Memorial Day

I won’t talk much about what this day means to me.  Like far too many I have a beer for friends I can no longer have a beer with.  I will leave one story, rather long, and a video for all of you on this day.  Fly dangerous.

Bob Kalsu, NFL Star, Artilleryman, hero.

All gave some, some gave all

Anatomy of a Shitfit

Failfits might be one of the most entertaining things in EvE.  Who doesn’t like seeing someone’s godawful mess of a ship posted in its full glory on the internet for all to see?  Well, other than the maroon that lost it.  But what makes a shitfit so bad?  I am going to take a look at some common mistakes you see on fits that make them bad.  There are a few exceptions that I’ll talk about, but most of these are things you just DON’T DO!  But first:  Some Excellence from Faifeaggro.  Warning lyrics are totally NSFW, and totally appropriate.

Don’t Mix Guns

There actually used to be a website at Dontmixguns.com devoted to all the reasons this was bad.  Sadly it doesn’t exist anymore.  Don’t mix guns exists on several levels.  First off you never want to have guns of different ranges or size categories.  You don’t want cruiser and BS guns on your BS.  All BS guns.  Always.  Also DO NOT put long and short range guns on your ship.  You don’t want to use say Blasters and Railguns on the same ship.  Pick a range and build your ship around it.

To a lesser extent you want to have all your guns exactly the same type/meta level.  Ideally T2 of the biggest size.  Sometimes this doesn’t work.  I have a Mega fit that uses 6 T2 Neutron Blaster Cannons and 1 T2 Ion.  That is less than ideal, but (barely) acceptable.  The rule for meta-guns is similar.  Ideally you want all your guns in one group so you can be an F1 monkey.  If it ain’t possible 2.

One Tank to Rule them All

Pick one tank.  Don’t go for more than one.  Shields OR Armor, OR speed (OR hull.)  If you are shield tanking, put as much into the shield tank as you can.  Use your lows for damage mods, damage controls, PDS, or shield recharge mods.  Not for armor.  If you are armor tanking, use your mids for cap, speed, or weapon enhancements, not for shield mods.  Speed tanking requires a single-minded focus even on ships that can do it, yes you want to include some buffer but putting a bunch of speed mods on a ship then dropping a plate on it… no.

This doesn’t mean you forego a damage control on… well… just about anything.  Nor that you should skip a speed mod on a ship that needs it.  Just that you focus your resources.  Pick your best tank for the role of the ship and it’s fitting resources / bonuses and USE IT.

Fill ‘er up!

Lows and Mids are made to be filled.  Put something in there.  Ideally put something useful in there.  This is where your fitting skills come in handy.  Maxing out your electronics and the various upgrades skills allow you more CPU, as does engineering for PG.  This allows you to use more and better mods to upgrade your capabilities.  Mids and Lows.  Always filled.  Nothing missing.

Utility Highs might (MIGHT) go empty.  For example the Drake has 8 high slots, and only 7 launchers.  You don’t see a lot of people using that last high, it just isn’t necessary in a lot of fits.  Hurricanes tend to see all kinds of things in their 2 utility highs, as do Tempests, and Armageddons.  These slots often just aren’t that useful.  There is ALWAYS something useful to put in a mid or low slot.  Always.

Rig it!

Rigs are cheap.  Decide what role the ship will fill and rig it appropriately.  These slots are important.  They give your capabilities beyond what normally you could do.

Fit to Your Bonuses

Lasers I cool.  I like lasers.  Don’t put lasers on a Brutix.  Brutix gets a big bonus to Hybrid Damage.  Fit Hybrids.  Ideally Blasters.  Your bonuses are what sets one ship apart from another.  Check the description and find out what your ship receives for bonuses.

Decide on a Role, pick your Ship

Often a ship finds its way to death by being used because it’s “neat” rather than because it is the best ship for the mission.  Don’t say “I have a *ship name* what should I use it for.”  Instead say “I need a ship to do *role* what ship is best,” that way you pick the right ship.

