R I 0 T's Tangled and Shady Web

The case of [SW-SS] vs [GAVIA], [VBEE], R I 0 T, and [TSRS].

In my previous blog entry I detailed the very deep flaws within the current WarDec and Citadel mechanics. In this post I want to discuss the dishonorable and untrustworthy manner in which R I O T is conducting themselves in the HiSec "mercenary" market, and how they conduct business in bad faith.

My motivations for sharing my findings are simple: Turnabout is fair play. My target hired mercs - fine. But that doesn't mean I'm going to be nice about being interefered with, either. My motivations for writing this particular blog piece are clear and in the open: turnabout. But motivations do not change facts. And I think my suspicions are true -because people are very angry and getting very defensive about what I have to say.

I probably wouldn't have even caught on to the scammy shenanigans, save for slips of the tongue on the part of Sgt Angel and [TSRS] leadership. Without further introduction:

The Original Shady Shit

I declared war on "Gavaid Janau Corporation" and "Volga Bulgaria Empire". "The SRS" declared war on me a few days later. A few days later, R I O T WarDec'd me as well. I reached out to Destiny Corrupted in R I O T to find out why. I was informed that it was a contract. It was very obvious to me who it probably was, as the list of potential suspects was particularly short. But everything was very "hush hush" and "need to know".

(Unfortunate for the contractee because because I was already buying up all the Type-C crystals and Light Neutron Blasters I needed to make sure that what would have just been a quick structure bash turned into a months long affair of grief and misery...)

I spoke to Destiny at length, trying to trouble shoot the situation and the game mechanics of the situation, to see what my options were. Everything was fine; everyone was calm. I even offered to transfer R I O T my Astrahus since at this point I just wanted to get rid of it, drop the outstanding WarDecs, and move on.

But during my conversation with Destiny, I was offered a deal: Surrender the wars immediately, and they wouldn't blow up the Astrahus. I didn't actually care about the Astrahus. It was stolen in the first place and I'd made my bucket of cash. But, why not avoid a loss if you can? I sent the surrender offers, and provided screenshots. However, after I sent the surrender offers, I was told that they had to be accepted. That's when things went sour instantly: This put me in a very vulnerable position wherein my target could accept the surrenders and end the war prematurely, but R I O T could still blow up my Astrahus. I don't take kindly to being tricked.

Here's proof of the deal, and the attempted switcharoo:

And the switch:

Talking with the diplo:

At the end of the day, I had to threaten to go public if R I O T violated the terms of the deal as written. 

[ 2022.06.16 01:12:18 ] Xuixien > I love hypotheticals! Okay. So let's say, hypothetically, that the CEO is too lazy to log in to check his mails, and then you guys blow up my Astra, and I post all these receipts on my blog showing that RIOT can't be trusted, that you guys make deals and then amend them after the fact with "clarifications" and other nonsense that was never talked about. And I the direct link in my bio. And then I start bumping every RIOT recruitment or jobs post on the forums, start mentioning it every time I respond to you on the forums, and making sure a link is sent to everyone you deal with.

It was simple: Break the agreement, and I will do everything I can to make sure it ruins your reputation as much as possible.

So the issue of R I O T vs [SW-SS], and by extension [SW-SS] vs [GAVIA] and [VBEE], were resolved. As far as [TSRS] vs [SW-SS], that also seemed to be resolved, which was strange, because I never mentioned them in the conversation. But Sgt Angel thought it was pertinent:

[ 2022.06.16 01:14:24 ] Sgt Angel > we're all good SRS are going to look into the surrenders and hopefully it will all be sorted within the next few hours
[ 2022.06.16 01:14:33 ] Destiny Corrupted > so sarge, let's make it clear that we won't be attacking him
[ 2022.06.16 01:15:18 ] Sgt Angel > correct, neither us nor SRS will be attacking and the two other entitiues will not war dec
[ 2022.06.16 01:15:30 ] Sgt Angel > SRS will talk to the corps to get them to accept the surrender

Why was SRS even mentioned? Why would they "not be attacking" me because of my deal with R I O T? And why they were "looking into the surrenders" and talking to the other corps about it? What did they have to do with anything?

