Sunday, August 8th, 2010
Issue: 40   Editor: HowlingMadMika


Delicious Thoughts... rawr!! KittehX
Hello everyone. This is the spirit of DeliciousX talking. I've come back as a kitten, and kittens can't talk.

So, this is being transmitted directly to your monitors from the afterlife. Don't worry about me, it's quite comfy up here, and they've got Only Fools and Horses playing all day long, so I'm perfectly content. And when I get a little bored, I'll come back to earth... as KittehX.

For those that don't know- which, unless I'm an arrogant bitch, I should assume that is most of you- I, that is to say, DeliciousX, died on Wednesday as part of a wipe of the 1337 Guard. I don't really know the reasoning behind it, nor do I really care. That side of Bootleggers just doesn't interest me in the slightest. I joined 1337 Guard for the community, and to have a bit of purple on my profile!

I certainly did not join for the protection. Being in a crew is meaningless nowadays. In fact, by joining 1337 Guard, I effectively signed my own death sentence. I knew that there was some troubled history there, and that a wipe was inevitable- it was a question of when, not if.

And you know what? A part of me is GLAD I was killed. I was slowly getting more bored of Bootleggers, as it turned into routine. OC money, booze run money, stock market money- it was all worthless, as I had a fair amount of money anyway. Doing 2 OCs a day, and staying at the rank of Legendary Godfather... every day felt the same. I was getting nowhere.

Now, at time of writing, I'm a scum. Suddenly, ranking is not only a possibility, but an inevitability. And it will happen at a fast enough rate to be entertaining. My money will grow from nothing to something, and I will actually NOTICE. Ironically, killing my first account has actually prolonged my metaphorical Bootleggers life. Killing DeliciousX has, in turn, saved KittehX. DeliciousX was slowly dying anyway. Some cookies just finished her off.

This whole experience has also made me think- if you play Bootleggers the way it was meant to be played, you WILL die. If you join a crew, it WILL, eventually, be wiped. It's just too easy to wipe crews nowadays. The only way you'll reach a decent rank is by avoiding crews altogether- but if you reach Don, you'll be killed by people to prevent you from reaching State Don. If you reach State/Nation Don, you'll be killed by people just for fun.

The only way you'll ever survive on this game, is to not play it. It's a rather unfortunate situation- those who play and enjoy the game will get knocked down repeatedly, having to restart again and again, whereas those who pop in for a quick look, will largely go unnoticed. It's the real life equivalent of spending all your money on a slot machine, then some snotty-nosed kid barely out of his mum's uterus comes along, spends a quarter, and wins the jackpot.

I've also lost a lot of respect for the State/Nation Dons. 5 out of 6 State Dons, and the Nation Don, at time of writing, are 'not a part of any crew'. They've reached this high rank by being wimps and staying clear from crews. As far as I'm concerned, if you aren't a member of a crew, you aren't playing Bootleggers the way it's meant to be played. Maybe these figures are a testament of how flawed the crew system is, or maybe they're just a testament to how the BL society works.

Do I have any regrets?

Regrets are easy to have- hindsight is a wonderful thing. If I'd have KNOWN I was about to be killed, I'd have spent all my money on points, or popped it into my Swiss bank. I'd have used all my bullets on all the forum trolls while I still had a chance. But obviously, nobody can predict when a major shooting is going to happen.

It's a shame to lose an account I worked so hard on- on the other hand, as I say, this has given me a new lease for (fake) life. And I fancied a new name, anyway.

So, time to beat up a blind man, and be refused into countless OCs. Bootleggers has never been better.