have high-sec and W-space have higher indices that null-sec by default. So they will be naturally less vulnerable there. We are also thinking about modules, rigs and gameplay options to affect the vulnerability window, but at a price.

3. It depends on which kind of gameplay we want to have in W-space. So far, office and market functions look fine, cloning does not. Again, not set in stone at this point.

Sounds so complicated… How about we give you guys personal hangers instead, just like in NPC stations / outposts? And then, if you don't want people to dock in a specific structure you can set restrictions to do so.

MOAR Q’s: (only quoted questions that were answered)

1. Can I anchor them anywhere (apart from some proximity restrictions). Does it have to be moons or can I put them at any spot in space. Can I have more than one on one grid?

6. Will citadel be able to shot without anyone piloting the guns?

7. Will there be fuel requirement. And if yes how will it work when structure go offline in terms of destroying it with Entosis link? Today if I forgot to fuel my pos and some start to shoot it will give me still some time to log back, fuel and online it (risking being killed ofc). How this will work with Entosis link and offline structures?

8. Will there be a way for attacker to know how many people are inside structure docked and in what ships? (i.e. warping to a pos and assessing defense forces)

9. When docked will I be able to see space or will I have some sort of station interior? (HINT: We want to be able to see our surrounding, even if optionally)

10. X-L structures in WH?

11. How will refitting work for structures? If I'm under attack or about to be attacked can I swap my guns or something? Will there be a delay before new setup will take effect?

Pls add some loot drop. Wormholers don’t attack poses for "production materials" and can’t stay in system for weeks waiting for defenders to scoop loot.

MOAR A’s:

1.  So far, our plan is to have them anywhere yes, as long as proximity restrictions are respected.

6. Structures won't be able to shoot without someone manning the guns. As CCP Nullarbor mentioned, we have options under our sleeves to mitigate the risk from this change. Like having a reduced vulnerability window in specific areas, and / or be able to have NPCs spawn.

7. Fuel is so far only going to be needed to activate the service modules, those structure shouldn't use fuel on their own, please refer to our previous blog for more details.

8. Not sure about being able to know docked people, may be part of scanning mechanics, but open to discussion.

9. When docked you will see surrounding space.

10. Yes, ideally we want all structure sizes and types everywhere. There may be gampeplay restrictions on them and / or their respective modules if needed however.

11. Refitting will most likely drain capacitor (like on ships) so while you could do it in combat, this would not be advisable.

EVEN MOAR Q’s:

1) However, will destroying these new M-XL class structures generate killmails?

2) When it comes to finding them in space, I agree with other posters that they should not necessarily need probes to scan down. However, maybe make this dependent on a fitted module or rig, where by default you can find the structure via dscan and directly warping to it, but players can customize them to require probes to find--for a cost. Say, a "dscan inhibitor rig" which has relevant drawbacks (e.g., maybe weakens the defenses or reduces the benefits the citadel gives) but then adds the requirement of combat probes to find the structure?

3) When it comes to giving player citadels benefits for trading above NPC stations, I would suggest (as a trader myself) raising the default NPC tax rate on stations. I think something this harsh is needed because it would be the only thing that would--personally--get a player like myself to trade in a player-run market, or start my own. However, how will it work in the market itself? Will public citadels in the region with sell orders--say, seeing nanite paste--appear on the market search, where I can then set destination to this public citadel?

4) Would it be possible to anchor two citadels close enough to one another so that they can fight each other? Citadel versus Citadel pvp??! That would be pretty fun and would open up a lot of gameplay options, especially in WH evictions.

5) Any thoughts yet about how the market will be seeded with the relevant structures and modules? Regular blueprint sales in NPC stations, for instance, or will there also be any BPCs that drop, say, for a Serpentis L Citadel which, like faction towers currently, give certain bonuses above the regular towers etc.?

EVEN MOAR A’s:

1. Yes  (…destroying these new M-XL class structures generate killmails)

2. I think we will show them on the onboard scanner to warp to.

3. Market will come a bit later and we'll have a detailed blog about how that will work but yes we reduced market tax will be a good incentive to use a player built market over the NPC ones.

4. No, because of so many reasons…  (Citadel versus Citadel pvp??!)

5. That's a bit early to say, we have a lot of options for new industry here building the structures and all the modules.

AGAIN WITH THE Q’s:

1) However, will destroying these new M-XL class structures generate killmails?

2) When it comes to finding them in space, I agree with other posters that they should not necessarily need probes to scan down. However, maybe make this dependent on a fitted module or rig, where by default you can find the structure via dscan and directly warping to it, but players can customize them to require probes to find--for a cost. Say, a "dscan inhibitor rig" which has relevant drawbacks (e.g., maybe weakens the defenses or reduces the benefits the citadel gives) but then adds the requirement of combat probes to find the structure?

3) When it comes to giving player citadels benefits for trading above NPC stations, I would suggest (as a trader myself) raising the default NPC tax rate on stations. I think something this harsh is needed because it would be the only thing that would--personally--get a player like myself to trade in a player-run market, or start my own. However, how will it work in the market itself? Will public citadels in the region with sell orders--say, seeing nanite paste--appear on the market search, where I can then set destination to this public citadel?

4) Would it be possible to anchor two citadels close enough to one another so that they can fight each other? Citadel versus Citadel pvp??! That would be pretty fun and would open up a lot of gameplay options, especially in WH evictions.

5) Any thoughts yet about how the market will be seeded with the relevant structures and modules? Regular blueprint sales in NPC stations, for instance, or will there also be any BPCs that drop, say, for a Serpentis L Citadel which, like faction towers currently, give certain bonuses above the regular towers etc.?

HENCE MOAR OF THE A’s:

1. Why shouldn't they generate killmails? We know how much you guys like your killmail states.

2. Been answered before.

3. You've heard it first here guys! If we end up raising taxing on NPC stations, you will have Sven Viko VIkolander to thank for it! Twisted More seriously, player structures should be treated exactly like NPC stations if they're set as public, or if you have personal access to them.

