I have been asked about how I made my ISK and, being of a naturally sunny disposition, I will now explain. My current position:
137,986m assets (Jita sell price)
22,000m liquid ISK
59,000m active sell orders (Jita sell price)
3,000m 10/20 BPOs (unresearched value)
Total: 222B ISK. Depressingly, I am not even wealthy. Still, I have enough ISK to do whatever I wish (within reason) and that's almost good enough for me. I was asked whether I was an ‘old player’, having accumulated assets over time. The answer is somewhat subjective so I will simply state that Zappity was created in early 2013 and that my market activities began at about the same time.
Region trading (the act of buying in one region and moving the goods to another location before selling) made me my first few billion. I moved faction ammunition between Jita and the other hubs, predominantly Amarr and Dodixie. This triggered my first foray into spreadsheets, using Google Sheets to pull eve-central.com volume data for the ammunition I was interested in, highlighting good buy opportunities when they were a certain percentage below the other hubs. The main limitation here was that I did not have the capital to do spread across buy orders and, instead, bought straight from sell orders. That cut into my profits and, more importantly, meant that I had to actively update sell orders because I needed to recoup much margin as possible. This 0.01 ISKing lasted about a fortnight before I burned out. I decided that I needed a better plan.
I took my hard earned billions into invention and T2 production. I put up a medium tower a few jumps out of Jita and made Expanded Cargoholds, Nanofibers, Damage Controls, Inertial Stabs plus a few other things I can’t remember. I would check the market prices and commence runs on whatever would be most profitable that particular week. I bought all the minerals from Jita and freighted them out myself. It was quite profitable but also quite tedious. It earned me a few billion more ISK before I exited just prior to the Crius changes.
At this point, I had about 6B ISK and roughly doubled it by cheating and buying an additional 6B worth of plex. This allowed me to establish a good array of low-price buy orders after training Margin Trading to V on my trading alt. I pulled sales volumes from eve-marketdata.com and selected the 300 highest (in terms of ISK) T2 items being sold. At this point I transitioned from Google Sheets to my own PHP scripts plus MySQL database. My scripts reported the item list and altered me when either my buy orders or inventory were getting low. This allowed me to see at a glance whether anything required attention, especially buy orders that had been filled and needed replacing. There was a continual balance between trying to keep individual orders small enough that I could service the payouts but large enough that I didn't need to continually replace the orders.
At this point I was turning over about 1-2B each day in Jita (more on the weekends, less mid-week) with roughly 10% profit. I managed a reasonable turnover because I bought at Jita plus a three jump range, relying on public courier contracts to move stuff back to base for me. Three jumps around Jita does not include any lowsec systems but does cover a lot of producers, some of which are happy to save the travel and sell directly to a buy order. I paid couriers about 0.1% reward with 150% collateral, meaning that I paid 20k reward to transport 20m goods back to Jita at a 30m collateral. I wrote a script to report the current worth of assets in The Forge, sorted by station value, along with the collateral and reward required for each station.
This was easy. I added replacement market orders every day or two, I never updated sell orders, and I still made a reasonable profit. This continued until I had accrued about 50B. The next major breakthrough occurred when I went POS hunting. I made another 50B with about a month of intensive POS scanning and war declarations. But it was too tiring to maintain and I felt bad for the poor fools I was stripping bare.
100B ISK was a major milestone. At this point I decided that a change of tactics was required. It was becoming increasingly difficult to spend all my ISK on buy orders so I diversified my items and bought a jump freighter. I toyed with lowsec for a while but soon concluded that sov nullsec was the place to be. I began stocking an alliance staging system and was soon turning over about 2-3B per day with 20% profit. Much better!
And that brings us up to the present day. Well, almost. It brings us up to the buyback program which is another story altogether.
Saturday, May 28, 2016
Sunday, May 22, 2016
Zappity's Adventures: Buyback program magnificence
I started a corp buyback program. It is magnificent. And, fittingly, it is called ‘Zappity's Magnificent Buyback Program’. Now that I write it out, I must admit that the title isn't quite as imaginative as I imagined when I thought it up. Still, it gets the point across.
Why am I telling you about this? Well, I have been travelling a LOT lately for work. I can sadly report that the Pacific Ocean is of precisely the same immensity as it has previously been and I wish they would introduce a new and even faster Concorde with an Australia-US leg and also teleportation. Actually, just teleportation would be adequate.
