Saturday, October 25, 2008

Musical side trip to Zappa's Universe

OMG WHAT A SHOW !!!

Yesterday was the return to Montreal of Dweezil Zappa and company, playing Frank's music as no else can, because as the ticket stub says: ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTES!

The only thing remotely related to EVE here would be "Cosmic Debris", but the band didn't play it. Here's my post from the Zappa.com show review forums:

Absolutely amazing! It was my first time at "Le Gezu" even if I'm from around here, and it's basically like having the band in your basement; so much for the neighbors !!!

I was invited buy a buddy of mine who bought almost the last tickets to be sold for the 1st show (before the 2nd one was announced) and we were to be sitting at the very corners of the hall. But by hanging around before the showed started Lady Luck burned away our chance to win a guitar by doing something just as good: a member of the Gezu staff came up to us and asked "where are you guys seated?". Upon seeing our situation he grabbed our tickets and said "here, E2 and E4!". This is FIFTH ROW, DEAD CENTER !!! I wasn't hearing the guitar from the PA, but straight from the amps !!! And needless to say we were blowing away, quite literally. I have no clue when something like this will happen again, if ever.

Thank you very much Dweezil for blasting my eardrums to smithereens. Unfortunately I'm not going to the second show ( Razz to those who are!) so I'll have to wait for your next trip up here.

Music is the BEST !!!!!!



I strongly urge you to visit Zappa.com to see and hear what Frank was all about, and there are tons of video clips from previous ZPZ shows, including two from Montreal when the band came the first time with uber music gods Steve Vai and Terry Bozzio.

And if you are american, please head Frank's call on the intro page.

Fly loud !!!

o7

Thursday, October 16, 2008

9-1-1, how may I save you?

Sorry about the lack of postage, real life has kept me off the 'puter lately; I really needed to go to bed at non-EVE-friendly hours (ie: early) because I've been going forward in my quest to enter the City of Montreal's 9-1-1 service. That means exams and having a brain in a semblance of shape to do them. And now that the first run of exams are done, the biggest part was filling in the paperwork for the security inquiry the police department will do, just to make sure I'm a good guy and only pod people in virtual worlds :))

I did get to play hard last monday when our traditionnal Jihad Monday turned into the Battle of R-MOC. The Jihad fleet was economically successful, as we killed a Sacrilege just after undocking, and I layed one of my best tackles on none other than a Rapier in the aforementioned system. Going head-to-head against a Rapier when flying a Stabber is not conducive to a lengthy live though, but I lasted long enough to take him into armor and when help showed up he got toasted. But then the opposition started to play a running game while we brought in real ships. Things got uglier after that as we discovered we didn't have the firepower to deal with 'em, plus we also discovered that these news enemies are working with our old gate-camping schmucks. Yay.

So there you go, a very short post as I head towards my parental duty weekend. So until next Monday, kill 'em a lot !!!

o7

Thursday, October 9, 2008

What a week...

Yeah, I know. I'm not regular enough with my updates. That's what happens when you're juggling a job you have to get up way too early for, dealing with the ex for parental rights, and playing a MMOG in the middle of all that. Add to that the fact that getting away from a computer for some fresh air is damn fun and the result is I don't play as much as I'd like. Oh well, such is life. that doesn't mean nothing happened though... here's the short, terse version that I'll be developing on in another post as soon as i can:

- On Monday October 6th, I flew in my first full-on op as FC, with much help from veterans Teister and Sygma. In short: Jihad fleet, Ishtar and Zealot killed, fleet death by AAA. Mission accomplished! Of course me being me I over-react when I get asked about the final minutes of the fleet's life by someone who wasn't there but I'll get over it. I was nervous as a virgin on her first night but I can't wait to do it again. THIS is what EVE is all about !!!

- On Tuesday I am violently ill; looking at my computer screen gives me seasickness, went to bed at 8h30 PM. No EVE for me, thx.

- On Wednesday night after I get back from parental duties I get word of a shocking piece of news in Bozo-land: veteran Cerui Tarshiel has dropped roles and will be moving on for an indeterminate amount of time.... o_O Anyone mining in low-sec better start worrying NOW! You'll be missed man, even if we can't understand you half the time :)

- On Thursday morning Cozmik is done training Destroyers V. Next step towards interdictors: Propulsion Jamming V... should be done in 3 weeks o_O It got stretched a bit because when I'm on I train Cozmik to fly Gallente ships. I can now fit a Brutix and with a bit of tweakage of Medium Hybrid turrets I should be able to field some NASTY Jihad ships >:)

And there you go. I could go a lot deeper in a few subjects as you can see but I have to leave for work now and tonite I intend to fly extremely hard, and maybe lead another fleet on a short, victorious war (thanks Mr Weber) !!!

