I thought it would be fun to create a ongoing review of the
play style of some of my more active pilots. I’m very proud of my guys and we
are lucky to have them as members of the Corp.
Pilot spot light. valkirri
Don’t let this foxy little minx’s portrait fool you, she is
a cold hard -10 sec status killer. She comes to us from Black Legion and wished
to experience wormhole pvp life first hand.
valkarri uses WH life for something a little different than
most. She uses it as a platform to spread destruction across the K space galaxy
from our random Lowsec and Null sec exits. When she logs in and finds we have a
low sec/null sec connection she is the first out the door searching for K-Space
targets.
valkarri is a newer member but already she has raced to the
top of our kill board for this month at 23 kills. She has set the bar for
murder just a few higher than another of our top killers, Andrew
Charante.
One of her primary targets seem to be cyno ships and anyone
else she can antagonize into logging on their main so she can murder them too. Often
times she speaks in local chat asking for a “hall pass”, a kind of ransom over
cyno pilots. What makes this behavior slightly unique is, she does all this
from her badger combat platform. YES, I said a BADGER! I can’t tell is she is
trolling our kill board or she is just truly crazy. Either way it’s funny as
hell. The 4th most used combat ship this month is a badger,11 kills. (I’m sure this number has changed upon release
of this article).http://underwear.eve-kill.net/?a=home&m=2&y=2013
Since wormholes are new to valkarri, sometimes her blood
lust gets the better of her. Often times not waiting for proper recon of a
target WH before just wandering in waving a hammer. We need to teach her the
sutilty that is needed to effectively tease a fight out of people. valkarri is
about as subtle as a Moros in siege mode.
All in all valkarri has become a valued member of our corp,
and her ‘no fucks to give’ pvp play style, fits right in with our corp attitude.
She is a shining example to all.
We have had our fair share of bomber kills recently. Not
sure if this is a growing trend to bring solo bombers into wormholes but it’s a
super bad idea, your valid target list is small and the risk is high.
If you want to pvp randomly, just jump in a T1 cruiser and
roam your chain, or sit at the sun at 0. If you are trying to harass people
using your chain, again, t1 cruiser. Just sit on one side of the hole and wait,
you don’t need to be cloaked.
The only reasonable use for a solo bomber in a WH that I can
think of is;
1. Trying to gank a PI hauler while it makes its rounds. Even then the kill will net you like 1 to 5
million. The PI cargo will most likely be stuffed right into the POCO sitting
next to them.
2. Long term C6/C5 care bear harassment, but this involves a great
deal of conviction to the cause. This is where a totally butt hurt guy or mad
man, sits in an occupied hole for a very long time. Find a safe spot and anchor
a giant container, fill it with bombs, torps and some probes. Sit in bomber and
wait till they run sites, close holes, or hell even function outside of their
POS in some way. Bomb/torp ships and wrecks, spawn sites. Forever! They can’t get you out of
the hole, they can’t run sites effectively, they can’t close holes without a
combat escort. You just sit there. With a pvp corp you are certain to die, but
a small farming expo hole, you could do a great deal of damage, and on the
cheap.
3. Bait?
Other than those reasons, there isn’t a really logical or
an effective way to use a solo bomber in wormholes.
Two nights ago we had a some random guy trying to torp/paint
Corpsreaper’s Brutix in our chain. Not a high sec connection but between a c4 and
a c3. We were all on coms and corps says to the group, “WTF?!? There is a bomber
trying to kill me”Our response was one
of equal shock “Where, what ship are you in?” He said “A brutix”We all started laughing.
Seriously? WTF? I
asked if he dropped a bomb on the brutix, Corpsreaper said “Nope, just painting
and torps” We laughed again. The bomber about 45k from him so a point was out
of the question before Corpsreaper got to him. Corps jumped into the hole he
was traveling to. We thought it might be
a ruse to get the brutix off the hole, so a fleet could warp in??! Our thoughts
were, more filled with laughter than accurate planning. So we formed a fleet on the other side, just
frigs, something that could get to the bomber quickly.
Since this dude thought it was awesome to attack brutixs
sitting on holes, we thought he was sure to attack a hauler coming from high
sec. We had a guy coming in, so why not use it for bait? Two birds with one stone. The hauler came from high sec without issue.
