“Did we get the names of the attackers?” BobLee asked.

Tsurgi was the one to report. “iLikeTatters was one of them. I didn’t catch the name of the friend.”

“Did we get any good loot from them?” Furiosa asked.

“A bit. Some typical mining run loot. Not many stacks or resources,” Kaiser informed. “We got a revolver now. Not that is worth much.”

“Nah, the revolver is shit. A last resort at best,” Furiosa replied.

“Something is better than nothing,” Kaiser mused.

“Eh, let’s just get better somethings,” Furiosa added.

“Agreed.”

“We need more enemies. Those last guys were garbage. Not even a challenge,” Tsurgi said hungrily.

Tsurgi was the best combatant of the Dojo. Playing for hours and hours on battlefield servers, he honed his FPS skills to a ridiculous degree to that point where he has been accused of hacking numerous times. The problem was: he was not. Tsurgi was just good. Good for the Dojo, bad for everyone else. Tsurgi was known for being able to take out numerous assailants even though all of them – Tsurgi included – had equal gear. Tsurgi’s abilities of battle truly were unparalleled. Whether it was luck or skill no one dared question. His results were unquestionable. Thus, the Dojo had granted Tsurgi the title of Master of War.

The problem was that Tsurgi was quite a little warmonger, always looking for a fight. Thankfully though, he has not started them… yet.

“If we don’t engage people soon I am going to get itchy trigger-fingers,” Tsurgi warned.

“Please don’t. We don’t need any of that mess,” Kaiser said pleadingly.

“I won’t. I’m just saying,” Tsurgi stated, not sounding all too trustworthy.

“Uh huh. Just saying?” Furiosa asked.

“You’re just saying!” Tsurgi exclaimed stupidly.

Kaiser went inside the base from a mining run and began to empty his inventory of stuff into the storage boxes on the first floor. The organization in the boxes was appalling. Nothing was in order or grouped in any logical manner.

“You guys go harvesting. I’ll man the fort. This place needs to be better organized,” Kaiser suggested.

“I’m already manning the furnaces,” Furiosa said.

“But not the boxes,” Kaiser replied. He checked the furnaces to pull out the resulting metal fragments and sulfur dust. To his dismay the furnaces were not burning even amounts of ore and there was too much or too little wood in the furnaces. “And the furnaces aren’t burning efficiently. Then Kaiser thought of something. “Besides, you saw what just happened with Tsurgi and me. If you go out you might get some action.”

“Hmm, but of course,” Furiosa seemed pleased.

It worked. Of course it would work. This may be a survival game but most players end up craving battle. Tsurgi and Furiosa are no exception to this – especially Tsurgi. Besides, Kaiser thought, they are much better at combat than I am.

“I am going to work on crafting as well,” Kaiser added. “We have enough resources to put to use.” They had stone that could be crafted into high external stone walls, high quality metal bars that could become weapons, charcoal and sulfur dust that could become gun powder, and then gun powder and metal fragments that can become ammo. This is going to be a lot of crafting, Kaiser thought.

“I’m going to work on building the external walls. Make sure you guys keep getting barrels while you are at it. We really need the high external stone gate blueprint,” Kaiser said. The walls were very good for defense but without a gate they will not be able to fully defend the base. Last game cycle Kaiser was able to find the blueprint for the high stone wall but not the gate. For Kaiser’s base design he would build a ring of high stone walls around the base with one gate so only him and his group can get in and out – with the added bonus of having a courtyard so they could build extra structures such as watchtowers and external large furnaces.

Especially the furnaces, Kaiser thought. Indoor, smaller furnaces were a good start for smelting ore but as you progressed through the game and accumulated more and more ore you need a way to smelt mass amounts of ore more efficiently. Large furnaces do this job by having a larger inventory – 18 slots versus 6 slots. With this, one could smelt a lot more ore with the same amount of wood.

At the moment Kaiser estimated that his crafting queue of several walls, large furnaces, and gun powder would take an hour or two to complete. He yawned.

