Living in wormhole space is about 75% information gathering and 25% doing other stuff. The sheer number of tools that are available to provide and sort the large amounts of information required to be successful in w-space should give an idea as to how much it really is about what information you gather, what information you give away and how that information is used, either by you or by your enemy.
So read the rest of this post keeping in mind that out here, information and its utilization is the end-all, be-all of success.
In most cases your scouting is going to be informal and sort like shooting from the hip. Still, it's good to get into a few habits. Situational awareness (SA) is paramount in general, but especially so for scouts.
First off, you need to make sure that your overview settings are correctly setup for your specific mission. Make sure you have POS's, Force Fields, all ships and Mobile Warp Bubbles set to show up. I also have TCU's on mine as well as another tab that I can switch to in order to see cans that when seen in combination with warp bubbles on a POS likely indicates a de-cloak trap.
Speaking of cloaking, if you're not in a Helios you're doing it wrong. The Helios is the only scout ship with the ability to field a combat drone and all enemy scouts must die! Seriously, taking into consideration the critical nature of scouts if you can remove the enemy's ability to gather information you've all but won the engagement already. The Helios grants you a near guaranteed victory (unless you really suck) over other scouts because of its drone bay.
I'm sure some people will disagree, but they're F-tools so just ignore those plebeian masses and continue reading.
Now that you're in the right ship with the right overview settings it's almost time to get to work. But before heading out make sure you're aware of some of the basic information gathering and relaying tools.
I always have my corporation's chain-mapper, Dingo's, WormNav and Wormholes loaded on my IGB or very close at hand. Between these various tools I'm able to gather and relay a wealth of information.
The chain-mapper allows everyone to see where I am (and vice versa) as well as allowing me to see a visual representation of the wider terrain.
WormNav and Wormhol.es are very easy to use and give intel on trends of past activity in any system.
Dingo's is awesome. It allows the scout to create quick summaries of whatever the scout sees on his dscan. This site will then provide a short link that the scout can share with his fleet to relay that information very accurately and very quickly.
Scouts (or wouldbe scouts), if you relay bad intel you will either get your friends killed or prevent them from getting a kill. In either case, you will likely be killed.
"But, Malception, I don't want that to happen! Can you tell me how not to suck?"
Yes. If you would shut-up and listen I'm trying to get to that.
Take your time and do things by the numbers. It will be slow and tedious at first, but as you get used to doing it the pace will improve and you'll make less mistakes. In short, the way not to suck is to practice. Scan massive chains and take notes on every piece of information you can gather. Make bookmarks several hundred kilometers off of every wormhole you pass through (on both sides!), every active POS you find and create safe-spots in every system you discover.
You may not have to use these bookmarks often, but at some point you will need them and having them will give you an edge over your enemy.
Do you see a second principle emerging here? Preparation. Only through the gathering of information can you be properly prepared. If you are more prepared you will likely win. Unless you suck or unless Bob turns against you.
Anyway, just keep practicing.
Just as an example (this is certainly not the only way to do things) whenever I enter a new system in w-space I eyeball my overview to see whether or not there are any ships sitting on top of the wormhole which determines whether or not I have to deal with an immediate engagement.
Assuming for the sake of instruction that there are no ships I hold my cloak, hit my dscan, refresh the info pages on WormNav and Wormholes. I also check out the solar system map and see which planets, if any, are outside my dscan range. I grab all the signatures in system and put them in the chain-mapper's signature list. Finally, I burn off the wormhole and cloak up, changing direction as soon as I hit the cloak.
All of that should happen before your cloak timer deactivates. If for whatever reason I think I might run out of time, I go ahead and burn off/cloak/change direction, then go back to the information gathering.
After I burn off the wormhole and am safely cloaked up I'll usually make the bookmark then, but if you're micro skills are 31337 then go ahead and make the bookmark prior burning off the wormhole.
The point in all of this is to get as much information as you can in as short a time-frame as possible while minimizing your own exposure to death and dismemberment. This also minimizes the time in which your enemy has the opportunity to gather information about you.
