What will I do now that I’ve quit? Well, I have just started college, so I do not have very much time for gaming. But when I do, I mainly play League of Legends. It has the advantage of being far briefer than Eve (60-minute max for a game vs. 3 hours roaming). Plus a lot of my college friends play it (while almost no one has heard of Eve Online). Also, when Star Wars: The Old Republic goes live, I will give that a try with other ex-Pythons.

This blog will go inactive; I do want to blog about other games but do not want to mix content on this blog. I will also stop maintaining the #tweetfleet list. Due to Twitter’s 500-person size restriction on Twitter lists and a lack of any good list management tools, pruning inactive accounts from the #tweetfleet is a fairly time-consuming task. And I feel that my work on the #tweetfleet is done. Just like CrazyKinux’s Blog Pack and blog lists helped promote Eve blogging, the #tweetfleet list helped organize and unify the Eve twitter community (from 15 Twitter accounts in 2009 to over 500 in 2011!). But now that the #tweetfleet has grown, the list has become less practical and less necessary. If someone else wishes to maintain a list, feel free to do so.

It’s been a great two and a half years in Eve. So long, and thanks for all the fish. o/

Make no mistake, I did not leave because my love for Python has diminished in any way. I left because Python has died.

Let me explain. Members of the Python Cartel always joked, “PYTHON IS DYING!!!1!!1!” whenever someone left the corp. We laughed at Spectre’s frequent claims to be quitting. We even laughed when as the most active members of Python such as Andrea Skye and Golden Helmet quit playing because we thought the joke was still a joke. But as time passed and Python grew less and less active, the joke became less funny and more true.

Interestingly enough, CCP dealt the final blow to Python. Like many other players, Python members were upset by CCP’s handling of Incarna and microtransactions. But then CCP permabanned Helicity Boson for his role as a leader in the player mobs. Why was this significant for Python? Helicity was not a mere forum poster and founder of Hulkageddon. Helicity was the current Python CEO, and he was doing what Pythons do best: troll. That was the final straw for most of the remaining Python members, who promptly quit Eve.

So after a year and a half in one of Eve’s most venerable pirate corps, it is time to move on. Python activity is nonexistent and lowsec is dead. As a result, I will be joining a couple other Pythons in Invicta, a former pirate corp that is now part of Rooks and Kings. The change is long overdue. Living as a lowsec pirate was killing my desire to play Eve. One thing I am looking forward to is medium gang warfare, as I love flying logistics and Rooks and Kings has some of the best medium gangs in Eve.

Farewell, Python.

Hello Invicta.

It is easy to write off the dissatisfied players and bittervets as anomalies. But are they really only anomalies? Why has nearly every recent devblog produced a threadnaught? Why is subscription plateauing? Is it because the players are becoming less thankful toward CCP?

No.

It is not the players who are at fault. It is CCP, for CCP has forgotten what Eve is.

Eve is not remarkable because of its spaceships. It is remarkable because of its players. The players who run the market, engage in huge fleet fights, and create resources in and out of game are unlike those in any other game. The players are not numerous – only a hundred thousand or so – but they are active and passionate.

CCP, like other MMO creators, wants to expand. But that desire has consumed CCP and blinded it to the players’ wishes. CCP no longer cares about the players. It only cares about the revenue.

CCP’s latest actions have been complete fiascos because of their changed mindset and priorities.

Why does CCP want to implement microtransactions and Aurum? Microtransactions in a free-to-play model are understandable. But Eve is a pay-to-play game.

Why licensing fees for anything and everything related to Eve? CCP is trying to stick their hands into the pockets of players who create killboards, apps, and resources for free. Those players create things and share it because of their love for the community, not because they want to make money off of Eve.

Why only new content? CCP releases new features late and broken, promises updates in the future, and never touches them again. Large chunks of Eve are nearly a decade old and feel like abandonware.

This complete disregard for those who made Eve what it is is incredibly saddening, and I cannot help but wonder what Eve will be in a few years if that continues.

While new members are joining the TweetFleet all the time, some older members stop tweeting for various reasons, usually because they no longer play Eve or have forgotten about their Twitter accounts. Until now, I simply left those inactive members in the TweetFleet list, as they might return someday. Unfortunately, Twitter has capped list size at 500 members, a limit that the #TweetFleet list reached last week. Unable to add any new members, I asked the TweetFleet whether I should form a second list or remove inactive accounts from the TweetFleet. There was unanimous support for cleaning the list up, so I moved all members that had not posted a tweet in the past two months to the TweetFleet-Inactive list. The list now contains 282 highly active tweeters (I often have trouble reading all of the TweetFleet’s tweets) and has room to expand once again.

This month’s Banter topic comes to us from the ever helpful Eelis Kiy, capsuleer behind the “Where the frack is my ship“ blog. She asks: How does your real life personality compare to who you are as a character in EVE? Does a good leader of people in the real world make a good leader of pilots in game? Or vice-versa? Do your real-life skills help you with the roles you fulfill in your corporation or alliance? Or do you behave completely differently? Does the anonymity of the Internet allow you to thrive on the tears of others in New Eden whilst you work as a Good Samaritan away from your keyboard? Or are you as mean outside of your pod as you are inside it? Have experiences in EVE Online affected your behavior, skills or attitudes outside of the game?

The blog banter essentially echoes the lyrics of Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody in asking, “Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?” However, there are a lot of questions being asked so I will answer them individually.

How does your real life personality compare to who you are as a character in EVE?

As would be expected, there are quite a few similarities between my real life persona and my in game persona.

Analytical – In game, I pore over ship fittings, game mechanics, and battles. I spend far more time reading and theorizing about Eve than I actually play it.

Frugal – I dislike wasting ISK. I always pinch pennies, buying the cheapest modules for my ship (most of my ships are not even rigged) and flying inexpensive ships (the only faction ship I fly is the Slicer, which costs 20 million). I also hate seeing wrecks go unsalvaged, a trait that my corp mates often tease me about.

Quiet – I do not talk much unless I have a good reason to. One of the byproducts of this is that sometimes my corp mates will constantly say “Hi Sage” on Vent until I say something.

Competitive – I do not play to lose. If I am poor at flying a particular ship, I will switch to something I am better at. If I lose a fight due to my own mistakes, I will berate myself and resolve to do better.