Cap is Important.  Sometimes.

PvE ships should generally be cap stable.  PvP ships don’t worry about it as much.  In general fitting for cap stability in PvP is pretty futile.  PvE ships should use Cap Rechargers, CCC rigs, etc, PvP should rely on cap boosting, especially those that are highly cap dependent.

Don’t Forget Ammo!

Bring the right ammo.  All guns should be using the same ammo, and have both long and short range varieties available.  If you are going into a mission, make sure you bring the right damage type.  Oh and make sure it’s in your cargohold.  Nothing is worse than finding out you have what’s in your guns and that’s it.

This is just a few examples.  There’s plenty of ways to fit ships badly.  There are a few ways to help you fit ships well.  The first is to use a fitting program.  EvE Fitting Tool, EvE-HQ (my favorite) pyfa, I’m sure I’m leaving a few out.

Fly Dangerous.  Fit Well.

I’m using it every time I can

Well That’s Different

So CCP has put in a module that will change blob warfare, and I think opens the door to a concept I think is LONG overdue.  From today’s Dev Blog

MagSheath Target Breaker I - Mid slot. A module that has a chance of breaking the lock of ships targeting you, the chance increases the more ships target you at one time. Also breaks your locks. Reduces scan resolution significantly as a downside. Only one can be fitted at a time and the can not be fitted to capital ships.

Well then…. that should change things a tiny bit.  Blobbing people with tons of cheap ships suddenly gets less effective.  Smaller fleets of more capable ships with better pilots become preferable to huge blobs in some circumstances.  What circumstances those are depend a lot on how widespread the module is, and the hard numbers on exactly how easily it breaks locks as numbers go up.

First thought – 20-30 close range gank ships can use this module to really go to town on large blobs.

Second thought – Logis will HATE this.  Soon as someone pops that mod they had better broadcast for reps because there’s no discrimination between friendly locks and hostile locks.

What’s going to make a big difference is how common the module is.  At first it will command a princely sum, how long that lasts depends a lot on how common the BPC drops.  I won’t go in to how bizarre it is to not have BPOs for this item, but having it as a drop for a while might be fun.  I might even run a few profession sites.  Or not.  If this ship shows up only on the specialists, like Arazus, Rapiers, (or Lachs and Huggy bears) then it won’t affect much in the game, if it shows up on Drakes and other line-of-battle ships, expect some shifts in the fundamental nature of fleet composition.

If it’s only on small ships then you will get “Hit Squads” of small, skills players flying faster ships to go in and assassinate people against whom the massed firepower of the fleet may not be effective anymore.  This actually sounds really cool, not sure how well it would play out in real life.

If it shows up on every shitfit drake in a 400 man fleet… well the other guy might go with a smaller fleet equally heavily supported with these modules and try to carve apart the larger fleet using their own numbers against them.   Also might make escaping ganks easier in PvE ships.  Heck might be a fun module for PvE ships in general if it works against rats.  At the very least provides a somewhat reliable GTFO button.

No matter what this module ends up doing it signals a clear sign that CCP is pushing back against the Blob.  I’m glad to see it, but I think it brings another problem into focus.  Discriminating between “Friendly” and “Hostile” locks.

In modern aviation and even in ground combat vehicles transmit their location and information to friendly units and commanders through transponders of one sort or another.  This potentially reduces or eliminates friendly fire and allows friendly assets to support each other without making the enemy’s job easier.  In EvE if you want to assist your buddy with reps or such you have to lock him.  There is no difference between locking your buddy in one of the (currently outdated) RRBS gangs and locking onto a hostile.  The same mechanics applied for friendly or hostile targets.  This is… well… unusual.  If I was designing a system in an environment where the safety of my ship was likely to depend on friendlies being able to target me, I’d include something in the transponder code to “boost” my signature to people in fleet, allowing them to lock faster.  Additionally targets locked that are friendly should show on a separate bar stacked below or to the side of the normal one, depending on orientation.  The “selected target” should NEVER jump bars.  This would allow ships that use both offensive and defensive modules (carriers, Domis, bad scimitar fits, RRBS if they ever come back into fashion) to quit whoring in on their buddies KMs, and encourage supporting modules in fleets that could benefit from them.

