CSM X

Voting for CSM is now open. PLEASE VOTE HERE.

If you aren't sure what CSM is, check out this post by CCP Leeloo - in short, it's an elected body of players who consult with the game's benevolent masters CCP. They are given direct access to developers and upcoming changes to the game are shown to them first, so they are the most important avenue of feedback and representation we players have available to us. Voting is by no means mandatory, but you can count on the big nullsec alliances to push their hundred thousand accounts to vote, so I want to make sure smaller voices, particularly "highsec carebear" types, get heard too.

I have just finished listening to all of the Cap Stable interviews and panels, w00t! They have put together some great resources which can be found here, if you are interested in doing some research of your own. There are only 5 days left at this point though, so if you don't feel like you have the time to do enough in-depth research, I'm presenting my ballot here for consideration.

The full roles of voting can be found here, and further information on single transferrable voting can be found on Wikipedia. In short (for those who don't use preferential voting... *coughAmericans*), you order your preference amongst the candidates (in the case of the CSM, the most you can vote for is 14). Anyone who exceeds the quota (a set number of votes, usually dependant on the total number cast) is elected outright. After that, the fun of distributing preferences takes place. After initial preferences (ie #1 votes) have been tallied, the candidate with the least votes will be eliminated, and their preferences distributed. If you have voted for only one candidate and they are knocked out at this stage, your vote will "exhaust" and not count; as such, I'm recommending a full ballot of 14, ranging from generally smaller candidates to generally bigger ones.

With that in mind, my recommended ticket:

- #1 Jayne Fillion

Jayne is responsible for adding great content to the game, which a number of SLYCE members take part in and enjoy. Since the game is all about "what can I do", any player that creates content for others to enjoy is a great candidate in my opinion. He represents the NPSI community (Not Purple, Shoot It) - groups who form up fleets and go shoot other players regardless of ordinary allegiances. It's the only way I've been able to enjoy PVP sofar. Campaign thread here.

- #2 Chance Ravinne

I loved Chance's energy and enthusiasm. He runs a great youtube channel, knows about marketing the game, and flies in bombers and wormholes, which are parts of my gameplay (that I haven't covered on this blog yet). Campaign thread. 

- #3 Erika Mizune / Yumene

EVE radio host and industrialist. Erika's ideas on reworking mining and industrial systems are very interesting to me, and represent the PVE content that I'm writing about on this blog. In particular, the idea that finished asteroids have a chance of spawning smaller chunks of bonus ore would make mining a little more fun. That being said, her interview on Cap Stable was pretty poor, with nervous answers and issues understanding the interviewer's accent. Campaign thread.

- #4 Aeon Boirelle

A high sec candidate representing for the carebears. While I don't like all their ideas, particularly on revisiting input duplication, they want to represent parts of highsec gameplay at the core for me, and anyone who wants to fuck CODE. over is OK by me. Campaign post.

- #5 Bam Stoker

AUTZ = BEST TZ. Bam organised the only EVE meet up that I've been to. He is a nullsec player, but standing to represent community interests, and lobbying to introduce better ways for communities to network through the game client itself. Campaign thread.

- #6 Lorelei Ierendi

Who is Lorelei? A high sec carebear. Tick. Some ideas of changes that might have unintended consequences on the economy, but in general, another representative of grinders, and one who is particularly reaching out to the solo players, which I was for a long time. Campaign thread.

- #7 Nervon
Another high-sec carebear candidate. They seem to be a bit more rainbow minded in terms of a mix of PVE play with a little PVP, much like myself, but they have done themselves no favours in terms of having little existence in the metagame. Campaign post.