Loyal – I value loyalty and trust as much in game as out of game. That is the reason why, during my two years in Eve, I have only switched corporations twice (once because the CEO was abusing his power and once because my corp did not PvP much).

Despite the similarities, there are also some differences.

Pen Fifteen Club – Being a member of the Python Cartel and a valiant Defender of Pen isLand, I sing of the virtues of certain male parts. In real life, this is not the case.

Smack talk – It is well know that smack talk is an art perfected by the Python Cartel (what other corporation comes back from roams with half its members gagged by GMs?). I often smack talk opponents in local, often accusing them of having small genitalia and equally small brains and courage. In real life, most of my friends consider me to be a nice, caring guy (which I really am, honest!).

Does a good leader of people in the real world make a good leader of pilots in game?

Although I do not have a leadership position in game (aside from managing the Tweetfleet) due to not playing frequently enough and having poor internet, I believe that a good leader is effective both in and out of Eve.

Does the anonymity of the Internet allow you to thrive on the tears of others in New Eden whilst a Good Samaritan away from your keyboard?

I commented earlier in this post about how I smack in game but am nicer out of game, so initially it would appear that I indeed “thrive on the tears of others in New Eden whilst a Good Samaritan away from the keyboard.” But I do not believe this is the case. Schadenfreude is not one of my traits. I smack for fun, not tears. And I PvP for fun, not tears. Things like can baiting, ninja salvaging, and neutral RR do not appeal to me. Many times after killing a new player I will convo them to teach them about Eve, lowsec, and PvP and give them ISK to buy a better ship.

Additionally, the anonymity of the Internet is not something I take advantage of. As stated earlier, I value loyalty and trust. I have never ‘Pythoned’ anyone (invite a newb to fleet, warp to them, and kill them). I have never used aggression mechanics to kill people in highsec. I have never scammed or stolen. Of course, I am not judging people who engage in such activities; I merely do not do them myself.

Have experiences in EVE Online affected your behavior, skills or attitudes outside of the game?

To the best of my knowledge, no. All the similarities I listed were already present out of game, and the differences obviously are not present out of game (otherwise they would be similarities, not differences).

-

Other Blog Banters Articles:

EVE Blog Banter #24: Be, all that you can be, and so much more!
BB24:RL + EVE = | A Mule In EvE
Freebooted: BB 24: You Talking to Me?
where the frack is my ship?: Blog Banter 24: Behind the keyboard
(OOC) CK’s Blog Banter #24: I Am Prano. « Prano’s Journey
mikeazariah » Blog Archive » BB24 Who are you, who hoo woo hoo
Drifting: The 24th EVE Blog Banter (January 2011 Edition) – Topic: EVE and Real Life
Victoria Aut Mors » Blog Archive » Eve Blog Banter #24 – Where Eve Meets Real Life
Who is more real?? « The Durzo Chronicles
Captain Serenity: blog banter #24 – Personalities
Confessions of a Closet Carebear: EVE and Real Life (EVE Blog Banter #24)
The 24th EVE Blog Banter – EVE and Real Life – The Phoenix Diaries
» EvE Blog Banter #24: EVE and Real Life EvE Blasphemy
The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Alt « the hydrostatic capsule
Blog Banter #24 – Me « Roc’s Ramblings
1. Blog Banter: Personalities in game and out of game
2. Fiddler’s Edge: Game Face – Eve Blog Banter #24
3. Progression’s Horizon: Blog Banter 24- Synonymous or Anonymous?
4. More to come….

So, why remove learning? I could respond by arguing that it makes the system unnecessarily complex or that it consumes two months of training time during which players cannot do anything new. But I will not, because the wrong question is being asked. A better question than “Why remove learning?” is “Why keep learning?” Do the learning skills provide any positives?

Proponents of learning skills argue that there is a choice, that new players do not have to train learning skills. But that is a patently false claim, as everyone does train learning. Does anyone tell players not to train those skills? Why is it that all the supporters of preserving learning skills have them trained? The reality is that fundamentally there is no choice. Sooner or later, you will train them. And the sooner, ideally while the 100% training bonus is active, the better. If the learning skill supporters sincerely believed that training learning was not necessary, they would not have trained it.

So there is no choice. What do the learning skills do then? Like any other part of Eve, they add complexity. Is that beneficial? Yes and no. Eve is intricate, and (in)famous for that. If you want to do PvE, you need to master ship fittings, cap stability, NPC triggers, agent standings, loyalty points, loot drops, salvage, and efficiency. If you want to do trade and industry, you need to master market manipulation, regional market differences, mineral pricing, production efficiency, location, and timing. If you want to do PvP, you need to master fittings, ship types, ship capabilities, maneuvering, tackling, tracking, ship radii, missile operation, cap management, fleet operation, and leadership.

Those are just a few of the paths you can take in Eve. All are complex, daunting for both fledgling players and seasoned veterans. Yet despite all their differences, they have one thing in common: choice. You choose to PvE. You choose to trade. You choose to manufacture. You choose to PvP. That is what makes Eve a sandbox.

But wait. The paths have another thing in common: the necessity of learning skills. Whichever path you take, you still must train learning. Let that idea sink in for a moment.

When you have no choice but to train them, why are they present? Should all new players be forced to train skills like “Becoming a Capsuleer” and “Pod Operation” upon starting a character? Obviously not. Yet how are those any different from learning skills? You have no choice in training them and they simply raise the learning curve. And when everyone but week-old players trying to figure out what Eve is all about (and even in their trial period they are being instructed to train learning skills) has them, what is the benefit?

It should be apparent by now that learning skills add nothing but artificial intricacy to Eve while forcing players to spend two months of their subscription in training them. But even the arguments presented may not convince some, as some critics of the removal of those skills seem to revel in the pain those cause. One person even stated, “I am more mad that the system goes from gradually-reaching-max rate to EVERYONE-at-max. There should be a little pain.” For those people, perhaps the desire to retain learning skills is due to schadenfreude. Or perhaps it is due to the “Back in my day…” superiority syndrome. Or perhaps a mix of both. Whatever it is, they must realize that Eve still requires time investment. Players still need to sweat for a month over Cruiser V before they can hop in a T2 cruiser. Players still need to train leadership to give bonuses to their fleet. That has not changed. What has changed is that unnecessary complexity has been removed, enabling players to concentrate on working toward their desired spot in the sandbox of Eve.

