The guys in Cold Moon Destruction are debased, violent, emotionally
abusive, trolling, 100% all gay, godless, immoral sons of whores. If I
ever had friends I'd never met they are it.
I can barely remember not having flown with Cold Moon. It seems like forever since I joined - probably because of No'Wai's proliferation of anti-straight propaganda, Torshawna's absentee-ism, Atom's endless complaining, Terumah's propensity for leading us to believe our static wasn't spawning, Everlast's desire to instigate trouble and me constantly being kicked to the em0 Scissor room mid-sentence. Of course, let's not forget Henry's uncanny ability to harvest an entire Instrumental with his army of alts before anyone else could land on grid or Fischey's scanning (and dying) in Tech1 frigates for months on end.
Honestly I don't know how we survived for as long as we have, but our time is almost up. The Summer of Swag is winding down and Cold Moon Destruction draws its last few breaths.
As we all go our separate ways I'd like to reminisce about our last glorious fight, a fitting end to the Summer of Swag.
http://kb.cldmn-destruction.com/?a=kill_related&kll_id=303
The Aztechs were looking for a fight and we determined to give them what for. Carriers and dreadnoughts were boarded. Support ships were readied. Scouts were already relaying intel from the hostile system and once everyone gave the good-to-go we warped our fleet onto the wormhole, held by a paltry token force.
We knew there would be more.
The Aztechs did not disappoint. While their swarm of Legions unleashed a debilitating torrent of energy neutralizers against our carrier pilot their Guardians formed a logistics chain we couldn't break. Their sub-capital assault ships held us down until their own dreadnoughts made it to the field and established their dominance without mercy.
Outnumbered 3-to-1 and without support we broke away from the engagement with what few sub-capitals we could, but that cannot be counted as any worth. The Aztech dreadnought fire ripped through our own capital hulls and whether anyone knew it or not the explosions were the death knells of Cold Moon Destruction.
No one regrets this. It is the natural order of things.
So, my CLDMN space-bros, this is it. We've murdered more things than I can count, relentlessly trolled every kind-hearted person we've encountered, mastered space that most people will never see and some will never learn of.
It's been fun and I love you like a dog loves a hump-toy.
Yolo swag.
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
Wednesday, September 18, 2013
Blood in the Water
"Battleships are picking up speed. Raven in warp. Megathron warping. Everything is warping off. They're all in warp," our scout called on comms. All hell was about to break loose and Cold Moon Destruction would be right at home.
Of course, this type of thing doesn't start out in the middle of an operation. The beginnings of this were quite innocuous and to be honest, boring, but in wormhole space boredom is the mother of invention.
I had logged in Monday night to find the chain already scanned down so I hopped into a cloaky Proteus and did a bit of patrolling, but there was nothing to be found. We had no more use for our static connection so decided to roll it.
Fischey (a rapidly-improving scout, btw, so props to him) and I went down the chain in our Covops boats. Our static, C4s, was occupied, but showed no signs of activity so I jumped into a connecting class 2 system while Fisch finished up the static.
I quickly noticed a variety of ships and some activity in the system so started getting eyes on all of their POS's. They had quite a few people on, but not everyone was in the same corp or alliance so it was unclear what exactly was happening in here, if anything.
We noticed that all the POCOs were reinforced and that there had been some recent Sleeper kills as well as player kills. It looked like an invasion, but as far as we could tell there'd been no hostilities between the groups that we'd put eyes on.
Fischey and No'Wai, in a covert Proteus, soon joined me in the C2. The locals were primarily flying battleships and battle cruisers with one or two tech 2 cruisers here and there, one of which, an Abso, was sitting on their critical-mass hi-sec connection doing nothing as far as we could tell.
Maybe he was fail-scouting. Either way this turned out to be the first of many instances in which these pilots were either lost or high. No'Wai was soon watching them switch back and forth between Ravens and battle cruisers, warp back and forth between POS's, log on different alts, etc.
It was all very strange, but soon enough they reached new lows when one of their pilots began slow-boating a Tempest out of their POS. This was very good news, but all we had in system was a cloaky prot and two covops, so in order to keep from embarrassing these guys too much by insta-blapping their battleship with my single Hobgoblin II I decided to go reship.
While all this was going on we were forming up a small, but respectable little gang of T3's and logi in C4s. The goal was to engage this Tempest at the POS and lure more of their people into a fight. No'Wai was closing the distance between himself and Tempest and when he gave the word everyone jumped into the C2 and warped.
40AU. Yolo-swag, as No'Wai would put it.
By the time we landed he'd decloaked and tackled the Tempest. The pilot was also sent on his way.
Unfortunately, none of his friends came to help. To be honest it was rather fast, so we all burned off the POS and headed back to the wormhole leading to C4s, but held in the C2.
The locals continued to perform their odd behavior but showed no sign of interest in a fight. After their hi-sec collapsed Fischey quickly scanned down the new one and managed to pull his probes before they had a chance to see them.
It wasn't long before one of their scouts jumped out to see what system their new static exit lead to. At this juncture we determined that Fischey actually has prescient mental abilities that allows him to call a wormhole activation before one actually occurs. This revelation was discussed in detail while we all sat uncloaked on their hi-sec connection for about 2 minutes "waiting for the scout's de-cloak timer to burn off."
The scout did jump back, though, proving Fischey's new found ability, and got himself polarized for a few seconds. It was long enough to liberate his pod of the burdensome Anathema.
We waited around for a bit, but they showed no further signs of activity. Still, we knew they were going to have to deal with those POCO's and had a pretty good idea what all those battleships were going to be used for. Since the system had a hi-sec static we decided to leave a scout and head back to Swagshack.
Their sick and weak had been picked off from the herd. The next day we'd return for the rest.
Upon logging in the last night (Tuesday) we had a few hours before the POCO reinforcement timers expired. Our fleet commander, Fuegooooooo Paaaaantaloneeeeeeees (yes, it must be typed just as it is spoken), decided to go with heavy DPS rather than stealth, so I headed out to hi-sec and refit my Proteus into beast-mode.
