Montag, 9. September 2013

Interview: Penny Ibramovic of Tigerears.


In this ongoing Interview Series we will get to know great Hunters and Scouts. In this episode I am very happy to announce we have a famous wormhole huntress with us, Penny Ibramovic of http://www.tigerears.org/
Be sure to give her excellent Blog a visit, there is much to read and learn!


1. Tell us a bit about yourself, your corporation.

I'm just another capsuleer. I was invited to join the corporation for industrial purposes, which soon became keen to go in to w-space. I found I couldn't say no when operations got dragged through a wormhole.

2. Why and when did you start EVE, what do you aim for?

I started EVE Online because a Mac client was made available. That may sound simplistic, but back in 2008 this was a big deal. And, really, it still is. That EVE Online was a sci-fi MMORPG set in space just made it sound sweeter.

My aim to was fly spaceships. I really didn't know much about the game to start with. I started in my frigate, ran the early missions, upgraded to a cruiser, then battlecruiser, and kept running missions. I'm not that social, so didn't look for a corporation or to engage with other players directly. That came from other people finding my blog.

3. The way of the hunter, what are your most basic tactics.

Gather information. Act on that information.

4. What has been your worst mistake while engaging people?

Nothing specific, but in general any time that I fail to draw on previous relevant experience or fail to take in to account any intelligence gathered then I would consider myself to have made a mistake.

5. Consequently, what was your best catch?

Piloting an interceptor that held a Tengu for my first T3 kill was pretty sweet. I'm also fond of the presence of mind I had in being able to hold down two Hulks with only a single warp disruptor fitted to my ship. I've managed to trap multiple miners in an Onyx's bubble a couple of times too, which ends up being a brutal massacre.

I think any catch where skill has played a strong part, either in intelligence gathering or scanning a site with a single attempt, makes for a good kill.

6. Any funny stories and weird things? I have had my fair share of odd stuff in wormholes, what did you encounter?

We found out how to move wormholes, maybe 18 months before it was fixed. We didn't do much with it for a long time, as moving a wormhole was fiddly and time-consuming without much opportunity for gain. We just thought it was a curiosity. But I eventually found the opportunity, and managed to shift a wormhole far enough to catch a hauler making a return trip. That was a bit underhand, though, and I'm glad the issue was fixed. In fact, it was left untouched for ages, then fixed maybe a few weeks after that kill. Coincidence? Probably.

7. A look back, how did you start and learn, what helped you?

I learnt by doing. I still have an old e-mail in a folder somewhere bewailing my pitiful scanning skills taking me ages to not even get out of our home w-space system. But with time, skill training, and plenty of practice you start to get good. Finding guides helps, and reading other people's experiences and paying attention to what colleagues are doing all help refine the skills you use.

8. Who is your role model, any hunter and scout you like most?

Kename Fin, Mick Straih, and Riyusone Haro have all been big influences. Fin brought me in to the corporation and has continued to be my guide. It was Riyu's enthusiasm to enter w-space shortly after Apocrypha hit that encouraged me to explore beyond my comfort zone. And after relying on Mick's excellent hunting skills for so long, when he was unavailable I had to either do it myself or go without, so I started doing it myself. All it takes is practice and not worrying about getting it wrong to start with. Sucking is just the first stage to being awesome at something, as Finn or Jake once said.

9. What are you favourite ships to hunt in?

Living in w-space and needing to scan to get anywhere has led me to rely mostly on ships that can scan and warp cloaked, particularly when wormholes can disappear behind you, unexpectedly stranding you in an unknown system. I used to scan in a Buzzard and roam in a Manticore, but the time taken to travel back to the home system to swap ships and the visibility of doing so wasn't ideal.

Taking the step to training for strategic cruisers opened up a much more flexible and powerful ship choice, letting me scan and engage many different targets, even if it means I only end up acting as glorified tackle for more specialized ships flying behind me.

By the same token, flying a T3 limits my ship choice by being flexible enough to make me forget I have ships that may be more suitable for a particular role. But even given that, as well as the skill point risk for losing and the cost of the T3 ships, being able to scan efficiently and ambush targets in the same ship has made the strategic cruiser my ship of choice. At the moment it's a Loki, but I can fly any of the T3s.

10. Any tips on fitting goals for those?

Nothing specific, which I hope is understandable given the flexibility of strategic cruisers. Just understand the role you want the ship to fulfill, understand the targets you'll be pitting yourself against, and understand the environment you'll be flying in, then fit for those circumstances.

11. Any secrets you want to share with the audience?

If you think the discovery scanner is a good idea, or want the directional scanner to update automatically, you don't belong in w-space.

12. Final shout-outs and greetings.

Come back, Mak! We didn't mean most of what we said about your truly enormous mass. 

