Jim Halescott is running for CSM 16!
Who I am, and my Self Introduction
Greetings fellow EVE Pilots.
Jim Halescott is running for CSM16 as an Independent, with no loyal or ingame political ties.
Jim Halescott is considered by some to be a mastermind thief, corporation infiltrator and overall griefer.
Whilst from an outside perspective this may seem to be the case, this is far from the truth, as those who know him will no doubt be happy to tell you.
Jim tends to be an opportunistic character in EVE, which explains his current gameplay, but a loyal friend and hard working individual outside of EVE.
Outside of EVE, he works very hard as a Moderator on the EVE Facebook Group, and is constantly active with his role unless busy at work, or sleeping.
The EVE Facebook group moderation can be challenging due to how different demographics and ideologies of EVE players can despise one another (such as gankers and anti-gankers), but Jim and the rest of the moderation group remain as impartial as possible when accepting or rejecting posts.
Jim has gathered attention from EVENews24 in the past, and has been on INN’s The Meta Show in the past.
Jim is typically a Highsec player, as Highsec tends to be a target rich environment where people “believe” they are safe, but are really not. This is not to suggest however Jim does not know or understand Lowsec, Nullsec, Wormhole Space, or Pochven.
Jim is a very passionate EVE Online player, and believes that “anything goes”, so long as it’s within the EULA, the TOS and the EVE Online Rules, and therefore deploys and administers all varieties of mechanics to get a job or goal done, and expects others to do the same to him.
During his downtime from work, Jim enjoys engaging with his hobbies including EVE Online and his local community whilst living in Japan, and thus has fantastic communication and social skills.
He has travelled to a variety of countries in the last 15 years and is currently living and working in Japan teaching English as a second language, and science.
Your EVE Online story
I have been playing EVE Online since the 1st February 2013 on my first account and have explored the entire game since that time.
I started out my EVE adventure by mining in Highsec, and quickly joined a Highsec/Nullsec alliance which had ties to CVA and Provi-Bloc back in late to early 2014.
I lived in DP-JD4, right on the edge of Catch, which at the time for a new player was a pretty scary ordeal with AAA next door. My alliance and I spent the days mining ice and exporting it to Highsec.
Eventually the alliance I was in dissolved and I returned to Highsec and moved onto other things.
I started mining the belts in Highsec in Ahkour, Tash-Murkon Region, and was plagued daily by a group of gankers out to kill anyone they felt like.
I quickly learned to use Procurers and Skiffs to avoid ganks, but also decided to create a few ganking alts myself to kill off the other mining competition in the belts.
At the time offgrid Orca boosts were a thing, and I got involved with a group which was boosting for their corp members within Ahkour from a POS. Over the next year I collected all respectable miners together and we formed a small coalition of corporations and alliances which were blue to each other, and we ganked anyone else coming into Ahkour to mine. Eventually, as our numbers grew, so did our appetite for more resources, and we expanded our operations into Gaknem, next door to Ahkour, and began assimilating or destroying the players who lived there.
This pattern of expansion, assimilation and destruction continued until around 2016 when I met a Goonswarm member, whom I unfortunately cannot remember the name of, but he wardecced my corp with an alt of his in an alt corp. I met him, 1v1, in open combat. My Deimos vs his Loki.
I got him down to roughly 60% structure before he killed my Deimos and was victorious.
He applauded my spirit and invited me to join Goons to which I refused as I had my own personal aspirations to follow, but we remained friends for a while until he stopped playing, and because of him I began going “dark side” within EVE.
I started experimenting with Wormhole and Nullsec exploration and left mining behind due to the income ceiling it has. This new career path was something I had never experienced before and was new, exciting, but also highly profitable.
I continued this until the first Upwell Structures were released into EVE, and I saw a YouTube video from a group of players who found an unanchored Astrahus on a gate near Jita, which they scooped and sold for a hefty profit.
Considering how much money structures were worth at the time, I decided to devote my entire time to use what I learned through exploration to hunt down and camp unanchoring structures so I could steal them from their owners.
This lead into a massive operation between myself and a number of other like-minded individuals, and we eventually founded The Thieves Guild.
