Imagine that you are an avatar in Diablo 3. You enter New Tristram after defeating some risen dead. The town is clearly in danger. The undead are attacking the gate, infected soon-to-be undead are locked in the cellar, more undead at the fields behind the other gate, smoke rises from the village over the river. The town itself is in dire condition, it's small, its inhabitants are either fighting or hiding. There aren't many options for you: you fight the risen dead and whatever dark power is behind them, or you just wait like the cowardly mayor until they break in and kill everyone. Fighting here is for rational interest: survival.
Now imagine that you are an avatar in World of Warcraft. You hear people speaking about war with Deathwing and you see his marks on the Stormwind gate. But since that attack, Stormwind has been kept safe. Out of the gate there are the gentle forest of Elwyn with playful rabbits and lowbie wolves. If you look around you see people minding their peaceful business or do some goofiness like playing with their pet or holding some midsummer festival. Sure, somewhere far there is a war, you met those who've been there. But it's far, far away from the safety of Stormwind. You also know history: C'thun, Kil'Jaden, the Lich king and all their underlinks have tried to conquer the world but they were all defeated without you. You can be sure that Deathwing and whoever comes after him will be defeated too without you. Sure, you can join the fight either because it's the right thing to do, or because you want personal glory, prove everyone that you aren't just one guy in the crowd, but a Kingslayer! Fighting here is a vanity goal, either social or competitive.
Time to place yourself in the position of an EVE avatar. You look around in highsec and see a perfectly maintained society. People are minding their business. There is no real conflict. Sure some hotheads fight each other in the FW warzones and there are criminals popping ships now and then but is it any different from a real life city? Unlike WoW, there is not even a distant war between "us" and "them". Why should you care about Delve any more than you care about the outcome of the fight between two African warlords? Not like it would have any effect on your life. If you want to be rich, you can have it all in the safety of highsec. If you want the fame of a great fighter, you can move lowsec or NPC-null and be an infamous pirate or a famous vigilante.
But does it make any sense to go sov-null and fight for it? It doesn't provide much of a fame as you'll act as a member of a large fleet, following orders, even if you are on a somewhat independent spot like scout or interdictor. You'll be deploying when told, extracting when told, shoot what's told, die when primaried. There are no financial interests either: sure, you can rat/plex in your space, but you can do the same in NPC null and the increased safety of sov (you can dock, they can't, your buddies are nearby) doesn't worth the increased hassle. This comes from the design feature "you are never safe" which prevents sov from being actually safe.
Only one individual goal left: leeching on their real or imagined wealth and fame. M&S flocks there for free ships and for having a "cool" corp/alliance logo. Most alliances are a mixture of mistaken individualists (who believe sov-null is the best place to be rich and famous) and a big bunch of leeching M&S. They are the standard "we are here to provide our members a good place to live, be active, help the team blah, blah, blah". These alliances fail not because of thieves and scammers, the same problem was pretty well handled in real life and the same methods (vouching, personal connections, long initiation period) would work in EVE. The problem comes from the above design point that makes sov-holding a pointless effort in terms of ISK as it cannot provide increased safety. The best way to serve their members would be disbanding and telling them to play in the NPC corp or in small corps with their close friends.
Since we covered the individualist reasons and clearly null can't be pure M&S (as they need someone to leech on), we can only turn to altruistic reasons. Of course this is defined from the point of view of the avatar. Throwing Rifters and get podded again and again is completely stupid from a pilot, while can be a great fun for a player.
Before joining sov-null (or WH) one must find an out of game reason to do so. One who joins for in-game or "avatar-selfish" reasons (fame, glory, wealth) will either recognize that he should be in high/low/NPC-null or end up as a leeching M&S. This statement isn't new, "EVE can only be won by uninstalling" is recited countless times.
