The Virtual Life of Tass

Living a Virtual Life in a Not So Virtual World.

2014-10-17T00:19:00.001-07:00

Well guys. It's been forever since this blog saw the light of day. Well, I broke out my maid uniform, blew off the dust and used one of those duster feather things to remove the cobwebs!

Today I wanted to address the ability of one with a job (mainly military) to actually accomplish gaming while still fulfilling the contract I signed and the oath I swore.

Let's just say... it isn't easy.

For those of you who know me, you also know that well, I don't talk about my job. Not because I don't love it, quite the contrary: I'll be the first person to admit I love it, but there's not much to say and the cool stuff I can't talk about. Ah well. I swear cool stuff is boring. But yeah, I find it incredibly hard to actively pick up a controller or sit down in front of a keyboard unless I'm in port which is not often enough.

On board where I work we have guys who find time to play Madden or MLB or FIFA but still, when you're shoved into a cramped space and your console is one of those protective pelican type cases with a monitor and an HDMI hookup, it's almost more fun to sleep which I frequently do.

When I am in though, let me just say. I have recently continued playing Planetside 2 and the game continues to look stunning. I haven't quit minecraft and I don't plan to, though I find myself playing it way less then I used to, and last but not least Age of Empires.

I even started streaming but it turned into a huge flop. A few dedicated fans are asking me to return but I don't know if I have the drive to. Maybe I will, maybe I won't. It all is yet to be determined.

So there's my gaming rant for the day. It's like 3am here and I need to switch over my laundry.

Peace. -Tassemet

Tinker's Construct: Way Too Much Fun!

2014-06-02T16:51:00.002-07:00

So, my buddy recently started up a server for us all to play on and insisted on "Only a few mods" to "make the game a bit easier and fun." Ok. Let's cut the crap there. Only a few mods resulted in Tinker's Construct, Applied Energistics, and some other mods like Zain's Minimap Mod... and while it certainly made the game more fun, an hour long car ride was really an hour of me using my phone and some graph paper to do drawings and tables/charts of all the things you needed and where they went and... GAH! Before I knew it I was sucked into one of the most fun yet complex mods I've seen short of Tekkit!

So yes, the biggest thing I liked in the Tinker's Construct mod was the modular tool system and how furnaces were more or less for early game. After that, the smeltery was the way to go. So let me show you some screenshots and let you all see our little village and how that's working out for us (as well as my complete inability to hold a solid thought long enough to construct a single building!) Via clicking.... HERE!

So yeah, this blog isn't letting me upload photos directly to it like I've done in the past but CLICK THAT LINK. You'll see it all in my imgur album including a Villager with a 'fro, me with a jester hat, and some other cool things.

Until next Tinker's Construct Update!

Cheers!
-Tassemet Zateki

A Lesson In How to be an Asshole and Not Walk Away

2014-06-02T13:14:00.001-07:00

It's been a really long time since I have written anything. Anything at all. But recently, an event irked me, so let me first start by posting some logs here really quickly.

Wardec chat logz
From: Tassemet
Sent: 2014.05.29 12:40
To: XXX,

Lothar Holdchar > Yes hello
Tassemet > good evening, sir/
Tassemet > I was just looking to inquire into the reason you wardec'd our corp?
Lothar Holdchar > Because 25 million ISK
Tassemet > What do you mean?
Lothar Holdchar > That Raven contract today
Tassemet > Ah haha
Lothar Holdchar > A very insulting offer
Lothar Holdchar > so I'm going to come on up from Stain
Tassemet > Knew it was something market related
Lothar Holdchar > and say hello
Tassemet > I must ask how it was insulting considering I had my market window pulled up and it was showing 170mil buy orders :)
Lothar Holdchar > For a regular raven
Lothar Holdchar > mine had 3 large rigs
Lothar Holdchar > You were asking me to sell you a stripped raven
Lothar Holdchar > Lowballing me by 25 mil
Tassemet > Just trying to make isk, man. No offense, but I was polite :)
Lothar Holdchar > The offer was extremely insulting
Tassemet > I appologize if I insulted you.
Lothar Holdchar > I didn't realize it in first due to being in fleet
Lothar Holdchar > So a wardec is in order
Tassemet > Fair enough, friend.
Tassemet > I wish you the best of luck :)

Now that I have that out of the way, cue lesson.

It seems all too often nowadays that people are being absolute assholes, and I've noticed it ever more since my early days of EvE when I started after Red Moon rising came out. It appears to me that there's been a huge trend towards violence as a means to "put people in line." Now, before you all dismiss this as another scenario of "Boo-hoo. Another care bear whining, the tears they are delicious!" Let me say this.

Violence is unwarranted as a scare tactic.

I'm not scared, not in the least. I mean, sure, I made the guy a low offer as the chat logs explain but honestly, who doesn't play the market game and troll through contracts and look for people who might be looking for a quick sell? I was when I sent out several offers via evemail. And of all those, I must say, only one guy took the high road with a nice reply of "Sorry m8, it's priced fair." No worries.

This guy made the point to laugh at me, throw insults in chat and leave on one character, and then turn around and contact me on ANOTHER character AFTER he said no with only "You're dumb."
Oh and then he proceeds to wardec my corp over a market offer. Ah well.

Lesson to be learned here: If someone makes a market offer, no need to go nuts to the point of wardeccing a corporation to prove a point. Awesome, you know how to pvp. Got it. Go find some enemies out in null that are the real baddies that are threatening to take your space. And while some may argue that taking isk is just as bad, how is twenty five million isk in my favor going to change anything? I'm all about reinvesting and making more isk. So while you have a wardec going that you will keep paying out millions for, I'll just log on with an alt and continue to play the game and have fun.

Who knows, maybe you'll be so broke that you'll come to me asking me to buy your Raven for 170mil.

Ermagurd! Tassemet Is BACK!

