Ironfleet Towing And Salvage

Last night when I logged into the game, a fleet commander I’ve been flying with lately greeted me and a few others in militia chat, proposing fleet ops at a specified time with a rally on the Nourvokaiken gate into Tama. Although it probably wasn’t the smartest thing I could do with a war on, I confirmed my intention (still in Militia chat) to be there.

In the event, we wound up rallying in another place, which was probably my good fortune. When the fleet warped to the Tama gate, I found a hitherto unknown (to me) member of CLDRI sitting fifteen clicks off the gate in a kestrel, flashing angrily at me as my war targets are wont to do. His name is vermilles, and he’s less than a month old.

He targets me.

I was in a Drake. I was still waiting for the fleet jump command, so what else could I do? I lit him him up and started chucking heavy missiles at him.

He absorbed one entire volley, which ate most of his shields. Heavy missiles don’t hit frigates very hard, sadly.

The next volley began to arrive. One missile, two missiles, three missiles, four missiles, armor melting in rotten chunks, he’s about to be dead… drat. He got into warp.

No worries. Fleet is jumping, I’ll follow as soon as my aggression timer counts away.

What’s this in local? VampireZIM, who was not in local last time I checked, is now in local shouting “XXX for fleet, XXX for fleet!”

I jumped into Tama, rejoined the fleet.

VampireZim is now trying to “X for nourv fleet” in militia chat. Someone in fleet calls the X to the attention of the FC. The FC, who was not born yesterday and who doesn’t seem to miss much that happens in his fleet, dryly says “I think we’ll leave that one.”

And off we went on about a two hour fleet operation, me keeping a weather eye on local in case any CLDRI boys decide to come into lowsec on an Ironfleet hunting excursion.

During the next twenty minutes, I observe that Max Threat and D34TH — the usual Zimster sidekicks — have logged in.

The fleet op is quiet but useful, we get several nice kills and show the Caldari flag on the pipe down to Old Man Star.

On our way back to Nourv, I observe that the three Vamskateers are all still logged in. Could they, are they, have they really been sitting, drones out, in their favorite Onyx/Ishtar/Ishtar combination, on the Tama gate, this whole time, camping for little old me to return from fleet ops in my fully insured disposable Drake?

I make discrete inquiries. It turns out, they could. They are. They have. Onyx/Ishtar/Ishtar, fully deployed in Nourv.

I decide to quietly end my evening in Tama, since I was planning to log anyway. The fleet jumps back into Nourv, without me.

About two minutes later, one of Zim’s former corpmates jumps into Tama. Looks like my failure to return with the fleet was noted.

I logged, content.

Remember Yorlock The Butthurt? This guy? You remember, the guy who wrote: “I am hoping your are exceptionally stupid and continus this conduct.”

Well, that was April. Lotta blustery smack, but then I never heard from him again.

Well, I did once. He saw me in local on June 22 and said:

Yorlock > 10 mil to whioever pods Marlenus
Marlenus > LOL, you still butthurt?
Yorlock > your a smacktard, a thief and a war dec dodger

Which I thought was pretty funny coming from Yorlock, whose outrageous smack has been documented before, and not just in this space. The war dec dodger remark is doubly funny — first because of my unblemished history of employment in Ironfleet, and even moreso because at that very moment, my last war had been the one Ironfleet declared against the INDY Alliance — and won.

It turns out that on June 22, friend Yorlock had just founded (the day before) a one-man corp called Bot Death (ticker: BOT-U).

The news: today’s bundle of junk mail from Concord included a war declaration from Bot Death. Yes, boys and girls, Yorlock is going to try and pod him some thieving smacktard war dec dodging Ironfleet “scumbags”.

We tremble in our pods, we truly do.

Also: good luck with that.

I swear, Vampire Zim cannot seem to decide whether or not he wants to get his grudge on.

After Max Threat’s one failed attempt to gank me outside the station, today’s mail brings news that the 60 member Blood Raider’s Initiate (wasn’t it 80+ members a few days ago?) has withdrawn its war declaration against Ironfleet Towing and Salvage, a mere 35 hours after the war went live. Fighting (gank attempts?) stop tomorrow.

Ironfleet has and shorter and more uneventful wars, true. But not many.

In other news, VampireZim and two “Caldari State Militia” (CLDRI) henchpeople (D34TH, the original founder of BLOOD, and Kniteflite, a 2008 player who came to CLDRI from BLOOD) are in local as I type this.

Do you suppose tomorrow’s mail will bring a retraction of CLDRI’s war declaration without a shot fired?

This morning’s mail from Concord included a declaration of war from our old friends, the Blood Raiders Initiate (ticker BLOOD), one of the longtime haunts for VampireZim and his alts, associates, and split personalities. Interestingly, Zim himself has split off (as of five days ago) into a splinter corp (along with other known usual suspects) called Caldari State Militia (7 current members, ticker CLDRI).

I guess the “thinking” is that when Zim and crew spot me during faction warfare ops, they can call in the goon squads to gank me without having to muss their own precious State Protectorate standings. Which ought to be, uh, interesting, given the attitudes of some of the fleet commanders I fly with.

I promise a blog post in the next few days giving the complete and squalid history of Zim’s vendetta against Ironfleet Towing And Salvage. The first time it was command ships versus T1 fitted newb caracals. This time, things are not quite so uneven!

