“We are an effective team.” – Victoria, Oblivion

My last three blog post were a behind the scenes look at the Great Hunt, the Signal Cartel corporate event that helped me to complete my journey. The more I wrote, the more I realized I just couldn’t say everything that I wanted to or thank all of those who participated. But, there is one last thing that I wanted to do before wrapping it all up and that was to review my goals, see how we did, and give my sincerest thanks once more to my fellow corp mates who made this all happen. I hope and I believe most of my corp mates realized why we kept it all OPSEC. I know there were some areas I could’ve done better, communication, and understanding of the event and rewards for one, and I’m sure there are other areas too. I think there may have been some misunderstandings on some things, I’m truly sorry and apologize for that if there were. I had several big goals and one of the main ones was to try and make sure anyone that wanted to participate could, no matter their level of experience or time in corp as well as spreading out the rewards to as many as we could. For an event this big and for as many people that participated, overall, I believe it was a great success.

How’d we do on the goals? Well let’s see, obviously we met some of them like keeping me alive, locating the last 600 systems, corporate wide participation from newbies to veterans alike, but what I’d like to focus on in this post is what impact the event had on our EvE Scout Rescue Cache deployment program (ESRC).

Let’s look at some numbers and graph as it wouldn’t be EvE without them! 😉 You can see in the yellow box in the graph below the timeframe of the Great Hunt. It’s easy and clear to see the increase of ESRC caches tended. Also, we ended up setting an all time corporate record of active caches of 2,174 on February 12th, 2019. That’s 83% of all wormholes that contained a rescue cache container.

I’m absolutely thrilled and happy with the levels of participation we had in ESRC program during the event. So glad to see my fellow corp mates step up to the challenge of not only finding wormholes for the Great Hunt, but also taking the time to deploy containers for ESRC along the way. Fantastic and great job!!! I hope everyone learned something from the experience and hope they continue to participate in our ESRC program. I think it shows that individually we can participate in something that together as a team becomes bigger than all of us. Check out our ESRC and SAR heroes!!!

There’s really only one goal I felt that fell short and that was encouraging the use of Tripwire (TW) and our corp mask. Signaleers, if you felt not many of your systems were verified during the Great Hunt, this is likely why. Not only was the Great Hunt dependent on a filled in TW chain, our SAR programs life blood is dependent on it as well. I hear in Alliance chat all the time from new members, what can I do to serve the corp, is there a place I can jump right in, and get started with rescues. Yes! Yes there is! I would encourage you to go out and explore wormhole space, take some ESRC supplies with you, crank up Allison and Tripwire. Map out your chains and fill in all of the details you possibly can on connections in the corp mask. By doing this, when you locate a SAR system, our SAR team is notified by Allison, they will then look at Tripwire and if all of the connection details are there with a chain that connects back to known space, guess what? They can get a SAR pilot in there ASAP to assist in holding the system until the stranded pilot can be safely lead out.

The Great Hunt worked much like our SAR team does. When a system was located, my team was notified, and we’d check Tripwire. If the chains and details were there, we could get to them in no time and secure the system. For me personally, when I logged in, I prioritized the systems I would go after based on the amount of details that were in TW and how close they were to my current location. I’d work those systems secured by my mates first, then the TW filled out systems from closest to furthest, then TW systems that had chains but lacked connection details, and lastly those systems that had no TW information. Fortunately for those last ones, Allison had chain information, but even she lacked the connection details. Those last ones were the hardest ones to work and took the longest. So, it was the best use of my time that allowed me to get the most systems verified in a gaming session. Thank Bob to each and everyone of my fellow Signaleers who took the time and filled out the TW details. I’ve no doubt you were the ones who were rewarded the most in The Great Hunt, at least I hope so because you definitely put in the effort and earned it. For the others, I would strongly encourage you to start using and filling in the TW details, especially if you’re one of the ones who ask the question, what can you do to help the corp. The SAR team will thank you!

This will be my last post on behind the scenes of The Great Hunt. So, I wanted to end it by thanking those who participated in the event as well as those who flew in The Great Fleet. My sincerest and deepest thanks to you all. I reached out for help, you didn’t disappoint, and I couldn’t have done it without you.

