2012 went that a-way, here comes 2013

Red’s question of the month was timely, given I was already penning a related blog:

“Does your Eve Online character have a New Year’s resolution? Do you specifically use the beginning of the new year as a clean slate for a new direction, adventure or skill plan for your character or Corp?”

The short pedantic answer is no – I don’t specifically use the New Year as a fresh start in EVE. I do however take the time to review how I am travelling against my objectives, and possibly add some new ones. (I attribute my longevity in EVE to always have a long list of goals I want to work towards.)

The Alt Corp Mining Op

The Year that 2012 was: (2011 can be read here)

My Main went from 90 to 110M SP. He spent 140 odd days of training on Capitals, getting all the hull and tank skills to rank IV. He got to the point where he can fly and fit every ship in the game aside Titans. He maximised his Mining Skills, picked up Recon and Covert Ops V, and improved his Exploration Skills.

Alt 1 went from 83 to 103M SP. He is 19 days off maximising his Orca boosting skills. He trained up all Racial Frigate and Cruiser skills to V, and is able to use all T2 Small and Medium weaponry. He also picked up Recon V, Interceptor V, Industrial Command Ships V, Covert Ops V and Assault ships V.

Alt 2 went from 16 to 33M SP. She mostly worked on Science and Manufacturing skills, and also picked up Wholesale V and Tycoon IV.

Alt 3 is unchanged at 10M SP.

Alt 4 went from 2 to 3M SP – picking up some extra Hauling and PI skills.

Hope my Carrier doesn’t end up like this one in 2013

My EVE Game time was hit really hard this year by real life (mostly the wife and kids). It ebbed and flowed, but overall it was the worst I’ve had in the six years I’ve been playing. It left me to contemplate giving up on EVE a couple of times through sheer frustration. In the end I dropped out of the Player Corporation I was a member of so that no one had to rely on me, and focused on areas of the game where I could walk away at a moment’s notice.

Given that, I’m surprised at how much game time I managed to fit in. I went to bed after midnight a lot.

One of my key goals crashed out in 2012 – which was increasing my passive income levels. My PI efforts became more and more sporadic over time, and now are rarely run. Frankly, while the income is worthwhile, I just find the process too boring. I also haven’t done a Datacore collection run since around June, when CCP changed the rules relating to them. My passive income dropped from around 200M a month to maybe 25M.

My plans to lose a Loki while Roaming through Wormhole space failed. Basically for 6 odd months my Player Corporation was constantly requesting we don’t pad the killboard with silly losses. Now that I am playing Solo again, I should fix that.

I ended up inventing and manufacturing more than a dozen different types of items, but this effort really trailed off in the second half of the year. In part this is because of how overly complicated and time consuming it can be to source all the ingredients at fair prices.

I re-anchored my POS, and am in the process of finishing off the researching of around 50 new BPO. A core reason for this was to be prepared for the possible and hoped for POS revamp in 2013.

I had a major cleanup of assets, and transitioned my Main to operating out of multiple mobile Orca bases.

I spent a lot of ISK on updating the implants on my various Clones – although still have work to do in that regard.

I spent the biggest proportions of my time in Exploration and Backwater Trading. I did next to no missioning or PVP (3 kills and no losses for the year).

I spent a lot of time in EFT – in part due to game changes, in part using experience and new knowledge to get more from my ships.

I would estimate my Main made around 2B of income in the year from Exploration, Mining and a bit of Trade. He sold around 10B worth of assets, and spent about half of that on Orca’s, Implants and new Toys. His net worth would have increased overall, but as with last year, most of this would be due to the positive impact of inflation against his assets.

My Alt Corp had a good year. Its liquid assets increased by around 3.5B, compared to a 1.0B increase in the previous year. That is currently made up of:

2.4B Bank
1.2B Up for Sale
0.2B PI Goods
1.0B Manufacturing Ingredients
0.6B POS Fuel

It also spent ISK on implants and skill books for the Industry Alts, extra POS equipment, and additional BPO. Its main ISK drain going forward will be POS fuel, which is costing about 77M a month.

