Boom Goes The Caracal

Um yeah, pretty much. I hung in there just a little too long and it cost me. At least I had decent insurance, bronze level I think. I'll still have to spend some time flying distribution missions to put together enough ISK to put another Cruiser in space, but I'm not so sure it's going to be another Caracal. I'm thinking maybe a Moa next time. We'll see.

I'm getting Level II missions now, which is a good thing. I need to make at least a few more million ISK before I even think about trying to buy and fit one of those monsters. Still I that's my current goal, to put another Cruiser in space asap. We'll see how it goes.

More soon.

Question of the Moment

Why is it that I can't find anywhere to buy an EvE Online t-shirt? Not an expensive hoodie or jacket, like they sell on the website, but a nice normal t-shirt, maybe something with the EvE logo on it, perhaps even a ship or two? How is it that this game can be as popular as it is and yet no one sells this most basic item of gaming memorabilia? I don't get it.

 

 

Vacation, All I Ever Wanted

Today I flew a few missions and continued fitting the Caracal. She's nicely appointed in terms of hardware now, but there are still a few skills I still need to train up for maximum impact. I've been training the important stuff up to Level IV before moving on to something else because of the long train times for Level V, but now I think it's time I started getting some of the more important ones done.

It's interesting to me that once I made the decision to return to EvE I haven't been spending much time with other games. I was playing Wildstar for a while but kind of lost interest. My account is still good to November but I have don't think I've logged in there in a month. To be totally honest, I'm just not interested. EvE is taking up about 90% of my gaming time right now. The other 10% is the occasional Need For Speed or Battlefield romp when I feel the need to clear my head, and I've also been known to hop in a Titan or two when the mood strikes me. Other than that it's been all EvE, all the time.

Another interesting thing is that I'm really enjoying being a solo player and realizing that I'm in no rush to join a corp. I know I'll reach a point where it makes sense, and if the right offer comes along I may take it. That said, I'm also not going out of my way to find one right now.

With everything going on in my life right now, EvE really is a vacation, a badly needed one. And I guess one aspect of this particular vacation I've been enjoying is the peace and quiet. Oh sure, I'll socialize when the opportunity arises but, well, it's just nice. Very nice.

More soon.

Everything Old Is New Again

I just bought myself a Caracal. Yeah, a fucking missile boat. I never tried one of these the first few times around in this game. This is fun.

I'm still just soloing missions for now, but I think I'll be looking for a corp soon. It seems many are recruiting and with a little practice and ISK I'll be more than ready to fly with a corp again.

All the basics have come back pretty easily. I've only lost a single ship this time (so far), and so I'd have to say that recovering my combat skills isn't likely to be a big problem. Right now, it's all about training up skills and making ISK.

It's funny, you know? One of the things I've always loved about EvE is that I can go at my own pace. I never feel pressured to level up, kill a certain number of something(s), or pursue a predetermined path. My path is mine to find and it's different each time I re-enter the game.

I don't mind the slow pace this early on, but I do wish I could get better agents. The only ones I can get right now are in distribution.

So, right now, it's slow and steady, which is why I haven't been posting much yet. Don't worry, when there's more to say, I'll say it.

It's good to be home.

Cruisin'

Well, not quite yet.

I just started training Cruisers on this new toon, because I think I'm ready. Yeah, once I have the skill trained up it'll take a nice chunk of the ISK I've accumulated to get something decent and fit it, but that's ok.

I'm actually doing pretty well with the Cormorant I've been flying for the last several days. All the old battle skills and strategies are coming back pretty quickly as I find myself in different combat situations, and so I've just started Level II agents.

I'm also out of The Forge and into areas like Lonetrek and The Citadel. Despite all the progress, I'm still thinking about spending some time with Eve University. I think I'd like a little group PvP and that's a great corp to fly with.

Things are a bit in RL busy today, so that's it for now. More soon.

One More TIme...

So yeah, I'm back in Eve again.

I know, I thought I was back in January too, but then all of sudden things got busy workwise and Eve, along with pretty much all other forms of entertainment, took a back seat. In truth, that's still the case to an extent. Yet, the busier I get in RL, the more attractive a vacation in New Eden is.