Show Time – Aknot, The Fifth Element

I can only give you my word, on my honor, (and believe me, like Signal Cartel’s reputation, mine is everything to me as well), up until those last 600 systems, I hadn’t utilized an alternate character or any other player to scout ahead for me during my journey. However, as you know for those last 600 systems, I did have the support and help of my 3 Explorer Mates, 100+ of my corp mates that participated in the Great Hunt, and an alternate character of mine. Even though it wasn’t a goal in the beginning of not losing a ship, by the time I got down to those last 600 and I still hadn’t lost a ship, it became a higher priority than actually finding the last systems. The pressure I put on myself at this point was unbelievable, I mean, to visit all the systems of New Eden was one thing, but to do it and not lose a ship? That would be epic and certainly something I couldn’t do alone at this point.

“You wanna play it soft. We’ll play it soft. You wanna play it hard. Let’s play it hard.” – Korben Dallas, Fifth Element

Now, that’s not to say I didn’t take any chances during those last 600 systems, I did. There were plenty of times I just went for them as they were found and I didn’t wait for one of my mates to secure them. Several times I ploughed through low sec on my way to a chain, not giving it a thought at all to use my alt to scout or hold for a mate to find a safer route. Once, I had completely forgotten that our corp was under a war dec and my alt (also in Signal Cartel) was caught on a trade hub gate camp and lost her ship (but not her pod! 😉 ) Whew! If I had been in one of my gutsy moods with Katia, that would have been it, game over!

“Big ba-da boom.” – Leeloo, Fifth Element

Before the official start of the Great Hunt, I was struggling to get down to the last 600 systems. The target date was based on my ability to maintain an average of finding 3 systems per day, which was becoming more and more difficult as I continued to find systems I had already been to. Such is the difficulty of wormhole space and not knowing what system was on the other side of the hole you had just scanned down. So, I was having to increase the amount of my daily playtime to scan down more systems in order to find the minimum number of previously unfound systems. Thankfully, working with AD Parrot, to test the new features that were being added to Allison to track the Great Hunt, he enabled her for a limited time in October so we could make sure it was working as intended. And Wow! Was it ever! In that limited trial, I hit 10 systems per day with ease which quickly made up the gap. With Allison’s feature enabled in a test mode, I was able to get down to the last 600 in a couple of weeks before the official kickoff, which gave me some time to take a break and get ready for the big push.

Firmly written into the “Vacant Spectrum” storyline as Chapter 5, The Great Hunt, our OPSEC team created an NPC by the name of Talon Commander Fedi to “lead” the efforts with a target start date of November 1st, 2018. I had something of an idea of what day one would look like, but even then, over the course of that first week in November, I was blown away by the shear numbers of systems that were found. I couldn’t keep up, many systems were missed completely as my Mates and I weren’t able to secure them fast enough before chains would break. That first day was a short session for me as it was a normal work day, but even still, I managed to visit 7 systems. Friday, November 2nd I had taken a vacation day so I could tackle this effort completely, and wow, 20 systems visited! Here’s how it ended up playing out:

• November – 341 systems visited (Average of 11/day)
• December – 187 ( 6/day)
• January – 61 ( 2/day)
• February – 10 (.7/day) (Through February 15th, half of the month)

Officially, Chapter 5, The Great Hunt was over, but there was still 1 system left for me to get and that was the Drifter system of Redoubt. Was this on purpose? You bet it was. 😉 For the last system, I wanted to include my corp by inviting them along (still not knowing what it was truly all about) on a fleet. When thinking about what would be easy for a fleet to get to yet still be a wormhole system that I needed, we knew one of the Drifter holes would be ideal. Each one has a bunch of connections to all areas of space, we knew it would be easy to find one when we needed it from High Sec space, so no wormhole chains would have to be navigated with fear of connections closing. The connections to them are via beacons and don’t have to be scanned down, so from a High Sec system it’s as easy as right-click and jump, ideal for even our inexperienced members to come along. It would be a treat for those who’ve not been to one before and do some sight seeing as well by visiting the Sisters Fleet while there. Best of all, we could schedule the fleet any time we wanted.

The Great Fleet. We scheduled the fleet for March 9th which gave me some much needed time off after that hectic 3 and a half month marathon. During that time a lot of work behind the scenes was going on to make sure we could pull it off successfully, from trying to schedule the best time for folks to be able to make it if they wanted and adding two more corp mates to the event team.

