Holding Corpmates Accountable

They say charity begins at home. That's certainly the case in EVE, where players are allowed to shoot their fellow corp members in highsec without Concord interference. It's a great tool for holding others accountable to the Code. You have a conscience for a reason. If you see anyone in your corp doing something that makes you feel uncomfortable--mining without a license, showing insufficient loyalty to the New Order, etc.--you are well within your rights to destroy him or her.

Agent Haedonism Bot is a model of corporate responsibility. As he wrote on his blog, he has created a safe space for Code-compliant miners. But if a miner joins the corp hoping to get away with murder, they've got another thing coming:

"Our ongoing efforts to reform our corporation, to transform it from a bloodthirsty pirate gang to a humble highsec mining corporation, have continued despite many unforeseen challenges. As of the time of this post, we still do not have any members who actually mine. We have recruited a number of miners, but to my shock and dismay, not one of them has turned out to operate according to the New Halaima Code of Conduct."

Sadly, Haedonism has been forced to kill new recruits to his own corporation. Case in point, ANZQ, who had only just joined the corp:

"This miscreant was supposed to be the shining hope of our alliance to expand into the Australian timezone. He is a well experienced and highly skilled miner/industrialist who flies exhumers, Orcas, and freighters, and had an extensive collection of BPOs in his possession. Fortunately, our corporate police officer, none other than my alt Kalim Dabo, caught wind of his intentions to mine without a permit in our home system, and was able to intercept him en route and confiscate/destroy his mining equipment and illicit BPO library, as well as, apparently, all of the rest of his possessions."

Haedonism performs what is called the "reverse awox". But you don't need to run a corporation to serve justice on your fellow members. Everyone in EVE has the authority to act in the name of the Code against their corpmates, even if your application was accepted five minutes ago.

Agent Lord Mandelor notified me of a victory against Cutie Mark Crusaders Militant Coalition, which had been infiltrated by a courageous Agent of the Order.

Does Cutie Mark Crusaders Militant Coalition (ticker "PONEH") sounds familiar? It's the home of bronies who rebel against the Code.

In a reply to a MinerBumping post about our Agents' activities in Ikao, one such brony threatened to petition any future awoxings.

Now it seems other members of the corp, including Botten Miromme, are angry at the New Order. They miss their Orca.

But you'll recall that the controversy began with brony2893, who was caught faking ownership of a mining license.

Recently someone took action against the brony corp, and brony2893 himself sent me an EVEmail expressing his displeasure. As soon as he told me that he was being sarcastic about honour, I knew I was dealing with one rude dude.

Although I'm not sure exactly what he meant by that line, it was clear that brony2893 was in the process of self-transformation:

Gone was the badge of "reluctant support" for me in his bio. Now he styled himself a take-no-prisoners leader in the rebellion against the New Order.

brony2893 was convinced that the entire New Order was out to get him--all because he "verbally skinned [my] butt".

(Though I have not yet interacted with brony2893, the above is a screencap of the verbal skinning he seems to have been referring to.)

...and the EVEmail continued for several more paragraphs. I have to disagree with him on the definition of a "true man". It's open to philosophic debate, but I don't think being a true man entails mining in highsec and threatening to petition when your corp's Orca gets blown up.

Once more, brony2893 insisted that he alone is the target of all New Order operations. He also referred to "harassment outside of EVE". In truth, no Agent of the Order has ever harassed anyone outside of EVE--or inside of it, for that matter.

Through the course of running this blog, I've found that the surest way to make carebears complain of being misquoted or "falsified" is by quoting them verbatim.

In his parting words, brony2893 invited me (and by extension, everyone else in the New Order) to visit the Ikao system, where the brony corp is located.

Despite his paranoia, I can understand why he might fear for the safety of Cutie Mark Crusaders Militant Coalition. They're a corp of 21 highsec carebears, all bronies, and their lax recruitment standards leave them vulnerable to awoxers and wardeccers alike. Still, I can't help but feel that their problems would be solved if they embraced the Code willingly. If they do not, perhaps their future will not be so bright.

Ninety-Three Billion in Shares Sold

Hey there, sports fans. It looks like we've achieved another milestone! Ashley Deeptower's purchase of 250 shares put us over the 93 billion mark. Ashley earns a Supreme Protector's Tip of the Hat™ for facilitating this wonderful development. 93,000 shares sold, unbelieveable!

The Rumble in Vattuolen, Part 1

Though I am in an exalted position in the EVE community, I stay in touch with the common man by touring my great empire. I often do this alone, without a bodyguard. That's how much confidence I have in my approval rating.

Hulks are nearing extinction. I came across one mining an ore belt in Vattuolen, and I was intrigued. Then I discovered that the miner in question didn't have a New Order mining license. Truly a dinosaur!

While engaging in a pleasant conversation with some curious miners, I was interrupted by the Hulk pilot, caveywavey. My bumping had disturbed his slumber, it seemed.

Actually, caveywavey had been following the local chatter, at least to some degree. He wasn't willing to budge from his prehistoric attitude about the Code.

"Father of the New Order" is one of my official titles. But it's more than that. It's a way of illustrating my attitude toward the teeming masses of highsec miners. Parenting isn't always a pleasant experience, but the alternative--neglect--is unthinkable.

Though MinerBumping posts are edited to suggest linearity, there are usually multiple threads running parallel to each other. While I was busy dealing with caveywavey, Rihanna Ashlie seized the moment to question the Code.

I've lost count of the number of times people have cited their parental responsibilities as an excuse to break the rules. Perhaps they forget that I have parental responsibilities of my own--to them. In any case, I think the miners underestimate the ability of their children to learn the importance of the Code. I suspect many of the little ones are more reasonable, in this regard, than their parents are.