I’m using it every time I can

Recruiting With Guns

Helicity Boson had a great comment on the TEST newbro story today.

I love newbies, I’ve just adopted one I caught streaming a mining op the other day. I tripled his wallet and am monitoring his inevitable fall from miner to scumbag pirate. Which is totally not going to be my fault.

This is the best kind of recruiting, whether for EvE Online in general, or your own PvP group.  Recruiting is something I am not very good at.  I rarely find people who are interested in joining Fancy Hats through forums, or ads, or even the blog.  I DO find people by shooting at them.  It seems counter-intuitive, but it works rather well.  By pewing someone you force them to react to other players intruding into their game.  They can react in one of several ways, and a clever person learns from their reaction.

1. Lose their shit publicly.  Funny, entertaining.  Pretty useless.
2. Be silent.  Smart.  Low risk play.
3. Engages their aggressor in conversation in an effort to learn more about what happened.

I fucking LOVE #3.  Despite how much of a hard-ass I am here, I love seeing new players attempt to overcome hardship and find a way to get ahead in EvE.  EvE is a hard game, and I’m not going to go out of my way to change a playstyle I’ve invested a lot of time in to making fun and effective for someone who hasn’t put in the time and effort to get better.  I will give credit to people who fight back successfully and to people who get blowed up I will give them considerable help and advice if they communicate intelligently with me.

Eventually Bad Things will happen to each and every single EvE player.  Whether it is a prized ship being destroyed, losing a mint on a market investment, a hauler full of goods being ganked, or being betrayed and stolen from by “trusted” corp-mates, EvE is a game that seems to turn heavily on tragedy.  You can’t really control that other than by limiting your exposure.  You CAN control your reaction.  I am going to go WAY out on a limb and guess that this guy talked to Helicity like a reasonable adult who had merely lost a ship in a game, probably laughed about it and displayed the maturity and intelligence that marks a good EvE player.  Helicity most likely responded to it by encouraging him with advice, isk, and probably an invite to a pub room where he could learn more, and find people to push him even futher down the road to “ebbil piwat!” He might turn into the next Helicity Boson, driving content for THOUSANDS of people in EvE, inspiring mayhem and shenanigans across New Eden.  That wouldn’t have happened without A: the nooblets reaction, and B: Helicity taking interest in the guy.

How do I know that this works?  THIS led to me chatting things up with Th3rm, a couple months later, after hanging around in the Sons of 0din chat room (they are probably recruiting and Rico Minali is a great guy) I joined them, and Cult of War.  This led to me having a BLAST in nullsec, including taking over for a guy named Mukkbarovian when he kept getting primaried off the field, and calling targets for 3 or 4 glorious minutes in a furious (losing) battle in J2-PZ6.  Had I lost my shit about the loss, getting warp scrammed by a Proteus at nearly 35 kilometers and hacked down, there is no way I’d have been invited to join the party later.  I would have denied myself the chance to have a LOT of fun and take place in something amazing.  The fault would have been mine.  I laughed about it with Th3rm, earned money for another ship, and Th3rm recognized my attitude and my eagerness to learn and brought me along, until I finally took the plunge.  THAT is recruiting.  THAT is responding maturely to adversity and giving yourself opportunity.

Fly Dangerous.  Score Kills.  If you get killed, don’t lose your shit.  Learn and have fun, it’s pixels in a game.

I’m using it every time I can

How to Run an AAR

The most important part of many operations is figuring out what the hell actually happened.  No matter how well or poorly a battle goes, there is an absolute wealth of knowledge to be gained from going through afterwards and getting different perspectives on events.

There’s 3 main ways of doing AARs.  Hotwashes, Leader Review, and Write-Ups.