I hope you enjoyed this episode with Penny, many thanks again to her for taking the time to answer my questions! If you have ideas for further people to interview or a great question you always wanted answered feel free to eve-mail me or comment here!

Dienstag, 27. August 2013

Earning ISK in Wormholes - Starting out

Hello everyone! This time we have a look at, how the dark side of wormhole space works – earning a living while we are in one of the most dangerous parts of Space.

I will start and explain very basic ways to get those all elusive ISKs into our wallet. There are some skill requirements attached to most of these, but even at a very basic level you can start. I managed to get a friend going and earning about double what he would make in highsec after 1 day of training.
The training wasn’t even specialized!

What you will need, a sense of adventure, risk taking, some basic ships you can replace. Also a good dose of paranoia helps keeping you safe!

First of we go with the most basic way of earning ISK. Can you guess it? Yeah, it is in fact mining. Don’t do it to long, or you go space mad. I nearly quit when I started out, because of it, but it is easy, available and earns you starting money to try other stuff.

Here is a good ship to start with, the venture, you already get two of these when you do the tutorials at the start, so why not make something out of them.
[Venture, mining]
Mining Laser Upgrade I

Conjunctive Magnetometric ECCM Scanning Array I
Residual Survey Scanner I
Experimental 1MN Afterburner I

Cu Vapor Particle Bore Stream I
Cu Vapor Particle Bore Stream I
Core Probe Launcher I, Core Scanner Probe I

Small Low Friction Nozzle Joints I
Small Low Friction Nozzle Joints I
[empty rig slot]

Hobgoblin I x2
Don't worry to much if you can not fit everything on it, basic things you want are agility and yield first and foremost. Obviously everything helps in its own way. As your skills progress, T2 miners will increase your yield a bit, but even after 1 day and with this fit, you make about 1 mil per 20 minutes. That can easily be doubled with better skills.

So – how do we do the mining part then? First we need to find a suitable place to mine. Get in your scanning ship and find a wormhole, preferably a c1 or c2, but it doesn’t really matter, ore sites stay the same throughout all classes.

There are no asteroid belts in wormhole space, the asteroids are found in anomalies. Since the Odyssey Expansion those have been moved directly into the Discovery scanner and show up on the list if you enable them. Make sure to check that little box in the probe scanner and to run the Discovery scanner option next to the capacitor.

Have a closer look here:


Kara-tip, you can have the pics I have on my blog bigger if you click them!

I have highlighted what information we need, enabling the scanner and finding an ore site. Now we can look the site up in eve survival. This will help us see what we can expect there.

Open up the “Common Perimeter Deposit" and have a look. Initial group spawns 5 frigates. OK, now that we know that, we are sure there are no sentry guns, we can mine safely in this site for 10-15 minutes. Guns can spawn as soon as you land, and they pack a punch, don’t warp to those sites!

It might have been activated before or it might be a trap, so you better dscan it before and see if you find anything odd. If you see something like warp disruption bubbles or the likes, it might be possible the ore site is setup as a trap from the wormhole inhabitants.

I advise learning by doing. Dive in and explore, failure will surely happen, but you will learn from it for next time. So we found the wormhole, bookmarked both sides, now we warp with the scanner to the anomaly. Bookmark yourself the ABC ores, Arkonor, Bistot, Crokite, those are the valuable ones in wormhole space.


Isn't wormhole space beautiful!

Bookmarking them will save precious time, you would waste if you would always warp in at 0 to the anomaly and slow-boat over to the asteroid, they are usually a bit away from the arrival point.
Once this is done get your venture and mine away, as soon as the rats spawn its time to move to another site. Since they spawn after 10-15 minutes after activation, the best way is to not warp to all sites first, but to keep the other sides fresh. Don’t worry to much if you warp somewhere and sleepers are already there, if you just warp out you will be fast enough to evade them.

So scanning with the venture might also be possible, c1s have a big signature and can be easily probed down, even without bonus-ed ships.

So this is the most basic way to make some ISK and mine away, next part will have gas mining and more! Check in soon, I will try to do the next one faster. This time around took me a while to make all the fittings I had in mind, now that these are done, it should work a bit faster.

Scanning tip of this episode, double-clicking an anomaly or a probe in the probe scanner focuses the camera on the map view onto it.

Last words of warning, make sure your clone is updated, med-clone is in the right place and never fly anything you can not afford to loose!

Montag, 12. August 2013

This is the Story about the most persistent miner of the world.

Well there I was back again in EVE and derping around when someone mentioned a Venture in our first wormhole out. Naturally as I am a big Venture hunter I had to get that. They aren't easy to catch, so I slapped on one more scram on my trusty Helios and oiled the Warrirouu drone all up to be extra sleek!

So then I thought, for sure he is in the Ladar! But damn! We didn't have a bookmark. No matter Super Scanner Kara has combat probes. So I launched them holding my breath, since the system was a mere 7au. So he could see them, but I moved them off dscan range fast.
He was still there!

