Whole lot going on last night. I had a family dinner last night so I didn't get on until much later than usual. I only had a 3h window for EVE last night, so I figured "should be a relatively calm, I can get some PI done and then run an anom or two before bed"... Just goes to show you how wrong you can be. Instead I get on and there's a CTA starting 2 min after I log in. So I grab a Hurricane (I really am going to have to get that Maelstrom hull down to 0.0 - getting tired of showing up to shield fleets in hurricanes all the time - course it would be nice if the CTAs abate a bit to allow me to do so...) and burn for the formup area.
Once there it was a matter of waiting a bit as there seemed to be quite a bit going on at the command level while the fleet (cap and supercap heavy!) was forming. I appreciated the chance to "look at" some ships I rarely get to see (having lived in high sec and wormhole space for most of my EVE career). The delay was explained when one took a look at EVE maps and noticed a constellation in our space that was suddenly without sov. In the end we were told that although the supercaps would eventually be dealing with some "issues" related to that situation, the fleet I was part of was going ahead with it's original plan.
And then things started to move. It was to be "Incap everything we can find in the two DRF systems in Geminate".
So we are bridged down right on top of one of the iHubs we need to hit. And the sub-cap fleet starts chewing away. We're not doing toooo badly, when our cap/supercap fleet arrive. As they finish deploying drones we are told to align to the outgate and start burning for the next iHub. Holy hell! Visible movement to the damage bar on the iHub. By the time we warp then land at the gate (about 2min total from the time the supercaps landed on grid) the iHub was incapacitated. The evening went like that for the next few minutes with us starting in on things and the supercaps arriving and "showing us the firepower".
We were undisturbed by the DRF for the duration of this op, this being deep in the US timezone. And we bridged back to our staging system. Cadillac all the way. 2.5h after start of op that op was finished. At that point although there would be further ops I just had enough time to head back to home base, do 15min of PI and log for the night.
In the morning I check evemaps and sure enough all vulnerable systems were in NC hands after downtime. Obviously the collective FCs had made the right call since we were able to achieve our original objectives and deal with the distraction of the sovereignty issue in our own back yard. Not a great night for forwarding my personal objectives of getting more appropriate hulls and fits established but a good night for the NC as a whole it looks like.
Note: I won't report what hearsay there was about the sov situation, except to say that there was a sov situation since that much can be observed through evemaps. Mainly because it was hearsay and since I'm not involved in the higher level stuff (thank god!) there's no way to confirm the truth about what we heard. Ah, politics, such murky waters.
Edit: Another point of view of these events can be seen at Kirith Kodachi's site
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Monday, March 14, 2011
Ok, that was a lot of ops on saturday and sunday
Busy weekend in the NC. Started off just missing a CTA to rescue a tower. Having missed that, I hooked up with a home defense fleet that was organizing to go after some reds in our space.
Engagement the first.
I ended up choosing a cov-ops for this mission. We ended up almost mousetrapping a Raiden roam that had gone up a one way street. I was scouting as the fleet was plugging up the only exit. At one point I did try to probe the Raiden roam that was probably at a safe spot while I kept eyes on a specific gate, but no luck on that. The Raiden guys bolted for home at that point and we did manage to get a kill or two as they tried to burn towards home. So we chased them back to Geminate. At this point things got a little messy. At a fork in the road we have the Raiden guys that went one way and at the other we're suddenly confronted with Blackline. The FC in his infinite wisdom decides to find out if Blackline. are as good as he's heard.
Engagement the second.
Short story: they are. I got a ring side seat to Blackline doing what it does best and our FC getting a little impatient and jumping into them. Sure enough although we managed to dis-engage with most of our fleet intact we did take a few losses, mainly to our logistics.
Engagement the second bis.
This is when things got fun. That Raiden roam we were talking about? Managed to slip between us and Blackline and then jump right into Blackline just like we did. So our FC decides to muddy the water and after a quick u-turn comes back and jumps into the ongoing fight making it a 3 way for a very short while. Raiden melted at this point and the engagement between Blackline and ourselves continued. But we managed to get out and dis-engage at that point.
Engagement the third.
