Racing not

It feels odd that, upon the start of a new racing season I should be writing about not racing. Yet here I go.

Hello, I am Quin and I am not a racer.

Well, for starters I did retire last season and went planetside. (Of course we all know how this goes, hotshot retires then keeps away from the sport, runway, politics, movies or whatever, then after much expectation comes back to glory and sponsors. Then more often than not gets injured, falls on her behind, melts down, is caught red-handed or whatever, then hotshot retires for good). I am still retired.

Then there is this little thing about the team. We were once two teams, Kay's Dragonstar and Quin's Scuderia Caille. Then we were Scuderia Dragonstar and it was the best of times. Now due to corporate politics we have had to split the team, which albeit done on the friendliest of terms still resulted in, you guessed it, two teams. Kay will race with Dragonstar and I will not-race with Scuderia Caille.

Which leaves us one little problem: racers. DS is welcoming all racers her corp's bigot policy (sorry, I just said that - but it's a sport for goodness' sake!) will not allow her, which leaves SC quite weak in numbers. Demon, our frigates champion, seems to be as retired as I am; Searaph is around but not with SC; Lief is probably racing away from police as the good smuggler he is. Our roster so far includes two.

Which by the way is ironic as we started out as an the University of Caille racing team, an inclusive bunch that reaches across borders, affiliation and ethnicity in order to go fast, have fun and learn. And this gets us? Two racers.

Not that I have been doing much team management work either. I went planetside, remember?

So I am not racing and am torn between placing my racers with someone else, while maybe putting SC on ice... or coming up with something for the team that is completely crazy and as fun as competitive racing once was. I have talked to some of the other team managers about placement and they have been nothing but supportive. Thank you, by the way :)

Anyway, last Saturday was the first race of the season and what did we have? One racer showed up.

Nicoletta's first race ever (did I mention she is also a rookie?) ended up with her taking 3rd place in the AF podium. Not bad. Even though she was a team unto herself (I refuse to say 'racing alone') we were on comms during most of the race, sharing tips and hints and trying to figure out where she was. Besides, she did not blow up which is like doing twice better than I did on my very first race.

Waitaminute...

First race, not blowing up, podium? Hey, not too bad at all!

Still, I'm really wondering about what to do next.

Maybe we need to be closer to our roots as a team - remember when in season 3 we kicked ass and took numbers? And though we were the best frigates team out there we still got zero season score due to our not meeting the requirements to register as a corporate team. And we did not care a bit about not getting points.

Or maybe our mission is to really be the little league of the sport. All we need is a few good newbies and good instructors, as when we registered for S4. To teach the racers of tomorrow! And looking back, I do feel proud about SC racers joining other teams and showing what they've got. That's what we said back then we would do: teach people. And we did it!

Or this could be a business opportunity. Want to race? Want to ride shotgun with the pros? So we go into the consulting business to help a team, any team or teams, beat the others. Our racing R&D is still unrivaled off and on the track - who flies frigates with large polycardboard rigs? Who developed the away-from-can opening? The jump-clone shortcut? The blind warp? SC did, that's who.

Possibilities, endless possibilities...

So be warned. We are still at the track, one way or the other. A blip in your overview, a shadow in your rear-view mirror, a system ahead, sniping at you in chat. One way or the other...

We are good. We are creative. We are Scuderia Caille.

And we are BACK.


Q

Racing Series
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Cee Vee

It is midnight and the man pushing the cart down the street stops to catch his breath. If it only were easier. A life of hardship has taught him to be strong, to be steadfast, but he has always wondered, and even now, looking up at some of the lighted housing in the arcology. He wonders how it would be if he had a life like that.

It is midnight and inside, another man stands up from his paper-covered desk and walks to the window. Oblivious to the man and his cart downstairs, he is too worried to notice. Expenses, mortgage, payments, ends having to meet; his climb up the corporate ladder slower than anticipated and now changes with the new CEO. There are needs that must be filled. If he only had a chance...

