We had invited Hellcats and Tuskers to attend as well, since they are friends of ours and it always makes for maintaining good relationships to invite friends to operations, and although no one declined, no one showed up either, but that’s ok. The invitation was made and won’t be forgotten and that was the point besides actually flying side by side with Hellcats and Tuskers would be so much fun anyway. We were also attended by one of my most trusted former corp mates, who I won’t mention his name here so as not to disrupt his corp’s peaceful lifestyle. Needless to say he is one of the very few people I would entrust my entire account, Alliance and all if it came down to it without fear of any dishonesty or greed taking charge. There aren’t many who I can say that about, and he is one I can.

 
In the end 6 of us showed up, which isn’t as many as I had hoped for, yet the group was large enough for some fun. Getting Eve voice working for all of us proved difficult. I struggled getting my eve voice to work until I remembered in the back of my mind that Eve Voice doesn’t work when using WINE (software to run Windows software on Unix systems). I should have realized since I am one of the Eve Online maintainers for Wine, but I guess since I never attempted to use voice before it slipped my mind. Oh well, I didn’t have a Ventrilo server, so we had to make due. So we hopped into our ships and out into space, and made quick plans about how to get in and where to go. We set CVA as red so we knew who are main targets we, and we ran over to the Kari gate into Providence.

 
Because I had no Eve Voice, we made Death Surge the Fleet Commander. Although I had the best leadership skills for boosting, he had Voice and had experience being FC once before. I ended up scouting, mostly because I am not afraid and I jumped in ahead in my Rifter while everyone was still discussing who the scout was going to be. I just took the role, well…because I wanted to.

 
So I jumped into Providence, saw lots of people a couple reds, but mostly buetrals. We decided to contact U’K to get permission to roam Providence without getting chased out by the people we decided we on our side for this little trip. I was forwarded on to the head diplomat who happened to be in Providence fighting as well. We were granted permission, but were warned away from 9uy system due to severe activities there. We were not however given blue standings, so we were still at risk though we had official permission. We wandered around the east rim of Providence, following the one way pipes. I had the chance to fire upon an CVA obelisk while I was still ahead of the gang and scouting, but he was inbound to the gate and once he was close enough he jumped. The rest of the gang saw him coming through, but we lost him. That’s ok. We continued on, then turned around after not seeing much activity after following the dead end to its conclusion.

As a group we decided we would try to bust through to 9uy and add to the chaos. I scouted ahead as usual warping to 100km from the gate, my corp mate followed a little too soon and warped right to the gate before I could warn off any one from warping in. He was destroyed by Karn, who turned quickly and brought his stabber to within firing range of me within just a few moments. I wasn’t expecting that, and Karn also destroyed me. I spam warped out of there back to Esa where we parked our spare ships. I had a short discussion with Karn about the mistaken friendly fire, but I don’t blame him. 9uy was being actively contested at the moment, and without checking the name first, and neutral is a neutral. As it turns out, Karn is one of the top officials of U’K, at least as far as I can tell, so we made some good relations with U’K if we chose to pursue that route.

We all decide to take a breather since we were flying for about an hour and half by this time, but when we returned to the Kari gate, and I scouted ahead there was a giant camp waiting on the other side for us. I am familiar with the first thing you do is speedboat back to the gate even if it’s clear so when I got fired upon I only had minor damage to my shields. We tried to talk our way through the camp, but it was useless. There were too many people on the other side and even if most of them agreed not to fire there was always someone who shot at us. We considering entering Providence from other directions, but the closest other gate was 17 jumps away, and we elected to end the mission as a success, at least in so far that as a first roaming mission we had fun, and learned a lot from the experience.

Death Surge did a great job as Fleet Commander, and we all did well and had a great time. Even those of us who lost a ship (like me).

Lessons Learned
Scouts should fit Covert Ops Cloaks, it gives you some freedom to look rather than speedboating back to hug the gate for all to see. Maybe a Covert Ops Ship would be ideal for this, as well can be used for probing out target ships you know are in system, but not sure where in-system.