At this point we get to a rally point for a slight break and for some of our pilots to get some replacement ships. While there we get wind of a roam that had some potential and was in need of some reinforcement. So off we go to the Kavala Expanse. On the way we manage to get lucky and two red ships going from point a to point b manage to run smack into our fleet. Since I was pushing ahead they managed to be ready and go the two. We then caught up with the other fleet and after some neutral results (no actual engagement was had once we caught up to them) we headed back to NC space in order to take a break before a scheduled CTA.
I make the CTA this time.
This one ended up being a simple shield repair fleet. We flew to the POS and the POS was patched up and we flew back. We did loose an interceptor to some shenanigans next door but otherwise it was un-eventful. Not exciting but necessary. After we went back to our rally point I decided to bail from the fleet as I'd now been on ops for about 7h total.
Flying with and against the Russians.
The next day was once again CTA time. This time a combined NC fleet was taking to that hotspot in Geminate that is the O2O system. My first thought on entering the fleet was: did I get in the wrong fleet? Lots of Russian. Turned out we had a Russian FC for this op. My big problem is that I was in a close range battleship with no way of switching fits right before the OP. Note to self: Re-fit some of the armor BS to long range fits. At one point I did manage to get high damage against a Jaguar that had wander a little too close to our fleet, but for the most part the reds were outside my engagement range. It was very frustrating. The initial part of the battle went well but eventually it went south and I lost my Tempest just prior to the fleet getting hot dropped by enemy super caps. Ah well, Geminate will remain hot for a while longer.
Towards the end of Sunday I did manage to solve my issues of getting an Orca into our operations area for my alt. And I also got my alt started on PI in 0.0. I'll be concentrating on tower fuels for the most part. My robotics production is hitting high gear on my main.
I did manage to get a Scimitar fit out and brought down. So the establishment of my "stable of remounts" is ongoing. Mind you all this logistics work does interfere with making isk. But such is life.
Engagement the first.
I ended up choosing a cov-ops for this mission. We ended up almost mousetrapping a Raiden roam that had gone up a one way street. I was scouting as the fleet was plugging up the only exit. At one point I did try to probe the Raiden roam that was probably at a safe spot while I kept eyes on a specific gate, but no luck on that. The Raiden guys bolted for home at that point and we did manage to get a kill or two as they tried to burn towards home. So we chased them back to Geminate. At this point things got a little messy. At a fork in the road we have the Raiden guys that went one way and at the other we're suddenly confronted with Blackline. The FC in his infinite wisdom decides to find out if Blackline. are as good as he's heard.
Engagement the second.
Short story: they are. I got a ring side seat to Blackline doing what it does best and our FC getting a little impatient and jumping into them. Sure enough although we managed to dis-engage with most of our fleet intact we did take a few losses, mainly to our logistics.
Engagement the second bis.
This is when things got fun. That Raiden roam we were talking about? Managed to slip between us and Blackline and then jump right into Blackline just like we did. So our FC decides to muddy the water and after a quick u-turn comes back and jumps into the ongoing fight making it a 3 way for a very short while. Raiden melted at this point and the engagement between Blackline and ourselves continued. But we managed to get out and dis-engage at that point.
Engagement the third.
At this point we get to a rally point for a slight break and for some of our pilots to get some replacement ships. While there we get wind of a roam that had some potential and was in need of some reinforcement. So off we go to the Kavala Expanse. On the way we manage to get lucky and two red ships going from point a to point b manage to run smack into our fleet. Since I was pushing ahead they managed to be ready and go the two. We then caught up with the other fleet and after some neutral results (no actual engagement was had once we caught up to them) we headed back to NC space in order to take a break before a scheduled CTA.
I make the CTA this time.
This one ended up being a simple shield repair fleet. We flew to the POS and the POS was patched up and we flew back. We did loose an interceptor to some shenanigans next door but otherwise it was un-eventful. Not exciting but necessary. After we went back to our rally point I decided to bail from the fleet as I'd now been on ops for about 7h total.
Flying with and against the Russians.
The next day was once again CTA time. This time a combined NC fleet was taking to that hotspot in Geminate that is the O2O system. My first thought on entering the fleet was: did I get in the wrong fleet? Lots of Russian. Turned out we had a Russian FC for this op. My big problem is that I was in a close range battleship with no way of switching fits right before the OP. Note to self: Re-fit some of the armor BS to long range fits. At one point I did manage to get high damage against a Jaguar that had wander a little too close to our fleet, but for the most part the reds were outside my engagement range. It was very frustrating. The initial part of the battle went well but eventually it went south and I lost my Tempest just prior to the fleet getting hot dropped by enemy super caps. Ah well, Geminate will remain hot for a while longer.
