Eija-Riitta Veitonen
Unicorn Enterprise
204
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Posted - 2014.11.09 00:59:32 -
[1] - Quote
It all started on a cold, dark evening somewhere in early Feb, 2005. I was scouring the internets for a sci-fi themed game when I found an EVE free trial ad on mmorpg.com. I took it and abolutely loved the game, the world, the complexity... Unfortunately, I did not have an ability to pay my subscription (I was but a first year undergrad student without any money to spare whatsoever), thus I left after the trial expired, but EVE has left me wanting for more...
Over half a year later a friend found EVE online and invited me to join him on his travels across the universe. I started another trial account and found EVE universe as much interesting and appealing as it was back in the February. Only this time I had means to support a subscription! I dug up information on my first trial character and re-subbed it. Since then I've had over half a dozen accounts and more than twice that characters, had periods of high activity and relative dormancy, but over nearly nine years since then I haven't been too far away from EVE. Funnily enough, the friend didn't last even through the first trial.
I don't remember my first days in EVE with much clarity, but I do remember dabbling with some mining, missions, and lowsec. Eventually I've come up on a corporation of like-minded individuals, all based from the same country I was in and speaking their language, so it felt like home, even though my english skills weren't that bad. We did some high-sec mining then, in early 2006, ventured out into null-sec, where we rented a system from Red Alliance somewhere in Insmother. I still remember the N-RAEL gatecamps with fond memories. We still were an industrial/mining corp back in the day, but that was where we (well, some of us) found a passion for explodifying other players' ships instead of red crosses. Luckily, we were able to participate in RA fleets and they noticed us too, extending an offer of membership, which out corp accepted. My first large-fleet engagements were had at around spring 2006, just after a Red Moon Rising patch hit the servers, introducing new capital ships, Carriers, Motherships (Supercarriers back in the days) and Titans. While we did not see titans for at least a few months after the patch, Carriers became a common sight in alliance ops quite soon.
Afterwards RA decided to move north, to around Deklein region (I still have assets around VFK-IV) we moved alongside with them. Got involved in the BOB's MAXX campaign, on the receiving end, had many good (and not-so-good) fights with them, but eventually they (BOB) drew us out. RA collapsed, many corps left, we also left, joined a new local alliance and participated in local activities. When that and the following alliance collapsed in a matter of few months we lived nearby in Venal region without having allegiance to any of the major alliances until we got forcefully evicted from there. The corp splintered into two, having most of the PVP-oriented people leaving for greener pastures and CEO resigning due to real life issues. I decided to go my own way from there.
Started my own corp in the end of 2006, primarily as a mission/industrial corp that (continuing the tradition of my old corp) recruited mostly on a nationality basis, for ease of acclimation and communication. After a while we grew up in numbers and become one of the most prominent corporations based on our language group. Moved out to a low-sec missioning hub and joined forces with a small russian-speaking alliance already living there, continuing the missioning/industrial activity but with increasing PvP focus as we needed to defend our home system from occassional pirate incursion, though our own policies around haven't been much different. We operated on NBSI policy, giving only two options to our opponents: join us (or at least become blue) or die.
After a while the core PVP contingent of the corp decided to split off and try their luck in nullsec again, by joining the Against ALL Authorities alliance, basing around Stain. I transferred rule of the corporation to one of the industrial-minded directors and went off to nullsec alongside with other corp members. The split was very amicable and we all continued to hang around in unified chat and even had positive standings set from alliance towards our corp, to recognize their friendly status, even though our paths rarely intersected due to being in different parts of the EVEverse.
Eventually my growing distaste for nullsec warfare which always revolved around CTAs and blobs, and the trend was only increasing, I returned back to my old corporation. After a while (late 2009 -- early 2010) we have met a group of highly skilled low-sec PVP players, known as Rooks and Kings, who were operating in the same region from a constellation nearby. It still beats me how we managed that feat, but after more than a few skirmishes our alliances realized it would be of mutual benefit if we became friendly, and this is how my history as a RnK pilot started...
I eventually handed over reigns of my old corporation to a good friend and became a part of Rooks and Kings alliance and participating in many of the feats they are renowned for. I am immensely grateful to them and my old low-sec Russian alliance for the fun and comaraderie they provided. Those were by far the best days of my EVE life.
Finally, at around early 2012 I found myself tired of all things EVE and went dormant. This character was created at around that time as my blank slate, as all of my other characters went dormant and eventually got sold or unsubscribed. Joined a friendly group of (mostly) indy players that operated in the same area. The old corporation I have created kicked around for a few years until most of the players went on with their lives and the corp slowly faded away. Now I have only one account and mostly station spin and live off the wealth I've accumulated over the years :)
Welp, that's all of my story so far. Thanks for reading! |