Rockbottom?

First of all, I must thank my alliance members and friends who aren’t in alliance but join roams I FC, for not biting at me when I go whelp our fleets. Thanks, and no thanks. Every time I do, they’re always eager or at least willing to come on the next round, and every time I ask them about it, they say it’s no problem, and I honestly believe them.

So why do I feel so guilty every time we lose a fight?

Sheep amongst the wolves (and my old blog is down!?)

First point of business: My first ever post on this WP blog linked back to a GuildLaunch user blog, where I started off my first few posts and decided I liked it enough to get access to a much more well-presented and professional blogging site. This does mean that I’ve forgotten what exactly I’ve written in those first posts and I have no clue what I’ve lost there, which is a huge disappointment.

Server down, looks like the old forums were taken down.

Interestingly enough though, a current event took place today that has made me remember one of the earliest things I ever did in EVE beyond what a typical newbie does: join a chat channel totally unassociated with anything they’re currently doing in EVE. I’ve been in the public channel Spoonful of Sugar for a while now, and they are a source of fun conversations with Sugar Kyle, current CPM member and low-sec representative, and the unique assortment of people her channel, like any other, brings to my doorstep.

I don’t think I’ve actually gone into the full story of how exactly I found myself in her channel before, though. I could’ve sworn I’ve recounted it previously in this very blog, but all my searches have been fruitless, so I am guessing it was back on that GL blog.

Anyway, it all started when I joined my the TSOLE DUST514/EVE corporation in Molden Heath. I fancied myself well-versed in the art of the meta-game, you see, in my first months, due to reading lots of fictional detective stories and of course, Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. So when I learnt about Calamitous-Intent living in the area, and the caution with which my corporation treated them, naturally as a newbie instead of deciding to also keep my distance curiosity made me poke further.

I thought I deserved a Master Spy title or something of the like when I penetrated into the inner workings of their corporation description and joined their public channel. Surely, I thought, surely this is where all the dirty secrets would spill that could allow me to compromise their corporation. A week passed by, nada. I had to dig deeper.

Unpredictability: A Series of Unconventional Fits

One of the reasons PvP in EVE is so satisfying is that the preparation is so complex and finding a good fight can be so tedious that when it does occur, it is just that much more awesome.

Preparation is something I’ve been considering a lot lately, even though I haven’t been putting it into action. Our fleets have very minimal requirements to partake in, something we believe is necessary for now to encourage maximum participation. This leads to possible holes or weaknesses in our compositions that could lead to failcascades should we come across the wrong fleet at the wrong time.

I commute to university most days, and most of that transition time is spent pondering doctrines for my fleet. I’ve gotten pretty good at it, and I have a fairly extensive personal EFT in my head if I concentrate hard enough. Pondering for the days when we have access to resources to field fleets that are more than a ‘glorified kitchen sink’.

My pondering, though, does get sidetracked a little, but that’s when it gets really good.

It’s getting a little hot in here…

Things really pick up once you get real involved in the player aspect, eh. I am starting understand why most corporations never want to enter alliances.

It takes a certain kind of leadership to keep cohesion in groups like alliances, and I think ours is hitting all sorts of obstacles right now. Some we leap over effortlessly, some we clamber over, and others…

Today there was an argument between a CEO of a corporation who was interested in joining the alliance, and one of the directors for a corp in the alliance, resulting in the possible new corporation leaving our chat. 😦

I admit, I was being a bit naive when I imagined sunshine and rainbows all along the alliance’s path.

The beginning (again): resetting goals

I feel out of my depth.

A week ago, I watched an EVE PvP video for a second time. The owner of the video was talking about one of his fights in it, and when I asked him how he managed to pull it off he directed me to the video, and I realised I had seen it before. Before being my first few months of EVE. Watching it again, I saw so much more to the fights. What had been utter confusion, with the only understanding being that he had killed another ship, became an in-depth mental analysis of his fight, his conditions and ship he had compared to the method of engagement of his enemies, and their ships. I can honestly look back at all the posts about me struggling through New Eden, constantly dying and losing all that ISK (zKillboard has me at 3.75b ISK lost in PvP), and say that without that struggle, I would not be here, and be able to look at EVE videos that had previously confounded me, and almost perfectly understand them, even at 2x – 3x speed.

But I’m still a noob in every other aspect of EVE, as I have found out today. Today I stuck to my word, and hung up the mantle of the solo PvPer for the time being. I will don it again when the time comes. But for now, I delve headfirst into the world of an FC of a budding alliance.

Laying down the sword…

Today was a good day…

---

 

Awesome Friday night down in Australia. Managed to get a free night to listen to the awesome crew doing the weekly EVE Down Under, something of a ritual for many Aussie players I think. Definitely fun to listen to the hosts’ takes on recent patches, upcoming patches and null-sec politics (which I have no clue about but I listen intently anyway because it sounds intriguing). I especially enjoyed the argument around the end-game, and what content exists in the end-game after Titans. But I won’t go any further, and will highly recommend you download the podcast and have a listen for this week! Also, perhaps just this once, listeners got to witness  nGR rDNx struggling to pronounce my character name! At least until some smart cookies in the EDU chat channel discovered out what is hidden behind a seeming jumble of random letters. 😛 The collective, revelatory ‘ooooohh’ was supremely satisfying.

The reason for my name even making its way into the show is, awesomely enough, because I somehow won a freighter answering this question at the end of the show: “Who wrote Templar One?”, combined with the keyword riptide delivered at the beginning of the show.

And to top it off, CCP Mimic made a special guest appearance for today’s show! Not only did she give awesome insights into some of the topics discussed and how CCP was adapting to the new 5-weekly patch cycle, but she was the one that judged that I was the 5th correct answer (based on the conditions of that prize giveaway, the 3rd and 5th answers got freighters) and officially got me the freighter! Woo-hoo!

It’s officially 41 days until the Eve Down Under event itself in Sydney, and (spoilers!) this may be part of my speech for the event. I’m certainly aiming for this sort of vibe, but I’ll try not to let too much on; according to my blog stats I do have some Australian readers, and some may be attending EDU, so I’m not going to spoil it for them.