I have no friends in any alliance. I can only join if I'd find one which have the same out-of-game goals as I do. Well, official goals are rare. The Not Red Don't Shoot region have a clear one, maintaining safety. That's not my bread and butter as granted safety is exploited by M&S, those who enjoy it but contribute nothing to upkeep it. However some alliances have a culture and every culture has a natural goal included: to spread it. Cultures are strong and reliable: if The Mittani would come up with the idea to turn GSF into a friendly, helpful, nice mining alliance, he would lose his seat in an hour. His actions are limited to what the alliance culture allows. The cultural goals are not necessarily known consciously by the members. The average guy just experience it as "I'm doing as it should" or "I do it as it's fun". If you understand a culture, you can predict their moves better than they do. This is how you shall pick an alliance. One that has the same goals as you, openly declared or defined by culture.
My goals are clear: hit the M&S where I can. Make the socials see that helping M&S is bad idea. Let's see if I can find an alliance culture that directs M&S bashing activity. If yes, I shall join. If not, I shall start my own. As I recognized that this goal is altruistic, everything I spend for ships is already sacrificed to the goal. Because of this, there is no additional utility flying them myself.
My original idea was to dual-box fleet booster titans, however titans are expensive enough to deserve an active pilot. So I will fly one titan, the subcap-fleet boosting, sometimes counterdrop-baiting Ragnarok. My Avatar pilot will be turned into the sitter of my reserve Ragnarok. The Avatar has a great boost effect (+37.5% cap recharge) but needs no gang link modules to provide it, so can be piloted normally. If the pilot is boosting a wing/squad anyway, using a mindlink is great to provide additional boost. So let me introduce the boost-Avatar lottery: after 6 month of my joining (that time is needed to evaluate if the goals of the alliance are really the ones I believe as cultures can only be fully understood from the inside), I will get an Avatar. Either buy it or get it built. This Avatar will be lotteried. Any alliance member is eligible to win it who has the following skills:
This is the last post in the series of "Gevlon looks for a nullsec alliance". I now apply to alliances I consider fitting to my goals. If you think yours also belong to the "grief/clear up the M&S" goal, feel free to comment where can I read up on you. On Friday I wish to announce the result (in-progress negotiations can cause delay). If I fail to find any or fail to gain acceptance to the ones I find, I start my own group.
Tuesday morning report: 116.6B (2.5B spent on main accounts, 1.8 spent on Logi/Carrier, 1.5 on Ragnarok, 1.0 on Rorqual, 0.9+1.5 on Nyx, 1.3 on Avatar, 2.6B received as gift).
Now imagine that you are an avatar in World of Warcraft. You hear people speaking about war with Deathwing and you see his marks on the Stormwind gate. But since that attack, Stormwind has been kept safe. Out of the gate there are the gentle forest of Elwyn with playful rabbits and lowbie wolves. If you look around you see people minding their peaceful business or do some goofiness like playing with their pet or holding some midsummer festival. Sure, somewhere far there is a war, you met those who've been there. But it's far, far away from the safety of Stormwind. You also know history: C'thun, Kil'Jaden, the Lich king and all their underlinks have tried to conquer the world but they were all defeated without you. You can be sure that Deathwing and whoever comes after him will be defeated too without you. Sure, you can join the fight either because it's the right thing to do, or because you want personal glory, prove everyone that you aren't just one guy in the crowd, but a Kingslayer! Fighting here is a vanity goal, either social or competitive.
Time to place yourself in the position of an EVE avatar. You look around in highsec and see a perfectly maintained society. People are minding their business. There is no real conflict. Sure some hotheads fight each other in the FW warzones and there are criminals popping ships now and then but is it any different from a real life city? Unlike WoW, there is not even a distant war between "us" and "them". Why should you care about Delve any more than you care about the outcome of the fight between two African warlords? Not like it would have any effect on your life. If you want to be rich, you can have it all in the safety of highsec. If you want the fame of a great fighter, you can move lowsec or NPC-null and be an infamous pirate or a famous vigilante.
But does it make any sense to go sov-null and fight for it? It doesn't provide much of a fame as you'll act as a member of a large fleet, following orders, even if you are on a somewhat independent spot like scout or interdictor. You'll be deploying when told, extracting when told, shoot what's told, die when primaried. There are no financial interests either: sure, you can rat/plex in your space, but you can do the same in NPC null and the increased safety of sov (you can dock, they can't, your buddies are nearby) doesn't worth the increased hassle. This comes from the design feature "you are never safe" which prevents sov from being actually safe.
