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[Ken]

I'm facing what should only be described as another long (10-12 months) business trip with expectations of intermittent to zero Internet access.  I think at least a few of you share that sort of occupational hazard with me.  Others certainly run into similar situations where they can't put in much time for gameplay or even casual RP/forums for a while.

What do you do about it?

I certainly have no desire to put the game away for good.  In EVE patience reaps great dividends and I'm invested in the universe for the long haul.  Now, I've got a lovely wife who has selflessly updated skill queues for me during shorter absences, but this one will be quite a bit longer.  I think I can convince her to carry the burden nevertheless.  My real dilemma is in the RP/character development side of things. 

In particular, how did you justify a character's absence for such a long time in IC terms?  I can think of plenty of justifications, but I'm wondering what reasons you might see (or have used) for a capsuleer to vanish for up to a year and then return from the blue.  If you've ever had to step away from the game for longer than, say, one subscription cycle (30 days), what did you do with your account(s), skills, assets, corps, RP storylines, etc?  Did you keep up with IC events even when you couldn't login?  Did you keep writing and did you write more or less?  I'm not necessarily looking for advice here.  I just want to hear your experiences.

[Casiella]

Prison (or on the lam) has worked for me in the past.

[Ulphus]

I've only really had a month or so at a time off. Excuses for my various characters have included:
* Going on a luxury cruise
* A vherokior character going on a spirit walk to understand some dreams (undetermined how long it would take)
* a Sebiestor character going to a gathering of clans to be shown off by his aunties as "their" pod pilot...

A year is a long time, but the Spirit walk might work for that, and you could come back with new directions and motivations for your character.

[Alain Colcer]

A wealthy individual has hired your consultant services for space-bound business, but being an eccentric client, he (or she) demands you travel along in the flesh.

The business is of course a roundtrip is obviously quite long, and will include everything from Planetary development, Starbases and most importantly supply chain management.

Given the ammount of zeros in your paycheck, you have decided this venture is a quite profitable one, and a change of pace from being a Capsuleer.

[Saede Riordan]

I have an epic story arc designed to take place the next time I need to go away, wherein Nikita is....lost, to put it lightly.

but it could be a number of things you could do, Coma, dealing with something family related, captured by xyzq group to do xyzq thing, sold into slavery, missing in deep space, honeymoon, birth of a child, friend/lover severely injured, sabbatical, finding god, the list goes on and on and on.

[Dex_Kivuli]

Collaborating as part of an important research project, that (at this stage) you can't tell anyone about.

Then hope that the day before you return,  tech 3 frigs are introduced 

[Lillith Blackheart]

Planetside vacation.

[Mithfindel]

On my Amarr character, wrote off an earlier pause as power struggles within the family. Of course, that is somewhat specific. Other things might be extensive planetside projects where you'd want to be there yourself, not only with camera drones.

[Mathra Hiede]

I haven't really had any absenses that long, but the last one - which was about 2 weeks or so for a massive step up in RL work, I used the idea that my character had basically set up his planetary holdings with him on-site and became "human" for a couple of weeks - net result was it messed with his head but it is turning into something fun

For your length of time Ken, I can't think of anything directly but the suggestions made here are pretty good so far, just have to have something that suits the character and his continual progression and whether you want to take the time to reform the character or just develop what you have.

[Myrhial Arkenath]

Planet-side vacations or trips to Curse (most of them are real, though) are my favorites. If you want to keep it simple make a character spin-off of what you are doing. I do wonder if that gives mary-sue points though 

[Laerise [PIE]]

Aside from vacations and family business I like to use bugs with the interface firmware of the pod as an excuse for absense.
After all every pod pilot is different, and I, personally, would not want to fly a ship when I'm getting migraine / epilepsy or other nasty things from a certain and hard to find bug that seems to be a problem for only a tiny minority of pilots including myself.

[Alain Colcer]

Archeology in a Planet on a Wormhole system could also be a good way to isolate the character into a location with little communications with the rest of the galaxy.

[Milo Caman]

Spending a Year dead is a popular Tax Dodge.

[Louella Dougans]

Kidnapped by mercenaries for political purposes!

Or, go through a wormhole into TEH FUTUR! (wormholes can do that, right?) And pretend it's still the previous year, for \o/ purposes.

Prison (or on the lam) has worked for me in the past.

just to comment on this, one of Mum's relatives, way back, like 19th century, was an acrobat in a circus, so would go off during the summer travelling with the touring circus, doing acrobat stuff.
Their wife was not too keen on this and they explained the absence with "oh, he's in prison", if anyone asked.

[Raphael Saint]

When I had to take a 3 month break, it was RP'd as Saint going on an errand to find someone (a player who had left EVE) for another character (player 2), complete with Blog posts that I had written up ahead of time and were posted by the player2, to show that Saint was still alive and active, just 'out and about.'

With a possible 6 month 'business trip' (playing catch-up to the rest of the co-workers) coming up, if he's still in the FW, I'll probably play off my abscene as training/working with the Imperial Navy in a closer manner, as FW does bestow a naval rank onto capsuleers participating.  If he isn't, I'll have to come up with something else. 

'Course the first was very RP-specific but the second could apply with any capsuleer who is loyal to an NPC faction.