Lei Harper. June 10, YC115.
Today I am flying “Matriarch”, my Tristan class exploration vessel. New equipment on my ship pleases me immensely, and my eyes have been opened to so much more than just ablating layers of slag from ancient hunks of rock. I will earn my riches in another manner; I just need to find one that suits me. Today I am toying with probes, skirting the fringes of Council Space where traffic is lighter and I have less chance of being disturbed. Over the last few days I’ve learned the rudiments of Astrometrics as well as some other useful tricks, but I still have far less command of these tools than I do my Drones or my Mining Equipment. No matter. My scanning is crude but effective, and with a little patience and a light touch on deploying the probes I’ve been able to make a tidy bundle of ISK so far.
The signature I’m tracking down today seems different, and troublesome to triangulate. After 25 minutes and through sheer luck, I somehow drop a probe practically on top of it and the signal intensity spikes, holding at a vibrant green. I read the anaylsis, condensed to a singular word…Wormhole. I purse my lips and consider the possibilities, the risks, the potential. A gate to another region of space. Who knows where? It is worth a look at least, so I command Matriarch to warp to the location of the signal, giving myself a good 100 kilometer buffer in case there are any undesirables nearby.
Matriarch drops out of warp with a brief lurch that I find extremely disconcerting. The region of space ahead of me is twisted and distorted; light being pulled into a bizarre spiral like water being sucked down a drain. I instinctive recalibrate Matriarch’s station keeping thrusters to account for the gravitational fluctuations, and my sensors begin to lose scan resolution. Damn Gallente Gravimetric sensor array doesn’t appear to play nicely with anomalies like this. I compensate, which is when I notice the Gnosis moving nearby.
This system still has a CONCORD presence so I am not overly concerned about my safety. More, I feel a little annoyance that this other capsuleer has found something I worked so damn hard to scan down. I watch the Gnosis as it approaches the Wormhole. It holds station for a short time in front of the event horizon, then abruptly the pilot appears to reconsider his course of action – the Gnosis swings about, aligns to the nearby stargate and drops into warp. I watch it vanish into the void.
Fine, More loot for me.
Half of my Corporation live in a wormhole, so they tell me. If you ask me, that seems a little anti-social but they do spend a lot of time poring over Blueprints and other such things best done in solitude, so whatever works for them is fine I suppose. I’ve never had the pleasure of visiting but I’m certain they will have advice for me.
“Guys, I just scanned down a Wormhole. Do you think I should go through?”
A brief crackle of dead air, then a crisp reply.
“Lei, if you do that I’d say there is a 50% chance that you’re going to die. Though given the luck we’ve had recently I’d say that’s more like 99% at this point.”
I smile and command my Frigate to approach the Wormhole.
“I like those odds. Don’t fly what you can’t afford to lose, right?”
They laugh. I realize that today, I am not afraid.
“You’re learning, Lei. You’re learning.”
————————————————————————————————————————–
A brief interlude before I continue. I am writing this entry after a lull of a few days, and I have other things to write afterwards so the chronology will be wrong – but I have to write about last night because of the clusterfuck of hilarious proportions that ensued.
First I have a question for you, dear reader. That which I write above (in italics) is told not from the perspective of me, the player, but from the perspective of Lei Harper, the character. It is of course, filled with more lore-appropriate detail within but does not include my comments on the metagame as the player.
Which would you prefer to read? My experiences as the player (the style of my original blog posts), or my character’s experiences through the filter of my writing? Or a mixture of the two? I enjoy writing these accounts in both styles but I am curious as to what those who follow this blog would prefer to see so I respectfully request your feedback on this. I will continue my story of the Wormhole on the edge of Gallente space in a new post.
Rising Star 
Really, I like both. Both tell different perspectives of Eve and both are good.
Both are good, however, what originally brought me to your blog was your perspective not Lei’s.
I like it from the Lei’s PoV. However, if non players read this I would go with your PoV. I think it would help them understand what the game is like as a player. Might bring in some new players too … more so than you have already inspired that is.