It is midnight and the new CEO looks down her domain from the top floor building. The pressure, the people, the petty strife amongst corporate divisions; public appearances and secret negotiations. Right now, she would rather be free amongst the stars, flying from planet to planet until she chose another star, any star in the sky and start over. If she only could fly like they do...

--

It was midnight and I put the finishing touches to a description of my entire life. It is grossly unfair to sum it up on just a handful of pages, but that is the way it must be. And if I spent any more time making it perfect, I would show up and next day's interview being sleepy, grumpy, stupid and with bags under my eyes. Not the best first impression, I am afraid.

I hate job hunting. Hate it, with passion.

--

Interviewer X> Can you tell me about your combat experience?

Quin> I have, ah, seen combat.

X> Do you have any killboard references?

Q> Not really. But here, see, I have two kills.

X raises an eyebrow> Two kills in four years?

--

I do not know which part I hate the most, whether it is the constant application/rejection cycle, or the part where I have to pretend to be someone I am not, just because everyone else pretends.

Okay, I get it. Really. Eggs must be broken to make an omelet. You have to apply a hundred times to get one acceptance. I do not have to like it, do I?

What I find disgusting out there is the sheer amount of people wanting to oversell themselves and embellish their life with fantastic details. Should I pretend as well, or is it better to be honest up front?

--

Interviewer Y> What are your best strengths as a pilot?

Q> I can go fast. I used to race in the pro circuit, you know.

Y> So you are a tackler...

Q> Yes, I could be.

Y> Could? You are either a tackler, or are not. What else do you consider a strength?

--

So I do not pretend and that usually lands me in trouble. Or, rather than trouble, -here is to positive thinking- saves me the time and effort of attending a second or third interview with the same people.

I have been saving a lot of time and effort lately.

Everyone else pretends. Then again everyone else is, well, not me. They have skills people want around here. Maybe I am looking in the wrong spot?

--

Interviewer Z> Your CV states you are committed pacifist; you also state you have trained Advanced Weapon Upgrades to level 5...

Q> I am an angry pacifist.

Z> What makes you think you are a good fit to our corporation?

Q> I think that people skills are a valuable contribution to any organisation. I mean, you can have all the technical stuff in place but your corp still needs the right approach to people to work and endure in time. The current skillpoint system does not really reflect that...

Z> Oh. Okay. Shall we... Is there anything you would like to know about us?

--

Or maybe I am the wrong candidate?

The worse that I have been called? I would say it was me being 'management material without management experience.' I think the proper answer to that one is feeling somewhere between flattered and insulted. Like I would be just right for the job if I did not know jack shit. Small detail.

I think I may be doing this the wrong way. I have been out of the picture for too long now, out of the loop. Maybe there is something I could do to make myself fit better, a skill or certification that looks good on my CV but is something real, substantive and useful. That way, I would not have to pretend being someone I am not. Rather, I would be interesting because of what I can actually do. Because of who I am. Which, incidentally, is the same woman I was before, only now with a nice certificate on the wall.

I think that's it: I am off to learn some skills.

I still hate job hunting, though.

--

What do people see when they look at capsuleers? Giants, gods, monsters, mythical creatures, insufferable snobs, unreachable heights?

Capsuleers are not gods, just people as well like everybody else. We bleed, we die, we look for acceptance, we look for a life to call our own. There are needs that must be filled, because we are human. And because we are human, it does not matter how many things one gets for granted.

There are still needs that must be filled.

Racing Blob

November 109, ISGC Season 4
Race 3: Sinq Laison

This race was nuts. I mean, I can barely recall all the way back to Season 4* but whoever was there for race 2 will remember that one, such a complete and utter mess that it was. Complete. Utter. Mess.

The race region was Sinq Laison, home of Uni of Caille (rah!). Back then we were mostly a UC student team, we flew as Scuderia Caille and were the shiny underdog to Kay's all-star DragonStar and Takashi's challenging Venture Racing Team. But Sinq is our region and we were flying as locals. We had something to prove.

Speaking of locals, by the way, Sinq is also home to Rancer and a whole lot of fun people who like to hang out with blasters and gatecamps. They do not take lightly on trespassers because, you know, it is their region.

