Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Bottomed Out...

OK, everything except the Ladar (Gas) and Grav ('roid) sites have been cleared and I took the last of my loot to market. As an update from the prior "Cashing In" post, the total profit from this WH on Jita and Amarr markets was just a smidge over $670M ISK. The widely-reported slow respawn rates has me thinking of moving into an adjacent "static" Class 2 WH the next time I login. This WH has consistently maintained a static Low-Sec exit and a Class 2 WH entry/exit.

Also, kudos goes out to ArcDragon for neatly capturing all of the eve-wide data gathering accross various forum posts into a single reference (PDF). In addition to covering WH basics, it also has sections for POS management and some perspectives on running a "scaled" corporate operation in Class 5 WH space. Nice work!

I will continue to document the interesting sites as I hit them. Next-up is making a decision on whether or not to move to the next WH...

Monday, June 29, 2009

Cashing In...

Well, a Low-sec exit wormhole opened last night just after my last post and although I had been basing my salvage value on an Alt sitting in Jita, I decided to go ahead and make sure I cashed in what I have salvaged to date. Did not want to login one night to find my POS ganked all of my loot gone!

Turns out the low-sec exit was a mere 9 jumps from Amarr, so I split my risk into two trips - one with all of the salvage loot and the second trip with all of the datacores and R.A.M. loot from the Radar sites.

First observation: The Amarr market prices for pretty much everything I had to sell, especially the big-ticket datacores, were getting between 10% to 30% higher bids than in Jita. As such, after comparing each sell order with the comparable Jita market, I decided to sell everything right there in Amarr. So, after clearing the following in my Class 2 WH over the course of limited play time over the past 6 days:

  • 12 of the 14 frontier sites (includes the 2 respawns)
  • 4 Radar Sites (includes the 2 respawns)
  • 1 Mag Site

The grand total ISK: 487 Million ISK!!!

I think that is pretty incredible. Mission Running 4/20 missions to hit that amount - forget it. I have made more than 1B ISK in a single day running exploration sites (Gurista Scout plex - lucked out with two in one system that both dropped a C-Type Medium Shield Booster), but that is rare and extremely inconsistent, not to mention risky (low-sec pirate-fest). The return based on time-spent in WH space was the best I have seen in Eve (just in my experience) since I joined nearly one year ago.

And where is the pirate traffic in WH Space? I have yet to scan a single other player in this WH since I set up the POS. NOTE: This will ultimately be a Murphy's law, so by stating this, I will now surely be overwhelmed with WH traffic.

Sunday, June 28, 2009

Radar - Unsecured Perimeter Comms Relay

Just returned from a weekend trip (no Eve time) and returned to my POS tonight to find it slowly repopulating with Radar sites. Five days ago I deployed my first WH POS and had cleared all but 3 of the Frontier sites. Today, I found 2 new radar sites and a re-spawn of the Perimeter Checkpoint and "Ruins of Enclave Cohort 27" sites I cleared last week. The first radar site was a re-spawn of one I did last week as well - the "Unsecured Perimeter Transponder Farm". The second was a new one for me - it was the "Unsecured Perimeter Comms Relay" - All I can say is: NICE! In addition to the rich bounty salvaged fro the below spawns, the cans dropped just over $180M ISK worth of datacores! The total take from the site was just over $210M ISK. Here is a recap of the datacores from the cans:
  • 3x Datacore Engineering Subsystems Engineering
  • 5x Datacore Defensive Subsystems Engineering
  • 7x Datacore Offensive Subsystems Engineering
  • 12x Datacore Propulsion Subsystems Engineering
  • 5x R.A.M. Hybrid Technology
Here was the Spawn sequence:

Spawn 1
  • 3x Awakened Patroller
  • 2x Awakened Watchman (Spawn)
Spawn 2
  • 1x Sleepless Patroller (Spawn)
  • 2x Emergent Watchman
Spawn 3
  • 1x Sleepless Escort
  • 1x Sleepless Watchman
(No 4th spawn like you would normally see in most Radar sites...)

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Wormhole Classes

Although this is covered in great detail in many places, including the comprehensive fact sheet, here is just a quick recap:

When you select Info on a wormhole, you will see a description that the WH leads to Unknown Space (Class 1-3), Dangerous Unknown Space (Class 4-5), or Deadly Unknown Space (the dread Class 6). As a basic rule of thumb, here are some basic facts on the WH classes:

Class 1 and 2: Definitely solo-capable. No warp-disruption by Sleepers. Plex sites are almost always "Perimeter" sites, which are the easiest - no more than one Sleeper BS in any individual spawn (NOTE: Be sure to research what the "trigger" sleeper is to make sure you clear as many sleepers as possible, especially the Sleeper BS, before the next spawn). Less Radar and Mag sites to harvest. Still bountiful in Ladar and Grav sites, and rich in ore types, but not in volume. For example, I have seen Spod and Crokite, but in small volumes in Class 2's. IMHO, forget Class 1. Use a Class 2 to prepare for Class 3.