So I dscanned him roughly down (well 8 AU distance is good dscanning no? :P) And dropped my probes in the general area. First scan 30%, oh my! Second scan had a hit! Yes sir we can bogey!
He was still there.

Warp Kara, warp! Move probes off! Run Forrest run!
He was still there!

So I noticed he is in a grav site! Face-palm! (This means no scanning necessary) Oh well. I slowly drift closer to him and give him a massive bump before double scramming him and setting my mighty Warrior II drone on him!
Die! Scum-miner Die!
Point the Pod, oh yes sir I do, kill the pod ! And get tasty delicious podsicle!



So yeah he is dead and gone, I scoop the great loots and am so rich now! A goddamn T2 survey scanner! Yes!

So I go back home and think about what skill I might need while we have a Highsec exit, I go and shop a bit and come back. Then Bruce says, hey, there's a venture in A. Could it be!
He has returned!

So I warp in, make fleet, get closer to our tenacious carebear and BUMP!SCRAM!DIE! Oh and Bruce joins the fun. So then I get an eve mail.
is kicking the noob really that much fun?
His question is something to ponder, but i have a black heart today, so I assure him it is.

So I send some more advise and stuff, maybe he should go hunting himself or join e-uni to learn. And give him 5mil so he doesn't rage-quit.
well thx for the money again, but I think I just dont get the mentalty, pissing other players of because u can.....just dont get it.....especially if there is no real gain....nah, at least u paid me after u f*cked me.....is there a profession like pvp prostitute....seems profitable....
I am not sure what that means, but I send him another mail that I am happy to shoot him whenever.

So I think thats that, but wait. Bruce tells me there is a venture in A.
Do I have Déjà vu? What is going on - It can't be!
I had a closer look.


But no, he is back. So yeah, I have the bookmark and I warp there and sure enough, BUMP!SCRAM!DIE!
And more eve-mail:
maybe u will her from me in a month or two....
anyway thx/die a slow painfull death....havent decided yet.....till next time hf fun
I am pretty sure that is the right way to celebrate my Junior promotion in TRECI, full member! :) That and eating chilli so I can hover now... :lol:

I hope my miner had fun and good fortunes in the meantime!



Bonus round! How do I fit my Helios for this stuff:

[Helios, Helios fit]
Overdrive Injector System II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II

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

Covert Ops Cloaking Device II
Sisters Expanded Probe Launcher, Sisters Combat Scanner Probe

Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I

Warrior II x1

Very basic fit for pointing ships successfully. Nanofibers and Overdrive to get into warp fast and get high speed approaching targets cloaked. MWD for GTFO purposes, Pinpointing array doesn’t get stacking penalty, so it helps me more then better scan accuracy. Two scrams for extra you stay here. Web is there for slowing people down or help with getting big ships in warp faster.

This fit is a bit split into, I know its not perfect for either purpose, its not perfect tackle nor perfect scanner, but it enables me to do both fast without reshipping.

Next up in a few days, the guide to making ISK in wormholes.

Samstag, 10. August 2013

Why do we play EVE?

Searching for a Signal in the Darkness.


Sometimes EVE feels like a vast, cold universe with lots of opportunities, sometimes it closes in on me. I am in a tin can rattling around with the other beans, no way out. The light shining in, comes from the dark outside. EVE is a harsh mistress.

So this time I want to talk a little bit about why we play EVE. If you want you can also tell me why you play EVE or why you don’t play it. This is really about both things.

I always go through phases in my playtime. I can be very active playing hours and hours and days on end, and then stop altogether for weeks. Its troublesome for some play-styles (it is why I never would make a good industrialist or Trader) and I just about manage in wormhole space, mainly with the great support I get in my corp TRECI. While w-space needs patience and planning it also enables my sporadic random play. I can do stuff for an hour, or longer times.

It is never something like a big event that makes me stop, more a tiring feeling really. EVE's many options sometimes seem too much, or the fact that some things seem so unattainable.

Its my love and hate relationship with the skill queue. You always train and train, it takes so long and sometimes I never get there. I have recently trained Logistics V, other people then seem happy when they get to something like that, I only feel empty. Its there, I can fly a Guardian now, one of those ships I always wanted, it looks cool and I enjoy the support role it fills.


But the goal is gone, I don’t need to get there anymore, it is achieved, so something has gone missing. Maybe I need more goals, I don’t know.

What are the things I enjoy most, these might give me goals? What do I do? Hunting, flying with my cloaked ship into the unknown, exploring the new connections and star systems I encounter. Finding new weird things in there, meet other capsuleers. And blow them up. The hunt is what keeps me going many times, away past being tired and sometimes longer. It drives me like no other thing. I wonder why. It is hard and often useless, so often nothing happens.

