Low Sec Lifestyle

I think the scent of January is waking the corporation. Holidays, DayZ, Minecraft, have all had their way with us. While none of these things will be put aside I think that our activity level will improve when people do not have as many social obligations as the holidays tend to bring for most people. The low activity level is not bad in so far as 'is 7-2 dying?' It is more frustrating for those who are active. Having been like a cold lizard, curled on a rock waiting for the sun, my activity level has been horrid. The Nosy Gamer  does weekly stats about game activity. He comments about Eve's plummet during the Holidays. I am not surprised by it and I did comment that I believed it was a side effect of Eve's player base. My corporation is close. We know a lot about each other On Holiday days they are often intertwined with their families. People travel to see parents or spend time with their kids who are home. Our activities decrease because real life social needs in

YC 115 Pod and Planet Fiction contest  results are in. Rhevas took the Grand Prize. I placed second which is where I was last year. The difference is that this year they allowed teh same person to win multiple times. This was not a rule last year. I do not know where the change came in. It may be because there were fewer entries or maybe the judges wanted to judge the stories. Winning stories were disqualified last year if their writer won a higher award in another catagory or something like that. I wrote four stories and all of them placed to my surprise. What I wrote is as different and varied a hand as can be. I wrote as inspiration hit and the responses to them are just as varied. I am as bad at figuring out what people like to read for creative writing as I am at blogging. Boots to the Ground; Fire in the Sky was my favorite entry and I spent weeks on it for it to do the poorest. ECM Nightmare was written in fourty minutes while giggling. In general I am strongest with first

I put Minecraft down to PvP. You see, I had just had an adventure that involved me getting stuck on a tropical island hours away from home slowly making my wayback. I had several random chance encounters that boggle the mind (I may write about them) and I was in route to my husband when I heard the boys get hotdropped and a falcon hit the field. Dinner plans went on hold for a little bit. They were gatecamping hoping that this exact thing would happen. I'm hanging out on coms with them even though I am not actively participating in game. I heard Diz say, "We're going to have a fight here," as an Arazu jumped in. They pointed the Arazu. A Cyno went up and things came through. Diz started calling primaries. I closed Minecraft (one can't idle, Zombies will kill you at night) and flipped Sugar into a Jaguar (having twenty fitted), undocked and joined the fleet (session change would slow my undocking so fleet second) and landed as the Widow died. I shot the Panth

The Almost Ganked Target > they won't fight me straight up, and I guarantee one of them will call me a cowrad for being too smart to go to low sec after them The Almost Ganked Target > going into low sec after them is nothing but a trap... patience is my main weapon against them.. they WILL get stupid & blink first I think cowardice is thrown around with the same gross disregard as honor. What is a coward? For some, it is a rational decision of self preservation. For others, it is the fact that a rational decision for self preservation was even made. In some way, disregarding oneself for loss is amazing and being sensible is not. I firmly ally myself with a coward. Earlier tonight, I was spinning around an idea wrapped around "when is it time to dock up?" I didn't get far with that initial thought. I don't really know. I dock when I want to dock. The idea came from the fact that a particular group has taken to avoiding the boys after several steamrol

I had a nightmare last night. I was running, with my husband, through some building. It was reminiscent of a hospital. There were security doors in the hallways that locked with a white chain. I wanted to lock the doors but he said that we'd be fine just locking the one. I let that happen and of course the guy chasing us T1000 style is fast approaching. We close, chain, and lock the last door and start digging through the room for the items we needed to build something. There was something Minecraft about the items because they needed to stack (I've been playing most of my Minecraft time with him). The bad guy just gets a dremel and saws through the lock faster then we can stack whatever we are doing. I woke up with a start, pissed off thinking, "Damn it! He procrastinates in my dreams too!" I'm a planner by nature. It shows up on my dreams, in day to day life (my trip planning is amazing) and in Eve. Such as my use of contracts to move items in game. On my work

Behnid brought up a point in a common and one reflected in a blog post about a lack of bloodlust . Often I speak about killing all the things. However, there have been hurdles that I have had to make in my game play. There are times that I have not wanted to shoot things. It may be one of those topics that I am not supposed to talk about. After all, what is a video game but indulgence in the things that we cannot or could not do. I cannot direct armies to conquer a continent as I do in Civilization nor can I spend my evenings saving the world by shooting zombies. Yet, I enjoy these violent activities and PvP in Eve is no different. All PvP is not created equal. I do not mean on the chest beating level of who does what in combat and what is a valid fight. I do not speak of the disparagement made towards the type of PvP people chose. I more speak of the activities themselves. They are all different. To PvP in high or low or null, to gank or war dec or duel, are all different types of P

"There are no faces behind the spaceships anymore." Brando told me. "Were there ever?" I asked. "The anti-pirate mentality is one of persecution. At the time, it was massively important. I've become the thing I feared, without even noticing." He told me. "It was a genuine process that I had not been aware of until yesterday and it has taken more then a year." Morals. Values. Focus. Reason. Goals.  They are all lacking in the basic structure of Eve. Nothing forces them on us but our own humanity. The sandbox exists as a shell full of interactive abilities and nothing else. When a player enters the game they are equiped with whatever they had, as an individual, before they entered but they are not given anything more. The player is not given morals. They are not handed values. There is no reason for them to do any particular thing. They are cast out into the game and everything that they do has to come from everything that they currently