I also have around 190,000 research points on my Main and Alt 1 – which are some 3,800 Datacores. I am not sure what they will be worth. Probably should check.

Current Goals:

. About 20 odd housekeeping tasks in my to do list

. Continue to focus more on the Trade and Manufacturing opportunities from game expansions and updates

. Update my spreadsheets to make it easier to calculate manufacturing costs and requirements for T2 goods

. Create my Own Alliance

. Spend more time in Low Sec

. Finally lose that Loki in Wormhole space

. Even though I won’t really use them, spend the 40 days to finish off my main’s Capital training to cover all skills at rank IV.

 

Thanks to those who have read and commented on the blog this year.  While traffic is only a small faction of the big EVE blogs, I did see a 4 fold increase in views in 2012.  It is still keeping me amused and focused on the game, so is achieving its goals.  Best of luck for the New Year to you all – may the loot and trade gods be kind to you.

More Gum than Bite

Fear the… oh, ok, nothing here

I’m not entirely sure why I bothered, but I armed my Small Empire Research POS.

The only risk the POS faces is if I get a War Declaration. It seems unlikely given I only have two Labs online, but stranger things have happened.

I’d like to be able to put up a token defense of the tower if that was to occur, so online went 8 Small Laser and 2 Warp Disruption Batteries. I anchored a further 3 Small Laser Batteries that can be onlined if I remove the Labs.

I will also set up a couple throw away ships to use in its defense. I am thinking of a pair of Dominix. I can park one Alt manning the guns, my main and another Alt in the Domi’s, and at least go down making noise.

Of course the preparations are likely a waste – but once again, it keeps me amused.

I finally sat down and looked closely at the research required on the 50+ BPO I had purchased over the last month or two. Turns out almost all of them do not require ME research (the Containers and POS Structures all have no wastage at ME0). That leaves just the new Destroyers, the Mining Frigate, and the Survey Probes that will need ME research – most of which are already well on the way to targeted levels.

(I would like if the BPO provided some indication on what ME and PE research would provide, instead of having to rely on third party tools.)

Arguably the POS might only need to be run for another month – but I expect I will make use of the copy slots and maybe work on some of my older BPO.

The market is quieter at the moment, but the Containers are still turning over ok, and I’ve collected a surprising number of Christmas collectibles on cheap buy orders. I will re-sell those, although I am not sure on what the best timing for that will be.

I’ve even done some mining – which turns over a surprisingly good profit with the Boosting Orca and two mining Toons running at the same time.  So much Carebearing…

Oops – that was premature

I’ve been working on maximising my mining yield. Not for any particular reason – more just because I can.

My Booster maximised his Orca and Mining Leadership skills, and my main just finished off maximising his Mining skills.

I updated each toons EFT data and compared their yield against the all rank V character, expecting to see the same numbers. While my main was maximised, the boosting from my Alt was down a little.

Scratching my head I looked at the skills affecting the Mining Foreman Link to find Warfare Link Specialist at IV. Checking in EFT, and then confirming in game showed that that particular skill also improved Mining Yield.

I never knew. Bragging rights will have to be on hold for another 30 odd days for me to finish the Sensor Compensation skills to IV and then start on Warfare Link Specialist V.

Well Played CCP Santa

The second round of Christmas Gifts were handed out last night by CCP – a random selection from (I would guess) 4 different re-skinned frigates, a special pair of boots, a special blueprint, 23 special Commodities, and 27 different trading cards, CA1 or 2 implants, or some Carbon (Coal).

Across my 3 accounts I got 2 of the different frigates types (3 in total), 3 implants, 9 special commodities, 10 trading cards and some coal.