Towards the end of Sunday I did manage to solve my issues of getting an Orca into our operations area for my alt. And I also got my alt started on PI in 0.0. I'll be concentrating on tower fuels for the most part. My robotics production is hitting high gear on my main.
I did manage to get a Scimitar fit out and brought down. So the establishment of my "stable of remounts" is ongoing. Mind you all this logistics work does interfere with making isk. But such is life.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
PI in 0.0
About the most annoying part of doing PI in 0.0 is that you need to keep on top of the resources piling up. Apart from that it works out fine. Don't need an expensive hauler to handle the goods, and if you are moving stuff around on a daily basis if you should get ganked at some point in time it won't be the end of the world.
Something some players loose track of sometimes is that it's not always necessary to build up "the best" ship for a specific job. Sometimes a "sufficient" ship will do fine. In this case I'm using a mammoth with 4 T1 extenders, 2 Medium shield expanders, 2 em hardeners and 1 thermal hardener. That's it. Total replacement value around 1mil isk. One day, I'm sure I'll get ganked in it. But at least it will have made it's replacement value in profits in the meantime and it will be cheap to replace (heck this one was built from melted rat loot - including all the modules in it). It's cargo space is plenty for moving around all the materials from my extraction planets to my production planet and the final items to the station. That being the case, why should I invest in a more expensive ship that would just be more losses when it gets blown up? It's not like a more expensive hauler will save me from getting ganked. Smart flying and attention to intel channels do that.
Something some players loose track of sometimes is that it's not always necessary to build up "the best" ship for a specific job. Sometimes a "sufficient" ship will do fine. In this case I'm using a mammoth with 4 T1 extenders, 2 Medium shield expanders, 2 em hardeners and 1 thermal hardener. That's it. Total replacement value around 1mil isk. One day, I'm sure I'll get ganked in it. But at least it will have made it's replacement value in profits in the meantime and it will be cheap to replace (heck this one was built from melted rat loot - including all the modules in it). It's cargo space is plenty for moving around all the materials from my extraction planets to my production planet and the final items to the station. That being the case, why should I invest in a more expensive ship that would just be more losses when it gets blown up? It's not like a more expensive hauler will save me from getting ganked. Smart flying and attention to intel channels do that.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Well I'm glad nothing happened
New definition for mixed emotions. Flying with an FC that does not inspire confidence to support a POS repping op and nothing happens. Yep it was one of those nights. Starts off with a standard announced CTA. The time rolls around and immediately things start to go sideways - the FC calls for a change in loadout. Not having either an appropriate ship nor reserve modules to refit a hull, I decide to grab my interceptor.
Equipped with my trusty steed, I head towards the rally point. We start moving out soon. Sure enough thanks to the vague orders the FC managed to split the fleet while traveling to the destination. This is not normally something that gives your pilots confidence in your leadership skills. Miraculously we arrived at our destination without incident with the repair work underway. A short amount of time and we were able to return home without incident.
The good thing about this CTA was that it was a short one. This allowed me to get back to running anomalies. I'm still running anomalies a bit hap hazard instead of concentrating on the best isk per hour ones since they are new and I'm trying to get a feel for them. So far I like the Forsaken ones best as they are short and sweet and the Hub and the Rally Point have BS on every spawn.
Meanwhile like most 0.0 residence I'm getting into PI down here and getting my main alt into the corp to help out with that. Lord knows with all the large towers sprouting all over the place there's a need for POS fuel.
Equipped with my trusty steed, I head towards the rally point. We start moving out soon. Sure enough thanks to the vague orders the FC managed to split the fleet while traveling to the destination. This is not normally something that gives your pilots confidence in your leadership skills. Miraculously we arrived at our destination without incident with the repair work underway. A short amount of time and we were able to return home without incident.
The good thing about this CTA was that it was a short one. This allowed me to get back to running anomalies. I'm still running anomalies a bit hap hazard instead of concentrating on the best isk per hour ones since they are new and I'm trying to get a feel for them. So far I like the Forsaken ones best as they are short and sweet and the Hub and the Rally Point have BS on every spawn.
