Reflections after last night
Last night Raan Corson appeared in open and moved to the T-Tauri system. At the time I was doing a tour of the five Generation ships discovered so far, in my normal habitat of Mobius. I wondered if I should head down. When Salome has popped up previously, I have tagged along and there were a dozen or so others, and everyone followed Salome to see what was going on. Someone else on my friends list was heading to T-Tauri and was relaying a few things Raan was saying to me. Other than that the place seemed quiet, so I decided to head down in my exploration Asp I was in at the time.
Earlier I has fired off a slightly accusational message to a few friends I have in the CoR leadership, stating that I think they had made a mistake by adopting a closed policy. But I will come back to that later.
On arriving at T-Tauri there were plenty of Commanders, it did not take long to be interdicted. My attacker was the capable Harry Potter. Now I don't have a lot of PvP experience, but I do have some. I was able to keep my 150Mg shielded Asp alive long enough to high wake out, however it was badly damaged and breaking up due to heat build up, owing to having gone into silent running prior to high wake to buy myself a few more seconds. This kept me distracted when I should have been low waking right away and making distance. So my 13% hull did not last the second encounter.
No matter, it was expected. But I did show me one important point, which again I will come back to. I saw another a friend from Lave Radio heading to T-Tauri. I have him a warning. He found out anyway in short order.
Afterwards I went onto the 'Allied' discord. Not to complain, but just to listen. Potter it turns out is on the 'Allied' side and was part of the force doing FoF ID and attacking anyone who did not meet two criteria: either no weapons (although people where still asking "Can I attack") or on there white list. The set up was actually impressive. They were very much trying to look after the 'VIPs' as they call them. But, again it showd me a number of key points.
So what did I learn from this fact finding, and where does that leave me?
I mentioned I had vented somewhat at CoR leadership. Understandable I got some vent back. Frustration that people where calling Drew's even a CoR event. "CoR don't have any influence on there apart from passing on bits of info that Drew wants the other participants to know" Put simply CoR are involved because Drew asked them to be. And yes, they set up the 'Allied' discord, but that is where there control stops. People are also talking a lot about PAC. I don't even know who PAC are, but it is not just PAC. It is the whole channel. The security operation had all sorts of people in it. And therefore we see some important points about this event:
1. CoR are not in control. If they ever were, they have lost that control. In the words of one of those high ranking friends from CoR "To be honest, I'll be glad when all this is over"
2. The 'Allied' defences is in effect now a private security force who are imposing there own rules and destroying anyone who does not conform to their rules, simply because they can
3. There was much chat about not shooting ships with [CW] in there names. This is Cobra Wing. Apparently Raan's own escorts. Raan was also on the discord but not in chat. Now ran was a normal player, whether he has evolved into one of these special NPCs now I don't know, but by the fact that he there and is apparently going along with this behaviour, means he is complicit in it and is happy for Commanders who want to help to be destroyed because they won't follow the dictates of this private army. I used to be happy with the idea of protecting Raan. No longer.
4. Drew has given his message about trying to be inclusive. It's a nice sentiment, thanks Drew, but it will be utterly ignored. The discord is no longer about wanting to help Salome, it is about the pvp people and there private army. Yes they appear to be genuinely wanting the VIPs to survive, but if you don't play be there rules, you are not invited.
5. I don't know if the other VIPs are involved in the discord or not. Nor do I know if they will be winged with them. But given there protection is more than happy to destroy anyone who is not on there list, or agrees to be a weaponless sheep, unless they come out and state otherwise, I must conclude they are also complicit in this behaviour. Which leads me at ask, "why would I want to protect them anyway?"
6. This private army may have good intentions in there own minds, but like all such unregulated groups consider the law to be in there own hands. I listened to one commander in particular who was looking for any excuse to attack people. As I said even people unarmed, who fit there own rules of engagement "shall I attack him, he's not on the list". Some where offered a chance to disarm, other, like myself just attacked. So like some private security force in post was Iraq, they are making up the rules and they go along, simple as there is little you can do about it.
So there you have it. If you, like I may still do, plan to try and be involved and you, like me, won't agree to be a toothless sheep and relegated to a spectator, you will be attacked by Salome's and Raan's private security force. And whilst I would dearly love to be involved, as I love Drew's stuff, others are now in control, and you are not invited.
