Diary of a Pod Pilot

Friday: Fanfest day 2

While I really like trading and creating stuff, and in any game I play I usually at some point get rich by playing the economy one way or another, I just couldn’t drag myself out of bed to attend the State of the Economy presentation. However, Ship Balancing was not to be missed, because EVE is about the spaceships! Sadly this isn’t on Youtube either (yet?), but there has been a dev blog which mostly covers what it was about. As I saw it but didn’t fully process it before I set off to Iceland, it was nice to hear what is in store here. Making all the ships useful, as they should be! It’ll be a great deal easier to understand and makes way for a lot more variety without adding ships that nobody will ever use. Currently only half the ships in the game really gets used, that’s just such a total waste, especially since some have really nice designs. What more delighted me is that the lore got some attention here and that T2 ships will fit in with manufacturers that suit their roles. It’s some shuffling here and there but it is little details like that which make my roleplayer heart beat faster.

Lag is nobody’s friend and CCP Veritas had lots of graphs to show again how it, or at least the server kind, is being dealt with. While that fight is not totally over with, focus seems to be shifting towards the client now. Actually being able to use brackets without slowdowns? Being able to run multiple clients without having to give up all the eye candy? Faster dealing with crashes? Yes please, make it so.

Then it was time for Factional Warfare. While not something I have ever participated in other than shooting the fuck out of the Militias back with Operation Bold Harvest, it’s been something that I’ve always kept an eye on. Especially because way back when CCP actually mentioned pirate faction warfare, and that is something I hope to see before I retire from the game. While last year was still an outright denial for it ever happening, this year it was said that it could be implemented as the system does account for more than a two-way fight, the issue just seems to be they first off want to fix up the current issues, and secondly they’re not quite sure how to make it all work. I may elaborate on my thoughts in a future post, but basically since the pirate factions form 2 blocs, you could have a 3-3 split just like Amarr + Caldari are opposing Gallente + Minmatar. And then make it so that all pirates are open targets to the Empires and reverse.

The proposed changes in the FW presentation are a bit of a shocker, and some things like cyno jamming or datacores being moved over to militia LP stores to me seem unrealistic to be implemented as they are presented here. I do however like the idea of a sov-lite kind of playstyle, the only downside being that only the Empire factions get to enjoy it. I suppose us pirate roleplayers will have to be content with playing mercs or infiltration for now, or simply opt for other non-FW styles of play. However, it is good to see that this is being iterated on, because it means people in lowsec, and that is relevant to my interests.

The Brave New Module presentation was a bit spoiled by not being led by the most engaging speaker, but I never realized modules had been intended to be like cards and the addition of new decks in Magic The Gathering. This is quite interesting however, not only because I have been making my ISK as of late by producing the (new) Tech 2 modules, but also because of how it affects tactics in both PVP and PVE. Finally drone damage modules! And webber drones of all sizes. And salvage drones make a return! And so much other interesting things. The plans for using alternative methods of seeding them into the game made me frown a bit though, I can see it work for those that are totally new like tactical warp, but drone damage should in my oppinion be the same as weapon damage modules and thus be a standard blueprint. However, as at the end there is talk of phasing modules in and out of the game, maybe buying blueprints and growing a large researched library is going to become a thing of the past? I can think of some unhappy industrialists though as some spent years growing a perfect catalogue which is invaluable due to the many years of research applied on them.

And then, of course, the EVE keynote. With the painfulness of the ‘failure’ of Incarna, and the 20% layoffs still fresh in mind, this was bound to be interesting, and the right approach was taken. Generally speaking, this entire Fanfest has been one of restoring faith and celebrating that EVE did not fall over and die. Loads of things that came up at the start here were basically fast repetitions of presentations already attended. But then, what is this? No, not the new stealth bombers, although those are mighty pretty as well. I’m talking about the missile launchers visibly on ships. Squeeh! Happy Caldari pilot at last. I recall talking about that with CCP Masterplan last year and he said with the old system it was just not possible, and it may or may not be with the new. So, I am quite happy to see that the new system does allow for this, and I hope eventually we will see all the high slot modules visible.

