Playtime for Poniez !!

Went back to my guv'mint agent (word has he was paying well) and got 2 combat missions one after the other. Fat ones. Put it this way -- the poniez and I (all expcent Snoball, who is In Trouble, after they noticed he'd eaten three of the station's staff -- I *did* tell them not to go in after dark, but he's very good at whinneying in a plaintive manner) will have a good break on what we made.

The first one ended up worth 2.5 million with all the bounties, and the second one 1.25, and I had to keep breaking off, during the salvaging, to drop hold-loads of stuff at stations. Ran out of missiles, but that's sort of inevitable when you fire them off like fireworks.

And got some good sales on the market. Some stuff just isn't worth selling, so I've started reprocessing, in the hope of getting rarer minerals for some building I have in mind.

But that's all in the future. Once the poniez are all aboard, I'm flying off to one of the leisure stations, and Ursus and White Carnation are coming, and we're going to "hav a partay".

See you on the flip-flop, whatever one of those is.

Celebration #2

My agent offered me a slaver-hunting mission, which I took because I hate slavers. Anyway, I found and rescued the slaves and then I get told that she (the agent) had another mission for me immediately. It turned out that now she wanted a whole bunch of slavers killing.

So I checked on what was entailed, and set off. Half way through, I ended up in an asteroid belt, and as there was plenty of time left to still get my bonus, and as I had my new mining cruiser a warp away, I put the "killing slavers" bit on hold and fetched the miner. Then it occurred to me that there was a *lot* of ore. So I commed Dr.Ursus and asked him if his Hulk was free. He came down and we tore into a field of ombar. Mind you, the Hulk chews 'roids at a pace my cruiser couldn't match, so a lot of the time, I was doing hauling.

After about 90 minutes we'd both had enough, but I was able to point him to where he could sell a hold-full of veld he'd happened to have, and I've promised him a skillbook or two from Mal's bequest.

Then I went back to slaver-killing. Now, the warning I'd had was that the second pocket aggressed automatically, and were *heavy*. So I looked round to set a book mark. But then I noticed that I was only partway into armour, and had taken out 2 frigates, so I repped, and kept my head down, and let the drones carry the fight, since all the slavers were locked on my ship. And we blew them all away. Good bounties as well, even if the salvage was a bit on the superficial side.

And when I added everything up, I had *2* million ISK, for the first time ever. Which is good because I spent 10 on getting a skillbook from the LPshop.

Now I *need* sleep

Short Note just to celebrate ...

... achieving both my short term goals in 2 days.

The Gallente drone skill book came courtesy of a storyline courier mission which paid ISK rather than implants (I think I got a rise in standings, but it's harder to tell when you aren't so sure which faction to look at), and the new mining cruiser because my agent wants me to mine some, and because, when I looked in my main stash, I had almost all the fittings. So I just had to buy the hull and insure it, and then fit it "from stock". Just need the T2 expanded cargo modules, but I'll buy those as the oppportunity comes up and I earn the ISK.

Gave Spotted Julian his birthday party -- not that I'm sure when he was born, but this week's as good as any. I enjoyed the Put the Saddle on the Ponie game, but the poniez preferred playing Guess Which Nosebag has the Apples In.

7 Facts Meme (OOC)

Courtesy of Sara Conna

And, due to the fact that everyone I can think of has already done this, I see no point in nominating anyone else (though if I knew where Chribba blogged ... )

1. I was once going to be a lawyer, till Cruel Fate (and a distrustworthy "friend") sabotaged that.

2. Arising from #1, I have actually been inside the cells of the Central Criminal Court in London, and come out alive.

3. I am intensely height-phobic: anything over one storey and I start to feel insecure (So now ask how I can fly a Minmatar ship with only a pod between me and infinity)

4. Inherited from my father, I have a deep-and-abiding love for the operas of Gilbert and Sullivan

5. I've visited (nominally) 4 of the 5 continents: I live in Europe, went to Florida once, did a day-trip stop in Cairo, and have been to China, Brunei and Thailand. Australasia/Oceania will have to wait till I'm retired and can go round the world, as I couldn't cope with the time it would take (Again, go figure: from someone who does 72 AU jumps)

6. I'm a heraldry maven in an English medieval-recreation group called the Far Isles, and over the last year have managed to acquire 2 library-standard texts regarding English heraldry, reading the which properly I *must* get around to, probably the next time EvE has a 3-day downtime.

