Intergalactic Summit

Particularly so in today's environment of lax militia standards. More than once I have entered a military control point, and engaged capsuleers that had not even had their weapons hardpoints uncapped. Instead, their ships had been engineered solely for speed and warp stability, as if they were to be competing in some sort of race. These ships were fit to run, not to defend and control militia strategic assets. And yet these people are rewarded with good scrip and praised for a job well done, simply for standing a post for a time. Would a ground troop be so well accepted were he to stand his post in running shoes, with an unloaded weapon?

I think you are out of date, Captain. The baseline defenders prevent the capturing of the military complex.

For the curious and inquisitive, I have set up the Point Blank Alliance killboard to display an ongoing record of training-related engagements we have had. Due to technical limitations, it cannot automatically follow alliances that support a militia, so those had to be added manually. Right now, in addition to the Minmatar and Gallente militias, it is monitoring:

• WINMATAR.
• Late Night Alliance
• T.R.I.A.D
• Ushra'Khan
• Electus Matari
• Defiant Legacy

I am sure I missed some big ones, so if you could indicate who else I should be tracking, I would be grateful.

So far, Late Night Alliance have the best performance, passing a majority of tests, and occasionally collaborating in order to destroy real Amarr enemies.

The poorest performance has been seen out of the Gallente militia (Federal Defense Union plus participating corporations). Many of them appear to lack basic combat training and fitting sense. Thankfully, Zao Amadues has been doing an admirable job showing them where they err. The alliance with the poorest performance so far is WINMATAR., who, despite having played an important role in the recent Minmatar victory, seem to have a wealth of overconfident pilots who forget that it is skill and knowledge that wins a fight, not boisterous posturing.

So far, students have lost approximately 2,750,000,000 ISK of materiel, and that number continues to rapidly rise. It is my hope that we can reach a point where the rate of increase slows down, to a halt if possible. We have a long road ahead of us...

No, they cannot. They test preparedness and reaction time in addition to skill and knowledge. Simulations are one thing. Real life is another.


I don't think joining in the militia requires ascribing to any sort of dedication to protection or betterment of the respective nation's militia. It is simply a legal contract to lend your combat services to the faction in exchange for payment, with the advantage of being CONCORD-legal.

You should really look into joining the judicial branch of the militia my friend! Should we be in it "only for the money" would we not be actively in the militia ranks? Indeed, I hear that the Tribal Liberation Force pay scale has been quite generous as of late. Petrus was simply pointing out an unfortunate fact. Currently one must have only the slightest loyalty to join the militia of any of the major nations.

As for posturing, one can hardly deny that there is much posturing going on by both sides, both literal and metaphorical. The nature of such posturing however, largely falls outside the scope of this live fire exercise - though I will gladly discuss the matter with you elsewhere.

If by "you" you mean the vast majority of capsuleers in the militias, then yes. The next largest group is only there so the policelets them shoot stuff legally. Only very few are there out of real fealty toward their nation.

We are not officially participating in the militia at this moment, since profit does not really concern us. Being officially unaffiliated in the same area and shooting both sides of the war (albeit each for different reasons) simply gets us labeled as "pirates", gets the police angry at us, et cetera. It is far better than the alternative of staying in the militia for profit, then being labeled as traitors for trying to conduct these live fire exercises.

I am not normally given to commenting within the political sphere, but as a native of Metropolis, I find this development discouraging. I was raised on-station in the company of a number of free Matari thinkers, accomplished researchers all, and grew up shoulder-to-shoulder with their children.

From the standpoint of militia machination, this exercise cannot be considered a great aberration. It is no different than a service contract, wherein the signatory bears no charge to observe the philosophical precepts espoused by the employer. The militia fleets form and aggress as they are paid to do, and the fiery death of many thousands of otherwise productive citizens need not serve the Republic's best interest.

However, from an ethnic and historical standpoint, this contradiction that we must 'sacrifice the lives of our countrymen to better save the lives of our countrymen,' bespeaks a mentality unable to recognize its own simultaneous disdain and reverence for life. How much can one value a fellow Matari when one slaughters them so casually? Is the tribal essence so threadbare that, upon aspiring to pod pilot status, it is dissolved in mere greed?

Can the practices of the Amarr be considered so reprehensible in comparison to this scenario?

I have no stake in the charade of inter-faction conflict, but I find it regrettable that, after witnessing the Republic struggle so mightily to attain an equal footing in the quadrant, some would claw their way back into the abyss one shipwreck at a time.

Gods in heaven, there's a lot of equivocating and feeble justifications for attacking people fighting for the country you claim loyalty for in this thread. You'd be better off just admitting you've gone pirate.

Here is a shovel.

There is a plot.

Dig.

-Eran

You've got the idea. It's unfortunate that some captains won't learn unless they are faced with the hard truth that they are not good enough and will get blown up, but it is what it is.


And pirates are motivated by... what? Greed? If that were the case, wouldn't we stay in the Minmatar militia and get paid preposterous amounts for very little and easy work?

If you're going to accuse us of something, at least choose something with more aplomb and that is not contradictory to what we have already said, like maybe calling us sociopaths or morally corrupt crazy people.



You are probably not familiar with my views. I do not fight out of loyalty to a nation. It does not make sense to: the Republic regularly chases me out of their high security space as a consequence of my doing my duties in their militia. When I was in the militia, I fought for them since they paid me. Now, there is no debt between the Republic and me, so I simply consider myself neutral and detached.

What i do fight for is the principle of freedom through self-determination. It just so happens that this aligns with the Republic and Federation mindset, so I help them. Right now, that involves hardening the capsuleer forces in the militia. I care not if their crews are Amarrian or Matari, so long as they are there of their own choice. That distinction is the difference between captains whom I prod towards growth, and captains I destroy with prejudice.

Incidentally, if anyone gets shot down by Point Blank Alliance and wishes to go a step further toward self-improvement, they are perfectly welcome to have a post-mortem discussion with us to figure out why things went the way they did, and how to do better next time.