Being given a free Fanfest ticket, as a perk for being a fansite, I decided to end the day by making my way over to the Fansites & Apps roundtable. Unfortunately, it was the App developers that took over the conversation and I felt pretty lonely and awkward as a blogger amongst them. Gladly, I have a background as a programmer so I could at least follow the conversation, but I’ll be mailing CCP Alice some things as I just didn’t get around saying what I wanted to say. A bit meh, as there were several other roundtables I understand were more suited for this tech talk that happened, but then again with so many apps and so many new possibilities for apps, I can’t hold it against those developing them to be all fired up about it.

Being a little tired by now and having lost track of most people, I missed out on the quiz show, but caught up with Verone who was assisting CCP during Fanfest and really deserves props for all the effort he is putting in. We managed to get everyone together and went out for dinner and then secured ourselves a few tables at Islenski Barinn before the pub crawlers poured in.

Saturday: Fanfest Day 3

Ugh, even 11:00 is too early at this time of the week, so I got in at the end of Growing EVE’s infrastructure and the first proper presentation of the day for me was War Declarations. Wars are going to get a lot of love, and seem to be moving from a griefing tool into a proper thing. I really like that mercenaries will get a proper way to offer assistance. The war statistics are also very nice, and I hope in future this can be expanded upon for all corporate killmails, as it would make an ingame killboard possible which would let a corporation see how well it is doing.

The game design panel wasn’t much interesting other than Diedra Vaal shaking things up with the first question, though I believe somewhere in there someone asked about pirate faction warfare again. Not sure, and can’t immediately find it. As the next thing was the art panel, which I assumed wouldn’t bring much new (skimming over it, I feel I was right), I wandered over to the EVE vs the Real World presentation. This had caught my attention because it was an actual player presentation, and it was about security theories (political sociology). While normally I’d have been able to keep up with this easily, I struggled to keep up, but was none the less intrigued by this subject which I knew a little about and how it applies in EVE Online.

Next up was the World of Darkness presentation, which I was happy to see getting some attention still. While I’ve only lightly dabbled in the WoD setting, or more specifically I have played Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines, it is a setting that captured my imagination long after. The game itself wasn’t that spectacular, and I didn’t know back then it was part of a greater setting, but it left a lasting impression. I do plan to look more into it in the future, as the Grand Masquerade seems like an event I’d like to attend at least once just because it seems so very cool. What mostly intrigued me about the presentation was the talk of a player politics system, with elected positions and city leaders. While they drew the connection to EVE Online, in my mind I immediately linked it to the text games Lusternia and Aetolia, both by Iron Realms Entertainment, which I have enjoyed dabbling in during the last few years. I do wonder if the WoD team is at all aware of the existance of these games and how studying their political system could be useful to develop an even better player politics system.

Bittersweet as usual, the last presentation of the day was CCP Presents, where we got to see a glimpse of what the future may hold. Got a bit scary when that fire alarm went off, but the new launcher and further work on EVE voice is something that bodes well, even though I currently skip the damn thing to get the Steam overlay on the main client. Tessellation looks pretty sexy, and nice to see what more is coming for Dust 514 — eSports and PVE and MTACs and non-temperate planets, oh my — but of course it is the EVE stuff that intrigued me the most. Ring mining sounds like it could be a lot of fun, not to mention finally allow the  ‘common player’ to take part in the moon mineral game. And modular POSes, ooh, I like building stuff, even though at times I bitterly hate taking care of my ‘space tamagochi’, as the POS gets so lovingly called. The new UI seems like it could work out really well, especially loving the camera close-up view and prettier explosions. What nearly had me jump out of my chair though was using avatar gameplay and combine that with exploring the insides of abandoned installations. If they put that in, and it will be as awesome as it sounds, I am so going to be all over that. I’ve always wanted the exploration system of EVE to be more interesting, but this just totally blew me away. And then, it could not have ended better, the story of Templar One turned into a new game trailer. Around the one minute mark it dawned on me what I was looking at. That’s just so cleverly done!

Gathering everyone up again, we went for dinner and then to prepare for the party. It was alright at first, but after HAM had performed and we retreated to the Fanfest lounge, it quickly grew terribly boring. We sat there quite a while until eventually enough people were bored enough that we packed up and left for the hotel. Settling down there was a lot better and we had a lovely evening, sitting around and talking. Keith Neilson, CCP Masterplan and some other folks dropped by as well.

Sunday: Brunch and Blue Lagoon

As per tradition, there was the Brunch on Sunday, this year at the Vox Restaurant at the Reykjavik Hilton. So many delicious foods!

