Something that amazes (and confounds me, quite honestly) is how EVE can regularly make you feel like a rank beginner. It happens to me all the time. I've been playing this game for over a year and a half, but I regularly run into things in the game that I simply have no idea how to do.
It happened most recently yesterday when a corp leader asked me to stop reacting one item and start reacting another in one of our POSs. I'd been tending the POSs for a while now, so this seemed like it should be pretty easy, but it actually turned out to be quite a bit more complicated than I expected. Now maybe this was more difficult than it needed to be, and perhaps CCP could have designed this feature to be easier, but on the other hand, the fact that you do have to put a bit of thought into things and that the game won't hold your hand is one of the things that make it fun.
Other areas where this has come into play for me include scanning, planetary interaction, and POS management. I'm sure there are many more that will pop up as I continue playing the game. And quite honestly, I look forward to it!
Sunday, January 9, 2011
What I've learned about high sec mining...
Not too long ago, I got ganked in high sec while mining. In fact, I've got a draft post that I just haven't finished describing the whole sordid affair. Anyway, I've learned a few things about high sec mining from the experience:
- If you can, use an Orca so you can avoid jet canning. The way that griefers can kill you without getting CONCORDed almost always involve cans, so generally speaking, no cans, no grief.
- If you do jet can, pay attention to your overview. The bad guy can't can flip if he isn't close to one of your cans.
- If you see someone approach your can and get within 2500m of it, it's best to just consider that can gone. I would not try to salvage anything from it and would just leave. Remember, he wants your ship, not your ore.
- If you are going to ignore the 3rd thing I've learned, then always grab stuff out of your can all at once, and only after making sure the can is not yellow. He will be sitting there with the can contents open, and the second he sees something disappear, he can drop something in, flipping the can and making you the thief the next item you move.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Announcing the "What I've learned about..." series
Over the next few weeks or months, I plan on writing a series of posts covering things I've learned about Eve. Most of these will posts will be nothing new for many readers, and some things that I think I've learned may not even be true, but what the heck, I'm going to post them anyway. Maybe they will help a new player...
Sunday, January 2, 2011
Toon update
I guess today I'll take a minute to just explain what's up with my toons.
Radd Trigon
My main toon is Radd Trigon. He's an Amarr capsuleer, and currently is sitting on 21m skill points. I have also about 800k+ of refunded learning skill points to spend, but haven't really decided where I want to put them at this point.
Radd is very much an indy focused pilot, but has a fair amount of skill points on being able to fly a few combat ships. My top 3 skill categories are:
Radd is currently focused on bumping up his combat skills, and is in the process of training up skills to improve his DPS at this point. After that, it's unknown, but I might get started on some capital ship skills. Who knows?
Tel Radic
Tel is new enough that he is still in his speed learning mode, with 1.5m skill points. He is a Caldari because I want to get him into a Drake eventually, but spends most of his time in a Merlin (a Caldari frigate) or an Iteron Mark V (Gallente industrial).
Tel is currently primarily focused on POS tending. He is fully trained up to Gallente Industrial V (his only Level 5 skill), and is able to fly a rigged Itty V which makes POS tending a lot better than it was for Radd in his unrigged Bestower. Unfortunately, by racing straight to Itty V, he has almost no other skills to speak of!
Tel is in the process of becoming a better Itty V pilot, and then will move on to become a Gallente freighter pilot. After that, I see Tel focusing on supporting other pilots, both in indy operations and in combat operations. I see him getting into an Orca and possibly a Rorqual, and then possibly moving on to train for flying logistics or command ships. I also expect Tel to train up leadership skills along the way. Obviously, this training is WAY in the future, so I fully expect this plan to change.
Anyway, that's a bit about where my toons are now, as well as where they might be going. Hopefully I haven't given you so much information that you will be able to waste me the second you see me, but if you do, I'd appreciate it if you'd at least let me know you read my blog after you've podded me...
Radd Trigon
My main toon is Radd Trigon. He's an Amarr capsuleer, and currently is sitting on 21m skill points. I have also about 800k+ of refunded learning skill points to spend, but haven't really decided where I want to put them at this point.
Radd is very much an indy focused pilot, but has a fair amount of skill points on being able to fly a few combat ships. My top 3 skill categories are:
- Industry: 8.3m skill points including the following Level 5 skills: Industry, Mass Production, Mining, Mining Upgrades, Production Efficiency, Refinery Efficiency, Refining, Ice Harvesting, and Advanced Mass Production (that last one is about 10% of my total skill points!). In addition, I have all ore processing skills trained up to level 4. Basically, if it has to do with mining or construction, Radd's got it covered pretty well.
- Spaceship Command: I have trained 3.3m skill points in this category, including Level 5 in the following: Amarr Frigate, Amarr Industrial, Mining Barge, and Spaceship Command. I am exclusively an Amarr pilot, and can't fly any other ships. I can currently fly Frigates, Destroyers, Cruisers, Battle Cruisers, Battleships, Covert Ops Frigates, Interceptors, and Exhumers. I am currently awaiting delivery of my first stealth bomber, and can't wait to be able to cruise around nearly invisible. I spend most of my time in a BS, BC, or Hulk.