You do not have to live in 0.0 to see the problem there.

That was, at least, what we expected.

We started out in Auberulle for the pre-race. Gyra had warned us that she would be a bit late, she had been having other commitments during the week and had had to outsource the track to someone else, but finally made it to host the race. She gave us the undock signal and, like lovely little lemmings that we are, we hit the first few waypoints: Olettiers, Rancer, Miroitem. Not finding the dreaded space pirates was a big relief but also a bit meh, we had been wondering how to evade them. Maybe it was pirate day.

We did not stick around for long anyway and went on to the next waypoints deeper into lowsec, Lamadent, Otou and Rorsins.

I know you must be thinking but Quin, what about the race itself? Like, who was in front and who was falling behind?

The answer: what difference does it make? It all went wrong starting waypoint seven. But now that you ask and just for the record, I would like to point out that I got there first.

Waypoint seven, Thelan.

[ 21:01:09 ] Quintrala > can 7 empty?
[ 21:01:26 ] Kayleigh Jamieson > Can 7 empty
[ 21:01:28 ] Takashi Kurosawa > Yes I think so too
[ 21:01:33 ] Saithe > is it just me or is there notging in wp7

There, see? I just wasted twentyfour perfectly good seconds, waiting.

A racer ages about a year in that time.

Gyra directed us to WP eight, Crielere which meant going back through Rancer again, ugh :/

[ 21:05:50 ] Quintrala > wp8 empty too?
[ 21:05:59 ] Kayleigh Jamieson > Um, WP8 appears empty as well.
[ 21:06:22 ] Kazuo Ishiguro > Ok, where's wp 9?

How is it that they say? "Once is an accident, twice is coincidence..."

We were directed to WP nine, Ambeke

[ 2007.11.11 21:08:37 ] Takashi Kurosawa > I cannot open can at WP9
[ 2007.11.11 21:08:44 ] Quintrala > bad password at Ambe
[ 2007.11.11 21:08:49 ] Kayleigh Jamieson > This is so not my day :(

From there onwards, almost every single waypoint was messed up in some way or another. WP10 had the wrong password, as did WP12 to WP14. While we waited, we even appreciated the irony of WP11 being okay. Gyra only knew the right password so she could not help beyond following the rules, that is, waiting for the second racer to report an error and then direct the pack to the next waypoint. Every time this happened, the few in front of the pack got delayed and the ones in the back had time to catch up.

The result? We were pretty much a racing blob.

WP15 Olettiers VII - Asteroid Belt 4

[ 2007.11.11 21:25:01 ] Quintrala > bad Wp 15
[ 2007.11.11 21:25:11 ] Kazuo Ishiguro > Finish line?
[ 2007.11.11 21:25:12 ] Takashi Kurosawa > confirmed
[ 2007.11.11 21:25:13 ] Kayleigh Jamieson > Coonf

See, right there? That was me, 10 seconds in the lead. Which, by the time ISGC confirmed, looked up and typed the finish line, would have evaporated. That's like a hour of flying, with 10 seconds to show for it, already gone by in the time it took you to read this but now that everyone was around I could be first as easily as last.

Unless... it occurred to me that it was not the destination but the journey what mattered: I would just pick a gate and warp. What was the worst that could happen? Did anyone know where to go next? Tell you what, certainly not at the can.

So how many gates did we have in that system? Four. Eenie, Minnie, Manny, Moe... Dondenvale!

I warped off, fingers crossed. If I was wrong, I would just have to do the exact same thing everyone else would: warp to the correct gate. Nothing lost with trying, that is, if Gyra so kindly waited to announce until I had already landed at the Dodenvale gate. Now if the announcement caught me mid-warp...

Of course, the announcement came in when I was nine seconds into my warp: FINISH: Unel IX - Chemal Tech Factory

I frantically punched the new navi data as my destination and, as a result, one gate in my overview lighted up in yellow. It was Dodenvale.

Just in time, I jumped on contact while they were all in mid-warp behind me :)

As it turns out it was a short, mad dash to the finish line. The entire blob was docked within two minutes of the winner. Kay was fourth, Tak was second and I... I had beaten him by those exact same nine seconds I had gambled back at Olettiers, yay!

