Happy Hulkageddon

As this mad month of mayhem closes the once target rich environment of Empire saw a dramatic decline in it's numbers. But there were still many brave and/or stupid miners present that were, for whatever reason not aware of this fabulous fury of fire that annually holds the core systems to ransom. I was not aware of any official warning from the powers that be; to keep the mining ships in dock for a week and spring clean, although it did make the evening news.

This had the effect of allowing green miners to slip outside the protective layers of steel to risk their worth to extract minerals from the floating colossus rocks that litter the core systems, oblivious to the danger lurking in the void. I enjoyed myself immensely blowing up all manner of vessels from Frigates to Barges.

I did find the quality of targets lacking, mainly consisting of relatively fresh pilots who cannot easily replace losses. I am not a fan of easy killing, I prefer a good scrap even if I lose. I had hoped to cross the path of a fake miner, fitted out to shrug off the attacks of plucky pirates but sadly this was not the case. I have to believe that the baptism of fire is beneficial to these green pilots as it's our duty to 'teach' them that nowhere is safe from our murderous wandering, and that they cannot simply collate vast sums of isk whenever they undock, even in Empire.

It's refreshing to be a part of something bigger, a rabble of raping pirates intent on obliteration of any vessels displaying a mining beam. I didn't win any prizes for my efforts, and in fact I was ruthless with my costs also, only fitting exactly what I needed to kill various targets. But I'm looking forward to the normality of hunting in low sec again, without reprisals by the concord fraternity.

My security rating has seen a hammering; I dropped two clear points in the last seven days and became banned from Empire, again. This will force me to undergo the slog of ratting and/or missioning but I am looking forward to respite on both my security rating and my wallet.

So bless all the miners for making a good show and dying so readily. The core systems belong to the industrialists, the miners and the agent whores once again. We've crawled back into the gloom to harbour our horrors, until next time...

Happy (not) hunting…

Related Links
Hulkageddon3 (official site)

Related Soundtrack

A Hole in the Head

Piracy is the essence of life in New Eden. Without the cold threat of death your heart would wither. Fear is necessary to remind us that our assets have value, that they need protection. Without piracy the will to cherish would be diminished. Piracy is one of the oldest traditions of New Eden. Conflict drives the development of weapons, ships and tactics and without piracy this conflict would be the will of the privileged and the selfish.

We are the unofficial guardians of this region between the Empires and Alliances. Without piracy resources would become subject to mass amassing by greedy corporations and individuals. Low security space would become a swathe of hulks and battleships earning an easy crust throughout the region. Traffic would become unbearable at choke points with ships of all configurations vying for their share of the richness found outside the core systems.

The product of this ruthless competing would descend entire constellations into war as corporations clash for control of the mining fields and ratting rights. The rich would become filthy, the poor would become marginalised and the rest of us would have little choice other than joining the biggest corporations available to survive against their onslaught for control.

As pirates we force the control of wealth from the bearer and distribute this wealth in many creative ways. We enjoy free reign to do as we please because, although we are subject to the laws of decency within Empire, we commonly disregard these regulations. As a mechanic; piracy is a necessary evil which must be practiced. A land without crime would be incredibly dull. We therefore risk our lives to educate the masses to be wary of your fellow pilot, to ensure your security measures are sufficient and to maintain the status quo of New Eden as a place unsuitable for most, save for those of us who have the nerve to regularly risk everything without the promise of gain.

Piracy is a noble profession and one for which the victims should be grateful for our practice. I for one enjoy this way of life, particularly where victims feel displeased with their judgement. This is the essence of what we do, so please feel free to flame us whenever and wherever you find us.

Happy hunting…

Related Soundtrack

Passive Targeter

This lowly passively useful device is one of my favourite covert weapons. It enables me to creep upon bewildered hulks and send them spinning into oblivion.

Used correctly it grants precious seconds against prey by withholding intent while they grapple with it. It's warranted a place on many designs, a personal favourite of mine. Though it does occupy a useful slot, I have found it invaluable in solo encounters. A truly useful tool which is gladly ignored.

Try it and you may find it useful more than once. Don't use an aggressive action until you are in range to warp disrupt, they won't see your lock until you unleash the hounds of hell.

