Aeon's EVE

It’s that time in my gaming life again, the time where I try to grasp what the future will hold. With all the games I have played, I have noticed a cycle that tends to repeat itself. Like putting heart and soul into playing Civilization at the time, Wing Commander Privateer, Morrowind… the list goes on. Each of these I played exclusively for a while, then abruptly put them aside to switch to something else. Most of these I go back to after a longer pause to relive part of the fun and immerse myself back into the same state of mind – with more or less success.

I have been feeling the end of a cycle on the horizon for a little while now, but I am treading on new ground with EVE, so I am curious as to how this will turn out. Only one other game still beats EVE in terms of longevity: the Civilization series, which I always come back to. EVE is a new kind of beast, one (like other MMOGs) that offers a world beyond the mere game. It is that world that holds me back, that withstands the cycle for the first time. But even if I know now that I do not want to end this adventure yet, there are many issues that make the game side of EVE pretty dull.

26 Million skill points is not much by EVE standards, but it is enough to get a large glimpse of what the game has to offer. To visualize this a bit better, the following is a breakdown of all the things he can currently do in-game:

- Fly frigates, interceptors, industrials, covert ops, force recons, heavy assaults, cruisers, battlecruisers, battleships.
- Run level 1 through 4 missions
- Run complexes and COSMOS missions
- Use his hacking skills to run hacking complexes
- Use his archaeology skills run archaeology complexes
- Use his probing skills to scan down ships, POSs, complexes and co
- Use cloaking devices, even in warp
- Fly a Hulk well and mine anything highsec has to offer
- Manufacture from researched blueprints
- Use research agents
- Unleash hordes of drones (ok, only 5 heh)
- Smite his enemies with laser fire
- Salvage anything of value in his Salvacane
- Wreak havoc in the market (I wish)
- Hoard pretty stuff (Exotic dancers, anyone?)
- Remote repair armor, shields and cap support
- Manage a corporation
- Some stuff that I probably forgot about

Sadly, I have come to realize that with my way of playing the game I have reached a state where further progression does not make much sense. Before you go up in flames, let me explain.

Within six days, I can fly a Command Ship like the Absolution. At first I was thrilled, but asking around and reading up on the ship specs I realized getting one of those would not make much sense considering the investment. The Absolution has a better tank than the Harbinger, but DPS-wise the Harbinger is still superior. And an Absolution is a massive investment (about 260 Mil for the skill, the ship and its fittings). For what would I use a ship like that? Fly a few level 3 missions with it?

An idea was to go for a black ops, until I found out it would even be quicker to train for a mothership. Besides, a black ops is a great ship but why should I invest all that bloody time training for jump drive skills I don’t need otherwise? Same goes for capital ships – that and the fact that a solo playstyle does not fit these ships. They need support, and even if it would be an asset for the corp we would not have much use for one anyway. Need I even mention the steep price?

So I realized that as a mostly solo player who does not like PvP, I am more or less stuck with what I can do now. Even that is a bit depressing, with 20 to 30 day training times that reek of artificial lifespan. It is not my style to go ranting and raving about things I do not like – I very much prefer working around them and stay happy. I cannot help feeling that training times this long are not really necessary though, and make for a cap that once reached pretty much removes the steady joy of completing skills. Somehow that does not seem like something I would want my customers to experience.

As a keynote I would say it may very well be that I expect something of EVE that it was never intended to be, namely a solo multiplayer game. Nonetheless I spent 1.6 years happily soloing it, which makes me think that CCP has created a solid framework that just needs adjusting for long-term players. Anyway I will keep the spirit alive and try to find new ways to play the game

On a sidenote, I would like to thank all the great players from RMS and of course everyone who joined Syrkos Technologies so far, without them I would probably have stopped playing altogether with the end of this cycle.

This is another good example of how one thing can lead to another. I have been playing around with EFT (Eve Fitting Tool) a lot lately, having first used it to create the new fitting for Pax Nemesis X (which allowed me to finally run level 4 missions). The aim was to find a cheapish fit for a Maller with PvP in mind, one that would not be too expensive to replace. I found out that the Maller can be a very resilient little cruiser, and that my knowledge of PvP is too limited to create any effective setup just like that.

A bit depressed, I started toying around with fittings for the Aeonizer (my Harbinger), and finally ended up doing alternate fittings for Pax Nemesis X. I gaped in shock at the screen when I realized I was still using plain old tech 1 guns now that I have the skills to fit tech 2 ones (and which I spent like eons to get to…!). In that instant I already had a strong intuition that Pax Nemesis X was doomed. The fitting I had used on the ship relied on using the least greedy beam turrets, and was never going to be capable of fitting tech 2 turrets.