Meanwhile our scout was providing intel that gave us pause. The locals in system were showing massive amounts of firepower. There were 14 piloted battleships and a few more supporting cruisers and battle cruisers. We were going to need help.
I don't know how this transpired, but at different points throughout the night we were flying with some good guys from End of Line, Fighting Carebears and Trimen Explorations. Maybe No'Wai tempted them with his butt or disconcertingly good Smeagol voice. I don't know.
At any rate, we headed toward their hi-sec system in Amarr space and held one jump out. The wormhole was once again at critical mass so we decided to jump in a hole closer under their noses. This worked better than expected since the pilot was able to slip past a faction cruiser. Our scout got the new hi-sec connection and we all burned 15 jumps to wait one system out.
We didn't have to wait there very long. The locals had just warped their fleet of battleships to the planet 7 POCO and we were given the word to move. Upon arriving in the C2 we all warped to the target area. Our scout was sounding off that their fleet was moving to evacuate the area.
They were too late.
Our fleet of cruisers landed in their midst and unleashed a wave of hate and discontent. An Abaddon and its pilot were the first of many sacrifices to Bob that night and were quickly followed by a Navy Raven and its pilot. Another Raven, its pilot, an Oracle and a pod were dispatched in rapid succession.
Bob was pleased but demanded more and our thirst for chaos was not yet sated. We warped our fleet to one of the newly-erected POCOs and began the process of reinforcing it in hopes of forcing the locals' hand.
They began launching ineffectual waves of stealth bomber attacks. I thought we managed to kill one of them on the first wave, but I can't find the kill.
Shortly after this our Fighting Carebear associates had to take off in order to meet prior obligations. This left us with roughly half of our fleet: 4 strategic cruisers, an Absolution, an Armageddon and a couple of Guardians. We did have some stealth bombers en route from hi-sec, but the locals had home-field advantage and were making use of it.
Many of their battleships and battle cruisers had escaped our initial contact, remarkably enough, and now, in light of our reduced numbers they were reforming with logistical support in the form of Ospreys.
"Battleships are picking up speed. Raven in warp. Megathron warping. Everything is warping off. They're all in warp," our scout called on comms.
Our force was outgunned and outnumbered. The enemy fleet of battleships - about a dozen of them - landed on top of us and I was down to about 60% armor before I knew it, my shields having been stripped off as an afterthought faster than you can say "Tijuana Crack Whore."
Our Guardian pilots were on the ball, though and kept me alive, forcing the counter-attacking fleet to switch targets, but their time was running out.
We'd already sunken our teeth into an Apocalypse and were switching to their Megathron. As we began our relentless work on their Armageddon the last vestiges of their fleet were escaping our clutches, probably having re-aligned for a quick exit as soon as they landed in the engagement area.
With their supply of ships rapidly dwindling and suffering massive losses the locals showed no further signs of aggression, though they did remain logged in. This allowed us to continue our reinforcement of the POCO and bring in our End of Line stealth bomber contingent who'd been making best speed to the hi-sec entrance from across the cluster.
I had to leave shortly after this point, but I intend to rectify the situation of enemy battleships being able to escape a wolf-pack of strategic cruisers if we return to that system tonight. They do have a reinforced customs office to deal with, after all.
Of course, this type of thing doesn't start out in the middle of an operation. The beginnings of this were quite innocuous and to be honest, boring, but in wormhole space boredom is the mother of invention.
I had logged in Monday night to find the chain already scanned down so I hopped into a cloaky Proteus and did a bit of patrolling, but there was nothing to be found. We had no more use for our static connection so decided to roll it.
Fischey (a rapidly-improving scout, btw, so props to him) and I went down the chain in our Covops boats. Our static, C4s, was occupied, but showed no signs of activity so I jumped into a connecting class 2 system while Fisch finished up the static.
I quickly noticed a variety of ships and some activity in the system so started getting eyes on all of their POS's. They had quite a few people on, but not everyone was in the same corp or alliance so it was unclear what exactly was happening in here, if anything.
We noticed that all the POCOs were reinforced and that there had been some recent Sleeper kills as well as player kills. It looked like an invasion, but as far as we could tell there'd been no hostilities between the groups that we'd put eyes on.
Fischey and No'Wai, in a covert Proteus, soon joined me in the C2. The locals were primarily flying battleships and battle cruisers with one or two tech 2 cruisers here and there, one of which, an Abso, was sitting on their critical-mass hi-sec connection doing nothing as far as we could tell.
Maybe he was fail-scouting. Either way this turned out to be the first of many instances in which these pilots were either lost or high. No'Wai was soon watching them switch back and forth between Ravens and battle cruisers, warp back and forth between POS's, log on different alts, etc.
It was all very strange, but soon enough they reached new lows when one of their pilots began slow-boating a Tempest out of their POS. This was very good news, but all we had in system was a cloaky prot and two covops, so in order to keep from embarrassing these guys too much by insta-blapping their battleship with my single Hobgoblin II I decided to go reship.
While all this was going on we were forming up a small, but respectable little gang of T3's and logi in C4s. The goal was to engage this Tempest at the POS and lure more of their people into a fight. No'Wai was closing the distance between himself and Tempest and when he gave the word everyone jumped into the C2 and warped.
40AU. Yolo-swag, as No'Wai would put it.
By the time we landed he'd decloaked and tackled the Tempest. The pilot was also sent on his way.
Unfortunately, none of his friends came to help. To be honest it was rather fast, so we all burned off the POS and headed back to the wormhole leading to C4s, but held in the C2.
The locals continued to perform their odd behavior but showed no sign of interest in a fight. After their hi-sec collapsed Fischey quickly scanned down the new one and managed to pull his probes before they had a chance to see them.
It wasn't long before one of their scouts jumped out to see what system their new static exit lead to. At this juncture we determined that Fischey actually has prescient mental abilities that allows him to call a wormhole activation before one actually occurs. This revelation was discussed in detail while we all sat uncloaked on their hi-sec connection for about 2 minutes "waiting for the scout's de-cloak timer to burn off."