Before i joined TRECI I had my cool-down day out of corp. So I went and visited Aldrat, the E-Unis home system, flew around and said hello. I fitted an cheap Incursus in an effort to blow up old frigates and went into lowsec faction warfare systems. Hopping that there surely must be people who would fight. Alas it was a sobering experience, no one wanted to fight and the few people I saw, were farming the systems and running, as soon as I entered system. I eventually managed to get blown up after I went back and forth a bit with one guy. But it was short and unsatisfying. I don't mind loosing a ship, but hunting empty space for several hours was not fun.

I also must confess I am too risk averse. I hesitate and miss things because of that. One day last week I found some target in the chain. I went for it and we got a fight, I lost my first ship hero- tackling and went back got another one, got caught, more sharks had come out of the dark and I lost ship and pod. All in all 330millions worth. But I couldn't have been happier. I fought learned, hunted and enjoyed the whole journey.

Obstacles to overcome are better then spinning in safety round and round and round some more. The lost pod also makes me happy as weird as it might sound. I don't have to dread loosing it anymore, I had packed to many implants in there. It was part of the problem and its gone now.

Sometimes there is truth in the sarcastic sentence we jokingly tease each other with sometimes. “Didn't want that ship anyway.” For me it shines true.


We humans are animals that dread loss and pile up stuff to avoid it. EVE hits a nerve there. I always thought EVE is more about loss then achievement. In a weird way, you never get anywhere and you like it for that. Stages of madness...


Some people quit eventually, like the great Azual Skoll:

He got eaten by EVE, the time to stay where he wanted to be, took him down, it is a wise decision to leave if you don’t enjoy it anymore. I hope he does it like I do, leave a bit, get the hunger and come back a bit. Sometimes you need to take the bitter EVE pill in small doses.

But lets not be so dramatic and depressing. When I drag myself to EVE I always get something out of it, the stories continue and the Journey goes on.

Next week will have the post I plan on ISK making in wormholes. There are fascinating ways to do stuff. I bitter-noob to much in this one I fear. Thanks for reading and feel free to write me what you do in times like these.


Dienstag, 6. August 2013

Wormhole Exploration for Beginners


This will be a post aimed at new players, who want to have a go into wormhole space. I try to included some basic tips and fittings that even a player who is on day one of his Odyssey will be able to use and enjoy.

Disclaimer, you might die and get podded. Don't fly what you cant afford to loose, update the med clone.

First of, a bit how my start in exploration went. When I started to play EVE on my trial way back when in early 2012 (you can get a free 21 day trial with the link on the top-right) I soon realized, I wanted to explore, but I didn’t quite know how and what. Wormhole space sounded very interesting and also scary. I had done the tutorials, and after some problems learned how to scan a signature in about 20 minutes. My first one took way over 2 hours, so don’t despair if it seems all a bit hard at first. It will get easier with some practice. I found an wormhole in one system close to my home but I was to afraid to go in it. When I later found the courage to give it a go it was gone.

My fear at that time was more of the unknown, then about loosing a ship in there. I then read up on w-space a bit and found a good scanning tutorial. Since they changed scanning it should be even easier to get into it. My path strayed a bit after that, I mined for new ships, nearly quit because of the boredom then went and applied to eve university, had a blast there and later joined a wh corp.

For this I assume you know and did the basic scanning tutorial. Here is a short refresher: http://wiki.eveuniversity.org/Scanning

Equipment & Skills:
You could use any ship really for the first steps, even a noob frigate. It only needs to have a core probe launcher to find signatures. But the exploration frigates have a bonus and this will make scanning a whole lot easier. They are: Magnate, Heron, Imicus and Probe.
Depending on which race you started out with, you will already have one of these from the tutorials. A basic fit for the Magnate:

[Magnate, Basic Scanner]
Local Hull Conversion Nanofiber Structure I
Local Hull Conversion Nanofiber Structure I
Local Hull Conversion Nanofiber Structure I
Local Hull Conversion Nanofiber Structure I

Limited 1MN Microwarpdrive I
Scan Rangefinding Array I
Scan Rangefinding Array I

Core Probe Launcher I, Core Scanner Probe I
[empty high slot]
[empty high slot]

Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
[empty rig slot]

This fit will only require these skills: 

Amarr Frigate I (16 minutes, 40 seconds)
Hull Upgrades I (16 minutes, 40 seconds)
Afterburner I (8 minutes, 20 seconds)
Afterburner II (38 minutes, 50 seconds)
Afterburner III (3 hours, 39 minutes, 30 seconds)
High Speed Maneuvering I (41 minutes, 40 seconds)
Astrometrics I (25 minutes)
Mechanics III (3 hours, 39 minutes, 30 seconds)
Jury Rigging I (16 minutes, 40 seconds)
Astrometric Rangefinding I (1 hour, 6 minutes, 40 seconds)
Astrometric Rangefinding II (5 hours, 10 minutes, 28 seconds)
Total time: 16 hours, 19 minutes, 58 seconds

You should already have the Frigate, Afterburner and Astrometrics skill if you did the basic tutorials. Mechanics and Jury Rigging is needed to fit the rigs, which will give you a massive bonus to scanning. You can go without but finding signatures will be much harder. Last optional bit is the Scan Rangefinding Array I, it takes 6h to train, but it can help scanning. Have a look at the scanning tutorial I linked earlier for more skills and modules.