2013-06-12T13:06:00.002-07:00

Hey all! So once again as my job dictates, I'm back. Yeah. Life is... so so ish, what with my upcoming work schedules and such. But later nights can be filled with a bit of classy drinking, and some gaming, so without much further ado, I present to you, a screenshot montage courtesy of my new gaming rig, named Alessia.

Alessia is an Alienware running some nice high end shit. 2 AMD grafix cards, SATA hard drives, an i7 Intel processor, and 32gb RAM. That's just the basic stats. Externally, it's running a TACX Alienware keyboard that glows with the system case, as well as a Razer mousepad (Goliathus, Speed edition) and I am waitin gon a second monitor, and more paychecks before I upgrade my terribad headset and my semi-terribad mouse.

So, let's start off with the best thing that I have returned back to, EVE Online!

So I just want to put out there that these were screenshots I took with my settings on max, and I get about 120fps running this way, too. The game is absolutely stunning. When missiles hit, I hope you can see the shockwaves they leave on your ship as well as I can on my computer, because blowing your ass up never looked so good. Also, with the interaction with Eve and my Alienware LED case, the keyboard flashes and such when I hit certain milestones in the game (ie shields gone, armor gone, reached destination when on autopilot, etc.) So be sure to spend some money and get one of these things, you'll be glad you did.

And now onward to my favorite cubic game, Minecraft!

So, I've been gone a while and if you haven't kept up with Rooster Teeth Let's Play Minecraft, I suggest you catch up now. And if you've never seen it, google Rooster Teeth Let's Play Minecraft and watch it from the very beginning. And then all 54 episodes they're up to. New episodes released every Friday. And while you're waiting for that to come out, check out their other Let's Plays and be amused. Seriously, they have so much good stuff on their channels.

So, world wise, I have officially downloaded the tekkit launcher for my new machine and I can now run my modded world without lag. Not gonna lie, I had a great idea but... but I'm more focused on the core intent of the game now and solely play vanilla. Anyways, the screenshots aren't on my laptop where I'm blogging from so i'll update that in a separate post.

So, until then!
-TZ

The Tassemet Challenge: Security Lighting

2013-03-25T19:04:00.001-07:00

Good evening ladies and gentlemen!

It's been a while since i last posted but never the less I always come back with to blogging with a vengence! This time around it's based on Minecraft and a challenge I thought up while underwater. So, without further ado, here's the challenge!

With the new 1.5 minecraft update, we were granted new Daylight Detector Blocks! These blocks as you may or may not know, send redstone signal based off of the dark/light level it recieves! So, I built a basic lamp that uses one of these connected to a piston connected to the new Redstone block to power 4 redstone lamps. So, to take that one step further, and it's something i'm working myself, is to connect this detector to a building that automatically turns on lighting to a whole building. I won't tell you how to build it but here's the rules of this challenge.

1. Use Vanilla Minecraft to give everyone a level and even playing field (We know you technic junkies laugh at Vanilla's simplicity)
2. Use a daylight detector to automatically turn lighting on in the building.
3. Lighting must be lamps. Redstone torches can be used in the circuitry, however.
4. The building (or buildings) must be 3 or more stories tall. Note I do say 3 or more.5. The circuitry must be hidden from view, because the buildings are to look "professional."

Anything beyond that, well, feel free to be as creative and aesthetic as you wish. Judging will be done by my girlfriend and I based on aesthetics, wow factor, and functionality, each worth 10 points. Each of us will judge seperately on the 30 point scale, and we'll average the two. In the case of a tie breaker, a third person will be brought in for judging, and we'll average three to break the tie of those tied.

Submissions for judging can be done via sending a world file to jmwalker8@gmail.com and the winning submission will be featured with an interview of your builds done, and the satisfaction of knowing you're an awesome builder! All entries are due by midnight of April 8th! If these challenges pick up we'll offer up some nice prizes but that's in the works!

Reply here if you're down so I can get estimates of interest.

Good luck building!
Cheers.
Tass

Tales From Cityscape 1

2012-11-27T11:38:00.001-08:00

So just a few more photos with an update on my world. As you can see, I've made a few changes: For one, the world name is now "Cityscapes" to reflect what I'm building inside. I've also changed my skin to look classy as hell. And, I've even got a few more levels on my building! On a side note- the bottom two photos don't do justice to the work i'm doing inside and underground of that building- I'm swapping to Redstone Lamps to make my building more ecofriendly by reducing carbon released into the air... that's right! The torches are slowly being phased out!

Also, planning to do an underwater walkway of sorts as soon as I figure out how I want to accomplish that task (working underwater is such a pain!)

Another thing: I had a distinguished guest in one of my worlds the other day. Click there and check out who it was!

-Tassemet

Those Worlds That Make You Say...

2012-11-25T07:03:00.001-08:00

I quit Minecraft.

Ok, not really. But this one world I saw today on reddit makes me look like a newbro to the game. The world is titled "The Kingdom Of Cipher" and features what looks to be a build done in Creative mode. I don't know where this guy's inspiration came from, but it looks to me like something out of either a Disney movie, or maybe even the Square Enix game, Kingdom Hearts.

I'm not going to post photos and steal this guy's imgur traffic, nope, he deserves it in my opinion.

Anyways, the build features a lot of pastel colors and glamorous shots of a fantasy kingdom. I'll just drop the link right here. Feel free to check it out and give him all your upvotes on reddit.

Another link here to a funny photo. Bedrock at level 26.

And another bedrock joke. Funny as hell.

Links galore. This one to a nice background for minecraft. I'd use it as my desktop if I were you.

I love Minecraft. And desktop backgrounds. Makes me wish I had a second or third screen to use it on!

How not to build a wheat farm. Seriously, decorative purposes only. I have a nice design for a stackable wheat farm as soon as I can find my graph paper drawing that I did...

And finally. An awesome legit build on survival. It looks like something I would build... only it needs a beacon somewhere in it.

The Role of A Gaming Community In A Game

2012-11-24T08:35:00.003-08:00

Let me first start by saying that this blog post was brought about by Minecraft.

