A Barrel Roll: A Day In The Life Of EVE Online

Few things in EVE make me laugh quite like a bomber pilot who has NO idea how to use the ship he's flying. A brief recap of today's events is in order, and as such, I'll try to be as brief as possible.

The wormhole in which we've decided to make our home has a Static C3, which makes things quite nice for running sites, and carebearing it up. It also makes it quite nice for running into stupid people. At the risk of defamation of character, I'll leave the names out of it here to protect the involved people, however "special" he may have been.

Today's C3 opened to a nice quiet system with eight public sites and a few radar sites. A perfect opportunity to make some weekend ISK, says I. Most everyone agreed with me, and we began to assemble the usual participants. Now, at times, this can be a bit of a trial, as everyone has to do their hair, get the right ship, brush their teeth, floss their toes, and whatnot - and by the time we had assembled the Drakefleet, we were in for a shock. Not so much a shock as a moment of awe. Our first drake jumped through to begin bookmarking public sites, and through usage of her directional saw two Helios' and an Imicus. Three scanning ships. Prolific over-use of probes. Perhaps this should have been the point when I realized just how the day would go.

We placed a Falcon inside the system to practice his voyeurism and ran a few sites in an adjoining wormhole. While everyone else was returning home, I decided to do a bit of fishing. Our Falcon pilot had reported a Megathron (possibly failfit), as well as a Maelstrom at their POS. To be honest, I'd hit somewhat of a dry spell for kills, so I was itching for some kind of engagement.

Fast-forward roughly twenty minutes later and a few cruiserbait jumps in and out of their system, and the Falcon pilot reports that they've switched to a Scorpion, Maelstrom, and a Taranis. We also now know that these three ships are one main and two alts. I run back to the hangar, grab the trusty Tempest, and set off to play some "Antagonistic Sumbitch II".

After setting up just inside their wormhole, it takes a fair bit for any of them to make a move. At first, it's simply the Scorpion, uncloaking(?!?) and tossing a few volleys of cruise missiles.. I take it in stride, hop out, and hop back in. The Scorpion uncloaks(?!?) again as well as a Taranis dropping cloak(?!?) and staying a fair distance away. Eventually the Taranis pilot warps out, heads back to their POS, and switches out to a Nemesis.

And this is where things get a little.. well, to be honest, fucking retarded. The Nemesis pilot dissapears from D-Scan, I brace for the coming bomb...

...and he uncloaks ten kilometres off me, bomb flying off into the middle of nowhere, and he's on a collision course with the Tempest. I begin locking him up. He's still flying straight towards me. I lock him up just as he passes by the wormhole, and proceed to two-shot him into space-dust. I then spent a good five minutes laughing.

Ya see, kids, bombing should normally go something like this:

Are you approaching your target? Y/N> Y
Are you roughly thirty kilometers away from your target? Y/N> Y
Uncloak.. launch bomb when ready.

But it always amazes me how for some people, it goes more like this:

Are you approaching your target? Y/N> FUCKBEANS BANANASLIPPERS FIRE FIRE FIRE

When I was new to EVE, I always wondered how it was possible that so many people had so many kills. I wondered how it was possible for people to lose battleships to a single pilot in a T1 frigate. It's startling, but I don't wonder about these things anymore. It seems that stupidity from the real world has found it's way into our sandbox, and this is a most distressing time indeed.

Fuckbeans Bananaslippers,
Alathus Christensen

Including EVE servers, evidently, which seem to begin and end whenever they wish. In high security space, this really is not a terrible inconvenience - aside from a few lost drones, and the occasional failfit mission runner which manages to pop in the short moment before the server realizes that it should have worn it's brown trousers and preemptively shuts down.
However, for those who make their lives in 0.0, and more so in W-Space, a poorly timed disconnect can be possibly the worst thing to happen on a given day - and the best thing to happen to the person who gets to smack your face. Just jumped through a wormhole? Have fun logging in to the middle of space with no bookmarks. Just jumped through a gate in 0.0, only to find yourself in stasis inside of a bubble? I really hope you can log in before your captors.
But the point of this blog isn't to complain. I like EVE Online. Hell, if I didn't I probably wouldn't play it near so much. However, on the list of things to open with, server stability could definately use a bit of a boost.

With that rant out of the way, let me tell you a little bit about who I am inside the Matrix, as it were. I'm the CEO of a 45-man corporation which currently resides in W-Space. It's not without it's trials and tribulations, but in general it's much more interesting than grinding missions, or busting space rocks.
Being a CEO was never really something I particularly wanted to do, in EVE. The added responsibility can - at times - be a headache. I much prefer the freelance approach to EVE, flying around space like the star of a futuristic space opera (Flash!! Ooooo!). However it does have it's merits, as well, and it's something I've grown used to.
W-Space is not exactly the "place" to be if you want constant action 24/7. In fact, if W-Space were to have a recipe, I'd break it down a bit like this:

1 part waiting game
1 part strategy
1 part exploration
1 part OMGWTFBBQ

With that said, it should be noted that going from a life in HiSec to a life in W-Space can change people. It has a habit of nudging you in the direction of that familiar friend, "blowing shit up". Of course, you can't win 'em all. Sometimes you're the worm, and sometimes you're the hook. In the interest of being the hook, I've taken it upon myself to lay down some ground rules - should you decide to go exploring the land of the Sleepers.

1.) Please, please, don't jump into a wormhole solo in a T3 cruiser and assume that you're just fine. Assuming that you jump into one of the few wormholes inhabited by solely industrial corporations, you'll be fine - but to the rest of the wormhole populace, you're a flying killboard trophy. On that same coin, if you plan to fly T3, and you spend the ISK for a strategic cruiser, spend the ISK to fit it like a strategic cruiser.

2.) Use your directional scan. This is penultimate. I cannot tell you how important this is. However, if you'd like a friendly in-game mail from the Secure Commerce Commission, feel free to ignore this.

3.) Bookmark EVERYTHING. The wormhole you came in, the wormhole you go out of, the wormhole on the floor, the wormhole in your hamper, and the wormhole in that two day old pizza you're considering the edibility of.

4.) Don't sit on a wormhole and scan a system. Some people will tell you this will allow you to jump out should trouble come your way. I'll tell you that those people are stupid, and should be kicked in the nuts. Not only do the inhabitants have an easy way to find you, but they probably have an easy way to make sure you don't make it back through that wormhole. Fit a cloak, safespot your ship, deploy probes, engage cloak, and scan to your heart's content.

5.) Live a little, have some fun. After all, it's just a game. EVE is not SRS BSNS.

And with those five little rules, you'll be at least a little more survivable - and hopefully have a little more fun in W-Space.

Sniffly and Tired,
Alathus Christensen