Why is this? Maybe people have moved to nullsec. Maybe the type of people playing Eve have changed. Maybe the good PvPers have moved on to other games. Maybe ship changes have slowly made small gang and solo PvP obsolete. Maybe it is something else. I do not know the reason why lowsec has changed. All I know is that I can sense it dying.

You may have wondered why my posting has slackened lately. This is why. Nowadays I rarely get any joy from logging into Eve. I log in, cast a wistful glance over the ships in my hangar and wish I could fly that Rupture without getting ganked, undock in a MWD and disruptor fit frigate, roam around a little, see nothing in space (or run into a battleship gang), dock, and log. I tell myself that something will change and the glorious days of PvP will return but know that nothing in the upcoming expansions and patches supports that notion. So I log in less and less.

Perhaps I have changed, not lowsec. Perhaps I have simply become a cranky old veteran who likes to talk about the good old days. Perhaps I just need to explore new things. Maybe. But for now, all I know is that spending hours on a fruitless roam has no appeal. All I know is that the adrenaline rushes during PvP have stopped. And all I know is that my enthusiasm is dying like lowsec.

This month’s topic comes to us from @ZoneGhost. He asks, “Is lowsec the forgotten part of Eve Online?” Is it? Is lowsec being treated differently by CCP Games than nullsec or empire space? Can one successfully make a living in these unsecured systems where neither alliances nor Concord roam to enforce their laws? What is needed? Or is everything fine as it is?

It is unquestionable that CCP has neglected lowsec recently. I do not want to rehash this again, as most Eve players and bloggers strongly agree with that statement. I believe that CCP is not intentionally mistreating lowsec – it is simply that their current strategy for adding content to Eve is failing miserably.

Take Planetary Interaction for an example. Theoretically, increasing the amount of resources as system security decreases would make lowsec more desirable than highsec and nullsec more desirable than lowsec. Except that whoever designed such a system never properly took into account risk vs rewards. Maintaining colonies in a 0.5 is infinitely less risky than doing the same in a 0.4. And ironically, friendly nullsec and wormhole space have both greater rewards and lesser risks than lowsec.

Planetary Interaction is just one example. CCP has applied the same broken thinking to nearly everything else – minerals, NPCs, missions, etc. With lowsec at such a disadvantage compared to other areas of space, it is quite obvious why only 8% of all Eve players reside in lowsec.

Earlier, I mentioned briefly that the risk in lowsec is significantly higher than in any other area of space. Highsec has Concord protection, discouraging most PvP of any kind. Nullsec has powerful alliances, which maintain intelligence channels, jump bridges, and constant gatecamps at key entry points. Wormhole space has collapsing entrances, which gives the defenders a significant advantage and deters all but the most dedicated hostiles. But what about lowsec? All it has are sentry guns, which only deters small ships from attacking (unless you are an outlaw).

With such high risks, making a living in lowsec is extremely difficult. And for the select few who do manage to make a living, the stress saps most of the fun from playing Eve. You cannot run missions or complexes without checking the scanner every few seconds for probes. You cannot mine without worrying about getting caught. You cannot manufacture without having to worry if there is a stationcamp outside waiting to pop your industrial. You cannot even PvP without the fear that losing the ship you’re in will consume a month or more’s worth of hard earned income.

Only a few pilots – mainly those who hunt missioners with cloakies and a gank squad – can hope to break even through lowsec alone. Everyone else must make their living from other areas of space. For example, despite having a 97.38% PvP efficiency and stingily T1 fitting my ships, I still cannot live solely off of loot and ransoms and have to mission and trade in highsec for ISK. And the pressure to survive is brutal: every time I warp into a fight, I find myself worrying involuntarily about the cost of replacing my ship instead of how fun the PvP should be. Clearly everything is not fine as it is, unless CCP intended for lowsec to become a hellish no-man’s-land.

What can be done? Lowsec needs its own unique perks. It should not simply be the “area between highsec and nullsec.” This could take the form of unique lowsec-only minerals or modules or implants or ships. Or it could have higher quality agents than in highsec. Or some sort of bounty hunting system. Or a less punitive GCC and reworked sentry guns. Or outlaw-only items. There are literally hundreds of ways that CCP could make lowsec more enjoyable. I just hope that CCP changes their broken content addition strategy and actually gets around to revamping lowsec.

–

Other Blog Banter articles:

1. CrazyKinux’s Musing: The Lure of the Wild
2. Banter 15: Arr, Yer be talkin’ bout me lowsec | TheElitist
3. Banter 21: Low-sec- Chocolate Heaven
4. Subs’ suds: Forever a noob in Eve: Low-Sec – the forgotten part of EVE Online
5. Blog Banter XXI – Lo-sec = Low Priority? | I am Keith Neilson
6. In the Ghetto | A Mule in EvE
7. where the frack is my ship?: Blog Banter 21: What’s good for the goose…
8. Blog Banter #21: Change? | Sarnel Binora’s Blog

Bait Drake is Bait

A corp mate and I were camping our station in Old Man Star when a nonblinky Drake warped in and aggressed us. Despite it being obvious bait (what Drake pilot in their right mind engages a Drake and Sleipnir solo?), we shot back. Nearly instantly, something lit a covert cyno and 15 black ops battleships and stealth bombers jumped in. Poof went my Drake. Poof went our Sleipnir.

The lesson learned from this one is pretty simple: it’s called a bait Drake for a reason.

LOLRAPIERTODRAKE

Our 11-man HAC and Recon gang fought a 14-man battleship, battlecruiser, and HAC gang in an asteroid belt. Though we held the field, we lost three ships in the process. After the fight, our remaining ships began to loot wrecks. Then I made what would appear to be an innocuous mistake – I warped to some wrecks that were at zero in the belt without first checking my directional scanner. To my horror, a hostile Drake landed in the belt at the same time that I did. Before I could gain range, I was scrambled and webbed. My poor 2-day old Rapier died before my fleet mates got close enough to help me.

Moral of story? Never let down your guard. A fight isn’t over until after you have docked up or are safe. Situational awareness is even more important after a battle, when your fleet has lost ships and is disorganized, than during the battle.

