Being broke sucks!

Well, its true in EVE and the Real World...it takes money to make money. At least the amount of money needed to afford all the shiney new and wonderful objects in EVE!!

This has really been the biggest struggle I have with continuing to play EVE. I read blogs and see corp killmails highlighting the struggle and fun others have in killing other people in this game. I like that, I enjoyed that in Warhammer Online with its easy ability to find a group in open RvR or join scenarios. Now as always pick up groups often got slaughtered, but many time you could still get in on the kills. No matter what it was easy and the entry barrier was so low.

That isn't possible in EVE. Yes, you can PvP in a frigate and tackle...but if your time is limited (as the name of this blog suggests) and your corp isn't on or available, your ability to fight other characters on a limited budget is almost nil...at least for me. I have a total of 100 Million between the characters on my two accounts. I finally have one person at lvl 4 mission, as in a couple of days will start them on Gallente Battleships for a Domi...now I have to sink almost 60% of my total worth into a ship to get more money. A direct vilolation of the "don't fly what you can't afford to lose" motto. I'm trying PI to gain money, and it can and does work...if I get on every day for at least 30 minutes to buy and move stuff around, something I just can do.

Bottom line, I'm not in nullsec, I'm broke, I'm certainly not buying a game card and changing it to isk, and I'm not having much fun...so why the hell am I sticking around?

Obsession with Lowsec

Welcome to the twenty-first installment of the EVE Blog Banter, the monthly EVE Online blogging extravaganza created by CrazyKinux. The EVE Blog Banter involves an enthusiastic group of gaming bloggers, a common topic within the realm of EVE Online, and a week to post articles pertaining to the said topic. The resulting articles can either be short or quite extensive, either funny or dead serious, but are always a great fun to read! Any questions about the EVE Blog Banter should be directed to crazykinux@gmail.com. Check for other EVE Blog Banter articles at the bottom of this post!
This month topic comes to us from @ZoneGhost who a few month ago asked "Is Low Sec the forgotten part of EVE Online?" Is it? I'd like us to explore this even further. Is Low Sec being treated differently by CCP Games than Null Sec (Zero-Zero) or Empire space is? Can one successfully make a living in these unsecured systems where neither Alliance nor Concord roam to enforce their laws? What's needed? Or is everything fine as it is?
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We'll start this discussion off with the needed assumptions. First, I don't live in lowsec. I never have and right now I don't see any reason that will change. Second, I've done some 0.0 and right now I'm a missioning "carebear" in highsec attempting to make some money while my corp shakes itself out of summer slumber.

Let's look at lowsec from the view of those who do NOT live there. As we say in the military..."Perception IS reality." The perception of lowsec, fostered in may ways by the people that live and blog there, is a lawless section of space where gankers live for scanning you down to blast you, laugh at your fit, and enlarge their e-peen.

I'm not saying that is the majority of what happens in lowsec, but it certainly is the picture painted by the vocal minority...who happen to be pirates with blogs. I'm quite positive that there are many people who perform mission, own POS', research and other industrial focused tasks in lowsec, however, we don't hear from them at all. The only voice heard from lowsec is the pirate, the ganker, the player who wants more targets for them. Now, I understand that Myxnee is looking for all types of player in her lowsec initiative, but if you look at the board she assembled there are a total of three player out of twelve who are not self-proclaimed pirates. Therefore, any "storyline" or proposal will have a pirate based flavor to it.

Perception, it rules the internet and the mob on any forum...which is always a vocal minority for any MMO. To those outside lowsec every complaint and every suggestion is geared toward allowing a player LESS penalties for killing people than they have now. Let's face it, the ONLY penalties of killing any on lowsec are 1) a -10 flashy and you can go into highsec anymore, 2) guns on the gate shoot at you and 3) you have a 15 minute Global Criminal Cooldown. Really, what other penalties exist? None, and most of these penalties are easily avoided...either through another account to move stuff or a guns that are too weak to kill anything larger than a cruiser.

