Took a break

I took a break this evening and went out and saw the new James Bond flick. Just got on enough to start my alt down the certificates road. First objective: getting Basic Core, Defense, Navigation and combat skills (gunnery, missiles, drones, EW).

A "relaxing" night of plexing

As I headed out to the dock and my collection of ships, I informed the crew of my Cheetah that it was time to do some scanning and see what the Amarr had left in the way of occupation complexes. As per my habit, I drop a multispec probe right on exit from the station. Since it's impossible to cloak up so close to a station there is no harm in dropping a multispec probe before moving off and cloaking up. I wave a quick hello to my CEO who happens to be on his way out of the system and settle down to wait for the results (175 seconds later).

Sure enough I confirm the presence of at least one Amarr complex in the system. I'm about to start running down the planets with the on-board scanner when I notice a war target in system. So I do a directional scan. It's an Amarr Navy Slicer!!! Unfortunately It jumps before I can nail it's location, neu bastien does an immediate 180 and orders me to jump arround looking. Although we don't find the the war target, I do find six open Amarr complexes one system over.

We decide to go run these plexes down. Since it's three medium and three major complexes, this calls for speed tanking. I go and grab my Republic Fleet Firetail. This ship realy is quite the sweet little ship. We settle in to running these plexes and we are eventualy joined by a friendly Vigil pilot. We're on the 2nd to last plex when a pirate AF comes in to play with myself and the Vigil. Since neither of us is realy in a ship that can take on a Retribution, we simply stay out of his way. About 5 mintutes of playing "Dodge the pirate" and we get a call from neu to come into the other remaining plex as it's nearing it's end. We do so and the pirate leaves system probably disgusted we wouln't play (we could taste his fustration and it was sweet). The last two plexes fall and we head back to the first system to run down any plexes that were there.

We find a minor Amarr complex and I radio ahead to the station containing my spare ships to wake up the destroyer crew and prep my Thrasher for action. Once in there the Amarr NPC scum rapidly fall to the masive firepower the Thrasher can bring to bear. Tech 2 artillery cannons are your friends. Once that one is done it's back to the Cheetah both to confirm that there are no complexes left in the system and to hunt down the next system

We find one in another nearby system. It is another Major Amarr complex. This time I head back and grab a T1 equiped Vigil. This turned out to be a good choice as eventualy a pirate Rapier came in to play. By this time my CEO had logged and the Vigil pilot had been replaced by a friendly Retribution pilot. When the rapier uncloaked to come and play with us I had managed to keep away from him in my Vigil. But the Retribution was not so lucky. He ended up caught so I charged back in with my Vigil to tackle and attack the Rapier.

I lost my Vigil but the Rapier was chassed off by the firepower and tank of the Retribution. In retrospect I should have ordered the Retribution to go on the offensive the moment he was attacked joined in a little slower. But overall it's better for me to lose a cheap Vigil than for him to loose his Retribution. We end up finishing the plex. After 8 plexes in the evening I dock up and call it a night.

Tackling and the FC blowing a fuse

First of all let's understand the role of the fast tackle. A fast tackle, when not in an interceptor (I really should train for those one day), should be a MWD equipped frigate with a disruptor and a web. Even in this day and age of the speed nerf. Your purpose is to get a point on what ever the FC calls as primary first. When you're not in a fleet fight (i.e. the squadron/wing/whatever just landed on a lone or a few enemy ships), there are certain things you need to be aware of.

First is as first tackle you will be primaried by the alert enemy. Since if he kills you he may be able to warp away. And he should be looking to warp away post haste if he sees the numbers he's up against. So the odds are you'll be loosing your ships prety regularely in such situation.

Second your job is to get the first point long enough for a 2nd ship to get point so you can get out of dodge. This is the part that will usually end up loosing you your ship.