I bought my brother a gift card for the game so we can play together, and today, I figured I'd hop onto our world a bit early before him and do some work on a house. Well, instead, I found the "CLICK HERE FOR LIVE MINECON STREAM" on my log-on. So, deciding I could listen to the live stream while playing, I clicked.

And was promptly disappointed.

Let's start with what i do know: Minecon is huge from a few years ago. Much like the one that was held in Vegas, it went from 11 guys and one in a creeper costume to thousands upon thousands. Notch became a hero in less then a year. And now, the venues are getting bigger and bigger and bigger. Anyways, I must have caught the Q&A after a presentation, because it was Jeb and a few others of the development team sitting down as kids and adults alike came to the microphone to field their questions to the panel.

Again I was disappointed.

A lot of these kids and adults came to the microphone decked out in their favorite Minecraft gear, hoodies, t-shirts, capes, you name it... and promptly began the "When are you going to add X feature into the game?" And there wasn't just one, it was a whole slew of them. And it wasn't just the kids asking these questions, but the adults too. And it made me remember a quote I had read somewhere, "Minecraft is being built for self-entitled 12 year olds." Now, I disagree to some extent there. I understand that these kids asking these questions are young, and just want an open forum to get their feature added in, much like football fans yell at coaches to run their favorite play, and will do so until the play is run (successfully, I might add.)

Now, one question that was fielded really caught my attention. A little kid stepped up to the mike and asked "How long does it take to add a saddle recipie to the game?" For those of you who don't know, saddles are used on pigs to turn them into a horse of sorts, and you can guide them via a carrot on a stick. And the reply came back, "About 3 seconds. But we're not going to." This drew a sad face from the kid. "We want you to find these saddles in dungeons, because we want less things to be craftable, and more things to be discoverable."

This brought me to realize that gaming communities can't ever hope to directly guide game developers. But they do have 2 indirect roles to play as the community. And those roles are, "Debugging," and "Feedback Reinforcement." In "Debugging," the community submit reports abouts issues to developers or intermediary game masters to get glitches and bugs removed from the game. These can be simple graphical issues, or be complex game breaking mechanics. And then there's "Feedback Reinforcement," which consists of positive or negative reaction from the playerbase. If the reaction is good, the feature stays and maybe gets developed further. However, if the reaction is negative, then the feature may be pulled, or if it can't, the effects of said feature are reduced or downplayed and development stops on it. This Feedback Reinforcement doesn't have to be before a feature hits a game, nor does it have to be instant. For instance, forum posts. These can be an early indicator, and a late indicator could be months down the road, when people think something is good, but then it turns out it wasn't. In which case, more forum posting, or just whining in game (as is usually the case)

In Minecraft, based on the question that the kid fielded and the response given, I have to feel for the kid. Who doesn't want their idea in a world famous game? But at the same time, I ultimately have to side with the Mojang crew. It is their game after all. If the developers want more content that users have to explore the game to find, then ultimately, that's what the developers want, and no amount of being a big loud fan boy (or girl) at a live event such as Minecon will change that. And while there might be whining in forums of "WE WANT THIS NOW!", maybe eventually there will be a time and place to release said feature, and today might not be that day.

And this doesn't just apply to Minecraft, but other games as well, and one of the most notable examples is the game I played called, "EvE Online." There was one such patch named Incarna that everyone hated. It brought about useless features that nobody used and took out useful features that everyone used. Eventually, CCP Games, the developers of EvE took a good hard look at the direction their company and game development was going after the player base gave "Negative Feedback" on the features of Captain's Quarters and the removal of spinning ships. Another incident in that game was the leaking of a letter called, "Greed Is Good," an internal company newsletter supposedly designed to "Stimulate conversation and ideas" but instead was one of the focuses of the "Jita Riots," an ingame event that took place over a weekend where people piled into the main trade hub of the game to shoot at a statue that is Invulnerable. Again, this form of Negative feedback got things to change, and now the game is going in a direction that everyone can *mostly* agree is positive.

Ultimately, gaming is a business however, and game companies have a duty to listen to their fanbase to keep making money. But they also have a duty to follow their own creative juices and not let a fanbase completely dictate how a game is created. If that was the case, then a lot of good games might head south. To the contrary, a lot of bad games might have been saved and made good. It's a fine line that gamers and developers walk.

But, little kid, don't be upset that Jeb told you no. Keep on gaming and having fun with what the developers of Minecraft have given you, and may give you. Request things on the forums, and get some support from fellow gamers. Who knows, they might have told you no because they have something bigger in store for that feature you requested.

-Tassemet

Minecraft World: New World Order

2012-11-18T17:05:00.001-08:00

A few photos form my world and buildings I'm working on.
-Tassemet

Just When You've Seen it All...

2012-10-28T10:05:00.003-07:00

Just when you think you've seen all Minecraft has to offer... BAM! Something new pops up to surprise you.

So while doing my daily reddit thing I came across a guy named Spaceribs's Imgur album which depicted his rendition of what I assume is the Book "World War Z." Now, if you haven't read the book, I highly suggest you do read it, because it's awesome. If also reminds me of the book "Deadline" by Mira Grant and when the characters go foraging into the wild zombie infested cities to get footage of them fighting zombies to boost their blog ratings. Maybe I should take a key point from that.

Anyways, here's his link to the imgur album. Click here for Zombie coolness.

Also the link to his subreddit where you can find updates on his work and his server, which looks pretty damn cool.

Anyways, there's your view of cutting edge minecraftiness.

I have a hurricane to go prepare for.
-Tassemet

First Alliance Problems

2012-10-24T13:06:00.002-07:00

Whew.

Class is done. Thank god. I was seriously bored and I wanted graph paper to doodle minecraft stuff on. Or eve economics because I had a rough price figure of all the mins in my head. You know, because paying for Oxygen isotopes is expensive nowadays. For those buying/wanting capitals, keep cost in mind. It's not one time like a battleship or cruiser with short spurts spent here and there for ammo or cap boosters. Nope. Shit is constant. And waiting for neuts to leave your jump in system so you can light a cyno is more then annoying too.

