Greedy Goblin

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Bad, bad Mr Metis

My biggest contribution to the New Order isn't ganking and scouting myself, on this front I'm just one of many. It's seeding the New Order HQs. You see, the New Order operates far from Jita and needs lot of supplies: catalyst destroyers and fittings are used in large quantities. If you check small meta ion and neutron cannons, you can see the price increase. That's us. So every now and then I send a batch of items to the HQs to restock.

On Sunday morning my HQ trader had this transaction log:
Mr Metis, a 1 day old character bought out all my meta guns in both HQs and relisted for 2x-3x higher than Jita price, clearly to "force" the gankers to buy from him. This is a targeted market PvP attempt against the New Order, since no one else buys these stuff in the middle of nowhere. Some ganked botter is upset, right?

Well, I already had bunch of supplies in Jita due to buy orders and bought some lower listed sell orders too and soon I could send my Orca to a merry 15 jumps with 1B worth of meta guns in the hold that should supply the Knights for a day or two until I get more. Just when I arrived, Mr Metis canceled his lists and disappeared. No, he didn't start to 0.01 me, just disappeared. Where did he go? We don't know. But we know this for sure:
As I mentioned I have large volume buy orders for these meta guns in Jita. This Wescro guy sold me a lot. Surprisingly similar quantities that Mr Metis bought in the HQs. Of course Mr Metis paid a 0.2B more for them than me, as I sell over Jita of course. To make it more suspicious, just an hour before these sales, I bumped into Wescro's Orca at the undock of our HQ. Literally. I even suggested him to use an insta-undock bookmark on the New Order channel. Yes, on our channel, as Wescro isn't a disgruntled miner. He is the hero-awoxer of the New Order, the guy every newbie Agent wants to be. Well, well, he should have put Mr Metis in a shuttle and autopilot him to Jita. If Mr Metis sold me the guns, we would forever believe that it was a miner who tried to rob the Knights of the New Order with overpriced guns, not one of our own most respected members. Buying and selling in highsec isn't a crime, so formally he did nothing wrong. However I doubt if he'll ever be called anything else than "Mr Metis" by the members of the New Order. From hero to laughing stock over a day. Good job!

Why? Why does someone do something like that? The answer tells why competitive anti-socials can't take over the World and social organizations still linger: because they just can't be loyal to each other. A group of competitive anti-socials usually turn on each other. I'm probably the only one who doesn't. Do I have ethics? No. I just know that if I'd try it, I'd fail. You can devastate the morons and slackers, but not your equals. The problem with competitive people is that their constant victories make them believe that they are above the people and the law. That they are special, godlike.

We are not. We are just guys. It is true that our powers are godlike compared to the morons and slackers but it doesn't make us gods. It just makes the morons and slackers ... well morons and slackers. We aren't above the people and the law. The morons and slackers are below it. We are not special, they are especially stupid. Yes, Wescro could awox billions from these drooling subhumans, well done. But it's not because Wescro was skilled, it's because they were idiots. Similarly I made the price of three titans before my first birthday, but it doesn't make me awesome. Hey, I'm just flipping implants, there is nothing awesome about that. I'm just filthy rich because most people can't even do that, or too lazy to set something up when they have money so they are forced to grind for 40-50 M/hour when they run out of it.

So dear Wescro and others, please be nice with fellow competitive anti-socials for your own good. Keep farming the morons and slackers as you wish, but don't think for a second that you can pull something like that on us. If you realize that it's a fight you cannot win, we will have a nice little community that brings havoc and destruction to the morons and slackers. We'll be wolves among the sheep. But if wolf is not good enough for you, if you need to be the alpha wolf... well, I'll always have blog space for new laughing stocks!


PS: on Thursday I make a post how can one properly control the market instead of failing like Mr Metis.

9 comments:

Foo said...

While this was market PVP; was it to do with specifically targetting the new order? or merely taking advantage of a limited supply (you only list 1/day)?

You listed glyphs back in WoW. There were plenty of times that you would have observed attempted market buyouts and relisting.

This read more like a 'traditional' limited supply market, so lets gouge it; rather than anything personal.

