Unsettled, Part 2

Previously, on MinerBumping... Agent Aaaarrgg thought he was performing a routine act of Code enforcement when he ganked Omerta Asanari. However, after a period of extreme instability, the cryptic miner hinted at dark secrets in the legal history of the New Order.

Aaaarrgg was interested in learning more about Omerta's secret lawsuit, but the miner insisted on spamming Discord links.

On occasion, Omerta shifted his strategy. Suddenly, the miner came up with an idea: What if he spoke to Agent Aaaarrgg the way that Agents usually speak to miners?

Omerta repeatedly called Aaaarrgg a miner and told him to calm down. Unfortunately for Omerta, his mimicry-based antics fell flat. Our Agents make it look easy.

The result was similar to when a miner attempts to gank someone--he just ends up making a fool of himself.

To Omerta's frustration, the Agent outmaneuvered him at every turn. So much for Omerta's "hardcore memeing".

Aaaarrgg grew bored of the miner's nonsense. Yet he remained intrigued by the idea of a secret lawsuit in Omerta's past.

Finally, Omerta returned to the subject that interested our Agent. The miner assured him that the secret was buried. Aaaarrgg's investigations would surely prove futile. And those in the mighty CODE. alliance hierarchy who did know weren't talking.

More tantalizing details emerged.

Although Aaaarrgg hoped to find an answer to Omerta's riddle, enforcing the Code remained his priority. Settlement or no settlement, the miner still owed our Agent 10 million isk.

Omerta ended up being a disappointment to himself and highsec when he failed to buy a permit. On the bright side, the secret of Omerta's lawsuit was revealed.

Omerta claimed to have friends. Perhaps he was referring to his corpmates. Of course, at least some of his fellow Efrafa members were his alts. Including the corp's CEO, Seth Anzomi.

If that name sounds familiar, you might remember Seth from the Attack on Poinen series three years ago.

Even back then, Seth/Omerta was a true Goofus. He was also a space lawyer who was convinced that gankers were violating the Code by shooting AFK haulers.

As recounted in the MinerBumping series, Seth lost his temper when his space lawyering failed. Seth then decided to log into the Agents' TeamSpeak server. A heated conversation ensued. Shortly thereafter, a recording of the conversation was leaked to Reddit.

Following the leak, Seth sent our Agents some follow-up EVEmails, and someone claiming to be Seth became active in the Reddit thread. What happened next is lost in the sands of time. However, what is known is that the recording of the TeamSpeak conversation disappeared from SoundCloud.

Regardless of the fate of the SoundCloud recording, the validity of the Code remains unchallenged. Omerta may live in a "two party consent state", but highsec is all about ones: One Order, one Code, one Saviour of Highsec.

Always!

Unsettled, Part 1

According to a highsec miner, the dumbest thing you could possibly do is gank him.

Omerta Asanari invited Agent Aaaarrgg to a private conversation. Omerta's objective was to convince our Agent that he'd made a terribly foolish mistake.

Aaaarrgg was not so easily persuaded. He knew that ganking Omerta's autopiloting Manticore was a good idea. And it had been fun.

Then Omerta realized that he was speaking to a Code enforcer. There was no persuading those guys.

At that moment, the miner had the bot-aspirant's equivalent of a system crash.

Seen here, the "blue screen of death" in chat form. This is not unusual, actually. We've been seeing this sort of thing since the beginning.

Despite the miner's obvious failings, our Agent still hoped to sell him a permit. There was little that Aaaarrgg could do but sit back and wait for the miner's brain to reboot.

In fact, Omerta's entire demeanor did undergo a sudden and dramatic reset. Only time would tell whether it was a change for the better, though.

Omerta didn't want to be viewed as a victimized miner; he wanted to be seen as a victor. To hear him tell it, Omerta had gotten himself ganked on purpose!

The miner declared himself invulnerable. The mighty CODE. alliance could not affect him--or anyone else--in any way. "Why the tears, then?" one might ask. To which the newly rebooted Omerta would reply: "What tears?"

Veteran Code enforcers are accustomed to dealing with all sorts of tricks. A greedy miner will say just about anything to avoid paying for a 10 million isk permit. Aaaarrgg chose to ignore the nonsense and focus on what was important.