First up, I feel so very lucky to have Theana Gaterau as the Great Fleet FC. She absolutely rocks and I hope she has forgiven me for my chattiness after the Big Reveal. She’s a wonderful FC, taking corp fleets out all the time that are great for first timers and veterans alike. I had the pleasure of being in fleet with her for the first time during our 4th Signal Cartel Birthday fleet and it was her first time to FC a hugs fleet too, what great fun! She did a great job and I knew I wanted her for the Great Hunt Fleet, so huge thanks for accepting and making the fleet an enjoyable experience for all involved.

Last, but certainly not least, Razorien was our official fleet photographer. If you’re not aware of Razorien’s work, then you’ve certainly been hiding under an asteroid. What an amazing and talented photographer he is and super glad he accepted the offer to be the one to take pictures during the fleet. He certainly didn’t disappoint as you can see from the album of the fleet which you can see here as well as the Banner and Trailer of this blog post. Thanks so much!

By the time the date rolled up, my fears of getting caught and popped increased until I lost my nerve to go with the fleet, but I think it was for the best and I loved the way it played out anyway. An hour before fleet time, my Mates secured Redoubt and I joined them for a mini celebration. That was it, my last system! I was done, but it wasn’t official yet, we wanted to have the Big Reveal of what it was actually all about during the Great Fleet. So, we were still rolling with the storyline and as the story went, our fleet was a diversion for something else going on. I took my other Signal Cartel alt character along with the fleet which you can listen to here. After visiting the Sisters Flotilla and firing off fireworks and hugs, we exited Redoubt and made for Saisio, my home system. While the fleet made their way there, I dropped and swapped out characters. Katia was waiting for them. At about the 28 minute time mark in the fleet recording, you can hear how the Great Reveal played out. Still gives me chills. 🙂

“BRAVO! Bravo! My compliments, little lady.” – Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg, Fifth Element

So, that’s it, that’s how the final 600 systems played out. In total there was over 22 billion isk in payouts and 100+ challenge coins awarded for locating systems as part of the corp event. We had over 100 individual Signaleers participate in locating systems during the hunt and we had over 70 for the fleet, our largest fleet ever. For not knowing what was really going on, the corp really stepped up and came out for what I hope was a fun and memorable event for all. I know it was for me. Definitely something I’ll never forget. The great show of support afterwards truly has touched me and I can’t thank everyone enough for everything.

“I had a suspicion that locating Katia Sae’s systems was somehow related to the Great Hunt … When I saw the big lists of WHs I thought this may be the final push. Great job to all involved to set this up in such a fantastic way, such that 75 people could participate today, as well as however many flipped on the Great Hunt in Allison!” – Angel Lafisques

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“I had no idea that what we were doing was somehow related to anything, and I’m proud that we did some good work to help get something as unbelievable as this done. I’d be used like this again in a heartbeat – thank you to all involved by making it so entertaining!” – Mako Koskanaiken

With A Little Help From My Friends – The Beatles

Seeing where this was going, Mynxee got me in touch with Thrice Hapus, our COO, and he asked if I was interested in turning my event into a story/roleplay event. As someone who used to love to RP, I immediately said yes, Thrice reached out to our OPSEC division (Operation and Planning of Special Events for the Corporation), and they agreed to make that happen. Our OPSEC division is a group of Signaleers that only leadership knows who they are behind the scenes. They’re our story crafters, a group of talented writers and corp event coordinators, who were also the ones that worked with Sky Diamond on her event. Sky’s event became the kickoff of our in corp storyline that’s been running for over a year now titled “Vacant Spectrum”. Let me just say this now, I shot high, but was astounded when OPSEC lifted me up, and together we shot higher. OPSEC, you rock! Not only did they meet my original goals, they added a couple of more, and they were huge additions: Allison, storyline, and remaining anonymous.

“He takes his drinking very seriously. Not to worry; he’ll be his usual charming self by morning.” – Aramis, The Three Musketeers (1993)

Each addition in its own right was huge. AD Parrot, as Allison’s creator, was included in the event team as he incorporated some added functionality to help us track the Great Hunt. I can’t say enough about Parrot, he’s awesome and a pleasure to work with and what an amazing talent. Allison is amazing bit of code that really comes to life as a pilot assist AI. She has a lot of functionality to help our Signaleers as they travel around New Eden as well as providing guidance with our EvE Scout Rescue Cache program (ESRC), and our Search and Rescue operations (SAR) by alerting the SAR team when a system has been located. It was the SAR aspect of Allison that was tweaked for the Great Hunt by adding capabilities to alert my team (my mates and I which I’ll talk about soon) when systems I needed were found.