I browsed the battleclinic loadouts for a while, and created about six alternate fittings. I disregarded the rigs installed on Pax Nemesis X, as I wanted to have an optimal fit. In the end, I came up with a perma-run setup with eight tech two beam lasers and about the same tank than on Pax Nemesis X. But now I was faced with a new dilemma: replace the rigs on Pax Nemesis X, or buy a new Abaddon? I had the funds to do it, but did not exactly want to “waste” them on buying a second battleship.

After a lot of winding and turning, I asked in my favorite chat channel, and the answer was very clear: “buy a second one, you can always sell the other”. Of course, how come you are sometimes blind to the obvious? There was a reasonable offer for an Abaddon in Rens‘ Brutor Tribe Treasury, so Aeon shuttled there and bought it. As I was running out of letters in the alphabet and did not particularly want to name the ship “Pax Nemesis Z”, I came up with something new: “Belgarath’s Hand”. Anyone familiar with David Eddings‘ fantasy books will recognize this instantly. It is a reference to Belgarath the Sorcerer. As I am currently re-reading The Belgariad it seemed fitting

The new setup has a mix of tech 2 turrets to make the best possible use of the available capacitor and power grid. Of course I would have loved fitting 8 Tachyons, but that requires a way too restrictive fitting. It nevertheless has nearly half as much more DPS than the previous one.

Here’s the detail:

High slots
5x Dual Heavy Beam Laser II
3x Mega Beam Laser II

Medium slots
3x Cap Recharger II
1x X5 Prototype I Engine Enervator

Low slots
1x Damage Control II
1x Large Armor Repairer II
4x Active hardeners depending on mission damage type (EM|TH|KI|EX)

Rigs
3x Capacitor Control Circuit I

With my current skills, I can run all active modules and the guns indefinitely. I could have swapped the webifier for a fourth cap recharger to replace one more dual heavy beam with a mega beam, but figured it is not worth it. Many BSs in missions get up close and personal, so the webifier is essential if I want to get rid of them in a timely manner. Otherwise it is pretty straightforward now that I look at it. Makes me wonder what took me so long in EFT

I tested it in several level 4s already, and so far I am very happy I made the change. The added DPS really show, and the tank seems just as solid without the three Auxiliary Nano Pump I rigs I had on Pax Nemesis X. Besides, the Capacitor Control Circuit I rigs allow for a lot more leeway in fittings, so I don’t think I’ll regret it.

The only thing that still makes me frown is that I saw next to no loadouts with beam lasers on battleclinic. They all used pulse lasers, so just to check I created an alternate fitting for the ship with the best large pulse lasers and understood part of the attraction. For one, they are made for close-up encounters, which you end up in unvariably if you fly around at 137 m/s. The second reason is that they use a lot less cap and power. In my test, I was able to fit all eight of the best tech 2 pulses – impossible to do with eight tachyons.

My feelings to that fact were mixed. On second thought, I think I was actually quite angry. “What bloody ship are those turrets supposed to fit on then??” The Abaddon is supposed to be that one big laser doom machine, and it can’t even fit all eight tech 2 turrets? Well actually it can, but don’t expect to be able to fit anything resembling an active tank at the same time. You need Reactor Control Units to even put them all on there, with all skills at level 5 and power-related implants. With the current fit I was able to marry tank and gank, but if you want total gank you will have to trade for vulnerability. Which makes sense, really – except it does not if you compare that to a tech 2 projectile setup…

Anyway, the new setup works like a charm and I don’t need more than that for now

On the traditional sidenote, this weekend SYTEK hosted its first real joint venture. I got a few interesting missions from my agent (like “The Score“), so we gathered in Isendeldik and even took our junior member along in his faction-fitted Myrmidon. I did the tanking, they did the ganking Loreena was there too to provide armor repair services. Compared to soloing missions, the added damage we were dealing made the missions go by pretty fast. It was a very enjoyable experience, and I am eager to see more pilots join us – the more the merrier!

The screenshot shows the 15 total drones we were able to field working on a 1.2 Million bounty Gist Seraphim battleship.

[EDIT 2008-04-14 23:09] Added the missing screenshot, and addendum: The Gist seraphim was already dead. The screenshot shows a Gist Throne.

I won’t keep the suspense hanging for long: Pax Nemesis III (Abaddon) is gone. Last night as Aeon accepted a level 4 mission to intercept some saboteurs, I made the mistake of not checking the damage I had to fit armor hardeners for. But that was not the sole problem – as always, it was really a sum of things that lead to this unfortunate turn of events. But before I explain in detail, let me make a brief summary of what has happened in the last weeks. I was very busy in real life, and did not have the time to write – you can always skip this part and come back to it later if you like.