The scout did jump back, though, proving Fischey's new found ability, and got himself polarized for a few seconds. It was long enough to liberate his pod of the burdensome Anathema.
We waited around for a bit, but they showed no further signs of activity. Still, we knew they were going to have to deal with those POCO's and had a pretty good idea what all those battleships were going to be used for. Since the system had a hi-sec static we decided to leave a scout and head back to Swagshack.
Their sick and weak had been picked off from the herd. The next day we'd return for the rest.
Upon logging in the last night (Tuesday) we had a few hours before the POCO reinforcement timers expired. Our fleet commander, Fuegooooooo Paaaaantaloneeeeeeees (yes, it must be typed just as it is spoken), decided to go with heavy DPS rather than stealth, so I headed out to hi-sec and refit my Proteus into beast-mode.
Meanwhile our scout was providing intel that gave us pause. The locals in system were showing massive amounts of firepower. There were 14 piloted battleships and a few more supporting cruisers and battle cruisers. We were going to need help.
I don't know how this transpired, but at different points throughout the night we were flying with some good guys from End of Line, Fighting Carebears and Trimen Explorations. Maybe No'Wai tempted them with his butt or disconcertingly good Smeagol voice. I don't know.
At any rate, we headed toward their hi-sec system in Amarr space and held one jump out. The wormhole was once again at critical mass so we decided to jump in a hole closer under their noses. This worked better than expected since the pilot was able to slip past a faction cruiser. Our scout got the new hi-sec connection and we all burned 15 jumps to wait one system out.
We didn't have to wait there very long. The locals had just warped their fleet of battleships to the planet 7 POCO and we were given the word to move. Upon arriving in the C2 we all warped to the target area. Our scout was sounding off that their fleet was moving to evacuate the area.
They were too late.
Our fleet of cruisers landed in their midst and unleashed a wave of hate and discontent. An Abaddon and its pilot were the first of many sacrifices to Bob that night and were quickly followed by a Navy Raven and its pilot. Another Raven, its pilot, an Oracle and a pod were dispatched in rapid succession.
Bob was pleased but demanded more and our thirst for chaos was not yet sated. We warped our fleet to one of the newly-erected POCOs and began the process of reinforcing it in hopes of forcing the locals' hand.
They began launching ineffectual waves of stealth bomber attacks. I thought we managed to kill one of them on the first wave, but I can't find the kill.
Shortly after this our Fighting Carebear associates had to take off in order to meet prior obligations. This left us with roughly half of our fleet: 4 strategic cruisers, an Absolution, an Armageddon and a couple of Guardians. We did have some stealth bombers en route from hi-sec, but the locals had home-field advantage and were making use of it.
Many of their battleships and battle cruisers had escaped our initial contact, remarkably enough, and now, in light of our reduced numbers they were reforming with logistical support in the form of Ospreys.
"Battleships are picking up speed. Raven in warp. Megathron warping. Everything is warping off. They're all in warp," our scout called on comms.
Our force was outgunned and outnumbered. The enemy fleet of battleships - about a dozen of them - landed on top of us and I was down to about 60% armor before I knew it, my shields having been stripped off as an afterthought faster than you can say "Tijuana Crack Whore."
Our Guardian pilots were on the ball, though and kept me alive, forcing the counter-attacking fleet to switch targets, but their time was running out.
We'd already sunken our teeth into an Apocalypse and were switching to their Megathron. As we began our relentless work on their Armageddon the last vestiges of their fleet were escaping our clutches, probably having re-aligned for a quick exit as soon as they landed in the engagement area.
With their supply of ships rapidly dwindling and suffering massive losses the locals showed no further signs of aggression, though they did remain logged in. This allowed us to continue our reinforcement of the POCO and bring in our End of Line stealth bomber contingent who'd been making best speed to the hi-sec entrance from across the cluster.
I had to leave shortly after this point, but I intend to rectify the situation of enemy battleships being able to escape a wolf-pack of strategic cruisers if we return to that system tonight. They do have a reinforced customs office to deal with, after all.
Thursday, September 12, 2013
Malception's Law
Malception's Law (alternately referred to as the Law of Caldari Navy Ravens, the Law of Nubs Flying Billion-ISK Navens or the No'Wai-Malception Law) describes the tendency of low-skill pilots in care-bearing wormhole corporations to fly officer-fit Navy Ravens.
This law can be stated thus: the absolute tendency of a pilot to fly an officer and/or faction-fit Navy Raven is inversely proportional to his amount of skill points as it approaches zero, such that at zero the tendency is infinite and the pilot is only prevented from doing so by his physical inability to board the spacecraft.
This bent was first observed in Katherine Upton of Weyl Manufacturing on 1 August 2013 in J224401 and the hypothesis was confirmed on 24 August 2013 in J111557 when Ander Elbow and Jonas M Bonamigo, both from Tenebris Venators, were observed flying expensive Navy Ravens.
All three instances resulted in the destruction of the Navy-issue Raven.
This law can be stated thus: the absolute tendency of a pilot to fly an officer and/or faction-fit Navy Raven is inversely proportional to his amount of skill points as it approaches zero, such that at zero the tendency is infinite and the pilot is only prevented from doing so by his physical inability to board the spacecraft.
This bent was first observed in Katherine Upton of Weyl Manufacturing on 1 August 2013 in J224401 and the hypothesis was confirmed on 24 August 2013 in J111557 when Ander Elbow and Jonas M Bonamigo, both from Tenebris Venators, were observed flying expensive Navy Ravens.
All three instances resulted in the destruction of the Navy-issue Raven.
Tuesday, September 3, 2013
337
Every once in a while there arises an opportunity for self-sacrifice such that the gains are so incredibly massive that their scale is difficult to grasp. Consider the fact that had Adolf Hitler's father carried little junior in loving arms to the front porch and caved in his infant head with an old, but serviceable ball peen hammer that the entirety of World War II would likely have been avoided. The emotional cost to the father, no doubt, would've been severe, but when compared to the immense gain in later years there's no question as to its worthiness and honor.
