In praise of activity

Roaming solo. Again.

Yes, Dear Reader, my corp has gone dormant.

There is stuff to kill and fun to be had, but there is a limit to what you can do as a solo pilot.

Now don't get me wrong - I'm not overly needy and I'm not averse to flying solo.  A casual look at my main's killboard shows forty or so kills for April.  Not a big number I grant you, but also not atrocious for a player of my minuscule skill and limited playing time.

The vast majority of those kills have been solo - the ones that were not, were either pods (zkill doesn't reward shooting pods as a solo kill), or kills showing damage from a prior engagement my opponent had entered into.

Flying solo makes it a lot tougher to find content.  I had to push hard and enter into more risky engagements than I normally would.

There were a couple of 1v2 scenario's as well as numerous engagements in my Comet vs destroyers (Can be done, but in the past I was very hesitant to do so).

Al this yielded surprisingly positive results (Blind luck!... but content win or lose)

What is that you say?  "Shameless self aggrandisement Absence...? Surely that is beneath even your low standards!?..."


Ah, Dear Reader...  It is a lamentation more than anything else... you see, there were no traps, no schemes, no upshipping, no dropping or getting counter dropped, no hasty fleet compositions...

No call to undock.  No cries of "Point"!  or "Secondary!"...

Had my corp been active my modest kill count would easily be four times what it now is.  And those would have been better kills (solo I tend to only kill small stuff in plexes).

Worse than all of that... there was no corp chat,   -banter, -laughter or -merriment. 

The truth is, I guess I just miss my friends....

I know what you're thinking.  And you're right.  Time to move on.  In due course I no doubt will.

But moving on begs the question: to where.... which in turn leads me to reflect on what exactly drew me to the crew I flew with for the last 18 or so months.







In a previous post I wrote about the big wheels and people who do the work in the background to make the corp run.  I still stand by those words.


I have however come to realise, that equally important is the "essence" of the corp.

The essence of Schneckt I regard as constant activity, fun, fast paced, small ship content generated during the time of day that I played.

Some of us log in and nothing much happens, and others log in and content explodes.

In this there were a few individuals that stood really tall.

Normally loathe to name and shame, in this instance, I will do so, because these guys deserve it (see names below).

You think I'm joking..?

Whilst navel gazing, I recall there were those in corp that told me I am getting too risk averse.  I now have to admit they were right.  A casual look at my killboard suggests that I did get extremely averse to losing ships.

As a consequence I (and my corp mates) missed out on many fights and kills (or losses :-) ).  For this I apologise.

Recently, flying solo, in order to engage more ships I had to tinker with fits and bring different- and in some instances more expensive ships and fittings.

I recall there were those in corp that pleaded with me to import a wider variety of ships into the warzone and fly different styles (I'm a one trick pony - scram kite..).  I never did.  I now have to admit they too were right.

For this too I apologise.  I should have supported you guys more.

Looking back it is clear that I was a venerable leach on content generated by others.

Don't get me wrong - just having another warm body around that can push F1 makes engagements possible that would otherwise not be, but in truth I could have done much more than I had.

"Oh my word... Would that have saved your corp Absence?"    No, no I don't think so.  What it would have done is improve the gaming experience of both myself and other corp members during the time the corp was running.

That is important.  And that is the lesson I think I should carry forward wherever I go.




Names of the "shamed" - thanks for what you guys did during the course of my Schneckt experience!  If I left you out, I'm sorry.  Alternatively it might be that you also just suck like I do... ;-)



 6eCeH0K Kaai

"... you better have eated all your vegetables,

it's gonna be a rough one" --Kaai

This guy joined Schneckt shortly before I did.  In the time I had collected 1500 kills Kaai collected 7000.  Yes 5 times the number of kills.

Kaai was prodigiously active.  He was always on.  Forming fleets, making plans, handing out ships.  Going for tackle...  Killing stuff... losing stuff - of course winning a fight is better, but if there ever was a guy that understood that losing was part of the game, this is him.

As an added bonus Kaai is a French Canadian - to his credit his English improved a lot during the last 18 months...

He came up with the most fantastic and funny  "Frenglish" expressions - what's more he was always the greatest of sports about it when we could not help but burst out laughing!!!






Zaloorb

We need tackle...

Zaloorb was an old hand even when I started.  In my admittedly limited experience and worthless opinion, Zal is one best PVP pilots I had ever encountered.

Few and far in between are the guys that know the meta better.  Know what to bring and how to fight an enemy, with a killer instinct and hunger for kills that I have not seen anywhere else.

Zaloorb takes the tough (often solo) fights against formidable opponents and often comes out on top.


We especially love him for two things -

1) being the guy in the dramiel that could not wait to go kill that hated kiting garmur in local (with amazing success!!)

and

2) imparting a lot of his knowledge to us.  I shamelessly admit to stealing all his fits....






Rahgg Graageor

So what are we doing?

Rahgg joined Schneckt about the time I did.

Very active, and if ever there was a team player Rahgg is it.  Always ready with a ship, always willing to go, often forming and leading fleets.

Did some heavy lifting to import ad hoc items from Rens for hapless corpies that did not have ships ready to go...

Seldom a complaint and the most delightful "of-the-wall-type" sense of humour that you will ever encounter.



Takes everything in stride and is without a doubt the best smack talker in local that I have ever encountered - it is smack, but never to the point where it is nasty or distasteful...

How not to move a carrier: A tale of two noobs

If you think hiring a pro is expensive, try hiring an amateur.

Recently a corp member, lets call him *Bill asked in corp slack if anybody could fly an Apostle.  He was friendly with a wormhole corp and wanted to move the Apostle into their wormhole.

Bill could fly other capitals, but he could not fly Amarr.  Not yet.

Now a long long time ago and in a universe far far away - lets call it *null sec your author did fly a carrier.

This was during the age of the slow cat.

For you kids that do not know, slow cat's was a doctrine of masses of remote repping carriers that were nigh unkillable.

Not that your author was that sophisticated - oh no, ever the slacker and under achiever he had a mere suitcase carrier - a carrier fit for travel, designed to move his sub caps from one staging point to the next.

The carrier favoured by your author's null sec corp at the time was the Archon - also an Amarr capital.

Thus, thinking himself imminently qualified (if slightly rusted), and ever the helpful type, your author volunteered the services of his alt, lets call her *delihla to help move said Apostle.

I mean,  get carrier, perform one jump, enter wormhole, dock at citadel... what could possibly go wrong?

Well plenty as it turns out...

At this point dear reader I will spare you (most) of the detail of the trials, tribulations and mishaps of getting *delihla into the home hole.

Suffice to say it somehow miraculously happened without anybody dying.

Not that we didn't try, oh no, there was a sabre and a bubble involved, my running back to the "gate" (*Bill had a smug wormholer chuckle at my use of the term "gate"... fu *Bill, if you had actually been scouting in lieu of just leaving bookmarks to follow none of this would have happenend....).

