Wherever we go, so many questions arise. Fortunately, we can find our answers to those questions in the Code. Case in point: I didn't need to worry about whether Brokus Starforge had windows closed, because the Code tells us that highsec miners are required to watch local at all times.
After Brokus was sent out of mining range, but before his lasers deactivated, he passive-aggressively gave me the Carebear Stare by yellowboxing without any possibility of actually activating weapons.
It's funny how even the most silent, AFK miners get in a chatty mood once they're no longer able to mine.
They may spend their days (and nights, with proper macros) mining ice, but carebears tend to be bad at breaking the ice. Our convo was off to a terrible start. Who invites you to a convo only to tell you to "gfto"?
Brokus gave me a standard-issue excuse. The good news? He might have been playing on another account before, but now he was playing on this account.
Brokus didn't seem to know the score, so I referred him to the most helpful website I knew of for new EVE players. Problem solved, right? I wish! Upon seeing the link to my dreaded MinerBumping, he immediately closed the convo.
I believe in total transparency, so I informed the locals what Brokus had done. Brokus was immediately put on the defensive.
The Code is crystal clear. Brokus was in the wrong. But he had not yet learned his lesson; he warped to the other end of the ice field.
He attempted to repeat his mistake, but ended up getting the same result. To expect otherwise is the very definition of insanity!
Once again, the Code provided the answer to Brokus' complaint. It doesn't really matter whether a miner thinks it's boring to mine at his keyboard or not. They have to do it anyway. The Code is very clear on this point. However, just as so many carebears invite me to go to lowsec if I want to PvP, I invited Brokus to go to lowsec if he wanted to mine AFK. They're the ones who say only certain activities should be allowed in highsec, right?
Brokus attempted to belch out a smokescreen about what constitutes AFK mining. Thank goodness for the Code! There's no ambiguity: The test of AFKness is whether or not a miner can promptly respond when I talk to them in local.
Now Brokus Starforge was fully educated. But it's not enough simply to know what's in the Code. Even dedicated resistance fighters have read the Code--some know it inside and out! The true test of a miner's worth is whether or not he follows the Code.
Sadly, Brokus chose the wrong path, and denied the value of emergent gameplay and order in highsec. He only saw value in watching his isk counter tick slowly upward toward some unspecified goal. I ask you, what kind of a game is that? Wouldn't it be just as fun to watch your clock tick upward, or to watch your calendar move forward?
If you've ever wondered why my bounty is 1,741,118,915 isk instead of 1,741,018,915 isk, wonder no longer: That's all Brokus Starforge.
Scary!
ReplyDelete"He only saw value in watching his isk counter tick slowly upward toward some unspecified goal. I ask you, what kind of a game is that?"
ReplyDeleteIm sure you are already familiar with that game, James, it's called 'Eve Online - Nullsec Moongoo Edition.'
Now, down to business. I need to buy a bunch of mining permits. Can we arrange it through PayPal, like nullsec renters have to?
Borkus is actually on the red pen list James. Please look it up. He was very rude to me, agent of the new order, and blocked everyone he did not like.
ReplyDeleteAlso he claimed to me that he is psychologist. I found that interesting as he did not take the class in anger control.
Greetings your kind agent Bruce ;)
He's a real, certified space psychologist!
DeleteMost people would be embarrassed to post such a low bounty as 100,000 isk. When someone chooses the name Broke-ass Starfraud, no matter how cheap they are, no one could possibly be surprised. I give him full points for honesty, and zero points for everything else.
ReplyDeleteWe all know one of the biggest flaws of EVE Online id that it fails at explaining the game to new players. Tutorials and High Sec itself should teach players what EVE is about.
ReplyDeleteThe New Order shows that at the moment you can spend years in High Sec without understanding that EVE is all about conquering your space in the game with your actions and defending what you have. Emergent gameplay lets the strong prevail over the weak, thus making the conflicts meaningful and fun.
Leaving the players in a safe bubble all the time is not good for them. Bad carebears threaten to quit, but they never do. The real quitters are the silent players, the ones who mine or mission for a few weeks or months and never get to interact with anyone else, just because they're used to "normal" theme park mmorpgs, where they just have to choose a premade activity and level or grind. They find it shallow and boring (EVE is not meant to be a theme park and it fails at it), and they assume the whole game is shallow and boring. So they quit.
High Sec should offer more opportunities for new players to experience what EVE is really about, what makes it engaging, fun and absorbing. People try EVE because they read online the great stories of conflicts between players and corporations, about the freedom to fight and conquer, about meaningful losses and gains. Many silent, real quitters do it because they make a trial, try the game and find that nothing of what they read about really happens, cause when they try the game they're in High Sec. They find it boring, they even call it a "screen saver" game.
EVE should present itslef to new players showing the best parts about it, not the worst ones. Even if they're more persistent and they try to go to Low Sec, like I did, they find it's very empty and mostly full of sharks. Scanning for a ship at their level takes a long time, and they find they need to scan for hours at end just to get a five minutes fight (that they will probably lose).
We should give to new players a thriving Low Sec. One where you can get protection from real players, not NPC overlords. One where occasionally you can experience defeat. Because half of a conflict, and more generally of a game, is defeat. There's no winning without losing. Always winning is boring.
How do we do it? Buff Low Sec and Nerf High Sec to oblivion. It's so sad that it will never happen. I hope that someone in CSM will at least try to push CCP to take some steps in that direction.
All of that said above is what made me decide I was going to let my account lapse and find something else. Only reading this blog changed that. Now instead of letting it lapse, I have two accounts. Instead of trying to find meaning in mining and missions, one char now lives in a wormhole where the risk of death is constant. The other ganks with the Knights. I don't know about saving hisec, but NO saved this player from quitting Eve. Eve needs more like the New Order and less of whatever hisec is.
DeleteAnother saved soul! We can all hope that with the help of your knights blasters that even more souls are saved!
DeleteMono