From that point onwards EVE became an information warfare game for me, as I was constantly looking through logs, data streams, anything I could get my hands on, looking for information on structures unanchoring and their timers.
Many corporations who had public channels actually advertised the date and time of the structures unanchoring, which was quite frankly, absolutely fantastic.
My friends and I spent months researching and refining our methods to gathering information and pulling off structure heists.
Eventually we moved onto corporation and alliance heists, and I am proud to say I have a number of corporations and alliances that I have shut down without firing a single shot, simply by stealing everything not bolted down, and blaming it on other people.
As Sun Tzu once said “Supreme excellence consists of breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting”, so destroying corps and alliances without firing a single shot was greatly satisfying to me.
From 2018, I setup a corporation within the game and advertised for everyone and anyone to join me on my crusade to destroy structures all around Highsec (this was before War HQ mechanics existed).
This was the beginning of an operation I called: Operation Siege Engine
We first used cheap Battleships and Logistics to attack and destroy structures, with the purpose of scaring other structure owners to begin unanchoring their structures, thus adding to our structure theft opportunities within The Guild. But we quickly discovered that any group which had adequate defences would be able to overcome us either with experience, better skills and ships, or pure numbers, so I contemplated over what could be done to change the landscape of the fight in my favour.
The next day, I organised an emergency meeting with everyone in my group to discuss a new tactic. Most were skeptical at first, but after trying it and seeing its success, we continued to use it until the War HQ mechanics were dropped on TQ by CCP.
The tactic was making use of either a POS in the system where the target structure was based, or using a number of Neutral Bowhead pilots at safe spots around the target system.
We filled the POS or Bowheads with T1 fitted Catalysts and Algos’, without rigs (as they would be destroyed upon repackaging the ships, when we moved to the next system), and essentially swarmed the target structure and continued to fire until it died.
Even if the enemy showed up to defend, we overwhelmed them by being able to warp out pods to the POS or a Bowhead to get a new ship, and warp back to the battlefield to continue to fight. So long as we kept the timer paused, and we reshipped faster than they could destroy our ships, we would eventually win.
Our ships were worth around 1.2 million ISK each, so losing them was absolutely no problem and well worth the investment.
But with the dawn of the War HQ mechanics from CCP, the writing was on the wall for this operation, and even with all my efforts, it was simply unrealistic and no longer profitable to continue funding it, as the pilots flying under me were PURELY OFFENSIVE, and could not effectively defend a War HQ.
As Operation Siege Engine ended, new opportunities arose and I’ve been exploiting those opportunities and unique game mechanics ever since.
Your areas of expertise.
I specialise in a large variety of aspects of EVE Online
I have massive experience in:
- Understanding at least 90-95% of all ingame mechanics, and using that knowledge to mix a number of them together to create novel and interesting tactics and strategies for all sorts of content.
- Mining and Industry
- Corporation Creation and Management
- “Meta” PVP – Structure Theft, Corp Infiltration and Social Engineering
- “Normal” PVP – High Valued Targetting, Opportunitistic Ganking (both suicide and non-suicide)
- Exploration – All areas (HS, LS, NS, WH)
- Social Media Community Management
- Information and Misinformation Warfare
- Intelligence Gathering
- EULA, TOS and Game Rules understanding
- Ingame Player Events
Why are you applying for the CSM?
A large number of people have been pushing me for the last 2 years about applying to become a CSM member, and I’ve always resisted it as quite honestly I’ve felt that I wouldn’t be great for the role.
Recently however, as the number of people telling me to apply has grown, I have started to consider that MAYBE, in fact, I would be a good member of the CSM team.
I know I have the knowledge, and I know I have the experience.
I already have a couple of friends on the CSM, and therefore I believe I would be a good fit for the role, as I work well in a team, and even better in a team where I am already on good terms with some of the current (and re-running candidate) members.
I also believe in creation of new and exciting things for EVE.
I want to be at the forefront of what’s coming next, so I can assist CCP in recognising potential future problems with their plans, as new mechanics meet old mechanics, as more than often, when those two mechanic types mix, there is the possibility of bugs and/or exploits within the game structure.