So if you go without rigs and the array you can fly the ship in 6h, with an afterburner even less. Be sure to buy extra core scanner probes, sometimes you can loose them and they are cheap. I usually carry 2-3 set extra. So if you really want to go after things fastest way possible, use the scanning frig, an afterburner and a probe launcher, it will work! Other races frigates might have a different slot layout but will work the same to fit.

The ship and modules should run you at about 1,25mil ISK. If the modules you find in the new player system are very expensive, check the market close by, nothing on this ship should be more expensive then 150000 ISK.

Basic Wormhole Mechanics:
So you have the ship and you know how to scan, but what is wormhole space like? It is quite different from the High Security Space you have been in so far. Before you undock, make sure you have everything fitted and working on the ship, you could also buy insurance if you feel like it. Make sure your clone is up to date and covers your skill points.
These are the four basic things you need to know about w-space.

First it has no concord, it is 0.0 security space. That means that everyone can shoot you and they won't get concorded or loose security status, like in High-sec. That means also that everyone will shoot you! Assume no one friendly. It also means Bubbles. Warp Disruption Bubbles are anchored/ launched/activated Spheres that prevent you from warping while you are inside them. If you get caught in one of these and enemies are close they will catch you easy.

Second, there is no local chat list with players in system. So you never know who is around and watching you. Local chat only gets active if you speak in it, you will reveal yourself to everyone but you still wont see anyone there, so don’t do it if you want to be hidden.
Thirdly, wormholes work different then gates to travel through them. There are some important rules you need to remember, the first is to bookmark the wormhole on each side. So bookmark the one you found on the outside. Then you need to click it on the overview and open up info on it.It will tell you about its status. 
 
Wormholes have a limit on time and mass. If time is up, it will close, also if big ships with mass jumped through them, they will collapse and close. Avoid these wormhole keywords if you seem them in the description: “Critical" or "reaching the end of its natural lifetime". Critical means there is very little mass left on the wormhole and even a frigate might collapse it. A cruiser most certainly will. 

Reaching the end of its natural lifetime means, that there are 4 hours or less (the less part is important) of life on the connection. It might collapse any minute. They also look different in space, they wobble faster and look shaky.
If you see a wormhole with these it is a risk to enter and you might need to find another way out.
So the next thing you can see from the description, it will give you a number, like k162 or c125.
These descriptions tell you about the destination a wormhole leads to. A k162 is the most common, because it is the exit of another wormhole. So its always k162 on one side, it also means someone opened that wormhole from the other side. 

Here is a website that lets you identify the wormhole class and static:
http://www.wormnav.com/index.php

You can type in the static there, for example c125 and it will tell you the wormhole connections time and mass and system where it leads to, go and try it out for c125.
Back? So you now know that a c125 is a class 2 wormhole connection with 16h time and 1 million mass. Wormholes have different classes. A higher class means more mass and time and usually harder sleepers. Sleepers? Yes, sleepers. The npc rats of wormhole space are very dangerous and in every anomaly. Even mining grav sites can have them. They will kill your frigate easy. They wont pod you and they wont be on wormholes, so that’s something.

Have you noticed the description also gives away a bit more? If you see a k162 you don’t know where it leads to from wormnav, but the description will say something like unknown parts of space. This means it leads to a class 1,2 or 3 wormhole. Dangerous unknown is 4 and 5. deadly unknown is a class 6 wormhole. And sometimes wormholes just lead to lowsec or another highsec system or even a nullsec system.

Here is a more in-depth article about wormholes: http://wiki.eveuniversity.org/Wormholes

The forth item you need to remember is the wormhole timer. A wormhole will only let you jump through twice, then you have to wait 5 minutes until you can jump again through the same wormhole. This can be used to catch you for example. If you are in w-space and enter a wormhole, see enemies, jump back then you are polarized, meaning you can not jump back into this wormhole for the 5 minutes, so you are stuck on the other side if you get warp disrupted. The 5 minute timer is called polarity.

There is no aggression timer on wormholes, so you can be shot on one side, jump and they can shoot you on the other side right then and there. On gates they have to wait 1 minute until they can do that.