On the plus side landing on a station exactly 0km off it while reds are in system is exhilerating. Awww yeah. And I get those ships delivered where they need to go in a timely manner. It is immensely helpful beyond just providing a DPS platform and an oversized triage. Although the triage is nice, I've yet to see it used due to it drawing fire almost immeadiately after entering it's cycle.

In other news, yeah holy crap. Finding it hard to blog today. I'm cracking a monster open at 4pm EST just to stay awake and it's killing me. I really shouldn't stay up late talking but you know there's this girl... Alright. Story for a different time.

So it seems that TEST is making serious headway against -A- since the fall of the 4-0 station. We're getting close. -A- doesn't have much further to run back to highsec. As it is, I believe that peeps are camping them into NPC space where they are trying to regain their breath. And jump carriers out... Which of course one got doomsdayed on the undock. Dumb bastard.

Also on a bit of a bad luck for -A- (course TEST calls it fate), they had a Ragnarock killed by a shit ton of Pandemic Legion Supercaps and Titans. Needless to say, It's was the ole logoffski trap we set. Just goes to show that some people shouldn't be flying expensive ships. Might be best to leave that to those who actually can do it right, or those who aren't stupid.

Right, also, -A-, thanks for undocking to kill rifters you fucking faggots. Can't fight TEST but you'll fight Goons. Especially if you know you will win. Spineless cowards. You all shouldn't rest knowing you killed a few frigs with your tengus still alive... we will find them and we will kill them, rest assured it's just a matter of time.

Anyways, I have a monster to finish. -A-, i'm done shitting on you guys for now. Stand up, give us good fites. And give us more comms in which makalu rages.
-Tassemet

More Minecraft Related Stuff.

2012-10-22T19:46:00.000-07:00

Ok, minecraft related stuff.

So, I just want to say (not that it's happened to me before) but sometimes the worst creepers are the ones that you let onto the server.

Ok, pagodas are cool. No, I didn't build the pagoda near the cherry blossom fields. I wish. In fact, I want the construction plans for it.

And My tower. LoTR style. Needs more materials and the area needs leveled. I hate Leveling.

-Tassemet.

My Second Winter

2012-10-22T12:53:00.002-07:00

Returning Home

Well guys, it's been forever. Some days I swear I forget I have a blog. That makes me a terrible person... sometimes it's just so hard to keep up with everything that goes on. Reminds me of an article Goonswarm once wrote about choice paralysis..

Anyways, guess what? I'm in TEST now since my last posts forever ago. And I also fly a carrier, albeit not that great but hey. Working on it. Photos at the bottom of the post.

Anyways, been flying blackbirds when I fleet up. Tons of fun those are! Gotten on several kills mainly because of jamming. Also got on my first ever capital killmail while jamming out a thanatos. This was also the same fight where I was hero repped by the best logi on earth. Came back from 26% structure to stay alive and fight another fight. Also photo of that on the bottom courtesy of (Insert Name here) who was also the would be hero.

Sindel Pellion, @SindelPellion http://www.sindelsuniverse.com/

Ok, so been in a few fleet fights that have triggered TiDi. Makes life easy. Also, been in supercap fights that also triggered TiDi and let me tell you, it's quite a sight seeing so many titans and supercaps on the field at once. It honestly makes me can't wait to structure grind with one (which I eventually want to do) but I'm working on pimping out my carrier first.

Speaking of TEST Alliance, there's been these amazing parodies released by a TEST member named Sindel Pellion. She's awesome, and has an amazing voice, and sings good stuff. She also does a song with a guy in (bleh) Against All Authorities, @DJ_StarStream. Give her a follow over on twitter, @SindelPellion, or visit her site http://www.sindelsuniverse.com/ and read it. GOOD SHIT. Funny shit too. Read it ALL. Also, give to her Angel Project. A worthy cause. I wish she was around when i was trying to afford a missioning Raven. It's about time someone has done something for our new players of eve. Read Here for more info on the Angel Project.

Anyways, gotta wrap this post up. I have another blog to update with more goodies (my writing stuffs) and also a fleet to join to head to Fountain. Time to kill baddies.

Until Then,
-Tass

PS- Photos. All the photos.

Maiden Voyage, Carolyne

BlackBird of Doom

Top: Logi Bro Lovin'!
Bottom: "Bridge is up, GO GO GO!"

CCP Lovin'/CSM Drink Follies

2012-05-29T07:51:00.000-07:00

Well, it's another thing I love about eve.

Tweet in on a conversation, laugh, spill your drink, and you get some love from CCP Punkturis herself. Yup, heart and all. It all started with a routine photo tweeted about a female waitress spilling drinks on our beloved CSM members (yup) and rumors swirl on whether or not she's a goon in waitress from. We'll have to see. But, CSM, drinks at 2:30pm in the afternoon? Means that everything is going smoothly! See, I'm guessing that orange soda has something to do with new content. Or maybe an orange soda mixer? We'll never know. But what I do know is thus far, I'm happy with the CSM's progress (I didn't get to vote for my choice, real life move and all that) but still, good to see progress being made, one spilled drink at a time.

As for CCP's interaction with their players (of which I am 50 miles away from being one currently... damn laptop bag is too heavy to fit on my back while I'm on my motorcycle)... I'm impressed. A few years ago, it'd be rare that you'd ever interact with the developers, let alone GM's except in curt replies on your latest reimbursement that that won't give you. In terms of interaction, a letter I sent to the mittani went unanswered. A tweet I said about CCP punkteris was replied within minites. Not that I hate goonswarm, but currently, CCP, 1, Goonswarm leadership, 0.

Oh, and photo proof, cuz I know there's some disbelievers (and those who don't use twitter)

Bringing The Inferno

2012-05-28T10:30:00.002-07:00

I'm back waiting to get in game.... the whole game download takes forever...

Damn my laptop for having to toss me a bad hard-drive... again.