I exist to serve,
Dra
I prefer your perspective, no Lei’s.
Both are fun to read, however, it is very interesting to hear your thoughts as each new experience is happening. I love reading these. Ive been refreshing the page everyday, keeping it open in safari on my phone.
Now tell the part where we kill you =p
*one of the two guys who killed you last night
I’ll get to that part! No spoilers. 🙂
Lei, If you have been perusing other blogs, (especially them as what prattle on ’bout holes n such… nudge, nudge) you will find 2 basic camps with a small middle group…
A. RP (Role Play) bloggers such as Mme Thalys (of Emergent Patroller) and yours when you write ‘as’ Lei blog as your toon. For instance Mme Thalys will always start her titles as “OOC” when she posts ‘Out Of Character’ for clarity.
B. RL (Real Life) bloggers such as Ripard (Jester’s Trek) & Hermit (EVE Hermit)… they blog about the game and metagame as themselves.
?. Then there’s us weirdos in the middle such as I who sorta do both. I write from Tur’s perspective, but I do not divorce myself totally from my RL. “I” am “Tur” and so I blend the two as I write. If a ‘meta’ subject strikes me and I have something to say ’bout it I simply write it as I think it… and when something moar personal happens I write ’bout that from that perspective… Come to think on it, my somewhat disassociated writing style and my Twainish colloquial spellin’ are why I am prolly not as popular as some… =]
What you should do, IMHO, is not write for US, but for yourself and let the chips fall where they may. If you write honestly and truthfully and if you give your muse the freedom to express itself as pleases then you will have done the best you can.
You will still be writing for your audience, but let that audience be those as like your work for it’s own sake. You have an easy, open and accessible writing style… you have already captured a large following, don’t change course… just keep doing what you are doing is my best advise.
Keep in mind as I said, my blog is not overly popular… and I once played around with writing to win readers… and I was disappointed with my work. When I went back to writing for myself… then I was happiest and in the end, was writing at my best.
I may not be a Tom Clancy or a Ripard or even a Mabrick… but I don’t want to be them, I want to be Jason/Tur and if anyone reads my stuff I want them to like or dislike it on it’s own merits. And TBH unless you are creating a Manual, writing is very subjective, both as the reader and as the writer…
Writing, to me, is painting pictures in the mind… paint from your heart and those who find resonance in your words will do so and them as don’t won’t. =]
Thank you for the advice, truly.
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Definitely no preference over who the voice is. I prefer first person pronouns because it’s more immersive when I read, but I take it for granted that there is some embellishment whether it is in character or OOC.
Both work, and others have tried to do similar. Take a look and see what you like reading best.
I did mine as an in-character perspective three years ago. Here’s my first:
Space Noob did player perspective, almost exactly a year ago. Here’s his first:
http://diaries-of-a-space-noob.blogspot.com/2012/06/day-one.html
Mike Azariah, current CSM8 member, is a great hybrid. Here’s a sample:
It really depends on what you want to achieve, as other people said.
Eve players, though, tend to be more realistic than role playing, and there is tons of material of role playing, a whole forum section for it.
However, The main reason EVE players are reading your blog is because it reminds them of old good times long forgotten, the funny mistakes that we’ve made and the learning experience, that’s is the main reason you got so much attention when other new players don’t, and that’s the value that you have given to readers, which caused them to donate billions to them! not the RP elements.
There is an RP community in EVE but it’s tiny, the majority are mature players, average age is 26+, very few are women, and there is already tons of RP meterial.
If you’re writing the blog for the EVE community they’re interested in your perspective. if you’re writing for yourself then do what you like 🙂
Personally you reminded me of my own experiences and that’s why I followed your blog.
I prefer your viewpoint as the person sitting in the chair watching the monitor. That’s just me. I will read everything, but that’s my preference. I like reading all the juicy get-to-the-point content.
Your perspective as a player, I just find the role player perspective uninteresting.