Eve is easy vs Web exploit

Over at Jester's Trek, Jester wrote a post about the Web exploit, tying in a reference to the new site "Eve is Easy." It is true that one of the contributors for the site is Garmon, but he is doing his "thing" over there with the co-support of two other successful PvPers, Willl Adama and Duncan Tanner.

While the exploit certainly drags Garmon's name in the dirt let me respond to certain parts and implications of Jester's post.

Jester says - "The website, http://www.eveiseasy.com/, includes a box to put in your e-mail address.  Once you do, you're given access to several initial videos.

One can only assume that further videos will follow, but that those videos won't be so freely available."

How can I put this... WRONG! As a subscriber to Eve Is Easy, I can say that two more video's have been released, one about 0.0 Shield Rupture soloing and the second about 0.0 Wolf soloing. These video's, contrary to Jester's statement, were also made freely available to the public and were released March 17th, before the webbing "scandal" broke. Not likely that they were completed as a damage control move by Garmon.

The focal point of these 'instructional' video's is actually learning how to deal with, and engage certain types of situations from people who have evolved tactics to do just that. The instructors disclose their use of boosting alts when it happens, but the more important focus of the video's is showing the method they use to engage camps and up engage against superior numbers. If you are watching those video's and thinking that you can't do that without those advantages then you are missing the entire point of the video's in the first place. Learn how they separate out tacklers, see the mistakes that other pilots made to get put into those situations, learn from those mistakes. Get better.

The singular complaint about Garmon's "Garmonation" video's seems to be "He uses boosting alts and 5 bil isk fitting and faction/t2/expensive ships to be successful. That's not 'real' solo! QQQQQQ"

So it's not your definition of solo, and if that makes it less impressive, then don't watch it. The assumption seems to be that any "above average" player could, with the boosting alt, the overpriced ship, and everything else, do what Garmon does(or any other soloer) is equal parts insanity and stupidity. Garmon is a skilled pilot and player, exploiting weaknesses and strengths of in game mechanics, his fit, his support, and psychological nuances in ways that most of the rest of the player base can only hope to. 

In one way, Garmon is identical to the rest of us his mistakes are fatal, often times the error margin is even smaller for him. The following point can't be stressed enough. For each of the "good fights" that make it into a Garmonation video, there are tens, if not more, of fights that go badly and end up with Garmon dead. Not every fight he gets into, is he successful. Usually it is a high-octane mix of skill and opponent stupidity that allows any soloer, including Prom, Willl, Duncan, Sard Caid, Garm, etc, to be out classed, out manned, out gunned, and still end up with a victory. Not nearly as linked to "fit" as it is linked to decision to engage, and how to go about engaging.

In this case Jester comes off a bit like a gossip columnist. Claiming loudly that Eve is Easy is a for-profit venture (it's not yet and shows no signs of becoming one, just seemingly tracking who is interested in their video's to see if the time is worth it). Second, damning Garmon for an exploit used to kill Jump Freighters. Failing to pass the same judgement on PL, or maybe it is expected from PL? But just not from an upstanding member of the community like Garmon?

To put it plainly in reference to the exploit, am I defending Garmon's use of the exploit to get kills? No. It is underhanded, an unintentional mechanic, wrong and a exploit, not to mention down-right mean? Yes, but seriously? If your belief is "oh god that never happens in MY EVE" You're clearly a little out of touch with this game! Is this actually a CCP issue, YES. They should (have) fix(ed) it and(or) in the mean time, have declared it an exploit as soon as it was discovered(months ago), not waited until the noise level on the exploit got past a certain point. Bug report failure.

Vote Match and CSM7

Well, I've been avoiding typing up this post for at least the past few weeks. Trying to make an informed decision and not just a knee-jerk vote for my corpmate Leboe. A while back I was going to ask some specific questions of the CSM hopefuls and see who responded, and with what. In the end my questions seemed hollow and contrived so I scrapped the idea. I wish had fleshed out the idea and asked those questions, it would have been interesting to see people's responses to small gang combat and NPC 0.0 questions.

Instead I have been listening to all of the excellent podcast coverage of debates, while simultaneously attempting to keep track of who said what, when, and why. Hell, even if I kept notes of who said what I think I would be lost by now. All for the effort of trying to keep up to speed with the upcoming CSM7 elections.

Then I just went back to the same site that has led me through every single other CSM, that is Vote match for CSM9 provided by Dierdra Vaal. Now not only does this site provide useful information, it also gives a chance to see, side by side, views of who best represents your idea's.

To do this, Dierdra has setup a simple statement based system, for example

"The core combat model of EVE lacks complexity and is too simple." And then gives five options to the right, ranging from Strongly Disagree to Strongly Agree, the middle option being "No opinion" or more accurately, "don't care."

From these statements and your responses it gives you a list of all the candidates and how their responses compare to yours. Even to the level of looking at things you strongly disagree with and see who agree's with them so you know who to root against.

Well my results are below, and it looks like it was a good thing that Leboe decided to fire up his own CSM candidacy otherwise my vote would be wasted by yet another vote for Elise!

I say wasted because I am fairly certain that he has a great chance to make it back in already. Leboe on the other hand is for sure a longshot. I see Hans Jagerblitzen on there as well, and a great candidate, representing lowsec and facwar very well from what I have heard of him. Korvin, was not well known to me, being a "Russian bloc" candidate, but turns out he holds more than one of the same views I do as I read his CSM page, coming in third of my suggested people I should vote for. I've read and reviewed all their campaign posts and I will once again follow Vote-match into the void and select Leboe with my accounts, hoping that a true small gang pilot can make it onto the special 7. I wouldn't mind seeing any of the other three on there as well.

I suppose it helps that Leboe is a Rote Kapelle alliance member, not that my opinion of him is based just on his alliance membership and Corp membership.

Surprise(to me)absentee's from my top five - Prometheus Exenthal (45%), and Alekseyev Karrde (60%). Both self-nominated small gang candidates, but yet so different from my responses. Very eye opening to see them nailed down on some topics that obviously we differ on in significant ways.

Really interesting for me to take a look at some of the "Big names" out there as they pertain to myself. My fifth ranked candidate is another very good one, Meissa Anunthiel (63%), of Rooks and Kings, who has a ton of experience in both the CSM as well as in game. The Mittani (Goonswarm) manages to have 48% of my views, not that he needs my vote. Trebor Daehdoow (51%), honestly thought he would be higher, he's had a vote of mine before. How about Seleene (56%)?

All in all, I will be supporting my alliance mate Leboe! Should you find yourself with some extra time and are still wondering who to vote for, you should go check out vote match and give it a shot for yourself!