Hotwashes

Hotwashes are when everybody involved gets together, usually on voice, for a moderated discussion.  They can be enormously valuable because every perspective is brought to bear.  Even the most incredible noob might bring something priceless to the discussion.  They work best when done IMMEDIATELY after the op ends.  Fleet breaks up, people dock and start talking.

The big things to cover are What went well, What didn’t go well, and what people would improve the next time out.  For this to be successful the people involved have to take the activity seriously, and be able to communicate openly, honestly and without malice.

Openly means being able to say what they need to say without fear of repercussion.

Honestly means being objective about strengths and weaknesses.  Admitting to what happened and not what “Should” have happened.

Without Malice means not taking things to a personal level.

By openly talking through what people think went well and what needed to be improved and how it can be improved while the events in question are still fresh in people’s memory you can get a whole lot of fairly rough information.  You can get insights that people may not remember, or think to voice up later, and you get people feel like they are more involved in their experience.

However the discussion does need to be moderated, personal attacks cannot be tolerated and once a point has been made, it has been made and it’s time to move on.  If a hotwash isn’t moderated or the people doing it don’t take it seriously for whatever reason than it loses a lot of its effectiveness.

Leader Review

Leader Review is a meeting between key leaders, whether it’s FC and sub FCs, FCs and CEOs, FCs CEOs, Scouts, or other designated personnel to have a serious going over of the events.  Again the participants need to be open, honest and without malice, and while they may lose some input from lower-level members, they should gain a great deal of focus.  This type of AAR tends to focus more on leadership actions and usually takes place at a greater remove in time than a hotwash.  These reviews are usually less fractious and easier to control than a hotwash as well.  They don’t tend to take as long and there’s less need to “mine for gold” to get the good information, but there is also the possibility of losing good input with the smaller pool of people involved.

Write-Ups

A write-up is a written report on the actions taken from the point of view of the leader doing the writing.  Who does them is up to alliance rules, although typically it’s the lead FC and anyone else who took over for a significant length of time.  Additionally other FCs who were in the fleet but not taking over might comment on the write-up or do their own.

This write up has the same requirements as the others with regards to how open the author must be.  In addition the writer must focus on things that went well, that need to be reinforced so they happen again, and things that went poorly and steps that can be taken to improve on it the next time around.  The advantage you get with a write-up is a far deeper look from the view of one person, and they can control the discussion initially, and get all their points off, if done on forums it can be replied to, again with a complete write up.  However if there are disagreements on the facts, as can happen, or the writeup is less than completely intellectually honest, the whole process is derailed at the beginning.

My Own Rules/Philosophies

The only name I will name in an AAR is my own.  There’s two reasons for this:  #1 I’ll happily admit my own mistakes, and no one else needs their name dragged through the mud unless they want to give a mea culpa.  #2 Multiple people might have made a mistake, or thought they made a mistake and “People need to be very careful to avoid shooting at non primaries” is something everyone can think “Shit… was I shooting a secondary?  Better check that” as opposed to “Hong Weiloh was shooting secondaries before primaries were down” in which case everyone NOT named Hong Weiloh is going to A: Ignore the comment and B: make fun of Hong.  This is counter-productive.  Additionally “We did a good job shifting damage to secondaries and getting damage on them fast to beat reps” is a lot better than “Shootin’ Star was on the ball calling targets and getting damage switched to beat their reps” because it’s an issue where everyone had a say, and while pumping up the target caller’s ego is good, getting everyone a bit of credit is better.

At least two of these actions should take place.  I prefer a hotwash and a write-up.  It gives both the highest and lowest levels a say, and makes sure that issues aren’t missed and that any action that takes place gets proper coverage.  In addition using a hotwash gives people a voice, and a reason to support the conclusions and changes that might come about because of the AAR process.

Do it fast.  Hotwashes should be done right after, Leader Review and Write-Up no later than 48 hours later.  Don’t let the lessons cool, strike while the iron is hot.