Kaiser usually had the least engaging jobs when it came to Dojo operations but they were by no means least in importance. Building, crafting, and logistics were Kaiser’s specialty. Conservation of materials and using exact smelting ratios allowed the Dojo to build their base and their gear all while wasting very little resources. He also kept all the loot and gear organized in labeled boxes as the rest of the Dojo had a tendency to dump anything anywhere. He solved this problem long ago by dedicating a few boxes as “drop off” boxes so that anyone who had anything they needed to dump out of their inventory could do it all in one place. He would then place these items in their appropriate place. Weapons in a weapons box, ore in an ore box or a furnace, and so on. When it came to construction he knew exactly how he was going to build a base before the next game cycle started. This allowed them to setup fast and not waste any resources having to demolish improperly placed scaffolding or break any wrongly placed walls. This gave Kaiser the title of Master of Logistics and Construction.

POW! A shotgun blast rang out.

Kaiser ran for the storage boxes to grab weapons. “What was that?” Kaiser asked.

“Sorry! Misfire,” BobLee cried pardon.

“Damn it, Bob,” Furiosa called out.

“I alt-tab-ed and the gun fired when coming back in,” BobLee stated.

“I hate when that happens,” Kaiser said, his heart rate slowing down. He continued to grab material out of the furnaces and queue gun powder to be crafted.

“How goes the harvesting?” Kaiser inquired.

“It goes,” Furiosa replied. “I’m returning now. Inventory’s full.”

“I’m getting there too,” Tsurgi added. “We have a few neighbors it seems. I see them harvesting in the distance but they haven’t gotten close. They are keeping an eye on us though.”

Kaiser raised an eyebrow. “Well if they see us and they aren’t engaged then perhaps they are friendly.”

“Maybe,” Tsurgi said. “Still feel more comfortable with a gun out though.”

Kaiser’s queue was beginning to diminish. With access to some gun powder he began making bullets. We need guns for the bullets, Kaiser thought.

“Furi are you bringing back wood?” Kaiser asked.

“A little.”

“Good, I need it to make some bolt actions.”

“Yes. Thank you. I can’t exactly do any base defense with an SMG on the roof,” BobLee stated.

“Why are you on the roof? Why aren’t you harvesting?” Furiosa asked.

“I figured you guys would want a look out,” BobLee said abashed.

Furiosa groaned. “Kaiser is manning the fort for now and we don’t have any bolties yet. Roof support is useless right now.”

“Gotcha, I’m heading out now,” BobLee stated. Kaiser could hear the ladder hatches opening and closing as BobLee descended through the base.

“Sorry guys. Still a little green,” BobLee said apologetically.

“No problem,” Kaiser said. “It is the beginning of the wipe. There are no real threats at the moment.”

“Alright,” BobLee said, grabbing some tools from tool boxes. “I’m heading out.”

“Fair enough,” Kaiser replied.

BobLee was new to the group only being with the Dojo since the previous game cycle. Being Furiosa’s friend, Furiosa took him under his wing and taught BobLee the game mechanics. He caught on quick. After a few days of training we found that he was good at two things: gathering and sniping. After BobLee’s unofficial training was complete the Dojo logged on a day later to find their coffers were loaded with building materials. The best part was that the only reason the Dojo did not have more was because they did not have enough room for it all. One could saw that it was because of BobLee that the Dojo had ridiculously sized bases. Providing the materials for these bases was not all he was good at. He was also particularly adept at defending them. Kaiser thought it had something to do with BobLee being an ex-marine. BobLee was a crack-shot with the bolt action – very rarely missing a shot. He did not get headshots every time – only a hacker was capable of that – but he did get them more often than others. Because of these skills, the Dojo had given BobLee the title of Master of Collection and Sniping.

Furiosa ran in the base as BobLee left. “I’ve got yer wood.”

“Mmm, you don’t say,” Kaiser laughed.

“Mmm. Now make those bolties.”

“I’m on it. Just keep bringing in the resources.”

BobLee spoke up. “Uh, guys? There is a naked approaching us from the road. He is crossing the field right now. He has a torch out and it’s lit.” It was day time.