Changes to the blog:

2012-02-12T06:31:00.000-08:00

So it seems that I missed the fact that I had commenting enabled to only those with a google account. That has now been changed to allow anyone to post now. Makes commenting that much easier (and that much more anonymous!)

Also, deleted an old roleplaying blog with only 2 posts in it and moved them to here. It's gaming related EvE stuff, so I've added a new "RolePlaying" tag in there. Read and enjoy.

Also, I fixed a few layout issues and color schemes. Enjoy the new bright hover-over effects and this random anime photo I'm posting.

Cheers!
-Tassemet

Eyes of the Stranger

2012-02-12T05:59:00.001-08:00

"Look. We have some important business we think you can take care of."

"Well then, isn't it always?" Elizabet replied, nonchalant. "It always is, and it always gets done regardless." She carried an air of indifference in her tone, but also a tone of arrogance. "It's the money that tells me exactly how important."

"Well in your terms then, this is not worth your time. However, I may have an exception to the rule." The man stated. "We have cargo. Worth hundreds of millions. We'll pay you ten percent easy." The man looked smug.

"Well, with that much isk involved... I'm almost afraid to ask what I'm moving around. But I won't." Elizabeth crossed her arms. "What's the size of the cargo? We talking a Bestower's worth, a Providence's worth?" She threw out questions rapid fire.

"Two trips in a Providence should satisfy the needs of the job."

"Two?!?!" Elizabeth exclaimed. "You can't be serious!"

"I am dead serious." The man replied, smirking. "Is it too much for you to handle? If so, I can always find someone else to do it for me."

"No. We'll get it done. Although now I need to know what I'm moving, or at least the legality of it." She replied, regaining her composure. "And if we need to provide colleteral."

The man smiled, then started laughing. "No need for colleteral." Elizabeth's mouth opened, in shock and confusion. It must have shown because the man's laughter only grew louder and more boisterous.

... "We want you to move a few million veldspar."

"Well, if that's what you want, then we'll do it." Elizabeth replied, finally realizing her slack jaw and fixing it. "If you'll send me a contract?" She started walking away, intent on finishing the job as soon as possible. "I'll get started on it right away when it's formalized." She started walking to out of her golden tan quarters, those typical of Amarr stations and down the hall towards the landing pad where her pod sat, open and inviting, before she turned around.
"Excuse me," she said, as she realized something, and walked back to her quarters and out of the hall. "For being such a terrible host and walking off. Allow me to offer you the use of my place until I return, and make yourself at home."

The man replied quickly, "No need Miss Zateki, I'll just be leaving." He started walking away.

"Oh wait!" She cried out, forgetting an important detail she normally never missed. "Sir, what's your name?"

"Tassemet." He replied as he opened the door into the station and left.

Elizabeth quickly took off her clothes as soon as the man was gone, and near sprinted down the hall to her pod, the cold air of the station giving her goosebumps, the metal floor chilling her feet to near numbness. As she plugged the neural jack into the back of her neck and settled into her pod, her last physical feelings were of the pod doors closing her into blackness, and the warm sensation of the life-providing goo being pumped into her pod. As the external camera bots took over her sight, artificial sound was piped straight to her brain, and her pod left the station, she mentally thouht to herself, "Damn! I forgot to drink my coffee!"

As the pod flew out of the hangar bay and into space, a lone robot in her quarters sensed her thoughts. It scurried to the table picked up the still hot cup before making its exit again.

Just Another Day

2012-02-12T05:58:00.001-08:00

The lone bestower slowly and quietly approached the station, and after requesting docking permission, was tractored into the docking bay, the ship releasing blue jets of flame as the thrusters assited with aligning the ship to the hidden hatches that lead to outside the ship. As the ship sat floating above the landing pad, a lone pod jettisoned itself and made for the nearby captain's quarters.

As she processed herself through physical and nanochemical scrubbing, and got dressed in her regal outfit fit for one of the amarr nature, she took the time to pin up her blonde hair in the braided bun she normally wore. As she stepped out of the decontamination zone and onto a catwalk overlooking her ship, she shook her head at the dock drone awaiting her.

"I'm going to be here for a few hours, please, unload the ore in the cargohold and move it to my hangar. Also, have the ship inspected for any damage. I think I might have taken a bit of fire from those damn rats that call themselves pirates nowadays. Oh. And also, bring me a holopad, and a hot cup of coffee with cream and sugar. All this flying has made me want some caffiene that isn't from a booster." The drone rolled away, blinking lights in acknowledgement.

Elizabeth glided gracefully over to the couch and sat down on it and consulted the hologram projector on the table and checked to see that her orders were followed, which she noticed were. Amarr stations... I love being home, She thought to herself as she glanced up from the cargohold readout of her Bestower, named Lilly II, and around at the draub colors of the quarters. She especially liked the majestic pillars and statues which paid tribute to their gods and religion. Then she reached up to the base of her skull and itched around the metal plate that was her pod link. That, she didn't like, as she once again thought of the first day she tried to walk. She found it more for her fancy and for pure enjoyment, walking on legs that she knew she had. However, being a spaceship pilot, tractor beams were her hands, thrusters her real legs, and lasers her weapons. She perferred being suspended like a child in the womb, in her liquid goo that was her pod, the interface that ran down her back connected to machines as advanced as man was old. But, there were times that warranted her stepping out of her protective comfort, like when money was involved, especially when money was involved.

The station door buzzed. "Yes?" she replied in her clear alto voice.

"You have a visitor, he says you were expecting him." Said the montone robotic voice.

"Yes, yes I was. Let him in." She got up out of the couch and quickly walked over to the door, not wanting to be seen as a rude host. Just as she got there, the door slid open with a hiss, and a white man, large and intimidating, with blue eyes and peachfuzz for hair, walked through in his cargo pants, quafe t-shirt, jacket, and combat boots. Around his feet buzzed a small robot which Elizabeth recognized as a delivery drone. The delivery drone went to the table and placed down her coffee, hot and steaming, and then made it's departure. The man on the other hand, hung by the doorway.