Due to my ever increasing knowledge on how EVE works on a fundamental level, I feel absolutely qualified to be able to help CCP navigate uncharted waters and any upcoming pitfalls.
I want to assist in the creation of new and novel mechanics in the game which will benefit everyone regardless of where they live, be that Quality of Life (QOL) upgrades to the game, to brand new mechanical systems to EVE which will give more power to the players and allow them to influence the game THEIR way, with of course, the ability for other players to resist their plans.
CCP should continue to be the caretakers of the game, but absolutely not the rulers and dictators of the game.
The future and development of New Eden should remain solely in the hands of the playerbase, and we should be given the freedom to mould New Eden into however we see fit, whilst avoiding the obstacles and difficulties that CCP present to us with every changing update.
That is what I believe, and that is what I am passionate about.
What can players expect from you?
If I am elected, I plan on hosting and maintaining a direct and public Discord Server where people can talk to each other, but also directly to me. If they wish to talk privately they can do, by sending me a private message.
I wish to be fully transparent to the player base (as much as CCP’s NDA will allow me to be) and give facts, advice and be a consultant to the player base and community.
I will work hard for all citizens of New Eden, regardless if you are Alpha or Omega, if you live in Highsec or Nullsec, if you play The Bad Guy, or The Good Guy, I will listen to you unbiasedly, and assist you to the absolute best of my abilities.
What I must make clear though, is that my loyalty is not to you as an individual, but my loyalty is to the player base and community as a whole, including the health of EVE Online as a game, so I can assist CCP into taking EVE into its third decade and we can keep the repeating the same old slogan “EVE Forever”.
I have a number of changes and additions I wish to bring to CCP’s attention.
These include:
-
Adding more PVE opportunities around the cluster to get people doing things faster.
- A massive overhaul of current site ratting mechanics should be looked at and brought into the modern era of video gaming. The old sites and how they operate can continue to exist within the game, but new sites which are more exciting and yield exciting rewards would be most welcome to the game for things to do. There’s nothing more demotivating than logging in and finding a lack of combat, ore and exploration sites to run. Jumping system to system and finding nothing for an hour or so is soul crushing.
- Regarding these new sites, they should be totally different to the current sites. With current site mechanics, you warp in, kill stuff, maybe loot stuff, and warp out, with the hope of getting an escalation. I believe each of these new sites will be more of a “hybrid” site where you have ore ongrid, difficult rats which will require combat ships ongrid, as exploration modules ongrid. They can also escalate randomly, but there is more opportunity for miners, explorers and ratters to compete for these new sites, or work together to complete them in their own way, taking their own rewards from their chosen career.
- THAT BEING SAID – NEW MISSIONS (for the love of god, new missions) Seriously… I don’t even know how many times people have told me they wish there were new missions, or even mission varieties. And I don’t even get involved with missions personally…
- Meaningful Events – During the Triglavian Invasion, we had a massive amount of players logging in to defeat or assist the Triglavians. This was a magical time during EVE Online, and CCP should really bring more content similar to this. Having a storyline arc which is semi-optional for players to get involved with, BUT ensure that the storyline can have consequences depending on the outcome of said storyline will keep people engaged with the game longterm. Now CCP can expand on the Triglavian story arc, or make something new, but related to it, but don’t let it die after it gathered such traction and attention.
-
Bring back the deleted asteroid belts around the game, or change the mechanics of how the PVE content from them spawned previously.
- I believe the removal of the PVE content these “belts” provided was an unintended side effect of what CCP was planning, and I will plan to be speaking to CCP to determine what we can do to rectify this situation.
- That… or… entirely remove the static belts from the entire game in exchange for a pure site based spawning system which encompasses the entire game. IE – If you want to go mining, there are no static belts anymore, they are instead in sites which randomly spawn and despawn when finished. During the time these sites are being mined, rats can spawn. Having the number of belts in an area become a VARIABLE rather than a CONSTANT will increase the necessity for mining fleets to move around the game looking for asteroids to mine, and therefore drive conflict as people fight for decent ore sites, thus creating more opportunities for content.
