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EVE Online article on piloting savvy a condensed gem of a resource
We read a lot of what EVE Online players have to say about the game, whether it's on the growing number of blogs out there, in the official forums, or at Scrapheap Challenge. In fact we've noted an ever-increasing amount of excellent content out there, particularly among the EVE Blog Pack that's either informative or entertaining, and often both. The only downside, if there even is one, is that we don't get the chance to highlight as much of what people are doing out there quite as much as we'd like. Now and again though, we come across something that we feel really stands out and truly deserves a mention. This is the case with "Piloting Savviness", one condensed gem of a post by 00sage00 on his blog Yarrbear Tales. 00sage00's article is chock full of tips on how to improve your effectiveness as a pilot, ranging from pointers on knowing your ship and its limitations to gaining an an awareness of your opposition, as well as your surroundings. If you're an EVE Online player getting into PvP, "Piloting Savviness" is a must-read.
Rumored four-year, multi-trillion ISK exploit in EVE Online
An exploit in EVE Online has come to light that may have some major repercussions for the game. Massively does not have solid confirmation on the details (and allegations as the case may be), as this has just come to light. The exploit was publicized on a third party EVE forum called Scrapheap Challenge, on Wednesday, December 10th. If this isn't a hoax or an exaggerated account of events, how serious an exploit might this be? Very serious, if the details listed prove to be accurate... The exploit was really a bug related to a network of player owned stations (POS) paired with a moon mining operation, which yielded far too much valuable material far too quickly. Four years and an estimated 2.5 to 3 trillion ISK later, the exploit was found and patched, and the offender(s) banned. Given the claimed amount of ISK involved, it's serious enough to potentially have an impact on the game's economy. The individual who posted the details of this exploit remains anonymous, and has only identified him or herself as "anotherone", but tells a story of how the exploit came to be: "I would like to tell you a short EVE story. Today all of my EVE Online accounts were banned. I was sure this day would come. What surprises me is that it took CCP this long to catch up with me. Even though they knew about it." It's that last sentence that is sparking so much response from the playerbase -- anotherone asserts that this issue was actually petitioned to CCP Games back in 2004, and subsequently ignored.Read on for more details on this economic drama.
EVE 'Blog Banter' discusses Walking in Stations expansion
While the official EVE Online forums have always been very active, there are other options out there. For those who like how busy the official forums are, but not the rules that govern it, there's Scrapheap Challenge. SH-C is a forum which is chiefly dedicated to discussing EVE Online, but not moderated by CCP Games themselves. Recent months, however, have seen a large number of EVE players striking out on their own, with their own blogs that focus on a particular aspect of the game linked to that blogger's playstyle. Industry, finance, piracy, 0.0 alliance warfare, and now even boosters (drugs) are being written about on a daily basis.While over 100 of these blogs are out there, the more prolific among them have joined under the banner of CrazyKinux's Blog Pack. By all accounts, it's been a successful community effort by EVE players, and now CrazyKinux is adding another dimension to the Blog Pack: conversation topics that are collectively tackled by the various bloggers, called "Blog Banter." The first Blog Banter got underway this past week, and the first issue up for discussion has been a timely one: EVE's Walking in Stations expansion, formerly known as Ambulation, which Fanfest attendees will get to try out firsthand in just a few more days. The question itself was proposed by PsycheDiver, who asked, "Ambulation: What are your hopes for your avatar and new functionality of stations?"
EVE server upgrades open possibilities for 1000+ player combat
There's been much talk of late about EVE Online's servers and the underlying technology that powers over 5000 solar systems in New Eden. CCP Explorer's latest dev blog, "EVE64", focuses on the tech side of EVE, and discusses StacklessIO, the blade cluster, and the migration of the EVE servers to 64-bit. The server enhancements, while not without some issues, are showing some promise according to CCP Explorer. "This Monday, 29 September, we saw a fleet battle with over 1100 pilots reported in local. Field reports indicate that the fight was quite responsive for the first 10 minutes but then the node 'missed its heart beat'... and was removed from the cluster...," he says. Despite such setbacks, it's good to see that CCP is doing something about the server issues resulting from an ever-increasing number of pilots in New Eden. Player response to this dev blog seems positive, with a few reporting their experiences being in combat with 1100+ players on the official forums, and even more players weighing in on the server changes at Scrapheap Challenge.
British scientists invent robotic "welly wanger"
With robots having already mastered such mainstream athletic activities as baseball, football, soccer (a.k.a. the "other" football), golf, and, um, foosball, it was only a matter of time before they became adept at lesser known sports such as bowling and Wellington Boot Throwing. A staple of British fashion since the early 19th century, the Wellington Boot (or gumboot, as it's sometimes called) eventually inspired a rather unique sporting event commonly referred to as "welly wanging" (we're not making this up -- it's even in Wikipedia, so it must be true), where the goal is to toss or kick the boot as far as possible. Well it seems that a team of scientists from Aberystwyth University were commissioned by the TV show "Scrapheap Challenge" to build a robotic welly wanger that could hurl the famous footwear even farther than the most adept Olympic shotputter, and by all accounts, they met with unbridled success. Their solution involved hooking a homemade propeller up to an engine from a concrete mixer and a gearbox from a Citroen 2CV, with the whole contraption controlled by three computers calculating such vital variables as wind speed and the propeller's RPMs. The robotic welly wanger is capable of hurling a boot as far as 242-feet, which must be be pretty damn impressive if it got a write-up by the BBC. Oh, and readers, let's see if we can go a whole robot-themed post without someone "welcoming our new welly-wanging overlords" in the comments section, m'kay?[Via Slashdot]