4. Short answer: no. Long answer: noooooooooooooooooo. Because those don't use HP mechanics to be taken down, thanks to the Entosis module, what would you achieve by having them shoot each other? They will not be affected by raw damage.

5. We will most likely seed blueprints for Tech I versions from the NPC market. Faction variants will drop as loot and LP stores. Tech II variants can be invented. Those act as ships remember, thus they should be acquired in a similar way.

Lastly…

CCP Lebowski wrote:

Soldarius wrote:

“w-space was never meant to be occupied. You should not be living there.”

Obil Que wrote:

“I'll let you read CCPs thoughts on wormhole occupation yourself”

http://community.eveonline.com/news/dev-blogs/into-the-known-unknowns

I was going to post this myself!

Here’s the important part:

Quote:

“We are absolutely happy with how players have taken the wormhole feature and run with it over the last five years and we look forward to many more years of watching the adventures of the wormhole community with joy and awe. Anyone telling you otherwise is woefully mistaken.”

Personally I love wormhole space, and try to make sure all those crazy bob worshippers are always considered :)

Fly Reckless and see you in the Sky…  =/|)=

Adrift in the Calm Before the Storm…

~or “It Feels so Wrong Enjoying Empire space…”

I am still in Hisec… I have not left yet… and I am still enjoying myself immensely… something is terribly truly terribly wrong here.  =\

I have started a BM Folder for Jove Spikes. I BM any and all Jove Observatories I see when I am out-n-about making store runs or some such. I have 3 systems now between Mormoen, Amarr and Dodixie with Jove Spikes in em. You see it is my experience that the Seekers don’t ‘always’ spawn just cause you warp in. I have warped to a Spike and orbited and sat at ‘0’ for 5, 10 minutes and seen nada… zip, no Seekers.

Other times they have spawned as I land, or seconds after I land or as I warp out disgusted that they are not going to spawn… had that happen more-n-once. I have landed only to have them warp out past me. I have been chased by them, ignore by them, killed by them and made some very decent ISK off them… well, off the Seekers at least… I’m quite literally scared to clonedeath of the Drifters.

I also heard/read that if you Entosify (Ento? Entosif? Entosing?) IE target and run an Entosis Link on a Jove Observatory you get bacon. Hrm… OK, so I made a store run to Dodi, bought both E-Link I and II AND (for the very first time in my EVElife) I bought a BPO, an Entosis Link BPO. Keep in mind at the time we are taking 100m ISK for the E-link I and 250m ISK for the E-Link II and 250m ISK for the BPO… sheesh. That took me wallet under a bil for the first time in months.

 Anyhoo… now I took a hard look at what to put it on. You see the way these things work is (1) a cycle time of 120 seconds… 2 full minutes… during which you cannot warp. (2) they take fuel, Stront, (Strontium Clathrates to be exact) 1 unit of Stront per cycle. (3) the T1 has a range of 25km and the T2 has a range of 250km… this means you are self-disrupted for 2 minutes within 25km (T1), or up to 250km (T2) depending, of a Jove Observation Tower… you know, the place where Drifter BSes spawn… oh yeah, there.

[Note: this post was started before Fozzie changed the E-Links… and I am too tired to go a dig up the new specs… =P  ]

So? So. So… LOLCeptor FTW. Yup… these things do fit on ‘ceptors and yes that is exactly what I am using. You see if/when the Drifters spawn I want OUT. And as I can’t warp away I will take the next best thing… speed tank as best I can while I hopefully get out of trubble faster than I got into it. This has, so far at least, worked with Seekers.

I landed on the Spike in Mormoen and started orbiting at 24km at near 5k m/s, I had made 2 BMs directly opposite the Spike Beacon where the Sleepers most often spawn, one at 200km and one at 400km. Once orbiting target and start the E-Link on the tower and select the 400km BM… now all I have to do is run n like hell if/when Seekers or Drifters spawn and hope 5000 m/s is fast enough, and my angle to the Sleepers is good enough so I have some transversal and can GTFO safely. So far this has worked twice with Seekers… haven’t had a Drifter spawn on me while Entosing (yes, I have settled on ‘Entosing’ as the verb form…) the tower yet.

So, what I have gotten while Enotsing the tower is one (1) Antikythera Element per cycle… One approx 10 mil ISK piece of bacon every 2 minutes… not too shabby. Plus you also get 1 unit of “Gleaned Information”. This is basically a data unit with some of the Jove Observation logs, these are the 4 I have collected so far…

Interesting… as Spock might say.

I am curious how all this is going to play out… you see the Drifters ‘seem’ to be disassembling the Jove Towers… I watched a Drifter and a Seeker working on one a few nights ago… and later the same Drifter was joined by another and they both were doing something to the spike. Not shooting or scanning it… but some form of energy ‘beam’ was being ‘fired’ or ‘played’ on the structure. One of my corpmates said he heard/read they were taking them down… hmm.

Now we have the Entosis Link, and it requires 1 unit of Antikythera Element per E-link, T1 or T2, so we will have to have some way to continue to gather these. Right now it is Seekers and ‘tosing (howz that for a quick slide to a slang verb form?) a Jove Spike… yet the Drifters seem to be taking the Spikes down and no one knows what they are going to do next…

Newz Flash!!! A disturbing broadcast from Hilen Tukoss has been released by The Scope… This creates more questions than it answers… Here is my attempt at a transliteration of what was said by Tukoss…

This is Hilen Tukoss aboard the Scout vessel (static), Scout vessel Arek’Jaalan. This is an emergency broadcast. We have succeeded (static) into an unidentified wormhole(??). (static) I can see Hundreds of these (static). We have a (low??) signal but we are (holding it??) as long as we can. Notify (DED??) Notify the DED. We may be facing a possible major (invasion??). More and More ships have been arriving at this enormous structure [Defense Alarm]… Detected at (static)-(en??) it is pos(ible??) that (static) (undecipherable) (static) [Defense Alarm]…

In the video we see a structure I have never seen before, a cloaked Buzzard Cov Ops scout ship assumed to be the Scout vessel “Arek’Jaalan”, an impressive force of Drifter Battleships and Circadian Seekers; the Buzzard gets decloaked and we hear the Defense Alarms go off… all through this Tukoss is attempting to transmit his dire warning. We can, I am afraid, safely assume the Scout vessel “Arek’Jaalan” and its crew were lost. I do not know if Hilen Tukoss was an Empyrean, I do not believe he is… and if he isn’t, then he too is lost to us now.

