Enraged EVE Online Player Offers $75,000 Bounty On Enemy Corporation
Heather Alexandra
Today 3:00pmFiled to: EVE Online
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EVE Online can get pretty intense. From battles that cost $300,000 in damages to histories so complex that a book was written about them, the long running MMO can get very serious. Now, a personal disagreement has led to a hefty bounty.
In a Reddit post, user holder2k has offered $75,000 for the eviction of Hard Knocks Inc. from their home star system lovingly called Rage. Alliances and corporations can claim sovereignty over space in EVE and can that claim can be removed by attacking a command node. The money will be paid through Paypal and split between the number of participants in the operation if it is successful.
The source of the conflict seems to arise from a series of chat logs between a member of Hard Knocks named “NoobMan” and another player “HeWhoShallNotBe Named.” The latter was banned from the Hard Knocks public channel and gave NoobMan his contact information so they could sort the matter out, later alleging that his phone number was distributed to other Hard Knocks members who then called to harass him.
“That number was a work number for a large global bank where I’m International Legal Council,” HeWhoShallNotBe Named claimed. “The bank has now turned it over to the federal authorities to investigate.”
Regardless of the veracity of this statement, the visible spat between players and threat of possible legal action has already led to much grief. Hard Knocks struck back against against HeWhoShallNotBe Named’s corporation, swiftly evicting them from their star systems in retaliation for the bounty. All of this is complicated by the fact that no one knows for certain if holder2k and HeWhoShallNotBe Named are the same person.
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It remains to be see if the bounty will be claimed. Hard Knocks owns a devastating Keepstar citadel, a huge space station with a massive laser weapon that can turn entire fleets into scrap. Keepstars are valued at around $15,000. Destroying Hard Knocks’ holdings would do a lot of damage to their checkbooks but it seems like a flat out suicide mission given their defenses.
A comprehensive post at PC Gamer helps to outline the situation further. It notes that holder2k’s efforts appear to violate the game’s terms of service wherein players agree not to market services or goods directly for cash.
Basically, it’s a giant and expensive clusterfuck at this point. Or as they call it in EVE: “Tuesday.”