Many times the timer is said to be 4 minutes for jumping wormholes. But that is false. It is actually 5 minutes. You already take a few seconds of that timer when you jump and load grid, waiting out the session change timer etc. So it looks like less then 5 minutes.

What can we do in w-space:
The basic things you can do in w-space, if you are brand new is explore, you can scan sites and other wormholes, look for inhabitants and enjoy the scenery, wormhole space is quite beautiful:

You can also do risky stuff, like I did in my other story, steal wrecks for example. All you need is some will and blatant disregard for your ship ;)

Remember a frigate is quite hard to catch, you are by far faster then anything into warp and speed. So you can outrun enemies, if they are in bigger ships. It is however also fragile so dont hesitate to warp off or run away. Its like a rabbit, hard to catch easy to kill.
There is one important tool I need to tell you about before you jump into the wormhole (finally! Ugh, wont Kara stop blabbering on!)

Dscan as we call it. The directional scanner is your way to success and keeps you safe. And your enemies worried! :) Every ship has a dscan and it works like a sonar in space, pinging a whole sphere around your ship for other ships or stuff. It works together with the overview. Open it up with Alt-d. It is right next to the probe scanner window.
It will look something like this:

You can scan like I did there in all directions, or you can narrow it like a cone (ice-cream, I should eat ice-cream) to scan almost anything down. It wont show you cloaky ships, but everything else will be there, with the limit of 14,4au. Together with the map of the solar system it is a powerful tool. Here is a good guide how to use it, play a bit with it in highsec and see if you can find miners at belts, watch a station undock etc: http://wiki.eveuniversity.org/Directional_Scanner_Guide

So you jumped into the wormhole and bookmarked it. I hope you did? Do it, make it a habit.
Don’t move! If you don’t move or activate a module you get 1 minute invulnerability to check what is going on. So for a bit you are perfectly safe.

Hit dscan, if there are no ships you are good to go for now. Jump range for wormholes is 5km. So if you are under 5km you can enter it, gates are 2,5km and stations 500m.
If you are unlucky and there is someone right there with you, just jump back to highsec, you can wait on the wormhole and see if she/he follows. They cant do anything to you in HS. Just don’t jump right back in, or you get polarity and might get killed.

So if no one seems to be there and dscan shows no ships you are pretty save. Well relatively, there might be cloakys watching you :) but that is half the fun.

We will now make a midway safe-spot. Pick a planet far away and warp to it at 100km. While in warp open the bookmark system (maybe you have it still open from saving the wormhole?) with alt-e and places → add location. It will pop up a window, just hit submit. Congrats, you just made yourself a save-spot no one can warp to but you for now.

If it didn’t quite work the first time, try it again warping to other planets. Avoid Moons and signatures, I will tell you later why.

So if you got the safe-spot, warp to it. Keep watching dscan. If you see combat scanner probes, warp off to another safe-spot further away. Or you can keep moving in your frigate with the mwd. It will be very hard at 3km/s to warp right on top of you and catch you in time.

So now that we are reasonable safe we can scan signatures in the wormhole, maybe there are more wormholes to explore, higher class wormholes or nullsec systems to find. Or maybe you find a ladar site to gas mine later with a venture and the whole system is so quiet you can risk it. This can be quite profitable. I know the gas mine skill book costs an arm and a leg when you start, but it will yield much more isk then any mining you can do. Also some gas sites are in HS, so go look for those also. Since wormhole anomalies are so different to HS ones you can check here what you will encounter: http://eve-survival.org/wikka.php?wakka=WormholeSpace

So you see even a normal grav site will have bad sleepers that kill you... But a secret, ladar sites will spawn the rats after 15 minutes. So you can suck gas for a bit and when they appear just warp away. Beware of those with sentrys, they will spawn right away.
Most times you have time enough to warp out with a frigate if you land and warp off right away. I wouldn’t bet on it tho.

Warping to a site at range (100km) is also ok, but sleepers have also quite the range, so be careful. They will go after you. And even the frigates pack a punch. You can kill easy wormhole sites in a very well tanked cruiser or better a battlecruiser. Frigates and Destroyers will die.

So we have established Sleepers bad! Why are moons bad then? Moons can have a POS, a Player Owned Starbase. This is where wormhole dwellers like me live, because there are no stations in wormhole space. So we bring our own stations, complete with ship hangars, module bays, guns, warp disruptors, shield and even pleasure deck. I also have a corpse collection there...

They look like this, maybe you have seen one in HS at a moon:

Here I am watching a POS from some wormhole corp. You can see it has guns around it and someone is inside. The POS can shoot you and lock you with warp disruptors in w-space.
They can also do that in NS or LS, so be careful not to warp to one with your fragile frigate. In HS you will be fine tho, you can have a look around and explore them.

Later on with a cloaked ship you are able to watch a POS in any space safely, and see what people do there.

