A New Face

        After driving himself to the point of sickness over a month ago, Knee had to take time out to recuperate. While the infection was cleverly dispatched via a clone jump, he still remembered his doctor's orders. Being in a pod for weeks at a time was taking a toll on his body. No amount of clone jumping could solve that problem because it would be the same body, with minor variations, as the one he transferred from. The only solution was good old-fashioned diet and exercise.

        After the diagnosis, he was placed on doctor-enforced medical leave until he could show signs of improvement. That meant no piloting of any kind. It was a cruel sentence, considering the recent news of the Alliance making headway in the Fountain region against IT. He wanted to join them. He turned his fervor towards helping the war effort locally - moving equipment in station, preparing ships for docking and undocking, and assisting capsuleers on the hangar floor. The physical labor was helping his body to recover, and the cerebral downtime helped him relax and concentrate on the long term plan - becoming mentally equipped for the future through skill training.

        Today was his checkup. The nurses took his vitals and sent the data off to be processed. A few minutes later the doctor entered, busily scrutinizing a pad in his hand filled with the diagnostic results. He seemed satisfied. He turned to address his patient and paused with surprise. "You look different somehow, Knee."

        "I tied my hair down. It keeps it out of the way when I'm moving stuff."

        "No, aside from that. You look healthy. You look like you're ready to fight a war."

        Knee smirked. "That's why we're all here, isn't it?"

        "Indeed. You've improved dramatically. I'm ready to sign your release. Let's take a baseline so we can update your clones."

        After what seemed like an eternity of scans, the clone update was complete. Along with a clean bill of health, the doctor handed Knee a small envelope.

        "What's this?"

        "Photographs. I thought you'd like to see how much you've improved."

        Knee studied the photos for a moment, shrugged, and made his way to the hangar to board his pod.

Before:

After:

EVE Blog Banter #24: Whooooo Are You? Who, Who? Who, Who?

Welcome to the twenty-fourth installment of the EVE Blog Banter, the monthly EVE Online blogging extravaganza created by CrazyKinux. The EVE Blog Banter involves an enthusiastic group of gaming bloggers, a common topic within the realm of EVE Online, and a week or so to post articles pertaining to the said topic. The resulting articles can either be short or quite extensive, either funny or dead serious, but are always a great fun to read! Any questions about the EVE Blog Banter should be directed to crazykinux@gmail.com. Check for other EVE Blog Banter articles at the bottom of this post!

This month's Banter topic comes to us from the ever helpful Eelis Kiy, capsuleer behind the "Where the frack is my ship" blog. She asks: How does your real life personality compare to who you are as a character in EVE? Does a good leader of people in the real world make a good leader of pilots in game? Or vice-versa? Do your real-life skills help you with the roles you fulfill in your corporation or alliance? Or do you behave completely differently? Does the anonymity of the Internet allow you to thrive on the tears of others in New Eden whilst you work as a good Samaritan away from your keyboard? Or are you as mean outside of your pod as you are inside it? Have experiences in EVE Online affected your behavior, skills or attitudes outside of the game?

---

       Ah, a wonderful topic. How does my roleplay mesh with my gameplay?

        Long story short, I play the game for myself, not for Knee. I don't play in-character and I don't think about Knee's role in things until later when I start writing. This causes some roleplay conflicts at times. I have portrayed Knee as terribly racist, with a loathing for the Amarr and a strong dislike for the Caldari by association. How could Knee tolerate working for the Caldari, to the point of killing his own brethren sometimes in missions? Such an act must be abhorrent to his character, so the answer is simple - he doesn't tolerate it at all. I make him regret his actions and attempt to atone by quitting his service to the empire. The real story was that I was bored of solo missioning and I wanted to give nullsec a try. But that makes a dull story.

        Knee's character is half newbie, half badass. A flawed hero. He grew up proficient in physical combat, but translating that knowledge into piloting a ship as a Capsuleer is a very foreign concept to him, a huge learning experience. It's fun to write about the triumphs and humble to write about the failures. In this way I can express my own little successes and failures as I play.

        Knee is a follower, not a leader. This is because of my own style. I don't want to be the FC. I want to be the loyal soldier who brings the pain. As a heroic type, Knee tries to be a good guy despite his shortcomings. But to contradict this, I've contemplated exploring the darker side of EVE. I want to participate in Hulkageddon. I want to ninja loot someone's mission and smash their carebear Marauder with a Machariel. I pod people without question in 0.0 if I am able. How can I justify such actions in-character? This forces even more creativity into the creative writing, and creates a better product. Life doesn't always turn out the way you planned. That's what keeps it interesting.