So… it does seem that interesting times just are around the corner in New Eden my friends… interesting times indeed. For me, I think for now I’ll stay in Empire… I joined EVE back in the heady days of Incursion… I saw one of the first Incursions, and lived to tell the tale… now it looks as though we may have another “incursion” into new Eden from a different enemy with far different goals… and this time, it’s an enemy I have spent my lives fighting already…
I'm here...
I'm ready.

Fly reckless and see you in the Sky =/|)=

Antikythera Elements for Sale… 1 ISK Only!!!

~or “Runnin Sleepers in Hisec, Who'da Ever Thunk It?…”

I have been having a ball in Hisec… bet those of you who know me, or actually read the stuff what comes from my brain, never thought you’d hear that from me, but it’s true…

You see I base out of Amarr when in Empire and last weekend I was in the hole solo and I scanned a hellishly long pipe out to Empire and made a store run to Amarr to sell my PI wares. I had thousands of Supercomputers, Robotics, Consumer Electronics and a smattering of over produced P2s to sell… enough to fill a fully canned and Cargo fit Prowler… vurry nice semi passive income to say the least.

Anyhoo, so while in Empire I decided to see to rounding up some of the last of my ships and goods as were still strewn here and there around the ‘verse and try to get them in the hole. These are all the leftovers from the Big Move into our new C4 homehole. Over in Mormoen I had a Mastodon and a shit tonne of GSC’s (Giant Secure Cans) full of PI and a crap load of mods plus a couple of ships so I trundled on out that way inna Prowler as I knew I had some high value stuffs and wanted to get them in to market too.

So I get out there and I’m gettin’ the Mast and Prowler loaded up and squared away when I discover a very particular SSC, Small Secure Can… one that has, well let’s just say it’s worth more than the ships and all the other CAN’s combined shall we? Hrm… Now while Prowlers cannot be cargo scanned, or because Prowlers cannot be cargo scanned, they sometimes fall prey to ganks on the off chance they are hauling something really valuable… like a SSC worth its weight in PLEX, and no, that is not what I had in the SSC… I don’t ever EVER transport PLEX… I am amazed that anyone ever does, no matter the reason.

That said, so I have this really godsawful expensive SSC I need to safely move to Amarr… so I bought a Crusader ‘ceptor and fitted it for SlipperySpeed… IE fast to warp plus just fast. But I lost the lows to the x3 Cargo Expander IIs needed to carry the 100m3 CAN… that cost me some slippery an’ some fast but not too much as she worked just fine when I finally made the trip safely to Amarr… Yes ‘made’ as in past tense so no one needs to waste time camping the route.  =P

Anyhoo, while I am doing all of this I am also as usual following them as I follow in the blogshere and Neville Smit, of NevilleSmit.com (go figger) recently posted a nice little write up, Bits and Pieces: April 2015, in which he gave us this…

“The lore also makes me want to try some new - and possibly very stupid - things. For example, I'm off to hunt Circadian Seeker cruisers today, to see if I can collect some Antikythera Elements without getting zapped by a Drifter Battleship. I'll share how that goes in a future post.”

Hm, uh, er, hm. I make my daily bread killing Sleepers in Anoikis… and ever since the Seekers first appeared in Empire space they have not really attracted much of my attention other than the very cool ‘whatthehellisCCPuptonow??’ factor, which was plenty good IMHO. But this was the first I had heard that they has started dropping stuff worth killing, and possibly dying for…

Well, it turned out one of the ships I had in Mormoen was one of my Sleeper Ishtars, schweet. I had her broke down and crated for the move so I broke ‘er out and fit ‘er up with what I felt it might take to handle Seekers, CAP stable w/ MWD off, active shield, 26k EHP, 70/82/94/77 resists and our std Gecko/Hammer II/x3 Hobgob IIs Sleeper drone setup. The tank is designed to let me kill the Seekers and also to ‘potentially’ buy me the time needed to GTFO if/when a Drifter drops on me while farming his little seeker pals… IF I’m flying smart and on the bounce that is… big ‘IF’ that…

So I’m ready and I undock… and lo and behold there is a Jove Observatory in Mormoen!! I do the warping back-n-forth thing make some pounce BMs at 160km at the station and at 200km at the Jove Observatory... then I warped into the site, 5 Seekers spawn and I go in hot...

Now here’s the fun… the Seekers do not react in set piece ways all the time, they are tough but not too tough, fast but not too fast... and they sometimes warp off if you break contact OR they sometimes follow you if you warp off!! And they will re-engage! At one point I decided to refit as they were outrunning my heavier droans and it was taking longer than I liked to break them.

So after downing 3 of the Seekers I broke contact and warped to the station pounce… and the remaining Seekers followed, landed and engaged me! I fought the same spawn at the Jove Spike and at the Station!! Schweet! I settle with the last 2 Seekers, dock up, refit to add a Web, go out and scoop the Antikythera Elements (AKEs) drop them in station and warp back out to the Jove Spike.

I piddle around a bit at the Jove Spike but no spawn to I go back to station and fiddle with my fit a bit more… go a few hops out n back to get some other mods to try, that done I head back to the Jove Spike and… 6 Seekers spawn! Hells yes! I go in and orbit close to use the web and now things are going a bit better.

