Thursday, September 3, 2009

All quiet...but not everywhere

My W-System continues to be quiet, typically I get the "system not loaded" message at login, meaning literally nobody has been to the system since downtime and EVE servers need to go cache the system data. I had one lonely visitor that I had to run off, but being the anti-pirate, anti-griefer that I am, I actually helped the pilot finish the sleeper site he/she was working and let them keep the loot rather than taking the easy kill. One Perimeter Checkpoint out of 63 was not a loss worth podding a fellow explorer... I closed the extremely rare HighSec WH that the pilot had entered through and continued with my efforts to cleanse this system.

I am down to 3 sleeper sites and some new Radar/Mag sites that have been spawning plus all of the Ladar and Grav sites untouched. I will clear the former and take another run to market.

I continue to struggle with the decision on how to run my Medium POS - whether to continue to let the Fuel burn at a high rate (specifically the Isotopes and Liquid Ozone) or to bring all of the defenses in-house until there is some action and then deploy. I have probably burned through 50M ISK in Isotopes and Liquid Ozone since I moved my POS and not so much as a whisper near the POS. A tiny investment considering the 1.7B ISK I have cashed in this system alone, but still... As such, I have been giving some recommended POS setups some thought and I think that I may switch to a new strategy around a "tanked" POS (I am not going to use the common reference: "d*ck star") meaning simply the POS is only supplemented with Hardeners to make the shield even more ridiculously difficult to put into reinforced mode. In fact, since the hardeners reside inside the shield bubble, the idea is to offline them until there is an attack, then online them only when needed. Less fuel burn and higher HP on-demand.

I also received a convo with Quiv over at Planet Risk - his POS has seen some recent action, and there is an excellent recap there about the experience - I consider this a "must-read" for W-space dwellers.

It also served to both support and augment my perspective on a good POS buildout - I will keep all of the turrets and active defenses stowed until needed, meanwhile maintaining offline hardeners in the event of an attack. Again, if a large force decided to make it their mission to take the POS down, they could, but the idea is to make it as big of hassle as possible - few pilots really like to stay online for 12+ hours and do nothing but re-lock the shield and shoot...

EDIT: Be sure to read comments as there is a great exchange on POS setups and perspectives.

Also - CONGRATS to Quiv on hist first-ever Bomber kill! OK, it was a poor little defenseless Iteron, but hey - it was the ENEMY and contained the resupply ammo stocks - what better way to defend than to eliminate the supply lines! It counts in my book...

Safe Flying.

19 comments:

  1. I was looking at your first loadouts of ships and POS setting and I'm going to that myself in a class 1 system, once I get more skills up.

    Right now I'm in a dominix and was thinking of using a Exequror as support. I fit the Domi with blasters and find that it just doesn't hit a lot. Any suggestions?

    Thanks again for the great blog.
    Cheer,
    Gen

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  2. I'm the merc that was giving the advice on the POS setups. Wanted to give a couple more quick observations.

    Online the hardeners and keep them online. You never know when you will be attacked and what will be going on in your real life at the time. If they start the attack 5 minutes after you go to bed, and you have something pop up for the next couple of days, the next time you log in will be to a missing POS.

    While ECM modules are a pain to anchor and online, not only do they hinder attacks through jamming, but they also take time to kill. Thats time on your side for a hole to close, or you to come online.

    As you mentioned, 50MM for fuel is nothing. The mods themselves are cheap also. If you're going to do the POS, don't start penny pinching. If the whole fueling/anchoring/onlining is too much of a pain, go for the GSC's in a safe spot in space.

    Lastly, don't forget the stront. You'd be surprised at the people who forget to stront their towers. This is another area you can use for your defense. Once an attack has started, if you can figure out what time zone the attackers are from, you can adjust the amount of stront so that it comes out when they are hopefully asleep.

    Just my .02

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  3. Genroku - My Domi is there for drone DPS and Shield Repping, but I recently just added 2x 425mm Proto Gauss and 2x Dual 250mm Proto Gauss for a little extra punch to replace my Tractor and Salvage fittings. No longer salvage as I go as my Cormorant can salvage so quickly after the fight. It reduced my 5-minute per site clear time down to 4 minutes, so helped a bit.

