Tell us the story of an in-game item with sentimental value!

I wear a medal which reminds me of scars and thousands of lives lost (and even more survivors).

On March 22, 2013, the great Battle of Caldari Prime exploded into New Eden history. The battle was the culminating moment of four years of occupation of Luminaire VII by the Caldari fleet consisting of the Shiigeru Leviathan and its escorts. The Leviathan had been positioned over the planet as the result of an invasion of Gallente space and Luminaire by Caldari Executor Tibus Heth. For years, the Leviathan fended off attacks by prospective capsuleers, but at the beginning of the year, tensions between the Gallente and Caldari reached the boiling point.

With DUST 514 deployed and clone soldiers fighting across the stars, an uprising on Luminaire VII led to escalating violence, which necessitated the deployment of the Caldari 37th Octopus Squaron capital support group to protect the Leviathan, which was deploying reinforcements to Luminaire VII. After several hours of standoff, the Gallente fleet then scrambled its own capital fleet and warped to the grid. The engagement began in earnest following the destruction of a DED officer’s ship, and the system-wide suspect-flagging of every single capsuleer pilot.

Capsuleer fleets engaged both sides for a solid hour, which resulted in the destruction of the Shiigeru Leviathan and the entire Caldari 37th Octopus Squadron over the planet. The crash of the Leviathan left molten scars which were visible from orbit for more than 11 years.

In the aftermath of the battle, the powers that be sought to issue an item to capsuleers who participated in the battle: a medal. While the gesture was nice, it was I who pitched the argument to CCP Falcon and others that such an item that could be bought or sold or even stolen could be a platform used to promote “stolen valor” and would be insulting to those who fought in that battle.

The plan was set to award actual medals to capsuleers who fought there.

I am proud to say that our efforts bore fruit, and the Battle of Caldari Prime remains as a permanent historical moment in the history of this great New Eden.

To help preserve said history, I hosted several gatherings on the anniversary of the battle (which included “Missing Man Formations”) and spent over a year writing a massive EVE-Wiki article on the incident, which has migrated between Wikipedia pages. Luckily enough, I have it preserved as a hard copy, and will be restoring it in due time.

I may be one of the last veterans who remember the Battle of Caldari Prime, but the medal is a constant reminder of the incident and its rich history.

One item with sentimental value for me is the Shadows in my hangar, I got them from killing a faction titan, the Komodo, where I was the tackler and the FC. Sadly the Komodo was my friend from a previous alliance :).
I've also kept the Nightmare that dropped from his Komodo too, and appropriately named it "Looted from a Komodo"

Here is my submission, nearly got emotional but managed to hold that in check (video may still be processing to higher quality)

My treasure is Heron. A regular frigate for scanning without expensive modules. At that time, there was an event in honor of the collaboration with the Doctor Who series and there were keys that opened the abyss for scanning. For several days in a row, I flew in them, saved up resources and periodically sold them. At some point, after several visits, I decided to sell the accumulated loot without placing sell orders. And suddenly I noticed that instead of 40 million, as the inventory calculated, the sum of all items on sale was more than 6 billion! It turned out to be some kind of jacket, the price of which was not even displayed in the hold. This is the first time when my balance was more than 1 billion and since then this ship has been stored in my hangar

One of the most meaningful items for me in EVE is my first Rifter, the iconic Minmatar frigate. It wasn’t fancy or valuable, but it was the ship that marked my first foray into low-sec space as a newbie pilot.

I remember fitting it with whatever modules I could afford (and barely understanding what they did). My goal was simple: try some PvP and not lose my nerves the first time someone locked me. It didn’t go well—I was obliterated within minutes by a more experienced player. But instead of trash-talking, they reached out afterward, shared advice, and even sent me some ISK to cover my loss. They told me, “We’ve all been there. Keep flying brave.”

That little Rifter became a symbol of my learning curve in EVE. I kept the wreck’s killmail and bought a new Rifter soon after, naming it "Phoenix" to represent my comeback. Even though I eventually moved on to bigger ships, I still keep one fully fitted Rifter in my hangar as a reminder of where I started and how far I’ve come. It’s a sentimental relic in a universe that rarely forgives mistakes but always rewards perseverance