7. I'm fatter and older than I'd like to be, but the one I blame on excellent food, and the other doesn't seem to reverse whatever I do.


And as a comment to someone else's meme-reply :: Yes, you kissed a girl; yes, you liked it; but ... did she kiss you back ?

So ...

I tucked the poniez up with feedbags, and went out to try some L3s again. Except that the 2nd one I was offered was anti-drone mining and I forgot I got good slavage and I turned it down, and went to do some L2s. In and among I ratted, though, and made a small profit there.

Now have 2 goals -- earn enough to use T2 Gallente drones (since I have some); and earn enough to buy another mining cruiser, so I don't have to keep going fetching the same one. Which will end up needing a Mammoth to haul for it, but Mal's hangar has a couple of them, so as soon as I can fly his freighter (dot dot dot)

What he doesn't have is a duplicate of my mining cruiser. Mind you, it's just occurred to me that he had have an equivalent, and since I'm going to need to learn most races' Cruisers to fly what he's left me ...

This is going to take months, but at the end I'll have ships enough to spread round space so that I don't have to go far to get one. Plus he has enough BPs for me to build some more as and when I need them.

As to which, if anyone has minerals and needs some building doing, I have a limited set of BPs ...

I also have an appointment with the strawberry skin-care pool again, and then a couple of lambmint chops, I think.

Later
J

's Done !!

Not that I'm saying farewell forever to the Sisters, but I'll take a week or two off away from them (and that plainsong!).

But I did my time, worked my way, earned my LPs, and then cashed them in for a Probe Launcher. Now I just need to find out how to use it.

With that, and a Cloak, I took my Cheetah (which needs a name, better than 'Denture Cleaner') and went to collect Mal's BPs (since I heard that you should travel BPs in something that can get away from attacks). Picked most of them up, as well as a share of his salvage, and brought it all home.

Then went out again in the Cheetah, and tried out the Cloak, by sneaking up on Bear and Chiana while they were mining. Somehow they spotted me (DNK how, but possibly because I shouted out to warn them of a rat).

Was going to do some ratting of my own in the Jaguar, but found I haven't fitted it with a salvager and don't have a spare salvage ship in the system. Suspect I'm going to be converting one or two of Mal's old ship for that job, when I get them freighted back. Which means when I have learned the skills to fly the freighter he has. Which will take a week or two. But then the poniez will have a new and bigger home (and some people to look after them -- I rescued some slaves from the Amari, and they seem willing to ponie-mind, for food.

Short and Shweet -- A good investment

[Dictated on the way to the spa]

I may have said that I was grinding for a probe launcher from the Sisters. And that I was trying to do it 500 Lp at a go.

Well, went to see agent, who mentions a merchant gate being blockaded, and offers me 600Lp to clear it. And when I looked things up, it seemed that these guys might be susceptible to explosive damage. So I nipped out and invested in a medium drone with explosive damage, and booted out the one with Thermal or some such (not *out* altogether, just into the hangar for now).

And went, and played with the NME, and blew them away, and got 700K in mission pay and bonus and another 700K in bounties.

So I'm taking downtime off to lounge in a strawberry skin-care pool, and drink Pie-Eyed Warthogs.

See y'all later
Jenni
(who may already have had a couple of Warthogs, but never mind who's counting ?)

Beyond the Game :: GrandChild of Threadnaught (OOC)

Okay -- Neither I (RL) or Jenni had anything to do with it :: we don't *do* lo-sec, and we don't do moon mining. Fact is, short of reading up on it, I wouldn't know how to moon-mine.

What irks me is less that the markets were flooded with insta-made whatever-the-h*ll-it-was, and more that people were able to use this mechanism to avoid paying for EvE.

The original poster makes much of this -- hadn't paid for his game in 4 years. And if he hadn't, what makes anyone think any of the other corp execs had ? So, people who in-game were making themselves immensely rich, were also, in RL, getting a free ride. And in the course of this they amassed large amounts of "ill-gotten" gains.
And now "all that has been taken from them" -- true. But the rest of us will actually be the ones who suffer because prices for materials will rise, which means that prices for gear will rise, and we will have to "work" harder to stay where we were. Meanwhile, the guilty ones simply rebook in under another name and IP address and are instantly back where they would have been, because their alt-accounts (Don't tell me, if you had the power to play free, you wouldn't set up more than one account) will be there, loaded with bear, to hand out the skillbooks and gear. Fine, they will have to relearn their skills, but they will also know which skills *not* to hurry learning.

