A Pixel Nomad

I have mixed feelings about The Agency screen that is now in EVE. I’m not sure when it was added, but it’s new to me, and while I like the fact that it gives people some direction on what they can do in the current system, I don’t like that it has made HI a LOT busier, and it feels like it has taken a bit away from the people who used to chase down those events on their own.

As an example, in the system I live in there is ice mining, and normally you’d have to scan down the signature for those with probes and find your way there – but now they just show up in The Agency, so there are over 50 people in what was once a quiet area, all mining ice.

On the other hand sometimes I’m at a loss on what I want to do, so seeing it all in a neat and tidy list is nice, I can just choose something and go from there. The direction and guidance is nice for those who need it or those times that I need it. There are still things ‘hidden’ in the system, but there’s a much larger chance of it being promoted (or such is my experience so far).

It was bound to happen sooner or later. I got in over my head. I had been flying my helios around scanning signatures when I found a particularly interesting wormhole. It was a class 5 which I knew was dangerous, but still I wanted to try. Inside were 8 more signatures, and one was a relic site. Since I had such luck with my first relic site I decided I’d take a peek. My helios warped in and immediately some big nasty were there, so I left and decided to attend with my Tengu instead.

Well, that was a huge mistake. I was jammed and webbed and I hadn’t aligned myself with a way out (though I did have the exit pinned at least) and unlike my helios who made it out, the Tengu was almost instantly smushed (NOT a good ship for tanking, the way I have it fit).

Insurance paid 35,000,000 ISK but the total value of the ship including fitting, was 895,000,000 ISK. My most expensive loss to date. There’s a saying that you shouldn’t fly anything you can’t afford to lose, and that holds true no matter where you are or what you’re flying.

Thankfully I could afford to replace it – and while I was on my way to Jita to do some shopping a good friend of mine logged in and helped replace those funds. He’s been playing a lot longer than I have, has more skills than I would ever know what to do with, and I regard him quite highly so this was a really big deal to me. Shopping in Jita was quick, prices were good, and I flew back home in my new Tengu – I’m still looking for a name for it.

Losing the ship sucked, but again, it’s EVE – and whether it’s players or pirates, you just have to be prepared. I, was not. For now I’m back to HI missions and grinding some faction, and doing simple mining runs.

Fly safe!

After much humming and hawing over things, I decided to reactivate my account in EVE Online and dive in. Not only did I activate my main account, but I actually activated two accounts, my main and an alt. Why both? So I could have a dedicated miner and hauler, of course.

Once that was set up and I figured out what skills I wanted to train, I took a bit of a break from mining and went scanning some signatures. Out of the four that were in my area, three were wormholes, and one was a relic site, which I had never heard of before.

They’re a lot like data sites (which I’ve heard of but never discovered on my own). An area that was filled with little canisters that I had to play a mini game with. I failed one (twice) and the entire thing blew up. Hope there was nothing good inside. The others I managed to beat, and was rewarded with some pretty generic crafting supplies (which I am always happy to have, as I do a lot of industry). Obviously the rewards vary, and if you’re in LowSec or NullSec they’ll be better (risk vs. reward). Still, it felt good to find one and solve it, even if I did have to train archaeology I before I could scan the site.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!