The Art of War

When I first started playing this game I was incredibly overwhelmed. I did all the "pants on head" retarded things newer players do now and more when I first started. It took me about a year to finally figure out what support skills were and why bigger is not always better. It took the advice of a real life friend who is now my new CEO to get it in my head that I needed to "slow my role." At the time battle cruisers were the meta (yes the drake used to be a bad as boat) and I was blitzkrieging through skills to get into one way before I had the necessary skills to fly or income to replace one. Everyone knows what came next, I died in a fire belt ratting in null.

I've wrote about this encounter before, and how this inspired me to get into pvp. Which presented a brand new even steeper learning curve that took me at least two years to climb. At the time I didn't know resources existed to help teach. EVE UNI didn't exist and most people were unwilling to help if you weren't a corpmate.

In this past year I stumbled across the alruist. Reddit led me to his signing off post and being that I'd never heard of him and my own blog was still in its infancy, I decided I'd read up on his style. If I had read his know your enemy articles all those years ago it would have saved me so many stupid losses. As I read though knowing what I know now some of his info is getting outdated, so I've decided to rehash his old series with up to date Intel, fits, and strategies stop that newer players can climb this learning curve with the proper tools.

Expect a post this afternoon.

Fit of the week: Firetail

Adjusting to gal mil has been crazy for me. I haven't farmed any lp like I used to in our short lived caldari stint when I was apart of Casoff. Honestly the space is too busy and I get sidetracked every time I try farm by the constant combat available to me. This is something I've been playing with recently.

[Republic Fleet Firetail, Scram kite]
Damage Control II
Small Ancillary Armor Repairer, Nanite Repair Paste
Gyrostabilizer II

Limited 1MN Afterburner I
Faint Epsilon Warp Scrambler I
X5 Prototype Engine Enervator
X5 Prototype Engine Enervator

280mm Howitzer Artillery II, Republic Fleet EMP S
Rocket Launcher II, Scourge Rage Rocket
280mm Howitzer Artillery II, Republic Fleet EMP S

Small Projectile Collision Accelerator II
Small Anti-Explosive Pump I
Small Anti-Kinetic Pump I

I've never flown in space where scram kiting was more popular. After watching a similar rocket scram kiter condor I decided it was time to retool a ship I haven't flown in a while.

At level 5 skills this ship pushes 155dps and moves at just over 1000m/s. I orbit at 7500 which pulls me around 8300 orbit where tracking is not an issue due to the double web. The ancillary is just to burst for the occasional glancing blow that you'll receive.

Fit of the week: Ishtar

I'm not dead! Hooray! January and February are the busiest months for my industry, and between moving to Minmatar space and out of it I haven't had a whole lot of time to write. I'm no longer apart of winmatar, I joined the frogs in my old home of placid I'm just further up the pipe now. I feel like placid will be where I spend the rest of my eve career. I know the groups, their capabilities and weaknesses, and where the pipes lead. Something I really don't wish to learn elsewhere.

So now that I'm back and flying a new banner why not fly a new ship? Sentry drones V finished from my short lived time with mafia so the ishtar seemed fitting.

[Ishtar, Ishtar]
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Drone Damage Amplifier II

Experimental 10MN Microwarpdrive I
Large F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Large F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Omnidirectional Tracking Link II
Omnidirectional Tracking Link II

Drone Link Augmentor I
Drone Link Augmentor I
Small Unstable Power Fluctuator I
125mm Gatling AutoCannon II

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

The general idea of this ship is to carry 2-3 loads of sentries, start a fight at range, and keep that range throughout the fight.  Always prioritize tackle so the enemy fleet can not get warpins on you and watch for long range alpha like tornados.

I love brawling so much but this ship gave me a new found admiration for shield HAC gangs. 700 dps at bouncer range is just silly. A few of these behemoths mixed with huugin and lachesis support makes a bad day for an AHAC gang.

We started this fight 15v many. That prophecy fleet came near the end to grab tackle on those trying to bugger off. Props go out to Deen Whispa for being the calmest FC/target caller I've ever flown with. If I get one fight like that a month in gal mil I don't think I'll ever leave.

Fly ballsy o7

Never fly what you can't afford to lose.

So for the first time on my eve career I lost something stupidly expensive through noones fault but my own.

Tengu

Yes that's 1billion with a b. I made some mistakes. First mistake #1 overconfidence. I've owned this same tengu for 3 + years and never even come close to losing it. It was a ship I flew often and knew it's limitations.

Mistake #2 know your surroundings. I was in between corps moving towards my new eventual home and I knew nothing about this area of space. 4 jumps through low sec in placid would have been no big deal. 4 jumps here I encountered way more pilots. Which should have made more turn around our dock up.

Mistake #3 don't be lazy. I had the cloaky subsystem in my hold and could have easily refit, but I assured myself I didn't need to dock. That would be a waste of my time.

So gg pandemic legion. I should put an obligatory "didn't want that tengu anyway" line here but I'm really not that bitter about it.