So there I was last night, we were in a plex and got the call that a flashy pirate had landed on the accel gate. I warp out to a relatively close object and then warp back to the plex and land on the gate and proceed to get a point on the Drake. We know it's bait but we figure we're enough to take what the pirates are bringing (being over 10 in local). Sure enough 2 BS drop in on the fight and I'm slowly being eaten away as I wait for someone else to call point so I can warp out. I wait in veign. I warn the FC that he's about to loose point on the primary and call point down as I get my pod out.

Sure enough the Drake warps off as I'm warping in my pod towards a new ship. The fleet had failed to ensure a secondary point on the primary. This is when our FC blows a fuse and calls everyone to get out of the fight and rally in Kourm at the Kamela gate. After a little talking to, and being in a new ship we go in to try again. Once again (This time in a Vigil) I get first point on the designated primary and hear the follow up points before I'm killed, I try to get away but am unable to do it in time. Another frigate down. This time however the fight goes much better and although we don't get the Drake, we do get a Megathron and a Raven. Unfortunately I don't get back in time to get in on any of the KM.

The point here is that I was flying a frigate as first tackle. I fully expect to loose ships. I fit my ships in consequence. These ships have un-named T1 fittings only. They are fully insured. My net loss for one of these shis is arround 140k isk. My income ability as a 23mil SP industrialist is such that there is no way I can loose enough of these to run out of ships or isk. In fact I tend to build my own since that's even cheaper than buying it off the market (for me - I have a full set of reserched BPOs for any frigate build I might want). The bigger ships are more work but frigates I can make batches of 10-20 (all modules and ammo included) overnight. Flight times and re-shipping times and the general ease of survivability of frigates in low sec mean that I've never lost more than 4 frigates in an engagement. So I don't need to worry about replacement issues with these ships.

Flying like I do, however, I'll usualy have to warp off sometime after getting first point. Usualy cuz some batch of drones is chewing on my exhaust ports. Some times I make it out, sometimes I don't. In either case someone else has to get "second point" after I do.

Some may argue that it would be better to fly in an interceptor. I agree - but a) can't fly one yet and b) flying like I do I'm available for fleet ops MUCH more often than someone flying T2 (unless their pockets are REALY deep). Most of the people that do fly T2 equiped ships on a regular basis end up spending an in-ordinate amount of time running missions or attending to their income streams. When I'm not in a fleet, I'm usualy scanning plexes or running them solo in offensive territory.

Little action, Lota plexing, *sigh* another fail dessy

Yesterday was one of those "all over the place" type of nights. Started off in some random station I had docked up at in my Vigil. I made my way to Asghed and wasn't seeing much so decided to x up. A quick invite from Wei and I was in the fleet, once again armed with my trusty Vigil I made my way over to the Kamela/Lamaa area. Once again we were using the local plexing to hopefully generate some fights.

Early on I managed to get tackle on a Tristan that went down rather quickly (suicidal the dude). After some un-eventful plexing in Kamela we have a flashy pirate at a planet so the cov-ops calls warp to 0 and I get a beautiful first tackle on the Hurricane. Once I hear second tackle gets on it and as I see my vigil start to take damage, I warp out and manage to keep my ship alive. Once again I'm amused that my Vigil seems to be highly survivable.

Not having a lot of other action at one point I am with a few other pilots playing station games with Dake Darkstalker (well known to the regulars for being a good Amarr pilot). Just in time to have a disconnect. Not good. Sure enough when I log back on I'm in my pod. Blink Blink. Sorry for the lack of action there Dake.

At this point I jump one system over and get in a reserve rifter (these low sec caches of frigates are darned handy). And we continue on. At this point, we hear that there is a magnate over in the Tararan area (genericaly) and some other running plexes. So I head on over with a small strike group to see what we can do over there. After chasing off some Amarr from one system, we get the call from a cov-ops in Sifilar that someone is running minor plexes. I put a burn on in my Rifter while the 3 other pilots keep playing footsy with some cagey war targets in the Tararan area, since I'm the only ship in our little squadron that can handle minor plexes at this point.