One of the things that makes this so much fun is the constant and very real fear of the Drifter HotDrop... I have watched the videos and read the killmails and battle reports… Drifters kill capitols… while the Ishtar is good it aint THAT good!! So I am trying to really watch the sky but... as I am finishing off the last Seeker my attention is focused on… in order; order drones IN, burn in to the wreck, align out, loot the MTU, scoop the MTU…

So while I’m trying to do all this a Drifter spawns and I don’t realize he’s there until I get hit… but Drifter weapons fire is very distinctive and I know immediately that that’s what I’m getting hit with! But luckily I had already aligned to my pounce so I spam warp and he only gets one more hit on me before I went to warp and broke contact… but even then…

Yup… 2 hits, stripped off all shields and armor and 9% of my hull... But I DID make it out validating my mathing that the tank I had devised just might last long enough to get me out IF I was flying smart and on the bounce… and I was.

So I land at the pounce, the Drifter targets me and goes red as I go to warp to the station to repair… but the station I am in does not have repair facilities. So I undock and… He’s there… EEP! I reflexively dock up until I realize I have full shields again, still no armor and 91% hull though… so I played dock games with the Drifter for a little then warp off and find a repair station.

Now back when the Drifter had spawned I had not made pickup on the MTU as it had been pulling in the last wreck when I warped out… So I head back out for the last Seeker Drop and that MTU and damn near got caught by the Drifter again... He spawned in the site as I landed at the pounce 200km out… he warped out as I warped in I grabbed the MTU and passed him again on my way out… LOL!!

I ran another spawn a bit later so that night I ran 2 spawns of 2 waves each and scooped a total of 9 Antikythera Elements (AKEs) for an ingame estimate of 12.6m ISK each... potentially 113.4m ISK!! oh hells yeah!!! Simply the BEST and most lucrative pure FUN I have had doing anything, much less solo PvE, in Hisec in YEARS!!!!

Oh and the title? Yea that… the next night I flew to Amarr and the actual sell price for AKEs was 13,899,999.99 ISK… I was gonna put mine up for 13,899,000.00… so I typed “1” and my pinky hit the “enter” key…

<facepalm>  I got 9.00 ISK.  =\

But… derping aside… really really nice job CCP... have a cookie. =]

Fly reckless and see you in the Sky =/|)=

Tiles in the Mosaic...

~or “Some Cool Features Coming in the Mosaic Release… and How is ‘ol Tur BTW?”

So I know I had not updated in a while… part of why I am not a recognized ‘fan site’ is my helter-skelter-lack-of-an-actual-posting-schedule thing… so I thought I’d bring ya’ll up to date on all things me/Tur and EVE as you know yer just dying to KNOW…  =]

I haven’t been blogging on much or even loggin on much these past few months… Mostly been playing PI Online (seems Skill-Q Online went away with the skill queue changes…). Not anything bad per se, just moar RL>EVE is all…

My job is going well, Monday is my 6mo anniversary… and I can start using built up Vaca time for ‘stuff’… or not and save it for an actual vacation. Keep in mind I have been an IT Contractor for 17 years… YEARS… and contractors rarely if never get vaca or paid time off or sick leave or, well ANY benefits outside of base payrate X hours submitted. I also have full medical insurance (of my own) for the first time in the same span of years so to say I’m happy on the career front is putting it mildly.

One slight downside is my hours… 9AM to 6PM US East Coast TZ. And my job like so many is not the kind you can always walk away from when the big hand hi-fives the small one right at 6P… many days I don’t get out till 7ish and Friday I dint leave until after 9PM… While I like the later start making for easier mornings, as I am not a ‘morning person’ by any means, the later arrival back home makes for shorter time in which to get things done ‘round the old place… and then there’s all the usual time burners and most nights now I find I just don’t have the energy to do a few hours online.

The rest is just the usual getting busier out-of-doors as the weather starts to warm up and ‘things’ become needful… yard work, tractor, driveway, Jeep, pigs, horse… yeah, pigs and horse. My wife decided late last year that she is a pig farmer at heart and we are raising pigs. For meat. Yup. My dottir calls the little ones, “Bacon Seed”…   =]

Plus this seems to not be limited to just me… several, well most, of our main content makers and enablers have had more on their plates IRL than over the winter so overall corp activity is down. But no one seems to be really worried that we are dying or stagnating or anything really negative… it’s just part of the usual ebb n flow of the mix of RL and our shared virtual lives in EVE.

OK, so the RL update is done, on to teh fun stuffs…

In EVE we have a bunch stuff comin down the pipe so to speak, CCP has a new site up called EVE Update in which one may get a glimpse of the future… of things to come. The next update, Codename Mosaic, is gonna drop this coming Tuesday April 28th… just 2 days from my typing this. EVE Update is a great site to get a decent snapshot of what’s in the works and I thought I’d work my way down the list offering the Interwebs ‘My Opinion’ ™… as if anyone asked…  The ones I CARE DEEPLY about havs Pictures!!!    =P

Permanent Ship Skins…  A personal meh for yours truly…

Now, you just let ME chose the colors and where they go and put MY Corp Logo on my ships and you will see me get embarrassingly mud-on-head excited… but until then, ifn you get you one a them ‘fancy nano-painted’ ships, well yer just one of the crowd buying someone else’s idea of how your ship should look… You might as well just get all Quafe ships with Quafe logos and be a flying billboard… not me.

Opportunities for all… Great for noobs… to bad I’m a vet, sounds like a far better way to get into EVE.

3D Starmap… Still deciding how I feel about this.

One thing you cannot deny is that the New Map sure is purty… just not sure how much added functionality, if any, it brings… I can say I did not like how it showed my “Visited Systems”… Very hard to see the systems you had NOT visited and one thing I liked in the old map was you could SEE the comparison… now you get a poor low color view of really only the systems you have actually been in and the circle they use to show number of visits does not scale enough to readily ‘see’ any real difference.

Burner Missions: Serpentis and Blood Raiders… Good.