- Electronics: I have trained 2.2m skill points in Electronics, with four skills trained to Level 5: Electronics, Electronics Upgrades, Propulsion Jamming, and Targeting. I have spent a fair amount of points to be a decent fleet tackler, but as I don't spend much time in fleets, my abilities here are mostly book learning without much practical application.
Radd is currently focused on bumping up his combat skills, and is in the process of training up skills to improve his DPS at this point. After that, it's unknown, but I might get started on some capital ship skills. Who knows?
Tel Radic
Tel is new enough that he is still in his speed learning mode, with 1.5m skill points. He is a Caldari because I want to get him into a Drake eventually, but spends most of his time in a Merlin (a Caldari frigate) or an Iteron Mark V (Gallente industrial).
Tel is currently primarily focused on POS tending. He is fully trained up to Gallente Industrial V (his only Level 5 skill), and is able to fly a rigged Itty V which makes POS tending a lot better than it was for Radd in his unrigged Bestower. Unfortunately, by racing straight to Itty V, he has almost no other skills to speak of!
Tel is in the process of becoming a better Itty V pilot, and then will move on to become a Gallente freighter pilot. After that, I see Tel focusing on supporting other pilots, both in indy operations and in combat operations. I see him getting into an Orca and possibly a Rorqual, and then possibly moving on to train for flying logistics or command ships. I also expect Tel to train up leadership skills along the way. Obviously, this training is WAY in the future, so I fully expect this plan to change.
Anyway, that's a bit about where my toons are now, as well as where they might be going. Hopefully I haven't given you so much information that you will be able to waste me the second you see me, but if you do, I'd appreciate it if you'd at least let me know you read my blog after you've podded me...
Thursday, December 30, 2010
POS bash-o-rama
It's not every day that you find fruit as ripe for the picking as my alliance mates found on Christmas day. While flying around in low-sec, one of my alliance mates found that a corporation had set up two POSs on valuable moons. Of course, they had anchored dozens of modules around the POSs in an arrangement that definitely made it look like they knew what they were doing. Numerous guns and other defensive modules deployed to keep out bad guys.
Unfortunately, there was one problem. Apparently, whoever was setting these up ran out of time when they got to onlining the modules. I'm guessing that the missus was calling from the front hall that it was time to go to a Christmas get-together or something. Whatever it was, there they sat: 2 faction large towers worth billions, surrounded by a bristling array of various turrets that could defend neither the towers nor themselves because they were offline.
If this strikes you a bit like the Maginot Line prior to WWII, you'd be right on target, and the call went out on Christmas day that we needed to put together our own little opportunistic Blitzkrieg attack. While turnout was understandably sparse on Christmas, we got the word out to start bringing battleships and other support vessels out to low-sec in preparation for the assault.
That assault came on Boxing Day, as we formed our fleet and headed out. We'd kept eyes on the targets pretty much around the clock, and since nothing had changed by the time our fleet formed up, out we went for a little POS bashing. There were a few moments when we thought we might be getting set up for an ambush, but in general things went very smoothly. No owners showed up that day, and no white knights flew in to the rescue which meant we were able to put the towers into reinforced mode in about 2 hours each. After reinforcing each tower, we incapacitated the guns just to make it harder for the owners to make the tower defensible when we came back.
Two days later it was time for the towers to come out of reinforced mode, and we formed up our fleet once again to go take them down once and for all. As you can imagine, we had a lot more concern about encountering resistance this time around as the corp had almost two days to get word of the attack and pull together a defence. In addition, we were concerned that a larger fleet might drop by to kick us out and take over the operation.
With scouts watching all the necessary gates, our fleet moved out and approached the first tower. After aligning to a safe location to help ensure a speedy getaway in case of emergency, the command went out to open up on the tower. Those first few moments were pretty tense, but after a while it became clear that we would not meet resistance that day either. After about another 2 hours per tower, they were gone, and we received two lovely kill mails with the details. We then popped all the silos and offlined and scooped up all the modules that we could. After that, we had to send out the repair crew to fix all the guns we had incapacitated so we could put them to use. All in all, a very successful operation.
As I've said many times, the things I really enjoy about Eve involve groups of people coming together to accomplish something, and this was a really big operation for me. It was lots of fun, and has really given me a taste for getting more involved in PvP. I know it's just Internet spaceships, but because Eve is such a merciless environment where all your actions have "real" consequences, it really gets your blood pumping when you are out there in space knowing that at any second a capital fleet could hot drop on you and really ruin your day. World of Warcraft can give you a similar sense of accomplishment when your raid finally downs a tough boss, but you will never get the fear in WoW that you get in Eve. How worked up can you get about wasting a flask or having to spend an extra 25G for a repair bill?
Anyway, it was great fun and I look forward to more alliance operations in the future. And to the owner of the POSs we took down, I'm really sorry if we ruined your Christmas holiday. I hope the party was fun though!
