Life Imitates Art

This Christmas I received an awesome new Jedi dressing gown robe. Shut up. Real men love Jedi.

Anyway, while I immediately recognised the intrinsic awesomeness of this gift, I underestimated the hood. I mean, hoods are theatrical and all, but hardly a comfort thing.

How wrong I was.

Putting the hood up makes my head and ears feel just that little bit warmer, almost cosy, in fact, and by cutting off my peripheral vision slightly the hood focuses me entirely on my monitor/keyboard. So yeah, I now play EVE in a Jedi dressing gown robe with the hood up. Deal with it.

As I was testing out my new Crow, it suddenly occurred to me: I now bear an uncanny resemblance to my avatar.

Malediction et alia v Vagur

The hunt:

I heard the first attempt go down when I first logged in. I was not sure what was going on, but something was clearly happening in Jov. As I was passing through that system on my way to Adirain, I offered to help, but the crew were too focused on the fight to give me a response. Sadly, this was the result:

2011.12.21 20:46:00

Victim: Bartomeu Sosimo
Corp: The Tuskers
Alliance: None
Faction: None
Destroyed: Lachesis
System: Jovainnon
Security: 0.3
Damage Taken: 14172

Involved parties:

Name: Sanityfree Soldier (laid the final blow)
Security: 5.0
Corp: Liquid Cold
Alliance: None
Faction: None
Ship: Vargur
Weapon: 800mm Repeating Artillery II
Damage Done: 14172

Destroyed items:

Invulnerability Field II
Small Capacitor Booster II
200mm Railgun II
Capacitor Power Relay II
Large Shield Extender II
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I, Qty: 2
Caldari Navy Thunderbolt Heavy Missile, Qty: 56
Navy Cap Booster 400
Spike M, Qty: 110
Heavy Missile Launcher II
Warp Disruptor II
Caldari Navy Havoc Heavy Missile, Qty: 400 (Cargo)
Caldari Navy Scourge Heavy Missile, Qty: 871 (Cargo)
Caldari Navy Widowmaker Heavy Missile, Qty: 400 (Cargo)
Caldari Navy Thunderbolt Heavy Missile, Qty: 271 (Cargo)

Dropped items:

F85 Peripheral Damage System I
200mm Railgun II
Large Shield Extender II
Caldari Navy Thunderbolt Heavy Missile, Qty: 28
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Qty: 2
Y-T8 Overcharged Hydrocarbon Microwarpdrive
Power Diagnostic System II
Warp Disruptor II
Navy Cap Booster 400, Qty: 20 (Cargo)
Spike M, Qty: 794 (Cargo)
Federation Navy Antimatter Charge M, Qty: 902 (Cargo)

Apparently, Bartomeu had scanned down the Vargur at a mission and warped in on him, holding point for a dps ship. However, Bart took far more damage than he had anticipated from the Vargur, and had gone down before his backup could navigate the warp gates that separated the warp-in from the fight. The Vargur escaped and logged off.

Undeterred, Konig decided to try his luck by sitting in the mission in a Hound. Since the Vargur had provided such a spirited defence on the last attempt, and because he had proved adept and destroying tacklers, my Malediction was added to the gang to provide a secure second point; Konig would probably need to bail pretty fast.

Sure enough, the Vargur logged back in to continue his mission, and he must not have realised that Konig was in the same corp as Bart, because he warped right back into the mission. Konig established point right away, and we proceeded to jump into Jov from Aeschee and warp to the mission.

However, the Vargur was game for a fight, and blew the bomber out of the sky before we could land, once again escaping to a station and logging off.

2011.12.21 21:06:00

Victim: Konig Dreizehn

Corp: The Tuskers

Alliance: None

Faction: None

Destroyed: Hound

System: Jovainnon

Security: 0.3

Damage Taken: 2129

Involved parties:

Name: Sanityfree Soldier (laid the final blow)

Security: 5.0

Corp: Liquid Cold

Alliance: None

Faction: None

Ship: Vargur

Weapon: 800mm Repeating Artillery II

Damage Done: 2129

Destroyed items:

Covert Ops Cloaking Device II

Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I

Caldari Navy Bane Torpedo, Qty: 28

Nanofiber Internal Structure II

Small Bay Loading Accelerator I

Warp Disruptor II

Dropped items:

Ballistic Control System II

Catalyzed Cold-Gas Arcjet Thrusters

Micro Auxiliary Power Core I

'Arbalest' Siege Missile Launcher, Qty: 3

Caldari Navy Bane Torpedo, Qty: 14

Medium Shield Extender II

Salvager I

Caldari Navy Bane Torpedo, Qty: 707 (Cargo)

This was a disheartening second loss, but Tuskers are a stubborn crew. While someone suggested that the Vargur would be ill advised to return, I pointed out that he had effectively won the last two engagements; why would he not come back?