Get in Arzad on the Sifilar gate and have the cov-ops localize which plex the WT is in. Once he does I warp in and burn for the specific plex and go right in. I barely have time to align to my prey when he simply decamps leaving me alone in the plex with the NPCs. I give chase to one of the gates but he gets away. I decide to go and switch to my plex running Thrasher.

Once in my T2 armed Thrasher, I head back to the two minors and after a few initial "issues" proceed to work on the plexes starting with the one that the WT had been working on. Once I was settled in and doing the first plexe comfortably, I had the cov-ops shake loose and go plex hunting nearby. While I'm running the first plex he uncovers a pastel of plexes next door in Arzad. It seems to be pirate and WT active. The FC takes note of this and starts making plans to come our way when their current plexes finish up.

I'm in my 2nd Minor plex (having cleaned it up) when one then two war targets show up in system. And at one point I see a Vengeance on scan. Well that's not getting in. Then a Catalyst. That however is getting in. So I sit on the button hoping for some action and praying he has the usual fail fit dessy. Sure enough he warps in and starts motering towards me. I target and start firing at him. Once he starts aproaching my optimal I start motoring away at full MWD to keep the range open. Sure enough I burn thru all his shields and he hasn't even scrached my paint. At this point he gives up and warps away and I calmly go back to the button and contiue finishing the plex.

Here we see the diference between a KM whoring pilot and an objective focused pilot. Look, destroyers are long range gunboats. Period. Any other fit is just asking for trouble. The Catalyst had fit for close range PvP (as evidenced by my pristine shield). I had fit for long range combat. I know the chances of a kill solo are very slim but that I would be in control of the fight. Sure enough I didn't get a kill. But my objective in FW is to close plexes and get the points. If we'd had a tackle at the warp-in point that catalyst was dead. We didn't so I did the next best thing. Drove him off and capped the plex. I will repeat myself. Destroyers are long range combat ships. Full stop. Other ships in gang are responsible for tackle you are responsible for killing what they tackle - at a nice long range. Don't fit a destroyer for close range combat. Fit it for range.

Anyways the fleet as a whole then proceeded to try and get some action in Arzad. We almost got some but too many of our pilots jumped in local too quickly and we spooked the WT/Pirates away and proceeded to run the plexes. For this I switched over to my Wolf. Didn't get any PvP action for the rest of the night but I'm liking the wolf's DPS.

Fly safe guys and remember AC/Blaster/Pulse armed dessies are fail fits. The ships are just not maneuverable enough to fly with those.

Darned cold

This weekend I was fighting a rather bad cold. So I wasn't actually on EvE as much as I should have been. But this didn't stop me from getting a 2nd solo kill (same guy same sort of circumstances but since it was a Minor plex he was at an even greater disadvantage since I could kill the rats by one-shotting them.

Speaking of plex combat we ran into a rather pickley situation. At one point as part of an offensive plex running group, I had managed to grab aggro. Then as we were running it some Amarr come in to bust up the fun. What ensued was rather annoying from my point of view since my job was to keep my distance and the NPC's off my fellow pilots. This I managed to do without problem. However the rest of my fellow pilots then proceeded to demonstrate how NOT to go up against a Griffin, a Crucifier and eventually a Punisher. The boys keeps screwing up their coordination coming in in dribs and drabs and not coordinating with each other. End result? after about 10minutes of loosing ships we end up having to abandon the plex (well they all lost their ships and I was left with abandoning the field).

Good work by the Amarr flying defensively exactly how you are supposed to. Griffin on the button (able to ecm any ships that warp in while not being in too much danger personally). Punisher at the warp in and Crucifier at optimal from the warp in point. It was, as they say, a turkey shoot. We need to get better gangs than this.

