Friday's Electric Lunch Hour - 2011/02/25

I'm neck deep in boxes so I figured I'd post the Musical one in the last moments that my computer is plugged in. By the time you read this the 'puter will be stashed and ready to go on its trip to the new place. I'll be getting my internet back on Thursday but I will be able to keep in touch during my lunch breaks. I've still got 3 weeks left to Command Ships V so no worries there. I just can't wait to get to the beer and pizza part of the move :))

I'll say it for once... fly safe ya'll !!!

o7

Hello miner... Bye Bye miner !!!

Although I will surely not win any prizes with my 3 kills of a Procurer, a Covetor and a Hoarder, and of course my 2 lolfail attempts on a Badger and another Covetor, at least I'm able to say that I put in my 0.02 ISK worth in the current Hulkageddon IV. At first I was using Thrashers, but those work better in a wolf pack. With my play time being limited I didn't want to travel halfway across New Eden to find a gang to fly with but I knew that a 280mm fit Thrasher can still pack a nasty punch. The first lolfail was in Derelik space, near the old "last truck stop before Curse" that is Berta. It felt special flying in there after so long, and the system's red star still gave me the feeling that "the edge of 0.0" was close. I still remember how special it felt to go there for the first time as I was about to embark on the BOZO train. But I digress. Just 25km off the Juddi gate was a Badger sitting there doing nothing. I had just toured a few constellations without seeing anyone to gank so I went for it, even knowing what the gate guns would do... but I didn't expect the gate guns to be that devastating. That was quite funny! The second lolfail was in the same area, in Maspah I think. I landed next to a Covetor so all I had to do was target, overheat the guns, and shoot. First volley I nicked the armor. Second volley I nicked the structure. But unfortunately the third volley never came as I was interrupted by a case of the CONCORDOKKEN. Close but no cigar... time to rethink my tactics.

A quick scan of the HAG4 killboard points me towards the next ship I should try, a gank-fit Neutron Vexor:


[Vexor, HAG4]
Gauss Field Balancer I
Gauss Field Balancer I
Gauss Field Balancer I
Reactor Control Unit I

10MN MicroWarpdrive I
Sensor Booster I
[empty med slot]

Anode Neutron Particle Cannon I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
Anode Neutron Particle Cannon I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
Anode Neutron Particle Cannon I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
Anode Neutron Particle Cannon I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
[empty high slot]

Hammerhead I x5


At just a little over 500dps with my skills, this thing should do the trick nicely. I also decided to change venues for my antics, flying in and around the Abudban system. Abudban itself is always full of miners because of the ice belt, and thus is a prime target for Hulkageddon participants. It also sports about twice as many CONCORD ships as there are player ships... not a great idea for solo-ganking! The next system, Alakgur, looked promising though. only 20-ish in Local, a few miners and industrials on scan, time to hit the belts! And I didn't have to tour the belts very long before I land 10km away from the Procurer. Same drill as before: approach, target, launch drones, overheat and FIRE! I didn't melt it, I vaporised it. It was so quick that I actually had to wait for CONCORD! I don't care what some people think about Hulkageddon or one-sided PvP, THIS IS FUN :))) So off to Rens to re-ship and wait out the GCC.

After the 15 minutes are up I undocked and headed to the same system, and sure enough there were still miners in there. I believe that people should not play AFK in space, and at least pay attention to wtf is going on in Local, so the lesson must be taught. Once again I do a quick tour of the numerous belts, until I land 20km from a Covertor carelessly munching away on 'roids. It didn't even budge in the time I closed the distance to be in my near-sighted guns' optimal range. Same drill, same result, but the CONCORD response was a bit faster this time. I even took some time, exposed as I was, to look at the miner's pod for a few seconds... and it just stayed there! What the fuck, people ?!?!