Before I was distracted I was about to say that I have not been much in the mood for PvP. This isn't all bad because I do not like to pretend that PvP is the only thing that I find interesting in EVE. So here is an adventure about breaking into a new market activity.
It was not at all planned. I was messing about in Jita when a ping went out about a change to corporation policy. Apparently, the powers that be had decided to change the corp buyback rate from 90% of Jita buy via evepraisal.com to 70%. This was purportedly to make room for independent marketeers to move into the space and take over but I think it is just because Gobbins is tight.
I looked at my trading corp wallet and saw lots of ISK and thought, “Hey, I could do that”. So I posted in the thread, “Gobbins is tight and is only paying out 70%. I'll do 90%.” And the contracts started rolling in. I didn't want anything too bulky so I initially excluded ore and minerals and PI (which scares me because I don't understand it) but after about a week I had paid out 10B.
Which was far too long in my opinion.
I took a careful look at the forums. There were buyback programs everywhere! This was just unacceptable. If I was going to bother with this thing then I was obviously going to have to crush them all.
I pondered my options. I pondered that I had a reasonably-sized 12-digit war chest, having liquidated a fair chunk of my trading items prior to the release of citadels and the price crash as a consequence of the inevitable liquidity squeeze. I pondered that I could probably manage for a while paying even 100% of the Jita buy price, admittedly with a sadly diminished profit margin. And I pondered that it was easier to retain customers than it was to get new ones.
So I posted that I was now accepting 100% of Jita buyback in Fade. Even more contracts started rolling in! Ha! After a week or so, I dropped the price back to 92%, confident that the general magnificence of the program, the higher payout, and the relatively rapid turnaround that I was managing would encourage people to hang around. I decided to ignore the Querious stations because they were just too far away. And because I was lazy.
Next, however, news went out that Pandemic Horde was moving into Fade properly and, subsequently, abandoning Querious. The corp program was paying 80% on everything. Hmm.
I added Querious to my program at 92% and bought another jump freighter in Amarr. I was still excluding really bulky cheap stuff (PI, ice etc) and was soon unfortunately forced to add non-faction T1 ships to the list. I thought a lot about ‘ISK density’, the curse of jump freighter pilots everywhere. But even excluding these items, I had soon paid out over 150B in Querious and needed to move some of it to Amarr.
I don't like jump fatigue for jump freighters. CCP supposedly likes to support ‘gameplay enablers’. I don't feel particularly supported to be honest. Jump fatigue is awful and frustrating. I understand the point of it - I even understand the need for it - but I don't like the way it feels, especially for a non-combat ship.
Things eventually calmed down in Querious and I was able to turn my attention back to Fade. My main competitor was now offering 93%! Disgraceful! Just the sort of shabby trick you'd expect them to play while I was busy. You just can't trust some people.
In addition to having a troublesome competitor, I had decided expand into ore and minerals. (I have a lot of blueprints, some admittedly more nefariously acquired that others, so I might as well do something useful with them.)
I faced a decision. Should I accept the presence of my feeble, so called competitors? Or should I CRUSH THEM!
Sunday, May 15, 2016
Zappity's Adventures: A capital idea
Capital ship changes had come to EVE. The fact that there were changes would have undoubtedly been more relevant had I actually flown capital ships beforehand. But nevertheless, the changes incited me to action and I decided to investigate.
I had been quietly preparing for a move into capital ships for some time. I had already trained up Jump Drive Calibration (the one that increases the range at which you can jump to a cyno) to V along with a pack of support skills and was ready to choose which ship to fly. Of course, I couldn't decide (or, more accurately, I sequentially decided upon most of them) and ended up injecting a whole bunch of skill books. I'm sure they'll come in useful some time.
I was initially most interested in dreadnoughts, imagining that I could fit a Moros (the Gallente one) like a gigantic Incursus and go roaming, swatting my feeble enemies out of the sky like mere flies. To be honest, a solo dreadnought roam is practically inevitable and you will no doubt have a good chuckle at my quite literal expense before long.
But before these dreams of magnificence could be realised, a ping went out to the Pandemic Horde capitals channel (yes, there is such a thing) for carrier practice on Singularity. I logged in.