- #8 June Ting

The recently announced rework of Sovereign Nullsec space means I want to put at least a couple of nullsec candidates on here, and of those, June is the one who appeals to me the most. Her ideas seem to match the thrust of the announced changes, so I trust her to get the details right. Campaign thread

- #9 Mike Azariah

The incumbent highsec resident and blogger who inspired me to start this blog. If you've ever experienced a watering mouth at the sight of the Bowhead like I have, thank Mike. Has done a fantastic job on CSM, and also on Operation Magic School Bus, helping to retain newbies after the success of the "This Is EVE" trailer. Campaign thread.

- #10 Xander Phoena

Incumbent. Although the crazy Scotsman has gotten some bad press in recent weeks, his blogs on CSM 9 have been highly informative. He makes it onto my ballot for his work on input duplication, if nothing else. Disclaimer: former Goon, now flies with Pandemic Legion. Campaign thread.

- #11 Sugar Kyle

The most respected incumbent candidate. Although she represents lowsec, where I barely dip my toes to nab a little ice or deal with market orders, she has also represented PVE content, and been one of the strongest workhorses of CSM 9. Campaign thread.

- #12 Corbexx

Incumbent wormhole candidate, which covers me during wartime and a fair whack of other time too. Has done good work in rebalancing the wormholes I spend time in (c1/c2) so that they are ISK fountains worth the inherent risks. Campaign thread.

- #13 Steve "FuzzySteve" Ronuken

Incumbent third party developer and industrialist. Highly specialised and involved with the CREST API, which has allowed for better market data on sites like Eve Central. Runs Fuzzworks, which has allowed me to optomise my PVE gaming to no end. Campaign thread.

- #14 Khador Vess

RVB fleet commander and all round good guy with some interesting ideas on how to make life in high sec more interesting. Loses out to Jayne, Bam and June for me, but I think he's worth having on the end in case all of the above get exhausted. Campaign thread.

Timezone

It's currently 8:35 AM local time as I type, and I've been gaming for an hour and a half. I'm hauling ore for a mining fleet with a dozen people from Europe and the US. We are chatting on teamspeak; they are sorting out dinner as I brew my morning coffee.

As an Australian player, I've gotten to know some of the guys involved in Eve Down Under. As they say, AUTZ = best tz... but i'm rarely on in our primetime, local evenings, to take part in the shenanigans. I usually prefer to game in the morning or during the day. So that ends up leaving me online during late EU or US tz - right now. Our regular fleets start at 20:00 Eve time, which in daylight savings means 07:00 local.

This does make it difficult to game with the few other Aussies I've been in corp with, since I'm usually on while they are at work and vice versa - but it's a great opportunity to make friends from all over. Those of us with matching schedules get to know each other pretty well, and SLYCE has a pretty good casual culture - we run sites or missions while having a laugh on comms.

Overview - what's coming

So, I mostly spend my time in high security space, mostly grinding, mostly aiming towards buying plex each month and not letting this game I love playing burn a hole in my pocket. I'm gonna make a short post about each of the main activities I do, as well as some of the fits I like to fly, talking about the ins and outs, and why I find it fun - or what I can do to make it fun.

So what do I do to make the space dolla bills without losing my brain from boredom? That's what I'm here to confess. First thing to say is, variety is the spice of Eve.

Level 4 mission running - when there's no war on, this is my bread and butter.

Mining - busting dem rocks every morning while I brew coffee, or fresh after DT when I should be going to bed.

Away From Keyboard (AFK) mining - somewhat different operation, might seem silly but it's surprisingly effective. In fact, it's happening right now...

Planetary Interaction (PI) - the background earner

Station trading - during a war I'll often do naught but this and PI. Split between traditional buy low, sell high in Dodixie and some slightly less effective but more convenient activity around my home in Verge Vendor.

Low sec hauling - a fairly new addition with my recent discovery of the MWD/cloaking trick. My first experience in using dscan :)

Wormhole - another fairly new addition. Others in my alliance spend most of their time in the hole, I've been raking in isk with PI in there but recently started some ratting & gas harvesting.

If anyone wants to hear from me on any of these topics, comment here - otherwise I'll run through them over the next few months as I get time :)