You might notice that my name and picture are different as well. My first main, Bekka Jai, appears to be lost to the ages. That's a pity because she had a shitload of skill points, but it's really not so bad because I need to relearn the finer points of the game and starting from scratch will help that process. The one I had in January, Bekka Skye, I decided I just wasn't happy with. I'm not really sure why, I just decided that I wanted to re-enter with a new toon and start on a new path.

All my previous toons have been Gallente, but this time I'm going Caldari. I decided I wanted to learn to fly some new ships and in order to do that I needed to be a different faction. I like the Caldari ships I've flown so far and I think this toon is a keeper. I don't know, she just feels right.

I'm also considering rejoining Eve University. I really enjoyed my time in that corp and learned a lot the last time around, so doing that will help me reconnect with the Eve player community as well as sharpen my in-game skills.

It was actually kind of funny. I've been considering returning to Eve for a while now, but work always seemed to get in the way. "Next week, when it's slower and I have more time." I'd tell myself, then something else would jump off and I'd find myself with even less spare time. And so it went, for a while. Then, a week ago, I just went to the Eve website, bought myself 90 days worth of game time, and started my new toon. I didn't take time to consider, I just did it, and I've been playing ever since.

In all honesty, I'm still pretty busy, but I value my spare time more now because there's less of it. It used to be that I used Eve as an escape from the boredom of unemployment, but now it's an escape from a busy work life. In addition, now that I own a MacBookPro and Eve has a Mac client, making it the only game I care about that will run on the thing, that's an additional incentive to get back in the game. Of course, first I have to install it on there, which I haven't done yet.

I've just been poking around, running missions in Caldari high-sec, and I'll see where I go from here. It's still early yet, but I do plan to be around for a while.

So, yeah, this time I think I'm back for real this time, at least for the foreseeable future. I've paid for time, I've reopened the blog, and once again I'm off to seek fame, fortune, and adventure in the New Eden star cluster.

I hope you'll stick around. It should be...interesting.

So, I'm In A Weird Place Right Now...

...and I don't mean just in-game.

I've spent the last two weeks re-familiarizing myself with Eve, and it's amazing how quickly so much of it has come back and how easily I've fallen back into the rhythm of this game. I've been running security and distribution missions all over high-sec and doing well enough that I'm now flying a well-fit Thorax that can (currently) put four medium scout drones in space. It holds its own pretty well on level two missions, but I'm still regularly running into situations where I know there's no way my little cruiser is going to be able to win and end up having to bail the mission, at least until I can come back with something stronger and more durable.

I'm ok with where I am in-game right now, but I've spent so much time and focus on getting there, and frankly, just enjoying being back in New Eden for the first time in a very long time, that I haven't spent any time thinking about what I was going to do when the free trial time was up. Today's the last day. Decision time.

It occurs to me that  Eve is an odd game. For an MMO, that is. There's plenty of mission-based content to teach you the basics but beyond that what you do in Eve is pretty much up to you. Most of these games, no matter how "sandboxy" they appear, tend to force or at least strongly urge the player along some sort of pre-determined path, whether it's from mission to mission, or more commonly, region to region. In just the couple of weeks since I've returned to Eve I've been to and run missions in all four empires and the Ammatar Mandate. I go where the agents are, crisscrossing high-sec as I need to.

It's really a completely different game structure than what most people, including me, are used to. Don't get me wrong, I love a good overarching story as much as anyone, but do I really need one to validate my gaming?

That's kind of where my head is at right now.Recently, I've spent a lot of time with Star Trek Online, which is what I left Eve for originally. In between now and then, I played STO for about a year, left that to play several other games, then came back to STO just after the recent Romulan exansion was released. I still enjoy STO, but I've reached the point where I've played all the new content and so I'm starting to get bored with it again.

This would probably be a good time to mention that I'm seriously ADD. For-real-no-fucking-around-misnaming-a-short-attention-span-but-actually-diagnosed-by-a-real-doctor ADD. It's not something that's curable, you just learn to live with it and make it work for you. What this means for me in the context of gaming is that a game not only has to win my interest initially, it has to work to keep me interested.

Here's the thing, though: When you're talking about story-based games, new content requires often long waiting periods for new chapters in the story to be released. Eve's updates usually have very little to do with actually new content in terms of story, it's more about adding to and improving on what's already there. When I feel the need for new content in Eve I can simply start doing something different because there's so many options. I don't have sit and wait to wait for new content to be fed to me, I have to go out there and find it for myself. I like that...I like it a lot.