Now, let me go back to the when I first jumped through the wormhole for a second. If there was a ship on the wormhole I have to make a split-second decision. If it's a scout ship (Anathema, Buzzard or Probe) I'm going to decloak and engage them with my long-point and Hobgoblin II. If it's anything other than that I'm going to perform the exact same steps I've already described.
The reason I wouldn't engage a Helios is because the fight is probably going to be evenly matched and 50-50 odds are little on the high-side for my liking. I'd likely see if he warps off or jumps through the wormhole before dropping cloak. If he does leave then I've learned quite a bit, but he's learned virtually nothing. If he does hang around and I have to drop cloak then I'll burn off and cloak.
At this point you've infiltrated the area and you're now behind enemy lines, so-to-speak. What next? In the interest of time you'll have to check back later. Until then, take your time and pay attention.
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Thursday, August 1, 2013
After Action
I logged in alone last night. I was tempted to chill out in my emo scissor room, but decided I'd better head up to the common channel just in case anyone else logged in. I scanned down the new static and proceeded to scout the rest of the chain in my super-elite Helios.
Surely You're Joking (SYJ) was active and had likely come from an incoming C6 which was connected to our static C4. I jumped into a class 2 system, the static exit of our C4s. The C2 was a Black Hole system with static exits to hi-sec and class 3 systems.
In the C2a I saw a lot of SYJ activity and decided to let it die down before making my presence known. They are a large group and with only myself and now one other Cold Moon pilot on I didn't want to attract their attention.
Once all their ships had been off dscan for a while I dropped probes and scanned down the HS and C3a. After checking out the hi-sec for any massive SYJ gang I warped to the C3 and jumped through. Almost immediately I heard the wormhole activate behind me so I burned off and cloaked in time to see a blockade runner - a Viator to be exact - from Weyl Manufacturing warp off.
I followed the blockade runner to his POS and found several piloted ships: a Megathron, a few Ravens and Drakes and the Viator. There didn't seem to be much activity and I suspected that SYJ had been hunting these guys, but bungled the attack somehow, allowing them to escape back to the POS.
Soon enough, though, these guys would get back to business, but with their superior numbers and larger ships I was a bit worried about our ability to keep up with their tank. Fortunately we had some more pilots logging on and the opposing numbers were becoming less of a problem.
Eventually our targets warped off to one of their null-sec wormholes and we formed a fleet of covert strategic cruisers with a couple of HACs and Guardians piloted by Henry and Fischey as auxiliary deeps and logi support.
Because of the prior SYJ activity I was weary of putting our non-claoking ships in the open, but I did want them close by in order to actually fulfill their support role. I decided to err on the side of caution and put them in the hi-sec system off of C2a. It was a safe spot and they were one jump closer to the rest of us than if they had remained in our home system.
While the auxiliaries got into position I set the trap. One of our covert Proteuses, Teseer, remained in the C3 on the NS1 wormhole. I went into NS1 with my covert Proteus and cloaked up on the wormhole. We also had No'Wai in a covert Proteus sitting at the enemy POS watching a Drake that had been chilling out there.
The ratting Drake docked up in NS1 while the Raven mopped up. Once finished the Raven warped back to the wormhole. At the sametime the Drake in the POS in C3a warped to the other side of the wormhole and jumped through to NS1.
I decloaked and engaged the Raven. Thinking they only had to contend with a sole Proteus the Raven and Drake both engaged me. Teseer jumped from the C3a into NS1 and I called the Drake as primary. Meanwhile our support group of HACs and Logi was moving toward us in the event that our targets conjured up some reinforcements.
When the Raven and Drake jumped back into C3a they were engaged by No'Wai in our third covert Proteus and Henry in his Hound. Teseer and I followed the targets back into the C3 where they were finished off on the wormhole before our support gang arrived on grid. Even though they couldn't whore themselves out on the kill mails they did get to live vicariously through us.
ze pod
Navy Raven
Drake
So here's my thoughts on things that went well, what might be improved on and a few other deep thoughts.
Sustain
1. We had really good fleet comms. There wasn't any chatter or talking over people.
2. The fleet movements, separated into two groups as they were, was excellent.
3. The springing of the trap went well. No one got polarized or anything like that.
4. The scouting was solid.
Improve
1. Auxiliary fleet positioning. I didn't really like having them so far off, but I didn't want to leave them exposed while the forward group waited for that initial contact. I should have placed inside C2a on the wormhole to HS. That would've put them even closer to us, but still provided an easy route to safety if they were jumped.