Does CCP ignore lowsec. No, they do ignore a pirate focused lowsec. Lowsec boasts high mineral yields, better ore, faster routes through space and higher agents. The problem is that they are in many cases worse than highsec options. Asteroids are a perfect example. Under today's market it is twice as profitable to mine Scordite or plag as it is to mine Hedbergite, a lowsec asteroid. Why would anyone mine in lowsec when its MORE profitable to mine in the safety of highsec. Everything a pirate really wants, more targets and more loot, will come if lowsec offers more profit than highsec...at least for certain items.

I have several ideas, like moving higher level agents into lowsec, lowering the mineral output of highsec asteroids and increasing the lowsec.

There are two major obstacles that lowsec is facing. The first is security status. Right now an anti-pirate corp suffers the same penalty as a pirate corp and all members will eventually end up at -10. If a player with a positive security status kills someone with a negative security status, they shouldn't loose security, they should GAIN some. Imagine a +10 security status, and the possible CONCORD faction ships that could be used as incentive to reach that level, and the rewards from the Angel Cartel that could be added with a high Angel faction score and a -10 security status....that alone would provide more small gang warfare as people would like ships of both types.

The second obstacle is wormholes. Right now, WHs offer everything lowsec offers...only BETTER. No local as an intel channel, no CONCORD, better industrial area. Why in CCPs name would ANYONE setup in lowsec when EVERYTHING is better in a wormhole? Wormholes really are the lowsec killer (and some 0.0 killer for small corps), because the reward from wormholes makes the risk acceptable...and lowsec just can't complete with that.

CCP hasn't ignored lowsec, they just made wormholes too good.

Additional banter participants:


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

Sitting in Idle

Its been awhile, RL and the lack of any movement left me with little to say. The Black Prophesy is sitting in idle right now with leadership having to take some time off. I've elected to stay, even though its mainly a solo thing right now for a few reasons.

1. I still don't play that much, so trying to get into an active corp will be a pain in the butt.
2. I like the corp and the players in it, enought that I'm willing to wait a few months before looking to leave.
3. I'm just starting to develop my skills and ship stable. I'm almost able to use a L4 Q16 agent, I'm ratting in 0.0 space for some isk, and our alliance is still fairly active with roams up at Moa available if I'm interested.
4. One of the guys and I are starting an alt corp for research and PI stuff.

So, all-in-all, things are much like they were when I reactivated with me doing stuff by myself. However, I do know that I have backup (at the price of the occasional wardec) if needed.

To generate some isk, I've launched a new PI manufacturing system for one of my mains, Attia, as two other alts. One alt is in 0.0 space extracting materials and now that Attia is in a cov ops getting in and out is much easier. The others are buying P1 materials and then manufactring P2 through P4 items. Frankly, some people are selling materials at all levels that are SO FRIGGIN below their cost...they are running themselves out of money. Its strange, but allows me to buy there cheap stuff and then make a profit on higher ranked items...all without me having to click thorugh 50+ extractors. Even if I can clear 10mill a day doing this, that will be enough for my playing time.

Things are looking up...or at least interesting

Where oh where shall my little corp go...

Looks like the small piece of 0.0 that the corp leadership was looking at had a visit by the Goonswarm for the past few days. The fact that the area may have frequent 30 man fleets that come through will put a damper on moving into that area.

Of course we did identify a great constellation in Curse...low jumps per day, single system entrance, off the pipeline....and owned by Noir apparently. They won't mind if we come and take over…right?

My PI plan is continuing to progress on the sub-alts, the first character is ready to lay down 4 command centers and the fifth will be ready in a couple of days. It took a little longer to finish as I forgot I had to train new characters up the Gallente frigate and industrial skills as well. Fortunately, that is only an extra days' training and I have the BPO for Iteron III's, and they are cheap to make. I dislike delaying the training on my main characters, but this will start paying for itself in the long run.