After all that practice, after trying so hard... my first interceptor win!

Race results: annulled

ISGC Gyra: ... for those that attended will attest to the complete chaos that ensued during this evening's race.

...

This event will be considered an exhibition, or practice exercise, and will not be counted towards the League scores. We will return to Sinq Laison at the end of the season as a make up event. For those interested in the details, I have provided track information and a raw data of the performances from the participants that attended this evening.

Damit.

At least we met no pirates on the way. **


--

* ((I can not remember so I cheat. Having a crap laptop helps, it is full of logs that go back forever.))

** ((Stay tuned if you want to know what happens when you get this false sense of security around dodgy places..))

Racing Series
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See what happened next

Perpetual Motion: People

At some point in your life you realize that it is not places but people that make you feel home.

So it is only natural that, as you leave places behind, you will want to bring your people along. A gift, a memento, a promise to write or to call, maybe visit. A social network link because, you know, you will also be chatting, talking, conferencing each other face to face across the chasm. Like being home.

Is it not great? Keeping in touch with people is so much easier than keeping in touch with places.

And maybe, if you are lucky, you will meet them again somewhere.

--

Age ten: Pator

Sitting on the rocks next to the beach, I was holding my knees to my chest while Taro basked in the sun, lying on his back with one leg dipping lazily in the water. The murmur of the ocean blanketed everything and was a lovely background to idle chat.

"Dunno. Journalist. An artist like Maman," I said, "something with people, definitely."

Taro chuckled "Like your mom? I hope not. She's fierce."

He had been one of my first friends back in Eram and one those who had left ahead of us. As it turns out when it had been time for my family to move out, dad's next assignment had been Pator. Down in Matar, actually.

Have you seen it? Of course everybody knows about Matar, the cradle of the Republic and everything, but have you seen it? From above it is this beautiful blue ocean world, with green dots here and there for people to live on. And on the ground, from the snowy mountain ranges to the plains and deserts to the jungle islands... oh, my favourite part used to be the islands. We lived on an island.

This is was where Taro's family had returned to. this was their 'home.' By some amazing coincidence we had ended up living on the very same island where they hailed from and it was cool because some of mom's old friends from Eram also were there.

Someday I would learn to do that, to arrange coincidence the way mom did. ;)

Anyway, funny how knowing someone from my previous life had helped so very much when I arrived... how long had it been, five years now? How time flies. Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath of salty ocean air. It felt great.

I felt home.

I swear there must be this law of the universe that says whenever I start feeling at home, it is time to move to some other planet. I did not want to tell Taro. And besides that, there was much more to say but... I did not really feel like it. Somehow it just felt as if it would make things more difficult. So I just looked at the horizon and kept the small talk going.

"And what about you?"

"I want to be a soldier with the Marines."

"Oh, I see. How typical, you want to kill people," I teased, "you suck, y'know."

"It is not about killing, Kü, it is about fighting for my people." He replied matter-of-factly.

See, most in his tribe, the Brutor, feel different about fighting than the rest of us. For them it is usually about people and freedom, not about conquest, profit or sport. Fighting is Freedom. Fighting is Life. I knew that.

Maybe I could poke him with that.

"That's just an excuse, you know, so all of you can go and beat the crap out of each other like in the holos."

He just grumbled and pretended to ignore me.

Hey, maybe that is what I really needed, a good fight. A good break-up fight so epic that we would look back, remember this day and think good riddance! That way we would not have to miss each other terribly, every single day. We'd hate each other's guts, good. I could live with that. Half a universe away, that's what I would do.

In case you have not noticed, I am really good at fooling myself, sometimes.

So there, Newly Discovered Fact: Fighting is killing, fighting is crap. I hate you because you want to be a killer. 'Cause I said so. Just like that.

I pushed it. "No, really, must everything be solved by fighting?" now seriously enough for him to take notice. "Stupidest thing in the world."

"Sometimes you can't avoid a fight."

"I think there is always a way, if you really want to. And if you are smart enough."