"Well, hello," said Elizabeth, nearly stammering at his impressive eyes and disarming smile. "How can I help you?"

EvE Never Takes a Hiatus

2012-02-11T10:36:00.000-08:00

It seems that I keep taking breaks from Eve as of late. however, I'm still around. Time to discuss this!
Ok so yeah, for some reason I seem to be bored with eve but I'm sticking with it as best as I can. For some reason I thought running a corp in eve would be easy with only 11 members, but it's a chore some days. Always hauling it seems. So I took a week long break, got some sleep, and I'm back. With a solid and steadfast director, my absence went *almost* unnoticed except when I missed my Friday ops. Ah well, I'm back, and it's time to play!

There isn't a whole lot happening in Eve... if you live in highsec! In nullsec however, supers seem to be getting killed rather regularly, and space is shifting hands at an astonishing rate. One big story however, is RA's current CEO stepping down from power. He admits that he did real money trading with the alliance wallet, and yet it seems people still love him. But when this guy stepping down, RA is taking a huge blow to their leadership and the potential for them to hold space against the ever increasing threat of Against All Authorities. My take on this is hopefully RA does fall, despiite the fact that a few of my friends live in their space, because it owuld be a situation of "Out with the old, in with the new." With over a hundred systems opening up to newer players and alliances, we could see the foundation of new nullsec powers. Although my current guess is that some of the big stars of the nullsec world will just drop down there and scoop it up for themselves. Good old nullsec!

I see a killmail floating around that has been confirmed from multiple sources that a carrier fully faction and officer fit was taken down in a wormhole! Congratulatory words go out to Aperature Harmonics and their crew for such an amazing kill. Hopefully, the pilot of that carrier will learn a lesson and not decide to rat when AHARM comes knocking on their hole- especially not in one worth more then a well fit super carrier. Ah well. An idiot is born every second and EvE is no exception to that rule.
*EDIT* Thanks to a comment from below, it seems that the carrier was actually willingly engaged into the fight. Mad props to that pilot for flying such an expensively fit ship an in attempt to ward off the would be invaders. I must say damn. Balls of steel. Link to the full story on how it went down here.

On another note- I have seen another impressive kill mail, this one comes from highsec and has video proof! A ~~ratting~~ *edit: missioning* megathron thought that he could take down an iteron and well, he was wrong. I can't say i know what the megathron was thinking but let this show to all you pilots that iterons are a lot nastier then you think! Props goes out to Pandemic Legion's own HulkUp for this amazing kill.

For now though, that's all I have! Fly dangerously!
-Tassemet

Crucible 1.1: Wishful Thinking or Half-Planned Release?

2012-01-24T12:31:00.000-08:00

We're not even a day into the new release of Crucible 1.1 and already there has been a server restart due to POS. The restart thus far hasn't been commented on as of yet but already rumors as stating it's about the overloaded conditions of the POS fuel bay mixed half with fuel and half with the new fuel blocks that are slated to make POS fueling easier.

Also with this new update comes the customizable NeoCom- Burger King style. Have it your way. Put the icons where you want them, place them in folders- and my personal favorite- the AUTOHIDE feature! Now Eve can be more about spaceships when it counts, and less about them when it doesn't. It also makes finding those browser bookmarks easier amongst other options that are offered in the patch.

While the full effects of the fuel block patch haven't been fully seen it, and probably won't for a long while- my predictions:
- Fuel block prices will double for the next two weeks while corps that didn't prepare buy them in massive quantities
- More War decs
- Higher POS module and tower prices
- More offline POS
- Higher PI prices due to increased fuel block price.

Only time will tell. Join me and watch; Just don't forget to bring popcorn.

New Year, Same Eve

2012-01-11T18:34:00.000-08:00

Wow hey all!

It's been a while since my last blog post on all the happenings of Eve, I Tassemet, do appologize for that. Vacation and paperwork on top of other stuff at my job keeps me busy, and suprisingly, I have hardly had time in eve most days to play, but I hope to change that and keep the whole universe abreast of recent adventures and happenings.

And happenings have happened! Let's start with the Goonswarm Alliance conquering the Branch region that was occupied by White Noise. Ok, let's not call it conquering. Let's call it Unopposed Steamrolling. In about two weeks (almost three), Goons managed to take the entire region of Branch from White Noise with little no almost no fighting, which is suprising, considering that many believe it to me one of the oldest alliances in the game. Without trying to sound biased, I must say, White Noise, really? Three weeks to lose a whole entire region? And Goonswarm- props, congratz, gf's, etc. You guys said you were gonna do it and you guys did it. Honestly, I like it because starting the war called for an end to the Ice Interdiction ops that you guys ran. Once again, ice miners can toil and sweat their proverbial asses off mining ice to keep the supers running and the big alliances fighting. Maybe we'll see ice product prices fall or bottom out as the market finally reacts to the end of the blockade.

Moving on to the next big deal- it appears that the Drone Russian Federation (Legion of xDeathX and Shadow of xDeathX) have said NONE SHALL PASS to Intrepid Crossing and Solar Wing/Fleet. For those who watch the sov maps, you might say why. Well, rumor has it (still trying to confirm) that DRF has contracted Pandemic Legion to put their enemies off the map. No word has been given on what exactly the contract entails, but I think it is safe to assume it is against property and ships. Let it be known to all- don't mess with fat lazy cats. They might not be able to defend themselves, but they sure can hire someone to. So mice- don't do it. You will be eaten.

Let's see. New dev blogs show new player requested features! Included in this batch will be a customizable Neocom. No longer will it sit on the left hand side of your screen, but early indicatiosn show it to be movable. For those who like to pew pew, your icons will now blink when you overheat them, and because CCP didn't like that you had to click such a small surface area that would result in you turning off (or on) a module, they introduced a keyboard shortcut Shift Click! Woot.