Still, there was obviously something not quite right here - a pve battleship should not have been able to deal so easily with our tacklers. Something more dedicated was required.

With this in mind, we had Jaxley's Claw log off from within the mission. My Malediction loitered in the next system, and we had a Wolf and Hurricane nearby for dps. After about 10 minutes, our neutral alt reported the Vargur logging back in. Once he was back in the mission, Jaxley relogged.

Without waiting for a point, I also jumped into the system, warping to the mission. Jaxley dropped out of warp first, of course, and established point. I secured a secondary point as soon as I landed on grid, and we settled into safe orbits, watching our combat logs.

The Vargur had a go at both Jaxley and I, but we finally seemed to have found tacklers the Vargur couldn't hit. Time to ask for a ransom.

The pilot, Sanityfree Soldier, seemed game, and we brought in our Wolf (with scanner) to establish the level of ransom we should be asking for. 1.5 billion ISK would have been a real steal for Soldier, but he could not afford more than 100 million. As the drops were likely to (far) exceed this value, we brought in our dps (Bart's Hurricane) and opened fire.

Bart had two tracking disruptors on his 'Cane, but he was nevertheless forced off the field by the Vagur! He also managed to chase off the Wolf, leaving only Jaxley and I able to hold a point. The tracking on the VagurJax and I were flying armor tanked Interceptors - the added signature radius from the shield extenders could have made all the difference (edit - according to Jaxley, he was actually flying an MSE Stiletto, and not a Claw, so I guess we had some leeway).

Of course, two Interceptors were never going to be able to break the active tank of a cap stable pve battleship. We needed something tough enough to tank the Vargur's damage, while also having enough dps to break it's tank.

Finally, Tsubutai, who had been monitoring our Vent conversation, decided to come to our rescue and warped in his Machariel. With two interceptors holding the Vagur in place, the Machariel was able to pound it to scrap. Victory at last!

2011.12.21 21:41:00

Victim: Sanityfree Soldier

Corp: Liquid Cold

Alliance: None

Faction: None

Destroyed: Vargur

System: Jovainnon

Security: 0.3

Damage Taken: 99367

Involved parties:

Name: Tsubutai (laid the final blow)

Security: -9.8

Corp: The Tuskers

Alliance: None

Faction: None

Ship: Machariel

Weapon: 800mm Repeating Artillery II

Damage Done: 33243

Name: Morin Blain

Security: -9.7

Corp: The Tuskers

Alliance: None

Faction: None

Ship: Wolf

Weapon: Wolf

Damage Done: 29734

Name: Bartomeu Sosimo

Security: -9.3

Corp: The Tuskers

Alliance: None

Faction: None

Ship: 

Weapon: Warrior II

Damage Done: 22962

Name: Jelen Sidheil

Security: 1.6

Corp: CNRN's Named Recursively Now

Alliance: None

Faction: None

Ship: Drake

Weapon: Caldari Navy Thunderbolt Heavy Missile

Damage Done: 11660

Name: Taurean Eltanin

Security: -10.0

Corp: The Tuskers

Alliance: None

Faction: None

Ship: Malediction

Weapon: Warp Disruptor II

Damage Done: 1768

Name: Jaxley

Security: -10.0

Corp: The Tuskers

Alliance: None

Faction: None

Ship: Stiletto

Weapon: Warp Disruptor II

Damage Done: 0

Destroyed items:

Large Capacitor Control Circuit II, Qty: 2

Small Tractor Beam I

Cap Recharger II

EMP L, Qty: 100

Salvager II

800mm Repeating Artillery II

Tracking Enhancer II, Qty: 2

Republic Fleet Gyrostabilizer

Contaminated Nanite Compound (Cargo)

Condensed Alloy, Qty: 20 (Cargo)

Precious Alloy, Qty: 17 (Cargo)

Broken Drone Transceiver, Qty: 3 (Cargo)

Tangled Power Conduit (Cargo)

Dark Compound (Cargo)