I guess the guy only likes
brutix, we put the brutix on the other side of the hole again. Sure enough, he
uncloaks 40 from the brutix again, and begins his paint/torp. Not threatened by
the bomber in the slightest and thinking we could get more 'friends of the bomber' people to commit to
his cause if we kept the visible fleet on the hole to a minimum. Only
corpsreapers alt jumped in with a jag. Over heating his mid wrack (microwarp,
disruptor) he burned to the bomber,
pointed it and destroyed it. The
pilot was in shock or something because his pod stayed long enough for corps to
point that too.
We have a custom our corp in situations like this. If the
fight is over and a pod has little to no chance of escape. We ask for a haiku,
in local chat in the form of a haiku, and they have 30 seconds to provide it.
If they do, they go free with their pod. Something other than a haiku, they
die. We call it combat poetry.
This guy being what we thought was Russian hadn’t any clue
what that was. He died. 1 billion valued pod because the guy didn’t know what a Haiku was. Such lack of culture in kids these days.
The guy later opened a convo with Corpsereaper asking what
he ment. We then got in to a very long heated debate about if Russians knew
what poetry was.
Moral of the story. Don’t fly solo bombers in wormholes. You’re
just going to die in a fire, and odds are, you won’t destroy anything worth the
cost of your ship.
This might be the strangest email I have ever written, and it pertains to this blog. People may find this funny, or sick... or well ... demented. I'm sorry to those people ahead of time. Its all really in good fun.
I just made a blog called "Invading Your Hole"http://invadingyourhole.blogspot.com/ The website is a place for wormhole hunters and my own nonsense.
I'm looking for two images.
One Image is the normal size banner like you used for the Semper Ubi Sub Ubi kill board.
This
is going to sound odd, but it really fits my overall personality when
it comes to this subject. In WHs we have a player made deity called "Bob".
If there ever was a jovial/vindictive/random god for EVE wormhole life,
it would be "bob". People in WHs sacrifice strippers, new players,
ships, probes... you name it... so we can get a favorable outcome from
"bob". Its all in fun, but its a common theme for more than one wormhole
alliance/corp.
I"m looking for a cartoony or superhero/god
figure sodomizing/fisting a WH care bear. This may be the strangest
thing you have been asked for, but seriously it will go over well with
the WH community. I need to keep it somewhat PG.. I know cartoon bear
sodomy doesn't fall into the PG realm.. but we can IMPLY that's whats
going on.
.. but instead of touching man... it touches the backside of this care bear.
Whats
important is, instead of star on the bears chest... it says like "K162"
or some other wormhole related icon. Across the god image it can say
"Bob". Not sure if you can exaggerate the care bears expression to
surprise.. or giant googly eyes... but something to that effect. Also
instead of just a finger of god, bury Bob wrist deep.
I hope you can see my vision what I'm talking about...
The
other image will be a smaller icon I can use for links to the blog from
other sites. Something small like 75px x 75px -- with just giant
cartoon care bear eyes that show extreme surprise.
Give me the ISK totals and I'll send them to whatever character you wish in the game.
Also I wish to note, you can say NO to me and I won't be the least bit offended. Artists of your caliber need to maintain a level of creative control.
Paranoia is an unfounded or exaggerated distrust of others, sometimes
reaching delusional proportions. Paranoid individuals constantly suspect
the motives of those around them, and believe that certain individuals,
or people in general, are "out to get them."
suspicious; unfounded suspicions; believes others are plotting against him/her *Check*
preoccupied with unsupported doubts about friends or associates *Check*
reluctant to confide in others due to a fear that information may be used against him/her -- Nope
reads negative meanings into innocuous remarks *Check*
bears grudges -- Not so much
perceives attacks on his/her reputation that are not clear to others, and is quick to counterattack -- No
maintains unfounded suspicions regarding the fidelity of a spouse or significant other -- Nope
So I guess 3 out of 7 isn't bad right?
EVE has a way of altering ones perspective if played too long. I think I fall into that category. If EVE makes people paranoid, wormhole life only makes it doubly so.
