Interview: Holymonk

It was a nice normal evening in the tavern. A small band was playing some nice easy folky music. At one of the tables sat Rayendir and Damorian, they had a big map and were looking at how big the country had grown in the last years. At another table sat Tyrael, enjoying his fresh meal of hot vegetables and an ice cold beer. He was waiting for his guest to show up. The door of the bar opened and there in the doorway stood Holymonk. Back from his travels in the west. Earlier that month he received a letter from Tyrael, he was invited for an interview for the newsletter. He walked to the table and sat down. “Sorry for keep you waiting.” He pointed his finger in the air to draw the waitress’s attention to order a beer too. “Glad you still made it, the weather is terrible tonight.” Tyrael got his pencil and paper, “Ok Holymonk, here we go."

Q: Ok first of all I would like to thank you for making some free time for us, as you stated on the forum you are busy with the making of a new division, this time with the game eve online.

A: Thats true

Q: And how old is your corp now?

A: I think the corp is about 1,5 months now, but for the first 2,5 weeks I was the only member in it. The corp is now about 11 members big, 4 of them are really active players and some more casually playing members. we have our HQ and recently got our first office. At the moment the first thing I really want for the corp members is getting a member that develops or that we recruit to do industry for us as an added feature so spaceship and equipment can be build efficiently

Q: That’s is a nice start.

A: Thanks you.

Q: Was this the period you also started to recruit within DS?

A: Yes when I got my first member I figured DS members might be interested, so I posted on the forums.

Q: You are not a DS member at this time, but you have been a member before. Does this recruitment within the DS also mean you are going to be a DS member again?

A: Well I might not be a DS member but I’ve been supporting DS for about 7 years now. why I’m not listed as a member is probably only because at the moment I don't play a
ny of the games that are played within DS.

Q: How do you plan to make a futuristic role playing game like EVE fit in the ways and traditions of DS?

A: Well first off, I don’t think we’re big enough yet for a division status. But when we get big enough my first course of action will be to get a forum. The forum will contain the event messages and corp specific information to "lure" the players to the forum and get them introduced to DS. Next will be to try and incorporate some more role playing elements into the corp by dividing the corps into sub divisions and giving them a specific task within the corp. Hopefully I can get some members to lead the sub divisions. As for the traditions, one element I make sure all our members know, is that we’re a totally none-pirating corp. I try to encourage players within the corps to help each other which at the moment is going great. People are doing missions together exchanging items with each other and even giving money to players that have lost their ship. There's a real corporative spirit within the corp which I’m pretty proud of. I try to lead by example, helping my members out with support on missions that are hard for them, lending them money to finally get that ship they’ve been saving for, or giving advice on how to fit their ships, etc.

Q: Do you also do cooperative things like group mining, for the corp’s wallet?

A: At the moment all the money in the corp’s wallet is provided by myself. I raise no tax at all. I have had a vote on it to see how the members react if I suggested to raise the tax to 3% or 5% or leave it at 0% and they all voted that the tax should be raised to 5%. So it seems members really want to help out the corp. As for mining ops there is only a small number of players that mine in the corp. I’m not one of them so I’m not totally aware what happens there, but there have been cooperative mining ops started up by members that mine with a 2 or 3 of them mining and one of them hauling. There have been a number of joint missions on different lvls, but for the reason of not loosing one’s ship joining in the lvl4 missions is restricted by a certain lvl of resistance on the ships taking part. This becomes very important at higher level missions, so it happened only a few times. Most members or not yet far enough in their development to do lvl4 missions but it's starting to come. It looks like lvl4 mission runs will become pretty common in the very near future. Also I’m making an alt which will boost the member on the missions this is to lower the requirements for the member to join in on these missions and in future ventures to get to lvl5 missions. But a real fleet booster needs pretty large numbers of skill points so this is another 3 or 4 months away.

Q: Is this also the direction you want to move in with the corporation? Primarily running missions?

A: Not really, the reason that we have a lot of mission runners right now is that I myself am one and can therefore easily offer help. Since recently a few starting miners have joined and one of the members is doing both missions and mining. The goal for the corps is to do almost all things that can be done within the game with a few exceptions, I don't want a pirate corp so there’s obviously a couple things we can’t do. Pirating is a no-go entirely. Some things can't be mixed with the other things we’re doing and would put the members in a position they really don't want to be in. So where not doing factional warfare as a corp. I am however making an alt so that people that want to get into factional warfare will have information on it. I also already have some contacts with an alliance that we will be joining in the future. This alliance has a number of normal corps in them and 1 corp that is pvp oriented but so far into .0 space that it doesn’t really effect us. It does give players willing to travel (23 jumps from our HQ) the means to participate in real pvp. But this remains something for the future. Another thing I’m currently looking into is to get a POS into low sec or even high sec space but for the moment the corp standing with the faction isn't high enough yet to realize it.