Fried Interface Circuit, Qty: 11 (Cargo)

Dropped items:

Shadow Serpentis Tracking Computer

Tracking Speed

Cap Recharger II, Qty: 2

Pith X-Type X-Large Shield Booster

EMP L, Qty: 100

Salvager II

800mm Repeating Artillery II, Qty: 3

Power Diagnostic System II

Phased Plasma L, Qty: 201

Gist X-Type 100MN Afterburner

Republic Fleet Gyrostabilizer

Lucent Compound, Qty: 5 (Cargo)

EMP L, Qty: 56 (Cargo)

Sheen Compound, Qty: 9 (Cargo)

Phased Plasma L, Qty: 115 (Cargo)

Crystal Compound, Qty: 29 (Cargo)

Gleaming Alloy, Qty: 16 (Cargo)

The killmail answered a lot of questions about the events leading up to the Vargur's eventual destruction. The faction tracking computer had allowed the battleship to swat aside all but dedicated tacklers and apply dps onto our Hurricane despite the two tracking disruptors. How very, very awesome. Full credit to Soldier for the fit.

Afterthoughts:

This is the sort of thing I love about flying Interceptors; you can do some light solo work, but when something big comes up, you can also play a necessary role in fleet. While you can optimize your fit for one over the other, there is enough overlap that the two fits are not mutually exclusive.

Bart handled the loot split, and took it all to Jita, where it fetched over a billion ISK - easily the most profitable kill I have ever been part of. After reimbursing the lost ships, we were still left with about 200 million ISK each. Time to buy some Caldari ships!

I have a new blog.

I'll start by saying that nothing is changing with Flight of Dragons.

However, my recent inability to play EVE following the Crucible patch got me playing Starcraft II. During that time, I came to enjoy the convenience of being able to log in for a brief period of guaranteed pvp; I might waste 30 minutes on EVE without finding a fight, or I could just play a SC2 match. When time is limited, Starcraft offers a known return on investment.

Because I like to do things properly, and because this blog has been so helpful to my development as an EVE player, I have started a similar blog for my Starcraft exploits. Expect something similar to the Punisher Plan - a record of my attempts to find an appropriate army and develop my skills as a player. I don't know if any of my readers also play SC2, but I thought I'd let people know about the new blog in case they are interested.

My larger chunks of playtime (as and when they occur) will still be devoted to EVE, which I strongly prefer.

Malediction v Probe

The fit:

Rocket Launcher II x3
Salvager I (offline)

Catalyzed Cold-Gas Arcjet Thrusters
Warp Disruptor II
Cap Booster II

Damage Control II
Small Armor Repair System II
Adaptive Nano Plating II

Small Rocket Fuel Cache Partition I
Small Hydraulic Bay Thruster I

I only carried five Cap Booster 75's in the Booster itself; there were no reloads in the cargo hold. In part this is because the Malediction already has a restricted cargo capacity, and I need some space for loot and salvage. However, it's also because the Booster is not meant to be running through the whole fight, but rather to give me the extra cap I need to rep incidental damage; if I need to reload the Booster, I probably should have bailed some time ago.


The hunt:

The fight itself was not particularly meaningful - even the best fit Probe is not going to give a well piloted Malediction a run for it's money. And in this case the pilot was new, trying his hand at low sec exploration without understanding the basic rules for surviving low sec.

What I did enjoy was the ability to warp in at range while still landing an immediate point. I had him scanned down to the sun, but I could not know the range. My point covers nearly 60km, however, so I can jump in at 30 or 70 km and still cover half of the standard warp-in zone. In this case I warped in at 30km, and found him sitting about 25 km off me.

I started applying my dps almost immediately, and ignored his request to ransom his ship.

2011.12.16 14:35:00

Victim: Shin VanKaundur
Corp: The smiling syndicate of Hari kari
Alliance: Shadow of the Apocalypse
Faction: None
Destroyed: Probe
System: Lisbaetanne
Security: 0.4
Damage Taken: 560

Involved parties:

Name: Taurean Eltanin (laid the final blow)
Security: -10.0
Corp: The Tuskers
Alliance: None
Faction: None
Ship: Malediction
Weapon: Foxfire Javelin Rocket
Damage Done: 560

Destroyed items:

1MN Afterburner I
Salvager I
Prototype ECCM Radar Sensor Cluster (Cargo)
Gatling Pulse Laser I (Cargo)
Charred Micro Circuit, Qty: 3 (Cargo)
Thruster Console (Cargo)
Hobgoblin I (Drone Bay)