This same character of self-sacrifice can also be seen in the holiest of all space: Anoikis. One might even risk saying that the self-sacrifice witnessed by the lucky few in w-space is even more glorious and worthy than that in the previous scenario.
Just recently our small, but savage group of pilots in Cold Moon Destruction, sustaining ourselves in spartan quarters and living off of what little could be found in our immediate vicinity were ruthlessly set upon by a horde of Bolshevik homosexuals.
Our elite pilots held the invading horde at bay for as long as they could, reducing the available mass on the wormhole with skill and cunning, but the onslaught was overwhelming. We were forced to fall back and regroup.
Knowing the communist dogs for what they were - a malignant infestation of Bob's holy cosmos, ever-seeking to spread their Marxist filth to all non-believers - we summoned our bravest pilot.
With his strength bolstered and senses dulled by delicious red wine he boarded the hole-closer (known to everyone else in the entire game as a pvp Phobos) and proceeded without delay to collapse the wormhole before those Slavic mongoloids had a chance to seed our system with scouts and blasphemous idols of their precious Rasputin.
Our beautiful Swagshack was saved, but the same could not be said of Malception.
On the far side of the wormhole he was surrounded by a vast armada of war ships. Unwilling to show any fear he targeted the largest of their brood, a Navy Dominix, and charged forward.
Guns and missiles and lazorbeamz erupted for as far as the eye could see. Only after vast swaths of the enemy fleet had been cripplingly reduced to the narrowest margins of buckling structure did the Phobos succumb to the massive amounts of terrible firepower arrayed against it.
Malception's sacrifice saved countless internet spaceships that day. We should all look to him as an example of righteousness and how to die in a glorious fire, selflessly sacrificing himself and his worthless Genolution implants in defense of the realm.
As for those Russian suck-tards...
This same character of self-sacrifice can also be seen in the holiest of all space: Anoikis. One might even risk saying that the self-sacrifice witnessed by the lucky few in w-space is even more glorious and worthy than that in the previous scenario.
Just recently our small, but savage group of pilots in Cold Moon Destruction, sustaining ourselves in spartan quarters and living off of what little could be found in our immediate vicinity were ruthlessly set upon by a horde of Bolshevik homosexuals.
Our elite pilots held the invading horde at bay for as long as they could, reducing the available mass on the wormhole with skill and cunning, but the onslaught was overwhelming. We were forced to fall back and regroup.
Knowing the communist dogs for what they were - a malignant infestation of Bob's holy cosmos, ever-seeking to spread their Marxist filth to all non-believers - we summoned our bravest pilot.
With his strength bolstered and senses dulled by delicious red wine he boarded the hole-closer (known to everyone else in the entire game as a pvp Phobos) and proceeded without delay to collapse the wormhole before those Slavic mongoloids had a chance to seed our system with scouts and blasphemous idols of their precious Rasputin.
Our beautiful Swagshack was saved, but the same could not be said of Malception.
On the far side of the wormhole he was surrounded by a vast armada of war ships. Unwilling to show any fear he targeted the largest of their brood, a Navy Dominix, and charged forward.
Guns and missiles and lazorbeamz erupted for as far as the eye could see. Only after vast swaths of the enemy fleet had been cripplingly reduced to the narrowest margins of buckling structure did the Phobos succumb to the massive amounts of terrible firepower arrayed against it.
Malception's sacrifice saved countless internet spaceships that day. We should all look to him as an example of righteousness and how to die in a glorious fire, selflessly sacrificing himself and his worthless Genolution implants in defense of the realm.
As for those Russian suck-tards...
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
The Night Crew
The Night Crew (TNC) put out one of the best fights last night and very nearly sprayed our guts all over their killboard. I have to give them the credit they're due: don't underestimate these guys!
It all started while I was minding my own business in TNC's home system, a class 4 that I will refer to as c4a. By "minding my own business" I of course mean "watching their POS and plotting destruction," but let's not split hairs, shall we?
Another Cold Moon Destruction (CLMDN) pilot, Fischey, was sitting in our static, c4s, with his scout alt and a fail-cloak Legion (he's new; blame me instead). There were a few other pilots online, but they were semi-afk.
Just as I was about to give up on these two TNC pilots there was finally some activity. One of them arrived back at their POS and if memory serves he switched into a Legion. At this point I'd counted three online pilots, two of which had shown no signs of life whatsoever.
Soon after an Archon was logged in and the pilot switched to a covert scanning Proteus complete with the interdiction-nullifying spoiler. As far as we could make out the Legion and Prot both jumped into the c4s and proceeded to chill out.
At this point I'm assuming they're waiting for us to do something stupid, so we began to try to think up ways to accommodate their expectation. Fischey scanned down the Gas site in c4a and then warped in his Venture.
This was intended to give TNC the impression that we either didn't know of their presence or were too stupid to care and lure them into doing something stupid themselves. What actually happened was that Fischey's Venture got blown up by the five Sleeper turrets he didn't see when scanning down the site.
Naturally, being such professional mentors as one might expect to find in CLDMN, we laughed, pointed fingers and assaulted him with scathing mockery.
Still, all was not lost. In addition to appearing unaware I was hoping we also now appeared incompetent, so I jumped my Helios into c4s and warped to our home hole without bothering to cloak.
I was told a stealth bomber had jumped in behind me and really started to believe we were going to get a fight at this point. These guys were on the hunt and had no idea that their paltry gang was about to get monkey-stomped by our superior numbers (I'll come back to this later, so keep it in mind).
After waiting a few seconds uncloaked on the wormhole back to our home system, Swagshack, I jumped back in and switched out to a Proteus then warped back to the wormhole and waited for their move.
At this point our guys who were AFK had now joined the fleet. We had a Legion, Proteus (x2), a Typhoon, a covops scout and a Drake.
I didn't have to wait long before our scout in c4s sounded off that the Proteus and Legion were jumping into Swagshack. I acknowledged and engaged the Proteus first.
While our forces were en route the scout called a TNC Hound and two Drakes were jumping through from c4s to the shack.