Quick heads-up
After my level 4 preparation post, I made a trip to nullsec (I have a log entry in the works for that). My good friend Serotta Ortot let me fly his Armageddon there for ratting, and he was using active armor hardeners on it. I was baffled by how effective the setup was, and when I went back to empire I refitted Pax Nemesis III to use an active armor tanking setup. On top of that, Loreena was already within reach of an Exequror, the small brother of the Oneiros. I bought her one, and so it happened that I tried running a level 4 mission again. Aeon was using 4 active mission-specific hardeners, a Damage Control II and a large armor repairer in a permarun setup with eight large beam laser turrets (not the tachyons anymore, they use way too much capacitor). While the DPS was obviously not the same with less powerful turrets, the tank itself seemed impenetrable. At one point, the ship was tanking six battleships and they could not even dent the armor.

Since then, I have run quite a few level 4 missions without any forseeable trouble at all. I ended up tackling them without Loreena, as the tank was good enough to handle anything the missions threw at me.

Pax Nemesis III’s last battle
Probably over-confident in the new tanking setup, I warped Aeon into “Intercept the Saboteurs“. Everything went as planned, and I did not take Loreena along as I had already done the mission alone before. As I mentioned, I use two active hardeners for each of the main mission damage types: Kinetic and Thermal in this case. I must have misread that, because I put in the kinetic hardeners, but left the explosive hardeners on. Once in the mission, the tank was holding nonetheless by pure brute force. Had the Serpentis Megathron not gotten within range, Aeon would have made it. That ship’s blasters started tearing the armor apart slowly, but I was not especially concerned as I was still busy taking out the cruisers to bring down the overall DPS. My drones were dispatching the frigates on their own, so the situation was completely under control.

After a short while, I started to realize that was not entirely the case. Only two cruisers were left, and their DPS was not likely to change much. I switched fire to one of the nearest battleships, a Core Admiral or some such, and even set the drones on him. He died pretty fast, but to my dismay it did not make any difference. I must have been extra sluggish, because only then did I realize it was the Megathron that was the big damage dealer here. HE was the one that was profiting from the thermal weakness in my armor tank. I think by the time I switched targets to take him out, Pax Nemesis III’s armor hitpoints were already down to thirty-five percent. Logically, I aligned the ship for warp, made the drones dock and warped. Warped….? No. “What the HELL?”

Coming out of the comfort of months of level 3 missioning, I still had that last resort escape possibility of warping out in mind. Level four mission bring new dangers with them, including warp scrambling ships. Probably needless to say, but when the ship would not warp, I knew I was done for. I logged Loreena in on the second PC, but she was parked in Rens BTT of all places, four jumps out. There was not way she could be there on time, and my desperate attempts to take out the warp scrambling ships failed at recognizing which ones were scrambling me at all. Panic transformed into dismay, strengthened by my dismissal of thermodynamics as useless a while back. I do not know if overheating could have given me the edge I needed, but it was another drop in the bowl of dismay.

In the end I think the ship put up more than an honorable performance, going down all guns blazing to the last second. The armor repairer managed to put in several cycles, delaying the structural hits long enough for the drones to cut down a few more frigates – but still not the right ones. After that I sat there in my pod, eyeing the surrounding ships with a vengeful look. Had my eyes been fitted with laser turrets, I think I could have destroyed a small planetoid. Except I was more mad at my own sorry self for being so utterly careless, bordering on the plain stupid.

Pax Nemesis “X”
So I sat there in my pod, pondering what to do next. The corp wallet was at sixty million, not enough to buy a new battleship. I noticed the flashy mail icon, and checked the insurance message. The ship was not insured of course, and I was expecting a condescending, mocking note telling me I should have had the ship insured, gna gna gna. To my surprise, the default insurance payout was 79 million. Now that was more like it! 130 million should get me a new battleship, if not an Abaddon. The fittings were another matter… I decided I had to start liquidating some of the assets I had stashed so far.

Loreena cancelled most of the running buy orders to free up another twenty million, and shipped all the salvage and sellable modules to Rens. In the meantime, Aeon was already on his way to the Amarr trade hub, Oris EFA, as buying the ship and turrets was going to be cheaper there. The salvage sales had the effect of finding a fabled hidden treasure – when I had finished selling everything, the corporation wallet was at a new record of 450 million… nearly half a billion! Not only was I going to be able to replace the lost ship, even fittings and rigs were possible

I spent a good hour with EFT (Eve Fitting Tool) to come up with an improved setup for the ship, laid out for better survivability (I included the complete fitting in the extended part of this log entry if you want to see the details). Once I knew what I wanted, Aeon bought a new Abaddon and promptly christened it “Pax Nemesis X”. Already having gone through three versions of the name, I chose something a little more final. If I ever lose this ship, I will have to change the name. Fitting it was pretty quick, as everything I needed was available on-station, and quite a bit cheaper than Rens too: 202 million for the ship, modules and rigs as compared to about 220 had I bought all that in Rens.