Ooh, Pretty Axplosions

Having just gotten an arty Thrasher, I took it out for a spin in my home system. Following my Piloting Savviness advice, I was testing its orbit, tracking, and damage on some belt rats. Although that would normally be a good thing, my brain was not functioning and I was barely paying attention to what was going on (it should be fairly obvious that something bad will happen now). A few minutes later, an Ishkur and Harpy landed on me, turning my ship into space rubble like the NPCs I had just been shooting. I was so loopy at the time that I barely even tried to fight back; all I was thinking was, “Why am I in structure? Uh oh. I think I’m in trouble. Oooh. That was a pretty axplosion.” The Thrasher was only 1 hour old.

Lesson learned? Pretty axplosions are pretty. Or something like that.

Can’t Catch Me, I’m the Gingerbread Man

I was flying around in a Slicer looking for a fight when I ran into an 8-man Gurlistas frigate/destroyer gang. I attempted to kill their bait Merlin but had to disengage when the rest of them landed. I burned away and to my surprise, many of their fleet did not appear to have any propulsion mod fitted. Only one of their ships, a Thrasher, had a microwarpdrive, so I pulled it away from the rest of the group and set about trying to kill it. I figured that if his nearest fleet mate got close, I could just run away, having nearly twice the Thrasher’s speed. It was a beautiful plan…except I overestimated how long my Slicer’s 2,000 EHP would last against an arty Thrasher (I would have orbited closer, but was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to get away in time when his gang mates got closer). Upon hitting low armor, I aligned for a celestial and clicked warp. Nothing happened, even though my overview said I was not scrammed. Confused, I spammed the warp button more. Then the Thrasher’s artillery cycled and my Slicer vaporized.

As I warped away in my pod, I was quite humiliated. I had lost my first Slicer to a Thrasher. Perhaps it was the exhilarating speed. Or perhaps the long kill streak I had in it. Either way, I was overconfident in the Slicer’s abilities. As you may expect, overconfidence is one of the leading causes of PvP losses for many skilled pilots (or semi-skilled in my case).

Ping Isn’t Just for FPSes

Over the past few months, I have been having increasing trouble with my router and internet connection. No matter what I do to reset the router and check the connection, I have consistently high ping (200-800 ms) and unusually high packet loss (5-40%). I do not know why the situation is worsening, only that it is making playing Eve difficult. Here are some recent examples.

A week ago I was on a gate in a Stiletto when a Hurricane jumped through to me. I pressed the jump button as soon as I saw him, but ended up on the other side in a pod. A few days ago, I was manually piloting a Slicer around a hostile Rupture and Hurricane when I suddenly stopped getting notifications for shooting and being shot at. By the time my client updated about 15 seconds later, I was in structure. And just yesterday, I was on a gate in a Hound and clicked jump when a Hookbill aggressed me, but apparently my connection failed me because I got popped and podded for the first time since early 2009. My unstable internet connection is extremely aggravating, and I am becoming increasingly unwilling to undock because I am losing ships pointlessly (and my wallet and PvP pride can’t handle so many stupid losses).

Here is a picture of a speed test I did with just Eve running, no Ventrilo or anything else:

It gets worse when I am using Vent and have other tabs in the browser open, and when others are also using the internet. I’m not sure what I can learn from this, aside from the fact that good internet connections are essential.

Etc.

Thankfully, not all piloting mistakes result in losses; the losses I’ve talked about above are just a few of the notable mistakes I have made. Although piloting foolishness is painful to learn from at times, the more you lose, the better you become.

With that said, what new content is CCP so excited about? What do they see in Incarna that is worth neglecting the rest of Eve and infuriating the players for? As far as I can see, nothing. But before I delve into that further, let me explain why I play Eve.

I (and I am sure most others) play Eve because of its unique features. For me, those include the rewarding complexity of PvP, the potentially massive scale of engagements, the immensity of the universe, the sandbox aspect, and the high average intelligence of players. Only in Eve do you spend hours and hours just tinkering with fits for a single ship. Only in Eve do you see thousands of players fighting over one system or one POS. Only in Eve do you truly feel small as you travel 30 jumps from one place to another. Only in Eve does the endgame not consist of simply hopping into a Titan and officer fitting it. All ships have their place (except maybe the Burst. That ship is awful).

But what about Incarna? The limited information CCP has released has shown characters customizing their appearance to a certain degree, walking around in a station, and visiting a player-made shop. For reasons I cannot seem to grasp, CCP (and some people) seem excited about that. Nothing in Incarna is remotely exciting or innovative. If you want an amazing character customizer, go play All Points Bulletin. If you want to walk around in a scifi environment, go play Star Trek Online. If you want to actually do something while walking around in a body, go play World of Warcraft or LOTRO or any of a billion other MMOs. And why devote 70 devs to Incarna when, according to the Eve backstory, capsuleers dislike how frail and powerless bodies are?

If I am missing something, enlighten me in the comments. Because all I can see is CCP wasting resources in the wrong areas. All I can see is lowsec being ignored, the UI stagnating, modules remaining imbalanced, lag worsening, players quitting. If anyone from CCP is reading this, please change course. I love Eve. I don’t want it to fall apart.

EveTube by Eddie Gordo

Forum thread: http://www.eveonline.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=1358217

EveTube by Solus Argum

Forum thread: http://www.eveonline.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=1358888

So at exactly 00:00 Eve time on July 4th, we undocked a battleship gang with logistics support and began burning towards Amamake. Because our sole goal was to have a fight with the Amamake locals, we did not stop to kill anything along the way. Upon reaching Amamake, we sat in the top belt, told everyone to come fight us, and waited. And waited. And waited. Despite there being 50 in local, nothing appeared on scan. So we began smacking. Apparently our smack was of such exceedingly high quality that the locals petitioned us and a GM gagged several of our members for “inappropriate ASCII art” (Python is the only corp I know of who gets gagged for smacktalking).

After thirty minutes of waiting, we were itching for a fight, so we left Amamake and toured the nearby systems. Everywhere we went, there were consistently 40-50 in local, but no one was willing to fight us. Disappointed, we decided to go to Egghelende to smacktalk Ken Plante. On the way, a BANE alliance scout told us that they were willing to fight us in Amamake (apparently AoS was too scared to fight us but Bane had risen to the challenge). The fact that the hostile fleet couldn’t even move one jump to fight us made us suspicious that they would drop capitals on us, but we were confident that we could hold our own.