Don’t squash people because you think that what they say is stupid.  It might be an issue people need to think about.  Don’t let anyone else call out a “stupid” idea either.  The idea is to encourage input.

In public discussions keep comments short.  Think then talk.  In forums or written formats go ahead and be verbose.  You don’t want to TL/DR (or really TL Didn’t Think) when it comes to improving your game.

I’m using it every time I can

Safety is Your Responsibility

EvE Online does not assume that anywhere is “Safe” merely “Safer.”  People will be punished for their actions in highsec, and in lowsec, but you will not be saved.  You are vulnerable to rats everywhere outside a station.  Your ship is your responsibility.

You have to take the game environment into account when you plan your activities.  This is no different from every other game out there.  Mario doesn’t let you walk through goombas and koopas.  Tetris doesn’t let you build modern-art masterpieces (for long) WoW doesn’t let you kill Deathwing in a naked level 1 toon.

There are ways to prepare yourself for situations in EvE.  If you are running a mission against Sansha, tank EM/Therm.  Going into a Wormhole?  Watch your direction scanner.  Moving stuff to null?  Make sure your contact is legit.  Mining during the most heavily advertised player-driven anti-miner event?  TAKE REASONABLE PRECAUTIONS.  Bounce between safespots in your belt if it’s big enough.  Mine in a tanked ship to give yourself a chance to survive a poorly planned gank.  Watch D-Scan for tornadoes, catalysts and thrashers.  Look for ships cloaking or decloaking in your belt.  If someone scans your ship, leave.  Bring friends with remote reps.  I’ve had a gank prevented by an orca with RR bots and mods.  I’ve heard of a few others.  It won’t save you from a big gank squad but it gives you a chance against a small one.

None of this is really earth-shattering stuff.  The Earth-Shattering bit?  Being AFK in space isn’t safe.  This guy posted This bit of fried gold.  This ship has a tank of 10,749 EHP with max skills.  You can fill the cargohold in 839 seconds.  Almost 14 minutes.  To get his cargohold that big he sacrificed more than 2k EHP, not that it would have helped him in a 0.5 against 2 catalysts.  Of course to mine plag all he needed to be in was a 0.7 system.  Not a 0.5 like he was in.  Now he might have actually been online seeing as he had 4 different ores in his hold.  Still this is a fit designed for going AFK for 10-12 minutes, coming back, warping off and back, and repeating this while jamming out to some My Little Pwny.

That is not safe behavior in EvE.  This isn’t safe behavior anywhere.  Going AFK while doing PvE in virtually any game will result in death.  Expecting EvE to be THAT different is sad and misinformed.  The dangers are different, sometimes less, sometimes more.  AFK is still bad.  Not paying attention is bad.  Not being suspicious is bad.  One of my favorite rules of EvE is “Just because you are paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you”  Catalysts popping up on Dscan?  Align out, Covops ship gets uncloaked in your belt?  Align out, catalyst warps into your belt?  GTFO son.  It’s a lot easier if you are pre-aligned.

I’m using it every time I can

Obligatory SiSi Post

Played around on SiSi when I could finally get on it.  I have to say the art team has done some damn good work.  The missile effects are sexy.  How sexy?  I’m about ready to trade Cloaky Loki for a Tengu to run around in null and sec back up.  It’s that good.  Didn’t have time the chance to try out the new modules, as they aren’t seeded.

The shield booster looks pretty bad.  It uses cap charges (X-Large can fit 6 Navy Cap Booster 400s) yet it has an activation cost of 470 GJ?  Does it inject cap and activate at the same time?  It boosts for 490 HP every 4s, the base T1 is 450 every 5 so a definite edge there. The problem?  It fits 6 navy cap 400s.  3 800s.  Once those are consumed?  60s reload time.  Also:  it runs your dog over in the street.  Those 60 second reloads are an eternity in a fight.  You will be dead and gone unless you are kiting so well you are taking practically no damage.