“Only the wrong words are a complete waste of time. The right words can leave a more lasting impression than a thousand of Porthos’ kisses.” – Aramis, The Three Musketeers (1993)

Next, the OPSEC team wrote the event as a chapter in the “Vacant Spectrum”, Chapter 5: The Great Hunt. The story provided the cover I needed for the last part which I didn’t think was possible, keeping me anonymous and behind the scenes during the event. Up to that point I had not suffered a ship loss and the OPSEC team wanted to keep it that way. Just as I had when I set out 9 years ago, I accepted the fact I would lose ships along the way, so I figured here at the end game, when everyone would know this event was to help me finish my journey, I would suffer my first loss for sure. We know there are corp spies, that as soon as someone figured out what was really going on, it would get out, an ambush would be setup, and I’d get popped. During the planning process, working with the OPSEC team, I was simply amazed at the talent at hand, as we figured out how to pull this off, keeping me in the shadows, writing the chapter that explained why, and fit perfectly in the overall story arch.

“A lively tune… I’m inspired to dance!” – Porthos, The Three Musketeers (1993)

There was one last piece that I needed to nail down and that was expanding the event team to include several Explorer Mates. I wanted three Signaleers to help me during the end game with locating and securing systems as our fellow scouts found them. My Mates would be the ones to take the risk for me, by scouting me into systems as needed, sitting in systems to hold them until I could get there, and help keep the corp motivated during the hunt as well. They would, of course, know the event was to help me complete my journey. Risky, I know, the team was already more than a few and it only increased the odds that word would get out as to what was really going on. Since OPSEC worked out keeping me in the shadows with the event storyline, I had to find these mates behind the scenes, so I went through a process of selecting them based on many factors including things like, tenure in corp, activity in corp, exemplified the credo, forum participation, etc. Starting with the entire corp roster, I cut the list down to my top ten and presented them to leadership and the OPSEC team. Based on their recommendations I choose, Captain Crinkle, Igaze, and Tamayo.

Let me tell you, my mates were my lifeblood. Some of my fears were, the real story of the event would get out, my mates would become bored, etc, but my fears were unfounded. We had a blast, they kept me motivated, and we made a great team. I couldn’t have asked for better mates, they often went above and beyond my expectations. We had a great time and it’s an experience that I’ll always remember. Can’t say enough about them. Each one brought their own unique approach to the end game. Igaze and I were joking around one day in our Discord channel, calling ourselves the Muskteteers. Igaze quickly pointed out he was Porthos, I gathered because he was most like that character, so I figured that made me Athos as the unofficial leader of the group. So, Crinkle and Tamayo, you’ll have to figure out who’s Aramis and D’Artagnan. 😉

The plans made, it was now – show time.

BONUS: If you’re still reading, here is an excerpt from document I sent to my Explorer Mates filling them in on their role.

5.10.yc120 Zoohen III – Theology Council Tribunal Station, Signal Cartel Executive Briefing Room

Running late, she entered the briefing room to find Igaze, Tamayo, and Crinkle seated around the small, but rather ornate conference room table. There was room to seat six with two on each side and one at each end. The ends were open, obviously for whomever was leading the meeting, so she took the only remaining side seat. She glanced around at her fellow scouts, her posture one of pride to be among them, her face revealed a hint of a smile, her eyes bright and warm, revealing her explorer’s heart.

It had been years since she had spent any amount of significant time in known space, let alone docked in a station. The air seemed fresher, which was silly, but having spent the majority of her time aboard ship, in a capsule, submersed in what was affectionately known as goo, the change was a welcomed one.

“Wonder what this is all about?” Katia finally said, breaking the silence, looking at each scout in turn, but she couldn’t hold her serious face on any longer and finally broke out in a huge smile. “I guess I should fill you all in.”

Welcome to the Great Hunt.