What's really making me uncertain about re-subscribing to Eve doesn't have anything to do with Eve itself, it has to do with me. I know myself well enough to know that sooner or later I'll probably become bored with Eve and start playing other things. Could be a month from now, could be a year, or it could be three years, like it was the last time I played. The truth is that I have no idea. What I do know is that the last time I decided to move on from Eve, I'd bought a years' sub and basically wasted six month's worth of access I never used. I'd don't like wasting money on stuff I don't use and so I'm skittish about pulling the trigger on buying gaming time I may or may not use.

I'm still not sure what I'm going to do, but I am thinking about it. By tomorrow, I hope I'll have an answer.

Money Changes Everything...

...well, almost everything, anyway.

When I was last playing Eve, money was at a premium. I was working a low-paying job and there were times when I had no choice but to let my Eve account lapse and not play for a while because I just couldn't afford the $15 that month. When it's a choice between paying the rent and eating that month or playing Eve, there's really only one credible choice you can make.

These days, money's not quite so tight. I'm not wealthy by any stretch, but I can afford Eve now, especially since it appears they've cut the subscription price by about a third. Also, I have a much better PC than I did when I was playing before. I have far less issues in terms of frame rate slowdowns and other issues related to processing. The game doesn't run perfectly on the highest graphical settings, but a lot better than it did on my old machine. Once I can fix my escape key issue (CCP customer service just replied to my ticket and I'm going to try their suggestions in a little while, after I finish this post) I'll be able to back my graphics settings down a notch, which I expect will allow the game to run without a hitch (right now the frame rate issue usually only occurs during the jump animation).

I've now officially decided that once I get this escape key issue resolved I'm going to re-subscribe.

Why?

Well, part of the answer is easy: I love this game. I always have, since I discovered it for the first time about 7 years ago. There's something about it that draws me back in every time I play and keeps me coming back for more. That's not to say that I don't enjoy playing other games, but for someone who's as ADD as I am, long-term commitment to anything is rare. If you were somehow able to track all of the time I've spent gaming over the last, say, ten years, I have no doubt that you'd find that Eve is the game I've spent the most time with overall, even today. I've played and enjoyed many great games, including during the times I've actively been playing Eve, but no other game has ever had the kind of hold on me that  this one has.

The other part of the answer isn't so easily defined. Eve gives me something I'm not finding (or, at least, not finding enough of) in other games, but it's hard to put my finger on exactly what that is. As time goes on and I get back into Eve and writing this blog, that's one of the topics I expect to be exploring here: What makes Eve so compelling?

I've also decided to make it a point to read up on the big events in Eve over the last 3 and a half years. I've heard about some that made the general gaming press such as the cash shop revolt and a few of the bigger scams, but I also know a lot of important stuff that happened in this game over the last few years hasn't been reported in the gaming press. In order, to really get back into a game like Eve, I think it's important, and probably a major advantage, to know what's been going on since I was last an active player.

For the moment, however, I still have 7 days left on my free trial. I'm going to use those days, at least unless and until I run into an issue getting missions, and then once that's about to end I'll have to make a decision on what subscription plan I'm going to take.

And then, once that's all done, I'm going to start looking for a corp to join. In my experience, that's when Eve really gets interesting.

Ok, that's it for now. Until next time, fly safe.

Suddenly, Three and a Half Years Later...

...it looks like I'm coming back to Eve, again.

I don't know what it is really. Yes, Eve-Online is one of the most beautiful and deep MMO's out there with a loyal and vocal fan base. Yes, it's one of the most unique gaming concepts I've ever played, one that offers players true freedom with the very minimum of hand-holding necessary, a game that basically makes you aware of the tools you have available to you to succeed in the Eve universe, teaches you the basics of how to use them, and then unceremoniously boots you out of the nest to make your own way in the New Eden star cluster.

I left Eve, for what I believed would be the final time, three and a half years ago, right around the date of the previous post. The truth is that I'd grown bored with Eve, for reasons that really had nothing to do with the game itself...well, at least not directly.