Why was this done well by CCP?  There is a large amount of market trading going on as people buy, sell and trade these.  I’ve spent around 150M across Rens, Amarr and Jita picking up the remaining frigate hulls, at least one of each of the commodities, the boots, and a selection of the trading cards.  (Not going to get all of those.)  You could actually make a real profit at the moment – but I just plan to thrown them all into my storage container filled with these sorts of once off gifts and items of interest.  Its my hoarding tendencies…

 

Folly or why not?

I’ve been consolidating my EVE To-Do list from the countless scraps of paper, spreadsheets, training plans and so forth. One little item has been around at the back of my mind for quite some time, and is probably at a suitable point to aim for. I have a Toon with nothing pressing to train for, and the spare ISK.

I am contemplating creating an Alliance for my Alt Corp.

There is no in game reason for this. I am not trying to make War Decs more expensive, there will be no one else invited to join, I don’t plan on conquering a corner of Null Sec.

I am simply intrigued to look at the mechanics, and amused by the thought.

Too pointless? Does it make a mockery of the serious business of EVE to do something so flippantly?

It is 2 skill books, 45 days training, and a further Billion ISK away if I want to achieve it.

Yes Boss

The Capsuleer looked over to the neigbouring docking bay, where a huge Orca was slowly aligning at its entrance. The giant tractor beams positioned along the golden walls of the bay were activated as law dictated, but the soft blue beams they emitted showed that they were exerting no force.

The Orca moved forward at a sure and steady pace along the center line, casting a long shadow. The stabilising bars rotated and extended from the bay floor as the vessel began to settle. The observer did not feel a tremor when the ship came to rest – a level of preciseness that would not have been afforded by the station’s automatic landing systems.

The sides of the Orca split and darkened openings grew, while station ramps swung out and extended towards the hulking ship. The heavy blast walls between his and the Orca’s bay were also lumbering apart. Down below him moved a mass of his ships and supplies, readying for embarking. A Cheetah, several Thrashers, a Wolf, and even more.

He glanced at his watch – he had around 15 minutes before his boss would extract himself from his pod, shower and refresh, and make his way to his quarters. Just enough time for one last check of the manifest and to ensure he wasn’t leaving anything behind.

…

For all the stories about the freedom and power of the Capsuleer, they are actually focused only on the premium class of pilot. There are a great many more Capsuleers which are in fact in the servitude of a higher master.

I pulled my Low Sec Cyno Alt out of his home for the last 18 odd months, and will park him closer to my current home base. He sits in his own one man Corp. His primary role was acting as a scout in a Cheetah Covert Ops as I flew in and out of my Carrier Staging system, and of course opening Cynos in a Probe frigate. He also had an array of PVE ships (and 10M SP to use them) to be able to build standings with local factions, but I rarely bothered and for the most part he was left doing nothing at all.

Once I’ve sorted and stowed away his gear in his new home, I will use him to bookmark some of the local low sec space.

While he was moving some of his ships out of Low Sec he had a brief conversation with my old Corp’s CEO, who wished me well and said I was welcome back any time. It was a chance encounter, but appreciated. I had expected my exit from his Corp to go with minimal notice – but was kind of knocked by how minimal it really was!

You spent how much!?

I pulled out my EVE To Do list and settled on setting up Cyno Buses.

While my Carriers are safely parked, I need to be able to move them when I want. That requires getting one of my Alts into the destination system with a cyno.

The concept is simple enough – a Cyno Bus is an Industrial Ship that is carrying a number of Frigate hulls and all the fittings and supplies required to open up Cynos. As anyone who uses Cynos knows, it pays to have more than one.

I decided I needed 3 Frigates per bus, enough space for various fitting options, and fuel for at least 10 Cynos. The aim then was a capacity of around 10,000m3. I checked the main Alts I use for Cynos, and they could all fly the Mammoth Minmatar Industrial.