Help! – The Beatles

This post is part 1 of a behind the scenes look at how my corporation, Signal Cartel, helped me achieve the last 600 systems without even knowing that they were and why that came about. It was during the holidays of 2017, while reviewing my wormhole progress to date, I saw I was averaging a little over 500 systems per year. With 2,600+ wormholes in Anoikis and averaging 1.5 previously unfound systems each day, it would be another 3 to 4+ years before I would finish and it was only going to get harder as the pool of needed systems shrunk. Compared to my known space average of 6 systems per day, I was discouraged and close to burnout. I knew I had to increase my daily average, come up with a better way of finding previously unfound systems, and figure out how to keep my momentum and spirits up. Oh, and I wanted to finish by the end of 2018 which meant I needed to triple my daily average.

“I do not suppose you could speed things up?” – Inigo Montoya, Princess Bride

First things first, increasing my daily average. January 1^st of 2018, in my blog post “Exploration is all about the jump, not the stargate” I announced setting a goal of finding 3 new wormhole systems daily, doubling my pace. It was doable, just meant more dedicated time to Eve Online and play catch up on weekends if I fell behind. The challenge was, I typically would have to scan down and enter around 3 wormhole systems daily to find the 1 or 2 that I hadn’t visited before. To double my pace meant I would have to scan down at least 6 wormholes to find the 3 I needed. Easy I hear you say and yes, it’s true, but keep in mind I do have a life (contrary to popular belief), a wife and son with things going on all the time, work, travel, other characters in EvE Online, other games, and other hobbies. I dedicated about an hour and half daily on average to Katia and her journey. Not to mention that as the pool of systems shrunk, I had to visit more systems than the initial 6 to find the few I needed to keep the daily average going.

By the end of that first month, I was well on my way of maintaining my new goal, “Years have flown by my open window” and continued through the end of March, “Know your Wormhole Space”. I wasn’t lying in my post “A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step” on December 30th of 2018 when I said “Well, let’s just say that wasn’t my average per day this year”. 3 systems on average wasn’t as it ended up being 4 per day for the year, but a helluva uptick that last quarter of 2018 when my average was around 12 systems per day when I engaged my corps help. For those that were paying attention to my blog, I did post some hints of things going on behind the scenes along the way such as “It does not matter how slowly you go” on March 3rd and “Climbing up, letting go” on August 31st.

“Inconceivable!” – Vizzini, Princess Bride

Next, figuring out the end game. While I was increasing my daily pace, I also turned my attention on better ways to find new systems and keeping the momentum going. I reached out to Mynxee, our CEO, to start some brain storming – if I could get down to the last 500 or 600 systems, could I somehow engage the corp and turn it into a big fun event with prizes and swag for participation? Mynxee was all onboard, thought it was a great idea, and between the two of us we got things rolling along. My goals were lofty, probably not achievable, likely inconceivable, but it was early in the planning process, and I wanted to shoot high and settle for less. My goals were:

• Encourage my fellow corpmates to help me find the last 500/600 systems needed to complete my journey
• Corpwide voluntary event where both newbies and veterans, Alpha or Omega accounts could participate
• Promote the use of our corporate Tripwire mask and our very own AI application assistant Allison
• Encourage ESRC (Eve Scout Rescue Cache program) participation while searching for wormholes
• Point out that by participating Signaleers were helping our SAR (Search and Rescue) program

“Oh good, my way. Thank you Vizzini… what’s my way?” – Fezzik, Princess Bride

It was during this time a fellow corpmate, Sky Diamond, was running a corpwide event, “The Search for Sky Diamond” which ended up being the beginning of our internal “Vacant Spectrum” corp storyline. It was a great event, fun, engaged our Signaleers of all levels of experience, and there was some great swag in the form of Signal Cartel drink coasters. The event set the bar high and it was a great model of just exactly what I wanted to do. It also got me to thinking, what could I offer in the form of a tangible real life item, a real motivator that would get folks engaged, fired up, and exploring wormholes? We have a saying in our corp “Be the content you wish to see” and there was only one thing that made sense to me, something that in real life had to be earned (or at least it should be in my opinion), something that I had seen in photos from EvE Fanfest for other corps that I really wanted to see Signal Cartel have as well, and concluded that it had to be a challenge coin.

With my increased pace set, goals determined, and rewards defined, I was ready to start planning the endgame. In part 2 I’ll talk about how this event turned from telling my fellow corpmates this effort was for me to help finish my journey to an OPSEC endeavor where only a handful of folks actually knew what was going on. Sneaky, sneaky, I know, but reasons, you know? It is New Eden after all, where very few can be trusted.

Stay tuned for part 2, thanks for visiting and reading! Fly clever!