Related Links
Passive Targeter I

Blessed are the Cursed

We are immortal. We share eternity with the elements of the infinite. Our vessels of steel and carbide shield our bodies from the vacuum of the void as our minds play havoc with the fates of strange and familiar souls. It’s a remarkable position to find ones-self. We are truly blessed, or cursed dependant on ones perspective.

We are cursed because we cannot leave our prisons of steel. We cannot enjoy sunlight warming the face, glowing on the eyes. We cannot shake hands or embrace our kind. We cannot face our opponents on equal terms, using our brute strength to beat them in hand-to-hand combat. We cannot bear children nor love thy love. We consume energy, not food as we cannot enjoy the pleasure of our pallet. We cannot feel the cold, heat or wind of our mother planet and we cannot see outside the confines of our craft with our eyes. Despite the thousands of hands that assist us on-board, we are alone in the void. We are cursed for these reasons.

We are blessed because we are the ship we inhabit. We are one with the metal flesh. Its structure is our bones and the drones, our children. We can travel unthinkable distances in mere minutes. We can communicate with our fellows across the known galaxy instantly. We tour the skies omnipotent to the masses below. We feel deaths claws whenever he calls, but ultimately we cannot die. We can amass more wealth than has ever been dreamt. We can travel to places no-one has ever seen. We can change our appearance at will and we are honoured, envied and worshipped by the billions of souls who depend on our actions to maintain an empire. We are blessed for these reasons.

Which side do you think we fall?

Related Soundtrack

Three's a Crowd

Tandem of Terror, the Deadly Duo. These phrases come to mind when I think of the relationship both B13 and I share. The two of us perfectly compliment each others abilities to bring pain unto any poor unfortunate soul that may stray into our terror trap of Web and Warp-Scrambler.

It occurred to me recently to consider perhaps bringing in a third pirate to assist our pillaging. Although the spoils would be diluted, the effectiveness of our combat unit surely would increase. In truth, we already utilise a third pilot; our intel officer; an alt. Perhaps an ‘active’ vessel would be wise addition to our terrific team.

In practice this dynamic became problematic. The bond and understanding B13 and I possess is so acute that it’s difficult to allow an ‘outsider’ to contribute and meld within our ranks and act as a third arm. Statistically there should only be positives points when increasing a fleet size, but New Eden is much more subtle; an unforgiving realm rewarding those with quick wit and iron nerve.

With a third member, the dynamic became loose. We all agreed that not only does it increase our fielded DPS, but it also adds an element of confusion and consideration for manoeuvring, as well as additional factors such as our presence in local which has increased by a third. This alone seems to have attracted unwanted attention, three pilots are seen as a threat where-as two were usually ignored as a nuisance. We also found it is easier to mask two pilots using mis-direction, three pilots are not so easily cloaked.

With our first encounters costing our fresh fellow his ships, it is fair to state that it isn’t going to be easy to improve our posse. Perhaps considering our friends’ lack of experience or our ability to protect his hull properly, that has caused this initial failure to improve. In any case, B13 and I are used to handling ourselves in combat, asking little of each other for support. In hindsight I am reluctant to amend the dynamic; my conclusion is to preserve our twin pirate gang. Adding to this relationship only spoils the broth and gets the incorrect cook killed.

Happy hunting…

Related Soundtrack

brb

It's that time of year again when I lose my head. My ship is docked and the slaves have a few days off to catch their breaths. I trust that the rest of New Eden's pirate fraternity will fill the monumental hole left by my absence and that piracy will surely be fine while I am away pretending to be cultured.

The plan is to forget who I am, where I am and how I got there. If I achieve this I will be pleased. The only problem I'll forget that too, but at least I won't care much.

I need a holiday though...so this is a welcomed distraction from murder and mayhem. I only hope the weather holds out otherwise we may all look like a Minmatar Mud Monsters and that would be bad.

Happy holidays...

Related Soundtrack

“Skill Training Completed.”

I particularly like that phrase, especially as I have finally reached a milestone. I can no longer improve upon my turret skills; they are all at level 5, this includes all the tertiary skills. Save for +5 brain augmentations, illegal stimulants or hard wiring skills into my flesh, there isn’t much more I can do to improve my death dealing abilities. I've mentioned this before, but today the final skill was actually ticked off the endless 'to-do' list.