Between Spring 2007 and Summer 2010, I was an Eve loyalist. I managed to keep my account active for most of that time, kept up with skill training for the most part, and so had a pretty potent and wealthy toon after a while. After spending about a year with Eve University, I eventually joined a tiny manufacturing corp called Stonewall Interstellar and served as second-in-command there. When our CEO left Eve, I was left with the wealth of Stonewall Interstellar but no real desire to run it on my own, so I sold off SI's assests and decided to see about getting into a 0.0 corp.

0.0 was a lot of fun, for a while. Eventually though, I came to realize that in a game that features space travel, I wasn't doing much traveling anymore. In 0.0, one generally doesn't leave the station without good reason, and so I found myself spending most of my time in 0.0 sitting in a station looking at my ship, and chatting with corpies. Great people, but I just needed more game in my gaming. And so, I made the decision to move on.

Star Trek Online was in beta at the time and I'd become involved with that. I later discovered that the CEO of Stonewall Interstellar had resurfaced in STO so that was a big draw for me as well. I bought a lifetime subscription to STO but about a year afterward, when Atari decided to sell its interest in STO and basically put all development of the game on standby to cut costs while they secured a buyer, STO began a year-long content drought and eventually I lost interest in that as well.

There have been no shortage of other contenders for my gaming time. I've played SWTOR, Fallen Earth, Aion, TERA, The Secret World, Age of Conan, and many others. All were fun and entertaining, but none of them captured my imagination in the same way as Eve did. With all of these games, even in the ones that could be fairly labelled sandboxes, sooner or later you find yourself following very prescribed paths to accomplish certain goals. For example, if you want to accomplish certain goals and fill certain roles in most MMOs you'll usually have to make those decisions early on, often during character creation. Not so in Eve. In Eve, I can pursue one path for a while, then change my mind and try another, and perhaps return to the previous path or try another completely different one, all without penalty or problem.

While most games feature an epic overarching story and fit the player into that story in some way, Eve offers really very little in that regard, and instead provides the opportunity for a new player to create their own story within the Eve universe virtually from scratch.

That's what I've decided I want to do.

My old account is gone, as far as I'm concerned. I don't remember what credentials I used and besides, it's been a while. I want to relearn the finer points of the game and I'm not going to be able to do that using a toon that's as far along as my old one in any case. Sure, if CCP sent me one of those emails asking me to reactivate my account like they used to, I might just take them up on it as that toon had a lot of skill training. If that never happens, though, I'm ok with that. I'm only a few days in, flying a Thorax (as of yesterday), and doing Level 1 missions. The closest I've gotten to low-sec or 0.0 is a couple of 0.4 systems I had to fly into or through during my travels. Saw a few possible pirates lurking about, but I wasn't flying or carrying anything valuable. Yeah, it's been three and a half years, but I've been ganked in this game too many times not to remember that when you've got to go through low-sec, you don't fly or carry anything you can't afford to lose.

It's seems there have been more than a few changes since I last played as well. Two days ago, a GM contacted me in-game just because (I suspect) I'd undocked from a station but hadn't engaged warp drive and asked if I needed help. I've never seen this kind of proactive customer service in any MMO I've ever played and I have to say I like it. The graphics and the jump gate mechanics have been updated and the UI has been improved since I last logged in as well. I like.

All that said, there's one thing about my return to Eve that's bugging the hell out me. I'm not sure if it's a bug, a bad interaction with another program running on my PC, or something else, but for some insane reason my escape key usually doesn't work in Eve. That means that not only do I have to shut the game down from the task manager when I'm done playing, but also that I can't access any of the graphics, audio, and other options on the menu the escape key is supposed to bring up. Nothing else in the game seems affected in any way, the damn escape key just doesn't work, until it suddenly works for a little while then stops again for no discernible reason.

I don't remember ever having this problem when I played before. I'm planning on contacting CCP on this because I need to be able to adjust my settings even more than I need to be able to turn the game off properly. I set my graphics options to the highest setting when the menu was working, but now I know I need to back them off at least one setting because of frame rate issues...but I can't, because I can't get to the menu to adjust them. Grrrr...

So, obviously in addition to coming back to Eve, I'm also returning to this blog. I make you no promises about frequency of posting, how long I'll be doing this, or anything else. For right now, all I can tell you is what I said at the beginning of this post: I'm back.

More soon.

So I Went and Got Myself Another Dommie…

…only this time I’m not going to go getting it blown up on a mission my first time out. It was affordable enough, and now I just need to to come up with a good loadout. I’ve been searching, but not finding a lot of good options. Any ideas are most welcome.