Update, day later: And here comes the wardec from Caldari State Militia, Zim’s current (FW-enrolled) corp. In other news, Max Threat from BLOOD was waiting for me outside the State Protectorate Logistics Office in Nourvokaiken, when I undocked in a suicide Caracal (irony). Although he was in an Ishtar with drones hot, I was able to redock OK. Then he camped me while I ate my dinner, which I always enjoy.

I had a LOL today while reading the official forums like no LOL I’ve had since Chebri sent me a cease and desist letter with implied threat of suing me (me, Marlenus, a fictional character in a computer game) for libeling her (her, Chebri, another fictional character).

Today’s LOL involved Kyuzo Takeda of the Black Dragon Crime Syndicate, posting a fairly normal and restrained public warning against somebody who was using the courier contracts system to set up suicide ganks. Gank, retain collateral, profit. So far, so normal.

Kyuzo got the usual Melvin-voiced “Ha HA!” trolls, plus a couple of fairly polite and helpful sets of advice for avoiding that sort of misfortune in future. To all of which he responded, fairly sanely:

Thanks for the advice. Although it doesn’t seem right. That they allow that to happen so freely.

Somebody random asks: “This is EVE, how does that not seem right?”

And then the wheels fell off the bus. Kyuzo again:

It’s not right because real stealing is not right. That isk I used as collateral was isk I paid for using the legal time-code selling market that CCP sponsers and supports. So either Baronsold stole real money from me or CCP did. Either way, if you have any morals, you would see it’s not right. Flawed game mechanics cost me real money.

At this point it doesn’t matter what any of you think though. I’ve taken this to a higher level than just a forum alert. I’ve already filed a formal complaint with IC3 and NW3C. As well as reporting it to my commanding officer in my chain of command. (i’m in the military).

Either way, I am not letting anyone steal real money from me. No different than if a thief breaks into my house and steals something.

Ohmigod, did he just say he went into his commanding officer’s office to complain that he’d been victimized by pirates flying internet spaceships? Scratch one promising military career!

Did he really report this terrible crime to The Internet Crime Complaint Center? (That’s “a partnership between the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the National White Collar Crime Center, and the Bureau of Justice Assistance.”)

Did he really report this heinous victimization to the National White Collar Crime Center?

I’d love to have the video of the reaction he got from his commanding officer. And I really, really, want to see his face when somebody in the business of fighting real crime tries to explain that when he logged into EVE, he consented to everything that might happen “to him” while logged in.

Update: Oh god, it just keeps getting better. If he really did this he is in for a world of pain when his “chain of command” figures out the true nature of his beef:

Not when the situation is worded ever so carefully, by stating basic facts on the situation. They don’t view it any different than if someone credit card scammed you on the internet. To put it in your language: “Sir, this company in Europe stole $200.00 from me.” Either way, I gave him all of CCP’s contact information and he told me he would take care of it personally, and also contact the legal branch here on base. Either way, CCP can expect some phone calls from several United States military officers; and perhaps even some people from IC3, if they accept my case as well.

“So, let’s see if I’ve got this straight. You used real money to buy some kind of Monopoly money, or something like that, from some people in, where was it again, Iceland? And then you used this electronic Monopoly money to play a spaceship game, and to buy, what was it again? Brain implants? I can see why you might think you need them. And then you put them in the cargo hold of a computer game spaceship, right? And went and flew it, and got caught by internet pirates? And that’s like, what the game is for, right? So now, you think, the people who run the game, should give your money back? Why don’t you run that by me again, I still think I’m missing a step. And once we’re done with this conversation — which had better be soon — I’ll see if we still have a Navy base in the Aleutian Islands where I can get you transferred.”

Wow, how long has it been since I had a chance to defend an Ironfleet can with heavy missiles? Months, I think.

Tonight, I did, though. And how!

As I mentioned in the last post, I’ve been forced to do a bit of mission running lately, for standings. I finally worked my way up to a high-quality Level III agent in a convenient location, and so last night I began to relocate my fleet into that system so I can work out of there when I simply can’t stand the fork-to-the-face boredom that is mission running.

So, tonight I took the Crane out for a sweep of the belts, hoping to haul some ore before getting down to missions. And I saw an unusual thing: a guy, member of a corp in an alliance, who’s been playing four months longer than me, jet-can mining … in a Retriever. Flying a full set of mixed Tech 1 combat drones.

Needless to say, I was suspicious it might be a trap. Checked the graphics, yup, he’s got two lasers running; check the can ownership, yup it’s his can at least. No telling how many friends he’s got, though, just waiting a short warp away to pwn the careless and greedy.

Still, faint heart never won fair lady. I approached the can. Hey, it’s mostly full of plagioclase! So I grabbed a Craneload, flipped the rest into an Ironfleet jetcan, and hauled ore for the station.

Hauling all that in a Crane is not going to be easy — better to use a bigger hauler after the agro timer expires. So, I’ll jump in the handy Cerberus and go guard the Ironfleet can.

Remember my Cerberus? Have I mentioned my Cerberus? INDY was flying one against me during Chebri’s War, and I admired it. A lot. So I finished the necessary skilling, and bought one. It’s a hangar queen and a toy, mostly, but I luvs it to death and polishes it to a high shine every Saturday afternoon, whether it needs it or not. Aside from one brief-but-exciting encounter with a Vagabond, I haven’t had a chance to do any combat flying with it, although it blows through low-level missions like you would NOT believe. Overkillus Maximus!