    [Dominix, Current WH Domi with Rails]

    Large Armor Repairer II
    Large Armor Repairer II
    Armor Explosive Hardener II
    Armor Kinetic Hardener II
    Armor EM Hardener II
    Armor Thermic Hardener II
    Damage Control II

    Cap Recharger II
    Cap Recharger II
    Cap Recharger II
    Cap Recharger II
    Cap Recharger II

    425mm Prototype I Gauss Gun
    425mm Prototype I Gauss Gun
    Dual 250mm Prototype I Gauss Gun
    Dual 250mm Prototype I Gauss Gun
    Drone Link Augmentor I
    Large Shield Transporter I

    Auxiliary Nano Pump I
    Auxiliary Nano Pump I
    Capacitor Control Circuit I

    Wasp II x5
    Hornet II x5

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  4. Forgot to add: As you have seen from my previous posts, the rest of my DPS is from a DPS and tank fitted Drake.

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  5. Anonymous Merc - thanks again for the continued commentary and valuable input. Time to coalesce all of this feedback into a new post.

    Thanks again.

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  6. Thanks again for the info star, I'll set that up tonight and see how it works for me. I find I just miss a lot, but I think I need to rely on drones much more. I'm thinking domi for my main dps and having my other account for salvage/probe/repping.

    Btw is it okay to post these newb questions in the comments?

    Cheers,
    Gen

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  7. Dude, your blog has inspired me to check out W-space and try to set up shop, however trying to do this solo is a huge task. Shot in the dark, but do you know of any corps spec'ing in w-space that are recruiting atm?

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  8. Genroku - just to be clear, my process is thus;

    1) CovOps under cloak and bookmark a jump-in point close to the sleepers. I will do this for 3-5 sites.
    2) Swap out Covops for Domi. Alt is in Drake, fleeted up. Warp fleet to warp-to point.
    3) Unleash hell upon sleepers: Drake with 7x Heavy Missile Launcher II's with Scourge Fury + 5x Hornet II's, Domi with above fitting. Combined DPS clears the Class 2 sites in well under 10 minutes - almost never have to repper the Drake - it is all over before the sleepers can even mount a decent attack.
    4) Drake bookmarks one wreck per site
    5) Warpto next site, repeat until series completed.
    6) Warp the Drake back to POS and swap out to Cormorant with a (4x tractor x 4x salvager II), warp to wreck bookmarks and salvage each site in the series.
    7) While Cormorant is salvaging, swap out Domi back to Covops and start again - by the time the Cormorant salve is complete, I am swapped back to Domi and ready to go.
    8)Cormorant drops all loot into hangar array and swaps back to Drake for the next round.

    Fly safe!

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  9. I would invite any readers in W-space corps to post a comment here or eve-mail me and I will post links.

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  10. Posting this because your blog inspired me to check out W-Space for the loot instead of just trying to gank carebears in it.

    Tonight I found a backwoods Class 1 that had several sleeper spawns and a radar site. SO I jumped my Zealot through and began to clear a few sites.

    After clearing 5 Sleeper sites and the Radar site (which only yeilded on unit of Hybrid RAM) I began salvaging. Long story short, for just a little investment in time I made over 200 million isk. Not too bad for a W-Space like me.

    I'm beginning to see why you like this so much, I'm definitely hooked. Thanks for the good advice and awesome reading.

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  11. Heheh - a convert! JK - good to hear your C1 yielded well - next thing you know you will be camping out in a POS and someone is going to say hey! let's go grief that carebear's small POS...

    ;-)

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  12. Cheers for the plug SD!

    Thankfully all ended well in the siege of Planet Risk and we learned alot without loosing any ships - fortunately that happens too! ;-D

    I hear the Anonymous merc's suggestion of keeping the Hardeners online - maybe we will keep some online if we can adjust some of the other structures - but attacks like the last one are very rare in Wspace. We have been here for over 4 months now and that was the first time our POS has been attacked so if you have a corpmate logging at least once to see how things are - you will still have enough time to mount a defensive.