The reason I bought the Dommie is because…well, why not? I can afford it and having a fully-fit Dominix handy can’t hurt. Plus, I’ll be able to use more drones and that’s always a good thing.

So, right now, that’s what I’m doing: Trying to come up with a Dommie setup I’m happy with. Once I do, it’ll be time to buy all the parts, put them together, and get back down to business.

Grrrrr…

The last few days I feel like the fates are conspiring against me playing EVE. Every time I’ve sat down to play, the phone rings or there’s some other reason I have to stop and go deal with real life. Last night I had to give up on a radar site I’d just successfully tracked down when friends showed up unexpectedly. The night before, another friend needed an emergency pickup at the train. It’s always something.
So, this weekend I’ve made sure that I have a block of time on Saturday with nothing to do, and kitty co-pilot Jazz and I are going exploring.
More as I have it…

Busy, Busy, Busy…

…and not a lot of time for EVE.

It’s been a busy week in RL, hence my lack of posts this past week or so. Last night I logged in for a while and checked out a few systems, but I was pretty exhausted so that didn’t last long. I’ll probably have some time tonight so I expect Jazzy (yes, the new kitty has a name now) and I will go exploring and make a little ISK.

In other, mostly unrelated news, I’ve found myself jumping into Need For Speed World for a quick race or high-speed chase with the cops. It’s something I can play and have fun with for ten minutes at a pop when I don’t have the time to play EVE. It’s not something I expect to invest a lot of time or money into but it is kinda fun in short bursts, like APB.

Anyway, more soon, fly safe.

A Short Semi-Respite

We had a new and unexpected addition to the household yesterday, a little silver and black kitten I’ve named Jasmine, or Jazz for short. As you might imagine, the last twenty-four hours since she’s arrived have been a little busy, without much, if any, time for EVE. She’s becoming quite skilled at locating a comfortable spot on my lap and settling in while I’m at the computer, so I expect I’ll have a co-pilot on many of my upcoming explorations.

One interesting thing I did discover when I finished my last skill training and went looking for something useful to train was that I had one glaring omission from my curriculum from the last time around: Advanced Drone Interfacing.

Talk about a game-changer. Most of the damage I do to NPC’s is from my drones, but until the other day I could only field three Ogre II’s at a time despite being able to carry six in the Myrm’s drone bay. Eve-Mon tells me that Level 3 will finish training about 2pm tomorrow (eastern US time of course, says the Jersey girl), and once that happens I’ll be able to launch a full bay of Ogre II’s at my enemies. No doubt I’ll be having some serious fun with that ability.

Oh, and there is one other reason I haven’t spent any real time in EVE over the last couple of days. STO just got a major update so I’ve been spending a little time in there checking it out. Actually, I’ve probably spent more time with STO in the last day or so than in the last month or two before it, but that’s not an especially high hurdle. I will say that the solo mission I did was a lot of fun and I’m sure I’ll do more. At the same time, it’s a good thing that I have a lifetime sub to STO because now that I’m back in EVE I’m not sure I’d be willing to keep paying for STO over the long haul, at least not as the game has been since launch. There are supposedly big changes coming soon, so as a lifer I’m willing to see what’s just arrived and what’s coming soon before I make any final judgments. At this point, there’s really no reason not to.

In all honesty, I need a little break from EVE every now and then anyway. Both the skill training and STO’s update, not to my mention my new feline friend, are perfect excuses to take a day or two off. I want to keep it fresh and interesting and one good way to do that is to mix it up at least a little.

Til next time, fly safe.

A Bizarre Expedition and a Visit To Lagland

Last night, a comment on my last post clued me in to why I couldn’t warp to the Gurista hideout I’d found. I had indeed been offered an expedition in my journal. By the time I saw it, though, there were only about seven hours left to get it done so I wasted no time moving both my ships along with all my exploration mods and ammo to the system my journal indicated.

When I got there, I went in with the Thorax and found plenty of enemies, and quickly realized I was overmatched. I warped out, went beck to my staging station, and came back with the Myrm, but when I did all of the enemies took off. Gone. Poof. All that time spent moving everything over and suddenly there was nothing to do there.