With our tummies filled, we went over to the Blue Lagoon, which was a first for me. Quite nervous about this, I admit, I’m not a good swimmer and the etiquette at these kind of places always kinda worries me, I don’t want to shock people but neither do I want to come off as too prude. However, it turns out that for the women at least, it’s really quite relaxed, everyone just stripped down, headed for the showers wrapped in their towels, put swimming gear on after, and went outside. Ah, it was so nice to just soak for a few hours in the hot water, even though I had to make a bit of a detour through the shallower ends of the water to keep up with people. For once, being small really wasn’t handy! But later on taking up a little corner of the sauna, I was quite happy with my small frame again. What I really liked was that you could just use your bracelet to buy drinks, so I had a slushy. Kind of handy, this hot water, when it didn’t melt fast enough to keep drinking I just dipped the bottom in the water for a while.

After the Blue Lagoon, it was quite late already when we finally got home. Some people got pizza, but I was still quite full from the brunch, so I started to pack my things up and watched another movie, before we all headed downstairs and sat together the final few hours, joined by the excellent folks from Rote Kapelle. As my flight was late, and we had Damir Delon to take us back, I stayed up into the wee hours with the people who had early morning flights.

Monday: Travel again

It’s never fun to say goodbye, but good things have to end someday. This whole week felt like it just blazed past. Adrian Schultze, Lacrimae, Stranger (who had flown in just for the party and the events on Sunday!), that guy from Rote Kapelle who I never asked for his character name and me all were on the same plane, together with Diedra Vaal and his girlfriend. Once landed in Copenhagen, our party soon started to break up as everyone headed on to their final flights.

What a week it had been. Props to the Veto guys for letting me hang out with them again, so nice to meet some new people again, and see many old faces once more. While I was really fearful this fanfest would be marred by the layoffs and the negative events this summer, I must say I am feeling very optimistic again now. It wasn’t quite the same as the previous years, and I fear it may never be again, but it was very nice in a different sort of way. Big thanks also to CCP for providing the fansites with free tickets again this year, it does help in me being there and writing about all of this now.

Last year I had no internet at all and blogged my experiences once I got back home. This year I discovered that blog writing from an iPod Touch seriously does not work well, although I have a lot more reference material available thanks to Twitter and keeping better notes. Since this is bound to get lengthy I will blog the days before in this post, make individual posts for each Fanfest day, and then do a closing post on the days after. Despite writing down short notes a lot of this is done from memory, so I apologize if there are errors in it and will conveniently blame alcohol consumption. To those who’s name I cannot remember, if you see yourself referenced, please leave a comment! I am terrible with names and faces and met so many people my mind is still a little blown.

Day 1: Tuesday: Travelling and swear in ceremony

Nervousness all over. This year I am going to Fanfest alone, and even though I will join the Veto blob on site, part of this journey I am travelling alone. It’s kind of sad, since I used to travel on my own and got quite used to it, but being settled spoils a person with always having my significant other to fall back on in case of problems. So for me this will be a way to reaffirm I can still stand on my own two feet and get things done (and in the end, it was).

Ah, airport security, despite following all the guidelines I still get picked out. Learned why other airports ask everyone to take their shoes off, mine were just one of the many that set off the metal detector. My bag lit up like a Christmas tree as well. Carrying several bags with coins was the cause. Since I was transferring through Denmark, and I had a ton of change left from my previous stay there, I had taken that along to buy myself some food. Which resulted in a lot of frowning. Not like I could have put that in my luggage, I kinda needed it.

Ended up meeting Irusu at the Reykjavik airport rather than Copenhagen as his flight got changed. Wonder if the weather had a hand in that, there was a lot of turbulence on both the flights I was on. After some hassle with the Flybus (I ordered the wrong ticket) we were on our way to hotel Room with a View, which I can recommend to those who enjoy an apartment hotel.

Received some quizzical looks when I arrived at the main apartment (aka Goinard Impro station) and got to my room, but once I took the time to sit down and talk to people everyone soon remembered who I was again. Lots of fun was had at the swear in night, the obvious highlight being Verone getting mohawked (this is now a verb) by Lacrimae (I’m the girl with the flowery shirt in the front). Other highlights would be reciting the ode and getting fondled with a sword, receiving honorary dogtags, and meeting some of the special guests at the house: Dierdra Vaal from EVE University, CCP Dropbear ( <3 ), and that guy from F-CORD who’s name I didn’t quite catch (please leave a comment if this is you).