I quickly threw together a T1 fit to provide the required capacity, a basic tank, a cloak, and mods to make it align quicker to speed up travel. I then flew to Amarr where I looked at the price of the various Meta 1 to Meta 4 items, and “upgraded” to them when the price was really cheap. The end result:

[Mammoth, Cyno Bus]
Beta Hull Mod Expanded Cargo
Beta Hull Mod Expanded Cargo
Local Hull Conversion Inertial Stabilizers I
Local Hull Conversion Inertial Stabilizers I

Experimental 10MN Afterburner I
Upgraded EM Ward Amplifier I
Upgraded Thermic Dissipation Amplifier I
Medium Subordinate Screen Stabilizer I
Medium Subordinate Screen Stabilizer I

Prototype Cloaking Device I
[empty high slot]

Medium Low Friction Nozzle Joints I
Medium Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I

On my lowest skilled Alt it has 7.8K EHP, a capacity of 10,547m3, and an align time of 8.4 seconds. I also threw two Warp Core Stabilisers in the cargo hold, for use if I try to fly the ship into Low Sec.

In the end these cost 5M each, although most of that cost was in the Hull, Low Friction Nozzle Joint Rig, and of course the Cloak. I set up 4.

Next I needed to pick the Frigate to use, and a mix of fittings to maximise my options. The actual fit when opening a Cyno was generally a MWD to get into position quicker if needed, the Cyno Field Generator, and enough fuel for one Cycle. However I also include a Warp core stab, Nanofiber internal Structure, Cloak, Micro Auxilliary Power Core, and Mini Shield tank – basically for when the little Cyno Frigate has to travel some distance through dangerous space to get into position.

[Probe, Cyno with the lot]
Warp Core Stabilizer I
Nanofiber Internal Structure I
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I

1MN Microwarpdrive I
EM Ward Amplifier I
Small Shield Extender I
Small Shield Extender I

Prototype Cloaking Device I
Cynosural Field Generator I
[empty high slot]

[empty rig slot]
[empty rig slot]
[empty rig slot]

Again on the lowest skilled Alt, that has a 2.0K EHP and a max speed of 2,942m/s. Fully fit, these come in at just under 5M each – hence why it is a good idea to leave the Cloak in the station. I grab hulls and fits for 12 of them – 3 in each Cyno Bus.

Last of all I placed 5,000 units of Liquid Ozone in each of the Cyno Bus, enough for at least 14 Cyno’s.

Each bus ended up carrying just over 10,000m3.

Cyno Bus Ready to Roll

 

Job done I idly took note of my bank balance, and almost fell off my chair. I had spent 80M ISK!

…

.. Small side note, this was my 300th post. I probably should have written something noteworthy and memorable to mark the occasion – but then again, why start doing that now huh?   *chuckles to self* ..

What happened to Christmas?

I logged in after downtime to redeem the first of the Christmas Gifts – only to find nothing there to redeem.

It’s the 13th here. It says it is the 13th in the game calender.  Did I mess up?

*EDIT – I was a few minutes premature it seems – they turned up at 11:30 EVE time.*

I played around with the Worm I purchased the other week. It looked good on paper, but the fitting wasn’t easy. I tried Buffer, Passive and Active Shield tanked versions for PVE. I ended up with this:

[Worm, PVE Active Tanked]
Internal Force Field Array I
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II

Gistii B-Type 1MN Afterburner
Gistii B-Type Small Shield Booster
Limited Adaptive Invulnerability Field I
Caldari Navy Small Shield Extender

Light Missile Launcher II, Mjolnir Light Missile
Light Missile Launcher II, Mjolnir Light Missile
Salvager II

Small Capacitor Control Circuit I
Small Capacitor Control Circuit I
Small Capacitor Control Circuit I

Hobgoblin II x5
Hobgoblin II x5

6.4K EHP, 76 hp/s omni tank, 139dps, cap stable with Salvager off, and moves at 1,137ms. I ran some bsical exploration anomalies but it just wasn’t that fun to fly when compared to the Retribution. In fact, even after further tweaking and playing, I ended up repackaged the hull and moved it into the “To Sell” container.  Not a successful experiment.