Oh and then there’s the inventory.  I can’t decide if I love this so much I’m giving up women or if I hate it so much I’m going to build a giant cannon and barrage CCP headquarters from central Iowa.  There is SO much info but it’s compressed.  There’s ONE sheet.  Like this:

Want to move something around?  Drag and drop, it highlights the bay you will drop it to (thank god) and updates the estimated price down in the lower right.  The filters are neat too.  I should check that out in m Jitamart hangar with one of m indy alts.  The one quibble I have so far, and it is a minor one, is to say that the Amarr T1 ship icons look very old school.  Like pre-trinity.

Also I want to buy all those ships for 9,580,000 isk. Contract them to me Aunenenenen please?

That’s a minor quibble.  Really minor.  The ships themselves look very nice and VERY tough.  The Golden Fleet is here for business, not partying.  Now for the part you want.  Missile spam.

and one more

Seriously I don’t care how badly missiles suck.  With these effects I’m using them.

Anyway next time I play around on SiSi, maybe they’ll remember to seed the modules next time so I can see how evil my AFK mission Domi is.  Also I should throw around some wardecs to see at least how THAT part works.  Someone else on SiSi want to throw a dec on Fancy Hats there so we can play with it a bit?

I’m using it every time I can

An Abbreviated Day 2

With my new and not so improved final project, and sec starting to weaken my striking power I’ve had to shorten my day 2 of Hulkageddon.  Currently I’m #4 on the Hulkageddon leaderboard, with Poetic and Shootin’ Star of Fancy Hats also ranked, #4 on solo kills with Poetic at #10, #2 in Amarr space, with Poetic and Star at #4 and #5 and generally having a blast.  Loot Gods have been generous, and salvage has as well.  Quite a satisfying event to date.  Some observations / tips:

Shoot the target in a belt, dock at a nearby station, undock in a noob ship.  Clears the belt of CONCORD.

Scan everything in the belt if your scout is scanning everything.  Might tip off targets.  Might show you that the Orca sitting there is loaded down with shield transfers.  Cost us a whiff that one did.

Miners are generally pretty ignorant.  There’s been some flat out DUMB killmails we’ve gotten.  For example:  http://tfhc.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=13220561 is not how you tank a Mack.  They were on, but I didn’t see his shields go up much in the time it took me to shred that ship.

http://tfhc.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=13223410 and http://tfhc.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=13214583

If you are gonna use any kind of EWAR, use ECM.  If they are as close as blaster catalysts will get (possibly inside your hull) damps and TDs won’t help you much.

http://tfhc.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=13223924 8000 EHP with all skills at 5.  More likely around 7500.  Not a good way to protect a 300 million isk ships amigo.

http://tfhc.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=13224928 Not bad.  Too bad he was sitting there not moving 4 minutes after another gank, especially when CONCORD had already left the belt.  In his defense he tried to warp off.  I was just 4km away and closing fast when he did.

Happy Hulkageddon Games!

I'm using it every time I can

Showing Their Sting

Today Goonswarm leadership “leaked” what amounts for a bid to win EvE.  Having extended their military might as far as is profitable then are pressing to more profitable Venues.  The three most revealing are Burn Jita, OTEC and the Death Squad, of lesser importance, but still of note is the leadership shuffle and the Tengu Fleet announcement.

Burn Jita

For anyone living under a rock, or willfully ignorant of what is about to start, Goons are about to launch a 2 (or 3) day hellcamp of Jita. The goal of this camp is to either remind everyone else that they enjoy EvE at the sufferance of the swarm, or that Goons can shut down any system, any time, any where.  Both are pretty startling messages if they pull it off.

OTEC

OTEC is a concerted effort by Goons, in concert with Burn Jita to dominate the economic sphere of New Eden.  It is the focal point of T2 components, the Spice of New Eden.  Wars are fought over single moons and much scheming and back-stabbing has happened.  Goons wants to make as much as possible before the far-off specter of “Ring Mining” shakes up their hold on New Eden’s gold.  To do this they will form a consortium between themselves and the other major players holding tech moons, restricting or loosening supply in order to profit the most from this death grip on key production resources.

