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An EVE Online player's carelessness has cost him 16 years' of work

By Kenneth Ang - on 12 Mar 2020, 7:13pm

An EVE Online player's carelessness has cost him 16 years' of work

Image: EVE Online

Ever played a MMO and spent a ton of time prepping for a difficult boss, only to lose everything in one fell swoop because you were careless? Well, we've been there, and we know the pain. But such pains are nothing compared to what this poor guy went through.

For those who are unfamiliar, EVE Online is one of the longest-running MMOs in gaming history, having stuck around since the early 2000s. Essentially, it's a sci-fi, Star Trek-esque game where players can pilot starships, trade, plunder and even form corporations with each other, among other things.

Anyway, the individual in question, known by his moniker Lactose Intolerant was a long-time EVE Online player, having spent well over a decade with the game. Naturally, that meant he'd accumulated a huge stash of stuff over the years, including 800 or so blueprints, which are highly prized among players for their myriad of uses. 

So, the story goes that one fine day, our pal Lactose decided to cash in on his enormous stack of blueprints, intending to use the money to help some of the other players in his corporation, Among Shadows. As such, he loaded it all onto an industrial vessel called an Orca and set off for a major trade hub called Jita, where he could sell copies of said blueprints for good amounts of ISK, EVE Online's currency.

That sounds perfectly fine, and it was. The only issue was how Lactose decided to do it. Piracy is rather common in EVE Online, and on top of using the slow-moving Orca to transport his treasure, which was estimated to be worth around 500 billion ISK, Lactose decided to travel through one of the most notorious systems on his way to Jita. 

Well, it should be easy to figure out what happened next. Lactose was attacked by pirates and his ship was completely destroyed, treasure and all. His carelessness cost him his 16 years' worth of effort, and according to his corporation director Tharvoil, it's even more saddening because Lactose was never a gaming "whale" - he'd saved and accumulated everything through sheer hard work alone.

Wow. In spite of his carelessness, it's really hard not to sympathise with poor Lactose here, considering how his intentions were purely benevolent too. Unsurprisingly, Tharvoil went on to mention how the former had resigned from the corporation and quit the game after the event. After all, if something like that happened to me, I think I'd have up and left too. 

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