We had 11 remote rep battleships, 2 battlecruisers, and 3 Guardians. Knowing our exact fleet composition, Bane brought what they thought would be the ideal counter: a triage Nidhogger, 7 battleships, 1 battlecruiser, 2 HACs, and a Falcon. Two of their battleships were fit solely with neuts just to cap out our remote rep chain, and their Falcon had only anti-Amarr jammers just to break our Guardians.

As Bane had planned, their neuts and jammers wrecked havoc on our Guardians. Despite energy transfers, I was so capped out that I could not even activate my damage control. And the Falcon had our ECCM-fitted Guardians permajammed. Whenever we could, we tried to rep the primaries, but several of our battleships still started dipping into hull. We managed to get a Bane Megathron into hull, but then the Bane carrier entered triage and the Megathron’s shields and armor popped back to 100% nearly instantly.

But the tide started turning. One of our sniper fit battleships alphaed the Falcon, freeing the Guardians. Our FC, knowing that the carrier would have cap issues due to how fiercely it was repping the Megathron, had us focus some DPS on the carrier. As the carrier’s cap dwindled, we were able to kill several more Bane battleships, including an Armageddon flown by Ken Plante. Realizing that they were losing, the rest of the Bane fleet quickly bailed, leaving the carrier behind to die.

As the last Bane pilot exploded and we floated alone amongst the wrecks in the belt, our lemming brains slowly began to realize that we had won - 7 kills for 0 losses. Ecstatic, we began circle jerking in Vent and in local, declaring ourselves kings of Amamake.

The logistics immediately proved useful, as our 6 man fleet (3 battleships, 3 Guardians) immediately engaged a 15 man Phobos Alliance gang on our home station. Just half an hour earlier, we had crushed a Phobos Alliance gatecamp, prompting them to return for revenge. Knowing our fleet composition, the Phobos Alliance gang brought two Falcons to jam our logistics. Due to the heavy ECM, our logistics had a tough time keeping the fleet together. However, aside from one battleship in half structure, we were able to hold the field, obtaining two kills for zero losses.

After waiting out GCC, we moved out of our home system with 4 battleships and 2 Guardians. In Huola, we aggressed a few ships on station hoping to get a fight, but they undocked three Archons (in addition to the multiple battleships they already had out) so we were unable to get any kills. A hostile Bhaalgorn initially gave the Guardians some trouble, but we scooted out of neut range and were able to keep the gang repped enough that the hostile gang deaggressed and docked. After lingering a bit in hopes of a fight, we decided to leave.

On our way back to our home system, a Crow tackled one of our battleships just as the gang was entering warp to the next gate. The gang immediately warped back to help, but the battleship died while we were in the 50 AU warp back. Upon landing on the gate, we decided to attempt to fight the hostile 12-man gang. Unfortunately, the numbers were heavily against us (3 BS + 2 Guardians vs 10 assorted ships + 2 Scimitars + sentries), and we had lots of trouble breaking their logistics. In addition, due to sentries shooting at us, we were unable to use drones effectively while they fielded swarms of ECM drones that nearly permajammed the Guardians (at one point my Guardian had ~30 ECM drones on it). We attempted to deaggress, but lost a Dominix due to the overwhelming odds and ECM. In the end, two battleships and both Guardians were able to deaggress, jump through the gate, and escape. We got one kill for two losses.

There was a lot we learned from the fight. For newb Guardian pilots (today was the first time I and the other Guardian pilot had ever flown Guardians), the remote repping was exceptionally well done (we were even congratulated after the fight on the gate). The largest problem for the Guardians was ECM; despite having one ECCM fitted, the Guardians were jammed a majority of the time. The rest of the battleships should also have fitted remote reps to strengthen the spider tank further (particularly when the Guardians were jammed). Overall, the roam was quite successful while we had enough pilots. What confuses me the most is why so few lowsec fleets incorporate logistics when it is so powerful (we fought against 1:2.5 odds and still performed acceptably).

Chain of Chaos: Healers FTW

Chain of Chaos (8): Brutix, Drake x3, Harbinger x2, Myrmidon, Caracal

Python Cartel (8): Abaddon, Dominix, Typhoon, Drake, Harbinger, Hurricane x2, Scimitar

Our battlecruiser gang was camping some locals in a station when we spotted a Chain of Chaos fleet moving through the area. Several people quickly swapped to battleships while I switched to a Scimitar. We warped into a belt at 0 km (I was at 70km), and the Chain of Chaos gang decided to engage. Being unable to overcome my remote repping, they primaried me. Thankfully, my fleet mates managed to kill the ships holding me down as I reached structure. I warped out and back in, but was unable to save Jawmare in his Typhoon.

Just as the space dust from the fight was clearing, an Ibis (the pilot is actually a scout for another alliance) warped in to a wreck, trying to steal some loot. However, before it could warp out, I managed to solo kill it with my Scimitar of Doom (the Drake whored my killmail).

In the end, we killed nearly every one of them and lost one battleship.

Rising Phoenix Alliance/The Alpha and the Omega: Meh, ECM :(

RPA/AaO (12 pilots, 17 ships used): Rokh, Scorpion x2, Typhoon, Hurricane x2, Brutix, Drake, Vagabond, Rupture, Stabber, Caracal, Caldari Navy Hookbill, Kestrel, Scimitar

Python Cartel (9 pilots, 10 ships used): Abaddon, Maelstrom, Armageddon, Typhoon, Dominix, Hurricane, Harbinger, Cyclone, Drake x2

As with the previous fight, our fleet was in battlecruisers when a pilot reported seeing 10 hostiles two jumps away. We jumped into whatever battleships we had and headed their way. Not wanting to get into a fight on a gate (sentries would be working against us), we warped to a planet and waited. And waited. And waited. Fifteen minutes later, ships began appearing on scan (it turns out that they incorrectly thought we were in RR battleships).

We killed what we could, but their ECM (two Scorpions) prevented us from using the majority of our DPS. And when we did kill a pilot, they returned in new ships. After a couple minutes, we had so few ships that everyone was permajammed, so we warped out.