Speaking of overkill…

When my Cerberus came out of warp thirty clicks from the Ironfleet can, there was no Ironfleet can.

What there was, was a flashing red Retriever. Really? Oh no, he didn’t!

Oh, yes, he did.

Lock, fire. In my haste, I somehow managed to miss turning on one heavy missile launcher, and I forgot to load the fancy missiles. So the first volley of four is on its way. Is he going to flee?

Let’s go to the videotape:

Your Scourge Heavy Missile hits ArcticIcewolf (Retriever), doing 184.9 damage.
Your Scourge Heavy Missile hits ArcticIcewolf (Retriever), doing 184.9 damage.
Your Scourge Heavy Missile hits ArcticIcewolf (Retriever), doing 225.6 damage.
Your Scourge Heavy Missile hits ArcticIcewolf (Retriever), doing 231.2 damage.

Volley one! Is he fleeing? Why, no, he’s sent his drones after me. He wants to fight!

Hornet I belonging to ArcticIcewolf places an excellent hit on you, inflicting 13.8 damage.
Hornet I belonging to ArcticIcewolf hits you, doing 8.6 damage.
Hornet I belonging to ArcticIcewolf heavily hits you, inflicting 11.6 damage.
Hornet I belonging to ArcticIcewolf heavily hits you, inflicting 10.9 damage.
Hornet I belonging to ArcticIcewolf heavily hits you, inflicting 10.6 damage.

Oooh, that smarted! Volley two, away!

Your Scourge Heavy Missile hits ArcticIcewolf (Retriever), doing 231.1 damage.
Your Scourge Heavy Missile hits ArcticIcewolf (Retriever), doing 290.3 damage.
Your Scourge Heavy Missile hits ArcticIcewolf (Retriever), doing 308.2 damage.
Your Scourge Heavy Missile hits ArcticIcewolf (Retriever), doing 308.2 damage.
Heavy Missile Launcher II deactivates as ArcticIcewolf’s Retriever begins to explode.
Heavy Missile Launcher II deactivates as ArcticIcewolf’s Retriever begins to explode.
Heavy Missile Launcher II deactivates as ArcticIcewolf’s Retriever begins to explode.
Heavy Missile Launcher II deactivates as ArcticIcewolf’s Retriever begins to explode.

Oops, that was fast.

A moment’s pause. And then, in local:

ArcticIcewolf > Marlenus you fucking prick

I decide not to dignify that with a response, but there’s a bystander:

Waxau > lol
Waxau > NERD RAGE!

Here’s the killmail:

Victim: ArcticIcewolf
Alliance: Chances of Misfortune
Corp: Hearts of Obsidian
Destroyed: Retriever
System: [redacted]
Security: 0.5
Damage Taken: 2067

Involved parties:

Name: Marlenus (laid the final blow)
Security: 1.2
Alliance: NONE
Corp: Ironfleet Towing And Salvage
Ship: Cerberus
Weapon: Scourge Heavy Missile
Damage Done: 1964

Name: Thorn Rocket / Guristas
Damage Done: 103

Destroyed items:

Strip Miner I

Dropped items:

Strip Miner I

So, I’m closing with the wreck to scoop that stripminer, and I’m thinking, this guy’s been playing longer than I have, he’s in an allianced corp, he should know better. What was he thinking?

I scooped the miner, flipped all the plagioclase back into an Ironfleet can, filled my cargo hold, and docked. Decided to go back and guard the can some more, until it’s safe to take a hauler in.

Back I went. In the Cerberus. Parked about 70 clicks out.

Here comes ArcticIcewolf, still flashing red, in an industrial (Bestower). I guess he still wants the ore. Doesn’t he know better?

Apparently, not:

Victim: ArcticIcewolf
Alliance: Chances of Misfortune
Corp: Hearts of Obsidian
Destroyed: Bestower
System: [redacted]
Security: 0.5
Damage Taken: 1956

Involved parties:

Name: Marlenus (laid the final blow)
Security: 1.2
Alliance: NONE
Corp: Ironfleet Towing And Salvage
Ship: Cerberus
Weapon: Scourge Heavy Missile
Damage Done: 1956

Destroyed items:

Civilian Expanded Cargohold, Qty: 2

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, he’s been playing since December of 2005 and he’s fitted his hauler with CIVILIAN EXPANDED CARGOHOLDS!

By now, I figure he’s mad, but there’s been no further smack in local. I continue guarding the can until the agro wears off, and meanwhile, I strike up a chat with a friendly bored hulk pilot. We’re talking about unrelated stuff, he mentions an ISK windfall he just got, and I mention a market killing I made once due to another player’s error. Suddenly, we’re hearing from ArcticIcewolf in local. During the conversation you are about to read, I had time to haul all the ore in my Crane (sadly, I didn’t have a larger hauler in system, so it took about four trips) and then come back in my salvage destroyer to salvage both of ArcticIcewolf’s wrecks. My favorite part of what follows is where ArcticIcewolf explains that he can’t fight because he has a life, and thus cannot play enough to afford any combat vessels:

09:04:54: ArcticIcewolf > hey you cant help being an asshole its in your nature
09:05:03: Marlenus > Lol, still chafing are we?
09:05:17: ArcticIcewolf > just a tad
09:05:38: Marlenus > Honestly I’m not sure why you came back in the hauler when I had an Ironfleet can to defend.
09:06:15: Lord Vindicarious > Did you boys get in a pissing match?
09:06:22: ArcticIcewolf > well concidering you stole all my shit i dunno think bout it
09:06:30: Marlenus > Naw, just an altercation over ore floating in space
09:06:42: Marlenus > Cerberus versus retriever, it was fast but ugly
09:06:43: ArcticIcewolf > yeah fucker stole my ore
09:07:03: Marlenus > actually, you were flashing for taking ore from an Ironfleet can, if we must be precise
09:07:23: ArcticIcewolf > because you stole the shit put it back out as yours
09:07:36: Lord Vindicarious > Tisk, tisk
09:07:50: Marlenus > All that fit, I kept, and I’m still hauling it as we speak.
09:07:52: Lord Vindicarious > Honestly, that’s what you get for not using a secure can
09:08:01: Gregory Wallace > sounds shady
09:08:07: ArcticIcewolf > oh that justifies it ?
09:08:26: Lord Vindicarious > Well, yeah that’s what you get for being a dumbass
09:08:30: Marlenus > You make it sound like I was trying to be deceptive, when I was just doing good honest salvage.
09:08:36: Marlenus > Of ore jettisoned into space.
09:09:19: Lord Vindicarious > People can only take what is unsecured
09:09:51: ArcticIcewolf > Lets see its rite next to me and you take it and then Rejettison it as your own, thats Honest ?
09:10:15: Marlenus > Just cleaning up the spaceways, one of the services Ironfleet Towing And Salvage is always happy to provide!
09:10:21: Gregory Wallace > someone picking a fight is what it was
09:10:32: Marlenus > Nah, somebody hauling ore is what it was.
09:10:41: ArcticIcewolf > its you being a dooshbag
09:10:52: Lord Vindicarious > And if you are flying a mining barge, you really shouldn’t jetison unsecure cans unless you WANT some prick to to pick a fight with you
09:10:55: Marlenus > I didn’t really expect the guy in the mining barge to pick an actual fight.
09:11:21: Lord Vindicarious > LOL, sorry but you get no sympathy
09:11:41: ArcticIcewolf > lol why because you just as disshonest as him ?
09:11:47: Lord Vindicarious > Nope
09:11:53: ArcticIcewolf > really
09:12:02: Lord Vindicarious > I never bother stealing ore, it isn’t worth my time
09:12:07: Gregory Wallace > with mining u have to have muscle with u- have a buddy or two cloak a recon by u
09:12:09: ArcticIcewolf > standing up for a disshonest player dont really put high marks on your moral opinions
09:12:42: Lord Vindicarious > However, if I am in my salvager and there are unclaimed wrecks laying about, I’ll salvage them
09:13:10: ArcticIcewolf > even if they rite next to the miner and you know whos it is
09:13:31: Lord Vindicarious > If you are in the belt, i’ll ask first
09:14:08: ArcticIcewolf > well great for you , but marlenus is as disshonest as they come
09:14:15: Lord Vindicarious > But as to your origional gripe of somebody flipping your can, sorry but that is like the oldest trick in eve of picking a fight with somebody
09:14:42: Lord Vindicarious > He did it so you would give him a reason to be able to shoot you
09:15:02: Marlenus > Actually, Lord V, that’s where you are wrong — nobody believes me but I really do do this for the ore.
09:15:25: Marlenus > I was in a T2 transport when this all started, hauling.
09:15:26: ArcticIcewolf > why cant earn your own
09:15:39: Marlenus > It is my own once it’s in my hangar.
09:15:47: Lord Vindicarious > LOL
09:16:22: Lord Vindicarious > I’ll tell you what though Mar, if you ever tried taking MY ore I’d kick your ass
09:16:39: Lord Vindicarious > I wouldn’t just whine about it in local
09:16:59: Lord Vindicarious > (hint hint)
09:17:00: Marlenus > I can respect that. Whether you’d succeed is an open question, but that’s a perfectly respectable approach to take.
09:17:30: ArcticIcewolf > hint all you like lord, some of us have a lifes and arnt on enough to earn biggger badder ships to fight back
09:18:29: Lord Vindicarious > I’m only on for about an hour or so a day, I think I “have a life” thank you
09:18:38: Marlenus > No salvage on the mining barge. :(
09:19:20: Marlenus > couple of burned logic circs from the hauler wreck
09:19:44: Lord Vindicarious > However, that being said, I’ve been playing eve since 2003, so I think I just might have the combat skills to kick your ass Mar if we are both in the same type of ship
09:19:56: Marlenus > Of that, I have NO doubt.
09:20:01: Lord Vindicarious > LOL
09:20:01: Marlenus > I am not a combat pilot…
09:20:14: Marlenus > …and I try very hard to start any fights with an overwhelming tonnage advantage.
09:21:05: Lord Vindicarious > Drones are nice, too
09:21:19: Marlenus > But I am very very good at getting ore out from under the guns of combat escorts, you might be surprised, once.
09:21:39: Marlenus > Having the element of surprise helps a lot
09:21:48: ArcticIcewolf > well, i do respect that you are honest about being Disshonest
09:22:06: Marlenus > You made up that dishonesty part, I see nothing dishonest about salvage
09:22:18: ArcticIcewolf > thats not salvage thats thievery
09:22:36: Marlenus > I believe we disagree on that point.
09:23:06: Lord Vindicarious > LOL, this point is getting a bit stale
09:23:07: ArcticIcewolf > nothing made up, your a poor player, you just admitted a few sentences up about being very good at getting ore from uder other players noses
09:23:25: Marlenus > Not “admitted”, rather I think I was bragging just a bit
09:23:40: Marlenus > And I don’t consider that any sign of being a poor player
09:24:02: Marlenus > Lord V, if you think it’s stale, how do you think I feel? I hear this sort of thing quite often, as you might imagine. ;-)
09:24:32: Lord Vindicarious > Artic, I’m sorry but when you consider the nature of this game then you have nobody to blame but yourself
09:24:40: ArcticIcewolf > if you hear it quite often then i’d prob say your logic of thinking nothing is wrong is missconstrued
09:24:47: Lord Vindicarious > DON’T USE UNSECURED CANS
09:24:56: Marlenus > Well, somebody’s logic has a problem, I’ll grant you that much.
09:25:11: ArcticIcewolf > I can respect that Lord but, to say he was rite in his actions is not rite
09:26:02: Lord Vindicarious > I am NOT saying he is right, I AM saying however that YOU are wrong for using unsecured cans and not expecting to be stolen from
09:27:46: Marlenus > Good night gentlemen, it has a been a pleasure providing salvage services and public entertainments to the good citizens of [redacted].
09:27:58: Gregory Wallace > night
09:27:59: Marlenus > Ironfleet out.
09:27:59: Lord Vindicarious > LOL, night