It’s been 12 months already?

Blog Banter 42– An EVE Year in Review

“A gaming universe as vastly unique as EVE Online is constantly evolving and the experience is different for every participant. Conventional games review techniques cannot possibly hope to provide an accurate measure of every aspect of EVE’s gameplay. However, with a community initiative like the Blog Banters, we have the resources to deliver the most thorough and up-to-date review ever.

By combining the experiences of contributors from across the EVE metasphere, we get a wealth of opinions from veterans and rookies alike. We’ll be able to combine input from faction warfare specialists, wormhole residents, null-sec warriors, missioners, pirates, industrialists, roleplayers, politicians and more to paint a complete picture of the health and progress of EVE Online in its current Retribution incarnation.

Who better to review EVE Online than those who know it best?”

 

2012 was my 6th year in EVE.  I concentrated more on solo pursuits, continuing my Backwater Trading, PI, T2 invention and Manufacturing, Exploration, and more than my usual amount of moving through Low Sec, NPC 0.0 and Wormhole space.

The year started out ok with the aftermath of the Crucible release, new Tier 3 Battle Cruisers, and new dynamic backgrounds.

It then seemed that the general feeling within the game took a turn.  There was still a lot of anger from the Incarna debacle; with strong opinions bantered about on what needed to be done to fix things, and the types of players who were to blame for the malaise in game.  I noticed remarks from CCP (CCP Soundwave in particular) and the CSM that seemed to target Solo Empire Players as needing to be forced to play the game differently.  (Steps that haven’t really taken place as yet.)

Inferno came along in a staggered release over April and May, with more graphic and sound effect updates, a War Declaration system overhaul which was soon gamed by the players, a Mercenary Marketplace (it is used?), and a Faction Warfare Overhaul which was gamed even harder by the players.  The UI was improved with effect bars and various aesthetics, and the Inventory system was further patched.  It was easy however to feel like there wasn’t much in it for you, particularly due to bugs, overview resets, and the feeling it lacked polish.

One area that was really noticeable about Inferno was the impact it had on my client performance.  Incarna had seen my reasonably spec’d desktop go from being able to comfortably run 3 clients at the same time down to only two.  Inferno knocked it from 2 clients down to only 1.  As I almost always dual boxed, the game had become unplayable.

While a steady stream of patches saw that improve somewhat, I ended up buying a new custom desktop to make EVE viable again.  If I hadn’t, I would have given away the game at that point.  As it was, there didn’t seem to be anything new in game that was interesting, and overall it just lacked cohesiveness.

It was probably the ship rebalancing which saved the game for me.  Here was change that you would have to review, plan towards and adapt to.  CCP’s communication in general was better in the second half of the year, and there was plenty of things for people to debate, muse over, and look forward to.

The Mining Barge changes in August highlighted to me the value of moving from a Tier to Role based approach for ships.  It was also a sign that CCP was willing address pressing issues outside of Expansions.

CCP provided a whole series of discussion threads in September looking at the Frigate, destroyer and cruiser changes.  For the first time in an age, there seemed to be a sense of positive progression in the game.

October and November passed with small patches and plenty to look forward to.  Retribution finally arrived, with its Bounty Hunting, Crimewatch, New Destroyers and Mining Frigate, all the ship rebalancing, UI and sound improvements, and finally an Inventory system which started to behave somewhat consistently.  The game client itself suddenly came together, and managed to feel relatively coherent.

At the start of the year I would have rated EVE at around 68%.  By mid-year it was down to 45%.  But over the last 5 months CCP has managed to turn that around to finish 2012 on a high.  The sounds, appearance and effects look markedly better, the UI – while not wining any awards, now fits together and mostly seems to work.   Areas like the aggression system – previously a complicated and mostly hidden aspect of the game, is now more visible and easier to understand.  Much shorter down times, much shorter session change timers, market order highlighting – just change after change that really seemed to add up by the end of the year.