Fly a bit around in the wormhole, explore and go sightseeing, there are some nice planets in w-space and you can even dare to try to warp at range to sites and bugger off after a very quick look. Might also work at POSes, but you have been warned, more then land, and right away warp off is not a good idea. Better to watch them from afar with dscan. :)

So this concludes a first introduction to exploration in wormholes, next time I will tell you a bit how to make isk in w-space. This will also be for a bit more advanced players, but I will included a training program to get you there.

In the meantime, don’t be afraid, like I was, poke around and try mad stuff, you will learn a lot and many skill that is applicable in every day eve life. If you know how to scan and dscan, you can be a valuable scout for pretty much any fleet for example. Many skills in EVE are not character based, learning the mechanics and workings will keep you safe and help you have fun.

For questions and comments either pm me in game, or write me here on my blog.
Have fun!

Dienstag, 30. Juli 2013

Kara's First Week in TRECI

Get a coffee and cookies, it's story time! Dear derping Kara will take you for a ride in the unknown, to the stars!

So this has been my first week in TRECI. After having decided to join up, things went fast.

Moving out went smooth as Bob blessed me with several HS exits over the week before. I had already put out unused ships in preparation for EKCHUs Move to a C5-C5.

So I was well prepared. I did my day in cool down with some messing around with frigs in LS, had some fun hunting for targets and exploding in the end. Also went back to Aldrat to visit my old home, having a look if the Unistas keep things neat and tidy. While running some L4 Missions there, which I hadn’t tried in ages and felt like doing for relaxing, a friend called for help.

So I jumped out to Amarr and went the 16 jumps out into the deep LS he was doing exploration in.
He was stuck not being able to kill the final rat. To little dps! But fear not the horrible drake of Kara went there and shot the rat dead. Well after nearly dying horrible twice to a missile launching web tower hehe... :)

My first day in corp started with a nice surprise, there was a HS. I was cheerfully greeted by so many, I most enjoyed that, such friendliness from the get go! Helping me along to get used to the new mapper and corp stuff, saying hello on mumble I was moved in fast with my trusty scanner Covops and Legion.

Zero which I knew from months ago in SKADI and EKCHU sold me a tornado and PVP commenced. We hunted around in a 0 pipe and I was happy and excited, hadn’t been doing that much lately.
3 kills were the icing on the cake! The next day followed suit, my Tornado got a good using and died in a glorious blaze - to a Thanatos carrier none the less - but not before getting 4 more kills.

We also encountered NoHo alliance in w-space and had a memorable fight over 25 minutes I think.
We had a nice T3 armour fleet with carrier support, they outnumbered us slightly, but had only guardians. After we fought them in our home on a wormhole and on the other side and no one could break each other, GF were exchanged and both sides got out safe without losses.

We then continued to roam 0 land and managed to angry the locals a wee bit. They got so mad that they set up 30+ man fleet to gate-camp us and hunted us. With minimal losses in our 6 man fleet and a nice 670mil Arazu kill we went to deep saves and logged a bit to cool them off...
But to no avail, they still were camping both the WH and gate back home.
But more TRECIs were online now and we sent in the cavalry. A small T3 fleet got us out save and netted some more kills against them.

The next day saw NoHo again, we had rolled into them again! But this time they came prepared.
They controlled our connection, but we decided to take the fight anyway. It was a fight against uneven odds, but we held fast and got some kills this time. NoHo used their good tactics and numbers to get us back and in the end not many of TRECI made it out safe. After 25 minutes the fight was over and I had a Legion less in my hangar. Still we had lots of fun in the fight and I learned some more. I was very lucky to coast my pod out of the bubbles and get safe back into my new home tower.

The next day I was trying to find a exit and scanning when I ran into a chimera in a wolf rayet c5 escalating sites. Unnoticed I slipped into system and began to scout. A group of pilots were doing sites in various Battleships and had the massive capital help them with it. An Alert was send out and we gathered pilots together to engage. While I kept getting new Intel for us in my little covops we organized. Just as we were about to attack the inhabitants suddenly decided to scan and saw our connection, they were fast to close it, the fleet wasn’t getting in and I was stuck with them.
No matter, I decided, one can do, as many can.

I devised a plan, I had done before. Making bookmarks in the sites they were running with my covops, setting up safe-spots and warp-ins.
I also knew they knew I was here, since they had collapsed the wormhole with a waiting Devoter, so I couldn’t get out. So I scanned the remaining anomalies quickly with my combats, which stirred them a bit into action, they decided to roll some other connections, always scanning the new one and rolling it. It kept them occupied I guess. I pulled my probes, headed to a safe and logged off for some coffee awaiting the things that might come.

As I logged back on and listened to some mumble chatter from corp I wondered if they were still running sites.