A fit of dubious quality was linked and I soon found myself undocking a shiny new Nidhoggur. To be honest I didn't really care about the fit - I just wanted to see what the new fighter mechanics were like. But I did notice an interesting new high slot module called the “Networked Sensor Array” which, when activated, greatly increased the carrier’s lock speed.
However, the ability to quickly lock something is not tremendously useful if you do not know how to kill it. I looked intently at my Fighter Bay window, a new variant of the old Drone Bay which looks very fancy. Having successfully remembered to buy some fighters before I undocked, I figured that the first thing I needed to do was drag a bunch of them into the launch tubes. This was pretty straightforward and I was soon dragging stacks of fighters into the appropriate part of the window. They loaded. Success!
Fighters, however, are of limited value while stuck in the launch tube. I figured that the next step was to send them forth to do my evil bidding. There were some nice, big arrows on the launch tubes and, sure enough, my fighters were soon circling my ship. Now, go kill something!
“Stupid fighters”, I thought. “Obviously bugged.” For there is was, hitting ‘F’ as hard as any seasoned drone warrior could hit it, all to no avail. My fighters were stubbornly orbiting my ship instead of going forth to conquer. I examined the interface more closely, just on the slim chance that I was doing something wrong. Ah, the fighter squadrons each had their own little module buttons!
I selected my target, then clicked the fairly obvious ‘go kill it’ button on the first squadron. It went! The squadron also had a ‘go fast’ button which activated a MWD and a particularly interesting ‘kill it faster’ button which unleashed one of a limited salvo of rockets, greatly increasing the damage.
As it transpired, there were three main fighter categories. First, the standard ‘light’ damage fighters have an MWD, a normal damage module, and a limited number of ‘alpha strike’ charges. These worked tremendously well against sub-capitals and, in quantity, against other capitals. Next, there was an anti-fighter class which was designed almost solely to kill other fighters, having an enormous damage buff for this purpose. These ones also had a tackle button to slow down enemy squadrons. Finally, there was a utility class which, depending upon race, would web, jam, point or neut enemy ships.
After playing around for an hour I was marginally less terrible at operating my fighters and decided that the only logical thing to do was to take a carrier on a solo roam of Providence! Unfortunately, the patch had only just dropped and the marketeers were asking the most exorbitant prices imaginable. Disgraceful. And there weren't even any Networked Sensor Arrays available. I was disappointed. But my time will come!
I had been quietly preparing for a move into capital ships for some time. I had already trained up Jump Drive Calibration (the one that increases the range at which you can jump to a cyno) to V along with a pack of support skills and was ready to choose which ship to fly. Of course, I couldn't decide (or, more accurately, I sequentially decided upon most of them) and ended up injecting a whole bunch of skill books. I'm sure they'll come in useful some time.
I was initially most interested in dreadnoughts, imagining that I could fit a Moros (the Gallente one) like a gigantic Incursus and go roaming, swatting my feeble enemies out of the sky like mere flies. To be honest, a solo dreadnought roam is practically inevitable and you will no doubt have a good chuckle at my quite literal expense before long.
But before these dreams of magnificence could be realised, a ping went out to the Pandemic Horde capitals channel (yes, there is such a thing) for carrier practice on Singularity. I logged in.
A fit of dubious quality was linked and I soon found myself undocking a shiny new Nidhoggur. To be honest I didn't really care about the fit - I just wanted to see what the new fighter mechanics were like. But I did notice an interesting new high slot module called the “Networked Sensor Array” which, when activated, greatly increased the carrier’s lock speed.
However, the ability to quickly lock something is not tremendously useful if you do not know how to kill it. I looked intently at my Fighter Bay window, a new variant of the old Drone Bay which looks very fancy. Having successfully remembered to buy some fighters before I undocked, I figured that the first thing I needed to do was drag a bunch of them into the launch tubes. This was pretty straightforward and I was soon dragging stacks of fighters into the appropriate part of the window. They loaded. Success!
Fighters, however, are of limited value while stuck in the launch tube. I figured that the next step was to send them forth to do my evil bidding. There were some nice, big arrows on the launch tubes and, sure enough, my fighters were soon circling my ship. Now, go kill something!
“Stupid fighters”, I thought. “Obviously bugged.” For there is was, hitting ‘F’ as hard as any seasoned drone warrior could hit it, all to no avail. My fighters were stubbornly orbiting my ship instead of going forth to conquer. I examined the interface more closely, just on the slim chance that I was doing something wrong. Ah, the fighter squadrons each had their own little module buttons!
