Monday 27 August 2012

Day 71 : It's a TRAAAP!


Saturday. The best day of the week. I’m going to ruin it slightly and get the Space Noob in trouble.

Owing to some serious scientific investigation of a new theory of economics ( see day 70 ) I start the day feeling a little off colour. With the experiment a success though I can slack off for a while and do something mindlessly easy from my TODO list. I fly down to Clenninon and run the Career tutorial missions again. Its easy to roll through them without thinking too much. Its even easier with the new drop down menu on screen detailing options for the missions I am currently on. I run the missions in tandem as much as I can, only accepting one mission at once but keeping them all at around the same stage. This means they work together, Business complements Industry, Military complements Advanced Military. The first time around I didn’t do this, I ran one chain at once right to the end, missing several key concepts explained in the others. That resulted in me getting my ass handed to me on a plate at the end of Day One. It’s good to see I was right about the strategy of running them in sync. If you see a noob running them, warn them about it.

I avoid the Exploration tutorial because I actually NEED to do that again. Exploration, like PVP, is one of those parts of the game where you need to develop actual skills rather than just rely on your characters skills. Speaking of PVP.

Jax and Robbo are online and we decide that it is high time we go shopping for trouble. Spanish is busy investigating Ice Mining (and surprise, surprise, finding out it is useless without setting up the skill queue for a month), so it’s just three fools heading off into the low sec black.

Before I get into this, let me state that even the most experienced noob can fall into a trap.

                                      

I gear up the Pale Horse as a tackling scout, Robbo comes along as spotter flying something cloaky, and Jax comes along as the artillery. Jax is flying something so expensive it makes my head hurt even more to think about it.

RULE 1 OF NOOB PVP : do not plan to go looking for a scrap after drinking beer that comes with tequila automatically put in it.

We end up in a quiet low sec system and find a couple of pilots who hurriedly vacate the area when we arrive. A couple of minutes later one returns and begins scouting the area. Jax, our most experienced pilot stars trying to determine where he is based using Dscan. Rob checks the stations and then takes up an observation point cloaked on their entrance gate. I begin zooming from point to point because a) I want to shake up any pattern the scout has and really b) I’m too hungover to think clearly.

I catch the scout on a gate but he vanishes as I get there. Rob is sure he is cloaked and hasn’t warped. All this running around has annoyed me and sent a lot of blood rushing to my damaged brain. At this point I’m going to fire first and regret the security status loss later. So I don’t think “what the hell is an Atron doing running around with a cloak on?” which is what I should have been thinking.  

RULE 2 OF NOOB PVP : Do not PANIC

The call comes in from Rob that the Atron is on the gate. Jax turns up just in time and sets drones on him as I’m flying in. From my warp in point I manage to be in range quickly, slapping a web and a warp scrambler on him so he can’t get away. Jax moves in for the kill and I’m too high on hungover adrenaline to pay attention which is why I don’t have a clue how Jax just exploded. Did the gate guns get him? He fired first and I webbed which means we are both criminals and the automatic defences of the local stargate are going to open fire. I have sense enough to press F1 to set my own tiny guns blazing and finish off the Atron. Now I need to get out of here and think about what is going on. If I can think. I am shaking so much I probably look out of focus.

RULE 3 OF NOOB PVP : When ignoring RULE 2 do NOT warp to the last thing you bookmarked. It is NOT your safe point.

Hastily I warp to my pre-prepared safe point and start the calming down process and try to figure out what happened. This is when my ship starts screaming at me as my shields are reduced to nothing in a couple of seconds, then my armour, and I don’t even notice the hull go. What the hell? In the midst of panic I’d warped to my last bookmark instead of my safe point. My last bookmark was where I thought the Atron had cloaked. Just off a gate. So I made the kill, dodged the gate gun reprisal and then thoughtlessly warped straight into the fire of another set of gate guns. Nice one Space Noob. Class.

RULE 4 OF NOOB PVP : Despite being lured into a trap, blown up by your own stupidity, having to warp home in a capsule : enjoy that grin on your face.

I’m gutted for Jax who lost his astoundingly expensive gun platform but what the hell happened? It was a trap. As we locked and chased the Atron across the face of the gate a Myrmidon class BattleCruiser appeared out of the gate and shot Jax to hell. I’d taken the scout and got away only to commit gate gun suicide. It was a trap and a well laid one. Noob PVPers getting so enraged by the zipping around of the scout that we not only engaged first, taking a security hit, but also never considered WHY the scout was doing it.

