Come to think of it...

Amarr rookie ship
Originally uploaded by Vestik Malice

...the Amarr rookie ship ain't half bad either!

The simple things in life

A Gallente Shuttle
Originally uploaded by Vestik Malice

I'm doing a bit of housekeeping today, such as relocating jump clones a lot closer to where I live these days.

I'm auto-piloting around in a shuttle, and I realised, I think the Gallente shuttle is probably one of my favourite-looking ships in the game.

There's something about it I find really appealing, but its simplicity and clean lines are lovely.

So nothing else profound or interesting for now... just something nice and simple.

Who Guards The Guardian?

Four ships went to war...
Originally uploaded by Vestik Malice

The short answer: no one. Whoops.

I've moved over to the Corporation representing the combat arm of our Industrial alliance, and have been thoroughly enjoying getting into group missioning.

We've been war-decced, again, but the corp in question haven't been seen around much, certainly when I've been online. A corp-mate & I made runs over to Eve Uni HQ in Korsiki and back, in order to move my PvP ships back to our base of operations (2 x Tristram frigate tacklers, and Vexor and a Myrmidon) so I could scramble quickly if needs be. But with that done, a constant eye on local, and a number of Cov Ops pilots scouting around the region, we commenced a few Level IV missions.

You can see most of our gang in the photo; Abbadon, Armageddon, Caldari Navy Raven, Vestik in his Dominix, and (out of shot), Brother Venkat in The Gruniad.

Now our CNR pilot has a cap-stable shield tank that can just run and run, Venkat was a little less in demand for cap. Though during Blockade his armour repping came into its own as each successive new wave of rats aggro'd (without fail) one of our DPS ships and not the CNR or Domi tanks.

Why I didn't think that, with the Abbadon warped out to pick up ammo (for the CNR), it might be some other poor suckers turn for aggo and get The Gruniad out of the way, I don't know.

I've learnt ANOTHER expensive lesson (after all, every ship lost in EVE is a lesson learnt, I find), which is that there's no shame in making Brother Venkat run like a little girl at the first sign of trouble... or even, just get him out of there until aggro has been pulled by appropriately tanked ships.

So yes, my lovely new Guardian buckeld under overwhelming force, enemies ripping through his shield, armour and hull like a hot knife through butter, and reducing me to a smoking pod in an impressively short time. Curses.

I turned the fleet chat channel blue for a few minutes (a practive strongly discouraged in our Alliance chat), but simply stuck Venkat in a shuttle to Jita on autopilot and carried on with the mission.

Thanks to the generosity of my fleet, who all made donations to the cause, The Gruniad II made his way back to the fray another mission or two down.

Looking forward to another day of the same.... I hope our enemies of war are as dormant today as they were yesterday. That said, would be quite fun to have a little PvP to spice things up.....

VM

“The Engine’s Overheating – and SO AM I!”

In tonight’s episode... we learn about the merits of using Leadership skills properly. Vestik takes some lessons in the benefits of being in command (and wonders if anyone will spot the significance of the Battle of Britain reference....)

With my newfound Logistical capabilities, I’m fully back in the swing of mission running. It comes at a great time, as my industrial Corp has now founded a combat oriented sister-corp which I am transitioning over to, which gives me exactly what I want after not being entirely sure I was in the right place.

I still spend time soloing; enjoyed knocking through a good few Level IVs yesterday... until I ran into a bit of a problem.

I’d cleared wave after wave of enemy frigates, cruisers and battleships. Brother Venkat had been kept on his toes, warping in and out as new spawns would often aggro him while Vestik and the drones played a war of attrition with the remaining Battleships’ shield tanks. Despite a few near things, all was going swimmingly – until the FINAL Battleship spawn.

The last 2 or 3 were really tough... but with Logstics support, taking a long time to slowly wear down their shields wasn't a problem as I had constant armour repping. But this last nut wasn’t cracking. I was orbiting at optimum range for my (admittedly measly) railguns, and had my full flight of Hammerhead IIs pounding on him. But try as I might, his shield repair rate kept pace with the entire weight if my DPS. As it was now one-on-one, I considered switching out Brother Venkat’s Guardian for a frig, just to tip the balance in my favour... but his nearest spare ship was some 16 or so jumps away in Jita.

Obviously, I need to pack a bit more DPS punch. Vestik has a solid tank, and strong Drones skills, but I was rueing the length of time it is going to take me to get to Ogre IIs.