These are the new Cruiser level Really Dangewus missions… I have not myself tried any of the burners for that would mean I would have to spend time, over and above store runs, in Hisuc and… well… I’d rather hit myself in the face with a hammer TBH… I’ll keep killing C5 Sleepers in a ‘Cane if it’s ok with ya’ll… and making far moar ISK than any “mishes” could ever net me to boot… But I do hope them as like ‘em like ‘em even moar now.

New Assembly Effect for Anchorable Structures… OK, now we’re sotra talkin!

I have HATED… (yes ‘all caps’ HATED) the way in which we build structures in New Eden since the first time I shoved one o them fugly as hell potato sacks out of the ass end of a Hoarder and watched as our POS ‘Tower’ “Magically” appeared from said ‘potato sack’ (if you’ve ever done it you know what I’m talking about, if you haven’t, please for the love of Bob, don’t so you can retain some tiny smidgin of belief in science in EVE… cause the way structures are “grown” in EVE is the stuff of pure WoW magic…)

And, TBH, this new mechanic, while light years better than the old way is still so far off the bat (personally, ‘tis me blog ya know…) that I can’t say as I ‘like’ it… but I will accept it as a tentative step in the right direction, though a faltering tentative baby step at best…

“So what do YOU want Tur?” you ask… Why, thank you for asking…    =]

[Wall-o-Text Warning… and no, ya don’t get no TL;DR… read it ifn yer interested…]

BUILDING a Planetary Orbital Station in SPACE should require at least 1 Deep Space Transport (or something with the same or larger Fleet Hangar capacity) for a Small POS, 3 DST’s for a Medium and 5 DST’s for a Large. ALL ships MUST be on grid at the same time, all will be loaded at or near max Fleet Hangar capacity (hence DSTs or larger) with the PARTS required to construct the given POS. The number of parts required would be manageable, say 10 for a Small, 30 for a Med and 50 for a Lrg, meaning 10 POS parts would fill a DST Fleet Hangar.

Note:

Yes this kinda screws with OMCs (One Man Corps) and solo players… it does seem to sorta force them to create alts or actually break their Vow of Hermitedness and debase themselves to actually talking or even (eee gads) working with other players… I dunno… mebbe a solo player could contract NPCs to bring the other loads out to the job site?? I’m quite sure this is naught but a bugaboo that can be worked out… later… mebbe much later…    =\

Anyhoo… The DSTs (or whatever) would need to be fitted with a “Construction Tractor Beam” (CST) module required to place the various parts together, and no, not the standard Salvage Tractor Beam (STB), though the CTB module could be based on the STB module in Industry… but the CTB could not only pull something to you, it could also push something away from you or hold something in place (and no, it would still not work on ships so you in the back quit whining…)

You also would need a “Construction Foreman” (new skill) and a “Foreman” variant of the CTB that would be required for construction to take place. The Foreman will be one of the hauler pilots and would oversee the whole job. The Foreman would have a Build Plan for the POS to be built in the form of a script that is loaded into the “Foreman” CTB.

All haulers would ‘anchor’ for personal/corp/alliance all the parts they carry (and yea I feel we should be able to select those levels of ownership)… These would appear in space in a “Construction Container” (special Jet Can) and the Foreman would call for each piece as required. The pilot with the requested piece would activate his CTB on it and (the CTB would) place it where needed. The Foreman would then activate his CTB to ‘weld’ it in place… this continues until the POS is completed at which point the Foreman just fuels her up and hits the Big Red Buhtan to raise the POS Forcefield.

Note: a POS could NOT be ‘partially’ built, once construction starts you are on a timer albeit a generous one, but all the parts need to be welded in place in order and before the clock runs out or the POS fails, breaks apart and you have to scoop all the parts back to cargo and start over again.

There would need to be a std hauler or 2 for fuels and stront same as now, or for that matter you could carry enough fuel in the std cargo hold in the DSTs to online the FF. Defense and interior modules would of course be staged as usual ready to bring in…

This whole effort could easily be designed to take approximately the same time it does now. But a well disciplined and well practiced crew could learn to shorten that time to its theoretical minimum…  And with this POS Construction would be an actual interactive ACTIVITY instead of a passive waiting game… one which in the history of EVE has been mostly spent waiting to get jumped, blobbed and die and to watch your POS get stolen to boot. This new mechanic gives us new gameplay, new modules and skills, new BPOs and BPCs for new ‘stuff’ to make for the market… hey, someone has to make all those POS parts and CTB mods right??

Does this mean it would not be as dangerous or moar dangerous than today’s mechanic?? I dunno… so why don’t let’s try it and see hrm?  Anyhoo… back to our not so regularly scheduled programming…

T3 Destroyer Rebalance… I have a Confessor and Svipul… but I live inna hole and we really haven’t had a real use for them so I can’t say I’ll see any real difference in gameplay as I am not that experienced with them yet… so this one is kinda meh…

New Control Tower Forcefield Effects…

Love it… crazy about it… don’t ever want to lose it…

Already blathered on about this in my last post here…

Mosaic Theme Song…  EVE has sound????

TBH I have not cared one whit for any of the theme music in EVE since they shut off the Incursion Theme… I have been faithful enough to give each a listen, but after a few minutes I shut off the theme music ‘cause nothing has ever come anywhere close to getting my blood up like those drums did… Heck the music of Incursion was actually part of why I chose to be a Matarii… it sounds so tribal and raw and pure…

 

Higher Nullsec Mining Yields… Oh joy, more love for (1) the space I couldn’t care less about and (B) the gameplay I couldn’t care even less for… Oh I know this is BIG STUFF for many, not dissing their game… (well, ok mebbe a wee bit of dis for nullsuccers…) but it’s just not for moi.

Two Factor Authentication… Hooray Moar Security!!!!  Boo Less Freedom to Hack!!!! Wait, wat??

Sensor Overlay Update…  FUKKIN BOUT DAMN TIME.