I’m laughing as I warp home in my pod. What else can you do? Its a learning process. We got a good taste of low sec PVP, and a good story - ganked or not. We had a good time working as a group, finding out how these things go and running afoul a plan we might be able to duplicate. Next time I’ll consider the situation more carefully. I’ll hone my Dscan skills, I’ll watch my bookmarks, I’ll not fly with a headache that even a greasy breakfast and a bottle of Irn Bru couldn’t shift.

Apologies to Jax for the lost of an expensive ship. You signed up with the Noob Crew!

Thanks to the German Army Aviation Corps (there's a phrase I never thought I’d say) for a well laid trap.

Apologies to Rob for not getting in on the measly little kill, but thanks for the observation work.

I start to gear up a replacement set of new ships designed just for this. I’m having another go as soon as I can.

I talked the other day about what I’m reading. I’m reminded of another book that might be relevant to PVP. They say "never judge a book by its cover" but this one has a useful message on it.

I now go to the land of sitting on my bed drinking hair of the dog beer, since none of the usual cures worked, where I will do nothing for a few hours but watch the first four episodes of Falling Skies. 


The shine is later taken off the day when I hear of the death of Neil Armstrong. A self confessed nerd who went to space for real. Someone I think all EVE players respected and admired. A hero of mine. o7 Mr Armstrong. Fly safe.



15 comments:

  1. Noob Vigilant pilot reporting in o7

    Been waiting for this post all day!

    Even though there was a lot of face palming done after that little event it was a lot of fun. Looking forward to doing it again. Except with something less expensive!

    I think we all learnt some valuable lessons from this encounter and it's these lessons that'll *hopefully* turn us into half decent pvp pilots. I really stress the hopefully in that statement though.

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    1. why why why man!!

      First lesson of PVP, faction ships aren't worth it (with a few exceptions you can't afford anyhow). Cheap and chearful man. If you want to lose bling, then take a falcon or a scimi, at least you will do some good as well as being called primary first. In general, Faction stuff is either for rich crazy soloers or as a dedicated PVE platform. You would have been much more effective in a Shield blaster brutix and it would have cost you a whole hell of a lot less.

      Some general rules: if it is faction or T2 and you can't fit it completely with T2 gear, don't fly it. It is just a very expensive and comedic kill mail waiting to happen (and you do NOT want to be in a corp that is known for tasty faction losses. Least we forget, our kill boards are public to all and sundry. They can and ARE used to hunt you). Keep it cheap and cheerful for now. Try something like this:

      [Brutix, Fucking Rape]

      Heavy Ion Blaster II, Void M
      Heavy Ion Blaster II, Void M
      Heavy Ion Blaster II, Void M
      Heavy Ion Blaster II, Void M
      Heavy Ion Blaster II, Void M
      Heavy Ion Blaster II, Void M
      Heavy Ion Blaster II, Void M

      Large Shield Extender II
      Large Shield Extender II
      Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
      Experimental 10MN MicroWarpdrive I

      Damage Control II
      Tracking Enhancer II
      Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
      Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
      Magnetic Field Stabilizer II

      Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
      Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
      Medium Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I

      Hammerhead II x5

      Put it in EFT and start training for it. Anything you can't fit switch up to a high meta variant, but train for that fitting and you will do fine. Don't forget your support skills! Gunner support skills will give you more bang for your buck in the early days than going for T2 guns. You want those to 4 before starting the grind.

      Hope that helps!

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    2. I knew I'd probably lose it, but I also didn't want to just leave it sitting in hangar forever. At the end of the day it's still just ISK and the lessons learnt are worth far more.

      For now though, I'm sticking with frigs. There's going to be a lot of Incursus's going through my hangar.

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    3. hey! I am not exactly known for my cheap losses, and I do love the faction stuff! But for now, keep it to things you can fit T2. Some of the faction frigs are really great. The Amarr Navy Slicer is fantastic, as is the Comet (a personal favorite) and the hookbill. They are pretty in-expensive as well for faction boats. In the cruiser area you really only have the navy stabber as a kind of poor man's HAC. The best place to shoot for right now is battlecruisers. The hulls aren't super expensive, and medium guns is the same grind as it is with cruisers, so no time lost there. They are fairly fast, and are pretty much the backbone of any fleet. You generally can replace the loss in a few hours of PVE or market work as well =).

      Frigs are a hell of a lot of fun, but tricky to fly. Check out this link if you want to learn some neat tricks for flying fast: http://www.eve-tribune.com/index.php?no=2_40&page=6 . Really, it is a must read for anyone in PVP as it works for bigger ships just the same, but slower.