Dropped items:

Core Scanner Probe I, Qty: 6
Core Probe Launcher I
Codebreaker I
Inertia Stabilizers I
Small Energy Transfer Array I, Qty: 2 (Cargo)
Hobgoblin I (Drone Bay)

However, I did manage to catch his pod, and I ransomed it for 3 million ISK. Another case, sadly, where a new player has plugged in a "free" implant that he does not have sufficient funds to actually save/replace. I suppose the killmail would have provided some bragging rights, but I'd far rather have some ISK - I'm perpetually space poor, and I've got a whole new line of ships that I want to be getting into, which requires some up-front spending.

Afterthoughts:

Not too much new to say about this fight; it was not particularly challenging. However, it did underscore just how useful the speed and point range of the Malediction is when hunting small, fast, and elusive targets. My Vengeance might have a wider theoretical target envelope, but the Malediction is far better at finding (and bringing to battle) it's smaller range of targets.

After the fight I had a chat with the pilot about how to survive in low sec. It's a talk that I've had with dozens of pilots now, and it changes only slightly (based on whether the pilot is looking for pvp or pve). I've half a mind to write up a basic low sec survival guide, but I appreciate that the people who read this blog are pretty salty, and don't need a guide of that type. The people who do need it probably don't read this blog.

Malediction v Jaguar

The hunt:

I was flying my experimental solo Malediction (active armor tank with a cap recharger in the spare mid), and I was roaming around the Aeschee area when spotted Bojangles in a Jaguar. Of course, I decided to say hello.

For whatever reason, I run into Bojangles a lot when I am testing Malediction fits; I practised holding a point under fire from his Hurricane when I was putting my original shield Malediction through it's paces.

At this point, I don't remember whether I warped in on him, or whether I let him warp in on me. Either way, we were both looking for a fight, and we made it happen. He/I landed far enough off that we had to burn towards each other; I remember putting my engines on half speed to try looking like an AB fit brawler - I did not want to scare him off with the threat of kiting.

Once I landed point, I set my orbit for 20km and settled in to see what he had. He was only moving about 1.2 km/s, so there was no chance of him landing a scram. However, once he loaded Barrage, he was actually able to hit me, if only barely.

Since I could not defeat him on range (at least, not if I wanted to shoot back - holding point at 26 km and calling in backup would have defeated the purpose of the exercise), I decided to try defeating him on tracking, and I closed my orbit to 15 km, which is about as close as I cared to get. However, he seemed to be able to continue hitting me, although not well. When I say "not well', he was scoring "barely hits" about once every two or three shots. I was frustratingly close to evading his damage.

Next I tried pulsing the repair system, to see if I could keep up with the damage, but even with the recharger, regular use of the repair function quickly drained my cap. While the booster would not have made a difference in the long term, in the short term I probably would have been able to tank the damage.

Eventually, I disengaged. I could not evade his damage, so I was not going to be able to sit back and try breaking his tank.


Afterthoughts:

I did not even open fire in this fight; because of my low dps I'm just not going to win any damage races. Far better to just get out, which is what fleet interceptors excel at.

I must admit that I was surprised that Bojangles could a) track me and b) hit me. Isn't this where Interceptors are meant to shine? Of course, I only have Interceptors IV, so I'm still getting a fair amount of mwd bloom. I'm definitely going to get Interceptors V within the next month, so it will be interesting to try a fight like this again to see if the reduced signature radius offers any greater protection.

The cap recharger was disappointing. Not only did it add very little in the way of cap (even with the repair system pulsed rather than left running), and it's only noticeable at all near peak regen - towards the extremes it might as well be an empty low slot.

This is particularly frustrating when a repair cycle and an mwd cycle arrive together (my mwd skills are weak  - only level III), which forces me below peak recharge. A capacitor booster would have freed me from this concern without any appreciable downside; I'm not going for cap stability, after all.

Fitting a Crow

In my last post about flying a solo interceptor I reflected that I might try flying a Crow after I train Caldari Frigates V. This got me messing about with Crow fits on EFT. I was blown away by the results.

As an aside, when I first started playing my instinct was to always look for other people's fits on Battleclinic or somesuch. Now that I have more experience, and more confidence in the way I fly, I always build my fits from scratch.