I was once scared of outlaw players. what a delicious shiver the thought sent down the spine. player pirates. People who spent their game time hunting other people. Violence in its rawest form. Beautiful in its attack against the social norm. it is a rather romantic image but player pirates are what they are, vicious in their game play even if sweet in their true temperament. Back when I was new, I remember my little industrial corporation's caution around THC2. Later, in Eve Uni chat, as my security status plummeted I'd be called out for what I was. Pirate. Outlaw. Killer for no reason. it was all true even if i never felt the pirate at my core. The interesting thing about being a 'PvPer' or at least a low sec resident, is that inevitably, people approach you to see if you are interested in killing someone. The answer is both yes and no. Am I or mine interested in killing someone? Yes. That is always yes. But, are we interested in killing the person that someone

I noticed that I was not selling Procurers. I noticed because I sold three. When I saw that Procurer bundle sell I went, "Huh, I haven't sold those in a while." Since I started selling Procurers back in the spring or summer they have sold well and steady. Better then Retrievers. The reason is that I could be more competitive. Procurers sold for 11 million in JIta. I sold them for 13 million. They sold in Teon for 15 to 16 million. That 2-3 million ISK jump was enough for people to buy their procurers from me. Teon now sells them for 13 million. So does JIta. Obviously that says something about the Procurer backlog that happened last year when they rebalanced the mining barges. Maybe some of the stock has been chewed through. However, it said to me that my days of selling Procurer for a profit were over. I now keep one in stock in case someone wants to buy one as a nice bait boat. After all, the main goal of the Cougar Store is to provide the residents of low sec w

Why is one of the most frustrating words. It can be played against someone to great aggravation. It can also be the gateway to understanding. It is a door step that I stand upon. I'm a curious person. I am somewhat insatiable. I absorb knowledge about things I don't even like because I enjoy learning. On twitter, I found myself plying the Why? card . I stopped myself because it looked aggressive and picky. It is easy for a simple bit of curiosity to dig in like a thorn. that is not going to get me anywhere. I want to know the answer but I cannot find out if I aggravate the asker. There is a lot about Eve's social opinion and activity that I seek to understand. Smack talk is one of my most common topics. I struggle to understand it and try not to place my value judgement on it. I do not understand it but I know that I cannot judge people who indulge in it by my standards. Their standards are not mine. These social rifts abound. For some, I am evil incarnate because I h

"Thankfully I have never done the tutorials, but can I assume that at the point where, "He turned in the mission and now could not get back to his wreck." the tutorial has not gone over making bookmarks? Or even if it has, why did the game not make him bookmark his wreck? To me, this case isn't about survival or even loss, it is about bad instructions. Eve is a product and the worst thing you can do is give bad or no instructions with a new product. People will assume their frustration is the products fault. If this guy could have gotten half his loot, maybe he could have blamed himself for not reading the mission, but instead EVE kicks him when he's down right from the start. I get that we are getting into how learning is painful and most people don't have a tolerance for that pain, but maybe they could spread the sting out a little more?" Anonymous @ December 20, 2013 at 4:33 AM I will admit, it has been a while since I did the training missions

What does it take to play Eve Online? Or, perhaps, it should be what does it take for a person to enjoy the gameplay of Eve Online? Last night, I was watching a new player ranting in Eve Newbie chat. He had died in a rookie mission, one of the ones that tells you you will die. He turned in the mission and now could not get back to his wreck. His wreck, of course, had everything he had accumulated this far. Now, this is a common series of mistakes. Loading all the things into the spaceship makes sense because the ship is your avatar and normally you carry everything with you. After all, you die and just reload or run back from your spawn point and pick it up. Only, he learned it doesn't work that way in Eve. Because he turned in hte mission and does not yet know about bookmarks he is short of luck. "But I have no stuff!" he wailed. Everyone explained that Eve automatically gives you a rookie ship and he can do his mission in that. They told him that he has to read the

December has just been a nasty month of work and I made it even worse by plugging in log skills in Eve. While I often preach the positives of the skill queue I also need to fess up to the negatives. Sometimes, long skills just suck. Sometimes skills just suck. That is how I felt when I managed to not only screw up being ready for a fleet on time but also not able to fit the fit because skills. Rigging skills this time. Something manages to kick me in the face just when I think, "Hey, I'm not doing so bad." The solution was an implant. Only, I've always avoided implants and fitting mods (for the most part) and needing to use it was strange. I won't discuss how much ISK I tossed in the fire in frustration trying rigs because I suck at the out of game fitting problems and was rushing because I was late for the fleet. I'm proud of finishing Tactical logistics Reconfiguration up there. It is a great skill. I turned around and plugged in Gallente Carrier V behi

