An Early Morning in My New Home

As soon as I leave the station I notice that in my usually abandoned area of space there are 3 ships tooling around on scan. I immediately use my warp out as you never know who's cloaked above or below you and I jump out to my secret spot from there, carefully aligning myself as to not cross any major traffic points in the system.

I use my directional scanner and slowly rotate 360 degrees quickly making notes of anything interesting and getting a pretty good idea of where these pilots are loitering. Sitting there with them are a few warp bubbles and some ship carcasses that had the unfortunate luck of running right into this make shift gate camp. They are right out in the open which is how I like them. Visible.

I hate gate camps with a passion. I don't hate the fact that you can have a gate camp, during war this is a necessary tool. But to consign yourself to relentlessly smash on other pilots with your super quick locking time and linked up one shot ability must be more boring than ratting out the belts.

I prefer honorable duels, or fair fights to be honest, but this is the real world and that's not how it usually happens so you've got to be able to do what they do as well but better.

Over the course of the past two weeks I have integrated my corp. into this system somewhat under the nose of the locals and so far I haven't gotten any problem from anyone. I believe the fact that they already have a rather large alliance who has recently taken to dropping in the system and killing anything that moves has a big impact on their patrolling duties as of late.

Normally, I do avoid everyone around here so that I don't ruffle feathers or step on the wrong toes as I need to be here for a bit. We play our cat and mouse games daily, however when hot drop time comes, we all scatter. I like to hole up and spy as much of the activity as possible, hopefully to learn a tactic or two and also to help protect myself if I am ever in the middle of that hot mess.

All in all though, I'd have to say my new home system in null is about the perfect fit for me currently. Right at my level of experience and that is rare. There are so many places to blend into in Eve that it's hard a lot of the time to get the right feel for a place.

Before I took the plunge into the cold, dark immortal abyss I used to move around a lot for a mortal and I continue that even after knowing I will live forever.

I have successfully setup extraction units on all of the massively overburdened planets in the system. You would not believe how neglected the harvesting is here. No one seems interested at all, which I can understand, but there's usually at least one alliance or corp. member in a group that will do it. It's too much Isk just to leave lying around. Makes me shudder to think that it was all just sitting here waiting for me and my machines

The locals should really not have any problems with this over time as I always bring merchandise that's been created with these resources to sell locally first, intergalactic second.

My prices are reasonable and only reflect the price of the materials plus a modest set base markup that I use across the board barring a few exceptional items.

I am sitting here at my perch over-looking the camp at the gate. I make note of the pilots involved and also any pilot ship hulls I see floating wrecked around the gate in case I need to recruit help in the future on the fly. They pop the locals I take a note, they pop a stranger I write it down only if they are somewhat formidable and just got caught with their pants down at a gate which does happen to the best of us. The rest I just ignore as they shouldn't have been in this area of lawless apathy in the first place. Not unless they were just looking to die, which is fairly common around here.

Who's got the biggest blaster? We all do, it's just a matter of timing.

Don't Worry About my Ship, It Don't Hurt Much...

Mistake number one, thinking I had already set my points necessary to keep me "mostly" free of bubbles and moving along my merry way.

That's right, turns out there were no links to anything once I got into the null systems (about 10 low sec jumps in).

Now if we rewind just a bit, I spent almost the entire day Saturday setting up my "safe" spots and my out of warp vortex bookmarks.

I did a great job, took my time and actually placed them like I had the whole year to do it.

In doing so, I also spent the amount of time I like to slow boating around, getting the correct random distance and watching local for conversations and just generally learning as much as I could about the area I was travelling around in.

Well, somehow - using the old GPS - I managed to go the wrong way. That has never happened to me before I assure you ;), but somehow I ended up on the very route I was trying to avoid. By the time I had realized it it was way too late. In addition I committed a big no no by not taking a scout with me (as I had preciously scouted it out myself.)

However, I got to meet some new people, lost a ship and eventually ended up spending the rest of the first day setting spots on the really dangerous route. I won't be going that way too often, but at least I can if I have to now. I would have left and headed back to high sec to reconnect to my original route but unfortunately once you're in deep enough it's just makes more sense to work your way through to the end point.

In other news, I've got all my equipment in place for my first three planets and at this point they are just in collect mode as is the entire operation. I like to build up a small supply of my ingredients before I head off and start manufacturing, that way there will never be a lag in the chain.

Over the 6 characters I have mapped out where they will extract and what they will extract, who's in charge of production and who manages the factories. We are all ready to go as soon as some of the others finish up their training, also fits in with us just collecting at the moment.

I'll be honest, just by getting up all the extractors and selling what comes off of that, it's starting to look really close to my final number at the end of the production cycle and that makes me a little frustrated as I want to complete the chain but I definitely won't if it's not worth the amount of profit that I pull out of it later.

Too early to make a decision on that as I really need to see everything in action and spitting out final products, sell a bit and keep on or change it up.

No rush, it's a learning experience and I plan on sucking everything I can out of it.

Change is a Part of Life

Operations have shifted to a more lucrative area of space. It's a new experience for everyone and therefore everyone has thin nerves, a lack of sleep and high alert and all of those other things that mean nervous. It sure does shape the environment for an entertaining Friday night though, but the next day everyone's just a little closer to snapping.

Once I shake the last drop of resources out of the line from extractor to spaceport I take down the extractors and pack them away for new adventure. It makes for an interesting morning and for some reason, no fault of my own, I have an increased bounty amount on my head. My factories are still running until the last drop is used up, then those too will be packed away for use at another time.