2. After the fight was over we had some loitering going on. In the future we need to clear the field or cloak up to minimize our exposure to a possible counter-attack or third-party-ganking.
Deep Thoughts
I'm tempted to say I'd have liked to have had more versatility in the auxiliary fleet like EWAR or neuts, but from the very outset this engagement was geared toward burning down tech 1 battleships and battle cruisers, so I wanted to bring a lot of DPS in order to burn through their potentially large tanks. With that in mind I think the entire fleet comp was perfectly suited to burning down the scouted fleet.
Surely You're Joking (SYJ) was active and had likely come from an incoming C6 which was connected to our static C4. I jumped into a class 2 system, the static exit of our C4s. The C2 was a Black Hole system with static exits to hi-sec and class 3 systems.
In the C2a I saw a lot of SYJ activity and decided to let it die down before making my presence known. They are a large group and with only myself and now one other Cold Moon pilot on I didn't want to attract their attention.
Once all their ships had been off dscan for a while I dropped probes and scanned down the HS and C3a. After checking out the hi-sec for any massive SYJ gang I warped to the C3 and jumped through. Almost immediately I heard the wormhole activate behind me so I burned off and cloaked in time to see a blockade runner - a Viator to be exact - from Weyl Manufacturing warp off.
I followed the blockade runner to his POS and found several piloted ships: a Megathron, a few Ravens and Drakes and the Viator. There didn't seem to be much activity and I suspected that SYJ had been hunting these guys, but bungled the attack somehow, allowing them to escape back to the POS.
Soon enough, though, these guys would get back to business, but with their superior numbers and larger ships I was a bit worried about our ability to keep up with their tank. Fortunately we had some more pilots logging on and the opposing numbers were becoming less of a problem.
Eventually our targets warped off to one of their null-sec wormholes and we formed a fleet of covert strategic cruisers with a couple of HACs and Guardians piloted by Henry and Fischey as auxiliary deeps and logi support.
Because of the prior SYJ activity I was weary of putting our non-claoking ships in the open, but I did want them close by in order to actually fulfill their support role. I decided to err on the side of caution and put them in the hi-sec system off of C2a. It was a safe spot and they were one jump closer to the rest of us than if they had remained in our home system.
While the auxiliaries got into position I set the trap. One of our covert Proteuses, Teseer, remained in the C3 on the NS1 wormhole. I went into NS1 with my covert Proteus and cloaked up on the wormhole. We also had No'Wai in a covert Proteus sitting at the enemy POS watching a Drake that had been chilling out there.
The ratting Drake docked up in NS1 while the Raven mopped up. Once finished the Raven warped back to the wormhole. At the sametime the Drake in the POS in C3a warped to the other side of the wormhole and jumped through to NS1.
I decloaked and engaged the Raven. Thinking they only had to contend with a sole Proteus the Raven and Drake both engaged me. Teseer jumped from the C3a into NS1 and I called the Drake as primary. Meanwhile our support group of HACs and Logi was moving toward us in the event that our targets conjured up some reinforcements.
When the Raven and Drake jumped back into C3a they were engaged by No'Wai in our third covert Proteus and Henry in his Hound. Teseer and I followed the targets back into the C3 where they were finished off on the wormhole before our support gang arrived on grid. Even though they couldn't whore themselves out on the kill mails they did get to live vicariously through us.
ze pod
Navy Raven
Drake
So here's my thoughts on things that went well, what might be improved on and a few other deep thoughts.
Sustain
1. We had really good fleet comms. There wasn't any chatter or talking over people.
2. The fleet movements, separated into two groups as they were, was excellent.
3. The springing of the trap went well. No one got polarized or anything like that.
4. The scouting was solid.
Improve
1. Auxiliary fleet positioning. I didn't really like having them so far off, but I didn't want to leave them exposed while the forward group waited for that initial contact. I should have placed inside C2a on the wormhole to HS. That would've put them even closer to us, but still provided an easy route to safety if they were jumped.