I think I’ll leave you with a bit of bedtime poetry (for it is far past my bedtime as I write this.) This is copied, verbatim, all spelling and punctuation unchanged, I shit you not (although I did add line breaks) from ArcticIcewolf’s bio:

I Hunt in the deepest and darkest reaches of Space,
I hunt those who wrong others,
I hunt where no man dares to go,
I protect those who cannot defend themselfs,
I hunt those who believe in enslavement of others,
I will not Rest
I can Not die,
therefor I am like the Wolfs of thee Arctic on our Homeworld whome we Lost contact with long long ago,
I run with the pack I die with the pack,
the only problem is,
;) the pack never dies!!

Hey, everybody.

After that last demoralizing loss, I took a few days to work on other projects. I also found a cheaper concept for a heavy salvage cruiser, using an Amar Maller (more lowslots) to save needing rigs.

Took the new heavy salvager out tonight on a very successful run, came back with about 300 salvage parts from four or five different missions, including a nice pile of armor plates and melted cap consoles. And then I got this lovely email, from one Yorlock of the corp Farmer Killers [FARME], alliance United Corporations Against Macros [UCAM].

Subject: dangerous game

As a CEO you of all people should know probin mission and stealing salvage from aliances will get ya war declared. I am hoping your are exceptionally stupid and continus this conduct. I am very bored and need to pod a few scumbags.

I really wish I knew someone who does needlepoint, I’d love to have “I am hoping your are exceptionally stupid and continus this conduct” tatted up in four colors with decorative jetcans and wreck icons in the background, to hang on the Ironfleet office walls. For some reason I am reminded of this classic photograph:

Update: I decided to do a little research on our pleasant friend Yorlock. It turns out he’s got a history of letting his mouth write checks his alliance would prefer not to cash. This Eve-Pirate account features him acting all ass-hurt because somebody looted his wreck and (gasp!) targeted his ship, resulting in a war-dec against UCAM that caused his alliance diplomat to acknowledge “he does have a bad habit of attracting trouble.”

Here’s the hilarious lightly-edited transcript featuring the UCAM diplomat:

[ 2007.08.29 23:36:57 ] PHPR Freighter > any directors here?
[ 2007.08.29 23:37:32 ] PHPR Freighter > I want to know on what grounds that we were war dec’d
[ 2007.08.29 23:37:41 ] Sofia Roseburn > For love and honour.
[ 2007.08.29 23:37:51 ] atrophocy > for pewpew and lols
[ 2007.08.29 23:38:09 ] Sofia Roseburn > We are but a peaceful industrial corp, and your undercutting of our prices has pushed us over the edge.
[ 2007.08.29 23:38:51 ] atrophocy > Donovan Killar is the guy you wanna talk to
[ 2007.08.29 23:38:59 ] atrophocy > ceo boss guy
[ 2007.08.29 23:39:04 ] Sofia Roseburn > He’s currently shitfaced.
[ 2007.08.29 23:39:07 ] Sofia Roseburn > So hi.
[ 2007.08.29 23:39:22 ] Sofia Roseburn > I’ll be your liason officer today.
[ 2007.08.29 23:39:42 ] PHPR Freighter > I would like a more serious answer on why we were war dec’d though
[ 2007.08.29 23:40:18 ] Sofia Roseburn > Do you represent the alliance?
[ 2007.08.29 23:40:25 ] PHPR Freighter > I am the Alliance Diplomat
[ 2007.08.29 23:40:31 ] atrophocy > honestly mate, there’s no serious politics with DKI, they wardec for fun and laughs, it’s nothing more than that
[ 2007.08.29 23:40:45 ] Sofia Roseburn > We dec for shits and giggles.
[ 2007.08.29 23:41:02 ] Sofia Roseburn > One of your members probably made us laugh with whining.
[ 2007.08.29 23:42:06 ] PHPR Freighter > well.. allegations were that since my member didn’t want to fight you, you dec’d us..
[ 2007.08.29 23:42:25 ] Sofia Roseburn > Our logs indicate that one of your members, a Mr Yorlock, insinuated that we were purposefully harassing him. Due to the retardation of this accusation, we decided to go for it anyway.
[ 2007.08.29 23:42:52 ] Sofia Roseburn > Do you have any other questions?
[ 2007.08.29 23:43:02 ] PHPR Freighter > he does have a bad habit of attracting trouble
[ 2007.08.29 23:43:16 ] Sofia Roseburn > That’s your problem, not ours.
[ 2007.08.29 23:43:26 ] Haargoth Agamar > boot him
[ 2007.08.29 23:43:36 ] Sofia Roseburn > Tell him to jog on for the lulz.
[ 2007.08.29 23:43:42 ] PHPR Freighter > peace?
[ 2007.08.29 23:43:53 ] Sofia Roseburn > I can’t offer that, but it may appease the masses.
[ 2007.08.29 23:44:28 ] Sofia Roseburn > And I’m sure your 56 Titans which he claimed the alliance had will hurt our rears in any case.
[ 2007.08.29 23:44:45 ] PHPR Freighter > we don’t own any caps…
[ 2007.08.29 23:45:57 ] Sofia Roseburn > I know. That was me attempting to be funny. I failed.
[ 2007.08.29 23:46:38 ] Sofia Roseburn > But yeah. The war goes ahead. You should be able to kill us all easily.