Q: Making a POS (player owned structure) is a hard and very expensive thing to realize, what are your plans for this?

A: well I’m sure I’m going to think of other things for the corp member to enjoy maybe complex runs and/or 0.0 mining runs, but at the moment with so many member still at an early stage of their development it will be mostly mining and mission runs.

Q: can you describe in short for the persons that are interested in the game of EVE, what kind of corporation it is that you run?

A: I really want to be a guild for both starting and experienced players. For starting players having a high tax in the corps is a real let down. I’m trying to keep taxes low and have experienced players that have isk invest in the corp by buying shares. As for the realization of the POS, it's going to be really up to the members if it gets realized. Buying shares of the corp will be linked to goals. If enough are bought, that goal will be realized with the isk that was invested into the corps. This will leave the beginning members with a low tax so they can spend their time and isk on their development. It will also ensure a great freedom within the corp. To keep it fair, if members want to use some of the features provided by the corp in the future, they will have to have a certain number of shares before they get access.

Q: Will the corp also invest in materials like blueprints to make items for the market and use this wallet for the future?

A: Yes, my current goal is to get industry going so members and (especially mining members) will have the means to construct things for low cost. This will be to provide members with lowered cost of items & ships. If I get it on track I consider selling things to get a better prize for mining members a next step within this track. So I hope it develops far enough to do this efficiently enough to really benefit the Mining members but since the first step in this isn't accomplished as of yet it remains a thing for the future.

Q: How do you think the corp will develop in the coming year?

A: For now helping the members out with getting to the point where they can solo lvl4 missions and to get more going for the current mining members that recently joined. The mission part is going pretty well, the mining part needs work Within half a year I want to have the members far enough that they can do lvl5 missions together. Mining ops at least in low sec hopefully even 0.0 having joined an alliance by then so people can go and have a taste of pvp and still come back to safe old mission running. having some more offices in minmitar space (currently only in gallente space) to speed recruitment. At the moment, joining the corps for a minmatar is still a fair distance of jumps. Having the industry part up and running so members can turn in orders and have things produced with their own mined ores. Having hangars with modules, frigate ships and ammo so members are new to the game can be helped to a quick start. As for within a year. hopefully I can get my char far enough with trade skills and industry to do some serious selling on the market. By that time the POS could be up and running. lvl5 mission running should be pretty common by then. Mining ops into 0.0 as well. It depends of course on how well it develops.

Q: And in the amount of members?

A: I want to be at about 40 members in half a year and somewhere around 200 within a year. I really want to first get some members that I know I can trust to lead subdivisions before I start a more aggressive recruitment. So, slowly building with the members now to see how they are in the game and when I have a few members that can lead ops and/or division I’m going to up the effort on recruitment

Q: 200 sounds like a bold venture.

A: Yup, it is. It might be wishful thinking on my part, but that’s the goal I set for myself. One thing I realized after about a month into playing again is that waiting on skills isn't something I enjoy but it is a large part of the game. I’m currently making a third char just the keep the "wow I have another skill" factor alive but I can't keep making chars and play them all. So you need to find things you enjoy to do to keep things interesting. and really there are two things in this game I really enjoyed so far. PvP, and getting this corp started and helping peeps in it. But I found out that running the corp gives me even more enjoyment than anything else in the game, so i plan to spend more and more time on getting it better and bigger.

Q: Thats a very nice personal goal

A: Doing missions is just my way of making isk, it's not something I really enjoy so much it would keep me playing. At the moment I’m not doing much recruitment because I lost some ships and so my cash flow dried out. But in the last 2 weeks this is turning around so I will be actively recruiting again in a short period of time.

Q: I see

A: I’ve lost 2 megatron navy issues so I was set back about 1 billion isk on those, but at the moment I’m up with cash 200mil but I have 1 week’s worth of lvl4 mission loot still lying around, so that would be another 400 mil isk, probably.

Q: In the end, as a small promotion of your corporation, what do you want to say to the people of DS to get them interested?

A: Well the game is massive, more then 6 thousand solar systems you can visit and there's only one server where all people play. It's a player driven, complex game with great space battles. As for the corporation, no tax. All the money you earn you can spend for yourself. There are some great people already in it that will help you if they can. Everybody in the corp really enjoys doing stuff together. That goes for mining as well as for missions. HQ is at Pucherie VI - Moon 11 - Federation Navy Testing Facilities, or you could also join in the corp office at Eglennaert I - Moon 1 - Federation Navy Assembly Plant. I also still offer 2 mil isk for people joining that are already member of DS so to help get DS into the corp and help them to a good start. Corp name is "Doaine Sidhe mission corporation.

- Article by Tyrael