Only one individual goal left: leeching on their real or imagined wealth and fame. M&S flocks there for free ships and for having a "cool" corp/alliance logo. Most alliances are a mixture of mistaken individualists (who believe sov-null is the best place to be rich and famous) and a big bunch of leeching M&S. They are the standard "we are here to provide our members a good place to live, be active, help the team blah, blah, blah". These alliances fail not because of thieves and scammers, the same problem was pretty well handled in real life and the same methods (vouching, personal connections, long initiation period) would work in EVE. The problem comes from the above design point that makes sov-holding a pointless effort in terms of ISK as it cannot provide increased safety. The best way to serve their members would be disbanding and telling them to play in the NPC corp or in small corps with their close friends.
Since we covered the individualist reasons and clearly null can't be pure M&S (as they need someone to leech on), we can only turn to altruistic reasons. Of course this is defined from the point of view of the avatar. Throwing Rifters and get podded again and again is completely stupid from a pilot, while can be a great fun for a player.
Before joining sov-null (or WH) one must find an out of game reason to do so. One who joins for in-game or "avatar-selfish" reasons (fame, glory, wealth) will either recognize that he should be in high/low/NPC-null or end up as a leeching M&S. This statement isn't new, "EVE can only be won by uninstalling" is recited countless times.
I have no friends in any alliance. I can only join if I'd find one which have the same out-of-game goals as I do. Well, official goals are rare. The Not Red Don't Shoot region have a clear one, maintaining safety. That's not my bread and butter as granted safety is exploited by M&S, those who enjoy it but contribute nothing to upkeep it. However some alliances have a culture and every culture has a natural goal included: to spread it. Cultures are strong and reliable: if The Mittani would come up with the idea to turn GSF into a friendly, helpful, nice mining alliance, he would lose his seat in an hour. His actions are limited to what the alliance culture allows. The cultural goals are not necessarily known consciously by the members. The average guy just experience it as "I'm doing as it should" or "I do it as it's fun". If you understand a culture, you can predict their moves better than they do. This is how you shall pick an alliance. One that has the same goals as you, openly declared or defined by culture.
My goals are clear: hit the M&S where I can. Make the socials see that helping M&S is bad idea. Let's see if I can find an alliance culture that directs M&S bashing activity. If yes, I shall join. If not, I shall start my own. As I recognized that this goal is altruistic, everything I spend for ships is already sacrificed to the goal. Because of this, there is no additional utility flying them myself.
My original idea was to dual-box fleet booster titans, however titans are expensive enough to deserve an active pilot. So I will fly one titan, the subcap-fleet boosting, sometimes counterdrop-baiting Ragnarok. My Avatar pilot will be turned into the sitter of my reserve Ragnarok. The Avatar has a great boost effect (+37.5% cap recharge) but needs no gang link modules to provide it, so can be piloted normally. If the pilot is boosting a wing/squad anyway, using a mindlink is great to provide additional boost. So let me introduce the boost-Avatar lottery: after 6 month of my joining (that time is needed to evaluate if the goals of the alliance are really the ones I believe as cultures can only be fully understood from the inside), I will get an Avatar. Either buy it or get it built. This Avatar will be lotteried. Any alliance member is eligible to win it who has the following skills:
- Amarr titan 5
- Jump drive calibration 4
- Cybernetics 5
- X warfare specialist 5, X is picked by the supercap FC
This is the last post in the series of "Gevlon looks for a nullsec alliance". I now apply to alliances I consider fitting to my goals. If you think yours also belong to the "grief/clear up the M&S" goal, feel free to comment where can I read up on you. On Friday I wish to announce the result (in-progress negotiations can cause delay). If I fail to find any or fail to gain acceptance to the ones I find, I start my own group.
Tuesday morning report: 116.6B (2.5B spent on main accounts, 1.8 spent on Logi/Carrier, 1.5 on Ragnarok, 1.0 on Rorqual, 0.9+1.5 on Nyx, 1.3 on Avatar, 2.6B received as gift).
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