And here’s the butt-hurt Evemail Sofia got from Yorlock:

IF looting my wrecks… then target locking me and orbiting at 500m is not piracy and harassment, then i must have missed something. And i am sorry if asking him to go pirate someone else was ‘insulting’. YOu need to know what your members do… I dont care about the looting… but locking and orbiting me afterwads is a tad insulting. I dont easily fall for such gank attempts…

Apparently he’s no clearer on the concepts of piracy and harassment than he is on the inherent logical conflict in his novel “stealing salvage” concept.

I’ll warn you all in advance, this post isn’t particularly entertaining. You may just want to skip it.

This blog serves several purposes for Ironfleet. Entertainment of the audience is surely one of them, but it’s only one.

Obviously it’s useful to have a propaganda arm where we can spin the Ironfleet side of the story and control the dialog — I expect and assume that goal is obvious to everyone. I aim for truth, because truth is persuasive, but obviously it’s truth the way we see things — for objective reporting, buy a newspaper. (Er, on second thought, good luck with that.)

Another thing I use the blog for, is to serve as a prosthetic memory. Months later, these accounts help refresh my memory of personalities and events. That’s saved my butt several times now.

Related to that, the blog tends to fix ephemeral behavior in amber, preserving and displaying it for history. So much of what we do in EVE is fleeting, and gone as soon as the screen changes. When my enemies behave in ways that do them no credit, it strikes me as a worthy project to document that here, in their own words, where the search engines (and their next set of enemies) can find it forever. To me, someone who treasures words, that seems a far better revenge than blowing up yet another soon-forgotten virtual spaceship.

And that, my friends, is why I’m bothering to reproduce the evemails that follow. In them, Chebri seems almost to plead for trust, demanding that she be believed because (she says) her word is good. And then, in bitter irony of which she seems totally unaware, she tries to justify failing to extend that same courtesy to others (namely me and my corpmates). She knows she’s truthful so we should believe her, but if we tell the truth the way we understand it, she disagrees so we must be liars. It’s like she lives in a black and white world in which she, and only she, can know the one truth. She’s obviously never heard of the parable of the blind men and the elephant:

Once upon a time there was a certain raja who called to his servant and said, ‘Come, good fellow, go and gather together in one place all the men of Savatthi who were born blind… and show them an elephant.’ ‘Very good, sire,’ replied the servant, and he did as he was told. He said to the blind men assembled there, ‘Here is an elephant,’ and to one man he presented the head of the elephant, to another its ears, to another a tusk, to another the trunk, the foot, back, tail, and tuft of the tail, saying to each one that that was the elephant.

“When the blind men had felt the elephant, the raja went to each of them and said to each, ‘Well, blind man, have you seen the elephant? Tell me, what sort of thing is an elephant?’

“Thereupon the men who were presented with the head answered, ‘Sire, an elephant is like a pot.’ And the men who had observed the ear replied, ‘An elephant is like a winnowing basket.’ Those who had been presented with a tusk said it was a ploughshare. Those who knew only the trunk said it was a plough; others said the body was a grainery; the foot, a pillar; the back, a mortar; the tail, a pestle, the tuft of the tail, a brush.

“Then they began to quarrel, shouting, ‘Yes it is!’ ‘No, it is not!’ ‘An elephant is not that!’ ‘Yes, it’s like that!’ and so on, till they came to blows over the matter.

Toward the end of the EVEmails that follow, the exchange bogs down in specifics, and gets very repetitive of the same factual disputes that have been hashed to death already in the comments on this blog. If you care enough and read that far (I don’t recommend it) you’ll see that Chebril still can’t seem to distinguish between facts (did an event happen?) and semantics (what the undisputed event should be called, how it should be characterized, what it should be named).

——————–
Marlenus,

Two weeks and neither of us has lost a ship to the other. Good match! I enjoyed the challenge.