Not being able to think of anything I could do to squeeze any additional DPS out of my setup, and reluctant to just give in after about 45 mins of play on this mission, I decided to call in the cavalry and put out an APB to my corp mates.

Within a few minutes, I’d added one of our senior combat pilots to my fleet... and without ever firing a shot or even having warped in to my position, I’d cracked the tank and had the guy down through armour, structure, and then little pieces of battleship dust.

How? Well, in two short minutes, he showed me what I could have been doing for myself all along. I’ve actually gone to the trouble of training Leadership V - which gives me boosts to being a Squadron Leader. However, whenever I create a fleet for myself and Brother Venkat, I just sit in the default position of Fleet Commander. I had no idea (until then), that by moving myself down the command chain to Squadron Leader, and assigning myself the boost position, I would be getting the boosts I always assumed I had. So just by having someone with the appropriate skills in the appropriate Fleet slot, I was able to finish off the Battleship and the mission.

With that extremely useful piece of knowledge in the bank, I had a great time for the rest of the evening. Quickly got into my first corp fleet missioning for a long while - which was awesome. Brother Venkat’s cap transfer and armour repair capabilities suddenly became EXTREMELY popular amongst my Corp mates – with only a relatively modest fleet, and Brother Venkat capping our Navy-issue Raven’s shield tank, we bashed through World’s Collide faster than I’ve ever done it.

So my big learning of the day was making sure I'm placing myself in the right position in a Fleet, based on what my actual Leadership skills will give to the fleet! Not that having Ogre IIs wouldn't have sorted out that pesky Battleship *much* faster anyway.... Train on, Vestik, train on!

In Profile: Colonel Roc Wieler

Members of the EVE Blog Pack are going to be coordinating and posting profiles of the members over the course of the coming weeks and months, as part of an effort to cross-polinate between our blogs!

Here is the first profile.

Name/Handle: Colonel Roc Wieler

Blog URL: Roc's Ramblings at http://everamblings.wordpress.com

Faction: Minmatar Republic

Started EVE: 2006

What brought me here:
My love for science fiction has been something inspired in me since I first Star Wars at the theatre as a kid. I loved the richness of the mythology, the vastness of the universe; the true sense of wonder. So naturally, I played Star Wars Galaxies the day it came out. Played dedicated for five years. The last two years though, I noticed the game was continually being dumbed down. I hate dumbed down. I enjoy depth. Someone mentioned EVE Online to me, and well, been here ever since. Even gave up Star Wars for it, my childhood love.

Playstyle:
I am a Fleet Commander for the Tribal Liberation Force, as well as recently promoted to Fleet Commander in my corp, Freeform Industries. I do missions every now and then, but my real passion is the market. Both my alts are out of the box traders, and I really enjoy the cutthroat nature of doing business. I've never mined, never even opened research or industry, and have never managed a corp. One step at a time.

What keeps me playing:
Ironically, there are two things. The first is that you don't need to be here 23/7 for fear of missing out on some huge event. That flexibility combined with real time skill training (as opposed to mindless grinding) makes it great for me. During the week, I'm a casual player, and that's just fine. The second reason I've already mentioned indirectly. Depth. Vastness. Mythology. EVE Online is so comprehensive that I am STILL catching up on my reading, just to absorb myself deeper into this universe we call home.

What I write:
My personal blog is all in character (with occasional exception). My approach to writing is a little different than most I am told. I tend to merge real life happenings with ingame happenings, with a bit of complete fantasy mixed in to throw you off. So far, it's been fun. I am also a columnist over at http://www.eve-mag.com and hope to also get an article or two into EON Magazine. That would be something.

Other Interests:
I am also a co-developer for Capsuleer, the definitive iPhone application for EVE Online. I enjoy making 3D wallpapers as well, and have contributed some to the EVE Online galleries.

What you should know about EVE:
It's intimidating when you start; overwhelming actually. It's like learning a new Operating System and learning how to live in a completely new universe all at the same time. But stick with it, seriously. The rewards are worth it.

Just when I thought I was out...

The Grauniad
Originally uploaded by Vestik Malice

Merrily repping my Domi
Originally uploaded by Vestik Malice

...it pulls me back in!

This is a really brief post, as I'm heading out of the door to a wedding in less than 5 minutes... but I'm happy to report I'm back in the game.