Righteous revenge
Now was the time to finish what I had started, and at the same time test the slightly modified ship setup. Aeon made the twenty jump trip back to the mission system, Isendeldik, and this time Loreena was there too just in case. At warp-in, the cloud of enemy ships was all around at about 4 kilometres. This meant that the Megathron was going to be able to lay down its max DPS instantly, but I had the right hardeners fitted this time. The DPS was still pretty high, but the new tank held on its own. With three Auxiliary Nano Pump I rigs I expected no less. I was able to finish the mission easily, and even though I regretted losing the ship in the first place it could have been worse. As the saying goes, everything that does not kill you makes you stronger…

Anyhow, it was an interesting evening to say the least. Loreena will be Aeon’s wingman from now on when I run level 4 missions, regardless of how well I am prepared. I am NOT going to lose another ship to a mission – not if I can help it, anyway

Pax Nemesis X fitting

High Slots
8 x Dual Modulated Heavy Energy Beam I

Med Slots
4 x Cap Recharger II

Low Slots
1 x Damage Control II
1 x Capacitor Power Relay II
2 x Armor XX Hardener II, for primary mission damage (XX = Kinetic/EM/Thermal/Explosive)
2 x Armor XX Hardener II, for secondary mission damage
1 x Large ‘Accomodation’ Vestment Reconstructer I

Rigs
3 x Auxiliary Nano Pump I

A while back, I tried running a L4 mission with Pax Nemesis III (Abaddon). My friendly neighborhood’s agent gave me Mordus Headhunters, and I was actually quite happy to get that because the level 3 version has very nice loot. Of course I had no idea that it is one of the hardest level 4 missions around… as you can imagine, it was way too much to handle. I refitted for a better tank after a go at the first room, and barely managed to clear it. When I got to room two, I knew instantly there was no way I could get rid of that fleet on my own.

I ended up cancelling the mission, and went back to the drawing board. Using EVEMon, I created a skill plan that should at least make it possible to survive level 4 missions, and from there go on to finishing them more efficiently. It is split into two parts, the first focussing on my drone skills. As I learned recently, drones are a vital element to level 4 missioning, as they can make a big difference in taking down cruisers and battleships.

My particular situation in fighting Angel Cartel ships with an Amarr setup is really the worst combination you can find, as Angel Cartel ships are highly resistant to EM and thermal damage. Lasers can only do those two damage types, so the Berserker (explosive damage) and Wasp (kinetic damage) drones are what you need to take down cruisers and battleships. The first part of my skillplan aims to give me control over Berserker II drones:

1. Drone Interfacing III and IV
4. Combat Drone Operation II, III and IV
6. Heavy Drone Operation II, III and IV
9. Minmatar Drone Specialization I, II, III and IV
13. Heavy Drone Operation V

Total time: 36 days, 12 hours, 50 minutes, 52 seconds

The second part of the skillplan is for improving my tanking capabilities as well as DPS (Damage Per Second). Here again the fact that I use laser turrets plays a big role in what skills I need. The capacitor is the biggest problem of all, so to be able to fit anything other than capacitor support modules in lows and mids I had to train Weapon Upgrades to V as well as Advanced Weapon Upgrades to IV, and am finishing off with Controlled Bursts V now. Base capacitor skills are of course all maxed out already. Here’s what I want to do:

1. Controlled Bursts V
2. EM Armor Compensation IV
3. Explosive Armor Compensation IV
4. Kinetic Armor Compensation IV
5. Thermic Armor Compensation IV
6. Large Energy Turret IV
7. Rapid Firing V
8. Thermic Armor Compensation V
9. Kinetic Armor Compensation V
10. Explosive Armor Compensation V
11. EM Armor Compensation V

Total time: 59 days, 9 hours, 57 minutes, 25 seconds

This gives me another 10% passive resists bonus for all damage types. The other skills, namely Controlled Bursts, Large Energy Turret and Rapid Firing are all for an increased DPS at hopefully no additional capacitor strain. To be precise, Controlled Bursts decreases the capacitor needs of all turrets by an additional 5%, Rapid Firing decreases the time between shots and Large Energy Turret increases the damage output by another 5%. With my current gunnery skills, that should be enough to open the doors to level 4 missions along with the drones as support.