The fit:

Rocket Launcher II x3
Salvager I (offline)

Catalyzed Cold-Gas Arcjet Thrusters
Warp Disruptor II
Medium Shield Extender II

Damage Control II
Nanofibre Internal Structure II
Micro Auxilary Power Core I

Small Bay Loading Accelerator II
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer II


Further thoughts:

That extra 15 CPU just makes a huge difference. With the extra fitting space, I can drop a fitting mod in the low slots and put in the Nanofibre. This actually makes me faster than my Malediction fit, despite the lower base speed - about 200m/s faster!

The inbuilt range bonus means that Javelin can hit out to 23km without any range rigs, letting me plug the EM hole AND get a damage rig in place, bringing my dps up to 80, which is about what I was doing in a Punisher. That's fairly respectable, and lets me break a fair number of active tanked frigates, providing they are not hardened against kinetic damage.

Against other fast ships I can switch to faction rockets (which still have a 15km range) and up my dps to 98. Still not very high compared to a Crusader or a Slicer, but I'll actually apply most of that damage as I have no tracking issues.

I could drop the Damage Control for a BCS, which would boost my dps to 115. However, that would drop my EHP from 5117 to  4045 and my peak regen from 20 hps to 17 hps. Not a worthwhile exchange, in my view.

There is a price to pay, though. I lose the Malediction's extended point, which means I have less ability to just back off while holding the enemy in place. It also means that I'm much easier to hit; the MSE and shield rig push my signature radius way up.


Conclusion:

I'll need to test this, of course, but my instincts tell me this is better. I commented at the end of the Punisher Plan that while the Punisher was a fine ship, if I had to do it all again I would have flown Caldari.

As a new Eve player I thougth that my true love would be lazers and cap warfare, putting me squarely in the Amarr camp. As it turned out, what I really enjoy are missiles and regenerative tanks. Trying to incorporate these both into small Amarr hulls has been a struggle, largely because active armor tanks are poorly designed for small ships (Oh, how much better would it be if regenerative plating actually, you know, regenerated?); you need two modules to provide buffer and regen when a shield tank incorporates both into one module. On small ships, module space is at a premium.

So after a year of forcing myself into a limited range of - admittedly excellent - Khanid ships (and enjoying myself the whole time, let it be said), I'm now keen to broaden my horizons and start flying the ships I probably should have been flying all along.

Malediction v Catalyst

The fit:

Rocket Launcher II x3
Salvager I (offline)

Catalyzed Cold-Gas Arcjet Thrusters
Warp Disruptor II
Cap Recharger II

Damage Control II
Small Armor Repair System II
Adaptive Nano Plating II

Small Rocket Fuel Cache Partition I
Small Hydraulic Bay Thruster I

I was looking for a solo Malediction fit, and this is what I threw together. I had been going to put a Cap Booster in the third mid over the Cap Recharger, but when I saw it in my hanger I decided to give it a go. In part this is because my mwd skills are weak (something I will be working on in the coming year) and I'm not cap stable with the point and prop running (something like 9 minutes). With the Recharger, I get get full cap stability.


The hunt:

I went on a local roam, checking out the nearby systems while looking for a likely target. I wanted something slow and short ranged, and preferably without an active tank; I wanted to be able to kill it on my own rather than have to call in dps once I landed a point.

After a few jumps, I spotted a Catalyst bouncing around some belts. I was a little uncertain, as destroyers tend to have good range and tracking, and they have received a damage buff recently that I've yet to have any experience with. On the other hand, I ought to be able to leave if things got tough, and many Destroyers are fit for point blank brawling to maximise their dps.

Rather than try and jump in on the Catalyst directly, I jumped one belt ahead and waited; I would rather he jumped into me than the other way around. However, he took a little longer to arrive than expected,and I did not want to miss my opportunity, so after a minute or so, I jumped into his belt at 20km.

Landing perfectly (within my point range but beyond his) I immediately began to orbit at 20km while activating my point. I then turned to my combat log and my overview for more info.

According to the overview, the Catalysts speed never exceeded 800ish m/s, so I guessed he was AB fit; range dictation would not be a problem. He also could not seem to land any hits on me at 20km, so I moved my orbit to 15km (which means an actual orbit of about 17km), well within my striking range (if I enjoy the fit I can move up to T2 rigs, which pushes my range to 22km).

Switching to Javelin rockets - because of the speed penalty I like to start fights with faction ammunition - I opened fire and reduced his ship to a wreck.

