Reflections of a painful day
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Those who were in Alliance chat yesterday may have been there to hear my gnashing and wailing of teeth as I lost my Buzzard, complete with a full day's exploration of 85m ISK.
They may also have hung around to hear more gnashing and wailing of teeth as I, acting like an addicted gambler trying to chase his losses, lost a 'free' Heron, in a WH trying to run a data site.
I grumped, I grumbled, and I logged off muttering various things like "I'm too old for this anyway", "I'll never make any money", "I don't have the time I need to enjoy it" etc.
I admit it, I sulked. But I've had time to reflect and wanted to share my thoughts in the hope that it might help others, particularly new players, to overcome those frustrations.
First of all, I'm not 'new' at Eve. My character is a 20m SP Caldari with excellent mining, exploration and Indy. I'm absolutely hopeless at PvP, and to be quite honest, don't really have any interest in it. I've been playing Eve on and off for 6-7 years, always resubbing trying to find my 'home'. I've been in various corps and done various things. I've been in Eve Uni a few times, mostly gravitating toward mining because I was good at making money at it, or occasionally joining a null-sec corp to tag along on fleets only to find that my playstyle/time commitments (I'm 41, have four kids, and probably no more than an hour or two of Eve time, three-four times a weeks) don't really suits fleets ("er....can we go back soon because it's late and I've got work in the morning"). Limited time means limited ISK making opportunities in most cases and therefore every loss hurts. That said, I've doubled my ISK to 400m in my two weeks back in New Eden and so although I'll have to invest in a new Buzzard, I'll still be up overall.
So, exploration is where I found myself, because I can do it solo, I'm decent at it, and I love the adrenaline buzz. So why did I die?
I've thought long and hard, and I've had to chalk it off to just bad luck. For the whole day yesterday I did everything right:
- No hacking with anyone in local
- No warping gate to gate if anyone in system
- Travel cloaked
- Create safe spots
etc.
In the end, I got popped because there was a local in system so I decided to warp to 100k off the exit gate to see if it was safe. It was. Unfortunately, 100k off the gate was where he had put his bubble. I must have been within 2000m of the unit because I was decloaked and spanked before I knew what had hit me. So, from his perspective, a good kill and well deserved with his cleverness. For me, bad luck I suppose.
The 'frustration' was less with the kill, and more with the sense of 'I've wasted my time all day collecting this loot only to have it taken from me' but I've realised that my enjoyment was in stealing it in the first place, and the thrill of the hunt, and to that extent, I got my 85 m worth, even if I didn't get the loot.
So, to summarise, I've scrubbed myself with a Brillo pad in the shower, and as soon as I can, I'm going to buy a new Buzzard, and I'm going to go back out there into the dark and beautiful emptiness, and I'm going to steal, hide, warp, wormhole and carve my own little piece of New Eden history.
Apologies if my grumpiness offended anyone yesterday.
Fly safe o7Darrenius
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Here at the ends of 30's.. two kids, mainly half afk mining at work. At home it's hard to find more than hour or just to find energy to play, I'm gaining it during a work week just to play few hours at weekand. Almost all ISK is going for plex and skills... for any extra money I buy some ships (not more than one, two per month) Also I'm still active musican and it needs time too... and my wife patience. Thats the sad ethos of family guys
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It is the sad part of exploration, risk of ship loss. You are allowed to be grumpy. Heck, it's good for me when I lost my first tengu that my brain to typing filter works otherwise space mom would have booted me so fast lol.
Good job on picking yourself back up, planning on going back at it, sharing what you've learned (bonus to caldari awesomeness :p ) Keep meaning to get off my lazy butt and get on my own tips and tricks post here to help out others as I can.
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@Darrenius-Enaka hey man, hang in there. My own play time is family limited, largely consisting of nights when the wife is watching a show I hate.
Frustrations abound - yesterday I had to amabdon a crystal quarry relic site after one small can, and I about cried. But we get up and go back out there for the next challenge!
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@Darrenius-Enaka I share with you my own story of being "punched in the gut" by a devastating ship loss early on in my explo career.
As a 44-year-old father of two, I have come to appreciate the long view on EVE. An hour here or there, a 3-4 hour window on Sundays -- that's all the time I can invest in New Eden. Signal Cartel and exploration have been great finds. I have learned to create my own game, hitch my narrative to that of our corp and alliance, take part in the community pieces (like the forums!) when I can't log in, and enjoy myself thoroughly along the way.