This brings me to the root cause of my problems, the lack of isk and consistent generation of funds. Now hopefully the PI plan will alleviate some of that, but the plan will require a significant investment...one which I've already paid for and lost while in 0.0. To put all four alts with five planets each, is at a minimum 18.5M isk for Command centers per character, plus training fees around 3M isk per character, and finally the PI setup itself which generally runs around 2M isk per planet. So for each character it is a total investment of approx 24M isk per character. Given that is about half of what I have in both accounts...you can see the level of risk that I'm assuming.

I did decide on a training plan..at least a short term one for Jonzac my main. I'm continuing to work the support skills for him...weapons upgrade V, advance weapons upgrade IV, long range targeting IV. I'll then start on projective weapons up to medium projective V. Once I have enough money to buy/make a Dominix Battle ship I'll start training the skills to fly that with Med T2 guns (either hybrid or projectile) to rat with in and perform L4 mission in.

What now?

I'm at an impass. I have hit the 9M skill point on my two characters and I'm unsure of what to train for next.

My combat character has training interceptors and can fly Gallente interceptors with T2 blasters or rails. I've also been able to fly Gallente Assault ships, fitted with T2 hybrids as well. I have Calari and Minmater frigates at level 4 and those cruisers at level 4 as well. I'm currently able to clear Level 3 Q19 missions with no trouble in my Myrmidon and it will be a little bit before I have the standing to fly Level 4 mission.

So what to train for next. My issue isn't WHAT I want to fly, its my inability to AFFORD anything to fly that is the problem right now. I had to buy a new Mrym and fit it out and that broke the back. I've never been flush...ever and its really starting to hamper my game playing. I've attempted the trading game and either I just don't get it, or I can't spend the time to "get" it.

I've decided to pause training on my two main characters and train the four additional characters slots you get. I'm training all of them to handle PI and it takes 9 days for each character to meet my PI training requirements. When I'm done, each character will be able to use the advanced command center on 5 planets. This will allow me to pull every P0 and P1 material off the planet for sale...or I could eventually move into P4 production or final Sov/POS construction if I want.

Hopefully, I can pull between 50-100million isk a month in with this effort. If I can reach that goal, it will meet my modest isk requirements for the next year at least.

Back on the horse

It really has been to long. I have to admit, in the confusion of everything that has happened in EVE combined with a rather busy Real Life...and knowing that no one reads this anyway...I've been remiss on posting anything at all. Well, that stops now, I remembered I was doing this for my own benefit and I shouldn't depend on readers to keep me going.

Where to start? The alliance I was in failscaded, the area of space turned into a hot drop zone, Atlas and the NC look ready to start hostilities. HTA where my corp belonged completely dropped SOV, corps and has completely disbanded. I don't know all the details, but given the fact the alliance couldn't be arsed into defending its own territory. The constant small gang roams that were never found and killed, the single bombers that would attack at the gate...never a firm smackdown from the alliance.

Since we were forced rather abuptly from 0.0, we had to leave a lot of stuff in the stations...all of which I managed to sell except for the T1 stuff, which won't sell and I can't refine, so it sits there cluttering up my assets window. I suppose that I could trash it all, but somehow I hope against hope that I'll be able to go get that stuff one day. Not sure why, its not valuable, but the fact that I had to leave against my will probably explains that for me.

Needles the say the corporation has been in a state of flux while we assess the damages and attempt to figure out what to do. Although this is often the time when corporations find themselves in trouble and shedding members, Black Prophesy has not...which makes me very glad that I managed to land in a corp that has a good corp of internal strength.

We've managed to figure out what's next and started our own alliance and have just identified a new area of 0.0 space to head to. Obviously, as a new alliance we are going to NPC space first. Now I just need to get there to start some actual PvP.