The Death Squad

The Death Squad is a broadside aimed at the metagame.  Anyone who thinks goons will limit themselves to the forums is out of his mind.  Write a blog post about how shitty you think Goons are?  Welcome to the list.  Host a news site with a perceived anti-goon cant?  Expect friends in local.  Your podcast not supportive enough of Papa Mittens during “Suicide gate?” might want to stay docked up.  This is a means to quiet voices set against the goons, either through intimidating them into silence, or by chasing them clear out of the game.

All this combines into one vicious stinger.  Goons are unsheathing their sword and declaring war on EvE.  I’m a little surprised they didn’t use Seleene’s “TotalHellDeath” expansion poster from his speech a few years back.  This represents a bid to display what Goons clearly feel to be their dominance in all aspects of EvE. Even while they do this.  Even while they burn thousands of Tornadoes and countless thrashers, they are creating a new fleet doctrine.  The Tengu swarm.  Expect these ships to be brought to lots of fights and lost in large numbers.  Goons will be the first to tell you they whelp fleets with occasionally hilarious regularity, and they feel they have the wallet and warchest to do it.  I believe them.

The final note is the leadership shuffle.  Goons are taking the most comprehensive, broad-based offensive, economic, metagame, and plenty of military action, and doing it at the same time as 5 leadership moves.  There’s alliances where this would amount to a complete changeover in leadership, and Goons are doing it in the midst of major operations.  Whatever you feel about Goons, Mittens or their method of operations you have to admire their ability to think big.  If they pull this off they will have demonstrated that not only can they control the game in their own territories, but that they can dominate the game at the heart of the highsec “empire” and beyond the bounds of the game itself.

Fly dangerous, and watch yourself.

I'm using it every time I can

I’m not a SiSi. I Just Play There

Using SiSi is a good tool to take concepts and test them without breaking your wallet, shitting up your killboard and making an utter ass of yourself.  So today I grabbed some guys and headed to a nice little area to blow up some hulks, macks, and take a crack and an orca or two.

We tested fits, to see how close to the bone we could cut it.  We tested some mechanics, for example trying to board a ship (in an Orca or in Space) while GCC got us this notice:

23:12:05 Notify You have been involved in illegal activity whilst piloting this ship. CONCORD prohibits you from destroying evidence by changing ships at this time.

Which I thought was interesting since I managed to apparently commit a crime in a pod.

We tested combinations of ships, how they reacted against the various targets out there, and came to some conclusions which I’ve found rather interesting.  I’m going to post some of them to help gankers do their planning.

The biggest challenge I see is keeping activity going.  With 15 minute timers after every attempted gank, and no way around them gankers will have to operate their fleets rather efficiently to maximize kills in a time period.  Using the minimum number of ships to ENSURE a kill, cleaning the battlefield (if they want) and setting up the support team while a secondary or tertiary squad prepares for their attack.

In addition the spawning of Faction Police (much weaker than CONCORD) means attacks must be launched FAST.  You have to move out from wherever you are basing as soon as you get in the ships, and start shooting nearly as soon as you land.  Losing from 0.3 to 0.5 Sec Status per kill means that kills can deplete Sec in a hurry.  A toon with a full 5.0 standing can afford to kill at most 24 ships before he starts losing access to systems.  With my corp targeting 0.7 and below a person with a 5.0 can hit 28.333 ships before having to worry about faction police.  Corelin has a -1.2 right now so he can kill at most 8 targets before we run into problems.  Clearly pre-seccing up will be a BIG part of this last week of pre-hulkageddon prep.  In addition as the event stretches on people might zip out to good ratting spots and pull their sec status up a bit.

Oh and a LOT of destroyers and hulks and macks were hurt in the preparation of this blog.

I'm using it every time I can