I selected my target, then clicked the fairly obvious ‘go kill it’ button on the first squadron. It went! The squadron also had a ‘go fast’ button which activated a MWD and a particularly interesting ‘kill it faster’ button which unleashed one of a limited salvo of rockets, greatly increasing the damage.
As it transpired, there were three main fighter categories. First, the standard ‘light’ damage fighters have an MWD, a normal damage module, and a limited number of ‘alpha strike’ charges. These worked tremendously well against sub-capitals and, in quantity, against other capitals. Next, there was an anti-fighter class which was designed almost solely to kill other fighters, having an enormous damage buff for this purpose. These ones also had a tackle button to slow down enemy squadrons. Finally, there was a utility class which, depending upon race, would web, jam, point or neut enemy ships.
After playing around for an hour I was marginally less terrible at operating my fighters and decided that the only logical thing to do was to take a carrier on a solo roam of Providence! Unfortunately, the patch had only just dropped and the marketeers were asking the most exorbitant prices imaginable. Disgraceful. And there weren't even any Networked Sensor Arrays available. I was disappointed. But my time will come!
Sunday, April 24, 2016
Zappity's Adventures: Sudden curiosity regarding shipment value
I had finally bitten the proverbial bullet and decided to do a few jump freighter runs out to Fade. I had been a bit slack on the market activities and my stockpile in Jita had built up considerably as a result of the slow buy orders by which I typically stock up. I had also started a buyback service to help our newer players out in Fade staging system and had lots of stuff waiting for transport back to Jita. So I filled the Anshar and made my way out to the edge of empire for the final jump to O1Y-ED.
Zappity’s partner in crime undocked from O1Y and made her way over to the cyno bookmark while I undocked the Anshar. Just as I clicked to light the cyno the station disappeared from the screen. It seemed like an odd visual glitch but I ignored it, already absorbed in my routine to jump to the cyno on the main screen. But I sure paid attention when my Anshar appeared 50 km from the station undock. Someone playing silly buggers with a command destroyer had jumped my cyno ship away from the station!
I still had an out-cyno lit on the other screen but had a jump fatigue delay of roughly a minute. The numerous ships on grid were all theoretically friendly since my trading corp was blue to Pandemic Horde. But everybody knows that Pandemic Horde is filled with spies and there were plenty of reds in system regardless.
I watched carefully, waiting to see whether anyone was approaching. I aligned to a celestial on the other side of the solar system, just in case I needed to warp away before the fatigue timer had cleared. While I was waiting I checked my cargo, suddenly curious about the value of my load: 17 billion worth of assorted ships and modules, plus the jump freighter, totalled an uncomfortably high 24 billion ISK on the line.
An interceptor suddenly appeared on grid, 50 km away. I still had 30 seconds to go on the timer. He began burning at me. I hit warp, thankful for once that freighters had a slow warp speed and even more thankful that I was already aligned. I warped to the celestial at 50 km, cursing myself for not having shared Zappity’s safe spots with the trading corp. By the time I was slowing out of warp the timer had expired. The interceptor was already at the celestial but, luckily, it was at zero. I was hovering over ‘Jump To’ and clicked as soon as I dropped out of warp.
Phew!
Sunday, April 17, 2016
Zappity's Adventures: Winning the propaganda war
I was flying a Sabre, accompanying a Thrasher roam into Deklein. SMA had just been burned out of Fade and Pandemic Horde had decided to use the O1Y-ED as our staging system. Only a couple of days before we had been camping this system, tormenting the locals.
We found a Chimera, ratting in a system. Deklein was still chock full of ratters despite the ongoing destruction of their empire. But this worked well for us because we wanted to hunt them! The FC herded our fleet of Thrashers while I concentrated on keeping the Chimera bubbled. This was pretty fun. I dropped the first bubble and darted out while he targeted me. I then burned away and dropped a bookmark at warp range. Every minute or so I jumped back and dropped another bubble on top of him.
Unfortunately, our fleet was not large enough to kill him. But we did kill a lot of drones, including eight Geckos! It was good practice for the newer players in their Thrashers, not to mention me in my Sabre. Eventually, we decided that it was time to depart so we continued to the next constellation where we killed a bunch of stuff.
Ishtar: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53082441/
Devoter: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53082672/
Vexor Navy Issue: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53082747/
Ishtar: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53082862/
I suspect this sort of thing will only increase in the coming weeks.