Fly with your dagger between your teeth

o7

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Of roams and RR Battleships

The brain feels a bit better now so here goes with the update. As I mentionned earlier, a lot has happened in Curse since the last big post. The first and most major event was that the alliance moved yet again, with all the repackaging, contracting and cynoing that this implies. The main reason is that the european Bozo players were basically perma-camped because their play time was in the middle of TCF primetime, and because they lived right next door and weren't afraid to show they vastly superior numbers at a time when 80% of the alliance is not even logged in the Euro-Bozos were stuck in station. There are more reasons to the move but I'm not in a position to discuss them here at the moment. Being very active during the move gave me the opportunity to see an impressive lightshow, as the capital ships were jumping back and forth between cyno fields, which I now have the skills to create. When I was on cyno watch duty I got to take a few nice screenshots:


Queb's Nidhoggur


The Anshar


TS's Phoenix


Queb jumping out

But moving isn't all that happened. With a new locale comes new neighbors, and ours have a love for gate camps. That is a good thing because we have a love for BUSTING gate camps! We are usually successful at breaking those camps with minimal losses, though sometimes we do have to call the retreat; we may be crazy but not stupid. On one of those camp-busting ops I was just logging on as the fleet was making it's initial attack on the Onyx that was on the gate, so I hop into my interceptor and fly top speed to the fleet's location. Just as I get out of warp the FC calls for bumps on the Onyx to get him off the gate. So because I had time to set up because I wasn't yet targeting I was able to line myself up perfectly, so not only did I bump him, I PUSHED him 15km away from the gate. The Onyx then proceeded to die a horrible death. R.I.P.

Sometimes the opposition brings heavier firepower though, in the form of remote-repairing Battleships (hereby called RRBSes). Well, that's ok because we have RRBSes of our own! I can't fly one yet because in order to be successful the ships have to be fit right and for that I'd need about 2-3 months of skill training, not to mention a good amount of ISK. I will get there though. So in these gangs my job is to tackle whatever the FC wants me to tackle, whore some killmails, and do my best not to die. Here's a screenie showing how dinky a Stabber is compared to an Apocalypse:


Now you can imagine a Stiletto, which I sometimes do fly on those ops! Speaking of small ships, I'm happy to announce that I've achieved yet another benchmark in my EVE piloting career, and here's the story from the start. A now-ex Bozo buddy (Xanthame left to form a pirate corp... gl hf!) was flying around in his brand new Cheetah which he had just gotten the skills for, and was happily warping around cloaked and saying how cool it was. At the time I was in my Hurricane, ratting away to make ISK and pick up loot and salvage. But then all of a sudden Xanth calls out on Ventrilo "There's a cyno open in Utopia". An open cyno from an enemy corp could mean a single jump freighter or 10+ carriers so I ask him "Is anyone watching it?". His answer: "I don't think so, there's 2 more in local but neutral and not the same corp and this Breacher is just sitting there". My answer: "I'll be right there !!!". So I dock up the Hurricane and get into my cheapest Rifter and head to a gate leading into Utopia. Xanth and I start a fleet together and he then proceeds to get close to the cyno ship so I can warp in on it. And of course during all this time we're expecting anything from freighters to Titans so time is of the essence. As soon as Xanth is in position I jump in Utopia, warp to him, and start pounding on the helpless Breacher, which dies very quickly but the pod docks up in no time. I barely have time to celebrate my FIRST SOLO KILL that one of the neutral pilots undocks, of all things, an Ibis on me... yes, the Caldari noob ship! I'm not sure exactly what was on his mind but he actually attacked my Rifter !!! Of course I blew him up and podded him as he deserved >:)

Before I sign off with a screenie of my killer Rifter, I'd like to wish fellow EVE player, blogger, Godfather of my eldest boy and great buddy Letrange a happy birthday. May your flights be safe and dangerous at the same time :))

Cheapniz, the Rifter of Doom