Altogether we lost four battleships and two battlecruisers and killed one battleship, two battlecruisers, and two smaller ships (Kazaji miraculously was able to survive the fight in his Abaddon, but stupidly warped to a gate and died right after the battle).

United We Stand, Divided We Fall

Although the two fights seem very different, both battles highlight how disorganized impromptu fleets are. For blobbing they work tolerably, but easily crumble under pressure. For example, in the first fight, there were both armor tankers and shield tankers in the fleet but only shield logistics. In the second fight, had we been properly prepared for remote repping (which all battleship gangs should be) and ECM resistance (almost no one fitted ECCM), we would have been able to hold the field. This stands in stark contrast to the organized battleship roam and our immensely effective DrakeSwarm.

Make Everyone The Same Volume
Follow these directions: About: Vent Settings. You can make some small tweaks to the settings, but overall the suggested ones work fine. For especially quiet people, you can also right click on their name in the main window and go to Miscellaneous>Special Effects>Volume.

See Who Is Talking on Vent
In the Ventrilo window, go to Setup>Overlay. Here are the settings to change:

Enable Overlay Support. Select this. Otherwise nothing shows.

Auto Open. When selected, the overlay always shows. I keep the option checked because otherwise the overlay keeps popping on and off, which gets annoying.

Screen Location. Set to Manually Position. To adjust the position, close the settings window, right click in the Vent window, and go to View>Manually position overlay. I place mine in the upper left corner, right next to the system name.

Popup Timeout. This setting is affected by the “Auto Open” setting; I just leave it as is.

Status Page Options. Uncheck “Recent events” and “Commanding messages”. They just waste screen space.

Hopefully those two tweaks are useful for you. If there are any other tweaks you use, let me know and I will add them to here.

Smack Is Rather Fun via Eve Newb.

Faceplant – vol2 via Skye’s Super Happy Fun Pirating Blog.

New Home

As of a few weeks ago, the Python Cartel has moved from Old Man Star (Gallente lowsec) to Ami (Amarr lowsec). Ami is much, much quieter than OMS; you can be afk for an hour outside a station and not get ganked. And most of the time, there are no neutrals or hostiles in system with us. Even when roaming throughout the area, I have yet to see local exceed 15 people. In a way, the lessened pressure is relaxing; in OMS I had to constantly worry about cynos and bait and blobs. On the other hand, getting kills in the area is relatively difficult. Many of the roams (both solo and fleet) I have been on get few, if any, kills (going 20 jumps and only killing a hauler is quite common). The lack of action in Ami makes me wish for a more active home, but I suppose the grass is always greener on the other side of the bridge.

In the three days since my return, I have only gotten 17 kills; I seem to miss out on all the exciting fights. My favorite kill so far has been popping and podding a Reaper pilot visiting the Eve Gate. Not exactly an exciting fight, but I imagine that not too many people get kills at the birthplace of New Eden.

Reps!

My decision to train Logistics V while taking a break turned out to be a good one. In the entire time I have been in The Python Cartel, I had seen logistics used only two or three times, so I was uncertain as to whether it would come in useful. However, it appears that the Scimitar in nano gangs is tremendously helpful; every time I am in one, my fleetmates seem to get more reckless (“Let’s engage that target on a gate. Our cruisers will be safe because we have a scimi!”). Logistics also comes in handy when your gang catches a Harbinger at a belt and decides to play Harbinger Hockey with him (that 94,433 damage taken was due to my reps on him, not because of the Harbinger’s epic triple shield booster fit).

Python Is 1337

In other news, Python is now in the top 100 PvP corporations according to BattleClinic. For a corporation barely a year old, that is pretty impressive. Python is also recruiting, so if you 1) like pewpew, 2) like WoW (kidding), and 3) like penis, send in an app.

Whoa. You basically do not appear in local for a while (similar to wormhole space, except in known space).

Note: I no longer use most of these ships due to their lack of speed. In Old Man Star and its surroundings, everything flies faster than 2km/s. Anything slower than that either dies horribly or has a cyno.

Rifter – Hunter-Killer. I have not flown a Rifter in a while (although I intend to).
Punisher – Just A Flesh Wound, Legion, Avenged Sevenfold. Being a devout Punisher advocate, I have three of these. The “Just A Flesh Wound” is particularly notable for having seen service against Spectre.
Rupture – Devil’s Advocate. I originally intended for this to be a more nimble replacement for the Maller, but it is still too slow to be useful.
Myrmidon – Fury. I no longer fly this.
Purifier – Hunting Wabbits, Hunting Wabbits #2, Surprise Buttsecks. I fly stealth bombers a lot. The Purifier is great because the majority of targets in lowsec are shield tanked.
Hound – Revelation. Worse than the Purifier, but the explosive bonus may someday be useful.
Wolf – Sharkbait. Like the Rupture, this is too slow. Even with nanos and overdrives, I cannot overtake (or escape from) faction frigates and cruisers. And with nanos I can pretty much get alphaed by a drone.
Hurricane – Carebear Cloud Nine. “Hooray, finally a fast nano pwnmobile,” you say. Nope. It is actually my salvaging ship. It sits unused because I no longer mission.
Drake – A Leaf on the Wind. Once upon a time I stationcamped. Then someone lit a cyno and everyone lived unhappily ever after.
Curse – Black Mesa. I fly this occasionally.
Tempest – Carpe Diem. EFT says it can volley a frigate from 150km. Eve says it can’t. So I don’t undock it any more.
Armageddon – Riot. Speed doesn’t matter when you have 20 battleships on a gate.
Thrasher – Mandated Chaos, Super Duper. Theoretically, this is great for killing those pesky nano frigates. In actuality, you get jumped by a Stabber or Rapier.
Coercer – 00sage00′s Coercer. Makes short work of any overconfident solo frigate pilots.
Malediction – Fail DPS. I caught a salvaging Cormorant once but had to run away when support arrived. Then I caught a ratting Punisher and spent the next 10 minutes trying to break its tank. I don’t ever plan on flying a Malediction again.