The Loreena joker card

Beyond that, I watched a nice little fight in Eram lately where a Rupture tanked two missile spamming drakes… with the help of a logistics ship that hovered about 80 kilometres out. If all else fails, I will train Loreena up for a logistics ship like the Oneiros and take her along on level 4 missions. She has to train up the Gallente Spaceship Command tree up to cruisers V, but even so it will only take her 35 days to get there. That leaves enough time for another serious mining venture to pay for the ship

Detailed fitting

All this only makes sense if you look at my current missioning setup of course, so here is Pax Nemesis’ revealed:

High slots
6 x Tachyon Modulated Energy Beam I.
  Charges:
       - Amarr Navy Multifrequency L
       - Amarr Navy Xray L
2 x medium

Medium slots
[Currently testing new layout]

Low slots
[Currently testing new layout]

Rigs
2 x Capacitor Control Circuit I
1 x Auxiliary Nano Pump I

I invested quite a bit in the Amarr Navy frequency crystals, and so far they have proven to be worth the money. Unfortunately they take damage and will eventually have to be replaced, but I had my first few cruiser insta-pops with them and once you have tasted that it gets difficult to switch back

…anyway, the level 4 adventure goes on!

After all the mission running, complex running, ratting, trading and moving from A to Z, I had to relax a bit. So I hopped into my speed monster “Naeroth” (Malediction) and made the sixteen-jump trip out to my mining system. I have not mined in a long time, and had not yet seen “Anamoth Lael” (Hulk) in its new Trinity-powered shape. I must say exhumers in general look a hell of a lot better now – they are more angular for one, giving them an air of pure competence and efficiency. I have not witnessed the “Pink paintjob” everyone talks about so far, on mine the colored patches are all orange. My guess is, this is like the color of a solar system’s star having an effect on the hue of the ship itself. I mine in a brown-orange-ish system, so it is possible a blue star would make those patches pink…

Anyway, I like the new Hulk and have rediscovered mining. It is tremendously relaxing, and highly profitable too. It is not like level 3 missions do not pay the bills, but mining is definitely a better time investment. From what I heard, this is different with level 4 missions, but after a failed attempt at them a while back I am waiting to complete my level 4 preparation skillplan (90 days to go) to try that again. The all-time highs in my wallet have always been after mining “lapses”, so I am going to mine for as long as I enjoy it and see what comes of it

The belt I am mining in is nice and quiet, and has Veldspar, Scordite, Plagioclase and Omber. I made a point of training Omber Processing to be able to use the specialty crystals, and going for level 4 to use the tech II ones. I found that the ore value comparison table at battleclinic is probably wrong about listing Plagioclase at 23 ISK per unit vs 12 ISK for Omber (for the highest value subtypes). Seeing how valuable Isogen (a product of refining Omber) is at the moment, Omber is better value – they must be basing their values on obsolete market data. Even so, it is much better to be able to warp to a belt bookmark with all crystal types in the hold and just mine everything in sight methodically. Aeon still needs to train for Veldspar though, then he will leave nothing behind but the cold void of space. Chribba would probably cringe at hearing that as a miner, I am only training Veldspar processing now

Loreena has flown in from Domain to help, with a locally bought Mammoth she hauls all the ore back to base. Aeon just flies into a belt and mines to his heart’s content. I use a jetcan to transfer the ore, but as Loreena picks it up directly there is no problem with potential can stealers. The stash of ore is increasing nicely, and I think this time I will wait a while before I refine it all. A courier contract for the refined materials will be a lot more comfortable than the unending hauling trips – if the price is right of course.

Aeon’s wallet being at a new low of about six million ISK, I will have to let him mine for quite a while. I am not sure yet as to what I will invest that money in, but I am sure it will not be cheap. Apart maybe from civilian shield boosters nothing is really cheap in EVE! Although… A friend in-game actually managed to sell two civilian shield boosters for 12 million each, so even those things can be quite expensive…

Somehow with all the level 4 and 5 skills Aeon has been training for the last months, I completely lost track of what he could do. He trained up all base support and gunnery skills, and sometime lately I fired up EVEMon, and realized Aeon was only four days away from Heavy Assault Ships. He only needed to train Assault Ships to level IV and Spaceship Command to level V, so I started on that path directly. Currently using Chawagga (my Amarr cruiser, Maller) to run complexes and do some ratting, the prospect of using a Zealot for that task was just too appealing. It seemed to me that I had gotten to Heavy Assault Ships all of a sudden, but after a little bit of research, I saw it was just an illusion. Getting a new character to Heavy Assault ships takes a lot of time, a I had just forgotten about how far Aeon has come. You can see how hard it is to get to Heavy Assault Ships by looking at the sole requirements to fly one:

(Race) Frigate IV
(Race) Cruiser V
Engineering V
Mechanic V
Assault Ships IV
Weapon Upgrades V
Spaceship Command V
Heavy Assault Ships I

For one of my throwaway newbie characters, that comes out at about 113 days without training anything else… Meaning you will be able to fly one, but not outfit it correctly. You will still be missing skills for gun turrets, defense systems, power systems and co. It’s a massive undertaking to get there, but then you usually have way too much other stuff to do in the game to really notice

The question of “was it worth it?” is one you may ask, but it is difficult to give that a straight answer. I did not train specifically for Heavy Assault Ships, but I trained the prerequisites because they are needed for a lot of other ships and make me better at the ships I already use. In that sense, the skills invested will never be lost – especially Engineering, Mechanic, Weapon Upgrades and Spaceship Command. The question should rather be “are heavy assault ships good?”. Well on that matter, I have a few clues already. Being specialized in Amarr ships, I decided to get a Zealot: it has bonuses to armor resistances as well as for medium laser turrets. The alternative, the Sacrilege, is a pure missile gunboat, and Aeon only has 65K skillpoints in missiles… It has a sweet tank, however.

The skill Heavy Assault Ships itself cost 35 Mil ISK, and the Zealot was at 92 million ISK in Rens. With only 32 million in the Syrkos Corporation’s wallet and 10 in Aeon’s pockets I moved my operations back to my mining system to grind some rocks. When it was finally time, I had enough funds to afford both the ship and the skill itself. To avoid paying the horrendously overpriced Rens prices on Amarr ships, I sent Aeon to the Amarr system in the Domain region. There I paid “only” 80 mil for the ship, still effectively emptying my corp’s wallet again

I had already flown an Omen, the Zealot’s tech 1 cousin, but what strikes you first is that this ship looks a lot more polished. That, and one look at the fitting screen tells you it is indeed a powerhouse. Eager to outfit it, I let Aeon take the 26-jumps route back to my main offices. Once there, I put on a passive armor hardener, some capacitor support modules, four tech 2 medium lasers, undocked, and scanned my home system for complexes. Luckily, there were two, one Angel Cartel base and one drone hive. Great to compare this setup with that of Chawagga, which I usually use for running complexes. Needless to say, it’s like swatting flies with a sledgehammer – it was like pop-pop-pop-wammo

Getting more confident with the use of the ship, I started using it for a few of the easier level 3 missions – and was surprised by the ease with which it cut through everything, from cruisers to tech 2 frigates. That medium lasers bonus really makes a difference. I use a passive armor tank setup, and have fitted a first Capacitor Control Circuit to free one additional low slot previously taken by a Capacitor Power Relay II. Only missions where you get a lot aggression from enemy ships are any trouble, because the tank cannot take it. I mean, I only have one Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II fitted, so it is not a real tank either. I prefer having additional support modules in for more DPS and better frigate handling than stretching things out with a better tank, as least as long as I can afford it. If the mission is too intensive for Dark Horizons, I simply revert to Pax Nemesis III.

I even get the impression that Dark Horizons performs better than the Aeonizer (Amarr Battlecruiser, Harbinger), but I may be wrong. I have not used that ship in quite a while now, and I think I should try it again sometime just to make sure. With only four turret slots, running missions with Dark Horizons is a bit slower than with Pax Nemesis III, but it is more fun

I’ll post a detailed fitting later on.

I have been asking myself for a while what to do with my second character, Loreena Syrkos, and have found her skillset to be fit for manufacturing – at least fitter than Aeon’s. Unfortunately, she has next to no standing with anyone as I have not played with her much. The only standing she has is the derived standing through my corporation. The idea is to get her standings up a bit more through Aeon’s missioning, but then I have to make sure he runs missions for the corporation she uses for her manufacturing. I then started a two-day search for an NPC corporation and station that would fit my needs:

- Have some decent corp standings
- Have at least one level 3 agent Aeon can run missions with
- Always have free manufacturing slots
- Not be too far away from Rens for hauling the stuff to sell
- Not be too high sec, 0.6 or preferably 0.5
- Have all services in-system if not in-station
- Be quiet

In the end, I decided to work for the Republic Parliament corporation which has two systems fitting the criteria and some agents within direct reach. In a three-day operation, I also used to occasion to collect all my leftover assets and move them to the new system. Moving the minerals I had stashed away was the biggest part of the chore, with Aeon and Loreena both hauling in unison. In the end, I was more than satisfied with having everything in one system. Only exception: my mining operation – that is still way out, and will stay there unless a deadly virus suddenly eradicates macrominers.