Of course, kicking the Imperium out of their space isn’t all fun and games. A ping went out for an entosis fleet and I dutifully joined, having nothing better to do at the time. After the first hour we had taken a couple of I-Hubs and TCUs, as well as a station or two. Our fleet was divided into an entosis group, who were distributed across the constellation, and a defence group, who were camping the constellation entrance. The defence fleet was probably even more bored that the entosing fleet since there was a noticeable absence of enemies. So we started playing a game.
Every time a neutral entered the system they were tackled and interrogated. Many of our captors were unwilling to play along and simply forced us to kill them. (It may also have had something to do with the fact that many of our fleet seemed to have trouble with the concept of non-violent interaction.) But we found one interesting case.
A Merlin jumped into system. He was in a highsec corp and had a decidedly high sec oriented killboard. We politely enquired as to the purpose of his visit and were told that he had read about the war against the Imperium and wanted to help. Sure enough, he had an entosis link fit and wanted to do something nasty to their stuff. That was pretty much as far as he had got in terms of tactical thinking but it was good enough for us. He accepted our invite to fleet and helped us defend the system while the clocks ticked!
We found a Chimera, ratting in a system. Deklein was still chock full of ratters despite the ongoing destruction of their empire. But this worked well for us because we wanted to hunt them! The FC herded our fleet of Thrashers while I concentrated on keeping the Chimera bubbled. This was pretty fun. I dropped the first bubble and darted out while he targeted me. I then burned away and dropped a bookmark at warp range. Every minute or so I jumped back and dropped another bubble on top of him.
Unfortunately, our fleet was not large enough to kill him. But we did kill a lot of drones, including eight Geckos! It was good practice for the newer players in their Thrashers, not to mention me in my Sabre. Eventually, we decided that it was time to depart so we continued to the next constellation where we killed a bunch of stuff.
Ishtar: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53082441/
Devoter: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53082672/
Vexor Navy Issue: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53082747/
Ishtar: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53082862/
I suspect this sort of thing will only increase in the coming weeks.
Of course, kicking the Imperium out of their space isn’t all fun and games. A ping went out for an entosis fleet and I dutifully joined, having nothing better to do at the time. After the first hour we had taken a couple of I-Hubs and TCUs, as well as a station or two. Our fleet was divided into an entosis group, who were distributed across the constellation, and a defence group, who were camping the constellation entrance. The defence fleet was probably even more bored that the entosing fleet since there was a noticeable absence of enemies. So we started playing a game.
Every time a neutral entered the system they were tackled and interrogated. Many of our captors were unwilling to play along and simply forced us to kill them. (It may also have had something to do with the fact that many of our fleet seemed to have trouble with the concept of non-violent interaction.) But we found one interesting case.
A Merlin jumped into system. He was in a highsec corp and had a decidedly high sec oriented killboard. We politely enquired as to the purpose of his visit and were told that he had read about the war against the Imperium and wanted to help. Sure enough, he had an entosis link fit and wanted to do something nasty to their stuff. That was pretty much as far as he had got in terms of tactical thinking but it was good enough for us. He accepted our invite to fleet and helped us defend the system while the clocks ticked!
Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Zappity's Adventures: Logi time!
It was time for some fleet action. I have discovered logistics. Not the ‘hauling stuff about’ variety, which I was already far too familiar with, but the ‘repairing other ships’ variety. I am still confused as to why CCP thought this was a good name for the class since the proper usage of the word is hardly rare. But regardless of the nomenclature, I have discovered the role and I quite like it.
The problem with large fleet fights is that they are boring. The FC does a huge amount of management (usually with a second account), the tackle and niche roles (command destroyers, webbers etc) do varying amounts (but these are by definition not numerous) and the DPS does absolutely bugger all. It is terrible. You wait for the target to appear in the fleet window, lock it and hit F1. Occasionally you might reload but that's about it.
I really do understand CCP Larrikin’s desire to change fleet mechanics to make individual members more involved.
And then, after hearing constant calls for logi (“we need more logi” is a most common refrain heard prior to unlocking), I finally trained Logistic Cruisers and Logistics Frigates to V and took my first Oneiros out for a fight. It was magnificent. I was locking things up left, right and centre, juggling targets and reps as the frantic demands for armour appeared. I was managing capacitor and heat (we were only just holding). I had to carefully manage my prop mod to keep range but not destroy my meagre cap reserve. I had to time the armour repper cycles correctly to ensure that the cycles ended in time. And, finally, I had to die when I was micro-jumped away from the fleet into an angry nest of interceptors. Oh well.
