(An In-Character record of life in New Eden. Posts based on real events of my day to day play sessions.)

Wednesday, January 20, 2016

The Immensea Immigration: Getting Back to Work

It's almost therapeutic to get back to mining. Maya Nao had once again followed me down to our home system in Null Sec and was again out in a Retriever beside my Procurer mining in an anomaly. Anomalies are best for mining here in Null not just for their sheer size, but they also contain some of the most valuable ores in New Eden. Most people refer to them as the ABC ores; Arkonor, Bistot, and Crokite. The rest here are pretty valuable as well, Mercoxit being the only source of Morphite known so far, a key material used in mostly Tech 2 Equipment and ships.

It wasn't just Maya and I out here. A lot of our Corp mates were floating around the belt, mostly in Barges and Exhumers of various types, all slowly eating away at the ores around our ships. I pulled up beside Koswin, one of our Directors and started shooting rocks. We were there for a few minutes when Maya sent me a message over fleet comms.

Maya Nao: I'm full. Heading to the Compression Array.

Sain Darkwing: Already?

Maya Nao: Yes. This is why I like it here.

Sain Darkwing: True. The Rorqual boosts are amazing.

This is one of the great perks of being in a Corporation like this. You get the best mining boosts from a Rorqual pilot that sits at the local POS and you make a killing at mining. I was busy daydreaming about how much ISK we were making when one of the lesser favorite things about Null Sec arrived. Pirates.

"Angels are here!" Koswin snapped over voice coms, "Drones out people." Maya heard and stayed put at the POS for now, just finishing compressing the load of ore she had and putting it in the Personal Hangar Array. Her drone skills weren't that up to par for the local Pirates as she had trained primarily for a boosting Orca. Something her current assignment couldn't make the most of.

I sent the order and a fleet of Valkyrie II's launched from my drone bay, circling around my Procurer as the small fleet of Angels closed in. I moved slightly closer to the rest of the ships around me, hoping to spread incoming damage around the fleet and keep all of our drones concentrated together, yet all the while watching my distance to the asteroid I was mining and making sure I didn't go out of range. The local pirates weren't that big of a threat, but it was best to get rid of the annoyance before too long.

As they closed in range, I activated my hardeners and started targeting their ships. I saw my fleet mates drones start chewing through shields and ordered mine to do the same. The small, unmanned crafts shot forward and started attacking the BattleCruisers and Battleships that came to try and ruin our day, but with our greater numbers they were no match for us. Once the last one went down, all the drones on the field darted back and recalled to their respective drone bays, and I turned off my shield hardeners with a huff. I don't think I was even shot at that time.

"Are they gone?" Maya asked.

"Yep." I responded. Short communications but it was time to get back to business. I saw her warp in beside me and start shooting rocks again, repeating the cycle to fill her ore hold.

Bad luck struck again at the sound of an audible alarm from a program called "Near" I had installed because I was not very attentive to the intel channel

"Hostile enemy reported two jumps out."

It made me jump a little even inside my pod. My ship responded by igniting the engines to full power for a second then going dark again. I drifted forward a hundred meters or so and stopped once more, my attention going to our coalition Intel channel.

There is a big difference between local Pirates and wandering Neutral Capsuleers, or 'Neuts' as they are called. Pirates are not flown by Capsuleers but rather by a crew who are nowhere near as efficient as a Capsuleer neural interface. Pirate ships are sluggish, stick to one target usually, and rarely ever warp scramble in asteroid belts and mining anomalies. Other Capsuleers, on the other hand, are slippery, cunning and will use any means necessary to remove you from existence. Even in smaller ships, a single Neut is a big threat. Especially when they could be carrying a Black Ops Cynosaural Generator. A single pilot can fly into a swarm of mining ships, use a warp disruptor bubble, then use his Cyno to allow other Black ops ships to portal to his position and quickly outnumber us. Even if they do not have a Cyno, a single ship can catch one or two of us and cause some serious damage and cause credible loss of ISK to someone.

"Hostile enemy reported one jump out."