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    4. I also wanted to say that your fit was would have been quite good had you had the skills to fit it correctly! T2 that fit and it isn't bad at all.

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  2. Noob scouter also reporting in o7 lol

    Was good fun, i was wondering what the heck the Atron was doing ay, he was very skitish, but hindsight is a wonderful thing. Im just gutted that I was off getting my Helios when all this went down. I could have hung around and lost my poorly fitted 70 DPS myrmie too!

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  3. Ouch, and a fed navy web too

    http://eve.battleclinic.com/killboard/killmail.php?id=17341963

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  4. Falling Skies??? There is only ONE kind of sky in New Eden: Clear Skies!

    http://www.clearskiesthemovie.com/

    Hope you weren't planning on doing anything for the next 4 or 5 hours ;-).

    Sounds like you are having fun Pew Pew down there! =). It is always great to read your blog as always. For the news of the day, check out http://themittani.com/. Well written and interesting news about EVE and EVE News. Everything from politics, to game discussion, to battle reports. You should ask Endie if they will carry your blog! I think it meets with their "good posting" requirements =).

    Now that you are encountering people from other corps, there are two sites you will want to check out. The first is http://evewho.com/. That will tell you who is in a corporation or alliance, who is leaving and who is joining as well as basic info. It should be your first stop when checking out an organization. Then there is http://www.eveskunk.com/ which is a WHOLE 'nother beastie. EVE Skunk is a spy's best friend and is the main reason you should never send an Alliance Mail. Some really great info on there at any rate. You should be checking these sites whenever you get a new recruit, as well as their http://eve-kill.net/ profile.

    Lastly, some silly configuration things and some corp things. First, get the CEO of your corp to take the shares out of the wallet and put it in his wallet. Do it now. Don't wait, as quick as you can. It really is critical. Any director can take those shares and with them they can trigger a vote among share holders to kick out the CEO. If they are the only share holder.. well.. you can guess how that goes. It is one way that corps can experience a hostile take over by a director. Not something you need to worry about at this very moment, but is one of those things that is so critical and easy to forget you want to make sure it is done.

    As for the configuration stuffs.. There are certain timers in EVE that you are likely to encounter. You are familiar with your cloak timer on a gate, but it is actually a combination of timers. First, when you jump through a gate, undock from a station, jump through a bridge or a jump portal, or to a cyno, you are given what is called a Session Change Timer. This timer exists so that you have time to load grid before people start shooting at you. I think it is currently around 10 seconds. In that 10 seconds you can't be targeted or shot (you can be bumped however). These timers are extremely important in combination with aggression and invulnerability timers (we can get into those at a later date, back to session change timers). It is very nice to have a visual indicator, but this is not set to on as a default in EVE. You need to go to your Options, then General Settings and Click the "Show Session Change Timer" in the top right of the window. While you are here, change your "Target Back" to 0 (the default setting can get you in trouble. If someone targets you, you want to manually target them back almost always). You will see your session change timer as a grey circle on the top right of your screen. It will fill up and when it disappears, you timer is done.

    Next time, if you want, I can tell you about your invulnerability and aggression timers and how that affects combat at gates and on stations.

    God bless John Rourke!

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  5. Also.. WTF was Jax doing flying that bling mobile in PVP? 40 lashings with a wet noodle! The best PVP ships are cheap and replaceable! You must adopt the moto of TRIBE: "We keep fighting until our wreckage clogs the enemy's guns and they quit the field in disgust!"

    Seriously, cheap and cheerful! Fast, face rape ships, are your friends at this point. Shield tank with blasters, pulse lasers and auto cannons. welp canes would be perfect:

    [Hurricane, T2 Welp Cane]
    Damage Control II
    Gyrostabilizer II
    Gyrostabilizer II
    Gyrostabilizer II
    Tracking Enhancer II
    Tracking Enhancer II

    Experimental 10MN MicroWarpdrive I
    Warp Disruptor II
    Large Shield Extender II
    Large Shield Extender II

    425mm AutoCannon II, Hail M
    425mm AutoCannon II, Hail M
    425mm AutoCannon II, Hail M
    425mm AutoCannon II, Hail M
    425mm AutoCannon II, Hail M
    425mm AutoCannon II, Hail M
    Medium Energy Neutralizer II
    Medium Energy Neutralizer II
    Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
    Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
    Medium Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I

    Hornet EC-300 x4
    Vespa EC-600 x1

    What you can't fit T2, fit high meta T1 (always fit meta and use faction ammo for PVP). That with scimi support is pretty easy to field. Just warp in on top of them, set your drones on the secondary target to stop them from shooting you and then stick your dick in their ear until they pop (turn your MWD off once you are in range and target at "Face fuck" range.. IE 500 - 1500m). If your crazy friend insists on blowing up expensive ships, at least he can do it in a scimi and give you shield logistics for the fight! Or he can chill in a Falcon or if he just wants to go boom, a blackbird.