More recently, I took a Scalpel on a destroyer roam into Imperium space. This little ship has a tiny 5 m3 drone bay into which the conscientious pilot will slot an armor repair drone and the selfish pilot will slot a DPS drone. I fall into the latter category and thus took a Warrior II, solely for the purpose of recording my conquests on the killboard.
We left from Okagaiken and easily evaded a Caracal fleet in Saranen, the Imperium staging system. We were soon winging our way through Pure Blind and, eventually, into SMA space in Fade to torment the locals as they evacuated. There were freighters going everywhere. It was amazing. But we concentrated on the carriers and Hurricanes sitting upon the undock. Unfortunately, they refused to fight. We eventually got bored and, getting wind of a ruckus in Deklein, we quickly made our way up the map.
Allies had managed to bubble three Marauders 70 km from the station. They died so quickly that my promiscuous little drone barely had time to contribute damage! Flying logistics was a complete waste of time on this fleet because nobody needed reps.
Paladin #1: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53001504/
Paladin #2: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53001531/
Paladin #3: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53001536/
We successfully extricated ourselves from the system without any friendly fire incidents (not an easy feat with not-blue-blues and a bunch of noobs) and were soon heading back towards Okagaiken via Fade, happy with our shiny kills. For some reason, there was a lot of singing on comms.
P.S. CCPls give killmails for logi somehow now that I have started flying them.
The problem with large fleet fights is that they are boring. The FC does a huge amount of management (usually with a second account), the tackle and niche roles (command destroyers, webbers etc) do varying amounts (but these are by definition not numerous) and the DPS does absolutely bugger all. It is terrible. You wait for the target to appear in the fleet window, lock it and hit F1. Occasionally you might reload but that's about it.
I really do understand CCP Larrikin’s desire to change fleet mechanics to make individual members more involved.
And then, after hearing constant calls for logi (“we need more logi” is a most common refrain heard prior to unlocking), I finally trained Logistic Cruisers and Logistics Frigates to V and took my first Oneiros out for a fight. It was magnificent. I was locking things up left, right and centre, juggling targets and reps as the frantic demands for armour appeared. I was managing capacitor and heat (we were only just holding). I had to carefully manage my prop mod to keep range but not destroy my meagre cap reserve. I had to time the armour repper cycles correctly to ensure that the cycles ended in time. And, finally, I had to die when I was micro-jumped away from the fleet into an angry nest of interceptors. Oh well.
More recently, I took a Scalpel on a destroyer roam into Imperium space. This little ship has a tiny 5 m3 drone bay into which the conscientious pilot will slot an armor repair drone and the selfish pilot will slot a DPS drone. I fall into the latter category and thus took a Warrior II, solely for the purpose of recording my conquests on the killboard.
We left from Okagaiken and easily evaded a Caracal fleet in Saranen, the Imperium staging system. We were soon winging our way through Pure Blind and, eventually, into SMA space in Fade to torment the locals as they evacuated. There were freighters going everywhere. It was amazing. But we concentrated on the carriers and Hurricanes sitting upon the undock. Unfortunately, they refused to fight. We eventually got bored and, getting wind of a ruckus in Deklein, we quickly made our way up the map.
Allies had managed to bubble three Marauders 70 km from the station. They died so quickly that my promiscuous little drone barely had time to contribute damage! Flying logistics was a complete waste of time on this fleet because nobody needed reps.
Paladin #1: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53001504/
Paladin #2: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53001531/
Paladin #3: https://zkillboard.com/kill/53001536/
We successfully extricated ourselves from the system without any friendly fire incidents (not an easy feat with not-blue-blues and a bunch of noobs) and were soon heading back towards Okagaiken via Fade, happy with our shiny kills. For some reason, there was a lot of singing on comms.
P.S. CCPls give killmails for logi somehow now that I have started flying them.
Monday, April 11, 2016
Zappity's Adventures: Hype in Provi
I decided to take my Hyperion to new stomping grounds in Provi! What could possibly go wrong? Actually, I just bought another in Amarr because I didn't want to fly a battleship all the way across the galaxy. Not that undocking from Amarr in a battleship was particularly safe when under wardec from practically everyone. But it was certainly faster.