Shame you involved ACME though. They really never knew about it until it was started. They did eve mail me intel from time to time but for the most part I used my own locate agents.

I enjoyed the creativity of your blog and ‘role play’ of your character which is what drew me to you. However, when it became apparent that you were blurring fact and fiction to the point that it affected other players, I lost respect for your writing.

ciao

Chebri

——————–
Hey, got your mail yesterday, but was just wondering whether all that past tense was intended to indicate that you were going to let the war lapse.

As for the rest, I’m not too concerned. Your respect for my literary talents isn’t exactly my top gaming priority, and your concern about ‘fiction” became hilarious to me when you kept labeling my honest opinions and intel estimates as lies and fiction. I DO thank you for the implied threat of a lawsuit, though — that was genuinely the most entertaining communication I’ve ever gotten in EVE.

See you in the spaceways, if one of us is unlucky —

Marlenus

——————–
Your twisted perception never ceases to amaze me. I say apple…you say orange and so it goes.

Chebri

——————–
At least I can tell when I’m in Jita — TorpedoTed still swears he saw you in local, and I know the man personally, he’s very truthful.

— Marlenus

——————–
I swear, on my great grandmother’s grave (very personal here) that I never jumped the gate into Jita. There are a lot of pilots in Jita and I can see someone getting confused between red stars and red skull n crossbones.

I have been completely honest with all players in game and I hate to be accused of having done something (like get backing from ACME, etc.) that I haven’t done. Every time I tried to get the facts straight talking to you you twisted my words. Frustrating.

And yeah I figure two weeks with no points on either side is a draw.

Chebri

——————–
With an equal level of sincerity and honesty, and leaving all gaming posture aside, I tell you that (a) that’s what he told me, and (b) that’s what he believes. Of course, he could be mistaken.

When I first reported this, you IMMEDIATELY called it a lie. It wasn’t. It’s a true account of the data I have.

Don’t you see the irony in you expecting to be taken at your word, while shouting “LIAR’ at others?

You don’t seem to comprehend that other people see the world differently than you do. You don’t seem to understand that it’s possible for two people to look at the same data and reach different, HONESTLY different, conclusions.

I’ll send another email about the gaming matters. This is a different topic entirely.

— Marlenus

——————–
On the contrary. I do know that two people can observe a scene and have two different perceptions of what happened. However, there are also facts to be considered that are not subject to perception.

Fact (game logs to support) I never jumped to Jita.
Fact (game logs to support) I never got funding or support otherwise from ACME
Fact (game mechanics) ore theft is theft – not salvage

You toss accusations around without bothering to address the facts. That’s what I don’t have an appreciation for. Add to that the perception that others have that you seem to enjoy making miner’s lives miserable by stealing from them and yeah…I think you’re a lousy person. You enjoy hurting others. I have no respect for that.

Chebri

——————–
OK, back in gaming mode.

You do know I saw you fleeted up with Sparkiec the first day of our war, and you were using him as a warp-to at a non-standard place outside my station, right? That’s support. I saw it with my own eyes. That’s backing. For that reason alone — and it’s only one of my many examples — I simply don’t believe your claims to have been acting alone. I saw it with my own eyes. Why should I believe otherwise?

And that has colored my willingness to believe other things you’ve said.

Without any desire to give offense, the credibility you want to have with me, is not present.

As for the draw, I agree — I’ve made no effort to hunt you, and you have failed to catch me. I never wanted war with you, remember? You could cancel it any time.

— Marlenus

——————–
As Cordus said on your blog, can you blame them for not being willing to provide information when you’ve stolen so much from their players? A few players helped from time to time. The CEO and directors had no idea what was going on until it had already happened. So you blame an entire alliance for the action of two players.

I don’t seek credibility with you. LOL I gave up on that. I was just trying to end the shooting amicably. I still have my credibility with people who matter.

Your war with ACME and their alliance is between you and them. I’ve no say in it as they’ve had no say in mine with you. I’ve asked the alliance leader if I was causing them problems and her reply was “do what you want – Ironfleet is just a blip on our screen.” LOL

Chebri

——————–
all this and I’m still not clear — do you plan to end the shooting, or not?

— Marlenus

——————–
Doesn’t really matter what I say at this point, does it? I mean, you’re just going to assume that the opposite is true. Assumptions can be such a bitch. I’ll just let the facts speak for themselves.

LOL

Chebri

There’s an old farmer’s saying that goes “Never try to teach a pig to sing. It just wastes your time, and annoys the pig.”

That’s how I feel about trying to talk about truth with Chebri. Note how it’s a “fact” if she saw it, but it’s a lie if me and mine saw it (TorpedoTed saw her face icon in Jita local. He just did.) She hates to be accused of doing something she says she hasn’t done (“like get backing from AC-ME”) but doesn’t mind accusing others of lying when they haven’t. Then when she admits she did do what she said she didn’t do (“A few players helped from time to time”) she tries to redefine “get backing” by saying “I never got funding”. Truth is a slippery thing indeed in her hands, and in classic human fashion she’s quick to accuse others of her own sins: “You toss accusations around without bothering to address the facts.”

Friends, I have addressed the facts. I have addressed them until I was blue in the face. I had to nail them down and chain them up, they were so tired of being addressed they were trying to sneak away for beer. (Yeah, they saw that’s where the audience went, and they were jealous.)