He grumbled again and, in the corner of my eye, I could see him tensing up. I kept my sight on the horizon, thinking of how to tease him next. There is something not quite smart enough about trying to pick up a fight with an islander, boy or girl.

Oh, whatever. Keep poking.

"So, are you?"

"Am what?"

"Smart enough?"

Without actually looking in his direction yet keeping all my attention on that corner of my eye, I think I saw his head move. He was there allright, maybe he was wondering why I was suddenly hostile. Or maybe his tribal instinct was sizing me up for a well-deserved beating.

"Taro?"

"Hrmpf."

"I'm leaving. Dad got transferred..."

A movement, then stopped. I finally turned my head and found him propped up on one muscled arm, the other resting on his knee, curiously looking at me.

"Kü." He still called me that.

"It's Amarr."

"Kütral, listen," he slid closer and drew me in. I felt his arm gently pushing me closer, firmly across my shoulders, and I nested my head against his chest. I did not hug back.

"It's Amarr, Taro, it's fucking Amarr. I am going to live in the Empire now."

You know what some people say, right? Only two kinds of people live in Amarr: slavers and slaves. Even in this day and age.

Yah, yah, I know, and already knew back then it's not like that... but how about everyone else? Did my friends know? What would they think, what would they say? I was moving to the Empire. What would he say, what would he think of me?

And I did not want to go but, what can you do? Sometimes there is just no alternative but going wherever it is comes next.

"So what? We will always be friends," he whispered to my ear, "You are one of my people."

WTF? Hello? I was trying to break up and he was coming up with this? And why was that, genius, to make things more difficult? Put me through the grinder and make me hate even more already what I was about to go through? I mean, was it that hard to figure out that we were over anyway, whether we wanted or not. Take a hint, you obtuse, uncaring and simple-minded idiot. I am going anyway, so let me.

Why bother? He has never been good at hints, even today. I pushed him away slowly, deliberately.

"Goodbye Taro." So much left unsaid.

I stood up.

"N'de rendape ajuta," he said to my back as I turned around.

Yah, right, I thought, I would love to see that. Ten-year-old crosses the universe to be with friend, news at ten.

I did not run, I walked... and I did not look behind, I just stared ahead all the way home. No running, no looking back, no crying. Hey, two out of three, not bad.

Only halfway my sore feet reminded me that I had left my sandals behind.

I did not care. Wish it had been only sandals.

--

Now by the second time you move, you have already learned it doesn't quite work the way you expected. There is always something in between: distance, timezone, time apart, the fact that no matter how many times you call each other, the nuisance of a call will never feel the same as sitting in front of each other for drinks. Or a hug. Or a kiss. And then you start drifting apart.

So it does not work, and it turns out that you do leave friends behind, as much as you may want not to. But you expected this already, right? I mean, you learned that the very first time you moved.

One thing though. Maybe, if you are lucky, you will have good friends; they will keep you in their hearts, the same as you keep them in yours. And the day you see each other again, it will be like you were never apart.

For good friends, those are forever.

Perpetual Motion
Previously: Places

[OOC] Do-over

Lights check, ears check, eyebrows check, do-that-is-not-from-Lazytown...

Check.

With an aprés-pod look too.

There :)

[OOC] Face Time

I have been rather busy lately.

See, I saw Myrhial's post and then I had to look for myself. That pic over there is a first go at what I would look like in Sisi.

I liked the sculpting tool, although I felt that it is sort of limited in range. I mean, you can move the cheekbone a bit but not too much, the jaw a bit but not too much, there is no control over the shape of your head -which limits the kind of hair you should be legally allowed to sport- but you can control the shape of your temples tho, and the corner of your eyes (WTF? "wow, did you see the temples on that guy?"). Yay. I guess that this has been done this way to get a more realistic look and, anyway, they do achieve that in spades.

It would seem that cartoonish pics are no longer that easy to create, whereas the classic pic maker made it more challenging to create verosimile ones. Way to go!



Sorry, you gallies all look the same to me.