What's done it, is that Brother Venkat has finally finished the long run of skills he needed to flying a fully-fitted Amar logistics ship. I took The Grauniad (Private Eye readers will get that one...) out this morning for her maiden voyage, to support Vestik's Domi soloing Level IVs. my first solo Level IVs, and I felt unassailable! (Bear in mind I was only in Empire, though!) It was awesome fun, and I'm looking forward to much more. Ah, good old EVE, thanks for having me back.

VM

P.S. I don't suppose anyone knows why, when I blog a photo from Flickr, the blog here doesn't know the full photo? Make nicely cropped photos (like the square one of the Guardian above) off-centre. It bugs me!

The Seven Month Itch

When I finally got into playing EVE beyond just the trial period (yes, I had a couple of early false starts!), I started a voracious consumption of EVE related podcasts and community blogs. In those august organs, I remember much being made of the concept of a “Severn Month Itch”, which many players seemed to experience. This seventh month was a point where some players felt they had fallen into rut, or were just feeling vaguely dissatisfied with the game. Strategies were talked about to get through this, and it was generally agreed that those who managed to push through that barrier continued to enjoy a long and satisfying EVE career.

I guess that was all about, well, seven months ago.

I do feel I’ve hit a bit of a wall, for a number of factors. Firstly, EVE doesn’t seem to suit my available playing time. To some extent, I’m the victim of my own success: I am just at the point where I can solo Level IV missions, but many of them are not exactly suited to dropping in and playing for an hour or so and then logging off. Especially as flying solo, I need to warp in and out a few times still to get through the mission.

Secondly, and again, perhaps an issue of my own making, I’ve not had the incentive of new skills being completed and new things to play with for a while. I set Vestik going on Battleships V, because I really want a Marauder class ship. That’s meant that haven’t had anything particularly exciting to look forward to on a more regular basis; no new modules to fit or fittings to play with.

I took an economically driven decision and consolidated Li Ran and Brother Venkat into a single account, which means I’m only training one of them at a time. I felt this was the right thing to do as Li Ran can happily mine in a Hulk, and now has a Cov Ops cloaked Buzzard for me to use to scout in. Though I’m sure I’ll want to dabble in Exploration and Production at some point (Li Ran’s main purpose in life), neither sufficiently piqued my interest recently to drive me to play with him. However, Brother Venkat is getting ready to fly Logistics for me, thus really increasing my Lvl IV soloing capabilities. But again, I’ve had some long skills to train to get up there, with Long Range Targetting V, Signal Analysis V, and Amarr Cruiser IV taking their toll.

Not having the mini-dings of new skills regularly ticking over, has meant I’ve been able to put EVE on a mental back burner and not think about it much over the last month. Prior to that, when I was working in Hong Kong, even though I wasn’t able to actually log on and play much, I kept myself interested by logging more time on EVE Mon and the EVE Fitting Tool than I did in-game, creating skill plans and just logging for changing skills. Even that I found fulfilling and compelling, which I guess is one of the appeals to a certain type of us who play the game!

So I am definitely not totally EVE focussed at the moment. I know what is going to bring me back in, though, and that is when Brother Venkat can fly his shiny new Guardian out of Jita and down to my normal mission running neck of the woods. I’ve got the ship and the full complement of fittings sitting in my hangar and ready to go. Thats still a good couple of few weeks away by my reckoning though.

In the mean time, I’m dipping my toe in other pools....

Coming very late to the Guild Wars party, I’ve been running around for a day or two having achieved the mighty stature of Level 4 over the weekend. I’ve got a friend who’s played consistently for years who I'm looking forward to playing with, and I’m really keen on the idea of joining Van Hemlock’s Tuesday Noob Club. I want to play solo for a while, though, to get familiar enough with the game to not totally embarrass myself with utter noobiness when I tap him up online.

And I’m going down to Games Workshop on Sunday with a friend to buy the Warhammer 40k Assault on Black Reach box. Yes, tabletop, here I come! My friend used to play when he was a kid, and has been really enthusiastic since I confessed to always wanting to give tabletop a try. He’s under very strict instructions from his wife, though, and is only allowed to play provided certain rules are met. This is the rule set he sent me:

1) it doesn't take over my life.
2) I don't fill the house with even more crap as a consequence of "yet another one of my stupid whims" (this was said after I also suggested I might buy a BMX...)
3) I don't spend all of my money on small bits of plastic

Well, I think we’ll pretty much ignore all of that then!!

Anyway, I’ll keep you updated on my EVE state of mind, and as soon as I’m logistics-capable, expect great tales of Epic fails as I learn to juggle Level IVs with two accounts!

VM