Fit of the week: Algos

New year, new me. The winds of change blew and I've been in 3 different corps this week. I've needed to fly in a different area of space for a few months now and this week I decided to go for it. I joined mafia redux and promptly realized I don't belong in a wormhole. It is a logistical nightmare to pick up everything you own and put it in a wormhole. So I joined winmatar instead. Faction warfare will always hold a soft spotin my heart because frigates and dessies are my favorite boats to fly. With that in mind.

[Algos, Algos]
Damage Control II
400mm Reinforced Steel Plates II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II

Limited 1MN Microwarpdrive I
Fleeting Propulsion Inhibitor I
Faint Epsilon Warp Scrambler I

150mm Light AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP S
150mm Light AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP S
150mm Light AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP S
150mm Light AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP S
150mm Light AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP S
[empty high slot]

Small Trimark Armor Pump I
Small Trimark Armor Pump I
Small Trimark Armor Pump I

This is my new plex sitter. Load EMP by default but keep fusion and barrage in the hold, swap to fusion when fighting armor tankers. Auto cannons make you non cap reliant and there's little to no micro managing to fly this ship. Enter the plex launch drones. Scram web, orbit at range for gallente boats everything else orbit tightly.

This is a tanky little boat that pushes a lot of dps. With 13.6k ehp without slaves and 254 dps with a flight of warrior IIs you're going to be hard pressed to find a dessie it can't beat 1v1. Obviously this is not a boat designed to take on gangs or some of the tankier assault frigs, so use your judgement on what you can fight.

The win:
Corax
Dragoon

The fail:
Haven't lost one yet

The only problem I've found so far, is that it gets very annoying to go rep armor damage after each fight. You will probably lose your plex while you are gone.

Now I've gotta learn all the new Intel for living in the new warzone. I'm so very lost in this pipe.

Fly ballsy o7

Fit of the week: Harpy

Continuing with my faction warfare fits, I've noticed slicers are a popular fit in my pipe. It's a valid ship and comes with its strength of speed and range to mitigate damage. Always wanting to find counters I present to you, the railpy

[Harpy, Harpy]
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Beta Reactor Control: Capacitor Power Relay I

Warp Disruptor II
Gistii B-Type 1MN Microwarpdrive
'Langour' Drive Disruptor I
X5 Prototype Engine Enervator

150mm Railgun II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
150mm Railgun II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
150mm Railgun II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
150mm Railgun II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
[empty high slot]

Small Processor Overclocking Unit II
Small Hybrid Locus Coordinator I

So first things first,with Genos you can upgrade the meta webs both to level 4 but I planned on plugging snakes in this week. Also if you're not comfortable with the EM hole you can sub out the optimal range rig for an EM rig.

You do 190 dps to 23.5km with a 7km falloff and you have 5.23k ehp. Like all assault frigates you are pretty slow at only 2199m/s under mwd so heat is your friend.

You are slower than slicers so you should let them get arrogant. Make them think your blaster fit and burn in close. You have a higher ehp and dps than slicers so you will burn them down. Their only option is to pull range and deagress. I overheat my mwd and webs and keep them at 13km or 16km if you have skirmish links. Also you don't have to add the pimp but it is well worth it. The b-type mwd gives you 10% less of a capacitor penalty which allows you more mwd time.

The win:
Slicer

Fit of the week: Imperial Navy Slicer

Casoff joined faction warfare this week on the side of the caldari militia. Which is pretty cool, props to gal mil for bringing the gfs to us. Being that were are based out of Maut we realized we would be receiving little no support from cal mill because of our vicinity to the two gal mil strongholds, nen and vlill. So plexing our pipe is solely up to us, and we've had lots fun cruising around doing so. Here's a ship that has shined these past few days and nabbed us some kills we would have missed without it.

[Imperial Navy Slicer, Imperial Navy Slicer]
F85 Peripheral Damage System I
Heat Sink II
Small Ancillary Armor Repairer, Nanite Repair Paste
Beta Reactor Control: Capacitor Power Relay I
Nanofiber Internal Structure II

Limited 1MN Microwarpdrive I
Warp Disruptor II

Small Focused Pulse Laser II, Scorch S
Small Focused Pulse Laser II, Scorch S
[empty high slot]

Small Energy Locus Coordinator I
Small Energy Locus Coordinator I
Small Capacitor Control Circuit I

I know I've mentioned before I have a thing for speed. I love fragile balls to the walls murder machines, and boy does this scream that. 3464m/s unheated  4957 with heat add low grade snakes to the mix and you cruise at 5751m/s.

So this ship isn't necessarily meant for crashing the plex gate. You want to pull range immediately and stay at it, carry imperial navy multi frequency in case you do get scramed and webbed. Sometimes you brawl them down faster.

Current fit does 137 dps to point range without heat (150 with) which isn't insignificant for a kite ship. Best if flown with others or defensively in a plex. You are fast enough to choose the engagements you want to take.

The win:
Malediction
Heretic #1
Heretic #2

The fail
Don't get webbed!