Once caveywavey had been bounced into deep space, he made his confession: He "kind of" AFK mines.

Emboldened by his fellow skeptics, caveywavey challenged my authority and that of the Code. It was preposterous. He wanted to know why someone playing a video game should need to look at the screen!

caveywavey made another damning admission: He felt that AFK mining in highsec was "the way that game is meant to be played". In his own words, he was guilty as sin.

If everyone was judged according to his own standards, everyone would be considered "good". The word would lose all meaning. That's why we need an objective, universal standard by which to measure everyone.

Despite the fact that I had bumped caveywavey and linked him to the Code several times, I wasn't making any progress. The danger of stalemate loomed.

...Or worse. Whenever a miner's greed for asteroids tempts him toward dark thoughts of murder, I always make an effort to steer him back on course:

But it was too late. caveywavey was consumed by rage and avarice. The situation was spiraling out of control. Was it possible to bring caveywavey to his senses, or would he be lost to the New Order community forever?

To be continued...

Opening a Can of Wormholes

The New Order has its share of enemies. No one ought to consider himself an enemy of the Order, but there's no accounting for taste. Some enemies are new; some are old. Among the rebels who know the New Order's history, the name Arctic Dungeon sends a chill down their spine.

Hesperaa and her corp have been allies of the New Order since the beginning. They are known for their enjoyment of wardecs, but not for their mercy.

Hesperaa informed me that Neltharak Idrissil, one of the first New Order Agents, had placed a spy within an alliance of carebears known as Another Space. The carebears set up shop within a wormhole. No big deal, right? The New Order governs highsec, not wormsec. But Neltharak is an old hand at the intel game, and he quickly realized that something wasn't right. He suspected that Another Space alliance might have ties to highsec criminals, and that they might try to use the wormhole as a safe haven from which to launch future acts of bot-aspirancy.

Armed with his suspicions and his authority to root out evil wherever it may be, Neltharak contacted comrades in Arctic Dungeon, Hesperaa and VolkenCDiskenth, along with Agent John XIII. Together, they discovered a small fleet of Another Space battlecruisers, which were in a wormhole attacking an offline POS--an act not altogether dissimilar to AFK mining.

Though outnumbered, Agents of the New Order fear nothing. The Agents attacked using a Loki, Proteus, Pilgrim, and Jaguar. The rebels were taken completely by surprise, and were wiped out. Our heroes suffered no losses. Being men and women of honour, the New Order Agents offered to accept a surrender from Another Space, should they remit a suitable payment. The carebears refused.

Later, Neltharak's spy in the alliance used his roles to empty an Another Space POS ship hangar, stealing battlecruisers and several industrial vessels. Another Space still refused to surrender. Arctic Dungeon declared war.

Shortly after the wardec went live, VolkenCDiskenth destroyed a hostile Retriever, which was mining without a license in highsec. Neltharak's instincts had not failed him; the Another Space alliance was indeed harboring Code violators. This is why we grant Agents of the New Order such wide discretion.

The next day, VolkenCDiskenth was on a highsec patrol and discovered Donegal Harkonnen wandering around aimlessly in a 1.8 billion isk Raven Navy Issue. Despite having ample opportunity to repent, Donegal made the choice to persist in carebearing. Outraged, VokenCDiskenth charged into battle with a Hurricane Fleet Issue and slew the beast.

The world is complicated. It is painted in shades of gray. But the New Order brings clarity. Everything in highsec is either black or white: You're either one of the good guys or one of the bad guys. The New Order makes no distinction between the Code violators and those who harbor them. Another Space thought they could get away with it. They were wrong.

Sins of a Solar Spymaster, Part 4

Previously, on MinerBumping... Ledrian Saisima outed himself as a spy after donating hundreds of millions of isk to the New Order. He explained that it was all part of his master plan to help the New Order take over all EVE by killing lowsec miners with a Drake.

Ledrian revealed that he hadn't been after our "schedules". Instead, he gathered intel about maximizing DPS and how many ships were needed to kill people.

Astute observers may be aware of the Gank page on this very website, which links to publicly-available posts on such topics.

Again... The Gank page. Some people get their info the easy way, some the hard way.

Ledrian understood that his spycraft came at a price. New Order Agents had become suspicious of Ledrian ever since he told them that he was a spy.

Armed with all of that information on how to properly gank miners in highsec, Ledrian was able to put together a good Drake fitting for ganking miners in lowsec.

Unfortunately, Ledrian's isk reserves were all but tapped out. Gaining the trust needed to infiltrate the New Order had been very expensive.

Having spelled out his master plan, Ledrian was eager to hear what I thought of it. I told him I would reserve judgment until he supplied the promised killmails of lowsec miners.

Putting Ledrian's plan into motion came at great personal cost to himself. But he was driven by the ambition to help me take over the whole EVE galaxy. At least his motives were pure.

In the meantime, Ledrian hoped I could loan him funds for his anti-miner Drake. I politely declined, citing his "burned spy" status. Imagine the scandal if New Order funds were diverted to a rogue black ops operation.

Since I had not yet banned him from New Order HQ, Ledrian returned to the channel and came clean.

It was nothing personal. Ledrian vowed not to use any of the intel against us.

Before his expulsion became official, Ledrian was given the opportunity to deliver a final message directly to my Agents.

Playing to the audience, Ledrian declared his fealty to me and the New Order. Always a crowd-pleaser.

Now it was time for Ledrian to unleash himself upon an unsuspecting lowsec--after he grinded some isk for his Drake, that is. But would Ledrian succeed in helping the New Order take over EVE? Or would Ledrian's master plan, years in the making, unravel before his very eyes?

To be continued...