Having way too much fun for my own good (and for my sec status), I head out again after the obligatory reship/GCC break, and head in the same direction. By this time I think some miners have clued in that "Cozmik R5 is a dangerous criminal" and it's looking like no one is left in the belts. Time to pay next door a visit! The system of Dammalin was much quieter; it has less belts and is the tip of this particular area of Hi-sec Heimatar. The quick tour showed that no one was mining so I came back to the Alakgur gate, and nearly fell out of my chair at some guy's carelessness. a few seconds after I landed at the gate a Hoarder lands at 15km from the gate on auto-pilot, crawling towards it at a snail's pace. I figured the following: I'm in a bigger ship, I do a lot more damage, and I'm in a 0.5 system... this just might work. So before he got in jumping range I burned towards him to give him a nasty bump, and unloaded. And ka'plah! No more Hoarder. This time I had warped my pod out to a planet because a battleship was witness to this and I was now free game. But to my complete disbelief, when I warped back to the gate to head home, the pod WAS STILL THERE !!! Once again, WTFUPPL !?!?!11

So out of the 3 ships that I killed, I can safely say that only one of them was actually manned. Props to the Procurer pilot for actually warping out as soon as the ship died, if not for noticing my presence... try aligning next time :) The other two "pilots" are either AFK's who shouldn't be out in space or bots. In either case, they fully deserved their fates. I really do not understand this gaming behavior. Look, I'm a gamer, and when I play a game, I play a game. I don't turn it on and then proceed to do something that allows me to do the dishes or watch a movie! I'll never get it, period. And all the while I'm thinking of my own industrial buddies. Are they out in space? Hell no! They not only know about HAG4, they make a profit from it, selling replacement hulls for miners and gankers alike. They are the ones to get the last laugh, all the way to the bank. And you know what? To do this they are NOT playing the game AFK, and if they are AFK they stay docked up. I'm happy Helicity created this event to remind people that EVE is meant to be played, and not simply turned on.

Fly hard, or dock the fuck up!

o7

Crunch time

Well, here I am once again. Five days until I load up a U-Haul truck with my stuff and move IRL. Already twice in the past 3 years I've said "Goddamnit I hope I won't have to move for a long long time!", and 2 other times I had to help my ex and most importantly my kids move, but as you can see, telling myself this has pretty much backfired like Elmer Fudd's shotgun. This time I'll just shut the fuck up and go with the flow. On the positive side, this will be a light move: zero electric appliances, no couch because it suffered 4 years of baby abuse, no bookcases because they've suffered way too many moves for their own good, and no TV unit because it's just too damn big. I may have to carry this last one and drop it off in the middle of the move, but still, technically this should be one of the easiest moves I've ever had.

And why would I talk so much about a move on an EVE blog? Because moving would be a much shittier proposition if I didn't have my EVE buddies to help me. Since February 2008 this will be Move #5. The first one was my ex leaving the house, but I helped her because I wanted my boys to be settled in as fast as possible; I even painted their room. Move #2 was the worst one ever. I was alone to finish packing what was left in our old suburbian bungalow, got some movers for the big stuff, and did the rest on my own. Alone. To make matters more "interesting", what was left of a bungalow got crammed into a 2 1/2 condo. If you can avoid this, do so because it just destroys you physically and emotionally. Number 3 was more fun (if you can call moving "fun") even if not quite expected. My ex's cousin which had helped us by having us rent an appartment in her building, announced non-chalantly that she was selling the place, and the new owners wanted us out. Awesome. But by this time we had shed a lot of the extra stuff from the house so packing was easier, and on moving day I had movers for the big stuff and a good chunk of the Montreal EVE community to help. Move #4 was on an awkward day so not a lot of people could come and help, but it was also fairly easy with some movers, my ex and my girlfriend of the time (which is now also an ex... *sigh*). Unfortunately this is also when the financial gods started to shit on me because the two surprise moves, 2x mover teams, and car problems meant that my debts were going crazy. But oh well that's all behind me.

And now here I am about to move again. It's looking like it will be the easiest move so far but you never know. Once again the Montreal EVE community has made it clear that I will have some help. I'm usually the one who updates the EVE-O forums and the EVE MTL channel MOTD for our pilot meets but last sunday I had quite a surprise when I noticed that not only was the channel MOTD updated, but a line had been added saying something to the tune of "Cozmik R5 is moving !!! Contact him to give him a hand!". I think I have an idea of who put it there and yes, he will get an extra beer!

To the Montreal pilots: guys, I thank you from the bottom of my heart to help me through this ordeal once again, and just tell yourselves this: no matter if the move is easy or not, there will be beer and pizza at the end of it, and if that's not enough there's also the EVE Meet at Brutopia :))

Flying, or moving, with buddies is more fun!

o7

Friday's Electric Lunch Hour - 2011/02/18

No, I will not be moving to Montana to become a dental floss tycoon, but yes, I will be moving soon. But EVE having royally sucked lately - lost a Loki last friday, came too damn close to losing my PvE Sleipnir, and having seen an alliance-mate lose a PvE Machariel due to a power outage - I haven't logged on much this week, to the point where this morning I came within 2 hours of missing a skill flip. And knowing that in the next week I will be making sure everything is ready for hauling, I set the skill that will turn my already powerful Sleipnirs into death machines. Command Ship V here I come!