Meanwhile like most 0.0 residence I'm getting into PI down here and getting my main alt into the corp to help out with that. Lord knows with all the large towers sprouting all over the place there's a need for POS fuel.
Monday, March 7, 2011
CTAs and the buildup continues
This weekend was a mix of CTAs and the continuing buildup of my nullsec reserves. My latest shipment arrived and I was able to fit (and loose a battle cruiser). I'm also starting to figure out which FCs are good and which, I'd rather not bring an expensive ship to their shindig. Clue: broadcasting primaries and secondaries is good, saying "just shoot the thing nearest you" is bad.
The one problem I have with the build up of my 0.0 presence of course is the time it takes. Basically I need to build up a stable of re-mounts from scratch. This is an expensive proposition. Replacing combat losses at least has insurance to defray part of the cost. An outright build up means you're paying full price for everything. And in 0.0 even with a well stocked market, this is extra expensive. Or time consuming as you purchase/build in high sec and ship it down. The other thing is that even though you make isk much faster than you do in high sec (oh yea momma, come to papa you sweet iskies you). Essentially re-shipping from scratch is a time intensive effort. One more trip up to high sec and that should allow me to get the base of my "stable" established. Once I do that it'll be "build back up to over 1 bil isk" and go shopping for the "cool" ships - like the Rapier, the Scimitar or the Munin.
In an effort to make a bit more iskies, I've started doing PI mainly to sell pos fuel to the corp. Not sure how this is going to balance out in the long run, but being able to make some more iskies than just running anomalies and exploration sites is a good idea. I've also decided to bring my alt Zindal down with me so some shuffling of corporations up in high sec is in order. I'll also have a corporation for sale in high sec that can anchor towers in 0.7 Minmatar and 0.7 Gallente space for sale once I bring back my 3rd account (contact me via in game eve-mail if interested).
The one problem I have with the build up of my 0.0 presence of course is the time it takes. Basically I need to build up a stable of re-mounts from scratch. This is an expensive proposition. Replacing combat losses at least has insurance to defray part of the cost. An outright build up means you're paying full price for everything. And in 0.0 even with a well stocked market, this is extra expensive. Or time consuming as you purchase/build in high sec and ship it down. The other thing is that even though you make isk much faster than you do in high sec (oh yea momma, come to papa you sweet iskies you). Essentially re-shipping from scratch is a time intensive effort. One more trip up to high sec and that should allow me to get the base of my "stable" established. Once I do that it'll be "build back up to over 1 bil isk" and go shopping for the "cool" ships - like the Rapier, the Scimitar or the Munin.
In an effort to make a bit more iskies, I've started doing PI mainly to sell pos fuel to the corp. Not sure how this is going to balance out in the long run, but being able to make some more iskies than just running anomalies and exploration sites is a good idea. I've also decided to bring my alt Zindal down with me so some shuffling of corporations up in high sec is in order. I'll also have a corporation for sale in high sec that can anchor towers in 0.7 Minmatar and 0.7 Gallente space for sale once I bring back my 3rd account (contact me via in game eve-mail if interested).
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Building up.
Now that I've finally settled into 0.0, it's time to get serious about the buildup of my fleet. Any pilot in EVE needs to maintain a stable of re-mounts. Different ships have different uses and specializations. On top of that you need to plan for the replacement of combat losses. For my initial fleet I plan on having a back bone of six battle cruisers and six battleships. Battlecruisers are for roams, fast response fleets and when I run out of battleships. Battleships are for main fleets (going for strategic objectives as part of a CTA or Home defense fleet when called for by the FC). Only once this backbone is in place will I work on building/re-building a stable of T2 ships for use on ops.
We'll see how it all goes but so far looks like within a few days I'll only be one BS hull short of my initial objective. At that point it will be "build back up the funds" time.
We'll see how it all goes but so far looks like within a few days I'll only be one BS hull short of my initial objective. At that point it will be "build back up the funds" time.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Stoping by the old haunts
Since it was quite a trip back to the area of 0.0 that I now live in from the op Sunday night, I decided to stop off at my high sec base and pop some stuff out of the oven and get some hulls built for later transshipment to 0.0. I'll also need to get the alt to Jita and purchase some module kits in order to fit out said hulls.
Mmmmmm Barrage M mmmmm....
Mmmmmm Barrage M mmmmm....
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