[TL;DR: Sugar is tired of people treating certain people like shit and has decided to start saying something about it. ] There is knowing of people and there is knowing people and then there are people who have your back. There are people who scream to for backup and know that they will get backup every time. They will do projects with each other. They will come to trust each other. They will share chatrooms with people and spend their time discussing things that are not Eve. They will bring their successes and their failures for commendation and sympathy. They become more than the other players that occupy your game with you. They are your friends. The problem is, sometimes they are corporate bigots and you don't know until it is too late. Bigot : a person who strongly and unfairly dislikes other people, ideas, etc. : a bigoted person; especially : a person who hates or refuses to accept the members of a particular group (such as a racial or religious group) Full Definiti

We killed a Rorqual the other day . Wrong place. Wrong time. Wrong decision. And he died. It was my first Rorqual kill. Kaeda was out in a Myrm doing Myrmidon things. He was eight or nine jumps away? Ten? The Rorqual was dead by the time he was two jumps out. Before the warp changes he would have made it to the kill. While some would take this as a time to discuss the habit of pirate types killing unarmed ships and swarming to the kill like sharks to chum, I'm more interested in the changes. Kaeda (who is a frigate/cruiser pilot predominantly) said in disgust, "This is the last time I am roaming in a battlecruiser." The slow warpspeed is terrible. I was in a Talos later that same evening. I killed stuff in it but I started to daydream as my ship warped. "I'll get there," I found myself thinking. "Lalala." It was funny because I had an adrenaline rush from planning to go out and fight. I was shivering so hard that I had to put my jacket on. Bu

One of the easiest things to do for any person is to drown in their own environment. Not the literal act of drowning where water enters the lungs and stops the processing of oxygen by the human body. This is the act of someone seeping in their own environment, be it cultural, social, or anti-social. It can be conscious or it can simply be the assumption of day to day life. There are arguments of nature vs nurturer, what you are and what you have learned to be and how the integrate into the core personality of a person. I describe myself as "growing up in low sec" because it has affected how I see things. It is not a bad thing but it is a real thing that should be recognized. Point of View is exactly that, a point of view not the entire thing. I often find myself puzzled in conversations. Why do we do what we do? It is an endless question that circles round and round. In games we often do what we do because we like it or it intrests us. Working off of that simple concept

Today is a wish day. I wish that when I sold items from the corporate hangar it showed as the corporation selling items instead of the individual corporation member. "You are way to hopeful that they'll fix your thing," Ender said to me. And yes, there is truth in his rational thought process. But my process? It is not a rational one. It is a simple want. I want it. To an extent I roleplay my store. I want people to buy from TCS. I want them to figure out how the billboard code works and let me advertise on a the billboards. I want to do fun things like that! I want my market to be more fun then I am already having. I love this 'store' concept I've built. It is one of the very tangible things I pride myself in having and maintaining in Eve. Since returning from Syndicate, I've upgraded my other TCS Employees to Tycoon, increasing my market order load. Right now, Bosena consumes about 700 orders for me. That is with me not stocking some things like fue

The best part is that I can calmly and honestly blame Susan Black  for all of this. It is quite refreshing. Susan commented that she has been playing Minecraft and that she is playing on an Amarr server. This caused Altaen to say that that sounded cool and me to go, "I've been wanting to play community Minecraft." A quick message to my husband and a "npnp" back and we were in business with a community server for our corporation and friends. Brando gave it a try and sank right in. We logged in with a PvP survival mode. It turned night, Zombies and Creepers chased us and we managed to get established, build a newbie house for new members joining into the game, sort out a Minecraft channel on coms to compliment our DOTA, WoP, Civilization channels, and we were in business. I've now done logistics on Eve, chatted, and not undocked at all because I am building my house out of sandstone in a sand poor area. Of course, we played Minecraft all yesterday evenin

Making money LS From: Erwenna Sent: 2013.12.12 19:02 To: Sugar Kyle,   Hey, Just found your blog and since you claim to be an advocate for LS, I thought I just might ask for your help/advice. I love this game but it just seems to me I can't find a way to last on it. For a simple reason : I don't know how to make money to support some ambitious goals : I wanna fly a Legion. I don't care about how and why, I just like the looks and the concept of the ship.  I heard about a few ways to make money but I can't put my head around it. Say exploration. I like the sound of that. The tutorial was fun. It was also way too short and vague. Can I just do it with a frigate ? do I need a BC or a BS ? if yes how am I supposed to fund it ? I won't get longer, I just which the veterans on EVE would give some actual tips on how to make ISK (without having to count heavily on donations and help from other players). People talk about incursions, ratting, WH, complexes... all of

Year two, hmm? The blog hits two on the 18th, but I started it a few days before and decided to steal the start date. I'm the only one who cares even mildly about this technical aspect of things yet here I am, justifying myself for absolutely no reason. :) Of course I could rage quit between now and the 18th, invalidating everything that I do as I transcend and erupt like cold fusion across the Eve Online Official Forums. How interesting that is to me, as the writer of all of this. I decided to do something a bit different. I made a little recording of myself. It isn't fancy. It's me, my headset, and Audacity to record me. I thought that after two years and over nine hundred posts I'd try something new. I spent a while doing tests and thinking of things to say. I started to cry some after listening to myself over and over again.  Nivin was kind enough to link me a nice article from Scientific America about how the voice sounds different when heard back. I know this