Hmmm. That wasn't expected, but even so, I knew my tank wasn't going to suffer any catastrophic collapse under the added pressure. I was, however, a little more interested as to when back-up was going to land.
As soon as they did I jumped over to c4s in order to save my armor and be able to tackle these guys when they fled, as they most certainly would. We now had a fresh Proteus, a Sleipnir, Drake and Typhoon on the Shack side of the wormhole and a Legion and my Proteus on the c4s side.
The fight quickly migrated into c4s as the TNC guys jumped over, but someone on CLMDN comms called out that more TNC guys were coming in. My overview which shows only targets was nearly full and I knew I'd very severely underestimated these guys.
The ships they were bringing in weren't covert ships, but somehow they'd managed to hide them. So be warned: TNC will surprise buttsex you without a second thought.
There was a Curse (these things always make me nervous), Domi, Tengu and another Proteus and more landing on grid. If we didn't unscrew this situation CLDMN would soon be covered in TNC dps. We'd already lost a Legion.
Two of us jumped back into shack and picked up whatever logi was closest at hand. We came back with a Guardian and Oneiros and managed to stave off total disaster, but not before our Typhoon went down. That pilot jumped back to shack and brought back an Astarte.
At this point the CLDMN fleet consisted of Zealot, Oneiros, Proteus, Astarte, Sleipnir, Drake and Guardian. TNC's fleet was substantially larger: Falcon, Legion, Proteus (x2), Tengu, Curse, Drake (x2) and Dominix.
The Curse was still a pain and made sustained reps difficult, but dual cap boosters on my Oneiros let me stay just far enough ahead of the neuts to rep our Guardian which was doing a phenomenal job mitigating the TNC dps.
At this point the tables were turning dramatically in our favor. We couldn't match their dps, but without reps they had no way to mitigate ours and began losing ships in quick succession.
Wisely deciding to cut their losses, they burned off the hole and left the field. "GF's" were had in local and I think everyone had a good time. It was definitely a learning experience for me.
Battle Report
After the fight I spent a lot of time thinking about how we came out on top of this brawl. Ultimately it came down to positioning on the existing terrain. The fight largely took place just outside our front door and when it started to go bad that allowed us to change tactics.
With no form of tackle on the Swagshack side of the wormhole TNC had no way to prevent us from leaving the field and stopping us from reshipping, whereas we were able to prevent them from doing so and even if they could've reshipped it would've taken them twice as long to do so because the fight took place on our wormhole, not theirs.
Ultimately, I take two lessons from this fight: 1) TNC are very cool guys, but they will rape you and 2) the ability to rapidly shift tactics enables you to move from the narrowest ledge of certain destruction to solid victory!
It all started while I was minding my own business in TNC's home system, a class 4 that I will refer to as c4a. By "minding my own business" I of course mean "watching their POS and plotting destruction," but let's not split hairs, shall we?
Another Cold Moon Destruction (CLMDN) pilot, Fischey, was sitting in our static, c4s, with his scout alt and a fail-cloak Legion (he's new; blame me instead). There were a few other pilots online, but they were semi-afk.
Just as I was about to give up on these two TNC pilots there was finally some activity. One of them arrived back at their POS and if memory serves he switched into a Legion. At this point I'd counted three online pilots, two of which had shown no signs of life whatsoever.
Soon after an Archon was logged in and the pilot switched to a covert scanning Proteus complete with the interdiction-nullifying spoiler. As far as we could make out the Legion and Prot both jumped into the c4s and proceeded to chill out.
At this point I'm assuming they're waiting for us to do something stupid, so we began to try to think up ways to accommodate their expectation. Fischey scanned down the Gas site in c4a and then warped in his Venture.
This was intended to give TNC the impression that we either didn't know of their presence or were too stupid to care and lure them into doing something stupid themselves. What actually happened was that Fischey's Venture got blown up by the five Sleeper turrets he didn't see when scanning down the site.
Naturally, being such professional mentors as one might expect to find in CLDMN, we laughed, pointed fingers and assaulted him with scathing mockery.
Still, all was not lost. In addition to appearing unaware I was hoping we also now appeared incompetent, so I jumped my Helios into c4s and warped to our home hole without bothering to cloak.
I was told a stealth bomber had jumped in behind me and really started to believe we were going to get a fight at this point. These guys were on the hunt and had no idea that their paltry gang was about to get monkey-stomped by our superior numbers (I'll come back to this later, so keep it in mind).
After waiting a few seconds uncloaked on the wormhole back to our home system, Swagshack, I jumped back in and switched out to a Proteus then warped back to the wormhole and waited for their move.
At this point our guys who were AFK had now joined the fleet. We had a Legion, Proteus (x2), a Typhoon, a covops scout and a Drake.
I didn't have to wait long before our scout in c4s sounded off that the Proteus and Legion were jumping into Swagshack. I acknowledged and engaged the Proteus first.
While our forces were en route the scout called a TNC Hound and two Drakes were jumping through from c4s to the shack.
Hmmm. That wasn't expected, but even so, I knew my tank wasn't going to suffer any catastrophic collapse under the added pressure. I was, however, a little more interested as to when back-up was going to land.
As soon as they did I jumped over to c4s in order to save my armor and be able to tackle these guys when they fled, as they most certainly would. We now had a fresh Proteus, a Sleipnir, Drake and Typhoon on the Shack side of the wormhole and a Legion and my Proteus on the c4s side.
The fight quickly migrated into c4s as the TNC guys jumped over, but someone on CLMDN comms called out that more TNC guys were coming in. My overview which shows only targets was nearly full and I knew I'd very severely underestimated these guys.
The ships they were bringing in weren't covert ships, but somehow they'd managed to hide them. So be warned: TNC will surprise buttsex you without a second thought.
There was a Curse (these things always make me nervous), Domi, Tengu and another Proteus and more landing on grid. If we didn't unscrew this situation CLDMN would soon be covered in TNC dps. We'd already lost a Legion.
Two of us jumped back into shack and picked up whatever logi was closest at hand. We came back with a Guardian and Oneiros and managed to stave off total disaster, but not before our Typhoon went down. That pilot jumped back to shack and brought back an Astarte.