A few days later I noticed something that got me thinking...

What is going on here? One minute [TSRS] is supposedly talking to the wartarget corps to get them to accept the surrenders, and working with R I O T on it, but then they turn around and WarDec the person who hired R I O T?

I wondered what R I OT would have to say about it. So I reached out. My contact didn't know anything - that was all leadership stuff.

R I O T leadership is "involved in" and "decides" on the [TSRS] stuff.

I pressed my contact a bit for more information. The story, from R I O T of course, is that [TSRS] declared the wars to spite me.

But how would that in any way hurt me? After all - a deal was made: I wasn't going to kill those Athanors. [TSRS] would have already known about the deal: after all they "looked into it" at R I O T's behest... so how would blowing them up in any way affect me what so ever? If anything, it was a win for me: that smug little twerp who hired mercs and thought he was so clever and invincible because of it? LOL. He would lose his structures anyway: TO R I 0 T'S FRIENDS.

And I made sure he knew about it:

People are making a big red herring about this "alt" thing to distract from everything else.
For all my being great at everything, I am not 100% infallible.

I am disappointed though. I was very much looking forward using Type C crystals on the moon fields and ganking the miners - all while being immune to WarDecs. Two can play at mechanics! Instead, all I could do was whore on the kills to at least put them on my KB.

The R I O T - SRS Connection

Let's go back in time a bit, to the days before [TSRS] declared war on [GAVIA] and [VBEE]. The following is a brief snippet of the EVEMail conversation between my contact in R I O T and myself wherein my contact tries to sell me on the idea of my corporation, [SW-SS], potentially joining R I O T and what a R I O T alliance head said about the situation:

Somehow, [TSRS] knew about this conversation. When I joined the [TSRS] Discord channel to get them to blow up my Astrahus, Storm Preldent said two interesting things. First, nothing about the deal with R I O T. His reason given for not shooting the Astrahus was not "we're honoring the deal made with R I O T". Instead, they've just been too busy and had to defend a Fortizar.

(My plan worked by the way, and I was able to goad [TSRS] into breaking the deal R I 0 T made. All I had to do was insult their CEO's masculinity in DM. The conversation is summed up as follows:

Xuixien: Can you blow up my Astrahus already? Don't be scared.
Storm Peldant: We're busy.
Xuixien: Faggot*. Come at me, sissyboy.

I trashed him and he did exactly what I wanted.)

(* more on this later.)

And second, he knew about my potentially joining R I 0 T.

Something shady was going on. And that shady something is the idea of cross-pollination. What this basically means is groups having ties by dint of their membership, or their leadership, knowing each other and being friends. They work together, in the background, "unofficially".

So let's say that, despite your being contracted to defend a certain corp, you look the other way when your friends, knowing about the upcoming timers (maybe you even told them...), decide to go and "do their own thing" and blow it up, even though you have an ongoing contract with the structure owner:

Your business partner can complain to you, but you can spew some official-sounding garbage about how "that's a separate entity" and "we have no sway over them". It's all for the sake of apperances. It's all bullshit, too.

Cross-pollination is how I got the deal with R I O T. I knew Destiny from the forums, so I contacted her when the war was declared to see what was going on. Because we were friendly on the forums, she put in good words for me and got me a deal that otherwise wouldn't have happened. See how that works? Things become flexible when there's cross-pollination involved...

The Chain of Responsibility

Destiny Corrupted explaining in detail how R I O T fucked me out of structure kills.

Destiny Corrupted failing at strategic self-anticonformity, AKA reverse psychology.

I'll try not to be too long winded about this. I want to keep this post short. But really quickly, I want to talk about the "chain of responsibility" to argue how, what [TSRS] did, is partly on R I O T's shoulders.