2011.12.12 20:09:00

Victim: Jimmy English
Corp: Federal Navy Academy
Alliance: None
Faction: None
Destroyed: Catalyst
System: Lisbaetanne
Security: 0.4
Damage Taken: 2943

Involved parties:

Name: Taurean Eltanin (laid the final blow)
Security: -10.0
Corp: The Tuskers
Alliance: None
Faction: None
Ship: Malediction
Weapon: Foxfire Javelin Rocket
Damage Done: 2483

Name: Serpentis Chief Spy / Serpentis Corporation
Damage Done: 460

Destroyed items:

Gyrostabilizer I
Cold-Gas Arcjet Thrusters
Light Electron Blaster I, Qty: 3
Antimatter Charge S, Qty: 660
F-M3 Munition Inertial Suspensor
Small Hull Repairer I, Qty: 2 (Cargo)
Dual 150mm Railgun I (Cargo)
Antimatter Charge S, Qty: 8049 (Cargo)
50mm Reinforced Titanium Plates I (Cargo)
Stasis Webifier I (Cargo)
Small Energy Transfer Array I (Cargo)
Cargo Scanner I (Cargo)
Ship Scanner I (Cargo)
Tungsten Charge S, Qty: 100 (Cargo)
Civilian Shield Booster I (Cargo)

Dropped items:

Tracking Speed Disruption
Damage Control I
Light Electron Blaster I, Qty: 5
DDO Photometry Tracking Disruptor I
Antimatter Charge S, Qty: 660
Hammerhead I (Cargo)
50mm Reinforced Titanium Plates I (Cargo)
Small Energy Transfer Array I (Cargo)
Thorium Charge S, Qty: 100 (Cargo)
200mm Reinforced Nanofiber Plates I, Qty: 2 (Cargo)
Ship Scanner I (Cargo)
1MN MicroWarpdrive I (Cargo)
Civilian Shield Booster I (Cargo)
Light Ion Blaster I (Cargo)
Uranium Charge S, Qty: 100 (Cargo)

I also captured his pod, and he offered me 5 million for his implants. While this might seem a little low for a 2009 character, the killmail heavily suggested that he was a returning player. He paid the ransom, and I sent him on his way.


Afterthoughts:

Obviously, I'm quite happy with how that worked out, but the truth is that pretty much any interceptor fit for range could have made this kill simply because he couldn't hit out far enough to threaten me. As a result, I can't really comment much on my fitting choices.

So Recharger v Booster is still up in the air. I suspect the Booster is the way to go, especially when my skills make me cap stable without the Recharger. This guards against heavy neuts (or medium neuts against long point Cruisers where I need to get in close to get under their guns, and also allows me a period of heavy repping.

I'm tempted to put a BCU in place of the Damage Control, but this would drop the EHP (and rep power) of the fit significantly. I'm not sure if it's worth it.

The truth is, for this kind of work, a shield Malediction is probably better, having higher ehp and capless regeneration. The difficulty is that the range rigs won't fit unless I downgrade the shield extender to meta 4, the added sig makes me easier to hit, and I have no rig space to patch the EMP hole, making my Crusader/Slicer matchups a nightmare.

Still, I may give it a try, depending on how my armor fits work out. Equally, once I have Caldaridps, and an inbuilt range bonus.

Very sexy.

Crucible: First Impressions

I know I'm probably a little late to the topic, but I'm just so blown away by Crucible that I'm determined to spend a little time on the good (and less good) in the patch.


Engine Trails

This is probably my favourite change among many good changes. Not only does it look awesome, but it adds a sense of depth and motion to New Eden that is often lacking from sci-fi games (it's the nature of space, to be fair).

Ever since playing Privateer way back when, I found that I often felt more like I was sitting in a turret than a space ship, as there is little in the way of natural speed indicators (which is very realistic, just not all that fun). Eve has done a better job than most, but the engine trails take it to the next level. Bravo.

However, the real reason that this makes it to the top of my list is the added tactical depth it adds to the game. Until now, enemy ships have simply been points in space; I can get a rough sense of their relative vector through my overview and the "look at" command, but this was a distraction from flying my own ship.

Now, though, I can quickly get an idea of each ships vector (meaning speed and direction) just by looking at the engine trails. Changes to that vector are immediately apparent, and I can react accordingly. I've yet to really put this to good use, but the potential astounds me.