So as of now, I would rate EVE at 85%.  Given its age and my bitter vet status, that is more than respectable.

Another year over, a new one just begun

Always wondered about that Lennon lyric, given a new year hasn’t started when Christmas comes around.

CCP have announced the Christmas cheer this year will be spread out over 3 weeks, redeemable from the 13th, 20th and 27th.

http://www.eveonline.com/holiday

They had to remove (melt) the Snow Balls previously after too many people where tricked into getting themselves killed by Concord by firing back with real weapons.  The new safety measures in Retribution should make that somewhat safer.  I have 1,393 melted snow balls and five festival launchers in storage – I suspect I will just be adding to them.

Jester probably has most if not all the mystery box contents – if you don’t mind spoiling the surprise, you can read about them here:

http://jestertrek.blogspot.com.au/2012/12/special-edition-assets.html

They will probably amuse the older players more, and I expect will also just go straight into my storage container.

I’m not sure what the last gift is meant to be.  I’ll set my expectations low and hopefully be pleasantly surprised.

I decided to try out the Dragoon, the Amarr Drone Destroyer.    I partially fit it with spares I have laying around, and then flew to Amarr to finish off the job.  It appears that someone had purchased all the stock of small turrets and missile launchers from the market and re-posted them with between 100 and 600% mark ups.  I’m not that desperate to fly the thing, so head home with a still half unfitted ship.  I might make some equipment for myself.

Keeps on giving

I logged in with over 50,000 players online. It has been a while since I’ve noticed the count so high. I am ashamed to admit it but my first thought was – best check the market orders to make the most of the activity.There are 23 pilots in my home system. What the hell? In the good old days it would only be 2 or 3 at most. Ah that’s right, market orders, don’t lose focus…

There is a sea of green in the transaction history, although mostly just low value Station Containers. They are turning over more than expected, and there is no real apparent competition as yet.

My three year old arrives asking for porridge for Breakfast. Once made, she takes a couple mouthfuls and runs off to play, apparently satisfied. I tell her I am not making porridge again for a long time. I go to sit back down at my computer when my seven year old turns up asking for toast. Once he is fed I go to sit down again, but the pair of them start clashing over a TV remote so I have to go separate them.

My wife finally gets up (out of the wrong side) of bed, and I go back to EVE.

I don’t think I will bother getting into the manufacturing of Station Containers, once the convenience stock has gone. Even if they continue to sell at 100K, I can only fit 90 of them in my Freighter at one time, and that full load would only see profits from slow sales of around 7M. Not worth it to be frank.

I wonder if the people buying them at 100K are swearing at the price gouging industrialist, or are just thankful they are available.

I don’t have long to muse over that before the kids and wife all knock heads, and I decided it will be more relaxing to visit a large shopping center to finish off the Christmas gifts.

<Insert long pause>

Many hours later I return to EVE. The last of the Christmas shopping is done, and the grumpy family is temporary sedated in front of TV, Computer or the Sunday Newspaper. Now where was I, ah, those Market Orders…

Wouldn’t it be great if anyone with the right roles could change any Market Order placed in the name of the Corp? Now that would save some time and hassle.

Ok, 5 hours after I first logged in to do it, I finally update my Market Orders. Competition really seems to have dropped away over the last few months. There used to be a good 3 or 4 other active traders, but now there are lots of areas I am left alone in. Is it because they gave up in the face of my dogged persistence, or (as I suspect more likely) the turn over isn’t worth their while.

The new Hulls are still at reasonably inflated prices – there seems to have been some unspoken agreement between manufacturers to put their stock up at the same low price with no undercutting. I toe the line and follow suit.

I spent some time yesterday and today in EFT. If you are not already aware, EFT 2.17 Retribution has been released.  (The turn around was a little quicker than normal.)

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=24359

I did notice a tip from Gripen which I had never realised before – the modules displayed in the fitting panel are sorted by Meta level by default. Crap, so obvious.