I wonder what will be the implication though, maybe we will transition from people that look all cartoonishly the same, to people that all look realistically the same? Then again, I have not played enough with this to build radically different faces within the same bloodline.

Maybe it is possible. We shall see.

Then again, maybe that's ethnicity at work, people looking alike. I remember that ethnicity did limit some of the choices you could make before, like no red-headed Amarrians, Brutor being generally more tanned and the Lonetrek facelift -that weird tight hairdo- only being only available to Civire and Sebiestor.

No such limits this time but again, test phase and we shall see. It would be cool if choices were ethnical (hair, eyes, tan) and some location-based (hairdo choice wherever you re-cast a character)



Fashion emergency


Regarding clothing you get the basics from what I guess are each race's designs of one piece of each top, pants, jacket and shoes. You can mix and match, and I happen to think Matari boots work surprisingly well with an Amarrian tunic :)

Designs are indeed gorgeous and very detailed; from a heavy-looking ornate tunic to a running tank-top. I can only imagine what the CCP wardrobe design department will be coming up with.. and I can't definitely not imagine all the many different ways that people will use them.

One thing though: no accessories yet, but these are promised for the future. I want backlaces!




Full freckles ahead!

You have many different face options, from hair to eyebrows to makeup and eye colour, no tattoos allowed. Sculpt sensitivity is weird, it takes some time to figure out what happens when you pull features in different directions with up/down/wide/narrow being an easy guess and smile/smooch/frown/sneeze being not so intuitive.




Eyebrows do not really work well on Gallentean faces yet and with my freakishly huge in-character ears, I guess I will be sticking with the bob for the time being.

Oh by the way? The round sliders are not that difficult to work, if you hate sliding it is possible to just click on any position and voilà, it slides by itself.


Express yourself!



After sculpting, I was surprised to find that you can make faces. I mean, you can smile or frown or squint, which is not the same as -and trickier than- pulling your mouth up or changing the size of your eyes from the previous phase. Range is again a bit conservative (see if you can tell wide-eyed smile from squinting smooch above and... yes, wide toothy smile was possible but I rather not). The pre-set poses look natural and are a much better starting point than the old ones.

What is cool is that the pic is alive as it is posing! Slight movements, eyes that wander here and there, light changes in expression... you get the idea. Which also means this is only the tip of the iceberg: come Incarna, I think you will find your avatar fidgeting, frowning or making faces you may not have intended and well beyond the control of the posing environment.

Which, I think, is a good thing.

And this is where the game is -'cause character creation is a game, did you not know?- in making a character that looks lifelike, real. Someone you could be talking to on the holo, or an ID card snapshot, or a realistic expression of happiness, anger, sadness, vengeance or whatever background history your character has. And it is still as challenging as it was before because, even if you get all these aids like the pre-sets and limits, the entire process from head to toe has now so much more complexity, that it still leaves you lots of room to come up with something unique, genuine and yours.




All things considered, I am quite impressed. It shows that there has been a lot of care and hard work done on Incarna, so I would like to send many thanks and kudos to CCP.

Also, thank you for allowing us to see this!

-Q



PS: I tried the Deteis and they look stunning already, just by pressing "continue" all the way. They sorely need to look uglier. Really. Lots. Nerf please!

PPS: I can see a meme calling. So, what do you look like in Sisi?

Planetary Interruption

Dear employees:

Operations in Hek II will be down for maintenance on 23 September 112. Regular downtime will be extended from 0900 to 1100 HST.

During this period the Company will upgrade the planetary Command Center to an Improved Lava Command Center, which will result improvements to overall productivity and employee experience. The soda vending machine at the SS-HIP launchpad office will be fixed as well.

Unfortunately it will be necessary to tear down all corporate structures on the planet and rebuild these from scratch; this shall happen, of course, on budget and on schedule.

We apologise for the inconvenience.

Employees are advised to take all personal items with them as they leave the office for the day.

With kind regards,

Management


(this item contains a hint: Bring a large supply of oxygen with you.)

--

OOC: Oh my. Was there not an easier way to do this? Why do I have to scrap everything just to upgrade? Tsk, tsk...