The difference

This battle report will demonstrate the difference between experienced wormhole inhabitants and people who are new to the wormhole scene.

First of all a tactical lay out:

We have BBW which is connected to a class 4 and a class 2
The class 2 is connected to an inhabited class 2 and low sec (over in metropolis - fairly uninhabited near nein)
The class 4 is connected to some other system not relevant to our discussion.

How it all starts.

I get on late and after nailing all the sites in BBW's location using my cov-ops I decide to check out what's in the class 2. Not much but it's un-inhabited and has a mag and a grav site along with 3 combat sites.

I switch to my Loki and call Apis Java (one of my pilots) over in a salvager to clean up after my kills since it's inefficient to keep going back and forth to switch ships all the time, and extra eyes on the d-scanner are always welcome.

I quickly kill off the grav site rats so Apis can get to work while I head for the mag site and start killing it (Forgotten Frontier Gateway for the curious). I"m into the last wave when Apis says "We dont' have an Arazu do we?". And I hit d-scan and sure enough there are combat probes out. "nope get out, get out, get out". And I abandon killing the frigate I was on and warp to the wormhole to BBW. Note that I have been hitting the D-scan regularly as well, but combat can be distracting and two eyes are better than one. Score one for our side - an experienced low SP pilot with plenty of wormhole time under his belt makes sure that we collectively don't end up on the wrong side of the killboard.

Now at this point we're headed back to the our POS. Someother alliance pilots are either kicking in BBW or in that unknown class wormhole on the other side of the class 4. I advise them that PvP potentially may materialize, and the Arazu jumps in to BBW just as Apis is warping from the wormhole to our POS.

At this point I switch ships to my cov-ops while forces gather. Getting back to the wormhole I have the Arazu on scan but he disapears before I can get eyes on him - either cloaked or jumped back. Note that the odds are he would not have spotted my Cheetah since I had cloaked up on warping off and the wormhole is out of scan range of the POS. When I get on grid (but not on the WH obviously) , I ask around to see if anyone sees probes. The answer comes back negative from all pilots spread around BBW and forces warp to me as I move off plane and closer to the wormhole. Rather quickly an Ishtar and a Vagabond as well as a Harpy and a Rifter (Apis) start showing up on our side of the hole. I then zip back into the class 2.

Well well well well... "Proteus on scan" with core probes out (not necessarily his but still). My immediate thought is that he's going for the site that I had not completed. So I warped cloaked to it and keep hitting the d-scan for intel. At this point I notice that he's got Hammerhead II's out, still no sight of the Arazu and he has not apeared at the site I was working (incidentally I get confirmation that Apis had gotten all the salvage/loot from the grav site kills). I notice an increase in wreck count. Humm ok they chase us off and go for combat sites? *shrug* what the heck...

I hit the onboard scanner and get the 3 combat sites that are in system on my scanner. I then get lucky and warp (cloaked of course) to the first one and there he is: a nice shiny new Proteus killing sleepers... Needless to say even with an Arazu in the area the PvP is on. This is where some aggressive cov-ops piloting and some patience on the part of the 4 other pilots (who did not jump into the class 2 yet) pays off. Since he's occupied and I haven't deployed probes he's unaware of the stalk. I did have time to observe his speed - 482m/s - humm AB fit obviously. I get to within 7km while keeping my LOS clear of any missed missiles and making sure I'm on opposite sides of the target from our wormhole connection.

"Jump Jump, warp at 10 to Letrange, Jump Jump warp at 10 to Letrange". Sure enough my boys all land about 8-10k from the target. Rather rapidly all 4 of our ships lay tackle and the fight for the Proteus is on while I keep an eye out on the d-scan and get a bit of separation from the fight.

He's got a good tank but we manage to kill him before any of his friends show up. Once he's dead I tell the frigates to get out of dodge since there are still sleepers there and we've been lucky and have no losses yet. While they get out of dodge, as we're looting the Proteus a Rapier shows up and the Vagabond and the Ishtar get out (the Rapier only managed to get a web on - not a point). As my buddies head towards our wormhole, an Astarte and a Raven also show up.

At this point we decide that since we don't have more reinforcements and there's still the Arazu kicking around, we might as well head back and relax at our respective POS's. After some rather elated banter in voice I log off for the night.

The end result: One rather fail fit Proteus kill on the right side of the kill board, no losses on the wrong side. We did abandon the mag site but can't have everything.

The difference: Turns out after a conversation between the Proteus pilot and the AMC pilot that got the kill mail that this was one of the first wormhole experiences for the Proteus pilot. You'll notice the difference in reactions and situational awareness. We spotted the opponents and reacted correctly, Switched to scout/pvp ships and went on the offensive (never just hole up in a POS - at the very least get in scout ships and scout aggressively). The enemy was fat and lazy and assumed that just chasing us off would allow them to go after sleepers in peace. They then had the gall not to keep an eye out for us. Neither stationing observers nor slamming the d-scan.

I once again prove that the Cheetah is the ship I have the most skill in (kind of embarrassing that the alliance leader engineers these types of kills but never shows up on the KB but oh well it's about presenting targets gift wrapped to the combat pilots, not about getting on the killboard). And I once again prove that situational awareness is key in wormhole operations. Also the flexibility to change from PvE to PvP at the drop of a pin. Even on defense aggressive scouting helps. It gets you intel you need to make intelligent decisions and make sure you're not a quivering pile of goo behind your POS shields.