To the credit of self same *Bill, this was the point where he did show his wormholer experience.

Told me to wait on the higsec side of the "gate" (wormhole) whilst he did something actually involving scouting and I'm guessing, showing some kind of scary ship on D-Scan to make the big bad sabre go away...

Why wait you ask?  Because of a thing called polarisation (don't worry, I didn't know either).... An arcane wormhole mechanic that would render me unable to run back to the "gate" a second time to jump back out - likely a "bad thing" for my little helios if a sabre still was around...

Reaching the home hole without further indecent, *delihla was provided with a cloaky hauler inclusive of Oxygen Isotopes.  Well done to the ever overachieving *Bill.

Out to the null sec exit she went and was spit out somewhere in NPC Fountain.  System empty.  One unscouted gate jump and she is docked in the (also empty) station system where the Archon is located.

Board ship, move fuel to fuel bay, move hauler into hangar.  So far so flatteringly good.

As I undock *Bill lights a cyno on the wormhole entrance...  I right click on jump to and.... nothing....

*delihla: "Wtf?  Did you light the cyno?"
*Bill: "Yes, why?"
*delihla: "no jump to destination...?"
*Bill: "Right click and... then go jump to..."
*delihla: "duh... duuuudeee, I'm telling you, no destination.  Did you actually light the cyno?"
*Bill: "yes I'm sitting here in space, with cyno up" (sounds kinda panicky).  "Maybe you tried to jump too early, dock and try again."

At this point *Bill is already regretting my help.  I dutifully dock and undock.  To my delight this time *Bill is available as a destination to jump to.

At this point dear reader you'd think that enough has happened and the story would promptly end, but nooooo....

I right click jump to *Bill and.... Nothing.  Just a message saying something about needing isotopes followed by a "traffic control" message.

At this point your author's nerves are fried.  All that he can think is that he somehow put the isotopes in the incorrect bay.

*Bill: "You have to put the isotopes in the fuel bay dummy..."
*delihla: "grrr... I did... I don't understand... OH F*CK!!!"
*Bill: "What!!!?"
*delihla: "I'm getting shot at - taking damage!!!"
*Bill: "I thought you said the system was empty....!?  DOCK!!  DOCK!!" (sounds very panicky)
*delihla: "It was... IT IS!!!"  (docking, again.)

 In our defence, this was in the hey days of the "chat system bugs" where pilots in system would often not show up in local chat.... but they would show up on overview surely?

A quick check of the log.... and... aaaaahhhhhggggggg.... I was shot at by rats (my pvp overview does not show rats).... F*ck me what amateurs.... ok, lets go again.

Undock, right click jump to... and... No jump fuel message again.  At this point both *Bill and myself have moved beyond panic to mere despondency.

Somehow becoming resigned to the idea of impending doom drives mindless clicking and chatter from our heads.  I actually read the message.  To jump the ship requires Helium Isotopes.

Something clicks.  I recheck the fuel bay.  And there it is: Oxygen Isotopes.

*delihla: "AAAWWWWWHHHH F*CK ME".
*Bill: (alarmed) "What??"
*delihla: "we need different isotopes"
*Bill":"Huh" (my turn to be smug and lecture his degenerate Gallente ass about isotopes)

Luckily there are some Helium Isotopes to be had on the market (at a nice markup for the seller, but at this point we were really beyond haggling over a mere 1000% markup).

I buy the fuel, move to fuel bay and undock.

*Bill:"Only one minute left on the cyno"

Yes dear reader.  During all this time that I had been trying to find the "jump to destination", undocking, redocking, undocking..., panicked about rats and finding fuel, *Bill had been sitting stationary, on that wormhole entrance, in the middle of null sec, cyno lit for all to see....

Astoundingly nothing had happened.  Yet.

I undock, right click jump to.... and I JUMPED!!!

Enter the wormhole and dock.

*delihla: "F.U. *Bill, you can keep the helios" (trades helios to *Bill and death clones back to Jita)

No dear reader, I don't know what happened to *Bill after that, so don't ask.

Thus ends the tale, with proof that no good deed goes unpunished, as well as vindication that Bob looks after the hopeless and the hapless.

In truth we deserved to lose something through all that....



For advice on how to really move a capital ship  I leave you in the capable hands of the (late) and great **Azual Skoll over at the EVE Altruist site (unfortunately dead. Edit: the site, not the author).  Much of this site is now out dated, but some things have endured...




*Names published without changes in order to implicate the guilty.
**F.U. Azual - you never said anything about isotopes!!!

The curious case of the PL spy

"Spies are ubiquitous" ~ Absence of Substance 2018. 

Comment made in relation to null blocks spying and backroom deals.  Specifically in relation to the Goons/GOTG peace deal.


"What?  A PL spy?  Who are you kidding?  We ain't got nothing worth spying on...?"  ~ Absence of Substance 2018

Comment made scarcely a week after the one above when a credible source revealed that Schneckt had a PL spy in our midst.




Yes dear reader as unlikely as it seems Sckneckt has been spied upon.  The information comes from a very credible source and I have no reason to doubt the veracity of it.  What none of us understand is the why...

As explained before, at Schneckt we don't take ourselves too seriously.

We have no CTA's.  We don't have any titans or supers.  We are such a small corp that we don't threaten anybody or anything of any size.

When we ping for fleets for important stuff such as defending a citadel we can maybe get 15 Schneckt guys in fleet.

Generally, when we are outnumbered or outmatched and clearly can't defend a citadel, we just shoot at it ourselves to get on the kill mail - yes, we do that - count the number of Schneckts on that kill mail.  It is after all just a 3 bil Astra right?

Further more our player base has such a diverse range of SP that a lot of the time our "newer" players (a fair percentage of those in corp) cannot even field a battleship or a HAC.

In truth what we do best is running sh#t fits in solo/micro gangs in and around FW space.  Some would argue we don't even do that well - we lose 2 ships for every 3 we kill.

In light of that it would maybe, at a stretch have made sense to find an Amarr militia spy in our corp.  We have however quit FW so even that motivation, scant as it was is now null and void..

What does not however in any way shape or form make sense is for an entity like PL to even know of our existence much less spy on us?

Maybe it is just my naivete and there is something I don't see.  Maybe it was a mistake from PL.  Maybe it is something else entirely.  Whatever the case, I am really curious to know...

If you are in PL and happen to read this, would you please help my perplexed self out?

Effort shock and the Big Wheel(s).

Effort shock as far as I know is a lesser known (unfortunately) term that was coined by David Wong the editor of cracked. 

Beware that the site has its share of weird s...tuff and is not for every one.  I can however recommend the editorial on Effort shock. 

For those who only have time for the answers the term relates to the fact that doing anything worthwhile takes effort.  So far so ho hum, BUT David Wong then goes and does a stellar job in pointing out that not merely does it take effort, but normally it takes SO MUCH MORE effort to accomplish something, than we had ever dreamed it would.