I imagine that FCs are going to be even more ecstatic. You should now be able to tell at a glance whether your fleet manoeuvres are working as planned; that guy who aligned to the wrong planet or who is falling behind because he forgot to overheat his mwd will be immediately obvious.

Of course, it will be obvious to the enemy as well, so a devious FC will probably be thinking of all sorts of ways to feed bad intel to his opponent. I am reminded of Master and Commander, where Captain Aubrey tells his men (who are pretending to be civilians in order to lure a French vessel into combat) to be "lubberly and un-navy like".


Hevrice

I did a fair amount of roaming yesterday, and I have to say that so far Hevrice is the most beautiful system I've encountered. Someone in the CCP art department must love us, because I can't think of any reason why they would have picked Hevrice, an unimportant nothing of a system, for such a breathtaking piece of scenery.

It's not just beautiful, though. It's right. One of the finest pirate corps in New Eden now lives at the heart of a nebula, a symbolic detachment from empire space and all that it represents. A hidden system for an outlaw corporation. A place of shadows for dark deeds.

Okay, I'll stop now. But it seriously is beautiful.

CCP wanted to create a sense of location and belonging in New Eden. They succeeded beyond my wildest expectations.


T2 Ammunition

I wouldn't be a real Eve player if I did not include a few complaints in a post about Eve, so here's one. The penalties were removed from T2 turret ammo, but not T2 missile ammo, despite the fact that this penalty was (according to the dev blogs) supposed to be removed also.

Perhaps it was an oversight, or perhaps it is coming in a supplementary patch. Regardless, this needs to be fixed. I have a kiting Malediction I want to fly. With engine trails.

Some good news and some... good news.

 

First of all, I thought that I'd let everyone know that the manual reinstall was a success and I can now get back into New Eden. I won't be able to play properly until tomorrow, but I'm looking forward to seeing the new engine trails on my Malediction - for some reason, it's my funny little Interceptor that I've been missing the most.

On that note, I'm going to take a little break from my Caldari/shield training to get Interceptors V. I've been really enjoying a mwd Malediction, both solo and in fleet, and it makes sense for me to max out a skill that I seem to be using all the time. This means that my Merlin/Caracal/Drake shenanigans will probably be delayed into the new year. It's fitting in a way; the first year of my character's life devoted to Amarr frigates, with the second devoted to Caldari cruisers and battlecruisers.

In other awesome news, however, it seems that the Tuskers have been wardec'd!

Now, I know that some of you are thinking "WTF? Aren't you guys all -10 anyway? Why would anyone waste money wardec'ing guys you can already engage anywhere, anytime, without penalty?"

Well, I'm not sure what's in it for Devious Decorum (or their alleged backers, Shadow Cartel), but that's not really the point. The point is that someone paid good money to fight us, which probably means that they are going to, you know, fight us! How awesome is that!

Of course, my visions of on demand, 24/7 pvp are probably a far cry from the reality, but I'm basking in the illusion for the moment. We've been forced to travel a long, long way for decent fleet fights recently (see our Dram roams to null sec), so the idea of someone actually forming up a fleet for us and delivering it to Hev is just a dream come true.

My corp mates feel that this is likely to be a whole lot of nothing, but this is a brave New Eden. I mean, have you taken a look at Hev recently? I live in a pirate base in the middle of a freaking nebula! I have engine trails! I've actually managed to install the Crucible patch! There is no level of awesome which is out of reach!

Accordingly, I face the coming war with naive optimism.

Where are the November accounts?

For the two of you that actually follow the monthly accounts I post, I thought I'd provide an explanation regarding the lack of accounts for November.

Because my patch problems started before the end of November, I've not actually had he ability to log in and sell any of the loot that I accrued over the course of the month. This means that preparing the accounts now would have simply resulted in a large (and misleading) loss figure, followed by a (hopefully) large (and misleading) profit figure for December once I am actually able to bring the loot to market.

Rather than produce two meaningless sets of accounts, I've decided to roll November and December's accounts into one, which means they should be coming out at the beginning of January.

I'll also be posting a one year character review around that time.

Dramiel Roam #2

While I'm still waiting for a hard copy of the Eve client in the post, I do have my bandwidth back, so I see no reason not to write the posts I had planned.

About a week after our first Dramiel roam, we decided to do the same thing again; our last "last chance" to fly Drams before the nerf. Of course, I flew my shield Malediction as I can't sit in a Dram and my next training priority is Caldari for the Merlin/Caracal/Drake.