    Now regarding SD's comments on POS fittings, I suggest that if you have any Guns / Newts etc you need to anchor them now ! Don;t wait to get attached to anchor them - you should only be onlining them then. If you have guns / ECMs / Newts or whatever you should Anchor them around your POS now. You will probably need an industrial ship with huge cargo and some propulsion mod to move all the way around the POS to anchor the guns. So it will take time and no way you could do that the same time someone is right outside your pos hitting your shields. I hear ya on the hardeners - anchor them now and put them online when you go for sleep or are under attack.

    What is the most important thing for ANY wspace colonist to understand and adhere to is that you need to keep your Strontium Clathrates bay on your POS FULL at ALL TIMES and also keep some stront for reserve. Also it's critical that you have an Osprey (Caldari Cruiser) with 2 Large Energy Transferers and assorted mods to keep them running while you are cap stable to repair your POS (more Ospreys will definately help if you can drive them and ofc a Basilisk or a Carrier in Triage could also do wonders!) You need that ship to repair your POS Shields in case of an attack.

    When the POS Shields will reach 25% it will go into reinforced - at that time the POS is invulnerable and displays a timer on how much strontium it has. Default is about a day and a half or so for a Large POS. You can only add more Stront from your reserve bay if your shields are at 50% or more - so you need to repair them fast before the enemy returns!

    I will make sure to talk about POS fittings, and defending your POS from attackers on the next Planet Risk Show - Wednesday September 9th 20:00 EvE Time at http://siradio.fm

    We will also be covering the first weekend of Alliance Tournament with our resident PVP Expert for AT7 TeaDaze - so make sure to tune-in for a great show! more details over at http://planetriskshow.com!

    Fly Safe!

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  13. Wanted to say thanks again for the blog.

    I now spam this site more then I spam capsuleer.

    Also thanks for the listing of the domi. Why the wasp? Vs the ogre or bezerker.

    Acinom

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  14. Howdy Star Defender,

    I'm glad that our POS Siege experience has helped you (and I hope others) take more variables into account when deciding on their POS fittings. I'm also glad that our POS is still there, alive and kickin' =)

    Regarding the use of hardeners, the merc fellow offers very sound advice erring on the "better safe than sorry" side. Keeping the hardeners online constantly, or offline and firing them up in case of an attack is a decision that has to be reached based on a lot of variables.

    If you are on your own in w-space and your fellow w-mates are just your alts, then any real life schedule misfortune might get your POS wasted. Having more people though logging in on a regular basis solves that problem by either having them alert you so you can get in eve and online the hardeners, or if there are no trust issues in the corp, have them online the hardeners.

    We over at Planet Risk find that life in w-space needs a lot of micromanagement to deal with daily ops (such as fuel runs, and limited POS resources), therefore having the hardeners 24/7 online is not only a waste of fuel, but also a waste of POS resources that could be diverted to other buildings, especially if you are dealing with production, reactions and the like.

    Our deliberations regarding guns on a large POS in a C2 are still inconclusive. We still have a lot to discuss on that field but once we do, we'll revisit the whole subject in an upcoming podcast.

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  15. Acinom - I should be using Ogre II's, but only had Caldari Drone Specialization skilled to 5 (relic from Caldari mission running days. I need to train up my Gallente Drone Specialization to get the same bonuses before I switch over to Ogre II's - just a matter of the skill progression game. Focused on Orca training on the Gallente alt at the moment.

    PlanetRisk team - yep, I am stocked to the max on Strontium, with extra Stront and Fuel in Corp Hanger as needed. Good comments on anchored guns - thanks, yes slightly different angle on POS care and feeding when solo/alt...

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  16. Welcome to the EVE Blog Pack. Look for a post about it soon.

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  17. Well I'm at work while the alliance tourney is going on. But from what I can gather from the Twitter updates, my guess is tech 3 is brutal.

    Hence more people will want tech 3

    hence more demand for production

    hence more demand for parts

    and hence you better be rafting more sleepers cause the cash cow is coming

    my 0.02 isk thoughts

    acinom

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  18. Acinom - I have not yet tuned into the tourny, but hopefully we see T3 domination - would love to see T3 demand increase...

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  19. SD grats on getting on the EVE Blog Pack m8!

    As for T3 goes, we do hope to see a T3 increase in demand (and maybe even increase in prices as well) after the AT7.

    We need more nanoribbons damn it!!! we got lots of hulls waiting in queue!!! :-D

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