As luck would have it, though, I found myself with all my stuff in an area I hadn’t explored yet, so I’ve decided to make that system my new temporary base of operations while I check out the local systems. Those that I’ve checked out so far have yielded about a million ISK in cargo and salvage, but nothing especially great in terms of profits.

And maybe it’s because it’s a Sunday, but when I warped to many of the cosmic signatures I scanned down today I’d discovered that someone had beat me to it.

I also did something today that I probably haven’t done in about two and a half years, and for the very first time because I had an actual reason to do it, not just to go be a space tourist. Reviewing the loadout on my Myrm I realized that some of the drones I was using with it were really far beneath the level it was capable of handling. So, I unloaded a bunch of Hobgoblins and Hammerheads and realized I only had two Ogre II’s, which are my favorites to use with the Myrm.

I have to admit I laughed a little when I went to the Market screen to buy five more Ogre II’s and found that the best local price, by at least 50%, was in Jita. I’d been to Jita all of once in my EVE career, very early on when I’d just made a trek out there just to see what the heck was so special about the system that everyone seemed to talk about it constantly. As I remembered, it was entirely unremarkable, other than that there were well over a thousand people in Local and the lag getting in and out of the system was by far the worst I’ve ever experienced in this game. Since that was almost three years ago, I hoped that by now it would be better. I bought my Ogres and set off for Jita.

I didn’t really notice any problems until I got one jump outside of Jita. First, as soon as I arrived it was pretty obvious that just about every ship in the system was headed in the same direction, toward the gate to Jita. When I got to the gate, there was fortunately no waiting line to jump in like there was the last time I was there, but the lag was definitely noticeable.

Once in the system, I docked and picked up my Ogres without much trouble, scanned through the offers in Local just to see if there was anything interesting, and then headed back to the gate to get back where I was exploring. When I clicked the button to jump out though, I didn’t go anywhere for several seconds, and then the screen went black and stayed that way. After nearly a minute, the phone rang and I stepped out of the room for a few minutes. When I returned, I found myself on the other side of the gate and headed back toward my staging system.

Y’know, maybe it’s just me, but I seem to remember CCP swearing up and down a while back that they were going to do something about the lag in Jita. Certainly, I have to say it’s better than the last time I was there, but by no means is it what could be called good. A black screen for well over a minute at minimum just to exit the system doesn’t indicate to me that CCP has finally got a handle on this issue.

Now, to be honest, I haven’t really given a shit one way or the other since I’ve only been there twice and I’ll probably never go back unless I have a really good reason like I did today, but nevertheless it would be nice if CCP could figure out a way to deal with the issue and make the trip a nicer and faster one for everyone who has to go there.

Gettin’ Experienced…

…but slowly, so very, very, slowly.

It may be just that it’s been a busy Saturday on TQ. Today it seemed especially hard to track down cosmic signatures, though I did run across and scan down my first magnometric signature. Big frakking deal. A few thousand worth of salvage for all the time it took to scan it down. Feh.

I’ve never been especially big on mining, so when I’ve scanned down a signature far enough to discover it’s gravimetric I give up on it and move on. At the same time, though, I know there’s a lot of ISK to be made at those sites so I’m reconsidering that. I dunno…I know there’s ISK to be made there, but boredom is also a factor.

Right now, I’m just playing “High-Sec Hit and Miss”, which is to say that basically I’m just picking a direction toward systems I’ve never been to or haven’t been to in a while and heading out to see what I can find. Most of the time this method seems to work pretty well and I find at least enough stuff to keep me interested and engaged, with a decent payout at the end. Today, not so much, but it’s really the first time since I came back to EVE and started exploring that I haven’t been happy with my daily take.

Another thing I ran into for the first time today was a signature that didn’t indicate a type once I’d scanned it down to 100%. Following this led me to an acceleration gate that sent me to a second room with a few enemies and another gate. I took out the enemies, gathered the few paltry items from the wrecks, then hit the next gate. This room had several more enemies, and during the battle I was notified that three Guristas had fled but my ship’s computer had determined their most likely hiding spot in case I wanted to go chase them. After I’d dealt with the room, I attempted to pursue, but was notified that natural phenomena prevented me from warping there. Interestingly, this did not prevent me from warping elsewhere. Quite bizarre, and not really worth the time and effort invested. Oh well.

So, I think I’m gonna go check out another system or two or three or…before bed.