Ok Absence... so you read slightly unhinged material and being rather obtuse, strive to palm of what many readers regard to be everyday and mundane, as profundity... How does this relate to EVE?

In every way of course...

EVE is a fabulous game with a very infamous learning curve.  To get better takes time, effort and deliberate practice.

At every junction one has to actively make an effort to step up to the next level. 

In the early days time was the only way in which to progress in terms of SP. 

Even though SP can now be bought, in practical terms players have to somehow earn it - be it in game ISK for injectors, plex or real life effort to acquire money to exchange or plex/injectors - nothing is free.


The learning curve does not only relate to SP - the real learning curve is in player skill.  And knowledge.

Want to get into frigate pvp?  Learning curve.  Step up to destroyers?  Learning curve.  Cruisers...?  Yes learning curve.  Low sec? Null sec?  Small gang?  Nano?

The learning curve is not limited to PVP of course - PVE has it too.  PI and reactions?  Manufacturing?  Research?  Even mining has its own can of worms.

As per David Wong the surprise is not that effort is involved but how much more effort is involved in stepping up to the next endeavour. 

Now this is not a lament - on the contrary - this level of effort is in actual fact that makes this game worth playing - to the extent that I sometimes wonder whether long term EVE players are not victims of the sunk cost fallacy

TL;DR;  The sunk cost fallacy is the notion that (in the EVE context) players continue playing the game merely because of hours and dollars already committed, when most of the enjoyment in the game itself has passed.

Ok, Absence so you really have to make an effort to achieve the bare basics in the game... but surely everything is not about you...?

Ah dear reader, indeed it is not.  Today's missive in actual fact is about the Big wheels.  The enablers and the content creators.

In your authors' corp there are a few individuals that do an enormous amount of work that often goes unnoticed and is mostly under appreciated. 

We have for instance a website, slack channel and team speak that is all organised and hosted by an individual. At his own cost and in his own time.

In game we have a free jump freighting service that would move our ships from Jita/Hek/Rens to the warzone manned by 3 or 4 people. 

For those that do not know, this takes a 10Bil ISK ship and every single trip involves risk to that ship. 

Also often forgotten is the 40mil ISK or so for jump fuel for every trip.  The time involved, the need for an extra account (or accounts) with cyno characters.

We have corp doctrines and in some instances ships belonging to the corp (bought and paid for by selfless members - we have a 0% tax rate). 

Ships and fits that were researched and fit for purpose.  Shipped and staged (or moved via carrier jumps to the new staging point). 

In a recent citadel defence in excess of 20 battleships with associated command booster/webbing/tackle ships belonging to the corp were issued - no cost to the line members and losses accrue to the corp. 

We are speaking many, many billions of ISK here in addition to the effort to organise this little get together.


The common thread in all these endeavours seem to be that they invariably involve mostly the same people.  People that I expect are hovering on the edge of burnout at the moment given the levels of citadel defence fleets we had to field in the last little bit.

Bear in mind that these are busy people with real life jobs, hopes and dreams - in addition to their EVE lives.... 

From the perspective of someone like myself that can barely get himself into a not too sh#t fit frigate to run a novice plex, this type of thing leaves me in awe - I am under no illusions - there is no way I would be able to do this.

A corp like ours with a number of new players, alpha players and witless older players like myself simply cannot exist without enablers and content creators like these. 

Our corp is also not unique in this - the theme repeats in most other corps and even alliances - reliance on a couple of key individuals is such that whole corps/alliances have closed down or fail-cascaded  when one or more of these big wheels left.

Sometimes someone else steps up and life continues, sometimes the line members just move on.  Few players function without the prime movers (you get exceptions like truly solo players).

Absence is your corp in trouble...?

A dear reader no, not that I am aware of...

What I am however aware of, is that creating content is hard - much much harder than most of us realise.

FW: A venerable tsunami of farmers.

Long standing veterans of faction warfare are used to the ebb and flow in the warzone.  One faction will be on top and after a while things will change and the opposing faction will be on top...  

And so it goes.

"damn they plex so much they can't even keep up with the bashing"
~ Meo Fafard

The Minmatar militia went from majority control of the warzone in December 2017 to "only" 28 systems (out of 71) in Minmatar control currently.  

What's more, at the time of writing no fewer than 7 systems are vulnerable and likely to be flipped soon (see table below).

7 Systems happens to be 10% of the total war zone and a quarter of what Minmil currently control.

Even the most casual of observers would find that a spectacular decline - or rise - if your vantage point is from an Amarr militia perspective.

Indeed dear reader, looking at the table below one might be forgiven for wondering what in the world happened to Minmil?  Another civil war?  (No).  They went into hibernation?  (No).  Their morale was crushed because the likes of me joined their cause?  (No.  Ermmm... well maybe, but I don't think so). 

Well what about the other side of the equation?  Did the Amarr do anything special?  (No).  FCON joined Caldari milita? (Maybe, but not directly).  Suitonia's project is paying off?  (Don't know, according to zkill the guy spends most of his time in 0.0, and credit where credit is due, the momentum started swinging towards the Amarr long before this group showed up).

Now any and all of the above obviously contribute in some way shape or form, but the real reason for the very rapid swing in fortunes is farmers.  Farmers?  Yes.  Farmers.

Farmers are the nicest people

As a relative newcomer to faction warfare I have to admit I never realised the extend to which the farmers influenced the war zone.  

Whilst Minmil controlled the war zone I also did not notice many farmers as I don't warp in on blues in plexes.  

Since the swing in fortunes, boy have we been inundated by streams and streams of warp stabbed farmers.

Your author killed two of them and was rewarded with the nice comments in the image to the left (by no means an uncommon occurrence - both the killing of stabbed farmers and the insults) .

A cursory look at zkill tells the sad sad story of Demone DED, Demone1 DED and Demone2 DED:

This particular person has three farmer accounts and by the looks of it farmers are universally despised as zkill shows they are killed by Minmatar militia, Amarr militia, as well as the local pirates in the area.

Suffice to say Demone* is not the only stabbed farmer in the war zone.

To this end the news from fanfest about stabs being disallowed in plexes in the future is most welcome.  Certainly a step in the right direction but due to the sheer  number of farmers I am of the opinion it will not matter much - for any one of these kills the toon in question probably ran 10 or more plexes before he got caught.  

Such is the nature of the LP payouts that a player will "earn" enough LP completing even a single novice plex to pay for 10 or more of these ships at 600k ISK each.

It is also worth noting that these farmer alts can be very low SP alts - and this is the reason why so many systems are vulnerable and not flipped.  By-enlarge farmer alts don't have the SP to be worth anything in an I-hub bash.  Nor does an I-hub bash directly provide any ISK.

What exactly the answer to this farmer problem is, I do not know.  Indeed one would surmise that had there been easy answers CCP would simply enact them. 