Because my computer will be one of the last things to get packed I will try to get in on a little Hulkageddon action as time permits; I will miss the opening ceremonies because I have my boys this weekend, but I'm sure I will need to gank something after packing a few too many boxes. I will most probably start idling in the HAG4 channel to get a feel of what's happening and where, and especially where is it more likely to collect the tastiest tears! I still have to buy my batch of gank-fit Thrashers but living near Rens this is not an issue. So to all who will be participating I wish the best of luck and may the tears be plentiful! And to the industrialists I hope you are like the ones I know and have batches of miners, industrials and gank ships ready to dump on the market. And to those who absolutely have to mine for whatever reason (surely not because you like it!) I hope you will be smart about it. And the same goes for mission and 'plex runners about to salvage a field of wrecks; remember that Noctii are free game this time around :))

Fly safe or dangerous, your pick. I know mine >:)

o7

Fail-est Loki pilot evar !!!

You want more proof that carebearing dulls the brain? Here goes: last Friday night I was taking things easy in EVE after a big work week full of weird events (including an intern who got fired... good fucking riddance!), a big drum session after replacing my snare head, and a huge well-deserved supper accompanied by some of Quebec's finest beer. So feeling mellow and lazy I didn't feel like hunting so I said to myself "just to a few missions before doing the couch potato", so I did. I was also testing a new Loki setup which now had some newly-trained HAM IIs and a pretty big drone bay. Sure it wasn't a DPS machine the way my Sleipnir is, but flying circles around ships that can't hit you can be quite funny and now with the drones I could easily take care of those pesky frigate rats. Until the fail happened.

My agent gave me the "go get my cans of Quafe" mission. If you're not familiar with it, you have to loot a can sitting about 40 km from the warp-in point in the middle of a Blood Raider camp, and when you loot the can a whole bunch of cruiser and battleship Bloods spawn on top of you. So the tactic is go in, loot and GTFO. But in my misguided lazy comfort I had forgotten one little but important detail. Among the initial spawn are a few frigates that have to be dealt with, and in my almost-sleepy state I completely forgot that little fact and proceeded to warp in and fly straight to the can, loot it, and click warp. Now the can is in the middle of a whole bunch of structures and in my dazed state it took me a while to realise that my Loki was going nowhere and had to be re-aligned, so I cut the warp and did so. But when I clicked warp a second time take a wild guess what message Aura gave me. Yeah, that message. But even then my numb and slightly drunk brains were too slow in realising it. By the time I woke up to the fact that the Blood Raiders were going to kill me I had no cap left, therefore no tank left, and didn't have enough time to kill the scramming frigate. A few seconds later, Hellbringer II went bye-bye. And to prove yet again that my brains were too slow to play EVE I had completely forgotten about the "loss of SP" part of flying T3's. Yeah.... bravo champion (insert ovation here) !!!

Oh well, at least I'll look at the positive point of my loss: the Loki wasn't pinata-fit with a bunch of faction and complex modules. But still, it's an expensive loss. EVE is a harsh mistress and if you think you may be a bit tired to play it, better stay away and do something else! Now, I'm not as financially poor as I used to be and if I wanted to I could buy two replacements right away. But do I really need one? Not really. Just like with the one that was lost in W-space my Sleipnir will do just as good, if not better. Hell, I think I'll train Command Ship V before I re-train Minmatar Engineering Subsystem IV, the skill that was lost in the explosion. And of course if things go according to plan I will be doing a bit more The PvP in the near future and this will inevitably have me replacing interceptors, AFs, cruisers, BCs, and maybe even some HACs and Recons. Lokis are nice, but my luck with them so far has been nothing short of disastrous. One was lost in a well-staged gank by a Titan-skilled Hall&Oates fan, but the loss that's purely my own fault is the suckiest, even if financially it doesn't hurt as much. But it was nothing that a quick game of Quake couldn't fix :)

Fly awake, especially in T3's!

o7