Omgah, another Python, has written down his thoughts about his corpmates on his blog. This is his assessment of me: “This guy was a guy we spent months trying to recruit. He finally gave in and joined one month  ago. Hes all around pretty chill. I think he likes flying the Ishtar but that might have changed with the pirate ship boost.” One small error: I do not have the skills to fly an Ishtar. He probably meant my Myrmidon, which is rusting in my hangar due to being too vulnerable to all the nano ships currently flying around lowsec.

In other news, Casiella has written a short guide to hanging with the TweetFleet. If you are not already a tweetfleeter (and even if you are), I highly recommend reading it. Also do not forget to read my Tweet Fleet overview page.

Eve Tribune #11, Year 5 – An Open Letter to CCP Regarding Tyrannis.

I completely agree with the author. CCP needs to focus on fixing existing issues and tightening up code. Apple did it for Snow Leopard; CCP can do it for Eve as well.

Python battleships blobbing an overconfident capital. My first capital kill.

Station camp, the Python way (see how we are all inside each other?).

Python drone art. It was supposed to be two circles, but the creators got lazy and quit halfway through.

Nearly 100 noobships perished on this station while attacking two valiant Python members.

This station is giving me a fistbump.

This is what the inside of an Amarrian station looks like after a fire (actually a weird graphics glitch).

Did you know that you can get a T2 capsule? (another graphics glitch).

My current ship hangar. Wolf is for wolfpacks, Drake is for stationcamping (although I stopped doing that after Advocated Destruction sent in a bait alt then cynoed in a huge blob), Armageddon was for the Python battleship fleet, Curse is for Python fag roams (4 Curses on this killmail), noobships are to make me feel like I have more ships than I actually do (and for Python noobship ops), and stealth bombers are for cloakiness and compact DPS. The rest of the ships I don’t really use.

One final picture:

That’s what you’ll be doing after you get Python’d.

The third Blog Banter of 2010 comes to us from ChainTrap of the Into the unknown with gun and camera EVE Blog. He asks us: “Eve University turns six years old on March 15th; six years spent helping the new pilots of New Eden gain experience and understanding in a supportive environment. Eve is clearly a complicated game where you never stop learning. What do you wish that someone had taken the time to tell you when you were first starting out? Or what have you learned in the interim that you’d like to share with the wider Eve community?”

To be honest, my experience as a new player was quite conducive to learning. I could not have asked for better; I was a part of a very active corp of dedicated individuals right from the start. Any questions were answered promptly, advice was given on game mechanics and ship fitting (my CEO actually fit my ships for me several times), we worked together, and we had fun. Even the collapse of the corp after a few months was a learning experience.

Here are several things that are key to success in Eve:

Ask questions. As the prompt states, you never stop learning in Eve. No one can say “I know it all”. “Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find.”

Create goals. With hundreds of skills to train, thousands of ships and modules to use, and countless careers to follow, it is easy to get lost and wander around aimlessly. Your goals will change as your knowledge of Eve grows, but always ensure that you have some goal.

Find a role model. It can be a corp mate, it can be an Evebrity, it can be a blogger (when I was a fledgling pirate, I wanted to be as good as Wensley). Identify someone you admire (and if you don’t know one, find one) and learn from him. Ask questions. Find out his goals. Just make sure it’s not a bad role model like Spectre (just kidding).

By practicing those three, you will avoid falling off the Eve learning curve.

Other Blog Banter 16 Posts:

1. CrazyKinux: The Three Pillars of Wisdom
2. The Elitist: Helping the new guy/gal
3. Hands Off, My Loots: Nothing Needed
4. Rantuket: Blog Banter 16
5. EVE Opportunist: Nooby Cluey
6. Into the Unknown With Gun and Camera: EVE University
7. Zero Kelvin: We’re the young ones!
8. I am Keith Neilson: Set Your Destination
9. Prano’s Journey: Just Like the Very First Time
10. A Merry Life and a Short One: No Seriously
11. A Mule In EVE: If I only knew
12. The Planet Risk Show: Dared to be Bold
13. Diary of a Space Jockey: WTH did I get myself into?!
14. EVOGANDA: Why?
15. A Memoir From Space: 16th Blog Banter
16. Death’s Sweetest Kiss: Who What When Where Why How??
17. Freebooted: Beyond the Shortcuts
18. Learning to Fly: Noobing
19. Caldari Outcast: My First Blog Banter Post!
20. Roc’s Ramblings: Financial Survival
21. Diary of a Pod Pilot: Free Knowledge Inside
22. Nullsec Carebear: I could’ve been less of an idiot
23. Facepalm’s Ramblings: Something Smells Fishy
24. Kirith Darkblade: Do you wish to know more?
25. Autopilot Disabled: I’m still starting…
26. Finders & Keepers: Relax
27. Confounded Capsuleer: What have you got to loose?
28. Clan Oriana: Sixteen
29. Flashfresh: EVE Blog Banter #16
30. Rettic’s The Chronofile: You Make EVE
31. Diary of a Bored Spaceman: Past Imperfect
32. Chocolate Heaven: Known Unknowns
33. Victoria Aut Mors: Blog Banter #16
34. Where the frack is my ship: If I knew then what I know now…

It seems that the topic of Drakes has been pretty popular this week (and I shall make it even more popular).

Rixx Javix at Eveoganda recently wrote a post about why people hate Drakes but shouldn’t:

Having said that, I know why the Drake gets such a bad rap. It is one of the easiest ships to get into in Eve, thousands of young Caldari pilots wizzing around the universe in the darn things, badly fitted, inexperienced and ready to be popped by the first thing that comes along.

Rixx is correct about a properly-skilled Drake having an incredibly tough tank; my lowsec stationcamping Drake perma tanks sentries at 70% shield. However, I disagree about the primary reason why Drakes are hated in fleets. It is not because Drake pilots are inexperienced. It is not because there are too many of them. It is not because they are slow, have less DPS than other battlecruisers, or use missiles.

Drakes are hated because they are not team players. The majority of Drake pilots beef up their tank instead of fitting modules to help the fleet – even though the Drakes will be among the last to be primaried. What good does a 100k EHP buffer do if you don’t help your fleet tackle, don’t provide ewar support, and don’t pump out lots of DPS? Drakes are hated for the same reason that snipers in FPSes are hated: they stay far away from danger, whore kills, and don’t help the rest of the team achieve objectives.