There are a couple of suggestions from the self same suitonia on his CSM election forum.  There are other people on other forums that also have opinions.  For the time being your author has neither the time nor the energy (or the wherewithal) to come up with solutions himself and will simply play the ball as it lies.

In his corporation, Schneckt corp members are warned to not be overly concerned with the state of the war zone and systems - no doubt by seasoned veterans that has seen this before.  Schneckt is but a small corp and it simply does not serve to burn oneself out for this purpose. 

Against these numbers of farmers there is not much that we as a corp can do.  We also had a citadel to defend (more on this in the future) and some other adventures in the offing (also possibly more of this in the future)...

In the mean time we concentrate in plexing Lamaa (where we live) down.  We are under no illusions that we would hold it under any sort of sustained pressure - no, purely as a driver of conflict and for the time being, a small source of pride...

As always we try to have fun.  See you in the war zone!

ISK

During my latest job search one of the recurring requirements in order to be a good corp member was "an independent, reliable source of ISK".

Sadly, by this (and many other) measure(s), your author is not a good corp member.  He has no "independent, reliable" source of income.  For him generating ISK tends to be ad hoc - i.e. when he's broke.  Because he is prone to PvE burnout he also tends to only farm ISK until he is barely not broke any more.

A casual query in corp revealed various "good", some even "great" corpies with lucrative income sources.

One has an alt corp in a wormhole.  Another manufactures rigs.  We have a builder of capitals.  Yet another has an army of alts doing PI.  All of these endeavours take a bit of time, skill and toil -  virtues distinctly lacking in your authors' persona.

To be honest the most tempting source of ISK  was suggested by a corp mate who claims to find 500 or so plex "lying on the floor of his hangar" every now and then - i.e. put there by his credit card.

Tempting, but as explained before I have an unfortunate moral aversion to this.

Of course with great amounts laziness and small amounts of creativity the commensurate adjustment to expectations and quality of life soon follows.

Whereas the aforementioned "good" corpies can fly "decent" ships and maintain losses of 3 to 5 Billion ISK a month, your author cannot.

He makes do with somewhat less "decent" ships and have to contain his losses.

Still even at his level he has to raise 500 million to 1 Billion ISK per month.

ISK generation follows the course of least resistance, which in the faction warfare context this means "selling" loyalty points from FW missions.

There is a nice guide on FW missions published by the Crossing Zebra's website.  In it that author - Gorski Car outlines how he runs batches of 10 FW missions in around 90 minutes.

Of course I am no Gorski Car and the same loop of 10 faction warfare missions takes me closer to three hours.

In addition Gorski seemingly has the luxury of running missions only when Minmatar is at Tier 4 or 5. Sadly waiting for an advantageous tier is not an option when you are broke.

Running missions and obtaining loyalty points is only part of the story.  LP has to be converted into items which in turn has to be sold on the market - (read: more time and effort).

One gets roughly 50k LP per mission and normally get a conversion rate of around 1000 ISK per LP - so I have to run between 10 and 20 missions in a month to sustain this level of activity.  Five to 10 hours a month of missions/hauling/market transacting.


This happens to be the absolute minimum amount of ISK to maintain this level of involvement (T1 frigates in novice plexes).  This is ok, and it happens to still be fun for a noob like me, but I cannot help but think longer term this will need to stagnation and falling into just another rut.

The consequence is that ISK generation has to be upped in some way shape or form.

One has to appreciate the irony in the fact that in order to experience PvP to the full one has to embrace a system that mandates more PvE to generate ISK, and at the same time then encourages risk aversion to contain losses.

I cannot help but think this is why some people stoop to botting.  Tempting but not for me.

Just one more of life's great contradictions.

If you, dear reader happen to have a nice idea for easy ISK please let me know!

The disconnect

Most Eve players have experienced the dreaded disconnect from time to time.  Even though we like to pretend in our little worlds that all our losses are due to this ill, the truth of the matter is that very few are.

In almost 10 years of playing EVE on and off your author has only ever lost one ship due to a disconnect.  A Tormentor that I warped to fight at a novice plex at 40km.  Right at that moment the disconnect happened. 

Of course I'm dead, but I restart the client and log in - only to have my pod that went into emergency warp land in the fray again...

As luck would have it all the scrams on grid were "busy" and the (empty) pod was reduced to half armor by a single glancing blow before I could warp it off again.

As far as disconnects go that was fairly ho-hum - spare a thought for someone disconnecting when flying his 2Billion ISK Blops.  Or his carrier, super carrier or titan (yes, they tell me it has happened).  Poor sods.

The most inopportune (and hilarious) disconnect that I have personally been privy to happened shortly after I had first joined Schneckt.  Our FC: Hilo (the name we call him by, unchanged to implicate the guilty empathise with the unfortunate).  Our ships: a bunch of cheap arty ruptures to test a doctrine.

We warp to a large plex at range (because sniping - duh) and sure enough there are a couple of ships on grid with an interceptor burning at us from 100km out.  The optimal on these arty ruptures is somewhere around 60km and the inty is fast approaching.

Hilo: "Align to citadel and lock inty.  LOCK ONLY!"... We do as he says

HILO JADAVEON V

Hilo: "Wait"... 90km

Hilo: "Wait"... 80km

Hilo: "Wait for it".... 70km

...   60km

...   50km

...   40km

Dafuq Hilo !!??? 

Staccato TS3 voice: "User in your channel timed out"... Hilo 

Of course by this time the inty is within scram range and our guns cannot track.  What's more the rest of the inty's fleet is now inbound.

Random fleet member: "We can't fight this in arty ships, warp to citadel and dock"... We sheepishly do so, leaving one of your members to die.

Staccato TS3 voice: "User joined your channel"... Hilo

Hilo: "Did we get him!?"...  Laughter!




C'est la vie.

HILO is in local bois!!!

P.S.  Hilo is a really funny guy and he likes to announce himself with this meme:

Finding Schneckt

Schneckt: Welcome to the wretched hive of villainy and scum...

Hive of villainy and scum!??

Absence what have you done?  Of all the corps in New Eden, all the opportunity that abounds, all the gates you may have jumped, THIS is what you come up with?  How on earth in space did this happen!!!?

Ahhh  Dear Reader I am glad you asked for finding a new corp is a venerable tale of trial and tribulation, fraught with perils and despair. There be wrong turns, scamsters, fraudsters and merely clueless recruiters and runners of corporations.

One man bands, do everything corporations, 2 day old corporations with aspirations to null sec, l33t pvp corporations, newbie corporations, oldbie corporations.... more corporations you can shake a Federation Navy Gamma Crystal light sabre at...

All of them declined your author's application diligently evaluated by your author and discarded one by one until by blind luck shear force of will and perseveration he stumbled onto the public chat room of Schneckt.

Now your author does not take himself too seriously when it comes to space ship games, so it was important that his corp also does not.