As an aside, I'm really looking forward to Caldari frigate V because sometimes you just want to take out a T1 frigate, and I've not been able to fly on that complements my skills. The Caracal will give me my first taste of cruiser pvp, too.

We had more Drams than last time, but no Sentinels or Interdictors. We had learnt our lessons from last week, and used a password protected sub-channel for vent, and spent far less time in each system. In that sense, the roam was more "professional" and we managed to avoid any serious response from the local null sec residents.

This meant that we actually did not find as many challenging fights as last time - perhaps a single fleet engagement - and most of our kills were solo travellers. While objectively better by null sec standards (avoided risk while hitting more expensive targets), I'm not sure it was better by Tusker standards. Towards the end of the roam we had a few pilots wanting to engage an obviously far superior fleet (with probable carrier backup) just for the challenge. However, cooler heads prevailed, and we simply went around.

Ironically, we had our own "spy" this time. We had a guest in our fleet who was a full time null sec resident himself, which meant he had access to the intel channels. In true Tusker fashion we completely ignored the opportunity to win the espionage war, and instead had him relay to us all the nasty things that were being said about us behind our backs. Much hilarity ensued.

Afterthoughts:

I'm not going to try and go through each engagement, but there are a few learning points for me to record.

To begin with, our lack of an Interdictor hurt us. There were probably about a half dozen small ships that simply slipped away because of their fast align time. A bubble would have been a huge help.

This also led to a rather embarrassing (for me) incident where I pointed one of my own fleet mates. A frigate had jumped through the gate and, being an Interceptor, I orbited the gate at 500m so that my long point could cover the entire spawn zone. With my point pre-triggered, I tried to catch the frigate as soon as he appeared on my overview.

The first time I was to fast, and he was still protected by the gate-cloak (even though I could see him). The second time was too late, and he disappeared from my overview just as I clicked on him. Of course, everyone below him on the overview then moved up a spot, and I ended up clicking on (and pointing) one of our Drams.

Now, I'm used to roaming solo, and I sure as heck want to see every ship that lands on grid with me. However, in the patented Tusker training style (ie, mock the heck out of you), it was suggested that this was not an awesome plan in fleets. As I now had 60 seconds of aggression to kill while the fleet moved on, I set up a separate fleet overview that did not include fleet-mates.

I had another embarrassing moment later in the roam after a bombing run against us. I had my mwd shut off, of course (although am I right in thinking that the mwd signature reduction on Interceptors makes them pretty safe from bombs even when the mwd is running?), but I took a little bit of shield damage.

Two things then happened at the same time. First, one of our Scimitars locked me up to give me reps, and second, I tried to point the bomber. As you can probably guess, my auto targeting locked the Scimitar first, so when I activated my point I hit the friendly again. Ugh.

Now, some people say that auto-locking is for noobs. I strongly disagree; it's free intel when flying solo. Is that neutral that just landed going to engage you or the other guy? Has your target launched drones? Auto-lock gives you a quick list of who to kill in small engagements without distracting you from the piloting and ship management that is so critical when you 1vX.

None of that means it's not completely fail when paired with Logistic ships, however. Once again I accept the mockery of my peers (I'm serious about it being a teaching aid, by the way. I'm not going to make either of those mistakes again.) while I turned off auto-lock for the duration of the fleet.

All together, I felt like the corp performed much better than it did on our last null sec roam, while I made every mistake from chapter 1 of "Fleets for Dummies". Still, it was a good time and I'm glad to be getting out of Hevrice and learning a bit about null sec.

Having Issues.

 

No real update today, for two reasons - both of which are Eve related.

First, I'm having internet problems. I'm on limited bandwidth and the recent patch maxed me out. It should fix itself in a few days when my bandwidth refreshes, but in the meantime my access is limited.

Second, though, the patch does not seem to have worked for me. The repair tool also seems broken, as it just sits on "(3/7) Initialising..." without doing anything. It looks like I'm going to have to manually install the patch, which means another download in a few days.

I've already posted a notice to my corp mates, and I thought I'd repeat it here. Worst case, I can't get the patch to work when my bandwidth refreshes, and then I have to look at cancelling my subscription; I simply can't afford to constantly download huge packets of information in the hope of making Eve work.

However, we're not there yet, so hopefully you hear back from me in a few days.