I have a knack at setting down stakes in other peoples back yards and spending a month blending into the background, setting up ops and the like, making points to keep myself moving and it also helps when you're learning a new systems active hours. I never rape their resources except for planetary. If I'm not caught killing all their rats and running all their sites I usually do alright. Maybe one every once in a while when everybody is out of system.

However, I was done here, therefore I made a lot of noise and showed up on a lot of scans where I wouldn't normally. In addition it was a holiday weekend and most Capsuleers were milling about where there wouldn't be any. That's fine though, I like it when there's a lot of people around.

Time to disappear as I have been avoiding the two Loki's that seem to show up at all the Customs Offices on a regular cycle the whole time I've been breaking down ops. I roll right past them all and head out the high security exit. They have tried to cover all the exits but there is only two of them and I slip away fairly easily with no chase.

I'll miss these guys, the first week I was here I brought 5 Thorax with me and had some shoot out time with the locals for fun and then gave away two of them as I was passing through surveying. It made it easier as they weren't questioning my presence later in my stay as long as I sent someone out every once in a while to have a good fight and kept regular transactions going through their surprisingly cheap Customs Office.

The crew has added irritation as I have been assigning cross training to all of their skill cues over the past month. I have devised a much more productive and profitable manufacturing system and in order to implement it I need the help of up to 6 members of the company and to be honest, only 2 of them have PI experience and that would be me and the other founder.

Education

In this Universe, knowing is the catalyst in almost every situation. Good intelligence, great training and a little luck. Here is the list of required training I just dropped on the boys and they aren't too happy as none of it has to do with guns, ammo, speed or piloting and defense.

However, they've seen the spreadsheets and they know its' worth it, so not too much moaning and groaning to report.

Here's the new training regimen:

Character Training

• Cybernetics I: If they don't already have it, yes there are several new players so we are starting from scratch on some.

Pilot Training

• Industrial I: They hated this one the most - once they complete the regular training I will push them all through on flying blockade runners. I encourage them to take it to III once they have some free time then eventually the whole way. I believe once they start tooling around in the system on their manufacturing tasks they will be begging for a Viator. I also expect several fatalities.

Engineering

• Hull Upgrades II

• Jury Rigging III

• Astronautics Rigging I

Planetary Interaction

• Remote Sensing III
• Interplanetary Consolidation IV
• Planetology IV
• Command Center Upgrades IV
• Advanced Planetology IV

This is the extent of it, if they can finish this up then they will be able to manage the number of extractors and factories that are required for the role that they will individually fill in the manufacturing machine. The cogs that keep things moving.

Herding Kittens

You may be wondering why my new care bears would want to leave their high security home and venture into null to work as a manufacturer in a machine that ultimately will cause some tears but overall and long term it will produce freedom. I love freedom.

One of the first things I did was judge how much time would be involved for each member to get up to speed and compared that with how much time I believe they would need to wander the area and get acclimated; including the occasional roam with our resident FC.

This of course is to teach a few hard lessons quickly and also to help see who will stick around after their world is turned upside down.

I ultimately settled on a 3 day pattern for each member including myself because let's be honest, this is not something you'd classify as a fun activity. It's rather mundane and feels a little like boredom. So 2 days off then 30 minutes of work on the 3rd day then two days off. Easy as pi.

I made very clear the risks, but also the rewards, the ones they actually care about.

• You'll get killed a lot at first, but then you will improve - it's a good place to learn and there's no telling what you will be flying within the year.
• You will meet a lot of experienced players that have been around for a bit and you will also get to experience what it is like living in someone else's sovereign territory and how to act accordingly as a subject of a new kingdom and of course keep your freedom loving ideals alive inside.
• You will walk away with a career you can setup on your own if you are alone and you will be able to generate income without a lot of effort (the 3 day cycle) I also provided projections for the next 12 months - honestly this was all I needed.

Loss of Isk

The biggest thing that our management was concerned about was of course the loss of Isk while we transitioned from one area to the next.

In order to setup certain parts of the system I have to tear down the old parts that are still generating.

What I did in this case was to step the setup process to correlate with the newer players training so that we are constantly and consistently putting up extractors and factories over the course of 1 month. During that one month I will  be deactivating everything else that's dated from the old system.

The new manufacturing configuration involves 6 people and the old one only needed 1 person. Because of that alone, the income generated in the first week with minimal setup already surpasses old income estimates for the 1 person configuration by a factor of almost 3.

That was enough to calm down some of our more nervous members and get them attuned to the idea of moving. Of course everyone isn't moving but definitely the majority and the key manufacturers of course. We have offices in every major area of space, it's not like you have to go we can assign you anywhere really. But this is the bread and butter.

It's an expedition and should be approached as such and with that an embrace of the risk and the tears and the sweat that will be involved in clearing an area and staking a claim. This is high adventure people and I believe that they know that.

Engage

"How long before we get there Captain?"

"Soon ensign, soon. Before you know it you'll be prying at the edge of the known universe…"

Plans are underway and as of today with the removal of the first set of extractors from the old system, it's on. Later this afternoon and again at an undisclosed hour of the wee A.M we will setup up our first extractors in our new system, local support or not and we will begin.

These extractors will run, reprocess and store, then repeat until such time that we are ready to move the resources to the first stage of manufacturing. I can't wait :) Collect all the things!

Next…

My next entry will be dedicated to the sometimes comedic yet always scary culture shock involved with moving a few newbies into a hostile environment and training them on learning how to survive. Always entertaining.