His old corp in null sec is going better than ever and would welcome him back, except that null sec really does not suit your authors game.  Don't get me wrong - I could have made it work, but the friction resulting from "making it work" tends to sap enthusiasm for playing the game.

Where recruitment and corporations are concerned, just about the only sage advice I can offer with any kind of sincerity is this:  Work out what your game is and then try and find the very best corporations that specialise in that game.



The two areas I identified was wormhole (WH) space and low sec pirate/Faction warfare (FW) space.
WH space was discarded as the general "feel" was that it required a bit more of a commitment to fleet up for pings, more doctrine ships, more participation requirements.   And they tend to be serious.

This left low sec and faction warfare... and Schneckt...

Schneckt is a serious, not so serious corporation.  It is a corporation that favours doing and dying rather than being overly concerned with the killboard.  As explained in a prior post, the kill board at times look more like a fail board.

It is a corp with a solid core of older players and a number of eager newer ones.  It has logistics, LP buyouts, strategy, jokes, memes and fits (weird and wonderful ones) for just about every ship in the game.

Above all is the solid advice - low sec can be a fantastically underhanded and frustrating place that really exposes one to the seedy underbelly of so called "l33t" pvp. (more about this in future).

It is an environment where you can just as easily fly solo as fleet up.
In many ways our small corporation fleets are what null sec fleets are not.

It is not uncommon for a fleet to be formed, fulfil its purpose and be over in 3 minutes (clearing some opposing faction members out of a plex).  No wait, no forming up on the titan, no drama.  Get killed, meh thrasher, reship.  Need to step out?  Dock in station/citadel and do so.

The size of the corporation also means that everybody counts.  It is at Schneckt where your author for the first time flew logi (he had logi V trained for years and to his shame never before used it).

He flew frigates, destroyers, cruisers, battleships, logi (as in repping), logi (as in freighting), dps and tackle.  Many of these on a daily basis.

There's a lot to be said for mixing it up.

Mixing it up however does come with a learning curve.  In your authors case the ponderously slow mug mashing the keyboard struggles to keep up.  Still he lives and he learns and his sec status drops.

It is early days but so far the union with Schneckt suits your author to a T.  Schneckt likes bringing and taking the fights (caution propaganda!) - indeed we invite the opposing militia into our pub chat to enable us to arrange fleet fights more easily...  A very welcome change of pace indeed!

Frigate Fighting Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah

Long have your author been sceptical about the oft meted out council to keep to frigate hulls during one's initial forays into pvp.

Frigate fights tend to be short, sharp and brutal affairs.  Rare is the fight that exceeds even a minute.

Over before you know it.

Worse, blink and you might even miss the lesson to be learned from it...

As far as novice frigate fights go, just about the only redeemable feature is the cost.  Or at least it can be - there are some eye-watering-ly expensive fits on frigates.

If one can temper the impulse to bling out the ship it is entirely possible to buy and fit 100 T1 frigate hulls with T2 and meta modules (fitting issues is a thing!) for less than 1 billion isk.

Still a fair chunk of change, but plenty are the examples on zkill where the loss of a single ship exceed that number.

At least in this way you get 100 chances to learn that lesson.  And practice one needs.  As expounded in the previous missive of this blog, there is no substitute for doing.

Fighting in factionware plexes on the face of it has nothing to it.  I mean, you warp in, and well fight... right?

Riiigggghhht.

The typical fight for your author goes down like this:
1)Warp at 10 to the plex
2)Click gate to warp - might have to spam
3)Remember to overheat repper, guns (always overheat!)
4)Land in the plex and start targeting.

5)Target some more as your fist couple of attempts failed because you had yet to exit warp.
6)Now that the targeting process is running, start your prop mod and get to either
   i)Keep at range
   ii)Approach
   iii)Orbiting
   depending on your fit and what you're guessing your opponents' fit is and his positioning inside the plex.
7)Shoot, web, scram (of course you pre activated your guns, web, scram..?)
8)In between all this you have launched your drones and pressed F right?  Right?
9)Because you landed outside of 10km your web and scram did not engage and you have to activate them again.  Missed this?  Oh my...  kited to death I am.

Frigates tend to be very fragile.  My fits normally has somewhere between 3000 and 5000 EHP.   Typical damage tend to be 150 - 200 dps.  The combination of typical EHP and dps means every millisecond matters.

Your author would like to be able to report that he has the little procedure listed above down pat... Alas he cannot.  He loses more often than he wins.

Great are the number of times a defeat is snatched from the jaws of victory because he is ponderously slow.  Or forget to launch the drones, heat the guns, lose point or web... or ...

Still he lives learns and yearns for those (very) rare occasions where he does pull it all off to perfection.

Finally, because your author has a slight sadistic streak in him he leaves the readers with the gem below - a tune that is stuck in his head every time he warps to a plex.  Here's to hoping you too cannot get rid of it.  All.  Day.  Long.

    "Kung Fu Frigate Fighting"

    Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah    
    Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah
    Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah

    Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah

    Everybody was Kung Fu Frigate Fighting          
    Those kids were fast as lightning
    In fact, it was a little bit frightening

    But they fought with expert timing

Riding horses

 

If you were to learn to ride horses by reading a book and I were to learn to ride horses by riding horses, who do you think will be the better rider? - author's father in law.

Your author married into a farming family.  Having grown up in the suburbs of the big city this turned out to be another of those humbling and character building experiences that life hands us. I still recall the first time my then girlfriend took me "home" to the farm. Prospective father in law extends a strong hard hand, callouses on both sides, grabs my sweaty little palm and proceeds to crush it.  I might be wrong but I could swear I spotted him glancing at her with a raised eyebrow silently asking: "erm... are you sure...?" Don't get me wrong, they are absolutely fabulous people - salt of the earth people.  But ego to be checked at the door farm gate people - especially for a city slicker like me. This is the place where my wife can do absolutely everything and I can do nothing.  She out rides me (cause I can't).  She out shoots me (Yes, with real rifles. Fml! Right!?).  Drives cattle like a boss (don't worry honey - I've put the bull that chased you up the tree back in the paddock...).  Slaughter, gut and skin a sheep? Yes. She does that.

Damn, Absence!?  That's rough.  Just one hit after the other, but as entertaining as stories of your incompetence and utter humiliations are, what exactly has this got to do with EVE?

Well dear Reader, nothing.  And everything.

Wife: Honey go fetch the bull.
Me: Look honey, no hands.   

You see for the longest time I approached EVE in the way I approached most other things in life - by RTFM.   This is all well and good, but as in the case of riding horses, no amount of reading Feyd (sadly moved on - picture to the right borrowed from him) et. al, watching eve is easy on youtube or theory crafting will make you a competent pilot.

At some point you have to get to doing.

My personal eureka moment was towards the middle of WWB/Casino war (pick your name).
During the so called Fabian defence.  No official defence was mounted, but members were encouraged to harass the enemy.