I don't know if I have coined the phase "Situational Paranoia" or I'm simply labeling something known by a different name. It doesn't really mater what its called, but its real. I see it in myself and my fellow EVE players. The game has a way of changing people and not for the better. Unless you think becoming a paranoid sociopath is awesome. The situational part comes in that it only happens when playing EVE, or participating with the META game (things that involve the game but not in the game) like say this Blog.
In real life, I'm a well adjusted adult with a job, wife and family responsibilities. I don't think my 5 year old is plotting against me, but when I'm in EVE every interaction is calculated, weighed and balanced for intel leaks or potential targets/threats. I am a victim of "Situational Paranoia". Victim isn't the best word, "willing participant" is a better description.
If 2 hours of paint ball is most MMORG, EVE wormholes is a 4 year trip to Vietnam. I often hear on voice coms how freaked out people are in high security space. How so many ships on scan or on a gate is terrifying. I have the same feelings. Our gut reaction is to lock them up, hit D and begin evasive action.
Perhaps this game has traumatized me to the point of me needing professional help. In the online definition of paranoia
Treatment options:
""Paranoia that is symptomatic of paranoid schizophrenia, delusional
disorder, or paranoid personality disorder should be treated by a
psychologist and/or psychiatrist. Antipsychotic medication such as thioridazine (Mellaril), haloperidol
(Haldol), chlorpromazine (Thorazine), clozapine (Clozaril), or
risperidone (Risperdal) may be prescribed, and cognitive therapy or
psychotherapy may be employed to help the patient cope with their
paranoia and/or persecutory delusions. Antipsychotic medication,
however, is of uncertain benefit to individuals with paranoid
personality disorder and may pose long-term risks.""
Self diagnosis is my strong point. Its easy. I'm cured. See, I just did it. But on a purely random note, if I was given any of those drugs would I be worse at EVE?
Since repeated psychological trauma could bring permanent damage the mind, is EVE making me crazy?
Recruitment Story
A guy by the name of Crake wanted to join us. This happens from time to time, and our recruitment is open for the most part. Our interview process is slightly well, for lack of a better description, "strange".
Our first step is to invite a perspective applicant into voice coms. This is before we have his API or anything. We then proceed in researching his corp history, kills, what he has ever said in any high sec local chat, in front of them. We put pressure on them from multiple directions, at once. We troll them nonstop with rapid fire questions. Our guys are not nice sometimes, we have helpful members, and loyal members, but for the most part we are a collection of salty a$$holes. We do not provide a welcoming environment.
We do this for a few reasons. The main reason, we want to make sure they can take a joke or harsh criticism. As a corp participate on the darker side of EVE sometimes, and morality often gets in the way. Offering hugs and a welcoming environment right off the bat is not us.
Our treatment of Crake wasn't nice. He has a shady corp history for sure. This sometimes doesn't stop us from recruiting people, hell one of our best members has done terrible things to previous corps he has been a part of. But something about him seemed 'off'. He wanted it too bad. His story checked out, but still our members kept calling him out.
Recruitment is a street gang voting system. We put a applicant through a serious ration of sh!t, if he can hack it, we ask every member online at that time, if they want him in they vote. In front of him. Flat out. If people pass this, we stop with the hazing. Interview over.
This guy needed further investigation, we couldn't figure out what his angle was. Enter Jhimmy, he is our corp creeper. The dirt he can find on people amazes me. He goes out of game, uses API's uses convos with people, connects dots that no one would even fathom, drills down to the point that would make the NSA blush. Jhimmy is amazing.
Jhimmy flagged him as suspect.
Now with that flag, our situational paranoia takes over. We told the guy to get lost. This guy could have been in the wrong place at the wrong time... not crossed a T or dotted an I when he should have. But because of this paranoia we have, he didn't make it. He was upset and pissed to say the least.
If the dude was legit, I want to say I'm sorry to him. But if he was the real deal, bent on the destruction of us, "work on your game bro".
Prognosis
Because of the inherent mistrust
felt by paranoid individuals, they often must be coerced into entering
treatment. As unwilling participants, their recovery may be hampered by
efforts to sabotage treatment (for example, not taking medication or not
being forthcoming with a therapist), a lack of insight into their
condition, or the belief that the therapist is plotting against them.