The 'correct' response to someone wanting to buy you out is simply to give them something to buy (as you did).

Gevlon said...

I can't know if his intention was to hurt the New Order or to get money but even if the second, he must have known that he has to hurt the New Order in order to get money (as no one else buys these guns there)

Hivemind said...

Let's be honest here, Wescro/Mr Metis made his name by signing on with player organizations and then backstabbing them when they least expected it. What made you think that he would be any different with your player organization?

Incidentally, I'm surprised you used such superlative terms describing Wescro; if memory serves the mining ops he AWOXes are exactly the kind of thing you want to see all mining become; groups of active players, dedicated boosts, haulers, probably a dedicated refiner and trader as well.

Anonymous said...

Competitive Anti-socials will never take over the world for far simpler reasons - the human being is an evolved social ape. We work better (and this is backed up by quite a lot of research) in social groups.

We are 'competitive socials' if you like, and that is a very large part of why we have risen to be the dominant species on the planet.

Also did you just state that you have no ethics? or an I reading something which is not actually there? (serious question, clarification would be greatly appreciated. Alternatively a blog post about your position on ethics if in fact you do not see yourself as an ethical being)

Gevlon said...

@Hivemind: exactly because it didn't work out well for him (he lost money and became laughing stock). Just like you shouldn't drive fast in the snow, you shouldn't try to hurt people who can defend themselves. It's simply better for yourself to cooperate nicely.

I want mining ops and not mining corps. One is open to anyone in the belt and focuses on profit, the other is a social group that usually don't even have an Orca.

@Anonymous: no, I don't think that ethics have meaning.

Anonymous said...

" you shouldn't try to hurt people who can defend themselves. It's simply better for yourself to cooperate nicely."

So no one should ever go up against goons, or anyone but newbie corps or indy corps that you are sure don't fly any ships with guns?

Plenty of AWOXing has worked, plenty of corp/alliance thefts against corps who can defend themselves have worked...that is some of the weirdest logic I have ever seen you use.

Citation needed for mining corps usually not having Orcas. An Orca does not an open mining op make. Plenty of people have solo (as in, their alts + main) fleets, boosted by orcas, which are definitely not open to all.

The idea of all playing nice, and opening up boosts to all who want to join is very socialist of you :)

Anonymous said...

Ignoring that this was a rubbish attempt at market PvP, why does this have to be an aggressive attack against New Order?

This is a new and immature market with only one main supplier who charges Jita +25% prices. To me that looks ripe for for a bit of market PvP

You aren't known for your alturistic behaviour. You aren't supplying New Order because you are a nice guy. You are there for the money. Attack him for being an idiot and he thought he could get an easy score. Don't attack him because you think his behaviour is attempting to profit from a social group. It reads as though you've decided it is ok for you to make X profit from New Order, but his attempt to extort 2X is unethical. When have you ever cared about that.

Hivemind said...

@Gevlon

"It's simply better for yourself to cooperate nicely."

Except if you're a miner, then you should hurt yourself (losing ships to Concord, losing sec status, losing mining time) ganking AFKers instead of cooperate. Do I have that right?

"I want mining ops and not mining corps. One is open to anyone in the belt and focuses on profit, the other is a social group that usually don't even have an Orca."

Which of course you would know because of your vast experience in mining corps... Oh, wait. I cannot say I have ever conducted an intensive study of hisec mining corps and their correlation with orcas myself, but I have spent some time in the recruitment channel and I do occasionally check the corp descriptions for players around me in hisec and I see "Orca boosts" advertised in pretty much every corp that has any interest in hisec mining. I see them offering refining skills/standings quite often as well. It's almost as if they recognise that players whose primary interest is earning ISK might be attracted by ways to increase that income.

Banedon said...

I have to say, your praise for this Wescro guy is confusing. He's running around, blowing up the very types of operations you claim to support.

If he was accepted into a corp and started smart-bombing corp AFK or botting fleets I'd be cheering. However, he's not and your support for this guy is pathetic.

The fact that the only reason he's lost your support is because he's an idiot when it comes to market mechanics instead of working against your stated goals is perplexing.