Your author could fleet up and push F1.  He could farm NPC's with the best of them.  Gate camp in a fleet a bit.  But on his own in this environment he could do nothing.  He had never learned to fly solo.  In effect, he had never experienced EVE.

This realisation and the resultant disillusionment had a lot to do with my losing my mojo and taking a lengthy break from EVE.  How can a player with my amount of SP, and so many years in game NOT be able to play?

It was already clear back then that I would have to approach things differently if I were to return to the game.

Astute readers will already know that I have joined a small FW corporation called  Schneckt.

Schneckt is a small but serious FW corp with a mix of experienced members and rank noobs.  The killboard would no doubt look more like a failboard to the smug l33t pvpers.  Flying and dying is encouraged.

We have guys that go for absolutely everything - sitting alone in a small plex and in warps 3 war targets?  Go for it.  His T1 frigate vs war target's navy/AF?  Go for it.  T1 frig vs Vexor?  You guessed it - go for it.  Of course these guys' kill boards reflect a large amount of losses.  But, and this is a very big but - it also reflects an astounding amount of unlikely wins.  Wins from fights most people would never have taken.

It is in this environment that your author has finally got to doing.

As can be expected, doing, mostly involves dying (almost through my stack of 15 Tristans).  Though your author is more cautious than some of the guys, he also takes some fights that he should not.  Mostly he loses those, but so far those losses are more than made up for by that single solo win against a Republic Fleet Firetail in his Tristan.

Life is looking up... now all I need is a horse that will fit into a novice plex...

Dipping my toes back in...

Like most people that frequent a blog such as this, I like playing video games.  In my absence to EVE I whiled away my time playing League of Legends (LOL).

In many ways League is what EVE is not.

You log on, you queue up, and generally you get a match-up within a minute or two.  Depending on how well, or how poorly you play the match is over in 15 minutes to an hour.  No blobs.  Ten guys, five a side and you go at it.

It is a game where good players can excel, but also a game that is very team dependant - rare is the game that you win when someone on your team lags, disconnects or tilts badly.

The downside of that type of play though is the repetitiveness of it - yes, there is a variety of champions, but at its core it is a game of farm for gear and XP, fight, win/lose, rinse, repeat.

Which is the downfall of virtually all games - and hence our penchant for oscillating between a variety of them.

For some strange reason EVE has managed to draw and keep my attention more than most.

If you were to ask me why, I'm afraid I have no answer - you still have the farm, the XSP, fight, win/lose rinse and repeat cycles.  Good players still excel and if logi disconnects or you lag, you die...



Truly - you can suck just as much playing as a Teemo than as you can as a rifter pilot...

Which brings me full cycle to the topic du jour.

Forgive me Dear Reader, for I have succumbed.  A brand new 3 month subscription is mine.  Three months, we will see how it goes.

I withered and dithered a bit on where to go and what to do.  My old corp in null is still going strong and would welcome me back, but null does not really suit me.  I had thoughts of WH space, but are loath to commit too much time.  In the end I settled on FW.

It allows a for more casual time commitments and can be slightly more solo oriented (I play at odd hours).  It can pay for itself via LP, and you can fly cheaply.

I have applied to a smallish, but serious FW corp and to my astonishment they accepted my noob ass...  

We will see how it goes...

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose

One year and a bit since I announced a hiatus from EVE I have again installed an EVE client.  Am I back?  Not quite.


I had refrained from renewing my subscriptions and instead elected to foray into the world of alpha clones.

Upon logging in the first thing you notice is that you cannot fly *any* of the ships you are used to.  Thanks to a generous, free rookie ship, I could eventually undock...  And do what exactly?

Perhaps I had to adjust my expectations but I cannot help being disappointed. Alpha clones really are useless.

Yes, I know.  Good for some things in limited niches.  And yes they are intended for newer players to introduce them to the game.  And yes, some newbies cause mayhem in their racial T1 frigates.  All the same - I was disappointed.

If I am to continue playing EVE alpha clone I cannot be, to which CCP will probably say "working as intended".


This of course led me to explore the market for PLEX.  Imagine my delight when I found PLEX could be had for the paltry sum of 3.2 million ISK.  Except of course, a PLEX is no longer a PLEX.  Instead of one PLEX I now needed 500 PLEX.   I read the blog on the why, but I have to confess I still don't get it. My aforementioned paltry sum quickly became a very princely sum.

Despite my bravado of earlier it seems an alpha I will have to be...

Other notable changes of are:

1)The training UI.  I have to confess I was lost and confused.  I liked the old interface much better.  Orderly, usable.  Awwwh well, I suppose there is always EVEMon.  Oh, and a 24 hour training queue - this at least had some familiarity - like a recurring bad dream that turns real.  I know, I know - alpha...

2)Some ship changes - most notably, I had an Archon that somehow turned into an Apostle...  Not that it matters because alphas can't fly either...   Besides in a default newbie corp (I got kicked for inactivity) flying that would still be a bad idea....

3)The same old depressing spam, trolling and questions still fills the newbie channel.  Sigh.

4)No IGB.  Will not be missed much.

5)A quick look through the old EVE news and blog sites made for depressing reading.  Goons, TEST, PL, NC and the Russians are still around.  Some comfortable old blogs seems to sadly be going inactive.  In fairness I did not spend time looking for new "fresh" blogs to colour my day.


All this within the first 10 minutes of logging in and subsequently logging off again.  I am sure I would discover some more delights if I were to subscribe again, but to be honest it still feels like the same stodgy old EVE that I had left a year ago.

Then again, EVE is what you make it and maybe, just maybe I am still the same old jaded player of a year ago.

Worth doing well

A somewhat belated post found in the drafts bin - first penned when the infamous WWB was still in full swing.

For some World War Bee was one of EVE's most momentous events.  For your author it was one of the greatest non events.

Due to the Fabian Defence, many members in the CFC Emporium World War Bee, despite its name is the war that wasn't.

This post however is not about the war, the winners or the losers.  No, no - this entree only serves to explain why your slacker of an author was ninja hacking in relic sites.  Relic sites best accessed via wormhole.

During one such excursion I was spit out in the south east of New Eden, only to be confronted by this:

Yes that is 23 bubbles.  On that gate.  For the four of us.  Such dedication.

And no dear reader... your author is not back, in fact he currently does not even have a functional eve client (or subscription).

For the time being I am merely cleaning out the old blog.  If time, energy and enthusiasm prevails I will post more of these draft snippets.

EVE Malaise

Yes dear reader, I have battled hard but I have lost.  I am giving EVE a rest.

It is worth noting that I regard it as but a battle and not necessarily the war.  I have after all "rested" several times before.  One such hiatus  lasting almost two years...

There is something different this time around though.  The things that kept my EVE self going for a number of years just does not appeal any more.  Things I regarded as fun now leaves me indifferent.

If I were to return it is clear that I would have to approach the game in a very different way.  And there lies the rub.  In order to go to the places I have not been I would have to invest a significant amount of time and toil - time that I for the moment don't have and enthusiasm that I do not feel.