 
Don’t jump into a situation unless you know you are ready, or are ready to get utterly defeated and ok with that. We _were_ ok with it before we even jumped into Null Sec, but it’s still worth mentioning here.

 
If possible, everyone really needs voice. Communications are rather discontinuous when some people are typing in reply to voice convos.

 
It may be a good idea for all ships that have an extra non-turret high slot to fit cloaks if able. Maybe even sacrifice a turret slot for a cloak since we are operating in a team. If things go bad, those that aren’t targeted yet can cloak up and be safe. This is just a thought, and not sure since I have little combat PvP experience in null sec.

United Trade Syndicate has opened its doors for business. United Trade Syndicate is primarily a trade-focsed alliance with strong ties to all sectors of the New Eden community and support from many different external organizations. We intend to unite the players of Eve to create, develop and support activity in low-security space for the masses.

Our Vision

We envision an improved low-sec experience with fully operational industry and market infrastructure, including support activities. Additionally, we hope to reduce the reliance on alts (mules) to get around mechanics which should encourage teamwork by design. While we fully support the use of alts in order to experience the full spectrum of the New Eden experience, including the additional revenue for CCP Games, we do not support the use of alts as a way to escape the limitations of mechanics that drive players to work together. Many people who live in low-sec do not have the support activities in place that allow them to fully experience that lifestyle without the use of alts and mules to allow them access to resources that would otherwise be restricted from them. This reflects our vision to encourage interaction and social structures rather than solo players each playing many characters. Our vision is to make all lifestyles fun, viable, and profitable within low-sec.

Mission Statement

We will repopulate the low-sec systems of New Eden. CCP originally intended these areas as the bridge between high-sec and null-sec, but instead they have become a den of lawlessness, where neither the empires nor frontier corporations and alliances can ensure the livability. This has effectively squeezed the pirate community into a thin ribbon of systems between the empires and alliances. Low-sec is a dead space for those who do live there — a no man’s land where very few others dare enter for fear of their very soul being shredded to ribbons within moments of entry.

Everyone can find much to enjoy about low-sec, not just the pirates and those hunting them. Low-sec contains quality resources simply not available in high-sec and otherwise only available to those in null-sec who submit to the rule of the local sovereign alliances. These resources include higher quality asteroids, ice fields, moons, missions, complexes and other goodies, as well as greater availability of manufacturing and research facilities and research agents. We also see an ability to produce and market goods for lower prices while still enjoying better profits due to less competition. We will access these higher-quality resources and train others to tap these resources in a relatively safe manner.

Using low-sec improves low-sec. We believe that pilot actions can improve low-sec in a very similar way that sovereignty improves life in null-sec. By bringing more people into these areas, we will make them both safer for those not directly focused on PvP as well as much more fun for the pirate lifestyle as well. We will bring all these people together in low-sec, making it a better place for all of us to live.

Ways and Means

We will improve the low-sec experience by creating the infrastructure required to support livability. First, we will develop market places for goods to be bought, sold and exchanged. By providing a full market to low-sec and increasing these areas’ visibility in the markets, we will draw in more people who wish to buy goods for less and get more for the rarer, higher-quality wares they have to sell.

We will also make use of the manufacturing and research facilities rather than struggle with long manufacturing and research queues. In turn, mining becomes a more viable and safe approach to “Life in Low Sec” (phrase trademarked by Mynxee). By preventing the need to ship minerals and goods through High-to-Low Sec jumps, we avoid the most dangerous part of Low Sec which is the entry points. When we eliminate the need to ship mineral into Low Sec, and the need to ship goods out of Low Sec, we need to find ways to gather more and higher quality minerals. Cartographers and probers become needed to sniff out more asteroids and higher quality asteroids needed to produce most equipment.

We will train all personnel how to operate safely in Low Sec if they have concerns or are not comfortable with “Life in Low Sec” (another nod to Mynxee). There are certain requirements to living in Low Sec beyond mere skills training. There are ways to behave and fly in Low Sec that keep you safe, and you shouldn’t ever rely solely on your ships and equipment to keep you safe. We shall go over this and help each individual who wishes to help improve Low Security space.