Day 2: Wednesday: Lazy start, #tweetfleetmeet and afterparty

No breakfast like pancake breakfast. Since the day before got late and travelling was more tiresome than I had anticipated, and I probably should have brought some warmer clothing too, I decided to skip out on the glacier trip. Probably for the best, as I’d have to drive, and I am a typical female driver. So instead the daytime was spent lazying about the apartment.

In the evening we went up to the #tweetfleetmeet at the Celtic Cross bar. The place was absolutely packed due to Goons joining in on it. Met CCP Zymurgist, The Mittani (I am “roleplayer girl”, in the absurdly small chance you read this), CrazyKinux, Laria Raven, and other people whos name I don’t remember, typically.

As we drank the bar empty they ended up closing early so we all headed back to the “Impro station” for an afterparty. Which was pretty interesting, because inviting just one person up resulted in a whole mob of people in the apartment. Luckily they all behaved very well and it was neat to meet some more of my blog readers (I forgot your names and corp, please leave a comment who you are!). One guy also found out why the first rule of the apartment is “You do not fall asleep in Goinard except in your own bed”. Photo evidence is here, and very much not safe for work. You have been warned.

Our rightful home

Been a good while again since my last update. Not for a lack of action, that’s for sure. I dare say things are busier than ever. And while they aren’t always easy, for the large part I am enjoying myself. That’s right, I love my job.

So what’s been happening? Well, the most important part, which I somehow always mention as last when catching up with friends or other contacts, is that we’re now basing primarily out of Curse. All of Naraka except for PRELI is, in fact. Well, and Aria, but Aria does as Aria likes and that’s alright with me.

We’ve grown quite a bit and I really like our new pilots. They want to be here, too. That helps, having people that share your vision, rather than cater to their visions. Ma’asei Merkabah likewise has taken in some solid pilots. We work together as a coherent unit.

Diplomacy has been intense. Some capsuleers down here can be so difficult. And I don’t do that. Why make things complicated when they can be really simple? Less room for error, more efficiency, and not as much headache and frustration. I understand it though, how thing sometimes become the way they are. But this fear of change and the clinging to the status quo? A strange thing in a region that is constantly changing. I hope it is a pattern we will never fall into.

I met up with Vincent Pryce the other day. It was good to see him again, even though things haven’t been good at all for him. He’s changed for the better in the face of terrible events. Even though he sees it as paying a price for all the bad things he’s done. I hope my words gave him some comfort, as I believe he is far stronger than he thinks he is at times. But I am not a professional psychiatrist, the best I can offer is the advice of someone who cares.

Vincent told me a little about how things are with Veto now. A tricky situation. Until word comes from Venal they are told to not fight back any Sansha forces. I wonder how my other ex-pilots are dealing with that. I can think of a few that must be dying to open fire. Yet they can’t. What if Venal decides to ally with the Sansha? What will they do then? What will Ethan do, even? I am also curious about the future of Veto, now that all forces have been merged into one central unit. In his latest IGS announcement he hinted at further details being released at the start of April — an unluckily chosen date, if you ask me — but even with holding top-level clearance for a while I can’t do more than guess. But those are worries that are best not to linger on too long. What is important is that we can strike down every last Sansha if we please to do so and we’ll even get a pat on the back for it.

Now that I mentioned the IGS, I had a little fun with what looks like to have been Revan’s last public event ever. Both Velarra and I made it through the first round even and I had a long chuckle as Koronakesh’s commentary. Milder than I had expected it to be, actually. A shame the second round fell right into a period my agenda was already overbooked. But then things took a strange turn when politics and love meddled into it all, the short version being that Jade Constantine — Revan’s lover — did not approve and used her position to have things called off. Must say I am disappointed, though not surprised in the solution Revan chose. Shame, at least an event like this brought some change to the ever so predictable back and forth arguments.

I’m sure I am forgetting a thing or two, but time is precious and I have to get back to work. Paperwork is nearly all done, luckily, so now we’re getting to the good bits like making ISK and enforcing our position within the region. More on that in a future post, I’m sure.

Back in Ghost Festival and Naraka, a little sooner than expected as well. Let’s start with a recap, considering I’ve effectively maintained radio silence for a good three months. I’ll be doing most of this by memory, as my access from Veto’s communication network has been revoked. Yes, more on that later as well, bear with me here.