In due course, of course, the panic will die down, and things will re-establish some kind of order. And then, doubtless, the next exploit will come along.

Cynically yours
JC

Not doing too badly

My aim, all along this grind, has been to record 500 LP per shift. Which, given I'm working with Level 2 agents, giving me from 60 points a time up, means 5 to 10 missions in quick succession (before they forget who I am and how bad my pounded gundark sarnies smell if they keep me sitting round waiting for work).

And in general it works out well. This last shift, I'd just about done my quota when my agent calls me up (rather then me having to go ask for work). Turns out there's a suspicion of smuggling and will I go deal with it.

Well, the combat missions pay better, and I was feeling confident, so I said 'yes', and took off.

In the event it was a bunch of Amarr slave traders, with frigate escorts. I remember when all I flew was a frigate. The baling wire was thin and the girders were fragile. Now I have my artillery .... Let's just say that a number popped with one shot. It took nearly an hour to get all of them and salvage the wrecks (memo to self: convert one of Mal's ships into another dedicated salvager and earn enough to afford an Orca to take stuff round in) and at the end I found some viral DNA stuff which the Sisters had asked me to look out for, as well as several cans of Vitoc. Imagine my pleasure when, as well as paying me for the mission, the Sisters offered to buy the Vitoc from me for 6 figures.
I haven't added it all up, but I reckon that probably makes it a 7-figure mission even before I sort the salvage (which Dappled Barney may have strewn around the cargo hold last night -- he was a bit .... frisky yesterday).

All for now

Been Busy

Mostly still grinding for the Sisters.

Went down to [LOCATION DELETED] to see over Mal's ships again, and settle which I want to move and when. Checked with the School and they say I'll need a third of a year and about a quarter of a billion ISK to learn all the skills I'm going to need.

Got some new poniez -- they were in a storage container that the Sansha had, which I sort of blew apart to discourage them (the Sancha, not the poniez) from trying to muscle in on Sisters' territory.

Saw my first Orca -- nifty looking ship. Would be nice to own one, but I think I'll wait till the price falls a little. I gather they're being used for suicide gank ops, but I'd really see mine more as a mobile base station to put a few ships in and some ammo and go and Have Fun.

Need to sleep.
J

Apologies for Harsh Language

... but F* F* F*ity F*

Still grinding; still (therefore) getting periodical storyline missions. And they ask me to look into some Sansha activity, which I do, and then to find out what's going on, by attacking some transports, which my drones see to while I mop up crumpled wrecks. And then they want some stuff moved to another station. Which, of itself, I don't mind doing. But this was 600 m3 (so far too big for my BC), and 2 jumps into lo-sec space.

What the ****'s wrong with somewhere in Empire ? Somewhere calm and tranquil -- a Leisure Corp station, where I could get a facial and perhaps a pool boy. No -- it has to be 0.3 space.

I took the Hathi to truck the stuff (stripped down, just in case, so no poniez and no comfort gear -- not even my MP84 player), and then switched to a Reaper for the 0.3 jumps (which also wouldn't have had room for ponie). Which meant looking like a needle, ducking in and out of gates. So, my thanks go to the (about 6) guys who didn't gank me on my trips.

Did get some standings increases, but I don't know if that will translate into extra LPs for the missions I'm doing.

And I'm finding there are too many things that I want to be training, and buying, and not enough time or ISK.

'Nuff 's 'nuff

If I see one more cattle ...

Mind you, I'll probably have to, so let's say another today.

All my agents want fresh beef -- and I have to transport it. Not to mention the t*rkeys. The cargo hold looks like a MidWestern farm. And the smell's beyond bad. Three poniez have had to go planetside to recover -- which isn't easy to manaeg when the planet your current main station orbits is a mineral extraction and refining centre. Have you ever tried (of course they haven't, jenni) finding fresh grass in the middle of slag-heaps, or places for poniez to gambol among rendering ovens. Gambling's different -- once you've loaded the ovens, there's not much to do till they've cooled and you can empty them :: Spotted Julian came back with 600 ISK he's won at Find the Oat Biscuit.

In other news, with things a little quiet at times, I got to play several rounds of Presidents and Interns and got my best character to Level 24. And LadyAngel got a new autopilot for her VoidAncer, which we test flew.

And now I'm going to check that the maintenace crew haave got all the cattle residue out of the hold, and then I'm going to do serious sleeping, before the poniez need feeding again.