This post is my four hundredth post. Every time I hit a
hundred, I’ve gotten into the habit of taking a moment to look back on the last
hundred posts since the previous review. The prior ones are all listed here:
So, what to do this time?
This milestone comes a bit earlier than anticipated due to
CCP pulling the Evelopedia in February. One of the sections I’d refer to
normally was the cosmic signature guides, and rather than lose them forever, I
copied, cleaned, and standardized the format of them on my own blog (you can
reference all of them at the Cosmic
Signature Page to the right).
Also during this interval, I made some changes to the blog
of a more technical nature. On the right, I’ve changed the listing for my most
popular posts to reflect the past week’s trends, not all-time trends. A minor
thing, but I’ve noticed my post reads evening out a bit.
And, I’ve cleaned up my blogroll recently, too. Ripard Teg
recently bemoaned the lack of meaningful blogs on reddit, and while I disagree
with his premise, I do admit to seeing a lot of old favorites going dark
(although, none of those listed on my post 300 are among them!). Is it because
the nature of Eve chews up and spits out writers, or does it simply represent
the community moving beyond the need for daily “reporter” blogs? Something has
changed, and only the niche blogs seem to endure anymore.
And that brings me to the purpose of this summary post.
My
last 100 posts have seen dozens of cosmic signature ratting guides. I’ve added
posts about rebalances and patches, shifts in the meta, philosophical studies
of the different aspects of the game, tips for PvP, and all those “lessons”
posts with real-world examples. What exactly am I trying to accomplish?
Put simply, the point of this blog is to change perceptions.
I want to change your perceptions about safety and risk, about what you want
from this game, and about the way you measure success. I want you to feel
comfortable making mistakes. I want you to feel comfortable trying new things
and failing at first. I want you to take
advantage of everything an online MMO has to offer – particularly the fact that
it involves you competing against other people.
I want you to know that PvP is really about improving
yourself and your own reactions, and far less about what your opponent does,
whether you win, or how many killmails you accrue. I don’t want you to be
afraid, and I want to get you out of high-sec and out into the more dangerous
areas of space – whichever of the other three regions (low, null, wh) you
prefer. I want you to embrace the PvP aspects of this game.
But, most of all, I want you to take a critical look at what
you do, why you do, and how you do when you log in. I want you to understand
yourself.
That’s a hard thing, and I can’t give you that answer. I’m
not the best PvPer, I’m not the best theorycrafter, and I’m not any smarter
than you are. Ultimately, only you can go down the path of studying yourself
and improving.
Along the way, I try to dissect the decisions I make and the
lessons I learn. I discuss changes to the game and how they affect those
things. And, yes, I post ratting guides to help you more efficiently fund your
PvP activities.
I write each post with the desire to leave readers with some
new thought, question, or piece of knowledge they can try out for themselves. I
avoid change logs, chronicles listing events, or meaningless posts for the sake
of posting. Your time is valuable, and I respect the fact that you spent some
of it on me by trying to make your read worthwhile.
I’ve gained a lot of new readers over the past hundred
posts, so I wanted to leave you with this brief summary. If you dedicate
yourself to questioning your assumptions and learning from each engagement,
you’ll continue to become better and better. You’ll be better than me. It’s certainly
possible, if not likely!
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