Class 3: I would say they are solo-capable if you are working with your alt character as a shield/armor repairer role. Even with the best fits, many sites can spawn sufficient DPS to force you into warp-out. However, the Emergent (frigate) and Awakened (Battlecruiser) units will commonly web and warp-disrupt, so unlike Class 1 and 2, be sure to bring ECM or take down warp-scramble capable ships first. Plex sites are typically of the "Frontier" variety, but you will still see "Perimeter" and you will begin to run into the much more difficult "Core" sites, which are definitely NOT solo-capable. I think the increase in loot value compensates for the risk, but I would "cut your teeth" on a Class 2 first to really get versed in ship types, and most importantly, become well practiced in managing shield/armor repair while keeping a constant scan going for gankers.

Class 4+: Frankly, I have only visited and been a rail-bird, watching epic 10+ member squads battling it out with sleeper sites. Truly the land of organized squads with the proper mix of DPS ships and Logistics/Reppers. Pretty much all "Core" plex sites, with the occasional "Frontier".

Living in WH Space...

Editor's Note: I decided to literally restart this blog, as I never invested the time to properly chronicle the Apocrypha release and the subsequent flood of information that ensued on WH space, Sleeper difficulty, WH Classes, etc.

Instead, I am simply going to chronicle my activities as they relate to WH Space and provide links to information where applicable. In fact, here are a couple of must-read's:



My first WH POS.

Well, I finally made the leap of faith.

Although I got side-tracked on exploration in Low-Sec shortly after the Apocrypha release (which was HIGHLY profitable and will post on in the near future) I am finally settled into my first semi-permanent WH. I am still debating on whether or not to post the exact details (pirates!), but I will say that I opted for a Class 2 WH that I happened upon a few days ago near Innia.

I had been exploring and in parallel was testing my ship buildouts on Sissi (Eve's test server) and I was eager to jump into a Class 2 or 3. My final decision to go with a Class 2 had more to do with gathering some experience in a "safer" environment such as a Class 2 before moving on to a Class 3 or 4 system, rather than purely about profit. In Class 2 WH Space, Sleepers do not use warp disruption, so there is always a warp-out option available to you if you get into trouble. I scanned down the WH entrance in Low-Sec and using my favorite WH Info tool, I identified a pretty lucky find! It was a Class 2, but it had a local effect to give a pretty large set of shield bonuses.

I jumped-in, ready for the inevitable WH-side gankers, but there were none to be seen. I scanned thoroughly and the system was empty and stock-full. I went ahead and scanned everything down. More than 25 sites, including a Radar (Transponder Farm), Mag , 8 or so Lader/Grav, and 12 Perimeter sites. There was also a High-Sec WH Exit and a Class 4 WH Exit/Entry. More than enough to decide this was worth farming.

So, off I go to retrieve my pre-purchased Small Caldari POS, Hangar, and Maintenance Arrays. I decided this would be a relatively short stay, so I only provisioned enough POS fuel for 7 days. With that, I brought my Helios and Domi for my main and my Drake for my Alt. After some heart-pounding drives through Low-Sec (Helios scouting ahead), I got all of my POS goods into the WH and online. Although it was already getting late, I could not resist taking a shot at the Radar and Mag sites. They produced what I would call great quality loot for a Class 2, and I decided to cash-in on impulse. My Low-Sec entry is a scant 10 jumps from Jita and I netted a cool 47M ISK on the loot.

Over the next few days I cleared 10 more perimeter sites for a total of 167M ISK worth of loot in Jita. So, even if I login over the next few days to see my POS summarily destroyed, I can at least say it paid for itself, plus I have the experience on my first persistent stay in WH space.

Observations:
  1. Pretty odd feeling the first time you cut ties to your entrypoint - as my entrypoint collapsed I had a very anti-climactic sense of "OK, you are in it now."
  2. With new entry/exit points daily, I am shocked that in the 4 times I have been online I have yet to see any evidence of other players in my little pocket of WH space. In fact, every time I login, I get the "please try again" message while the grid is loaded, typically a good indication NOBODY has been there since the last downtime.
  3. After the second perimeter site, clearing and salvaging quickly became routine. The Radar and Mag sites were a bit more challenging, but Class 2's are definitely easily solo-capable. I am using my Domi as main (drone DPS and remote repair) and a Omni-passive-tanked Drake for DPS . I have 1 salvager on the Drake, 2 plus tractor on the Domi.
Once I clear the remaining perimeter sites, I am really just interested in witnessing first-hand the respawn rate. If it takes more than a day to see new sites, then I will pack up and head out to the next convenient exit...