A waste of time for sure, and I apologize for boring you with it. But if this blog post saves just one person, ever, from making the mistake of trying to discuss truth with Chebri, it will have been worth my time.

And meanwhile, Chebri’s war is now in its third week. So what was all that “enjoyed the challenge” and “I figure [it’s] a draw” and “I was just trying to end the shooting amicably” stuff for? Unless I’ve counted my dates wrong, she paid her war bill before we started talking last night. I guess it’s more truth, Chebri style.

Today has been a frustrating day. I’d blocked it out in my schedule as a day to tend to war matters.

In the morning, AC-ME had no targets in space, so I fitted some ships and tended to other matters.

Later in the day, my internet connection started to get flaky, dropping me offline every forty seconds or so, or worse, at the end of every third warp. That’s a price I pay for living out in the country for part of the year, but usually it’s not this bad. I suspect my ISP of having worse-than-usual weekend internet congestion today, but it’s also my impression that my disconnect problem has gotten much worse since Trinity.

I waited until evening, then tried again. Utter fail, I must have gotten disconnected a dozen or more times before I’d localized AC-ME’s Saturday evening mining operation.

Once I did, though, I felt like a World War II submarine commander looking through the periscope at a fat and juicy North Atlantic convoy:

Mind you, with five visible combat escorts and one known stealth bomber on the grid, I was expecting much the same result as your typical World War II sub commander: a chance to launch a very small number of volleys, take out one non-combatant, and then fight like hell to make it out alive.

Which chance I did not get, because my full-of-fail internet connection chose to fail just as I got within cruise missile range. I was actually trying to decide which non-combatant looked like the faster gank when I got disconnected.

Which means, of course, that from their perspective I uncloaked and warped away. I tried to log back in — even though warping back in uncloaked at that range to an alerted fleet was almost certain suicide — but I got disconnected during my next three login attempts, said several bad words, and started drinking alcohol, instead.

I do want to call special attention to the enemy Manticore pilot who was in space tonight, one Loz Kias. In previous encounters, he’s distinguished himself by his remarkably direct tactic of dialing me up for a private chat and simply asking me where I am. Fair enough — it’s good for a laugh, and I can block him if it gets out of hand, or ignore him if I want to “confirm” his suspicion that I’m AFK.

Tonight, however, he trotted out two new tactics. All’s fair in love and war, I suppose, but didn’t the “spam your intended victim with gang invites and hope he flails his interface while declining them” gain its users something of a reputation for lameness, back when this was a popular tactic in Empire ganking?

After several repetitions I blocked that, so he trotted out what I’m starting to call the “Marvin The Miserable Android Offense”, defined as the attempt to get your opponent to give up by depressing him with the supposed pointlessness and hopelessness of his cause:

Loz Kias > so,
Loz Kias > the notion is,
Loz Kias > where are u?
Marlenus > LOL
Loz Kias > u can loose your ship or…
Loz Kias > stay in isa for a long time
Loz Kias > spending money on the war
Loz Kias > both seem rather pointless to me
Marlenus > I’m sorry my war seems pointless to you …but i’ve documented my reasons in exhaustive detail
Marlenus > This feels like the most public war in the history of EVE
Loz Kias > well…..
Loz Kias > why dont u hand yourself in
Marlenus > Why would I? From where I sit, I’m winning
Loz Kias > no,
Loz Kias > its like, trying to sue microsoft, u my do 5mil worth of dmg to a 12bil corp
Loz Kias > males soo little dif
Marlenus > LOL, do you still think this war is about ISK?
Loz Kias > well isk makes the world go round

“Why dont u hand yourself in?”

I think not.

This has got to be one of the funniest EVEmails I have ever received:

From Chebri:

2008.01.04 00:57
libel

An untruthful statement about a person, published in writing or through broadcast media, that injures the person’s reputation or standing in the community. Because libel is a tort (a civil wrong), the injured person can bring a lawsuit against the person who made the false statement. Libel is a form of defamation , as is slander (an untruthful statement that is spoken, but not published in writing or broadcast through the media).

cease speaking of me in your blog. period.

I’m not sure she got my EVEmail response (I got disconnected right after hitting send) but I’m sure she’ll see it here:

a) Truth is an absolute defense to any charge of libel.
b) It is impossible to libel an alias. Characters in a computer game have no reputation in communities recognized by the law.
c) I’ll speak of you as and where I please. Don’t like it? Go away and leave Ironfleet alone. Then I’ll have nothing to say.

Good day!

Was Chebri seriously trying to imply that she’d try to sue me for libel if I don’t stop talking about her? The idea that the owner of one fictional character might try to sue the owner of another fictional character (in what jurisdiction, the Jovians only know) over role-playing statements is just about as absurd as it gets.

I tell you this, though; I’d pay large dollars to be the fly on the wall in her lawyer’s office, just to see the look on her face as she tries to explain exactly where and in what manner she’s been damaged. “Er, and who is it again you want to sue? Marlenus? Is that his real name? No? You don’t know it? Hrmmm… And what did he say about you? Oh, you mean, he doesn’t even know who you are, or what your name is? Then how did he damage your reputation? No, no, not in that game thing, out here in the real world where the courts are…” and so on, ad infinitum. Forty minutes later, she would emerge, $300 poorer and (hopefully) a smidge wiser.

My advice to Chebri: Dude. Don’t forget. It’s just a game.

Blustering about libel, when you can’t even point to a lie, equals “full of fail.”