But Omerta was still bouncing off the walls. His latest strategy to avoid Code-compliance was to spam Discord links.

Aaaarrgg tuned out all of the noise. But then Omerta let slip something that caught our Agent's attention.

Omerta made intriguing references to a lawsuit--a mysterious lawsuit that had been covered up by members of CODE. It soon became clear that this miner possessed secrets that could change everything.

To be continued...

The Best Revenge, Part 61

Previously, on MinerBumping... After the threat of an Imperium civil war seemed to pass, aiva naali aka FighterJets GuitarSolo 1000Years resumed his duties as the coalition's chief theorycrafter. He enjoyed the work, but he was perpetually short of funds.

Despite his lack of isk, aiva was determined to buy director roles in Goonswarm Federation. He was tempted to engage in RMT in another game so that he could fund his extravagant lifestyle in this one.

aiva's star appeared to be fading. He confessed that he still had yet to recruit anyone to his all-important highsec mining corp. So much for becoming a highsec "supper power".

Despite the setbacks, aiva's council never lost faith in him. They'd seen him pull off miracles before. He'd do it again.

Financial problems continued to weigh on aiva's mind. His theorycrafting now focused on ways of gaming the PvE system to generate isk.

Reading between the lines, it seemed that aiva's earlier ideas of manipulating the PLEX market had gone nowhere. Otherwise there would be no need to fish for rats.

Money was on aiva's mind, but so was revenge. He still thirsted for Pandemic Horde's blood.

aiva planned to target Pandemic Horde's miners. If he did enough damage, maybe some of them would be driven back to highsec, where aiva could recruit them into his corp.

aiva's council stood back in silence as more and more ideas poured forth. aiva was ready to burn his "lax hours" trump card. Things were getting serious.

If aiva had seemed a bit sluggish and unmotivated before, there was no hint of that now. His theorycrafting engine was running full tilt.

aiva's prolific posting wasn't all good news, though: None of his ideas had been vetted by his council. Most of aiva's best work had been done with their assistance. For now, they simply allowed him to keep going.

At last, aiva came to a stopping point. Huffing and puffing, he awaited feedback from his council. What did they think?

MONEY.

To be continued...

The Best Revenge, Part 60

Previously, on MinerBumping... aiva naali aka FighterJets GuitarSolo 1000Years struggled mightily to secure the Imperium's future in the midst of chaos and civil war. But for all his wisdom, aiva couldn't solve the ultimate mystery: How does one go about recruiting a highsec miner into a highsec mining corporation?

aiva temporarily put aside his recruitment drive for Mission Ready Mining RELOADED corp. Obviously it wasn't his passion. Theorycrafting carrior tactics, on the other hand...

Over the past few months, aiva had surrounded himself with the Imperium's best and brightest. He needed good advice from experts in every field.

aiva sensed that the moment was ripe to unveil his latest plan to destroy Pandemic Horde.

aiva's plan was all about timing. You might say he was interested in stealing Pandemic Horde's schedules.

But unlike lanceing fleets, skank traps, and other ideas that can be used repeatedly with great results, the "lax hours" attack was a single-use, all-or-nothing tactic.

Luckily for aiva, the geopolitical situation of nullsec was nearly ideal for a lax hours attack. While Pandemic Horde was busy fighting DeadCo coalition, aiva would push the big red button.

aiva envisioned a Pearl Harbor of sorts. But aiva had learned from the mistakes of all those WW2-era Japanese admirals. His surprise attack would be decisive. He would not give PH an opportunity to regroup.

The more he pored over the details of his plan, the more involved it became. There was so much potential; every resource needed to be diverted to the lax hours attack.

Alas, all of aiva's careful planning couldn't account for the random nonsense of life.

aiva felt that DDoS'ing was outside the scope of fair play, even for EVE. Indeed, it was grounds for a ban from the game. This was a reasonable view--so what zany spin would aiva put on it?

...There we go. aiva would test for potential DDoS attacks by firing off doomsdays and seeing if their trajectories were altered.

The doomsday DDoS tests needed to be done right away, of course.

But the money.

To be continued...