EVE Blog Banter #19

Welcome to the nineteenth installment of the EVE Blog Banter, the monthly EVE Online blogging extravaganza created by CrazyKinux. The EVE Blog Banter involves an enthusiastic group of gaming bloggers, a common topic within the realm of EVE Online, and a week to post articles pertaining to the said topic. The resulting articles can either be short or quite extensive, either funny or dead serious, but are always a great fun to read! Any questions about the EVE Blog Banter should be directed to crazykinux@gmail.com. Check out other EVE Blog Banter articles at the bottom of this post!

This months topic comes to us from @evepress, and he asks: The CSM: CCP's Meta Game? - The CSM, an eve players voice to CCP.Right? In the grand scheme of things yes, the players bring up issues and the CSM presents them to CCP. But in its current iteration the CSM was supposed to be given small authority to assign CCP assets toprojects that the CSM thought needed work on. As it has not come outthis was not the case. So fellow bloggers, is the CSM worth it, has the CSM improved the game in any way, or is it just a well thought out scamby CCP to give us players a false sense of input in the game? What's your take?

I have to admit I've only breezed over many of the posts written by the CSMs and the Devs about the latest rounds of talks between them. Frankly, I am of the opinion this is a tempest in a teacup.

The CSMs are frustrated as they feel they have a mandate from the people to "force" CCP to listen to their demands. After all, they represent the people that pay for CCP's existence and that has been the mantra of every player of every MMO since Everquest. You HAVE to listen to us, we pay your bills, without US you'd be nothing!!!

The fact of the matter is the CSMs are not a true representation of the EVE player community, and more importantly, CCP knows this. Mxynee was swept into the lead CSM position on the strength of her importance to low-sec inhabitants and her popular blog. I'm positive she will do a wonderful job in representing some of EVE's players, but in no way can she represent the majority of EVE players. Frankly, like any election, the silent majority who didn't bother to vote probably do not want any of the changes Mxynee and others have proposed solutions for. These folks don't live in lowsec or nullsec, they don't run into the game crippling lag, they abhor the random violance and e-peenery that many low-sec pirates exhibit. They "carebear" their way through missions and focus on the myriad of industrial opportunities available in our sandbox.

Its often the illusion of the rabid forum leader that they represent a major faction of the gaming community. You go to any MMO, (WoW, DAOC, EQ2, etc) there will be major forum names that the dwellers recognize and lend "internet" expertise to. However, game developers know that most players don't even read the forums (or blogs) at all. Take WOW for example, hard-core raiders spend hours online and have a heavy representation in the forum, but they are a small fraction of the 11 million players in WOW.

The bottom line is this, CSMs are not game developers and do not have access to the corporate plan CCP has. They cannot, nor SHOULD not, be able to direct CCP to "do" anything. That is not to say that the CSM program is not successful nor useless. CCP has been chasing down the reason for increased lag, in large part, because of the representation made by prior CSM groups. Yes, CCP is focused on its next two major projects. No, many forum dwellers do not feel these projects will be useful to you. CCP, does not and SHOULD not care to the point they crumble and move corporate assets to meet the mobs every whim...especially when the mob can't even agree in which direction to move. They do have a responsibility to shareholders (not stakeholders) to grow and return a profit on investment. The return can only be build by continuing to bring in new and more players. Frankly, in my opinion, they HAVE to do something completely different to renew EVE, especially to bring in a more diverse player base. YOU may not like the new advances, but its not like CCP has TAKEN anything away from your playing experience that you enjoy now.

Finally, the CSMs are important. They have argued for CCP to become more transparent to the player base on what their plan is. Much to my surprise, CCP has accepted the challenge and posted where almost EVERYONE OF THEIR DEVELOPERS are working. That is a huge change to openness. When has any company ever done anything like that? I encourage the CSMs to continue to work with CCP to press forward their agenda, it will not be quick, it will not be easy...but if CCP gets to the agenda press forward by CSM5 in 18 months, which is still a successful mission. Company's do not respond like a college student changing their mind on a major...they project for costs and goals a minimum of a year out and most like on a five year schedule...they can't and won't change those no matter what the CSMs propose...but the CSM can help CCP develop the next iteration of the company plan...and THAT is making a difference.