Without further ado I bid thee adieu.



* I have a few draft posts saved - it is possible that I might find the time to finish these and publish them.  Longer term though, if I am not actively playing EVE, it feels wrong to be writing about EVE.

He said, she said and other agressive Sov-less World War BEEmusements...

Astounding.

That is about the only word I can use to sum up the collection of commentary, hubris, naiveté,  spin, propaganda and flat out lies written about the "war" in New Eden.  Such is the confusion that there is not even agreement on the name to call the latest bout of mass conflict.

Indeed the array of arguments and commentary about the unfolding events based on the same observable facts is a source of wonder in and of itself.

It reminds me of a scene out of the movie Annie Hall (around 6:20 in the tl;dr version here although watching the whole thing to me was worth it!):

"[Alvy and Annie are seeing their therapists at the same time on a split screen]

Alvy Singer's Therapist: How often do you sleep together?

Annie Hall's Therapist: Do you have sex often? 

Alvy Singer: [lamenting] Hardly ever. Maybe three times a week. 

Annie Hall: [annoyed] Constantly. I'd say three times a week."

This suggest that readers should take what an author says in the context of said authors personal erm... context - present author included - for even assuming one was not engaging in malice - blatant propaganda spin or lies, one is still bound to one's own prejudice and biases.  Caveat Lector!


A side effect of all this excitement seems to have created an even more fertile environment for the normally ubiquitous Internet Tough Guy - numbers in comment sections are reaching epidemic proportions!!.

VFK by next week here, retaking all "our" sov in an hour there.  Both sides victorious before Christmas!  Fabulous entertainment!

Through all this one might ask, who really is winning, who is losing, and what in indeed is the war about.  Alas, your author does not know (not that it stops him from having a guess and making a fool of himself anyway - see below).

The winning and losing on the face of it is easy to track.  The kill boards seems to suggest that most large battle objectives as well as ISK metrics are won by the MBC.

Dotlan does a fair job of the number of systems/stations corporations/alliances the Emporium has lost.

All a one way street yes?

Except it may not be.  Yes spin abounds but with the Sovless Aggression writ the mittani hit on a couple of very important points.

1)With the advent of the Aegis expansion, sov became more difficult to defend.  Yes if you live there your corp/alliance can fend off a simple trollceptor, but your corp/alliance does not stand a chance if TWO corps or alliances show up...  Numbers still matter more than one would think.

2)The Fabian defence, burnout and the numbers game.  As time goes by, burnout sets in - as one attacker recently posted passive regen seems to be one of the attackers greatest enemies.  Of course burnout works both ways, but this does seem to suggest it is affecting attackers more at this stage.  Of course this will work AGAINST the CFC if they were to retake sov.

3)The most crucial of all though is that the benefits of holding sov is not clear.  Groups like PL and NC have abandoned sov.  In circumstances like the present position the CFC find sov is a burden.  The empire is too big to defend.  As the sov empire contracts the problem contracts.  Indeed burden of defence will then move over to the takers of said sov.  One can imagine that it would go to the MBC - a move that would eventually put them in the same situation that the CFC now finds itself in.

From the CFC perspective (tin foil and spin alert!)  Losing all sov may unshackle it from a burden and thus putting it on equal footing with PL and NC!

Of course the MBC also have a number of valid points.

1)Sentiment: The evil goons narrative, and the utterings of Sion and the matani during what I call the kickstarter of hubris. Add the latest leaks (courtesy Lemba) where the mitani seems ok with the idea of throwing all the other CFC alliances to the wolves in the hope that their members will join GSF.  Personally I find this plausible as situations like the difficulties with CO2 will not arise.  In addition many CFC alliances are defunct anyway (sort of why the Bastion was created) - why not have them in GSF?  What all this does is load the sentiment against the CFC.  Friends come and go, but enemies accumulate!

2)House of cards - the idea that the CFC is hollowed out and contains a large portion of miners and ratters.  With the advent of Aegis and ADM's these guys are needed by any coalition that wants to hold sov.  As such mere member count in an alliance may be misleading!  As such the CFC has much more space than its PVP'ers can actually defend.

Now I have no idea which way the war will go.  Whether Kirith Kodachi is right and the MBC will march to Deklein, whether Jester is right (although he did hedge his bets with three possible outcomes - inclusive of Goons defending Deklein and winning the war).

Personally I don't know whether Deklein would be successfully defended, whether Deklein will be defended at all or whether Deklein is already conceded by the CFC (like almost all their other sov) and they are for the time being becoming a low sec entity.

What I do know is that the wheel turns.  The CFC was dominant for a long time and perhaps this is the time for them to be trampled into dust.  Perhaps they will merely ride the cycle to the bottom and back to the top.  If the the CFC's time has indeed come, will the MBC merely take their place? Like ElleRisalo comments on reddit: "Burn the fields, Salt the earth, fuck the skulls....MBC literally new CFC already."

Plus les choses changent plus elles restent les mêmes.

The nature of EVE is such that it is very very difficult to really "kill" off an enemy in game.  Hell war proponents may find that "forever" turns out to be a long long time.  Promises to do "whatever it takes" may turn out to be promises too tough to keep.

Which brings me to victory conditions for the current engagement:  What kind of force the CFC is after the war.

For the CFC.  Survival as any sort of major power in the game of EVE would be counted as a win.  If significant power blocks will regard them as worthwhile to be feared or hunted.

For the MBC the opposite.

 I think it all hinges on the capital fleet.  It is not by accident that CO2 was accused of a capital trap conspiracy.  It is not an accident that PL/NC is continually baiting CFC capitals in the hope of an escalation.  Nor is the march of 500 MBC suppers, dreads and titans to Villasen yesterday.

Forget everything else.  Every station, every IHUB, all the sov.  All that can be recovered if needed/wanted.  Replacing heavy assets without friends or sov?  Not so much.

Remember folks - you heard it here first!!*

* That last bit by way of humour and a dig at all the (other ;-) ) self aggrandising bloggers and commenter's that make off the perfectly obvious and mundane to be profundity - and are wrong - just like me.

No mojo. Enemies, opponents and the difference between players of the meta and players of the game.

I've lost my mojo and I'm struggling to get it back.  No dear reader, I'm not quitting the game (at this time) but post my bout of PVE I am still not in the mood to play EVE - despite a desperate but maybe not well thought out remedy.

 In a bid to get out of the rut I rejoined my old corp in null sec.  They are in one of the CFC Emporium Imperium alliances.  Despite my best efforts to get a corp of 90 members to move we are still there.  Selfish sods... ;-)

Their reasons though are sound - the corp has a number of active small gang/solo pvp'ers and their argument is that right now there are few other places that can provide us with the content we are getting.  Sure you can join some other null/low sec bloc or whatever, but then you have to go out and look for content.  Currently we can sit around almost on any station undock and content comes to us.