Back to Loreena’s role: Aeon made a trip to Amarr space recently to buy some Amarr-specific blueprints, and now she has a healthy little selection of ships and modules to manufacture. With Aeon helping to provide the necessary salvage components, I was even able to build my first self-provided rig – a Salvage Tackle I. I have gotten used to salvaging my missions, and recently refitted Crimson Skies as a “Salvacane”: 2000 m2 cargo space and 4 x Salvager I + 4 x Small Tractor Beam I. I know it hurts to defile such a fine ship that way, but it is just perfect for the job. Ultimately I would like to fit three Salvage Tackle rigs to make it a specialized Salvager.

The only problem with manufacturing is that you will not be able to make any real profits against the competition with pristine blueprints, because then you will use up more materials than the pros who have done material research on them. When you start looking for ME research slots in highsec though, be prepared for an average of 25 days wait for the next free slots. Fortunately, making friends helps. Someone from my regular chat channel is in a corporation of the Zzz alliance, a group of science and manufacturing enthusiasts. If you follow EVE news a bit, you may have heard of them lately as a mercenary corp wardecced them. Anyway, I gave him a set of blueprints, and for a small fee he is doing the ME research on them for me. A very handy exchange in my opinion, as both parties reap the benefits.

Now I am waiting for the research to be finished, and in the meantime Loreena is working on a skillplan dedicated to manufacturing, with Production Efficiency V first on the list (5% material waste reduction per level). Then I will try to crash a few market parties! Using my set of game utilities, I had a look at what my current stock is worth, and was quite surprised to see that I have about 230 Mil worth of salvage and materials in my hangar. That should help to build a few things alright

On a sidenote, I have not done any advanced calculations to find out how many manufacturing runs I will need to make good on my investment (blueprint prices and research costs). In fact, I do not even care. I have a feeling I would not have started this venture otherwise, and now that the money is gone, I do not miss it. I look forward to the manufacturing part, even if it ends up being only for myself and my friends. As always, fun takes precedence

And here’s for some eyecandy:

…was the Rogue Slave Trader 2/2 mission. Not that it would have been any trouble under normal circumstances – I jumped in and started shooting things as usual. Only the game became unresponsive, and after a few minutes told me the connection had been lost. Another perfect strike by my ISP, which is specialized in “slow” disconnects: the line stays connected, but next to no data gets through – enough for EVE to stay online a while though, enough to keep off the disconnect safeguards that warp your ship automatically to a safespot…

When I logged back in a while later, I could not believe my eyes – of Pax Nemesis II only a wreck was left, my pod hidden somewhere in the rubble. Apparently the command to activate the armor hardener and repairer hat not gone through, giving those blasted Arch Corpii the perfect occasion to tear through everything – my ISP providing the necessary timeframe. Aeon was safe of course, the Corpii ships circling around the wreck like scavengers. When I came back to my senses, I had Aeon warp back to base. Fortunately, a few days ago Aeon had gone back to Balginia, to fit the Aeonizer properly again and bring it back to my new missioning base. He hopped into it, and warped back into the mission room.

First things first, I salvaged the wreck but there was not much to be saved. A few drones and two modules was all. From then on, it was pure Corpii carnage, with the ship’s armor tank holding out at a mere 25-30% up until four minutes before downtime. Satisfied, I handed in the mission and sat back to think. After a quick calculation, I realized I had just lost about 270 Million worth of ship, modules and rigs. I stared at the number, and seriously considered taking my Lochaber Axe from the wall and pay a visit to my ISP’s local office.

Hell, I petitioned the thing, but that ship won’t be the same if they refund it. In the end, there is a lesson in every defeat – next time the hardener and armor repairer will be running when I jump into a mission room.

Exactly the type of thing one should probably not do unprepared and on an impulse: hop into a jumpclone, outift a small cruiser with six Warp Core Stabilizer I modules and head out 38 jumps into lowsec. Why? Because in all likelihood you will not make it. The key word being “unprepared”. Regarding lowsec, I am as much a noob as you can be. The most time I spent there was fifteen minutes, and that was in systems controlled by friendlies…

So what brought this on? Well, I was mining happily when I started thinking about how pretty it must be in lowsec, seeing how much prettier lower security systems like 0.5 to 0.7 can be, with nebulae and stars that literally blow you away. This precipitated my jump cloning back to Balginia, where I had a Maller doing nothing, as well as some Warp Core Stabilizer modules I looted. In utter noobishness, I just fitted the six Warp Core Stabilizers and nothing else. I figured that if I had no guns nor cargo, pirates would leave me be – and if anyone tried to warp scamble me, I would be fine. On second thought, I loaded as much metal scraps into my ship’s hold as it could take. If I was to go down, at least they would not get anything remotely valuable. Theoretically, hmmmkay. In practice, here is what happened:

I plotted a course deep into the outer reaches of the 7-KXBJ region, to the ZS-PNI system to be exact, and started jumping. I trained a bit clicking in the overview to minimize the time I needed to initiate the jumps and warp to the next stargate, then finally started my journey into 0.0. The first two systems were no trouble at all, there was no one there. In the third, I materialized right under a bubble – and warped away in a flash as I noticed a bunch of ships sitting there. As the system had an interesting green-hued nebula, when I reached the outbound stargate I veered around and warped to a planet to take some screenshots.

When I had done the screenshots, I realized I had some company. A small ship that had been at the bubble had warped in not far off, and was heading straight for me. Confident in my WCSs, I warped back out to the stargate and jumped to the next system. My newfound friend was on my heels, and I quickly jumped to the next stargate in my course – only to find him already at the gate. Sure – Interdictors warp a lot faster than cruisers… Again I jumped, only to find myself caught in a nice, big bubble. You can fit as many WCSs as you like, bubbles are stronger.

So it happened that I just sat there, bubbled and webbed, and unit003 took his time blasting me to oblivion. It was not fun, not honorable, just plain stupid and I cursed myself. I had nothing to retaliate, and as he was making fun of my noobishness I realized he was in just for the kill. The chase had been interesting, but now even though I was defenceless he still needed his kill. That’s lawless space for you – honor is a luxury; it is not required.

Victim: AeonOfTime
Alliance: NONE
Corp: Syrkos Technologies
Destroyed: Capsule
System: ZS-PNI
Security: 0.0

Involved parties:

Name: unit003 (laid the final blow)
Security: 4.9
Alliance: INVICTUS.
Corp: eXceed Inc.
Ship: Flycatcher
Weapon: Thorn Rage Rocket

Putting the operation into perspective, chances are I was subsconsciously eager to finally lose my podding virginity Now that is done, I will have to equip myself for some real blockade running and give them bastards a real run for their kill. From what intel I was able to gather afterwards, blockade running is an art. Bubbles get you everytime, and there are a lot of those around. The best workaround for them is having a microwarpdrive installed, and get out as fast as you can – before anyone can lock and web you. If you get webbed, fighting is your only chance! Making the foray into lowsec right after downtime helps too, as it takes time to put up the bubbles.

I’ll do better next time. And if not then, the one after that. I WILL do my sightseeing tour!

After finding that nice new macrofree^TM 0.7 security system to mine in, I decided it was high time to upgrade Aeon’s mining capabilities. I made him mine like a madman for two days, and called Loreena in with Sayathos – which has recently been “pimped” to carry 22.000 m3 – to refine and haul the whole stash. With all that Plagioclase and Omber, the corporation’s wallet ended up with a healthy 125 Mil. It took five hauling runs with 36 jumps each to bring all back to Rens. During the process, I realized how expectations can rise over time: exactly 259 days ago, Aeon was hauling 18 Rifters using a Hoarder, for a maximum of 2 Million ISK profit

The aim was to reach 150 million to buy a Hulk, but fortunately that was not necessary – when I rechecked the market, there was one for sale in Pator for a stunning 125 million. Needless to say, I bought it before anyone else would notice (incidentally, they currently sell for about 110 million). As always Aeon had to wait a full day before he could fly the ship, as Exhumers III had to finish training – but then he flew to Pator, christened the ship and took it on its maiden voyage. I called it Anamoth Lael, and it went directly to Aeon’s mining spot to relieve Natayos of its duties.

I have to say, I had always been a little sceptic as to why the Hulk should be that much better than a Covetor. It has the same amount of turret hardpoints, so only the additional Exhumers bonus does something for the mining amount… But it is much better in all other aspects. It has great shield resists, a real capacitor that does not deplete entirely when activating the three laser turrets, and three more medium slots for defensive modules like a shield booster and hardener. The real “clou” is the cargo capacity though: 8.000 m3… No wonder macrominers do not jetcan anymore – with two Expanded Cargohold IIs and two Cargohold Optimization II rigs, a Hulk can easily be upgraded to about 16.000 m3!

Anyway, after the operation the Syrkos Technologies Corporation was broke again, a mere 1.5 million in its wallet. It is going to take some serious mining again to get that back up, as well as some missioning. A shame Aeon cannot run level 4 missions yet – the pay, loot and salvage are much better than level 3 missions.