At this point the CLDMN fleet consisted of Zealot, Oneiros, Proteus, Astarte, Sleipnir, Drake and Guardian. TNC's fleet was substantially larger: Falcon, Legion, Proteus (x2), Tengu, Curse, Drake (x2) and Dominix.
The Curse was still a pain and made sustained reps difficult, but dual cap boosters on my Oneiros let me stay just far enough ahead of the neuts to rep our Guardian which was doing a phenomenal job mitigating the TNC dps.
At this point the tables were turning dramatically in our favor. We couldn't match their dps, but without reps they had no way to mitigate ours and began losing ships in quick succession.
Wisely deciding to cut their losses, they burned off the hole and left the field. "GF's" were had in local and I think everyone had a good time. It was definitely a learning experience for me.
Battle Report
After the fight I spent a lot of time thinking about how we came out on top of this brawl. Ultimately it came down to positioning on the existing terrain. The fight largely took place just outside our front door and when it started to go bad that allowed us to change tactics.
With no form of tackle on the Swagshack side of the wormhole TNC had no way to prevent us from leaving the field and stopping us from reshipping, whereas we were able to prevent them from doing so and even if they could've reshipped it would've taken them twice as long to do so because the fight took place on our wormhole, not theirs.
Ultimately, I take two lessons from this fight: 1) TNC are very cool guys, but they will rape you and 2) the ability to rapidly shift tactics enables you to move from the narrowest ledge of certain destruction to solid victory!
Monday, August 26, 2013
Scouting Like a Pro III
This is the third in a series of posts about scouting in wormhole space. The first covers the necessary preparation and infiltration while the second covers POS recon.
It's about time to drop those probes, but before you do take note. If at all possible drop them outside the dscan range of all enemy pilots and keep them outside the dscan range of all enemy pilots for as long as possible, but finish the scanning job quickly. The goal here is to resolve the system without spooking your target. You achieve this by minimizing the time your probes are visible to the enemy.
Using probes is covered in all sorts of other "Nub Scouting" videos and blogs so I'll skip all that crap. What you need to know is that All signatures will be within 8 AU of a planet. I don't know why that's the case, but it is. With that knowledge you can save yourself a lot of time by narrowing your probes down to a size of 8 AU and centering them on planets before you activate the scan sequence.
Because you have the proper ship and equipment that was prescribed in part 1 of this series you can go directly from 8 AU to 2 AU when you've re-centered on a signature. Sometimes you'll have to go down to .5 AU in order to pin down a sig, but most of time can get it at 1 AU. If you've got maxed out skills and are using the right implants you can get pretty much everything at 2 AU, but I don't use the implants. If I ever do I'll make a part 4 of the series and name it "Scouting Like a Fat Kid in a Candy Store."
Now that covers the tips for scanning down sigs, but what about ships?
For ships you need Combat Scanner probes. Yes, these probes can also find regular signatures. No, you should not just use Combat probes.
"Why's that, Malception?"I
Because Combat probes are only half as powerful as Core probes. In effect, if you use combats to scan normal signatures it's going to take you twice as long to do it. You will suck at scouting and die an inglorious, ignominious death. If you're in Cold Moon Destruction you'll likely be killed by your own people for such incompetence.
So... when you see a ship on dscan, but know it's not in a POS then you simply use the Dscan to get a general direction of the ship from your position. Once you've pinned down the direction to as narrow a degree as possible you want to play with the range on your dscanner to determine about how far away the ship is from you. Once you've got a direction and range you launch probes outside his dscan range and prepare to scan him down.
The diameter of the scan range for your probes is dictated by how closely you've pinned down his position and also the size of the ship. An Orca is a hell of a lot easier to scan down than a pod. When in doubt use 4 AU on your combats. You will get a hit and if you're lucky you'll get 100% on the first pass, but you will probably have to make a second pass in order to pin him down.
Scanning down ships is very tricky. For one thing, ships move so you'll have to move quickly and accurately on your dscan in order to get a good position to target your combat probes. Another thing that makes it difficult is the fact that ship sizes, their signature radii, are so different that it's hard to say what range you need on your probes.
In all probability you will fail the first few times you try this. Having a second set of eyes in the system to help with dscan while you do the combat probes is very helpful, but it can be done solo. Just keep at it. Remember, slow and smooth and smooth is fast.
Once you get the target ship pinned down pull those probes and warp to 0. If they're paying attention to dscan they'll have seen your probes and if it's a small ship they'll likely have escaped. If not then you've got a shot, but that's about it. Nothing is guaranteed.
Last, but not least: remember to tag your dscan even while you're probing. Most people don't do this and they get tunnel vision while using the probe interface, thereby denying themselves one of the most powerful scouting tools in the game.
That's it. Do these things consistently and you're scouting like a pro.
Final Thoughts (aka things momma said before dropping you off at school)
Use the right gear for the task at hand. Don't rush. Take your time. Watch dscan at all times. Provide accurate information. Ask questions if you don't know or are unsure about anything.
It's about time to drop those probes, but before you do take note. If at all possible drop them outside the dscan range of all enemy pilots and keep them outside the dscan range of all enemy pilots for as long as possible, but finish the scanning job quickly. The goal here is to resolve the system without spooking your target. You achieve this by minimizing the time your probes are visible to the enemy.
Using probes is covered in all sorts of other "Nub Scouting" videos and blogs so I'll skip all that crap. What you need to know is that All signatures will be within 8 AU of a planet. I don't know why that's the case, but it is. With that knowledge you can save yourself a lot of time by narrowing your probes down to a size of 8 AU and centering them on planets before you activate the scan sequence.
Because you have the proper ship and equipment that was prescribed in part 1 of this series you can go directly from 8 AU to 2 AU when you've re-centered on a signature. Sometimes you'll have to go down to .5 AU in order to pin down a sig, but most of time can get it at 1 AU. If you've got maxed out skills and are using the right implants you can get pretty much everything at 2 AU, but I don't use the implants. If I ever do I'll make a part 4 of the series and name it "Scouting Like a Fat Kid in a Candy Store."