With that said, Drakes can be effective in the right hands (notice how I repeatedly said “the majority of Drake pilots”?). Last week the Python Cartel had a 100% Drake roam (along with one Scorpion and two stealth bombers who fail at following the OP’s instructions). And we did quite well; in one epic battle, our 11-man DrakeSwarm fought 46 Gallente and Caldari militia pilots (and they even had sentry guns on their side) and still managed to get equal kills and 72.9% ISK efficiency (you can see Spectre’s pretty pictures of the event here).

How did we manage to achieve this? By working together. By being team players. Good FCing and individual pilot skill certainly played a part, but without a coordinated spider tank and distributed ewar, we would have been crushed far more easily. Of course, we did make some costly mistakes with our first iteration of DrakeSwarm (I won’t tell you what those mistakes were :P). But fear not, DrakeSwarm Mk. II is coming soon to a bad neighborhood near you.

The Python Cartel has always been well known for its prowess at smacktalking. But a lesser known ability of the Pythons is excellence at rhymes.

So without further adieu,
I present to you,
Python Poetry:

Smack is wack yo
But I got no sack so
I’ll stay on this gate
Hug the guns and wait

My backup is coming
So you’d better start running
We’re going to blob you, gank you
Rob you, spank you.

The truth of the matter is
Without my friends I ain’t got shit
I never fight when there’s risk
21 vs 1 is the shit.

Just look at my killboard
It’s full of my killwhores
I did 24 damage
But I filled local with spammage
- by Kobrakilla

I want to take a knife
And logoffski Life.
- by 00sage00

And here is a small sample of Python Rhyme Time:

Kobrakilla > what’s a transom?
Kyle Langdon > your mom
Kobrakilla > sounds lame
Kyle Langdon > like this game
00sage00 > what a shame
Kyle Langdon > it can be quite a pain
00sage00 > to take the blame
Kyle Langdon > what was its name?
Kobrakilla > If you take it frame by frame
Kyle Langdon > i think i just came
Kobrakilla > but it was quite a pain
Kyle Langdon > and the splooge was pretty plain
Kobrakilla > it came down like the rain
Kyle Langdon > and you lost the game
Kobrakilla > but that isn’t the same
Shaka Laka > this hurts my brain…
Kyle Langdon > that’s a pretty large claim
00sage00 > to fame
Kobrakilla > and to tame
Kyle Langdon > aim
00sage00 > defame
Kyle Langdon > exclaim
00sage00 > proclaim
Shaka Laka > ascertain
Kyle Langdon > does this really pertain?
00sage00 > bob the builder
Shaka Laka > Only if you’re insane
00sage00 > >_>
Kyle Langdon > blob the quilder

So next time you’re in local
And we’re being very vocal
You’d better run away fast
Or our rhymes will leave you aghast.

Fun (but pointless) observation: 00sage00 (my name) appears at the top of 99.99% of every Eve channel listing. And Yarrbear Tales (my blog’s name) appears at the bottom of 99.99% of every blog listing. So it seems that I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and Last of Eve Online. :P

1: What is your real-life age and country/state/province in which you reside?
17/m/cali. What’s your a/s/l?

2: What is the full name of the character you are applying with?
00sage00

3: Is this character your main character, or an alt?
It’s my alt (17 mil SP). I spend most of my time on my main (150,000 SP) running level 1 missions, mining in 1.0 security, and trading.

4: What ships are you currently capable of flying?
Noobships, frigates, Amarr industrials, and some other ships.

5: What are your favorite ships for PvP? What are your preferred setups for these ships?
Shield tanked Punisher, PvP Itty V, probing Zephyr, and pod tanked blaster Typhoons. I also like Titans for 1v1s.

6: What are your short-term skill training plans?
I need to finish training Retail III so that I can have enough market slots to sell all the lootz I will steal as a badass pirate.

7: What are your long-term skill training plans?
I’ve always wanted to fly a Hulk.

8: Do you have any prior Low sec/0.0 PvP or Piracy experience? If so, please be thorough in telling us about it. Links to Battleclinic/corp killboards are very much appreciated.
(why are the slashes backwards?)
I’ve died a couple times in lowsec/nullsec and been ransomed by pirates. One time I tried to kill a nonblinky battleship on a gate with a frigate. I died, but I gained lots of PvP XP.

Here’s a link to my best kill: http://eve.battleclinic.com/killboard/killmail.php?id=8317485

This one was also pretty good: http://pcmk2.griefwatch.net/?p=details&kill=7234. Although not the best because the pilot was a total nub.

9: Why do you want to join The Python Cartel?
Because I’m awesome, and the Pythons are awesome, and we’d be even awesomer together.

10: What is it you look for in a corporation? What do you expect from a corporation?
I look for a place where I can be loved. I expect backrubs from the corp members.

11: Do you have a working microphone and installation of Ventrilo?
Yes. I do prefer Eve Voice though because I can sound like an underage, mentally deficient girl.

12: Are you self sufficient in terms of ISK generation and hauling equipment?
As long as I don’t lose too many more frigates trying to kill battleships, my alt in a mining Velator should be able to keep up. My pod isn’t too hard to haul around, either.

13: Are you willing to go to -10 security status, honor all 1 v 1′s, and honor all ransoms?
I’m scared of lowsec and prefer to have a positive sec status.

Should I happen to have a 1v1, I will attempt to get a solo kill until I start dying. Then I’ll call in backup.

And of course I will accept any ransom ISKies after I steal a victim’s ship, pod, tears, and soul.

14: Do you have any questions that you would like answered about The Python Cartel? If so, please ask us!
Do I get complimentary drinks? I’d also like 72 virgins every time I die.

15: Please eve-mail your limited API key (including the user ID) to all of the following people: Golden Helmet, Spectre3353, Lachesis VII, and Omgah
You’re just trying to h4x me. <_<

The yarrbear to yarrbear transition is exciting; I am looking forward to going -10 and PvPing 23/7.

Neat time-lapse of nullsec sovereignty changes during 2009.

Just kidding. Here is my real Evespace:

I play Eve on the 15″ MacBook Pro shown in the picture (except that I boot Windows XP because the Mac client runs too slowly). And as you can see, my Evespace is dominated by school books instead of Eve-related decor. :(

This Goonswarm manual explains how to create ultradeep safes; it is a must-read for PvPers.