Til next time, fly safe.

The Thorax Flies Again

Sometimes, I think I’m too damned creative for my own good.

Tonight, I was scanning down a radar site that was a little tougher than than most so I thought it would help if I added a couple of extra probes to the five I already had out there. It helped a little at first, but the reality was that it made it a lot harder to keep the rest of the probes aligned. After a while, I got rid of the two extras and went back to a five-probe scan pattern. Once I did that I was able to scan it down in just a couple of tries. There are times when simpler really is better.

Before I found this little three million ISK treasure trove, though, I’d done another run through my assets and discovered that I own not one, but three Thoraxes. Since two of them are out in 0.0 where I’ll almost certainly never see them again, I decided to go get the one I had in high-sec, just a quick thirteen jumps from where I was.

I flew the Magnate out there, stripped it down, threw the parts in the Thorax’s cargo hold and headed back to where I’ve been exploring. Once back at my current staging station, I refitted one of the Thorax’s high slots with my Core Probe Launcher I, stuck a Codebreaker I in one of the mid slots, loaded up with ammo and probes, and off I went.

Once I’d successfully scanned down the radar site, I flew the Thorax in, took out the few guards there, and hacked and looted the containers and wrecks, all without having to go back and get the Myrm to finish the job. I like.

Hell of a way to make a living, but a lot easier than running missions, that’s for sure.

Explorations

So today I went out and scanned down several more cosmic signatures, bookmarked some anomalies to go check out with the Myrm later, and found one radar site which brought me a few million in loot after I went in with the Myrm and took care of the NPCs. Not bad for an afternoon.

I’ve decided that I need to upgrade the ship I use to do my system-to-system exploring in. The Magnate I got for finishing the exploration course just ain’t cutting it and it’s not like I can’t afford it, so I think that’s going to be my next in-game project. Hmmm, I think I may just happen to have a spare Thorax lying around here somewhere…

Out of game, I realized the other day that I still haven’t read “The Burning Life” so I think I’m going to get that for my Kindle after I’m done with the Star Trek novel I’m reading now. Yes, when I jump back into this game, it’s generally with both feet.

And hey it’s nice to see CCP finally taking an interest in updating its fan site page. I like the idea of EVE Gate/Spacebook too. I used it to send a message to someone in-game the other night just to try it out and it seems to work pretty well. The one thing they’re going to have to be careful about is information control, who can see what, etc. I can see a real concern with EVE Gate being players wondering if their information is secure enough to have it in there and not have to worry if the right people are able to see it. Not everyone wants a site where anyone can go and see where they’re currently located and other vital information they may or may not want to share.

Oh yeah, and I when I went into that radar site, I found myself up against a pretty fair amount of Guristas but my Myrm handled them pretty easily. Damn, I love that thing.

It’s really amazing how easily it all comes back. I was a bit concerned that I’d forget to do something or massively screw up in some other way in combat and cost myself my battlecruiser, but no…at least, not yet. This site had by far the most enemies I’ve faced since coming back to the game, but I just fell into that rhythm you get into when you’re being attacked by NPCs. You know what I mean, that “…lock, lock, lock, lock, lock, approach, engage drones, orbit, engage, approach next target, lock new target, engage drones, orbit, engage, approach next target…” thing you get into when you don’t really have time to think or do anything other than keep up with the masses of incoming enemies.

The short version is I’m having a pretty good time with exploration so far, and its getting progressively better as I continue to train up the relevant skills. I don’t know how long I’ll be doing it for or how often in the future, but right now I’m having a blast so who knows?

Until next time, fly safe.

This Ain't So Bad

I went out and did some more exploring today. Most of my attempts were pretty fruitless, except for one.

I managed to scan down a radar signature, but this time I remembered to bookmark it and then came back with my Myrm. I took out the couple of guards and then brought my Magnate back in to codebreak the containers and collect the loot. I scored about 15 million ISK for that little adventure, not too shabby.

I just can't escape it. I'm having a blast with EVE all over again. Earlier today I officially reactivated my account because I already know that whether I do it today or tomorrow, I'm gonna do it. One day, I'll learn.

In the meantime, I'm liking the income from exploration so far, and it's fun. I think I'm going to do a little more tonight. I'm enjoying it, but I clearly still need more practice before I can consider myself proficient.

See ya out there.