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    Replies
    1. LOL. All good tips! You've written more than me!

      We've got a handle on the next run, probably trying out T1's with a variety of fits to check em out.

      Got most of the web's you mention - currently having a laugh at the epic troll up there at one of them. I found a lot of resources investigating the stolen POS too. Details on that to follow when I've sold the damn thing. It is probably nothing having thought about it but the name of the corp will be up on here soon.

      In short - good tips! Glad you enjoy reading! We aren't going to be pro' any time soon though....

      PS - aiming for the Brutix with my skill queue indecision?

      PPS - already got clear skies - 20 minutes in. I've been trying to compress it for the phone!

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    2. Glad you liked the tips! I keep thinking on how I can get you the info in some other form than massive brain over-loading info dumps! Both TEST and GOONS have huge wikis (TEST's is mostly stolen from Goons) that they have been working on for years in order to try and disseminate some of the info. At least reading your blog I can pick the stuff that is relevant! =). Reading through this I realized I said "Shield Tank" and kicked myself for being non-specific. That is a buffer fit, shield tank. EVE, being EVE, nothing is simple. There are active tanks, passive tanks, buffer tanks, passive fit active tanks, passive fit buffer tanks, shield tanks, armour tanks, sig tanks, hull tanks and speed tanks. Every one of them for a different style of combat or fleet setup.

      I just figured I would start with timers =). You should read up on your invulnerability timer and your aggression timer. An aggression timer happens when you shoot someone. It is 30 seconds and it prevents a session change in that time. So you can't jump through a gate or dock at a station for instance. "Station Games" are when people take advantage of the session change and aggression timers. They will undock in something that can't be killed in under 30 seconds and bait the outside force. So if you shoot someone and plan to dock to avoid incoming fire, make sure you can tank 30 seconds of what is out there. You can also do it to aggress the camping party so they can't dock. Perhaps to warp in a sniper gang at range and engage in some high velocity gift giving of slightly used ammo. The other place that this REALLY matters is on gates in 0.0. When two unaligned parties meet at a gate, you will often see them not jump through immediately. Even when it is a single ship and you run into a large camp on the outgate, you don't want to jump through right away. You WANT them to target and shoot you. Then you can jump through and know the pursuing gang can't pursue you for 30 seconds. Now a competent camp will have both sides of the gate covered, but often they won't and if it is two ships meeting in the night.. that gives you a free 30 seconds to get away and get safe if you need to run.

      At the gate you have three timers. A session change timer that lasts 10 seconds, an invulnerability timer that lasts 30 seconds and then a cloaking timer that lasts 60 seconds (I think). So when you jump into a camp, don't panic and remember the words to this song:

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vfv1QtZDirY

      Fly dangerously!!!

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  6. dont be afraid to try out your own fits, no matter how great the fits sugested to you are
    the real thing you need to learn is WHY certain things work
    if it was just a matter of copy and paste, almost everyone would be really good pvpers ;)
    that said, looking at premade fits is never bad

    also if you have a computer able to handle it, i really sugest recording fights, this makes it alot easier to go back and actually see where things went wrong, as im sure youve noticed adrenalin doesnt exactly help your memory ;)

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  7. Great to see you going out and stirring up some trouble, you've definitely got the right attitude.

    Gate guns make a pretty huge difference - they do enough damage to kill a frigate in literally seconds, and even a well tanked vigilant would only last a couple of minutes at most. Then again if you hadn't taken gate gun aggro, the myrm probably wouldn't have taken the fight.

    If you're interested, drop me a line in game some time (Azual Skoll is my character name) - I'd be happy to take you guys out for a roam and help you get the hang of things.

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    1. A tempting offer indeed! I'll be in touch at some point. I think I even considered the PVP school before deciding just to throw it all in there and see what happened. If you can stand a T1 roam with the Noob patrol we may be in touch. You'll have seen my added contact hopefully :)

      PS - honestly we are the Noob patrol though. Imagine the EVE equivalent of the Blues Brothers driving through a shopping mall. I'm going to get the music for that next time and play it over the top.

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  8. If you haven't done yet - you really should take Azual up on that. Lot's of players paid lots of ISK to go on his classes when he ran Agony's PvP University - he knows his stuff, and he's a really nice guy to-boot!

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