Let's see what else. Oh. Something i'm coming back to seeign is taxes increased on Planetary interaction goods. Not happy but what can you do about it? Nothing really, except in lowsec/nullsec where poeple are blowing up customs offices and putting up their own at reduced/no tax to their corps or friends. And that's what's nice about these new custom offices: it gives lowsec corps some sort of control over the system they run around in- like 0.0 without the sov. More power to them, as I believe that lowsec is an under populated area. But I'll have a good story piece on that another day, where I'll be interviewing my teacher and fellow peer Yuki Onna.

Apart from those changes- i can't really think of much more, save one little piece that is coming down the pipe- Fuel blocks! They've been kicking around our inventories for the better part of two months now, they've been given to us in the form of actual blocks or fuel block BPO's through CCP's holiday gift giving event (it was two of the 20 or so choices) and pretty soon they will be going live! This new feature promises to be the coolest and most amazing release to happen to eve. Let me explain why. The current system now requires that you have to have a certian quantity of items in the POS tower to pull from per hour. This includes 10 or so different items, and would require for large alliances, spreadsheets worth of data on when to fuel the POS back up. Now, they've streamlined the process. All those 10+ items now get combined into a fuelblock, and the tower consumes so many fuelblocks an hour. The break down is 40/20/10, Large tower, medium tower, and small tower, respectivly. Now, instead of needing to know when to fuel robotics, all you do is fuel the tower, and record the time, and come backa few days before then to top it back off. Simple.

Anyways, it's almost time for me to sleep here- I've been up since 1am my time. Hopefully next time I'll have some better pieces for you all; Moving to Highsec: The Truth Behind the Nullsec Veil, and Scout Reports: 10+ In Local, where i'll interview Yuki Onna and get her perspective on nullsec and lowsec's local populations and some insight as to how to increase it.

Until then all, fly safe or dangerously; it's your choice.
-Tassemet

Official Announcement

2011-12-07T13:58:00.000-08:00

WARNING! ВНИМАНИЕ! SOLAR FLEET. EN/RU
From: Kupyc
Sent: 2011.12.07 21:52
To: Shadow of xXDEATHXx,

The Official Statement from Legion of xXDEATHXx of the 8th of Dec 2011.

There will be a standings reset between Legion of Death and Solar Fleet right after downtime. This tough decision came as a result of all diplomatic attempts, towards our old neighbour Solar Fleet, failed. Drone Regions are no longer the quiet corner of the universe - a war begins now. Not only the ingame war, but political and propaganda warfare: there are already articles on forums, there was a DDoS attack on our services for the past several hours, our Teamspeak, utilities and billing system.

Alliance Legion of Death is now mobilizing forces to fend off the aggressors and to protect what Drone Regions stood for since the begining.

In addition to direct notice that your welfare is being threatened alliance Legion of xXDEATHXx offers you to stand up for this well-being. Solar Fleet are renowned for the discipline and are a good tough opponent - the war with them will probably become an unforgettable experience. You are welcome to join alliance CTAs. Fleet format, ships and fits will be announced later. This isnt mondatory - join the fleet to experience what you probably wont experience anywhere else.

Regards, Karer.

-As thus, let the war begin!
-Tassemet

The War Machines of EvE Churn On...

2011-12-06T14:38:00.000-08:00

Ok, so in my last blog post I predicted the coming of a large scale war within three to four months.

Well, my post came about two days before Solar Fleet reset the standings towards the alliances of Legion of Death and Shadow of Death. That has kicked off a massive effort to prepare for war- and I myself have been mining ice to fuel capitals. Isk isk baby. This potential war has three options to it- One, Drone Russian Federation wins by a landslide, two- Solar Fleet wins by a landslide, three- each side is evenly matched and we'll be in for a slugfest. Of all the options I like the sound of a slugfest- war is good for industrials.

And to add to that little kicker, I have intel from someone saying Goonswarm is preparing to make a move on the north alliances in an attempt to stir up trouble- although it isn't clear yet whether or not they intend to drive them out of the space and take it, or to just roll through it and cripple all those who stand in their path. Regardless, it'll make for an interesting fight as alliances put their pride and assets on the line in order to subdue their opponents.

Remember: war is good. To my enemies, I say:

Christmas Time

2011-12-02T10:49:00.000-08:00

With Christmas around the corner and my own vacation starting in less then two weeks, it's been a fun last week or two, starting with the crucible patch. As my Pandora Radio cranks out tune after tune to add to my christmas spirit, and as my workplace begins to add christmas decorations to our front lobby and lounge, I am once again reminded: It is winter. Yes. It has snowed, EvE has released a new patch, and heralding in this season was the first super capital kill the other day in HED-GP, an old stomping ground of mine that is constantly camped, due to it being a pipe to highsec.

It is rather unfortunate though that he was a scrooge and self-destructed versus fighting the good fight because even with the new changes, he could have taken a few battleships out before being toasted himself. So, it is sad to see this Nyx go to the graveyard without generating a killmail, but i'll still call that a kill. Tis' the season to be killing capitals. And of course, who else would perpetuate such a kill? Why, Pandemic Legion of course! They fought the NC. supercap and killed the pod when it was liberated from within the mass.

Link Here if you want to see PL <-10.0> Kill an NC. Nyx.

On a side note, we had a supercarrier hunt in our alliance the other day as a pilot that was flying a thanatos was attacked and killed by an ev0ke supercarrier. The pilot managed to get his Nyx out before we could get in and capture it with a bubble, and while it was sad, it wasn't exactly a prevented kill. The carrier taken down had no fighters and seemed to be relying only on sentry drones and heavy drones.... so their fault. However, we gave good chase and came up empty. Thanks again to the people who formed up the fleet extremely quickly while my corp and I rallied everyone to the system to try and get the guy. Mad props to your speed.