Space, The Final Frontier

A couple of nights ago, I finished the exploration career intro missions with my newly-created alt, but instead of taking her out for a spin, I decided to log in as Bekka Jae and see how feasible it would be to have her do the training as well.

Of course the last place I played as Bekka was out in the wilds of 0.0, and I quickly discovered that the corp I used to belong to had moved on and I was in what is now a hostile station. It was a slightly expensive if not difficult decision to leave all the ships and other stuff I had in that station behind to clone jump out of there and back into high-sec.

Once back in high-sec, I called up my Assets window and took a quick inventory. Aside from the realization that I'll probably never want for a Velator as I seem to have dozens of them scattered all over known space, I also discovered a few interesting things I had just lying around and gathering dust, such as a Tech II tricked out, combat and mission-ready Myrmidon. In all honesty, it had been so long since I'd used it that I'd forgotten I had it. I'd been running missions with it before I moved to 0.0 and I'd left it there, ready to fly, as a "just in case I need it one day" thing. Apparently, a smart move on my part.

As nice as it is to find myself in possession of a fully-fit and combat-ready battlecruiser, it's even better because it happens to fit perfectly with another decision I made the other night. Over the last couple of days, I completed the exploration career path missions with Bekka Jae. For some reason, even though Bekka is Gallente I was directed to an Amarr agent out in Kor-Azor and ended up flying a Tormentor (or "The Cosmic Shrimp" as I like to call it) to complete the missions.

Once I was done with that, I got my first refresher lesson in why you can't just go out there and play EVE like you do other games. I started scanning down cosmic signatures in systems near where my Myrm is, knowing that if I ran into something I couldn't handle in my Magnate, which I'd been given after completing the exploration course, I could always come back with the Myrm and (theoretically) deal with it. I did scan down and check out a few wormholes, but aside from one that lead to a system in the far reaches of Amarr space, all of these led to unclaimable void areas of 0.0. Since there was nothing in those places really worth investigating as far as I could tell, I'd jump back through after just a short time and move on.

Mainly, it was practice for what I want to do in EVE for a while, explore. Late last night, on my last scanning attempt before bed, I scanned down my first actual radar site. When I went in, I found pirates there and instinctively warped out immediately, knowing I had nothing on the ship I was in to defend myself with, but I forgot to bookmark the location before I left, nor did I take the time to see what kind of ships I was dealing with. Also, I realized that I hadn't yet installed a codebreaker so there was pretty much no way I'd get anything useful out of that site other than location and enemy force information until I did.


When I got back to my staging station, I bought what I needed and realized that I needed to train a prerequisite skill before even installing the codebreaker. I took the half hour to do this, then I went out signal hunting again. After successfully scanning down another wormhole that led to the void, I decided to pack it in for the night.

Exploration is hard and often frustrating, but it's also a lot of fun. I'll be jumping in a little later to do a little more. Should be interesting...

Damn, That Was Fast

It happens every time.

Whenever I've gotten bored with the games I've been playing, I eventually end up dropping by the EVE website just to catch up a bit on what's going on with the game. I've made it a point to never stay very long, knowing that if I did I'd find myself nostalgic for an experience which real life just wouldn't allow me to take the time to enjoy. Still, I couldn't help dropping by now and when, just to keep semi-updated.

After a few of these occasional visits, one of those "Come Back..." emails inevitably arrives and I end up taking the offer. It's just for a quick look to see how the game's changed since I left, I tell myself each time I click on the link and reactivate my account once again, thereby rationalizing to myself the start of what I already know is coming. I download the client once again, knowing that there's only one possible way this will end.

Within an hour, maybe two at most, it's like I never left. It all comes back pretty easily, and after a while I find myself as immersed in this game as I've ever been. I've tried blogging about other games, but none of them have ever fired my interest as a player or writer like EVE has.

This blog has been in existence since early 2007, soon after I began playing for the first time, and I've kept it current during the times I've been a player. For me, blogging has become an integral part of the EVE experience, almost as much as actually playing the game. It's not a coincidence that I've already got two new blog posts up and I haven't even converted the five-day trial back into a full subscription yet.

One day I'll learn. This is my game. When one way of playing it isn't working, there are plenty of alternatives. I've decided it's time to explore another one, and I'll talk about that in my next post.

So yeah, I'm back. More to come.