The ability to TURN OFF the Gods Damned Discovery Scanner Sweep has been badly needed… as a matter of fact that whole idea shoulda died horribly and noisily in the crib…

But I can now go back to at least pretending I am an Explorer in a Vast Uncharted Frontier… instead of just one moar sad Pedestrian milling about in the Billboard Covered Starscape we actually live in.

Corporation Roles Interface Improvements… I actually should be jumping up and down over this one… I used to be a POS Manager and yeah, it does suck. But I know of things that suck worse and all in all once you understood it, it was what it was. Now understand I am NOT saying it was good or shouldn’t change but…

I look at changes like this and worry about Nerf Creep… those small changes to make ‘this’ just a little easier and make ‘that’ just a little less complex… and when you add up all those inconsequential ‘little’ changes it one day ends up with us now really bitter vets crying in our Ruum an Quafe over the good ‘ol days when EVE was harsh and hard and not full of 13 year olds playing in Creative Mode…   yuch.

Visual Upgrades For Environmental Content… I am all for better visuals… but I do worry about the effect on players with lower end video capabilities. I play EVE onna simple Laptop, an HP Pavilion Sleekbook 15, not a Power Gamer System by anyone’s lights… but I must say I recently upgraded to 8GB RAM (from 4) and I can run dual clients at full video boogety with no real issues...

So, while I have my concerns they are outweighed by CCPs relentless, and so far successful, efforts to keep the client as clean and lean as possibly while giving us a visual right-out-of-the-box-experience bar none.

I know some guys who go to great lengths to push their systems and mod games like Skyrim to the point of being Uber Real… and yet EVE is as visually stunning (to me) as all that without the mods and without all the low slots full of Water Cooled CPUs…   =]

Battlecruiser Warp Changes… Faster is good… ‘nough said.

Nullsec Infrastructure Improvements… so very much less than meh.

New Damage Control Module Icon…

Me no like. Want suitcase back. Bad CCP… no donut.

This is a change without a reason. Explain WHY it had to change and if logical, I will accept it, until then this is change simply cause ‘change’ and that is simply not good enough. There is value in History and Legacy and Tradition… not all change is ‘good’... Dunt believe me? just ask the guy with one foot if all ‘change’ is good.

Import Clipboard Skill Queue… Hrm.

I miss the old skill queue… ok, go ahead… scream and yell and throw things…

OK, you done? No?…

OK, are you done now? I do hope you got that out of your system.

Ok, so as I said I miss the old 24 hr skill queue. Why? Cause skilling doesn’t MEAN anything anymoar. I never know what Tur has learned or when he has crossed some Big Skill Line and can now use T2 Heavy Missiles… ‘cause Aura doesn’t say in her oh so damn sexy voice, ”Skill training complete.” anymore… ‘cause for me to have any idea where I am in skilling I have to go look and I have NO REASON to go look anymoar ‘cause Tur’s Skill-Q is FULL for the next YEAR so I can just fahgetaboutit… and I don’t like that. No, not one bit I don’t.

Skilling used to be an active part of my game… it was something I and all of us managed and thought about a lot and planned for and around and it was something we DID. It was something you checked on EVERYDAY... and I miss the excitement of knowing I could now use T2 this or that… This is, to me, a perfect example of Nerf Creep.

Oh please CCP make Skilling easier ‘cause it’s Hard and it makes me Have to DO stuff and it makes me Have to Log On and that irritates me and it should be a game and it should be EASY… oh, and while yer at it can you just give me ISK, ‘cause Running Missions are Hard and running them makes me Have to DO stuff and running them makes me Have to Log On and that irritates me and it should be a game and it should be EASY…  see? Nerf Creep. So yeah… I miss the 24 hour Skill Queue.

Mac Client Improvements…  Finally!! Something I care about even LESS than nullsuc!   =P

Th, th, th That’s ALL FOLKS!!!!

Fly Wreckless and see you in the Sky  =/|)=

“Is CCP Gonna Bust Da Bubble?”

~or “Woe Betide the POS Force Field…  Mebbe.”

For them as did not catch it, I recently commented on Sugar’s blog about the impeding removal of the POS Force Field… This was brought on by section 5 of the BACK INTO THE STRUCTURE Dev Blog… which I quote in toto here;

5.     Housing

Proper housing of player items and ships is a critical must-have if we wish those structures to be used over NPC stations. As such, we have different ideas up our sleeves to make that happen.

First, docking will still be available for the largest structures, as long as you have rights and your ship isn’t too big for this kind of purpose (we are looking at you, Supercarriers and Titans).

For the smallest structures, or if your e-peen is too large for docking, mooring will be preferred option. Replacing forcefield mechanics, this will make your ship invulnerable and not being able to be bumped as long as you are within a specific radius of the structure. Of course, when that is the case you will not be able to interact with the outside world either. The idea for the mooring capabilities are that they are configurable and have a finite limit, so multiple structures will be required to house particularly large fleets.”  (emphasis mine)

Yup… according to the Structures Dev Blog it seems they are seriously considering getting rid of the POS Forcefield, the POS Shield. As a player who has lived almost exclusively in POSes for going on 3.5 years of the 4 I have been ingame… I find this change personally abhorrent and unpleasant… and even more, unneeded.

Unlike my null brethren who screamed and rage quit with the advent of the Jump Changes, getting rid of the POS Shield is not a ‘game changer’ that fixes anything game breaking like Force Projection did… the extreme ease of overwhelping Force Projection made possible due to the way Jump mechanics used to be was wayyy broken… the POS Shield is not and does not affect the game in anywhere near the same way Force Projection did.

I commented on Sugar’s post, CSMX - Post #1, about this… there was some back-n-forth commenting on this then Halycon said;

“Mostly it comes down to it cannot be fixed without a deep level rewrite of how the game functions and handles objects. I'm not talking horror code, I mean a complete rethink of the entire engine that handles objects in space, and therefore a complete ground up rewrite. The impact of that would be far beyond force fields. By it's very nature it'd change the entire balance of how Eve work; from flying ships, to weapons, to just about everything you'd do in space.”

and…

“The devs have wanted to do away with force fields for the better part of a decade, but couldn't. And now that they finally can, they're gleefully going to kill it. I absolutely guarantee the day they turn them off for good, one of the coders is going to have a victory dance.” (emphasis mine)

In four years ingame I have never once heard any of this…

Then Sugar responds… twice…

“Thank you Halycon.