"Time to go." Koswin says over comms, "Neut next door. Everyone safe up." This is standard practice to save your ship and limit the number of potential targets for the unfriendly Capsuleer. All of the ships in the Anomaly slowly turned to point to the POS and one by one they suddenly burst off into warp in a stream of blue light and a dull pop as the wake from their warp drives hit my ship and reverberated off the hull. It's the only thing I can think of as to why I can hear other people warp off in the vacuum of space. Still, it's interesting to see a dozen or so ships all warp off at roughly the same time in the same direction.

As my ship enters warp, Maya's Retriever somehow matches my speed and follows me into the same warp bubble, gently flying along beside me in the tunnel before we exit inside the POS shields among the rest of the fleet. A few of us started bouncing off each other but there was plenty of room inside the shield.

Everyone stared at the local com channel as every ship in system would show their pilot's name in the list. A pilot appeared that had no friendly tag, and someone in fleet reported it in the intel channel.

"Enemy is present in your system." Yes. I know. I can see that.

Voice comms became active with other pilots in the system trying to figure out what kind of ship he was flying, where he is and that sort of thing, trying to organize a defense against the unknown threat. Several of them undocked and gave chase as the offending pilot turned around and left the system in the same direction he came from, but some of our more combat oriented pilots in our corporation smelled a little blood in the water so to speak and was off hunting.

The mining ships around me started zipping off into space towards the anomaly once more.

With great reward comes great risk...

Thursday, January 7, 2016

The Immensea Immigration: A Fresh Start

Personal Log (YC 117 Nov 25)

I've been stuck in a low sec station in Chamemi for several days now, waiting for our leadership to choose the best course of action for our Corporation and Alliance. I don't blame them for taking their time as the sudden force eviction from our space in Querious has everyone reeling. I'm impressed with them to tell the truth. They can keep things together and keep moral at a sort of high level throughout this whole ordeal. I would have probably caved under that pressure. Still, it's rough having to pull out of what we thought was our new home, and have to relocated all over again.

I've decided to move all my assets out of this pocket low sec system and into the next high sec system one jump away into Parses, where my Sister could come with the Orca and pick most of it up. It's too much and too big to ship anywhere. I'm going to try and sell it all and rebuy once we've gone to wherever it is we decide to go. I hope it's soon.

Personal Log (YC 117 Dec 07)

Our leadership has announced we will be moving to Immensea and parts of the Tenerifis region yesterday. I spent most of the day shipping my assets to Parses in an unfitted Iteron V for pickup by Osiph, who had already left to come and pick it up. I believe it will take several trips but she agreed to do it.

I've been watching the communication channels for any wormholes that would lead down that way but none are being found. I want to get down there and help, but need a way to get there first.

A while ago in Querious, I was lucky enough to find an abandoned Caldari Interceptor at a planet but was unable to pilot it due to missing skills. Now that I have the skills, I have purchased a Crow and intend to try and fly it down to our new home.

I feel bad now. In the confusion and turmoil of the sudden evacuation, I completely forgot I had invited my closest friends to come join me in Querious to fly with me and help mine. I had to tell them to wait until I was settled in yet a new home system.

Personal Log ( YC117 Dec 13)

The trip down here in an interceptor was uneventful. I set up my medical clone in our home system and jump cloned back to Agil, where I took my stealth bomber back down to Parses. There I loaded what I could into my Crane and set out again, this time hoping to avoid warp disruption bubbles on the way back down. I started bouncing off of planets on the way, warping while cloaked of course, and did avoid several warp disruption bubbles in the direct path between gates. It was a smart thing to do.

Once I was back again, I started buying the things I needed. I fitted my Buzzard again for scanning, I bought another Rattlesnake for ratting, I fitted a Procurer for mining, then took the Buzzard out to get the lay of the land, and also to try out my new tech two Relic Analyzer.

Afterward, I may try out the facilities in our local outpost to see how the beverages taste...