2. After the fight was over we had some loitering going on. In the future we need to clear the field or cloak up to minimize our exposure to a possible counter-attack or third-party-ganking.
Deep Thoughts
I'm tempted to say I'd have liked to have had more versatility in the auxiliary fleet like EWAR or neuts, but from the very outset this engagement was geared toward burning down tech 1 battleships and battle cruisers, so I wanted to bring a lot of DPS in order to burn through their potentially large tanks. With that in mind I think the entire fleet comp was perfectly suited to burning down the scouted fleet.
Tuesday, July 9, 2013
Better Scouting
The other day I was scouting in my Helios. I don't remember if I was scanning down a chain or just patrolling an existing one, but I noticed a couple of industrial ships in the open on DSCAN. It was an Iteron V and some sort of rock-chewing ship.
As expected they were at an ore site doing their thing. The Iteron had a flight of T1 hobgoblins out. I don't know if it was out of boredom or if it was supposed to be some sort of deterrent, but either way it was pretty useless.
I wormed my way through the asteroid field toward the two ships to get into warp scrambler range and called for our fleet. While they formed up in another system I continued to relay intel, which was pretty boring: "No movement and they're still shooting rocks."
As the fleet traversed the wormhole I decloaked for a bump and point on the Iteron. The fleet landed and the carebears were issued tickets for the HS Express. I made sure to get on the kills with my point.
So, here's what I learned from that experience. I need to switch out my scrambler for a disruptor. The extra range on a disruptor would've been very useful here and I think is better suited for light/scout tackle.
The second issue I have with my performance during that engagement was sticking around to get on the kill mails like a whore. In most cases it doesn't matter and I don't think it really mattered in this instance, but we are creatures of habit and it's better to do the right thing all the time, not just only "when it matters."
I should've held my point and bumps only as long as it took for the Hictor to arrive and as soon as the bubble went up I should've disengaged and cloaked. The reason I say this is because as a scout my role is to provide intelligence and support, not charge in with the heavy cavalry when it arrives.
That may be debate-worthy to some people, but if you think of it in terms of roles and then translate those roles to the real world you get something like a recon unit relaying SITREPS, calling fire missions and only when necessary do they engage targets themselves.
As expected they were at an ore site doing their thing. The Iteron had a flight of T1 hobgoblins out. I don't know if it was out of boredom or if it was supposed to be some sort of deterrent, but either way it was pretty useless.
I wormed my way through the asteroid field toward the two ships to get into warp scrambler range and called for our fleet. While they formed up in another system I continued to relay intel, which was pretty boring: "No movement and they're still shooting rocks."
As the fleet traversed the wormhole I decloaked for a bump and point on the Iteron. The fleet landed and the carebears were issued tickets for the HS Express. I made sure to get on the kills with my point.
So, here's what I learned from that experience. I need to switch out my scrambler for a disruptor. The extra range on a disruptor would've been very useful here and I think is better suited for light/scout tackle.
The second issue I have with my performance during that engagement was sticking around to get on the kill mails like a whore. In most cases it doesn't matter and I don't think it really mattered in this instance, but we are creatures of habit and it's better to do the right thing all the time, not just only "when it matters."
I should've held my point and bumps only as long as it took for the Hictor to arrive and as soon as the bubble went up I should've disengaged and cloaked. The reason I say this is because as a scout my role is to provide intelligence and support, not charge in with the heavy cavalry when it arrives.
That may be debate-worthy to some people, but if you think of it in terms of roles and then translate those roles to the real world you get something like a recon unit relaying SITREPS, calling fire missions and only when necessary do they engage targets themselves.
Frigid Satellite Disassembly Company
After about a month or so of being on my own, diving into wormholes from hi-sec I've returned to Cold Moon Destruction and found them in nearly the same condition I found them the first time: living in a class 5 system with a static to class 4 wormhole space. They've also rid themselves of a lot of dead weight by abandoning a necrotic alliance.
At any rate, I've been busy since returning to my true internet spaceship home and I look forward to the greatness I'm sure we'll be accomplishing on our own in the near future.
As for the rest of you hole-probing internet spaceship nerds, please fill your hulls with PLEX and exotic dancers before re-entering Bob's holy space.
