Stark Raving Mad, Part 4

Previously, on MinerBumping... VictorStark Stark raged against Agent Aiko Danuja in local chat. VictorStark was apparently angry about losing all of his assets. But would he ever calm down?

VictorStark tracked Aiko down and berated her in local. On occasion, he used his newly impoverished main character for the purpose. But he mostly preferred to speak through his alt, Lilliana Lestrange. (Also newly impoverished.)

VictorStark felt free to say whatever he wanted to Aiko; he had nothing left to lose.

Unlike VictorStark, Aiko had friends and allies. Whenever he spotted individuals associated with Aiko, VictorStark raged against them, too.

One potential downside to using local chat as a forum: Random passersby witnessed the spectacle. They didn't side with VictorStark--though they were curious as to the source of his anger.

VictorStark had become obsessed with Aiko, the Agent to whom he'd assigned most of the blame for the loss of his assets. He read everything he could about her, including some particularly wild rumors about her exploits. (Apparently you can lose your spouse in a Bonus Room. But if you win, you become a bigamist.)

Though he was clearly upset with the Agents, VictorStark didn't want people to view him as a victim. He claimed to have upgraded his character with lots of PLEX and skill injectors.

As time went on, the Agents began to doubt VictorStark's willingness to calm down and obey the Code. He truly seemed to despise them.

VictorStark believed pretty much everything he'd heard about Aiko. However, he doubted whether she was literally a princess.

Then again, many sources spoke of Aiko's royal blood. VictorStark had to wonder.

Actually, maybe Aiko really was a princess. That would be just like the cruel, unfair world that VictorStark lived in--a world where an honest guy couldn't trash-talk an alliance and then immediately join and become a leader of it.

Most miners calm down after a few hours of crying in local. But VictorStark vowed to keep up the fight. This time, the miner's tears would continue until systemic change was accomplished.

And he didn't need to calm down. He was calm, thank you very much.

VictorStark felt he was making progress. He was harvesting tears from Aiko!

The siege would continue.

To be continued...

The Plague of Nakugard, Part 8

Previously, on MinerBumping... Agent Alt 00's mission to clean up Nakugard took on a new importance when her investigation revealed that the miners were spreading filth and disease. The mighty CODE. alliance took action.

Miners often complain about the lack of a warning--but sometimes an explosion is the only warning they can understand. There are miners who actually think it's safe to violate the Code because "CODE. will protect me."

Thanks to the explosions she delivered, Alt 00 was able to get on K Scribbles' radar. But what did he want? It sounded serious.

Everyone knows that schedules are the most valuable intel available, but our Agent was disappointed by the miner's ignorance about hygiene.

After getting caught in a lie about hand washing, the miner went away in a huff.

Alt 00 sighed. Every time she told a miner to wash their hands, she received more bad news.

Bringing civilization to highsec isn't easy. That's why there was never any progress during the pre-Code era.

Each miner who failed to obey the Enhanced Bathroom Protocol was executed. Antimatter is the best disinfectant.

Nakugard's miners were forced to grit their teeth and dock up whenever Alt 00 entered the system. However, those who were AFK provided additional targets:

Our Agent was used to prevailing in combat and winning amazing victories, but Nakugard had became a slaughterhouse. When would it end?

The only solution was to continue killing the miners until they stopped dying.

Miners are bad at learning, but they're also bad at teaching: The death of one miner seemed to make no impression on another. They couldn't learn from each other's mistakes, no matter how well-publicized.

After hgichoda returned to his keyboard, he finally admitted that there was a crisis going on. But he couldn't see that the Code was the only way out.

To be continued...

Over Two Trillion Forty-Three Billion in Shares Sold

Triumph after triumph--that's the New Order way.

ST0NER SMURF triumphed over the naysayers with his purchase of 7,000 additional shares. In addition to taking us past the 2,037, 2,038, 2,039, 2,040, 2,041, 2,042, and 2,043 billion isk marks and earning himself a righteous Septuple Supreme Protector's Tip of the Hat™, ST0NER also moved up the shareholder ranks and took the #8 spot of all-time biggest shareholders.


BONUS!