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The thing about Null Sec is that mostly everything has to be imported. Therefore, everything costs a lot more than in empire space. This is fine, however, because you make a lot more ISK out here too. I think another issue is that people are too busy out making that money to do all the little things.

Like maintenance for example.

I sighed heavily as I nearly walked into a half open door to a room that leaked the musky smell of cigar smoke into the hallway. With a grunt, I resorted to pushing the rusted door open the rest of the way and entered the only bar on our small outpost, our so called refuge from the rigors of ISK grinding in space.

Yep, the ol' watering hole. A place where people can meet, be merry, and enjoy one another's companionship. If only they bothered to show up. The place was rather empty spare for a corp mate in the back, buried in a terminal so I wasn't sure exactly who it was. Then again, with all the commotion with the move and the new faces around, I haven't spent much time out of my pod to meet these people face to face.

I'm always wary of other people, especially non capsuleers, but the man behind the bar had an odd air about him. An image that portrayed friendliness, and trustworthiness. Something rare in today's society. I felt like I could tell anything to this man and he would keep it in confidence. Perhaps he spent all his money on Charisma implants or something. The bartender was a short man, thin build, almost lanky like an awkward teenager if anything. He would have been mistaken for underage if not for the scar across his face and the almost white mop of hair he kept uncombed and stuck off in different directions. Other than that, his face was young looking and he dressed in a professional suit, minus the double breasted jacket he kept hung on a hook on the wall behind the bar. As I slid onto a bar stool, I noticed he had an odd sense of elegance about the way he moved, as if he had experience being a servant or butler of some kind of someone very rich or important. When he opened his mouth, I realized that I would receive much better service than expected of the run down place. Especially when the door noisily squealed as it slowly shut behind me.

"Good evening, Sir." The bartender said, setting the wine glass he was drying down gently before hanging his cloth over his shoulder, "What can I serve you tonight?"

"What do you recommend?" I asked, gently drumming my fingers on the bar.

"How about a classic." He said, turning around, "Whiskey."

"Sounds good." I reply as he drops a couple of rocks in my glass and pours the liquor. I take a sip and sigh heavily. "This is what I needed."

"Finding things hard?" He asked, resuming his cleaning. He raised the wine glass to the light, slowly twisting the stem to inspect for smudges. Satisfied, he inverted the glass and hung it on a rack, them proceeded to take another from a nearby tray to continue cleaning.

"Not hard, but there's a lot to do to get straightened away. Need to get the old ISK flow moving again. Hopefully into my wallet instead of out."

"Are you that concerned with your wallet balance?" He asked, "Or do you have other interests?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, like most Capsuleers I see come in here, they seem to be ruled my the almighty credit. Their motivations are all driven by money. Money is a means to an end, not the end itself." he said, again looking through his glass into the light. A slight sigh and he continued wiping the glass.

"My goal has always been to acquire money." I admitted, "With money, I can expand. I can build or buy bigger ships, finance my friends to fly with me, and afford to do the things I want to do."

"Which is?"

The question left me with my mouth agape to answer, but nothing came out. What did I want? What did I want to do? I know I'm here in Null sec to make money, but is that all? No, not really. If I just wanted to make money, I would have stayed up north. I'm here because of the community I became a part of. I'm here because of the fantastic people I'm flying with. I moved down here with them because they're now family.

"I want to fly with my friends. To make memories and have fun doing it." I said, "I make money to afford the things that let me contribute and participate in events with my Corporation and Alliance mates."

"Oh?" He says, setting his sparkling wine glass in the rack, "You're not just another money hungry Capsuleer who basks in the tears of their enemies?"

"Not at all." I reply. A memory of a nervous clerk in an empire station came to my mind. I remember her becoming extremely nervous at the mention of me being an Empyrean. I really don't like the reputation Capsuleers have with the general public.

"Then I applaud you for your actions, kind sir." He said with a smile, "I do hope you frequent this establishment." He paused for a moment, quickly dried his hands and held one out to me, "Allow me to introduce myself. I am Donta. Donta Ren."

"Sain Darkwing." I reply shaking his outstretched hand.