Albeit with restricted lifestyles, some patients with PPD or persecutory
delusional disorder continue to function in society without treatment.
I wonder, if EVE is making me crazy, was this latest recruitment problem my wake up call?
I would love to be vindicated and find out this guy was in fact a corp infiltrator, but if he isn't...
"So we thought it would be funny" is what someone or a group of someones says right before they do something stupid.
Nightly activities in SUSU (Semper Ubi Sub Ubi) involve rolling our static hole looking for targets or potential conflict. Once a hole is rolled we jump in, and look what we got. If there are no targets on D we resolve the new static hole. Find exits in that hole, repeat the same process. Nothing interesting, we just close that hole and do it again.
We reward our scouts/target finders by giving them any loot received from the pvp activities. You don't find targets, you don't get to keep the loot. That simple.
This particular roll we came across a C6 connected to our static C3. Corpsreaper the one who found the connection, jumps in and hits D-scan. He sees soo many assets that he can't accurately describe them all on Team Speak. He also stated music to a wormhole hunters ears "and we have wrecks on scan". This means potential targets.
Well we got more than we asked for. On scan was something estimated at 4 dreds, about 2 carriers, and a metric fk ton of T3 ships. More ships that we could engage with our meager gang and have any hope of winning or making it out alive for that matter.
Not wanting this opportunity to go to waste, we thought it would be funny to kick a hornets nest.
And here comes the bad idea.
We had the cloaked scout Corpsreaper book mark the wrecks of each of the anoms that had been run, giving us clear warp in targets. Then we all got into frigs and me in a blackbird. My job as blackbird ECM was to jam the remaining sleeper frig that was left up (for farming reasons) and the frigs would burn to the wrecks and we could pocket some quick C6 loot, and have a laugh doing it. The net worth of our entire fleet was about 20 million.
This was a bad idea, both in planning and execution.
Corpsreaper our scout bookmarked all the sites all right but he didn't distinguish the difference between each of the wrecks in the book marking process. So when our frig/cruiser fleet jumped into the C6... all 4 wrecks/site came up the same. He also was nice enough to book mark a site with the ENTIRE capitol fleet with T3s at them. He says in TS, don't warp to 'the top one'.
Heres a tip for those wondering, if you label all the bookmarks the same in corp bookmarks they all show random for anyone viewing them. Everyone went to different spots, with half of us showing up on grid with the entire cap fleet.
Kinda funny... we kept shouting in local "WEEE" or "You didn't see anything!" We all warped to different locations, and started scooping loot. Each sleeper wreck and there were lots, had 20mil worth of blue tags in it. We weren't really there for the money, it was more just the LOLs of it. I made it off with about 40 million (two wrecks) before our scout started saying there was a fleet forming on the hole we just jumped through and our only exit. Some other guys got a bit more but honestly the entire heist took about 30 seconds. Everyone said, its only a matter of time before they put up a warp bubble on the hole out, and we are stuck in here with them.
Everyone was laughing on coms...till our scout stated... "Uhh guys I think they are mad" They brought the fight to us. 4 guardians, 10+ T3s, various tackle frigs, and other random stuff. Their scout dropped probes in our C3 hole connected to our home hole.They found our hole in less than 5 minutes. That whole time, I was telling people in Jim (our home hole) to hurry up and make battle ship/orca passes to reduce the hole, and thus limiting the amount of ships they could bring to us. The attackers were fast and all we got was one orca pass(It takes at least 4 + a battleship or 2) to close the hole. Our scout reported some of their fleet warping to our door, we scrambled to get into combat ships.
In fights were we are outnumbered or out gunned by class of ship, we just engage at range and try to stick to gorrilla tactics. Hit and run style. We brought out a scorpion, blackbird and three tornados.
The fight started with a single proteus on our wormhole in Jim (our wormhole)which we shot and jammed. A legion jumped in, and cloaked up. Fearing a cloaked legion would uncloak next to our sniper ships, we spread out a bit. The enemy fleet cared little for our sniper ships and jumped their entire fleet into our hole. It was just too many targets, all made it out but their primary target was the scorpion. An over heated proteus with what looked like a faction warp disruptor pointed my scorpion from what seemed like 45k. My jams were cycling on their logi and small frigs, but there were too many ships. Dead scorp. The blackbird tried to save me, but he had problems of his own. Dead blackbird .