My activity in space during these months has been low, as I’ve spent it mostly station-side suffering apathy towards everything and everyone around me. Even amongst former Ghosts, I felt alone, so I kept confined to my quarters dabbling in planetary industry to keep some form of income. My own fault to some extend, as I never planned to stay here for the long run and made that quite clear.

There was also the loss of VCS Acquisitio — a Tengu class — during Operation Platinum Halo. It all started out so well, getting a small fleet together and sneaking into Curse where we would work for the Cartel. Morwen, Mortis and Plumb were with me, as well as Fey Delade and Great Artista. Being unprobable sure gave us an edge in hostile terrain, and with interdiction invulnerability and a covert-ops cloak moving about was no longer an act of suicide. It was indeed not capsuleers that brought my ship to its knees, but the simple combination of scrambling and webbing Gallente Navy frigates circling the dropout point of the very last acceleration gate of an highly important series of missions. Something about researchers, the details elude me as I didn’t exactly pay attention to them. The Cartel wants something done and I do it, simple as that. But yes, an egger beaten by non-eggers, due to them cleverly exploiting the one weakness of my setup, a speed tank. I was lucky though, I took down the objective with me and thus did not suffer a standings setback. Just the loss of slightly over a billion invested, and a skill level yanked out of my brain. While I did almost break even on selling Cartel goods and other mission spoils, the latter did leave me a little shaken. Medical staff assured me that everything was alright, no damage other than forgetting part of what I learned was detected, but I am still convinced it triggered something somewhere in my unconsciousness that drove me to becoming a recluse.

It was August when I got contacted by Alexander Rykis about laying the foundations of a grand new Angel Cartel loyalist alliance: Ghost Syndicate. While his methods and attitude were controversial and abrasive, there was potential in the idea of forming a group that would be the CVA of the Angels. Feeling restless in my “home” I decided to take a chance and help with the formation stage and see where it would lead us, thus joining Resistance Project. Alas, after only 7 days the whole thing got called off. Even with known and respected loyalists like Aria Jenneth and myself, and the inclusion of Nikita Alterana and her project Risen Angels, the continued mistrust and ridicule from the capsuleer community towards Alex got to him. And there was the failed attempt to infiltrate Stillwater through an associate as well. Hadn’t he decided to end things, I would have left, as targeting Stillwater for valuing their independence is something I simply cannot agree with. I had hoped I could have steered him away from his ill feelings towards them, but alas. As he denounced the Cartel, had a short stay within Star Fraction, and eventually moved on from being a CEO to joining an existing corporation, I found myself back home in Ghost Festival. Now there I can see a question arise. Why did I not return to Veto? The answer is fairly simple. The same day RESPR defected Veto announced that 40% of its shares are now under Guristas ownership, moving them from independent contractors to the status of Guristas loyalists.

In the two weeks I’ve been back I have been working hard – and so has Marcus Gord who has returned to lead PRELI —  on getting everything ready to reopen recruitment. A meeting with representatives of Risen Angels, Anshar Incorporated and Stillwater was held, where mutual blue standings including exchange of goods and services with the former two and an NAP with the latter was reached. While it was sure to happen due to the alignment with the Guristas, we were reset by Veto and followed suit, after a poor choice of words by Nikita Alterana sped up the process. Thus we shall be leaving Goinard, which should curb any rumors that “we would have never survived weren’t it for Veto”. Our new home is already decided on, and the last work is being done on a clear formulation of our goals, as well as a final review of policies, rules and organisational procedures. Keep an eye on the IGS, and another one on my Galnet Blog for more information soon. For now I have to get back to work.

“Ghost Festival is currently in stasis mode. Operations will be resumed in the future.” That’s what reads in all our channels at the moment. In this post I will elaborate on how it got that far and where we go from here.

When we first came to Goinard it was a paradise. The location is ideal in the middle of the lowsec map, it connects directly to highsec with a market hub nearby allowing for easy supply runs, and our old stomping grounds The Bleak Lands were still within reach. And we had mutual blue standings with Veto, who occupy the same home system, allowing us to have the numbers to organize larger and heavier fleets, while we could pass on our small fleet expertise. Win-win.