Remember Padrick, the sad guy who was unhappy that he wasn't the Emperor of Solitude? Well, he tried to hire mercs to attack <WHBOO> and <-HC->. <WHBOO> and <-HC-> found out, and they destroyed Padrick's organization - <GSC> - for it. Why? Well, because Padrick would have been a responsible party had he succeeded in his plan and gotten mercs to attack.

Do you know who else would be responsible? The mercs!

Why? Because they're both active participants and in cahoots with each other. People are always responsible for their own freely chosen actions, regardless of the pretenses behind those actions. Always.

A lot of times people will use this language of "independent entities", "third parties", etcetc. All they're doing is trying to obviate their responsibility for their participation and save face. But they're still actually partly responsible. So R I O T, by their own admission of working with, collaborating with, and making leadership decisions with [TSRS], as well as having NAPs and various other agreements with them, are responsible for the destruction of their contractee's Athanors.

R I O T fucked their client over by allowing their friends, [TSRS], to destroy their client's Athanors because of a NAP. It was R I O T's leadership's decision. They were involved with it.

The Conclusion

In conclusion, can I really "prove" anything, as Destiny Corrupted said? I don't think "proving" is necessary here. R I O T's shady behvior - at the very least, gross blunders - are clear. Furthermore, R I O T's connection to and involvement with The SRS is also plain to see and painfully obvious.

R I O T also showed up to system while [TSRS] was destroying their client's Athanors, chatting in Local with [TSRS]. Their "official story" was to make sure I didn't attack the Athanors, but cmawn naw - that is not even somewhat plausible. [TSRS] were in system with 12 combat battleships and 7 Nestors. R I O T knew this, but still camped the station for over an hour.

So R I O T was in system, trying to camp me in station, to ensure that I didn't attack the structures R I O T was hired to protect while their friends in [TSRS] blew them up instead.

There are no doubt people who have had good dealings with R I O T, and perhaps even The SRS. But the problem is: you don't know if you'll be one of those groups. And even if you are, there is the possibility of shady, backroom dealings with other so called, "independent and unrelated" organizations that may get involved and screw you over in some way. In summary:

• R I O T and [SW-SS] made an agreement. R I O T tried to shift the terms of that agreement post facto.
• I had to threaten R I O T with bad publicity unless they adhered to the original, as written, terms of the deal.
• R I O T and [TSRS] leadership are in contact todo el tiempo, and have a close enough relationship to discussion such matters as who they might be recruiting.
• R I O T and [TSRS] are, by R I O T's own admission, involved in a NAP and work together on joint ops.
• [TSRS] WarDec'd R I O T's client and blew up his Athanors.
• R I O T was in system and more interested in blowing up my Rookie ships than protecting their contractee's structures - a contractee who has "a long series of contracts" with them.
  

Because of their close ties, [TSRS] is free to keep an eye R I O T's war history, and check around for any upcoming timers. While R I O T might defend you against the original attacker, your money will have been wasted when [TSRS] shows up to finish the timers - and R I O T looks the other way as their friends - in the independent and not-in-any-way associated with them corporation that they do joint OPs with - destroy your stuff

Any "mercenary" LARPers who have "NAPS" can't be trusted. Because someone who they have a NAP with can screw with you, and they won't take the contract. You will have wasted your money and lost your assets anyway.

Either Way, I Win

At the end of the day, things worked out well for myself. I was able to extricate myself from the Astrahus by getting [TSRS] to blow it up by insulting Storm Preldent's masculinity (he's an insecure, sensitive type of guy - I think he should take a break from the game for a bit, and come back fresh in a few months...) I got to harvest some tears and rustled jimmies, or at the very least get a reaction out of a lot of people. It was fun flying around Koona with 20+ flashies in system who wanted nothing more than to "stick it to me" and blow me up. I particularly enjoyed R I O T camping the station for over an hour just to kill a single Rookie ship - just because it was me. It fills me with giggles.