We took refuge in our POS trying to regroup and form our next move. More of their ships started to come from the C6. We bit off a tad more than we could chew.
A convo invite from one of them opened up on my screen. I didn't save the convo, but it was short and to the point.
TLC pilot: "Do you speak for your corp?"
Me: "Yep."
TLC pilot: "Here is the short of it, the first offer will be cheap, following offers will be more expensive"
Me: "Ok."
TLC pilot: "We will remove you, starting with your POCOs and then your POS if you don't pay us"
Me: "Fair enough"
My corp knew I was in talks with them and was screaming in coms to not pay them a ransom. I have always stated we wanted to keep the POS lean on assets because at any point in wormholes someone can come and remove you with force. My members keep few ships in the wormhole, and I do the same. All our ships are ment to be destroyed. We might have about 3 billion worth of stuff in our wormhole at any particular time. Not the biggest target out there, but it has value.
We did a little checking on the TLC alliance and they had the member base to siege a POS to the point we couldn't even defend well. We checked the kill board record and they do in fact 'remove people' quite regularly. Their threat was valid, and the resulting conflict would be brutal and not fun. Based on the amount of stuff they brought, and how angry they seemed to have gotten by our little "joke" I think they had the conviction for a drawn out conflict. Our 40 man corp vs their 200 member plus C6 funded alliance.
They had the ships, they had the experience, they had the people, and they seemed MAD! Combine that and removal was certain.
Now we were not without our defenses, or options. Mercs are just a bat phone away. They have their prices, but quality and professionalism is always the best with them. They also like a good fight just as much as the next guy. They might even do it for free, if we can get them good warp ins and good kills.
The ISK totals of my POCOs, POS and ships, totaled up in my brain. I explained it to the corp like this, if you want to fight them, I want you all to have some stake in this game. If the corp wide member base wanted to fight them, they are going to need to anti up for the price of new POCOs, and POS/MODS. When I put it in that context, the desire to make a stand for the sake of space honor reduced.
TLC pilot: "Our first offer is 500m"
Me: OK. Money sent.
These guys were letting us off on the cheap. We had pissed in their face and they just asked for a napkin. Hell yes, I would pay that. For 500m, it was worth the joke and the resulting story. If they had asked for more, I might have paid it, but if my money can be better spent on hiring mercs, I'll do that instead. As a ransomer, and having participated in ransoming in my past, there is a fine line with asking too much and having the ransomie simply telling you to get fked and hiring mercs.
The ransom if anything was symbolic and a show that nobody fks with TLC. Which I'm OK with. I get that, they needed to save face. After I sent the money, I asked if they thought what we did was the lest bit funny. He said, yea it was, and that they had people watching us from beginning to end.
If anyone from TLC is ever reading this, I want to say thank you for letting us off with a slap on the wrist. We understand you could have removed out small corp with a brush of your hand just on general principal and we are grateful for the lesson taught.
Ok, I'm not sure what your opinion maybe about corp infiltration and or AWOXING it differs from person to person. I want to clarify my stance on it right now.
All forms of pvp in EVE are valid. Be it undercutting people in the market, obtaining/enforcing a monopoly, creating an EVE scam that nets you billions or just millions, shooting blues, stealing, or just plain ganking someone. These things are real in EVE. The game for some is a battle of wits, cunning and just plain luck. This is what makes EVE so special to me.
All of the above being said each of us follows a different moral code of conduct when it comes with dealing with each other in EVE.
I personally draw the line in the sand box and say, 'if I give out my word, which I don't do often. I won't break it'. My pilots trust me because I haven't given them reason not to and on instances they have trusted me, it has been to their gain. Wormhole life is all about reputation and trust.
This game for me is much like a small mob family. All targets are exploitable, but family/Corp is most important above all. Cross the Corp/Family and we got trouble.
Now that we have my sociopathic outlook sorted, on with the story.