They are trying to keep functionality (things floating in the shields are safe) with things like Intel and fix problems in Eve.

Force fields do not work. I'm sorry that I'm using the wrong words. But they don't work and they have to go. That means what you have now is going to be given to you in a different way.

Thianis the discovery phase of the details and everyone is trying to get it right but its not going to be the same. Your hangars should still be there for storage.

But shields are not staying.”  (emphasis mine)

Well… fuk me. But you know what, if it really is as stated, for the overall good and health of the game, well then I can and will, grudgingly granted, accept it… until I saw this…

During the EVE Online Fanfest 2015: Art & Graphics Panel I saw and heard this…

CCP BasementBen, Development Manager, showed us what you see in the title pic and here (25:52 to 26:50)… a short animation of an “improved” POS Shield… Hrm. Improved? Then CCP Mankiller, Lead Graphics Programmer, tells us it is “…basically a magnetic field with a bit of Northern Lights, or Aurora Borealis…” hmmmmm…

Then during the Q&A, here, (44:07 to 44:40) there was this question:

“Hey guys, a quick question with regards to the POS Shields, umm, not sure if this is something that’s going to be covered next with the actual Structures discussion but, are we gonna see, when you’re taking out a POS, impacts on (the) actual shield instead of everything seemingly penetrate as if it’s not there and impacting on a tower, is that gonna change at’all and make it slightly more realistic?”

The response is… “Not for this, ah, this release.” then “Not for these POS Shields because the new structure things that’s the new thing to go and we will, most likely, do it for that yes.”

“…and we will most likely do it for that, yes.” Well… seems the art dept missed the ‘POS Shields have to GO.’ CCP/CSM memo… and I seriously doubt this CCP, the CCP being run as it is NOW, a company that it taking bold aggressive ownership of its product… I sincerely doubt they are going to accidentally allow the art dept to showcase something that is not at least seriously on the table… ESPECIALLY something that has such an impact on one of the biggest changes to come to the game in its going on 12 year run, something as regards the changes to POSes, Null Sov and the New Structures… changes that the players have been waiting for, and begging for, for YEARS…

Oh I know, I know… there are those out there who will LOL and say, “Dude, CCP always steps on their own dick man! It’s just par for the course!” but I disagree. I’m not saying they can’t make a mistake… anyone can… but this is BIG. I sincerely doubt CCP Seagull would allow something that states pretty plainly that they are working on the POS Shield and it is gonna stay when the plan is to take it down.

As for me… I will hold out hope that CCP decides that the POS Shield had uses other than just defense of a POS… for me, for most of us who live out of a POS, meaning all of us who live in Anoikis (wormholes) the POS Shield is so much more than just a defense… The Great POS Window is one of the few truly enjoyable aspects of POSlife... unlike the poor sots in Empire Stations and Nullsuc Outposts we have a huge 360 deg omni-directional WINDOW... we have a 30km of our very own protected space in which we can fly around in and DO shit… move stuff around, goof off with each other, plan ops, reship, prep for fights or just sit back and chill after a day of whatever and enjoy the company of our friends and corpmates… with the best gods damned VIEW in all of EVE…

Sugar also said, "POS shields are they currently are are broken and problematic. They don't work with how Eve functions which leads us to the endless cases of POS shield exploits."

Then FIX POS shields FFS... but don't just get rid of them. Make them work as they should... Like the guy asked… make them the thing you target, make them the thing you shoot, make the POS Forcefield actually impenetrable and everything inside it untouchable until taken down, period.

"They don't work with how Eve functions which leads us to the endless cases of POS shield exploits."

Exploits? It’s EVE, in EVE finding and exploiting cracks in the game mechanics, or ‘gaming the game’ is usually called ‘emergent behavior’… and the POS Shields ‘don’t work with how EVE functions’ how? because Empire Stations and Nullsec Outposts don't have them? Empire Stations and Nullsec Outposts aren't POSes... of course they don't have them... they are huge and invulnerable...

POSes are a western frontier fort with a wooden palisade, a sturdy log cabin out on the prairie with gun ports in the shutters... Anoikis is not Nullsec... we are the wild west of EVE... let us BE the wild west of EVE... please.

Please don’t screw us over once again like you did with the effing Discovery Scanner… don’t burst our bubble.

Fly Wreckless and see you in the Sky  =/|)=

These Are Not the Freighters You Are Looking for, Just Move Along…

~or “EVE Needs a ‘Mayflower’ service…”

This is not a 'meta post', nor a 'what the hell is up with Fozziesov' post nor a 'the Svipple has tits?' post.... this is just yer run of the mill 'what the hell has been going on in Tur's verse' post...
We have moved… again.

This will be my fifth move in and/or out of an Anoikis system. We, meaning HBHI my home corp, originally lived in an Alliance owned and operated Large Amarr POS in the old Demsal Alliance C1 back many years ago now… but that wasn’t really ‘ours’ and cause we were not in the POS owning corp we therefore not only lived in our ships same as we do today but, we also had no POS access other than password-through-the-FF. 

What ships we had and other stuff had to be managed by the actual POS corp members, IE the worst possible way to live in a POS out of the wide range of unpleasant possible conditions that POS life has available. It was not long before we simply needed full access and that meant a POS of our own.

So we ended up anchoring, for the very first time, move #1, “Serenity Station”, a Large Matarii POS in the C2 owned by HELPeR, an Allied corp. This was our first real home in Anoikis. As these things go over time we decided we wanted not just our own POS but our own hole too, we had reached a point where the C2 sites n PI n raids didn’t provide us all with the levels of ISK to which we aspired, so we moved out and up to a C3, move #2.