“Huh, interesting,” Kaiser said. A lit torch during the day typically meant one of two things: a noob or a symbol of non-hostility. Typically when a person had a torch lit during the day and they were approaching someone this meant that they were not hostile. It was known as a torch of peace. Kaiser did not know how well this was known on other servers but this server it was quite popular. “Don’t kill him.”

“Wasn’t going to,” BobLee stated.

“I was talking to Tsurgi,” Kaiser laughed.

“Hehehe, awwwww,” Tsurgi laughed mischievously. “And I am right behind him too.”

“Furi, you want to handle this?” Kaiser suggested. “Politics is your area.”

“Yea, I got this,” Furiosa said, his ego inflamed.

“Hey there,” Furiosa pointed his waterpipe shotgun at him. Tsurgi did the same.

Kaiser climb up to the second floor and walked to a window to get a view. BobLee, Furiosa, and Tsurgi surrounded the naked.

“Hey guys,” said the naked. He sounded as though he was ready to get shot.

“Hey, what are you doin’ here?” Furiosa inquired over proxy-voice-chat, trying to sound a little threatening.

The naked kept moving around, his lit torch held still above his head. “My name is Anderson. I am with two other by the lighthouse. Just thought we would introduce ourselves to everyone in the area. We’re friendly,” Anderson said in a tone that seemed honest enough.

“That may be true but this is our territory,” Furiosa said.

“That’s alright. We won’t take from you. What exactly is your territory?” Anderson asked.

“Everything past the road in our direction,” Furiosa replied. “We also tend to farm further though.”

“Alright, well would you guys like to be allies?” Anderson asked uneasily. Furiosa had been coming on a little strong but if we were hostile the naked would have been dead already.

Furiosa paused for a moment. “Let me confer with my associates.”

“Sure.”

Furiosa switched over to talking to his group only. “He seems pretty harmless.”

“I agree. He probably wants to be friends with the biggest base in the server. Who wouldn’t? He’s not going to pose any threat,” BobLee said.

“It’s always better to have friends than enemies,” Kaiser added.

Tsurgi groaned. “Enemies are more fun.”

Everyone laughed.

“Alright, the verdict is in,” Furiosa said to Anderson. “We’ll be allies. We need a way to identify you though.”

“My group only wears blue hoodies,” Anderson stated. He sound quite relieved.

“We only wear black hoodies,” Furiosa replied.

“Awesome,” Anderson said. “We’ll see you guys around. Let us know if you need help.”

“Same to you.”

Anderson ran off, putting out his torch. The Dojo watched him travel over the field past the road. They now saw where he lived. A small base just over the crest of another could just barely be seen.

“Yet another successful encounter,” Furiosa said with pride.

“Furi the Diplomat,” Kaiser laughed. The slight irony of this name did not escape him. He was sure it did not escape Furiosa either.

Technically speaking, the Dojo did not have a leader. However, early on Furiosa did show a knack for handling volatile situations effectively and diffusing them. He was also particularly good at talking down and negotiating with hostiles. After the Dojo counterattacks a raider group after that group fails a raid on the Dojo it fell on Furiosa to negotiate peace terms. This typically meant extorting them for materials in recompense for their attempt at raiding the Dojo. This was also done after one of them was killed and their gear stolen. Furiosa with the intimidating support of the Dojo would negotiate the return of the stolen items. Sometimes it did not work but most times it did. Considering the type of people who play Rust it was quite surprising that Furiosa was ever successful in the first place. Charisma was Furiosa’s highest quality. He ended up becoming the public face of the Dojo and leader in terms of inter-clan relations. This gave him the title of Master of Diplomacy.

Kaiser was right, making friends was better than making enemies. The trouble with this was that not everyone wanted to be friendly. In fact, the better portion of those who play Rust were quite the opposite – to the point of being toxic. The Dojo knew this. In a game like this it was to be expected. They thought they knew all about the trolling and cruelty of most players in Rust. They thought wrong.

Next Chapter: Chapter 4 – Trainees and Enemies