Sunday was mainly ship displacement day. Moving ships arround to make up for the losses, running some plexes in my general area of operations. I've come to some conclusions about plexing and FW in general. It's been my observation that we've got two types of pilots running arround in FW. You've got your plex specialists who tend to run the plexes but have problems doing PvP then you've got your roaming gangs which tend to go out hunting equaly large gangs of Amarr. I think what we need is to organize specific plex running squadrons so that when a force goes into a plex the squadron commander can take over the fight inside the plex. We also need to get better at PvP combat within plexes. We need to come up with some procedures for dispersing combat strength and concentrating it without having the FC micro manage that level of it.

Observation: Griffins are VERY powerful in minor plexes. They are a great force multiplier. I think we may need to come up with a specific fit for a thrasher to take care of them. 50-70km combat zone with ECCM. We'll have to see.

I also need to think about switching my Rifter builds up a bit. AB/Scram combo is MUCH more powerful than it previously was and can compete very well with the MWD/Disruptor/Web that used to be the sin qua non of pvp fits. The MWD Vigil is still insanely fast (a T1 version is hitting 4.7km/s), so those will probably stay as is. We'll see how this works out.

Solo Kill!!!

Today is a great day in my training as a PvP pilot. Today I managed to get my first solo kill. Some will argue it wasn't much of one but for two things. First of all it was in an offensive plex so I had 12 NPC cruisers and frigates trying to kill me at the same time. Two if he had managed to slap a web on me when I was vulnerable it would have gone poorly for me. So it was a rightous kill.

I started the day off moving ships arround. After about an hour of this I decide to find out what plexes are in the area. I manage to find 4 of em. So I solo the 3 minors. Then a WT comes into system and opens up the BC one. I warp into it to find out what he's in. Turns out he was in a crucifier. which cloaked as soon as I got on grid with the NPCs.

Ok I see his game. He'll uncloak and run the clock down when I'm not arround but cloak up when I am arround. Well time to change that up. I head back to station and switch to a disposable dessy and warp back to the plex, sure enough he cloaks up but I proceed to speed/distance tank the NPCs. Seeing me occupied he uncloaks to run the plex down some more but I proceed to burn towards him but at an angle to avoid the npcs. Sure enough I get close enough to target him and prevent him cloaking up and proceed to lay into him. I think he tried to get a web on me but it was for naught and he got killed. I didn't get the pod but was well satisfied with my first solo kill.

The rest of the battle for that plex got rather wild and wooly with an onyx and various and assorted interceptors. Unfortunately due to a DC and good piloting by the Onyx pilot when I re-logged I got killed and podded. I made it back and forces built until we forced the Amarr out of the system and ran the plex down. Then later on they apeared in force (a BC heavy fleet with 19 pilots) and took a regular sized plex. But with the 3 minors and a BC major we of course kept it in contested.

Overall a good morning.

Getting ships together

I've had this wolf hull up in high sec for what seems like ages now. I had bought it back when I had first gotten the skill to fly assault frigates. But I had been unhappy with the various fits I had observed and come up with. So, in a container it sat for many a month.

With Quantum Rise, however, there are some changes in the mechanics of warp scramblers. A scrambler will now turn off an MWD. Also, signature now has much more of an impact in missile combat than speed. So I've finally found a fit I like. After spending a good part of last night running around getting salvage from the market and grabbing modules from various places, I now have a decent wolf fit. We'll see how it performs in combat. May it last longer than most of my combat ships (not likely I know).

One of the advantages of having a nice big BPO collection is that I'm relatively independent from the module/ammo/hull market for T1 equipment. Not you'll note from the mineral market, but definitly from the T1 market. As a rule of thumb, I tend to use pure T1 modules in T1 ships if they are intended to be used and lost. This keeps my expenses down to a very reasonable level. T2 modules go into T2 ships as a rule of thumb. Rigs of course are a different story, I don't realy bother with T2 rigs since they are WAY over priced. The way rigs are structured, they are only realy worth it for larger/more expensive ships. I realy hope one day we get sized rigs.

I know a lot of people tend to go for T2 modules in T1 ships, and indeed I do do this some times. However the truth is the T2 hulls tend to be more survivable than the T1 files. I prefer to put the expensive modules in a more survivable hull. But that's me.