At any rate, I've been busy since returning to my true internet spaceship home and I look forward to the greatness I'm sure we'll be accomplishing on our own in the near future.
As for the rest of you hole-probing internet spaceship nerds, please fill your hulls with PLEX and exotic dancers before re-entering Bob's holy space.
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Welcome to class!
So
after creating this new corporation of my, Tenebrous Effect, for those
of you that may be interested in joining in on the ground floor of a
scrub corp like this (or not), I decided to do a bit of hi-sec diving.
Odyssey has just recently been released after all and there would be
plenty of poor nubs eager to learn their first lessons in w-space.
It
didn't take long to find an incoming K162 from a class 2 wormhole. I
jumped in and saw that someone was already scanning. In the process of
creating a safespot I noticed a lone Caracal on dscan toward the outer
planet. Naturally, I abandoned the prudent course of action in favor of a
more aggressive tactic.
The
Caracal was sitting about 100 kilometers off of the customs office and
with his probes still out I figured there was little chance of him
keeping an eye on the directional scanner so I decloaked and engaged.
First kill of the evening: http://eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=18135021
Once
dispatched I sent him the obligatory "gf" and went on about my
business: setting up a safe and observation point near the local POS. It
looked like they ran sites fairly regularly and I wouldn't turn down an
easy kill.
It
didn't take long for the next new explorer to roll in from hi-sec. He
was sporting a brand new Caldari faction Heron and like his predecessor
figured that no one would see him at the outer planet even if he was
uncloaked.
I found this poor soul chilling out at a site near the outer planet. A bump gave me all the time I needed.
Second kill:
I
was somewhat disappointed with the loot drops so far, but to be honest I
wasn't expecting all that much. These were simple nubs after all. But
still, how is it that everyone else always finds those morons who carry
PLEX?
I
had left both of these wrecks untouched. I'm still not sure if that's
such a great move or not. It does act as a bit of bait, but I'm thinking
it might give away more information than it's worth. In hindsight, now
that I think about it, leaving the wrecks was probably a stupid move.
People can look up the kill on killboards and figure out what I'm
flying.
Yep. Definitely stupid.
After
this I went back to observing the locals. There was one or two logged
in, but as far as I could tell they were perma-afk. I kept an eagle on
them though. You never know when someone's going to do something
incredibly stupid.
After
a few more minutes of watching the locals though there was another
newcomer from hi-sec. A Moa this time. That was good. I was getting
tired of blowing up pitiably defenseless frigates.
Amazingly
I found the Moa at the outer planet. Whether he was attracted there by
the wrecks or by ignorance of the threats lurking in Anoikis I can't
say. Yet there he was at that same site I'd made my last kill.
I
have to give him credit though. He was aligned, but nothing that a
simple bump couldn't take care of. Once engaged this guy quickly turned
to the offense and opened up, but he just didn't have the firepower to
break through my Proteus's elite shield buffer? What?
Third and fourth kills from that chap:
Sunday, June 9, 2013
New Digs
There've been a few changes since the last post: I left my homosexual brothers-in-arms, Cold Moon Destruction. Those guys are probably the closest thing I've encountered in EVE to what the personal relationships are like in the Marine Corps: total debauchery!
At any rate, I've struck out on my own for the time being. Without a home in w-space I've pretty much been stalking other people and preying on those who don't know any better. Just today I've killed three people who were out exploring from Amarr and though they thought enough to fit the probe launcher none of them bothered with cloaking devices.
A few old friends have invited me to join up with them so far. I'll probably play it stubborn for a few weeks and see what I can't make happen in this scrub corp I've got going right now.
Monday, May 13, 2013
Countertrap on Hisec
I love combat in w-space. In my opinion it's the best in the game. There are some instances though when people generally avoid combat in w-space, such as on a wormhole that leads to high security space, but it does happen from time to time.
One such opportunity presented itself yesterday. A Transmission Lost pilot, Draconic, was utilizing a hi-sec wormhole that was at the other end of a chain which opened up as a K162 into our system; he was moving in some ships and supplies and had garnered the attention of a small Wayward 7 gang.