Unfortunately, there was one problem. Apparently, whoever was setting these up ran out of time when they got to onlining the modules. I'm guessing that the missus was calling from the front hall that it was time to go to a Christmas get-together or something. Whatever it was, there they sat: 2 faction large towers worth billions, surrounded by a bristling array of various turrets that could defend neither the towers nor themselves because they were offline.
If this strikes you a bit like the Maginot Line prior to WWII, you'd be right on target, and the call went out on Christmas day that we needed to put together our own little opportunistic Blitzkrieg attack. While turnout was understandably sparse on Christmas, we got the word out to start bringing battleships and other support vessels out to low-sec in preparation for the assault.
That assault came on Boxing Day, as we formed our fleet and headed out. We'd kept eyes on the targets pretty much around the clock, and since nothing had changed by the time our fleet formed up, out we went for a little POS bashing. There were a few moments when we thought we might be getting set up for an ambush, but in general things went very smoothly. No owners showed up that day, and no white knights flew in to the rescue which meant we were able to put the towers into reinforced mode in about 2 hours each. After reinforcing each tower, we incapacitated the guns just to make it harder for the owners to make the tower defensible when we came back.
Two days later it was time for the towers to come out of reinforced mode, and we formed up our fleet once again to go take them down once and for all. As you can imagine, we had a lot more concern about encountering resistance this time around as the corp had almost two days to get word of the attack and pull together a defence. In addition, we were concerned that a larger fleet might drop by to kick us out and take over the operation.
With scouts watching all the necessary gates, our fleet moved out and approached the first tower. After aligning to a safe location to help ensure a speedy getaway in case of emergency, the command went out to open up on the tower. Those first few moments were pretty tense, but after a while it became clear that we would not meet resistance that day either. After about another 2 hours per tower, they were gone, and we received two lovely kill mails with the details. We then popped all the silos and offlined and scooped up all the modules that we could. After that, we had to send out the repair crew to fix all the guns we had incapacitated so we could put them to use. All in all, a very successful operation.
As I've said many times, the things I really enjoy about Eve involve groups of people coming together to accomplish something, and this was a really big operation for me. It was lots of fun, and has really given me a taste for getting more involved in PvP. I know it's just Internet spaceships, but because Eve is such a merciless environment where all your actions have "real" consequences, it really gets your blood pumping when you are out there in space knowing that at any second a capital fleet could hot drop on you and really ruin your day. World of Warcraft can give you a similar sense of accomplishment when your raid finally downs a tough boss, but you will never get the fear in WoW that you get in Eve. How worked up can you get about wasting a flask or having to spend an extra 25G for a repair bill?
Anyway, it was great fun and I look forward to more alliance operations in the future. And to the owner of the POSs we took down, I'm really sorry if we ruined your Christmas holiday. I hope the party was fun though!
Monday, December 6, 2010
World of Warcraft: Cataclysm launches tonight
That's right, I'm excited about a WOW expansion, have already bought the digital download and will be playing it starting tonight at midnight PST. Feel free to abuse me as much as you like. Note: I will be playing Eve until that time though, so do I get some real MMO gamer points for that?!
Sunday, December 5, 2010
My new toon
As I mentioned a little while ago, I started a new character. His name is Tel Radic, and he's a Caldari capsuleer. He's joined my corporation, Phoenix Propulsion Labs, and has finished all the starter profession missions, plus part of the Epic storyline.
I was wondering what I should do with this character, and even got some suggestions from readers (Thanks, folks!). Now that I've been tasked with POS maintenance for my corp, I've decided what he will be learning first. His first order of business will be to get qualified to fly an Iteron V. Right now my main toon, Radd Trigon, is tending POSs using a Bestower. Only being able to carry 14.6k m3 of cargo makes moving fuel and materials around very inefficient.
Getting an alt out there the skills to fly the Itty 5 will make a big difference. In addition, this will also free up my main to spend more time doing things that are more useful for the corporation, like running missions, doing builds, and mining.
After I get him set up for POS tending, I think I'm going to train him to fly an Orca, complete with all the leadership skills to give mad mining bonuses. This will allow me to do some efficient mining solo. Mining is something that I enjoy, especially since high sec mining is pretty low stress.
After Itty V and Orca, I'm still not sure. Fortunately, the Orca training should keep me busy for at least 6 months, so I've got some time to think about it.
I was wondering what I should do with this character, and even got some suggestions from readers (Thanks, folks!). Now that I've been tasked with POS maintenance for my corp, I've decided what he will be learning first. His first order of business will be to get qualified to fly an Iteron V. Right now my main toon, Radd Trigon, is tending POSs using a Bestower. Only being able to carry 14.6k m3 of cargo makes moving fuel and materials around very inefficient.
Getting an alt out there the skills to fly the Itty 5 will make a big difference. In addition, this will also free up my main to spend more time doing things that are more useful for the corporation, like running missions, doing builds, and mining.
After I get him set up for POS tending, I think I'm going to train him to fly an Orca, complete with all the leadership skills to give mad mining bonuses. This will allow me to do some efficient mining solo. Mining is something that I enjoy, especially since high sec mining is pretty low stress.
After Itty V and Orca, I'm still not sure. Fortunately, the Orca training should keep me busy for at least 6 months, so I've got some time to think about it.
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