Now that covers the tips for scanning down sigs, but what about ships?
For ships you need Combat Scanner probes. Yes, these probes can also find regular signatures. No, you should not just use Combat probes.
"Why's that, Malception?"I
Because Combat probes are only half as powerful as Core probes. In effect, if you use combats to scan normal signatures it's going to take you twice as long to do it. You will suck at scouting and die an inglorious, ignominious death. If you're in Cold Moon Destruction you'll likely be killed by your own people for such incompetence.
So... when you see a ship on dscan, but know it's not in a POS then you simply use the Dscan to get a general direction of the ship from your position. Once you've pinned down the direction to as narrow a degree as possible you want to play with the range on your dscanner to determine about how far away the ship is from you. Once you've got a direction and range you launch probes outside his dscan range and prepare to scan him down.
The diameter of the scan range for your probes is dictated by how closely you've pinned down his position and also the size of the ship. An Orca is a hell of a lot easier to scan down than a pod. When in doubt use 4 AU on your combats. You will get a hit and if you're lucky you'll get 100% on the first pass, but you will probably have to make a second pass in order to pin him down.
Scanning down ships is very tricky. For one thing, ships move so you'll have to move quickly and accurately on your dscan in order to get a good position to target your combat probes. Another thing that makes it difficult is the fact that ship sizes, their signature radii, are so different that it's hard to say what range you need on your probes.
In all probability you will fail the first few times you try this. Having a second set of eyes in the system to help with dscan while you do the combat probes is very helpful, but it can be done solo. Just keep at it. Remember, slow and smooth and smooth is fast.
Once you get the target ship pinned down pull those probes and warp to 0. If they're paying attention to dscan they'll have seen your probes and if it's a small ship they'll likely have escaped. If not then you've got a shot, but that's about it. Nothing is guaranteed.
Last, but not least: remember to tag your dscan even while you're probing. Most people don't do this and they get tunnel vision while using the probe interface, thereby denying themselves one of the most powerful scouting tools in the game.
That's it. Do these things consistently and you're scouting like a pro.
Final Thoughts (aka things momma said before dropping you off at school)
Use the right gear for the task at hand. Don't rush. Take your time. Watch dscan at all times. Provide accurate information. Ask questions if you don't know or are unsure about anything.
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Scouting Like a Pro II
This is the second in a short series of instructional posts on how to "scout like a pro", as it were. Click here to read the first, which covers what you need in order to accomplish this worthy goal and how to achieve the initial infiltration of a possibly hostile system (i.e. all systems).
Been taking your time? Paying attention? Good. Now pay attention because this next part is critical. It determines whether or not you're a pro or a scrub. Speed is very important when you go about doing all this stuff, but don't screw up because you're trying to go too fast. That happened to a corp-mate of mine, recently and I had to walk him through some things. There's no telling how long he would've been failing if he hadn't learned this very important lesson.
The lesson, as handed down to me will now be handed down to you: slow is smooth and smooth is fast.
Getting all this stuff done quickly is important, but getting accurate intel is paramount! That means "most important" for you illiterate retards. So go slow and get it right. The speed will come on its own.
Now let's get down to business.
The next thing you want to do is find all the enemy strongholds - all their player-owned stations (POS's) - and get eyes on them. This requires a lot of dscan voodoo, so pay attention. I apologize ahead of time for the boring step by step, but I don't have any pictures at the moment. I might add them later.
"Uh, dscan? You mean drop probes, right?"
No, you little pustule! That doesn't mean drop probes. That comes later.
Idiot.
Dscan is the directional scanner. Open up your system map and activate your tactical overlay. Hit the scan button on your dscan. Anything you see on that dscan will be inside that 15AU radius on your system map. Those other planets outside the 15AU radius on your system map (if there are any) still need to be checked out though, so go ahead and warp to that planet's customs office at 100km and do another dscan. Repeat for every planet outside your dscan range on your first dscan (the scan you performed upon first entering the system).
What you're looking for are active POS's. You can determine whether or not they're active by looking for Force Fields. Now, just because a POS doesn't have a Force Field up doesn't mean it's inactive. It could be a good trap. It could be that the owner is just now setting the POS up. It would be an AWOX in progress. In all of those cases you will likely see ships on dscan so always be on the lookout and maintain your situational awareness.
For instructional purposes, let's say you've got an active POS around planet III. You warp to that planet's customs office at 100km. Keep your system map and tactical overlay up because you're going to need them.
Now that you're at the customs office you can see that your tactical overlay conveniently divides the planetary system up into quadrants (that would be four 90-degree sections for those of you who are mathematically challenged). Set your dscan for 180-degrees and align your field of view with along one of the axes of the dscan (look down a row of AU ranges).
Activate your dscan and rotate your field of view 90-degrees to the right until you find what quadrant the POS is in. Once you determine the quadrant you want to reduce the angle of your dscan until you single out the specific moon that the POS is at. If you are unable to determine a specific moon even at the narrowest dscan angle (5 degrees) then play with the dscan range until you figure out which moon the POS is at.
This is very easy when there are only a few moons and sometimes you can go really fast through the narrowing down process, but rest assured, this process will never fail you.
When you do get a bead on that POS you want to be aware of those pesky warp bubbles that can really screw up your day. If you've followed simple instructions from Scouting Like a Pro I, then you've got them on your overview tab and they already show up on your dscan. Now, if you see a warp bubble you also want to check for containers, which likely indicates the presence of a decloak trap when seen together.
For you baby wormholers, a decloak trap is a warp disruption bubble lined with containers. The bubble sucks people into it who are warping onto the grid and the containers decloak any and all ships that land within 2000m of them. The POS will then target and destroy your ship.
Luckily, there are ways to minimize the risk of certain death from decloak traps and since you're reading "Scouting Like a Pro" and not "Scouting Like a Bear" I will share with you my methods.