So speaking of the holiday season and cold, oxygen isotopes are through the roof, almost 1400isk/unit. Goonswarm's "Operation: Interdiction" has thus far been the driving reason behind the price inflation, with the only current places able to get ice and ice products is in nullsec and lowsec, where goons won't venture to place fleets. Besides, on sites such as evenews24.com and from screens I have seen on the web from Kugu forums, it seems that the goons might be in league with the DRF, as a paraphrased quote from The Mittani was stated as "We realize we are handing the Russians a lot of isk. We're ok with that." So any speculation on the fact that it might be the goons trying to inflate ice prices to the point where they would make as much isk as possible selling off stockpiles is clearly wrong. As prices have slumped temporarily I think (winter is coming afterall; even supercaps hibernate too) despite the fact that new fuel blocks will require the oxygen isotopes, it appears that this is being done in an effort to make moving capitals against enemies of Goons or Goons themselves (Gallente capitals only) extremely expensive, and therefore make combat scenarios involving capitals less likely. Well, it might be working. I've heard the gripes and complaints of corps and capital pilots that use their Thanatos for peaceful industrial moving purposes complain of the increasing costs to move stuff around lowsec and nullsec.

And all these leads me to my point: Thank Goons. Despite the fact that they have increased fuel prices, 0.0 ice miners will certainly find their wallets full for all those presents of joy this christmas season. And, despite the fact that there are less capitals fighting and less fighting occuring, I expect that the spring and summer months will will bring about a renewed need for new capitals and industrial handiwork- namely in the measure of dreadnaughts, which right now have seen prices go up 10-25% just for the hulls alone due to the buffs they recieved in Crucible.

As i found out exactly expensive it is to move ships around and goods from high to nullsec via step-off/jump-off systems, I myself plan to get in the market out here and mine ice to sell to my corpies. I've already been offered a massive ice contract which I plan to fill. Myself, I plan to go beyond that and start a stockpile of ice products too- I forsee an increase in fuel prices beyond what they currently are.

So for now, i'm heading out to the ice belt. It's time to quit denying the fact that Winter might not be coming, but that it is actually here, hiding under our frost-bitten noses and that we are keeping it at bay with good cheer, christmas songs, shopping (ingame and out), yule-log fires, PvP and industry.

Fly safe, and Happy Holidays from Tassemet and Elizabeth!

Crucible

2011-11-29T15:24:00.000-08:00

(Photo is of the new shaded Drake, thanks to my fellow corp mate and pilot Death for allowing me to photograph)

(Photo of Elizabeth flying a harbinger.)

Two words.

This is...

I'll let you fill in the last word on the new details of the newest eve online expansion to be released. Thus far, only an hour or two into the patch, and the details and patch notes speak for themselves- This is not your momma's expansion. Thus far what i've seen is mind blowing. I'll highlight the chances and drawbacks that thus far I've noticed to be mentionable.

Positives/Advantages
First up is mining lasers- specifically, strip miners. They now have accurate sounds that I think match the style of the ship and the 3D turret animations on our ships. Also included with the strip miners is the new sound effect that goes along with the laser actually hitting the rock. It sounds like it's being buffeted, and a green glow surrounds the site that's being hit. I won't lie, i'm biased for industrialists and it's about time they are getting a little love that they deserve for all their time and effort.

Loot all- FINALLY. It only took CCP a few years to put in a button that cuts down on the clicking that people who endlessly salvage have to do. It will make it faster, more convient, and makes the time requirements to salvage decrease significantly. It made flying by an enemy wreck in space looting take 2 seconds and 2 clicks, one to open the wreck, one to press the button (Loot All). I see this being one of the most used features of this expansion.

The return of the old weapon icons! This makes it easy to be able to identify weapons based on their picture and not have to right click -> get info all the time. So railguns actually look different from blasters and not the visually unimpressive pixelated versions. Hello artwork, we love you <3 Speaking of artwork, they have revamped a lot of the ship's colors to bring them up to par with the new graphics. Also, nebulaes. They are unique per system, and shift slightly when you move to a new system. And to top that off, the gates now face the direction they will send you catapulting through space, and the destination star is quite bright in system.

Last but not least- the new tier three battle cruisers. These bad boys can fit battleship sized weapons while still having the mobility and speed of a battlecruiser. Of the ones introduced, the Talos, Oracle, Tornado, and the Naga, I personally like the visually stunning appeal of the Oracle, with it's golden shimmering hull and smooth curved oblong hull. With some battleship sized weaponry, I forsee these new ships being fast mobile sniper gangs fielded en masse to just tear apart capitals ships, I also see them as close in blaster ships that move fast, shoot fast, and hit harder. With logistics (since these guys can't pack a massive tank) I forsee these fleets becoming a mainstay in alliance and large scale PvP.

Corp Bookmarks- Now we can finally share bookmarks amongst the people of a corp. So now jumpbridges can be shared with the corp and one person can keep track of all of them and modify them as needed. Oh yeah.

Disadvantages/Negatives:
Pinning Windows- Appearently the feature is gone. Forum crying/threadnaughts have been started as thousands attempt to bring the feature back, as appearently it's used by a lot of people. I personally don't use the feature and won't when it gets back, but then again, I'm for the people, and the people cry MOAR PINNIN'!

Supercapital Nerfs- This is by far the biggest debatable item. Many see this is a positive and negative, mostly negative by the large alliances who use massive amounts of capitals as their fighting force. They removed drone bays in dreads and titans, and nerfed the size of the drone bays on supercapitals. Also, they made it so that supercapitals and carriers can only launch fighters. This is all in an effort to increase the use of subcapitals to counter capital fleets. But I think the new tier 3 BC's are the counter we've been looking for. We'll see how it turns out.

New Font- Some hate it, some love it, most don't have an opinion. However, I'll label this as a drawback. The old font was good, and yes there were a few inconsistencies that made it hard to read, and maybe it's just the newness of this font, but the new font seems more cartoony, doesn't scale well with the -a and +A options in the chat windows, and is extremely hard to find a middle ground on size that is neither too big nor too small to fit in certain window sizes. That, and of all the things in the game, the font seems out of place. I'll label it is a negative for now until I either grow use to it, or I still hate it in a month.

For now though, these are just an overview of all the new features and options available to players in EvE. Come check them out and fly with us.

Until I see you on the battlefield, or in the asteriod belts though, fly safe!