And, the best of all: I got to sit on grid and laugh as the smug twat who hired mercs lost his Athanors to their friends anyway. Who knows, maybe the loot from the Athanors was split between R I O T and The SRS? "Hey guys, this guy we have a contract with has some timers... you know we have a NAP in place so jussayin, jussayin, if you WarDec him and finish them off, well, ehhh... maybe we could split the loot yeah?"

I have to say I'm happy with how this all turned out though. I officially wash my hands of EVE's HiSec war mechanics and will be moving on to better and more interesting playstyles.

EPILOGUE

Just Some Racism Without Ownership

These guys sure like to ragespam.

There is a long documented history of comparing certain ethnic and racial groups, most notably those of African descent, to primates and monkeys. You can read more about it here and here. There are contemporary examples as well:  Milo Yiannopoulos was banned from Twitter for calling a black actress a "gorilla", and the term "sheboon" was coined just some years ago.

Folks in [TSRS] have tried to rationalize their use of racist language: accusing me of "pulling the race card", or saying "oh yeah well you called our CEO a f*ggot!", or saying that because I'm (supposedly) white, it's not racist. Or that, because I'm white, I don't have the right to say anything (this is, again, a racist proposition). To this I ask: Assuming I'm white, would it still not be racist, and gross, to call me the N-word?

Yes. Yes it would be.

I fully acknowledge my use of a certain F word in order to goad [TSRS] into doing what I wanted - namely, blowing up my Astrahus. [TSRS] has taken issue with my use of that word. Fair enough. I typed it. I own it. It's not a word I use often anymore, and I'm fine with my having done so. I don't hide what I do, or try to weasel out of things. However, if [TSRS] wants to maintain that it's not "racist" to hurl racial insults at someone - as long as that someone is not a member of the relevant racial group - then is it really "homophobic" to use the F word against someone who is, in all probability, heterosexual? By their logic - no, it's not.

[TSRS] have logic-mathed themselves into a corner. If my use of the F-word is "homophobic", than their use of "chimp" as a pejorative is racist. But, the difference is: I'm not trying to weasel out of what I said. I own it. [TSRS], however, does not. I hope in time they mature into adulthood enough to do so.

And I think Storm Preldent needs to take a break from EVE. He is so unhinged and burnt out from grinding undefended structures in HiSec that being called a "f*ggot" is enough for him to go off the rails and spam racist epithets in Local chat and on blog comments.

Destiny Corrupted

I know Destiny from the EVE-O forums, where I have been semi-active, off and on, for a few years now. She always struck me as a sensible, rational, and calm person. Our interests often aligned wherein we did not like certain other forum posters, who are undeniably toxic and probably certifiable narcissists. But we've never been close. Less than a week before R I O T declared war on me, I had mailed Destiny. Apparently, we had a mutual contact who was interested in working with both [SW-SS] and R I O T for removal of abandoned structures and defense of his own. I thought it would be nice to fly together. Maybe she would enjoy my playstyle and cause mayhem with me. But that was not to be the case.

It's unfortunate that Destiny has gotten herself mixed up in such a shady and untrustworthy group, who are friends with a racist and toxic "independent third party". It's unfortunate that she has taken it upon herself to be R I O T's mouthpiece, making a liar out of herself, while simultaneously leaking enough information to ruin R I O T's reputation. She's only been with them for a few months, so perhaps in time she will notice things that make her question her membership, and move on to a better group. Perhaps she'll even get out of HiSec for a bit and stop blapping haulers near Amarr.

While I hold towards her no personal ill-will, she is nonetheless part of a group that declared themselves hostile to me and interferred with my affairs. They should have done some research into my background before taking the contract. It would have been obvious to them that this is one they should have reconsidered. It's not like they're not above doing shady shit and letting their clients die anyway. And it's not like who I am and what I do is any secret, after all. 

I wish Destiny the best of luck and am sad that things did not go in a different direction. But it is what it is.

Until next time dear readers. This is space kitten Xui, signing off.