The story goes as follows. A friend of a friend joined a small corp for the soul reason of destroying and stealing its assets. When a social predator chooses his targets, its usually not by random happenstance. From talking with the individual and finding his motives, he explained. They had assets floating in space (in the WH) and looked to be the 'trusting' sort. They had an orca and thanatos floating in their unoccupied POS with a recruitment advert easily found.
Within 5 days of being a newbie in the worm hole corp, he was given "Starbase Config" roles. The reasoning behind giving this new person this level of access to a POS is hard to understand. I could make some guesses, help with fuel, help with POS management in some way, who knows. The point is, it was done. This gave the new person the ability to online and offline POS modules, including ALL POS towers owned by the corp.
The mark's wormhole had 3 POSs up in it all of different shapes/sizes and uses. They had only 1 large POS, 1 medium and 1 small (which is were the new person was located). I suspect they felt they could give him that level of access because the other POSs in the system were password protected. But you can offline/online a tower from outside the forcefield, also with this level of access, I think password protecting doesn't even stop him.
The Take down
Our corp doesn't do this type of thing very often, so our experience with these types of attacks is slightly limited. We made some mistakes, but keep in mind we don't know exactly what would happen in a given situation. All of the intel we got was from the infiltrator.
The marks had a habit of sitting in ships and being AFK while they went to work. No real reason behind this, its just what they did. This made it difficult to set up an accurate invasion time when the marks would be out of the POS and we could take them. We had no idea if they were actually behind the keyboard or just afk. The problem we were trying to tackle was when they noticed the shields were down, they would simply put them back up and remove the roles from the infiltrator.
Main Mistake
The primary mistake we made was thinking it took time to offline a POS and that it would show up on the overviews of the marks that it would be happening and it could then be stopped without a laps in defenses. This was a HUGE mistake on our part. Turns out in hind sight, a Pos can shut off with a flip of a switch and it just takes forever for it to be turned back on. Had we known this, the attack would have gone very differently.
Morality
In planning the attack I asked my guys multiple times if they had a ethical problem with executing the op. Personally I did, and I wrestled with it for awhile. My personal game ethics have nearly always been honorable combat. Not always even combat, but never any underhanded stuff. Being a WH ceo and constantly on the watch for spies. I thought to myself, have I become the person, I have been trying to protect my corp from? Has my paranoia manifested in very thing I build my defenses to keep out? My empathy for these poor bastards we were about to take for billions was strong. The first one is always the hardest, then a part of you kinda hides/dies and it becomes easier. I guess its a good thing I even thought about it at all, but the line in the sand clearly moved back a tad this day.
The Plan
We were still on wrong track thinking off lining a POS took a while. So we planed accordingly. We moved our fleet to the K space entrance of the WH. There were 5 actual humans controlling multiple pilots. In total we had about 14 characters. Each doing a different role. One of my characters was going to bring in a invasion kit (Iteron 5 with a cloak, 1 med pos, ship maint array, pos fuel,Corp hangar) two others would be scouts/'eyes' with 1 of my characters as a combat ship (enyo). We were going on the idea once we popped the ships we would need to lock/pod the pilots to further disrupt their ability to remove roles from the infiltrator.
We brought 2 orca's for looting reasons, fast lock frig,1 rapier, 1 interdictor for pods, two battle cruisers (hurricane and drake) just in case. We were accompanied by a Black legion guy, also a friend of a friend who was invited to join in on the fun.
The first plan was for the infiltrator to change the password of the large pos so that a out of corp pilot could warp to him and jump into the thanatos floating in the POS and fly it to a safe spot. The infiltrator was sure he wasn't allowed in the main POS and his sudden appearance in it would raise suspicion. Once the thanatos was safely away, he would change the POS targeting rules to not shoot on the fleet, and then Eject the marks in it out of the pos with the "allow corp usage" button. We would then lock up the ships ejected, pod them. Then with them dead, we would remove all fuel in the POS and shut it down for good. Our primary target would be the large POS because we felt it had the lions share of loot, followed by the medium then the small.
