I'm pretty sure that's what he said. He had an Arkonor you could buy from him if it would help.

Definitely. Hope I didn't give the impression that I thought you were somehow wrong. I just thought you had a lot of good points and I can write here without feeling like I have to check every letter for grammar and punctuation like I do on my own blog. It's an opportunity for me to lazy blog.

While I'm not very creative with expensive ships, I try to do unexpected things with small and cheap ships. I fit up a brawling Condor and took it out about 10 jumps before I thought to myself, "self, this is really dumb; i have less EHP than any other brawling ship and no active tank -- I'm going to die and be embarrassed." So I flew it back home and docked it. In actuality, it would be great against any kiting ship I can catch -- which is why I fitted it: it's fast. The only real problem with it is the engagement envelope, I can't engage much [that is 'optimally' fitted] and expect to win. It may die horribly, but you've convinced me to undock it again and give it a shot. I have a handful of experiments like that -- if you fit a ship in an unexpected way you're in a good position to hand out a nasty surprise.

On another note, your point about fitting tools not always being an indicator of a ship's capability is absolutely true. There is truly no substitute for experience. But experience has taught me that, and those without experience won't get it until they get the experience. Get it? But with that said, experience AND the fitting tools can combine to create some interesting ideas. Don't knock it until you try it.

And finally, you know this so it's for your gentle readers: If you aren't sure if you can take a fight or not, try it. You may be more capable than you think. Your opponent may not be capable at all. There is no sure thing, so stop looking for it.

If we didn't have interesting histories, we wouldn't be playing the game anymore.

I haven't invited you because I'm not a full member yet, but from the way everyone has been talking I'm sure you'd be welcome where I am.

Anyway, taking it slow is a good idea. It took me 2 weeks to decide to finally pull the trigger, drop roles and move to Repo.; the final straw came in a dream. If you join, you can read all about it.

This is really silly. I thought more of the Tuskers.

I'm sure you'll do well wherever you go next.

I, too, play for fun rather than to have a killboard of what others consider perfection.

It ended badly if I recall. That was during a period I didn't play much though.

There are other small entities near you though. I've been having a lot of fun with Repo., though I think our time zones differ a bit.

Genius. Though you should have convinced him to put a webcam poking through your pupil-less eyeball so you can see what Rixx sees. Or does he see? I can't even tell if you're rolling your eyes at this.

I put the brain hat back on for Twitter. Just the metal plate here though.

Distilling this down to: "there are victims in EVE who don't know how to stop being victims and don't bother to do anything. There are also victims in EVE who want to learn how to stop being a victim". If that's it, I agree wholeheartedly.

Personally, I don't ridicule either category. If they don't want to learn, I just take their stuff and move on.

Those who want to learn how they can avoid being a victim or how they can instead be a victor deserve to have support. And I can honestly say that I think there is a lot of support there for them. Most of the bloggers I read talk about how they will spend time talking with their victims and help them understand what they could do differently the next time. There are, of course, victimizers who just don't care -- but I'm sure you couldn't call Rixx one of those.

I started out as a victim; several times it made me just want to quit -- but I didn't. I took the time to learn how to fight back.

Thanks for this. I came to the realization last night that I wasn't having much solo luck because the ships I was flying around trying to solo in had a very narrow range of target selection. I was helped to this realization by a conversation with a recent addition to our alliance who is a prolific (and good) solo artist.

I've shifted my thinking and am looking for something that has a wide range of target selection. Comet has been suggested several times -- and since I have a few of them I might as well give it a shot.