#1. If you've got great big balls like No'Wai you can scout in a strategic cruiser, which gives you the ability to fit the Warp Disruption Nullifier subsystem. This will make you invulnerable to the drag effect of the warp bubble and render most decloak traps ineffective.
#2. You can also simply stay in your Helios and warp to the moon at the standard 100km. You will get sucked into the warp bubble and will likely get decloaked, but because your ship is very small the POS will not be able to target you before you can put all cans at a distance and cloak up. If you opt for this method don't activate your MWD, because that greatly increases your signature radius, making it easier for the POS to target you.
#3. There is also dumb luck.
Keep in mind that these measures only reduce the risk. They do not eliminate it. Some traps are very clever. I recently encountered one that made use of freight containers, which don't show up on dscan, so I warped to the POS thinking I'd get sucked into a bubble and could slow boat out of it at my leisure. When I got onto the grid I was not happy to see a bubble full of containers waiting for my beloved Proteus.
"Wow, Malception! That loss must've really sucked."
Negro, please! I Scout Like a Pro. Utilizing method #3 I evaded that feeble trap and went on to gather valuable intelligence on my target.
Once you're on grid with the POS you need to figure out who owns it. Check out the owner's kill board. Get names of any pilots. Copy all the dscan information and paste it into Dingo's. That tool will organize all the information for you and provide you with a link in order to share the intel. Make sure you relay everything to the FC.
I think that's about all I'm going to put in this post. It may not look like a lot, but it's something that takes a lot of practice, so while you're out and about perfecting these skills I'll be writing up the next post.
Check in later to find out about dropping those probes.
The lesson, as handed down to me will now be handed down to you: slow is smooth and smooth is fast.
Getting all this stuff done quickly is important, but getting accurate intel is paramount! That means "most important" for you illiterate retards. So go slow and get it right. The speed will come on its own.
Now let's get down to business.
The next thing you want to do is find all the enemy strongholds - all their player-owned stations (POS's) - and get eyes on them. This requires a lot of dscan voodoo, so pay attention. I apologize ahead of time for the boring step by step, but I don't have any pictures at the moment. I might add them later.
"Uh, dscan? You mean drop probes, right?"
No, you little pustule! That doesn't mean drop probes. That comes later.
Idiot.
Dscan is the directional scanner. Open up your system map and activate your tactical overlay. Hit the scan button on your dscan. Anything you see on that dscan will be inside that 15AU radius on your system map. Those other planets outside the 15AU radius on your system map (if there are any) still need to be checked out though, so go ahead and warp to that planet's customs office at 100km and do another dscan. Repeat for every planet outside your dscan range on your first dscan (the scan you performed upon first entering the system).
What you're looking for are active POS's. You can determine whether or not they're active by looking for Force Fields. Now, just because a POS doesn't have a Force Field up doesn't mean it's inactive. It could be a good trap. It could be that the owner is just now setting the POS up. It would be an AWOX in progress. In all of those cases you will likely see ships on dscan so always be on the lookout and maintain your situational awareness.
For instructional purposes, let's say you've got an active POS around planet III. You warp to that planet's customs office at 100km. Keep your system map and tactical overlay up because you're going to need them.
Now that you're at the customs office you can see that your tactical overlay conveniently divides the planetary system up into quadrants (that would be four 90-degree sections for those of you who are mathematically challenged). Set your dscan for 180-degrees and align your field of view with along one of the axes of the dscan (look down a row of AU ranges).
Activate your dscan and rotate your field of view 90-degrees to the right until you find what quadrant the POS is in. Once you determine the quadrant you want to reduce the angle of your dscan until you single out the specific moon that the POS is at. If you are unable to determine a specific moon even at the narrowest dscan angle (5 degrees) then play with the dscan range until you figure out which moon the POS is at.
This is very easy when there are only a few moons and sometimes you can go really fast through the narrowing down process, but rest assured, this process will never fail you.
When you do get a bead on that POS you want to be aware of those pesky warp bubbles that can really screw up your day. If you've followed simple instructions from Scouting Like a Pro I, then you've got them on your overview tab and they already show up on your dscan. Now, if you see a warp bubble you also want to check for containers, which likely indicates the presence of a decloak trap when seen together.
For you baby wormholers, a decloak trap is a warp disruption bubble lined with containers. The bubble sucks people into it who are warping onto the grid and the containers decloak any and all ships that land within 2000m of them. The POS will then target and destroy your ship.
Luckily, there are ways to minimize the risk of certain death from decloak traps and since you're reading "Scouting Like a Pro" and not "Scouting Like a Bear" I will share with you my methods.
#1. If you've got great big balls like No'Wai you can scout in a strategic cruiser, which gives you the ability to fit the Warp Disruption Nullifier subsystem. This will make you invulnerable to the drag effect of the warp bubble and render most decloak traps ineffective.
#2. You can also simply stay in your Helios and warp to the moon at the standard 100km. You will get sucked into the warp bubble and will likely get decloaked, but because your ship is very small the POS will not be able to target you before you can put all cans at a distance and cloak up. If you opt for this method don't activate your MWD, because that greatly increases your signature radius, making it easier for the POS to target you.
#3. There is also dumb luck.
Keep in mind that these measures only reduce the risk. They do not eliminate it. Some traps are very clever. I recently encountered one that made use of freight containers, which don't show up on dscan, so I warped to the POS thinking I'd get sucked into a bubble and could slow boat out of it at my leisure. When I got onto the grid I was not happy to see a bubble full of containers waiting for my beloved Proteus.
"Wow, Malception! That loss must've really sucked."
Negro, please! I Scout Like a Pro. Utilizing method #3 I evaded that feeble trap and went on to gather valuable intelligence on my target.
Once you're on grid with the POS you need to figure out who owns it. Check out the owner's kill board. Get names of any pilots. Copy all the dscan information and paste it into Dingo's. That tool will organize all the information for you and provide you with a link in order to share the intel. Make sure you relay everything to the FC.
I think that's about all I'm going to put in this post. It may not look like a lot, but it's something that takes a lot of practice, so while you're out and about perfecting these skills I'll be writing up the next post.
Check in later to find out about dropping those probes.
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