Feeding a Habit - Part 1 (Carebear to Scarebear)

Bear with me tonight, this is more of a ramble than post :)

[Caution the following post contains bad spelling and Jargon]

Once upon a time in carebear land I had a happy peaceful mining toon, well I had three happy peaceful mining toons. Enthusiastically munching away at roids, turning rock into useful things, and then letting other people have fun blowing them up.

Well we all know what happens to every carebear corp at some stage in its' Eve existence...The War Dec.

War Decs are normally a time for panic, bluster, and fail fits. (I got famous for about a week on the Scrapeheap forums once for losing a Fed Navy Comet that was fitted with Auto Cannons and had no ammo :) )

Many carebears hate so called griefer corps, or mercs with too much time on their hands, for declaring war on them to fill in the hours between paid jobs or for lols, or simply because they have a ridiculous name, or had too big a mouth in local. (personally I cannot resist indy corps with war like names. they get just a li'l bit more 'special' attention when I am in local and bored.)

All of these reasons are valid in my humble opinion, after all, it's just a game to while away the idle hours that accumulate in RL on slow days or when you need a bit of Eve to cheer you up or mellow you down.

Well my first war dec was spent in station in fear of our aggressors, as directed by my corp management. My second was a bit more experimental (Hence the navy Comet loss). My third, the longest and most violent at that time in my Eve existence, is where I had the fortune to take part in a meaningful way under a good FC and got some kills and held the field against Mercs and griefers, not all the time, but in a few battles.

I became more experienced, more confident, lost some of the pvp 'jitters' and acquired a taste for blood.

Mining was never the same again, missioning was empty, and now only a way to generate isk for my growing addiction.

PVP.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank those heartless, mean spirited bastards, for taking the time and spending the isk to open up a whole new level of Eve for me.

Honestly if you have never really got into the combat side of Eve, in particular the role of the aggressor, you have not played the game.

Its one thing to Kill some AI pirates, its quite another to jump in to a hostile gate camp and bait, point and trap your opponent, have your buddies jump in and watch him go down as his buddies either make a break for it or burn in for a good fight.

To all the guys, and gals who have assplodded me, podded me, and in their turn been keelded and popped by me GFGF.

Still gets my heart racing, and its worth flying around for an hour or two to end up circling each other wondering who will run out of hull first.

I have read that many pirates and top ranked killers in Eve have started out like myself as an indy or mining toon. Just like me they probably also still have their indy toons, saves you a bit on ship replacement and fitting to be sure, and most are ready to admit it.

Did they also have their eyes opened by a blood thirsty killer who used to hunt rocks instead of men?

The War dec that opened my eyes was with No Trademark when they used to live in syndicate near solitude.
They rang rings around us, but we had a go at fighting them and learned a thing or two. They even gave me a decent fit for a Navy Comet :P

Now on the other side of the War Dec I give great respect for players who band together to fight off myself and my corpmates. It's a lot more fun to have someone fight back. I do honour my 1v1's and I try to not fight way over my enemies ability to fight back. After all a close fight is a good fight.

Hell yeah I like to win, but there is no fun in popping some poor guy in a frig with and alpha cane. (Well maybe a little bit of fun, but not as much as a frig vs frig fight.)

So I created a pvp alt, and got him training while I read a lot and went out and did some roaming on my indy toon to get some experience. I died a lot, but I learnt a lot. No where near enough of course, I have always been a slow learner, but what I did have is a lot of fun, and many heart racing adventures.

I roamed Null, low, and WH space, when that came into being, and while my poor abused under skilled indy toon never became a combat monster, I became a very good blockade runner, and scout.

An important lesson in combat is your are more effective in the long term if you do not get killed. Dead men only stink up the place.

Meanwhile my new PVP alt was getting more skills and now ready to jump in a well fitted frig and, I thought, do some damage and make a name for himself.

Tune in next time for Kills, spills, and lols...

Fly Dangerous,

Meat