        Now, how has EVE augmented my own story? For starters, being a member of Dreddit has unsurprisingly gotten me hooked on Reddit and awestruck by all the things they have done for the common good. Just like in EVE, it makes me want to be a part of something grand done entirely by the community, without any kind of external prompting.

        I guess EVE has also made me more wary, since EVE is scam and gank central. Creating months-long skillplans is also a lesson in discipline - creating a plan and sticking to it. Now if only I could train a skill to cut my taxes by 10%. Sigh.


Other responses to EVE Blog Banter #24:


CrazyKinux's Musing - Be, All That You Can Be, And So Much More!
Where the Frack is my Ship? - Behind The Keyboard
EVEOGANDA - Real Life & EVE
A Mule in EVE - RL + EVE =
Confessions of a Closet Carebear - EVE and Real Life
The Hydrostatic Capsule - The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Alt
Inner Sanctum of the Ninveah - Reflections
A Scientist's Life in EVE - The Other Side of the Screen
The Durzo Chronicles - Who is More Real??
A Lush in Space - Worlds Collide
Captain Serenity - Personalities
Diary of a Space Jockey - I Am Me
Freebooted - You Talking To Me?
Drifting Through The Stars - EVE and Real Life
EVE A to Z - EVE and Real Life
Fiddler's Edge - Game Face
Yarrbear Tales - In Real Life
Victoria Aut Mors - Where EVE Meets Real Life
Prano's Journey - I Am Prano
Mike Azariah, A Missioner in EVE - Who Are You, Who Hoo Woo Hoo [Great Minds Think Alike]
Roc's Ramblings - Me
EVE Blasphemy - EVE and Real Life
Phoenix Diaries - EVE and Real Life
Play the Game - Personalities In Game And Out Of Game
Progression's Horizon - Synonymous or Anonymous
Aggressive Logistics - Do Unto Others...
The Lathspell of Mithrandir - To Play Or To Live...
Wanderlust - I Am Not Who I Am In EVE
Latro's Bunker - EVE and RL
Shall We Not Revenge? - Multiple Personality Disorder

New Year's Resolution - The Master Skillplan

        For quite a while now, I've been working on my master skillplan. My ultimate goal is to be able to fly any sub-capital warship and be awesome at piloting it. This will increase my versatility and hopefully my overall experience. Thanks to EVEMon, that ultimate goal is about 2 and a half years away.

        Such planning takes discipline. Support skills in EVE are more important than the ship skills themselves, as the ship is useless if the pilot can't use it to its full potential. To that end I have been training exclusively Int/Mem skills for the past few months. Today marks the day when the Navigation branch of the plan is completed.

        Without further ado, commence pretty graphs! Here's my current skillpoint distribution:

        As I promised in School's Out, I dumped my reimbursed Learning skillpoints into Leadership fleet boosting, an excellent investment that will be useful in a Battlecruiser, a Command Ship, or even a Strategic Cruiser.

        I'm still debating at what point I cut the umbilical cord and get into the sweet, sweet combat skills, but it's looking to be sometime between Mid-February and the beginning of March. At that time, the distribution will look like this:

        During that time, I'm planning to train some more levels in Rigging, Astrometrics, EWar, Tech III Subsystems (Defensive, Electronic, and Engineering), and a couple of other vital skills.

        After that it's remap to Per/Will for a long long time, hence why I want to get everything else out of the way beforehand. First priority will be to skill for a Tech I Maelstrom since that's the current fleet flavor of the month. That's just a few days away. After that will be a fairly logical progression:

Tech II Minmatar Frigates and Tech II Small Projectiles

Tech II Minmatar Cruisers and Tech II Medium Projectiles

Battlecruisers V and Command Ships

Advanced Weapon Upgrades V and Tech II Large Projectiles

Minmatar Subsystems (Offensive, Propulsion) and Strategic Cruiser

All other Gunnery Support skills to V (Rapid Firing, Surgical Strike, Trajectory Analysis)

        The remainder of the year will then go to cross-training Amarr, starting the process anew - Frigates and Small Lasers, Cruisers and Medium Lasers, Battleships and Large Lasers. This will allow me to be useful in Armor fleets. By the end of Perception / Willpower Year 1, the skillpoint distribution will look like this:

        2012 is devoted to boosting up my Drones skills: getting Tech II Sentries and Heavies, as well as Drone Interfacing V. I also sneak in Gallente Frigate V and Cruiser V so I can play around in an Ishtar and use Dramiels and Cynabals to their full potential. The remainder of the year is devoted to the Caldari, training all the Missile skills as well as Caldari ships. After 2012, it will look like this:

        2013 wraps things up by skilling up Gallente and Hybrids in the same manner. After that, who knows? Capitals, perhaps?