On his way out Draconic, our resident pedo-bait by the way, spotted a Harbinger and Drake sitting on the hi-sec side of the wormhole. I decided to go sit on the w-space side of that wormhole and keep an eye on things. Not long after I arrived in my covert Proteus a Phobos landed on the wormhole and bubbled up.
Now I'm not sure what these guys were thinking would happen. It's possible that they were waiting for Draconic to get back and try to kill him when he jumped back into the wormhole, but were they under the impression that he would jump in with a Harby and Drake chilling out at the hole? If so he would be able to jump right back out. Maybe they were hoping some other ships would be coming to access hi-sec and the ships in k-space would jump in, but why leave them in k-space? It's not like someone watching d-scan would jump to the wormhole with a Phobos on it, but not with the two battle-cruisers. Like I said, I don't know what they were thinking.
Nevertheless, I did intend on killing them. Draconic was on his way back with a heavily-tanked bait-Abaddon and while I was waiting I'd also seen a Tengu arrive and cloak up on the hole. It was obvious these guys had no idea I was there, which was perfectly fine with me. They were under the impression that they were going to net some easy kills in this "tarp" of theirs.
Guys from Loveshack, our home system, were already shipped up and sitting on the other side of the wormhole one system back.
A few minutes later Draconic jumped through the wormhole. Remaining cloaked I moved toward the wormhole, but kept my distance. We could never kill the Phobos since he could jump the wormhole as soon as he got in trouble. I waited for the Tengu to decloak then dropped my own cloak and immediately engaged him. Draconic's Abaddon drew the Harbinger and Drake in behind him.
At this point a hostile Proteus decloaked and engaged us, but our own gang was coming onto grid and the enemy began to flee through the wormhole to hi-sec. Unfortunately, their Harby had followed the Abaddon too far off of the wormhole and could not make it back before his ship and pod were destroyed.
While we looted the field a Wayward 7 Hound decloaked and launched a bomb. Bravo, sir! Once again I have no clue what you were thinking, but who am I to judge?
One such opportunity presented itself yesterday. A Transmission Lost pilot, Draconic, was utilizing a hi-sec wormhole that was at the other end of a chain which opened up as a K162 into our system; he was moving in some ships and supplies and had garnered the attention of a small Wayward 7 gang.
On his way out Draconic, our resident pedo-bait by the way, spotted a Harbinger and Drake sitting on the hi-sec side of the wormhole. I decided to go sit on the w-space side of that wormhole and keep an eye on things. Not long after I arrived in my covert Proteus a Phobos landed on the wormhole and bubbled up.
Now I'm not sure what these guys were thinking would happen. It's possible that they were waiting for Draconic to get back and try to kill him when he jumped back into the wormhole, but were they under the impression that he would jump in with a Harby and Drake chilling out at the hole? If so he would be able to jump right back out. Maybe they were hoping some other ships would be coming to access hi-sec and the ships in k-space would jump in, but why leave them in k-space? It's not like someone watching d-scan would jump to the wormhole with a Phobos on it, but not with the two battle-cruisers. Like I said, I don't know what they were thinking.
Nevertheless, I did intend on killing them. Draconic was on his way back with a heavily-tanked bait-Abaddon and while I was waiting I'd also seen a Tengu arrive and cloak up on the hole. It was obvious these guys had no idea I was there, which was perfectly fine with me. They were under the impression that they were going to net some easy kills in this "tarp" of theirs.
Guys from Loveshack, our home system, were already shipped up and sitting on the other side of the wormhole one system back.
A few minutes later Draconic jumped through the wormhole. Remaining cloaked I moved toward the wormhole, but kept my distance. We could never kill the Phobos since he could jump the wormhole as soon as he got in trouble. I waited for the Tengu to decloak then dropped my own cloak and immediately engaged him. Draconic's Abaddon drew the Harbinger and Drake in behind him.
At this point a hostile Proteus decloaked and engaged us, but our own gang was coming onto grid and the enemy began to flee through the wormhole to hi-sec. Unfortunately, their Harby had followed the Abaddon too far off of the wormhole and could not make it back before his ship and pod were destroyed.
While we looted the field a Wayward 7 Hound decloaked and launched a bomb. Bravo, sir! Once again I have no clue what you were thinking, but who am I to judge?
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