I made it safely to the quiet lowsec pocket from which Misaba enters Providence just before downtime. Dotlan confirmed my half-remembered fears that practically all the stations in the pocket were those nasty little Amarr kick out stations of SFI-killing fame (see last week). I decided that logging off in a safe spot was better.
The next day saw me hop cheerfully into Provi. And yes, I had a scout. I really should have taken a booster since the rep bonuses are obscene. There was an Apocalypse on scan! I searched the nearby anomalies with d-scan and became confused when I ruled out the last one. Unfortunately, the battleship pilot had decided to skulk in his POS.
I knew that I had been spotted and that the exciting news of a roaming battleship, probably somewhat shiny, would have appeared in intel.
Two systems later I found an Interceptor gang. A bunch of them landed on my gate just as I was entering warp for the outbound but they immediately turned around and arrived at my destination before me. I landed in the middle of them and started aligning back to the other gate. Needless to say, they tackled me.
I checked the ranges and targeted a bunch of nearby ships. The grappler was magnificent while they were close but rapidly fell off in terms of effectiveness. I didn't want to change my alignment and they were all able to escape from scram range as they entered hull.
Once I had cleared away the scram tacklers I activated my MJD (I learned, see?) and was 100 km away in the blink of an eye. They chased! I targeted them at range and managed to get a few solid hits on the frigates who were unwisely approaching at zero transversal. But, again, I didn't manage to kill any of them. It was very disappointing.
I soon got bored with their orbiting and warped to the next system where I met a second frigate gang. As it transpired, the two gangs were not on friendly terms and were having a scuffle. The Provi side concentrated on killing the other fleet, while the intruders split their efforts between Provi and myself. I, of course, was oblivious to all of that and opened fire upon all who dared stray into scram range.
After a while it became clear that no more ships were going to come close enough for me to do damage. So I activated my MJD again and warped to a safe spot. The out gate was bubbled so I launched a mobile depot and cloaked up, disappointed that I hadn't killed anything. But I was also satisfied that I hadn't died!
I think Provi should bring a cruiser gang next time. That would be better, I think. They really should be more considerate toward their guests.
I made it safely to the quiet lowsec pocket from which Misaba enters Providence just before downtime. Dotlan confirmed my half-remembered fears that practically all the stations in the pocket were those nasty little Amarr kick out stations of SFI-killing fame (see last week). I decided that logging off in a safe spot was better.
The next day saw me hop cheerfully into Provi. And yes, I had a scout. I really should have taken a booster since the rep bonuses are obscene. There was an Apocalypse on scan! I searched the nearby anomalies with d-scan and became confused when I ruled out the last one. Unfortunately, the battleship pilot had decided to skulk in his POS.
I knew that I had been spotted and that the exciting news of a roaming battleship, probably somewhat shiny, would have appeared in intel.
Two systems later I found an Interceptor gang. A bunch of them landed on my gate just as I was entering warp for the outbound but they immediately turned around and arrived at my destination before me. I landed in the middle of them and started aligning back to the other gate. Needless to say, they tackled me.
I checked the ranges and targeted a bunch of nearby ships. The grappler was magnificent while they were close but rapidly fell off in terms of effectiveness. I didn't want to change my alignment and they were all able to escape from scram range as they entered hull.
Once I had cleared away the scram tacklers I activated my MJD (I learned, see?) and was 100 km away in the blink of an eye. They chased! I targeted them at range and managed to get a few solid hits on the frigates who were unwisely approaching at zero transversal. But, again, I didn't manage to kill any of them. It was very disappointing.
I soon got bored with their orbiting and warped to the next system where I met a second frigate gang. As it transpired, the two gangs were not on friendly terms and were having a scuffle. The Provi side concentrated on killing the other fleet, while the intruders split their efforts between Provi and myself. I, of course, was oblivious to all of that and opened fire upon all who dared stray into scram range.
After a while it became clear that no more ships were going to come close enough for me to do damage. So I activated my MJD again and warped to a safe spot. The out gate was bubbled so I launched a mobile depot and cloaked up, disappointed that I hadn't killed anything. But I was also satisfied that I hadn't died!
I think Provi should bring a cruiser gang next time. That would be better, I think. They really should be more considerate toward their guests.
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