Next, my plan is to maximise my engineering skills as these are currently adequate. One of the keys to surviving combat is capacitor, an element the Amarr are notoriously weak due no small part to the vast amounts diverted towards weapons and armour maintenance. I am constantly at war with my power-grid and recharge rate, even with my turret skills maxed. It would be nice to fit without being constantly reminded of our(Amarrian) shortcomings, so engineering needs some lovin’.

Navigation wise, I am lacking. I refused to train the Micro-Warpdrive to Tech II, I prefer to utilise Afterburners as they are much more versatile and penalise the ship less. My ECM skills also need a little work but my drone skills are second to non; unusual for an Amarr pilot.

Traditionally I prefer to train ship skills first then outfit them with weapons as I train up the turret skills. I currently have Assault Frigate 5, Heavy Assault Cruiser 5, Recon Ships 5, Covert Ops 5, Marauders 5 and Interceptors 5. These skills enable me to use any ship from the group with maximum potential and, in the grander scheme of things; I feel the extra boni are worth the months of hard training.

The Redeemer is my next target. With that comes a plethora of level 5 tertiary skills which must be trained, not to mention the 65million ISK I need for the Jump Portal skill book. So back to the books, the graft and the late night booster abuse.

Now where’s that damn bookmark gone…?

To Boldly Go...

Wormholes are a delicacy. Few pilots muster the courage to enter such alien environments, but those who dare can become very wealthy or dead within hours. I prefer to become richer through harvesting resources, or appropriating funds and items from the poor lost pilots found within. I recently convinced my mentor; EiD to assist the mining of an asteroid belt overflowing with rare ores as the job alone would've taken days.

The operation went without incident and we left wormhole space with our holds bursting with the rarest of ores. Despite the success I was slightly disappointed that there were no pirates, sleepers or trouble of any kind. For months I’d been telling tales of the hardships I’d encounter whilst dragging riches from the void, only for our joint expedition to be completed without the terror I usually endure.

As a director of our corporation, EiD has much more influence for my cause. I continue to request corporate funding to explore wormhole space, and although I'm alone in my pot holing, my efforts have not gone unnoticed by our CEO; CT. This is partly the reason EiD was tagging along, to observe my actions and evaluate the need for corporate funds.

With all the ore we gathered now processed and donated to the corporate wallet (minus costs) I am hopeful that this development will release funding to help me collate a fleet of dare-devil pilots, and to finally embark upon a crusade to mine the riches from wormholes with my corporations consent and backing.

My real intentions are to claim a wormhole environment as my own and use this random roaming space to carry out pirate attacks on the local populace, something my corporation does not condone. If I get the funding it will help me deploy a POS within the space; this is something which was previously deemed too expensive for me to carry. With the corporations backing, things may be a little easier and involve less risk to my own wallet. Only time will tell. Oh how I hate bureaucrats.

Happy hunting…

Related Links
Wormhole Harvesting

Related Soundtrack

"Can you hear me?"

The live voice is the most efficient medium by which we pass on vital information in New Eden. Although communications must be fundamental to any universe it is odd that only in the last few years have we seen an integrated voice system.

Because of this delay, other systems grew into place to enable voice. Teamspeak and Ventrillo have both been widely used to bridge the gap left by the lack of voice communications. Although these systems are accepted and work with varying degrees of success, EvE Voice is the medium by which I prefer to use.

All three systems have their flaws but none, save for EvE Voice can claim to be integrated into our HUD. This makes identifying and managing voice communications much more efficient and requires virtually no administration when compared to Teamspeak or Ventrillo. Voice and identity management can be achieved with Teamspeak and Ventrillo through the use of sophisticated upgrades to ones neural interface, but not every pilot has the resources or inclination to access such systems.

Agreeably our corporation has embraced EvE Voice, eliminating the need for constant updates and amendments to our server accesses. It also reduces fraud and espionage as the only pilots able to connect are already within the corporation, ie: not using an exterior server which can be open to manipulation.

The decision to use of any live voice communications system, whether within the cluster or not, is subject to the individuals and/or collective preferences and that this is subject to change on a regular basis, but for my own and my corporations use; EvE Voice is our best solution.

Happy chatting…

Related Links
Ventrillo (download)
Teamspeak (download)