This was our first real complete takedown, move out and setup in a new hole move. We lived in pretty happy with things for a long time until we got seriously camped by some guys from SYJ Alliance and all of that ended in us joining SYJ and once again doing a full move, move #3… this time out of the C3 and into Bastion, SYJ’s C6.

After most of a year there we left SYJ on good terms and moved out, move #4… temporarily living in Empire while we decided what to do next… which was going to be a C4, then we got wind that our old friends in HELPeR had left null and moved , move #4a, into a C3… we mothballed HBHI and our POS and POS mods and joined HELPeR, so not really a full-on ‘move’ for the HBHI guys as such this time.

Now, the corp has grown quite a bit over this past winter and we found were spending a lot of time scouting C5’s to run for ISK to feed the membership so basically, we needed to move up. So we have found... well purchased... a C4/C5-C3 with very good PI. This means a C4 wormhole with 2 statics, a C5 and a C3. So we will no longer have to scout for C5s… we will have a connection to some C5 23/7/365 and we will have a connection to some C3 which ‘should’ give us decent access to Empire most days… this is move #5.

And lemme tell you man, moving in Empire sucks, but changing wormholes can be a real logistical nightmare… you see moving between systems in Anoikis entails a few things even nullsecers don’t have to deal with…

(1) No gates. Daily you have to scan down the ever changing wormholes in and out of not only your old home home, but once you buy or find that perfect new hole with the great access to downtown and fantabulistic schools, you have to have all the holes there scanned down daily if not several times a day.

(2) Add to this is the moving of often large numbers of ships (I myself have over 43 personally owned ships in the POS…) multiple hauler runs loaded with equipment and everyone’s personal PvE/P ships out and in is dependent on the mass limits of the holes you find. Scanning down a hole that cuts 10’s or more Empire jumps down to a mere handful is met with raucous jubilation… but when it is noticed that it is a Frigs only hole… the scanning pilot has no other option but to leave fleet, cloak up and run for his life.

(3) No Red/Blue/Black Frog freighter pilot can help you at all… ‘cause at the VERY most your access to your new home system lasts just 24 hours, and C4 and down don’t take Freighters… and no self-respecting freighter pilot is gonna risk his ship inna wormhole… period. So the best you could hope for would be a pickup and drop off at the nearest station to your new home’s hole-of-the-day… but R/B/Black Frog doesn’t ‘guarantee’ delivery in under 24 hours… though you could possibly offer a bonus for that service.

Keep in mind, no matter where the holes put you, you HAVE to move ships out and stage them at the closest Empire station as fast as you can… hoping against hope that when you get time to move them in your new connection isn’t 45 hops away. We’ve had days where we get the dream… an exit from old home that is through an acceptable lowsec, not camped all to hell and rife with riff-raf… and like 9 or maybe even 5 jumps to the entrance hole to new home… and we’ve had days where we just can’t move crap cause old home is 5 low jumps to hisec and 2 are hard camped and new home has a pipe through null and an active C6… cripes.

Multiply all of this by the number of chars who have ships in the POS and, well… tempers between players who have never had a bad word to say ‘bout each other can get very short… and them as aren’t BFFs to begin with… well, it can get unpleasant, but… there is nothing to it but to do it.

Now the C4 is a trade-off… a compromise hole. Better home sites, vastly better PI than the old C3 and easy daily access to C5’s for sites and C3’s… the downsides? Easy daily access to C5’s and no static Empire holes... this means not only do we get the possibility of a C5 loaded with sites… we also have the same chance of a C5 loaded with players… eek. Plus the connection to ‘a’ C3 does not mean that we WILL have an Empire connection… just means we ‘should’ have one most of the time but still it will mean scanning down a ‘pipe’ to Empire instead of a direct connection, granted it will normally be a short pipe.

Still an all, the vastly better PI means greatly enhanced passive income for all and for the corp, plus the C5 static means over all better opportunities for enhanced ISK making in both home and adjoining holes… so the compromise is just that, some good some not so much.

Lastly there is the new hole to consider… choose a moon for the POS, get it all setup and deathstarry… get ervybody’s ships n shit in and now we get to settle in start runnin sites and setup PI… or, er, no. POCOs.

Planetary Orbital Customs Offices… (Player Owned Customs Offices)… all of the POCO’s are owned by other corps with various tax rates… which means… POCO Bash Fleet! Oh joy… 13 planets… Thirteen POCOs to bash down, and that aint fun shooting I dunt care who ya are.

Anyway we started in on it, as many as could joined in but I must say Joran, our member who is the most involved or at least the most interested in PI and Industry, was of course, the guy who put in the most time and DPS on this little project. To which we all owe some debt of gratitude as bashing POCOs just plain sucks.

Anyhoo, it is all now done and we are getting PI setup and final alts from the old home hole are now trickling in… and people are simply not loggin in as much. Huh…. Seems for many of us there has been a general feeling of being just kinda tired of the game as the last few weeks have not been about ‘fun’… they have been about work.

The ‘move out’… ‘moving ships n shit all over hell n creation’… the ‘move in’… ‘POCO bashing’… add to this that a few of our prime ‘content creators’ have had more on their plates than usual and the end of the move has also coincided with some RL>EVE stuff cropping up in some of our lives.

In the end you get people poking their noses in TS and not seeing anyone active so they log off and so… only a few of us are on together at any given time, and not enough to really ‘do’ anything. Not enough for sites or a raid or a roam or more than scanning all the things… and even that is not nearly as up to date as we used to keep it.

For me personally… I’m sitting on almost 2 bil ISK and so my inner drive to run sites or to even get PI setup is not as strong as it has been in the past when I was used to a much much leaner wallet… plus I am one of the ones who have been slapped by some of that RL>EVE stuff and so I am guilty of not loggin on as much nor for as long as usual.

This needs to change, hell… everything else has.  =]

Fly reckless and see you in the Sky =/|)=