While you're at it, why not sow a rescue cache or two? Guaranteed steady income while you work in W-space. I made my first billion ISK scanning wormhole in Thera for eve-scout.com over the course of three or four months. Not everyone's cup of tea, but it really helped me learn to scan efficiently.
Glad to hear you're hanging in there.
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@Darrenius-Enaka Time limitations is normal, loosing stuff in EVE is even more normal. But most of all - feeling feels is absolutely normal (acting on them is another topic
).
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@Thrice-Hapus Thanks - I've just been watching a Youtube video on Tripwire and will definitely try my hand at helping to map Thera and do my bit for the corp. I absolutely get what you are saying about the long game and making your own story along the way. Add me up in game
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@Este-DeStirr Oh my God....the terrible TV shows I've managed to avoid by "playing that stupid warp drive active game"
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@Thrice-Hapus Just read your story - beautifully put and I genuinely felt your pain. Well written, Sir! See you out in space
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Good job getting back up again! When I came back to EVE a couple of months ago I got a few harsh lessons (like don't haul 200m in cargo in an Iteron) and taught my kids new exciting words at the same time*. I typically shut the game down at that point, take a break, come back and get going again.
I'm also getting very curious at the demographic breakdown of Signal Cartel. There seem to be a lot of middle aged parents around.
*Not true, my kids already know all the words they're not allowed to say in front of their grandparents.
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@Darrenius-Enaka Good for you in knowing what you learned from the harrowing events you described, and seeing your planned changes in playstyle.
I'm glad you wailed your teeth in alliance chat and not in local.
I, in a similar bout of angry introspection, made some changes to my overview that really worked out for me. Specifically I highlighted ALL ships in red so that they really stand out on the overview and I can readily see them when hacking cans. This made for some initial shocks outside of WH space but I got over the sight of a mass of red near Amarr or other hubs. In short I treat every ship as a likely hostile.
I also diagnosed and fixed some of my own out of game issues, for example, running a boatload of sites in a WH and then being killed when really mentally tired and being too tired to reply quickly while running the last site.
This is going to sound harsh probably but being killed is only tragic when we don't learn from the experience. The other times are good learning opportunities, while frustrating.
See you around space.
[Addendum: also a mid-40s father with two teens, one of whom will start driving next year. That's a scarier thought than any possible WH experience
]
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@Igaze maybe I should setup a little doodle askign for peoples ages and see if others are as curious as the two of us and want to participate in this?
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Sounds good. We could start a midweek 'Dad's on tour oam' to a WH!
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@Darrenius-Enaka How I love your OP and the conclusions you came to. EVE can either be extremely frustrating (if you only measure kills or ISK success) or extremely rewarding (particularly if your mindset permits you to see value in the doing, rather than just the achieving). Sounds like your meditations were worthwhile in helping you figure out a good balance!
One thing I love about this corp and our wonderful people is the support and hugs I see in Alliance (and sometimes material assistance) when someone has a painful loss. Just knowing others can sympathize because of similar experiences helps take the sting out of things sometimes.
@Vox-Populii When my daughter (soon to be 32) left in "her" car to drive to school the first time on her own, I seriously thought I might projectile vomit as I stood there on the deck watching her drive away! But...ya gotta let 'em go sooner or later or they'll never grow up and leave home.
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@Darrenius-Enaka I would totally be in!
What are we talking here, after the kids bedtime but before ours? That should give us a healthy 15 minutes! hehe
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@Darrenius-Enaka I'd be game. Good incentive for me to get voice coms set up and working.
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@Darrenius-Enaka said in Reflections of a painful day:
"warp drive active game"Hilarious. Is that what the kids/wife call it?
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@A-Dead-Parrot actually the good lady tends to call it "warped mind active"!
In terms of a roam, it depends what time zone we are all on. I am GMT and 20:00 to 2200 tends to work for me. I will start a separate thread to see who is interested.....
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@A-Dead-Parrot Another reason why I always (well mostly) play with sound off.
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@Vox-Populii some sounds are useful, such as a wormhole splash. There is a fair bit of fine tuning in the sound options for the more annoying sounds.
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@Dave-Ordo You mean that when someone enters a WH others can hear it? Or just the player themself? WH sounds to me are just generally creepy and blood-pressure raising.
The "you're being targeted" sound is useful all right.