-
PI and Industry related stuff:
- Now that the Industrial Update is upon us, and some of the bottlenecks for new ship building requirements appear to be PI related, I believe the ability of friends or alts, to connect command centres together to share Power and CPU resources (with diminishing returns) would be a fantastic addition to the game, and allow for players to collaborate and cooperate together to build huge sprawling metropolises on planets
- Find some sort of ability to remove other peoples PI networks as well. Currently there is no counter. There needs to be one as Risk/Reward must be satisfied.
- COMPRESS MOON ORE FOR TRANSPORT (I don’t see why this isn’t already compressible)
- COMPRESS GAS FOR TRANSPORT (Now that we need it after the indy update, let’s make it easier to move)
- New images for the Moon Mining crystals. Currently they are just the same as Veldspar crystals, and that’s boring as hell.
-
Inclusion of Ganking, Scamming, Theft, anything like that which is generally underhanded needs to be added to the NPE experience so new players… get a clue
- Including using Local as an intel source, and adding players, corporations and alliances as contacts to use Local effectively.
- D-scanning tuition needs to happen as well
- Understanding for new players via the NPE that they are not safe after leaving Starter Systems and Career Agent Systems
- Physically make it impossible for a player to suicide gank a new player (defined as the ACCOUNT being less than 30 days old) whilst said new player is inside Starter System or Career Agent System. Outside of those systems anything goes.
-
Deployable structures
- New Deployable – Mobile Ore Compressor – Can compress ore at 5,000 blocks per minute. Takes 1 minute to deploy and 2 minutes to pickup. Can be attacked in Highsec, with offender getting suspect timer only (like MTU)
- Allow for deployables to be “shared”. Give the owner a right click option to “Give access to”, and either couple it with access lists, or have it so you can input names of toons, corps, alliances. Only the owner can pickup the deployable and “unanchor” it, but people who have access and use, put in and take from the structure (including use of the fitting tool around Mobile Depots)
-
Upwell Structures:
- Allow for Upwell Structures to be upgraded in tiers, including and not limited to, upgrading a Medium Structure to a Large structure of the same variety, and Large to XL. (Input materials for this upgrade will apply)
- Make structures stronger, more difficult to destroy and easier to defend. Right now they are incredibly easy to destroy. Give me 10 good men, and we’ll go raze hundreds to the ground just for shits and giggles. It should be an UPHILL BATTLE for the barbarians at the gate.
- Furthermore. EVE prides itself on being an intense but also laid back game. Hence why we don’t need to grind skills and why it’s passive. We should have the ability to have auto defence systems on our structure. I want to see mobile turret guns around structures which are automated to defend the structure should the structure come under attack. These guns will be similar to the old POS guns, and only a maximum of 8 can be positioned around the structure similarly to the way Sentry Guns around Gates and NPC Stations are positioned These guns can be attacked and destroyed by a competent attacking group, but these guns will add to the “uphill battle” idea of what structure removal should be about, whilst at the same time allowing for the “laid back” aspect of the game as they will be automated. Of course, having someone ACTIVELY defend the structure will be more effective at defending, rather than just relying solely on the Sentry guns, as they can use the structures modules to defend at the same time the Sentry guns fire on attackers.
- Similarly to how T3D’s work (such as the Hecate), Upwell Structures should be able to switch between specific battlemodes. One which will increase structure resistances to make it harder, and longer for enemies to kill the structure, thus this will force the defenders to rely heavily on their fleet to defend their base. Another will be as it is right now, smack bang in the middle. And the last one would be to focus solely on DPS and damage application output, at expense of defence. This would give more options and flexibility to structure owners.
It would be an honour to represent you, and the entire player base, in order to help make EVE a fantastic game, now, and for the future.
If I am elected into the CSM, I will be constantly available, provided my Real Life obligations, and I will likely have an “Open Office” period every weekend, where anyone can join me on Discord and speak to me directly about any issues or concerns you may have.
LET’S MAKE EVE THE BEST GAME IT CAN BE, TOGETHER!!!
