Recently, some rather embarrassing ship losses were deflected off the killboards of Pandemic Legion (PL) and Northern Coalition (NC). On two separate occasions, a titan and a supercarrier were going down, so the captains of those ships did what all good captains do – they went down with the ship, alone.
On June 12, a Reikoku corp pilot flying a Leviathan class titan was baited and killed by Project Mayhem alliance. Before the final blow was delivered, the pilot was kicked from Reikoku and fell into into an NPC corporation. This move took the 130 billion ISK lossmail off PL’s killboard. A pilot cannot leave their corp while in space, but he can request to be kicked, and corp leadership can kick them, regardless of where they are.
A few weeks later, on June 28, a pilot from Blades Of Athena refused to listen to his CEO’s command not to move his 28 billion ISK super, and was kicked several hours before he was caught and killed by Snuffed Out. Blades of Athena corp recently joined NC, and was probably exceptionally strict about risking an embarrassing loss early in their NC career: they joined NC the day before, on the 27th.
Killboards
Both cases highlight the tyranny of the killboards. There are precious few ways to prove you are “good at EVE” and the killboard is often something pointed to. Funny enough, birthdate of a character was another, as evidenced by this Howard Stern segment on EVE Online. Here, two players, clearly out of their minds, argue over elitism:
Killboards are third-party creations made from the information CCP releases through their API. CCP has been reluctant to put an official killboard ingame, although they do show some similar statistics for wars, faction war control, and incursion progression. Each character has his or her own of kill/loss records too, but there is no tracking or corporation or alliance kill/loss records.
In case you are wondering, the term killmail or lossmail is the old term for a death notification because a player used to get an email of a loss when it occurred.
Measures of PvPers
Some corporations use killboards to size up players skill. Normally the number of kills is looked at along with their ISK efficiency. A pilot who wants to advance their PvP career is always worried about their killboard. Alliances also judge corporations based on participation and kills per month. This puts pressures on CEOs to get their members into fleets for the alliance.
Players do ridiculous things for sake of a good killboard. In large fleets, players will sneak sensor boosters to increase their locking speed, ensuring they get on killmails. They will often shoot the primary target once before moving onto the next target early. This splits fire and sometimes weakens their fleet’s firepower. They also sneak shots into their own capital ships before they die, to get ISK credit for their efficiency rating. In smaller fleets, tacklers will often hold a ship until everyone in the gang has shot the victim at least once.
Recruiters understand killboards are imperfect, so they use them in other ways too. They will look at losses to make sure there are few dumb losses. Recruiters will investigate a ship’s fit, top damage markers, and most expensive losses, among other things. A new recruit’s PvP ability is found in the details, not just the number of kills and losses.
The embarrassing behavior of jumping out of your corporation to avoid a huge loss is a recent phenomena. There was a time when leaving a corporation took 24 hours. It is just one of many methods used to skew the killboards. Capital pilots often remove their high-priced modules before they die and throw them into a mobile depot, using it as a kind of life raft, so they can recover them later. To avoid a lossmail altogether, pilots will eject from a ship just before it explodes. When the pilot ejects, the removal of their skills will cause the ship’s hull hit points to drop. If the ship goes into negatives, it explodes without a record of the loss. Freighter pilots can do this when being ganked with high-priced cargo.
The major problem with killboards is that it only records certain stats. Logistic pilots are often in short supply because pilots want kills for themselves and for their corporation. Logistic pilots often fit a single gun to get themselves on killmails. Sometimes they launch a single drone and assign it to a fellow pilot to ensure they get credit too.
Credit is important. Way back when video games were in arcades, there were always the top scores listed. Getting to put your name in as a top scorer was a satisfying honor. CCP’s reluctance to create a player ranking system (leaderboards) for PvPers and corporations is ironic, considering the game is known as a PvP-centric game. CCP is starting to show signs of measuring pve progress through their new Scope Challenges.
Conclusion
Eliminating embarrassing losses is one more example of how EVE players game the system. PL and NC aren’t the only one’s that do this. There are many examples of groups manipulating the boards, and not just in the “elite alliances” arena.
When recruiters want fighters, they aren’t’ looking for mannequins with no scars. They want to see those deaths as well as kills written on a battle-hardened face. They want to see the logic behind your fit, the risks you take, and will tolerate dumb losses if you explain what happened.
Finally, a moment of silence for Battleclinic.com, which quietly closed this year. It was a treasure trove of pilot rankings for EVE.
This article originally appeared on TheMittani.com.