In our last shareholder update, we put out the call for attribution of a certain piece of artwork that was presumed to have been created by Agent Donatien Alphonse Francois. Donatien wrote in and gave proper credit to the true creator of that piece, TheInternet TweepsOnline TheInternet. However, Donatien also contributed an additional piece of artwork with a similar theme; it was used in his campaign against Silent Company:

Click for full-size version

Good art can sometimes silence an unruly miner. It can also trigger them, though. When the above-pictured art inspired complaints about multiboxing, Donatien referred the miners to this:

Click for full-size version

Hopefully that cleared things up.


BONUS BONUS!

Of course, we cannot mention Silent Company without some Silent Company tears...

Nikolas Super, a member of Silent Company, lost his ship and then lost his temper.

It's probably safe to say that this miner did not see fit to wash his hands.

Miners, repeatedly using the word "freak" is not an argument. And it will not get you a mining permit. You're gonna need 10 million isk for that.

...Unless you get yourself Red Penned. To be safe, set aside 30 million isk before you even think about mining in highsec.

The Best Revenge, Part 75

Previously, on MinerBumping... aiva naali aka FighterJets GuitarSolo 1000Years took his eye off the ball: Instead of focusing on his mission to help the Imperium conquer nullsec, aiva got bogged down in a bizarre debate about gender dynamics.

More than an hour later, Aiko Danuja still didn't see eye to eye with aiva. As a result, aiva grew frustrated and annoyed with his council member.

In a last-ditch attempt to make Aiko see reason, aiva threatened that the world would end if she didn't agree with him.

aiva was confident that he'd won the debate, but there were more important matters to deal with.

aiva gave his council an update on his most prized secret project of all. He had described it before, but now he presented the council with a bunch of random alliance chat logs from 2019.

That's when it all fell apart.

For months, aiva had endured the unendurable. He'd been mocked and humiliated and forced to pretend that he was a highsec miner instead of the Imperium's mastermind. Now they'd gone too far. He demanded the return of the billions--tens of billions--that he'd invested in his titan fund.

For the first time, something truly precious to aiva had been leaked. He could no longer take for granted the absolute privacy of the Discord channel.

And what was the secret project that had gotten aiva to turn against his council and threaten to burn down the Imperium?

It was his plan for a "nullsec internet", which he'd first spoken of a few months before. Someone in the council had told an Imperium bureaucrat about it. His dreams shattered, aiva couldn't continue as before. It was over.

Or was it?

aiva's council leapt into action. They gave aiva a coded message and instructed him to send it out via EVEmail to a set of key Imperium officials.

The message was so well encrypted that its full meaning could not be cracked even by aiva's supercomputer of a brain.

Nevertheless, aiva was convinced that the contents of this message would be understood by those who received it.

A question remained, however: Could aiva still trust his council? Was this the end of aiva's career as chief strategist of the Imperium--and the end of his weekly payments?

To be continued...

The Best Revenge, Part 74

Previously, on MinerBumping... aiva naali aka FighterJets GuitarSolo 1000Years was an extraordinary individual with unique talents. aiva's council used aiva's gifts to fight the Imperium's enemies, but could they exploit him in a bid for real-life global domination?

aiva didn't spend all of his time analyzing the EVE galaxy map; he analyzed a bunch of other stuff, too. And what he saw troubled him.

In casting his critical gaze upon the world around him, aiva found that radical feminism might end up posing as great a threat as Pandemic Horde.

But here aiva faced a new problem. While the council was united in its loyalty to the Imperium, not everyone agreed with aiva's approach to the world beyond EVE.

Sensing that council member Aiko Danuja was receptive to the notion of a society dominated by women, aiva pushed back. He wasn't afraid of a friendly debate.

...Or an extremely weird one.

aiva attempted to set the terms of the debate, but not everyone was persuaded.

Though he was determined to win any argument, aiva ran the risk of dividing his council unnecessarily. There was plenty of time to divide the spoils of war after the Imperium took over nullsec.

At last it seemed that aiva was ready to return to the matter at hand: How to defeat Pandemic Horde once and for all.

...No, still some unresolved issues to take care of first.

aiva would not rest until he had persuaded everyone to unite behind his philosophy. But Aiko stubbornly resisted.

For the first time, aiva considered that he or someone else might need to construct an artificial womb before inventing faster-than-light travel.

Why was aiva so preoccupied with gender dynamics when there were wreacking boallquals and skank traps to build?

Perhaps aiva had become too accustomed to getting his way. If aiva's council did fracture due to his philosophy, could he put the pieces back together in time for Operation Devil's Night?

To be continued...