Upon execution we ran into some snags. The infiltrator warped in, changed password, thanatos pilot warped to the thanny and then warped it to saftey. The AFK tengu that was piloted by the CEO right next to the thanatos, came home from work 10 minutes before we began. Bad timing, bad luck. He also noted in corp chat, "I think we have company" having seen the rapier jump into the hole and make its way to the large pos. We executed the plan, expelling the CEO and his tengu out of the large POS he bounced almost 100k from the POS away from our fleet and the cloaked ships we had around the POS. We failed to tackle him with our fast ships, he warped off. Moving as quickly as possible our guys started ejecting small cans near the POS tower to fill up with fuel being yanked by the infiltrator. Once the we filled up 5 cans worth of fuel blocks, the infiltrator got the idea to just turn off the force field, which he did. It went down without a timer. (uggggg)
The infiltrator headed to the medium POS to repeat the steps. Half way through warp, he found his roles stripped. We only took 1 out of 3 POSes. Not the best outcome but we would make due. My guys started targeting the SMA and Hanger. The SMA was empty. Terrible outcome. We expected that to be filled ships because this was the largest and most defended of the three. The Hanger was filled with minerals for what we though would be their second carrier created in the C3. It also had multiple BPOs for small ships and BPCs. Total value of all cans 3.1 bill. Not as good as we thought it would be, but an OK pay out for the infiltrator and most involved after 5 days of work.
One of my alts opened up a convo with CEO of infiltrated corp. He took it well. Here is the convo.
My goal in this convo was to sell him back his stolen thanatos and exit his hole with a little bit more money in our pockets. My corp was thinking of double crossing him further, but I explained to them. Even though we just turned off the POS with a spy, I wasn't happy about going back on my word once given. This is a very clear distinction in my mind, but might be unclear for others. Since I'm in charge, thats what we were going to do. All ransoms must be upheld. Period. Needless to say, the people we just attacked were not convinced by my conviction level.
The CEO was calm for the most part and understood, this was a purely business transaction. He gave me the impression while talking with him the owner of the thanatos may want to buy it back at a discount. Remember the value of the thanatos is nearly 1.4 billion. We can't take it with us and sell it on the open market, because its trapped in this C3. Capital ships can not enter or exit C1 - C4's. They can be built in them, by retarded people, but not brought in or out. Its value is entirely based on what the people living in the wormhole place on it. Hence the best person to sell it to, are the people actually living there. We asked for 800m.
Seeing that the trust point of the transaction needed to be addressed by a 3rd party, I went to the only people I trust to keep their words in worm holes. Mercs. Good mercenaries in EVE have a very strict code of conduct when dealing with customers of their services. They call these transactions 'contracts'. Once a contract is negotiated it will not be altered by ANY party, unless its change agreed upon by all parties. Exhale is one of the best in wormhole space. The call went out in the merc channel that I needed a 3rd party for a ransom. This is a common thing for mercs to deal with so the professionalism I got was awesome. Here is that convo.
By the end of that convo. It was clear they were not willing to pay. Other actions needed to take place. Being a CEO of a PVP corp, I didn't want a unfit thanatos kill on our kill boards, I was happy to self destruct it and collect the insurance money. My corp had some concerns, they felt there was a recent change in the game saying if you self destructed a ship, no insurance was paid. They also had blood lust in their hearts and wanted something to explode. The black legion guy volunteered to pilot it and get shot by us. He received reluctant permission from his alliance/corp to do so. My corp stripped the thanatos of whatever was on it, and fit it with whatever we could find from the loot of the marks POS. It made this hilarious kill mail. and this video of the thanatos's destruction.
After the destruction of the thanatos, the rest of the op was us removing the stolen goods out of the targets wormhole. Our intention was never to "take the C3". It was always just to get what we could get and move on in a day.
We heard random conversations after the fact that the primary CEO that had awarded the infiltrator his roles has stepped down. I hope for the sake of the corp, the new CEO will be more aware of what POS roles have what impact and which don't.
Having participated in the darker side of EVE, I'm still not really sure this will be the path our corp will follow. I hate using the typical excuse, "its just a game" because in my eyes its not. The bonds of human interaction are real to me. The empathy I feel for my victims is real, the care I extend for my friend and corp mates is real. The effort applied to the game by the victims has some value. To disrespect them, is to disrespect the hunter/prey relationship.
In summary, I'm conflicted and I'll leave it at that.