Surely that couldn’t be, system security was clearly not possible for them? But greed is great then risk sometimes and as I logged back I saw ships all over still. And they were even escalating sites, using a Moros with the chimera. Look at all these wrecks they were producing!

I had my warp-ins setup and decided it was go time. They were warping in a Noctis and I had to grab loot as quick as I could before he could. Surely they would bring an interceptor or something once they knew what was up. So I warped in, adrenaline going; would this be the end for me?
I had my doubts, I was fast, but they could kill my helpless scanning ship with ease if they caught me. And then I truly would be stuck. Only with my pod, I would have no chance to get out.

But the price would be so rich! All this went through my mind before my ship hit the grid and the can de-cloaked me – there was no going back now. I grabbed the first BS Blue loot and warped to one of my safe-spots, cloaking up. Going back to see the reaction of them in site. Nothing I could see yet.

So I went in again, this time to 2 wrecks closer together, risky to grab both, but maybe less so then warping in twice? I also took these. But the remaining typhoon had looked me and was target painting me, was this the end? I hit warp like mad and tried to get out. It was a close call, the missiles behind me scream to where my ship had been mere seconds ago, but I rode the shock wave into warp with my sturdy Helios.
Exhilarated I went on back, franticly grabbing what I could, while they were trying to catch me with their slow BS and lone Incursus.

In the end no more wrecks littered the site, they had salvaged them all and I had grabbed 160 million ISK worth of loot. Grinning I decided this was what I would do for a bit now.

I went to the POS and watched them as they arrived back in their rabbit hole wondering what they were talking about. Maybe they would stop? So my fun would end? I wasn’t sure, they were bold before, maybe they would decide to set a trap in the other side? A cloaky, fast locking me and holding me to interrogate me for my loot? Or sending the unwelcome guest back to HS?

I went to a deep safe spot to drop of my first loot to secure it somewhat, sadly I had no container to anchor, so a normal one had to do. I decided to check the other site again.
There they were, this time escalating it fully with lots of angry sleeper Battleships.
They did the site as if I wasn’t there! Maybe they said to themselves, no matter its only a small loss?
Maybe it was the trap!

I decided to be bold. I made myself some more good spots in the site, some warp-ins, cleaned quickly my older bms from the other site. All setup and ready, take a deep breath Kara.

This time even the sleepers were there to fight me. But no matter. I warped in and grabbed things left and right, warping off, and in, lots of times. They were expecting me this time, drones swarmed, and several fast frigates were there. I had to be fast and precise not to get caught, little time was left, the Noctis was working hard against me. I managed to fool them, grabbing wrecks first far left, then right, then at the top, warping seemingly random into them, giving them little chance to get close. It was risky business, several times they were as close as 18km to me when I was on grid and running. But they didn’t catch me.

I watched them grabbing the last empty wrecks, salvaging them, leaving. My work for this evening was done, as was theirs, no more sites. But there’s always tomorrow.
My grand total was up to 260 millions ISK. What a rush, what fun!

The next day I woke up and checked the system, things were eerily quiet. I made the rounds, checking the sites then scanned the system as I could not see any inhabitants.

I found a new connection and went there to have a look. Behind me a flash and a Legion shows itself, what was that! He must have waited for me and jumped after me. I was already cloaked thou, so I watched him, an Anathema appeared on Dscan and went back to the system we both just had came from. What was up?

Short after that I saw what was up, they had sprung a trap for me, to get rid of me once and for all.
They sent BS back and forth to reduce mass, there was an interceptor on the wh waiting and a bubble up, it would be hard for me to go back. Cursing myself a little bit I watched the proceedings.
They all went back, surely waiting if I would dare again to jump thru. And then the mighty Thanatos gave its farewell appearing on the WH. They must have decided I was to dangerous around their freighter Charons... :D

Another flash, what was that, another activation. Suddenly also a BS appeared on grid again. But the hole was critical already? The BS hovered there, then the pilot noticed his error. He initiated self destruct. If he would jump back in the BS the Thanatos would be stranded.
He ejected and sent the capsule back just mere seconds before the Thanatos also jumped back, collapsing the WH behind him. Farewell friends! I will see you again.

I didn’t manage to warp to the BS in time to grab it, they had timed it well. So I was sent off with a big bang. I then continued to scan my way back, the c5 had another c5 connection, therein I found a c3 and another wormhole, a c2, I jumped into that despite it being critical, c2 have 2 exits and surely this one would lead me out to HS. But alas no such luck it had a 0 and a LS exit. I still scanned that down and checked the LS.

Bob must have liked my escapades he sent me 1j from HS close to my old starting noob home in Gallente space. I went out, sold my loot and decided to wait for a new connection back into TRECIs home on the next day.

As it was, next day saw another salute from Bob and I was sent home back to the flock. Rejoing with a new Legion for new adventures in the next weeks!

Join us for next instalment!