For someone like myself that is less than proficient at hunting and D-scan they do make a compelling argument...

The availability of all content in the world is not proving to be the catalyst to return my mojo though.  I am very lethargic.  I seldom log in.  I have joined one corp fleet.  I died once as hero tackle in a Jaguar.  I joined no PAP link fleets.  I am NOT a corp asset as it stands...

In retrospect, maybe the choice of corp was not that wise - I have a timezone difference of 11 hours between myself and the main body of the corp and I'm still playing mostly solo.  In addition, arguments of content or not I am starting to dislike what the Imperium stands for post what I call the kickstarter of hubris and maybe this too servers to scare away my muse, who knows.

The people in corp though are fantastic - we hunt, kill (and die to) MOA, TISHU, PL, NC and neutrals alike.  For this corp our opponents certainly are not our enemies.  It is what I have come to expect of the corp and something I really admire about them.

As an aside  this illustrates the dichotomy between the players of the game and the players of the meta.  None of the guys are ignorant about the goings on in the meta - they just look past that to the game - their game.  As long as the position the corp finds itself in serves the aims of the corp's game we will stay.  If and when it does not we will leave - as such the allegiance of the corp is much more to its members and the content than any alliance or other entity in the game.

Of course opponents will call us goon pets and the like, but there comes a time when all of us in never never land has to grow up and realise that this is a space ship game and for most of us minions it is just fun, entertainment - the players of the meta are almost irrelevant to us.

;-) That's my story and I am sticking to it.

P.S.  Even though I like my corpies and corp, due to the timezone difference and the fact that I have never lived in a wormhole I might have to jump corp again.  If you know of any good wormhole entities that will indulge an old, slow, sucky at pvp, wh noob  and at this time a very casual player of EVE, please let me know.

Cosmos missions: A humbling and character-building experience

I set of with great fanfare and even greater expectations to complete some of the COSMOS missions.

Now to be honest this action was not borne out of a burning desire to satisfy a noble curiosity, or to explore the virtues of PVE.... No far from it.  My reason was as petty as a promise of easy ISK an lots of it...

The terms "easy ISK" and "lots of it" are to say the least, relative.  With my "easy ISK" scale being at the easier end of things, and my "lots of it" scale on the higher end of things I ended up being slightly disillusioned.  

Yes I made some ISK, but due to the drudgery I experienced during the whole endeavour, I cannot in good conscience recommend COSMOS missions to anybody.  

I go into a bit more detail on how I approached the whole thing below but I have to stress that the advice comes with a very hefty caveat:  

Before I even completed what I call the "COSMOS missions" I was well and truly sick of it.  Sick of PVE, sick of EVE.  Sick of anything to do with EVE.  I did not want to log in, I read no blogs, and I neglected my own.  To be honest I don't think I have even now fully recovered.  

Your mileage may vary and you might have a stronger penchant for PVE, maybe a more moderate approach will help - whatever the case, just remember this: I told you so.

Without further ado here is the thick and the thin of it.

1. The good:

During the course of running the "COSMOS missions" I netted in total 8 billion ISK in rewards, loot salvage and mission items (ran with two characters).  

2. The bad:

Drudgery.  The big money is to be had in items granted by just two agents:

Zabon Michi grants Michi's Excavation Augmentor (1.5 Billion ISK at time of writing) and Akemon Tolan grants Inherent Implants 'Noble' Hull Upgrades HG-1008 (2 Billion ISK at time of writing).  The trick with these two agents is the high faction standing requirement (6.00 Caldari faction standing for Zabon and 7.00 Amar faction standing for Akemon).

If you have the requisite standings (or would rather do lvl 4 missions/tags/whatever to gain standings) your drudgery may be diminished.

3. The so so.  

Both these agents are in a highsec pocket in the Otomainen system (no station).  This means you have to cross a low sec system (Ihakana) in a ship that has a fair Gurista tank and enough dps to kill the ships in the complexes and missions.  In addition you need to fit a Gurista shuttle in you cargo hold.  Be careful as the pirates in Ihakana are fully aware of what goes on here.

Where Akemon Tolan is concerned some items are required that drop very rarely.  The first is Jakon's head found in the Otitoh system (see guide).  The second is Myrkai's Data Chip found in Otomainen itself, but is a very rare drop.  The best I could do is this forum thread that suggests the chip drops at most twice a day - and then there is a lot of competition for it.

There is a bunch of guys perma camping the system and seemingly making a living of afk mining the spawns of rats in the complexes in Gila's as well as snagging the Data Chip and putting it up on contracts for hundreds of millions of ISK.  

These guys know the layout (there are a couple of tricks, you need to know where to go, when to go, be quick, kill rats and avoid webbing drones).  The numbers and knowledge made this a bit of a challenge.  I did however manage to snatch the Data Chip on one occasion.   

This bit of pvp interaction was almost the highlight of the whole episode - these guys aren't shy to show up with gangs inclusive of logi.  In addition they don't have qualms going suspect in order to steel "your" Data Chip.  Unfortunately downtime falls very late at night for me - 00:00 (with respawn of Chip around 01:30) - thus I ended up making a deal for another Data Chip with one of the Otomainen inhabitants.

A little bit about my methodology: 

I ran the COSMOS missions with the sole purpose of extracting ISK.  Due to standing requirements I focussed on Caldari/Amar Cosmos.

I used two characters that had no standings.  To quickly build standings it is important to get your social skills up - this saves you a lot of heartache later on.  

I would run a couple of the starter missions for each char until I could access the lvl 1 Caldari COSMOS agents.  Then I would only run enough lvl1 COSMOS missions to gain access to the lvl2 COSMOS agents.  Ditto for lvl3 and lvl4 agents.  You will notice that your derived standing for Amar faction will also rise during this process.

When the Caldari agents are done (or at least the ones that I could do in highsec) I swithced to the Amar lvl1 agents (if you got your social skills up you should be ok here), then lvl2 through lvl4.

After the lvl4 Amar COSMOS agents were completed I was OK where the Caldari standings for Zabon Michi was concerned.  I was however short on the Akemon Tolan standing requirement.  It is at this junction that I decided to complete the Amar Epic arc.  This greatly added to my PVE shooting rats pain (There are a lot of rooms with a lot of rats in some of those missions... and I had to do it twice!).

If you are still short, try some of the tag agents, circle missions, starter missions or good old lvl4 missions until you get over the line.

Some of the guides I used:

Cosmos-Missions-101

Caldari_COSMOS_guide_by_Jowen_Datloran

Amarr_COSMOS_guide_by_Jowen_Datloran

These are generally good in as far as it gives advance insight into the missions and explains where to find the mission items.

In conclusion, I did not enjoy the journey through the COSMOS that much, but if you are a PVE person at heart, or go about it in moderation there is no reason that you cannot farm a number or the required items and then repeat the missions with more characters.  If one can manage to solve the scarce item problem and stand the drudge then this might not be a bad path to some ISK.