So where did it go wrong? There isn’t one thing or anything specific for that matter that can really be given the blame here. It is rather a combination of some members leaving the game, others moving on, real life and financial issues forcing a few to take an unwanted break coupled with some of those that did remain not seeing eye to eye or simply clashing because everyone got frustrated and demotivated by this downpour of bad luck. I had some nice plans for Operation Longshot being our first steps into nulsec roaming, but for inty swarms and other light setups you need a certain number of people, which we simple didn’t have anymore. We tried to make the best of our stay in Eugales but other than probing down mission runners in two local hubs the area was simply unfriendly for the type of combat we’re used to.

It’s been really difficult to accept the decline, and for a while I didn’t even want to consider that an option, working left and right to keep everyone’s chin up, a smile on their face and help them with finding something to do. But that takes its toll eventually. I wasn’t leaving station anymore, and that is a major nono in a small corporation, because you do have to lead by example. I could preach proactivity all I wanted, but I wasn’t doing it myself.

Enter Saturday, where I got on vent after being asked by Kimochi, Morwen and Plumb if we could have a chat. My gut feeling immediately screamed trouble, and it proved to be accurate as usual. Kimochi was moving out to Veto. The other two said I didn’t let them help enough, but in all honesty I knew they meant to say this was it for them too. I tried to explain that I can’t delegate work before I’ve done my part, and that with everything happening I hardly got to do my part, which I realize is because I too had trouble staying motivated. And then I called it.

Some time before that I had gotten the offer that if I wanted to take a break from leadership Veto would take on all Ghosts willing to stick together so I could relax and do my own thing, but while also receiving the chance to take a look at their inner workings as a learning opportunity. Tempting offer, surely, but I kindly declined it. It felt like quitting, taking the easy way out and leaving the roleplaying community down by taking away the only (?) dedicated corporation and alliance for Angel Cartel loyalists. I figured if I just stayed optimistic, left the paperwork for later and got back into my yarring seat all would end up well. And it seemed to do so, certainly with the interest of new people in membership. But in truth I know now those three Ghosts were just retreating in the back trying to figure out how to bring me the bad news without upsetting me too much. Not that there is such a way, really, because I still shed a tear when it all came out.

It is still sinking in, and I’m keeping clear from the game a bit, but I feel I made a good decision. Everyone gets to stick together — if they make it through the application process, which shouldn’t be a problem — and new doors are opened which would have taken us months to provide. If we didn’t entirely die down, which seems to have been the more likely case. The fourth habit of Highly Successful People says win-win or no deal. Carrying on would have been win-lose for me in relation to the members, or even lose-lose. While not my preferred solution the merge with Veto is win-win for all involved parties. They too like many pirate corporations have been hit by the recent wave of inactivity, and even if we all join they don’t make up for the numbers they’ve lost.

Those looking me up ingame today will see that I now fly under the Veto banner. I personally want to hammer our the in character details before I get back into the saddle, a post of that will also follow soon. It is my intention and desire to remain an Angel loyalist, and while Veto might be Guristas aligned I’ve been told there is the freedom for that, so we’ll make it work one way or another. I know there is a bunch of naysayers out there, or those fearful I will “cave in” over time, but in all honesty they can kiss my behind. Or go read The Burning Life, and pay particular attention to a character in there to a character who is an Angel as well.

To end this post, one question I am sure some will have is if I feel that Veto has stolen my members, or had that intention all along. My answer to that is that I do not feel that way. They’ve been hesitant in the past with taking on people that came from us because they too felt Angel Cartel roleplay is underrepresented and that regarding a larger corporation as an utopia without problems is a pretty dumb thing to do. I’ve received all the help I could ever want, and in the end it is up to each individual to decide where to go and what to do. I actually consider myself lucky, because many a crumbling corporation could only dream of an offer like this and is stuck with watching people drift apart, or having to start from scratch with looking for a group to merge with. And it is certainly not common to receive the offer to become a shadow CEO within a well-known and long time running corporation. Receiving that kind of trust in a game like EVE is a risky move and makes me feel flattered. Put the ideas of bribing me out of your heads though, they ain’t going to work. In fact I’m enough of a bitch to make them backfire on you. Consider yourself warned.

PS: PRELI’s fate is under discussion with their membership. I’ve told Marcus they can stay within the alliance, as I am keeping it open, and he can do as he pleases with the corporation, be it to take it solo, or reform it, or find a home for its members too. It’s pretty damn ironic that while we were doing so bad they really have been thriving. I hope that success will continue to last them.