The Venture mining frigate turns out to be a great little ship – and good fun to fly. Fitting is very easy, and they trump the traditional Moa Gas Harvester by a useful margin. I can also clean up the empire rats and salvage them as I go (keeping an eye on the range to the Asteroid I am working on.)

Venture Mining Frigate

[Venture, Basic Empire Fit]
Mining Laser Upgrade II

1MN Afterburner II
Survey Scanner II
Medium Shield Extender II

Miner II
Miner II
Salvager II

Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Small Core Defense Field Extender I

Hobgoblin II x2

I also look at my Hurricane fits after they got their Power Grid Nerfed with this release. It doesn’t seem that bad – I have to drop down to 220mm Autocannons (which frankly was probably a good idea anyway, they hit the smaller stuff so much better). Nothing else needs to be done to my shield fit, and on my Armor fit I drop to a Meta 4 Energy Distruptor and swap one Trimark for an Ancillary Current Router. Both fits still seem workable.

I only have the armor fit in the hanger – so I decided to take it out and test it against.. errr.. a Rapier, why not.

[Hurricane, Armor]
Damage Control II
1600mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Gyrostabilizer II
Gyrostabilizer II

10MN Microwarpdrive II
Warp Disruptor II
Stasis Webifier II
Sensor Booster II, Scan Resolution Script

220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP M
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP M
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP M
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP M
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP M
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet EMP M
Heavy Assault Missile Launcher II, Caldari Navy Mjolnir Heavy Assault Missile
Medium Unstable Power Fluctuator I

Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Medium Ancillary Current Router I

Hobgoblin II x5
Hobgoblin II x1

While this looks good on paper with 62K EHP and 588DPS, it is an absolute brick to fly. The Rapier wasn’t able to kill it, but it obviously had no problem dictating range and making its escape when the long range ammo and drones plinked away enough at its shields.  I might have to play around with the shield fit.

(The reason for a PVP ship? I will probably never use them, but with suspect flags being so obvious in local, it might be nice having some combat ships nearby in case I want to do something stupid.)

Hauling Backbone

One of the benefits of being within your own Corp is that it is convenient and safe to have communal ships stored in a Corporate Hanger.

Because I am consolidating some of my haulers into the one location, I’ve been going over how they have been fit. Historically I have used a mix of Inertial Stablizers and Nanofiber Internal Structures in some of the low slots; carrying replacement Cargo Expanders for when I need more Capacity.

Inertia Stabilizers speed up your align times, but increase your signature radius (-20% Inertia Modifier, +11% Signature Radius for the T2 Module).

Nanofiber Internal Structures speed up your align times and max velocity, but reduce your hull hit points (-15.8% Inertia Modified, +9.4% Velocity, -20% Hull HP for the T2 Module).

I did a lot more auto piloting with empty haulers in the past, so the speed boost from the Nanofibers reduced the time it took to approach the jump range of each gate.

Now I rarely autopilot in a Hauler – even if it is empty. I guess it feels like they are easily killed and always a target.

The downside of the Nanofiber is that they take longer to go into warp in comparison to Inertia Stabilizers, both because they don’t improve agility as much, and because they increase the maximum speed. (You warp when aligned and at 75% of your maximum speed.) Because I am mostly manually flying my haulers now, I am swapping them out.

I figure every little bit helps, even if it is just a second here and there.

Speaking of haulers – I had lamented the loss of the Exequror’s Cargo role bonus with Retribution. Turns out I shouldn’t have. Due to the slot layout changes, they can carry even more!

Old capacity 2,830m3 with 18K EHP
New capacity 3,230m3 with 18K EHP

(Rigged and with full row of cargo expanders. They do lose one high slot, which is not really an issue.)

The other Cargo role bonuses ship I used was the humble Probe. That two turns out to be even better at hauling after Retribution as well!

Old capacity 989m3 with 1.4K EHP
New capacity 1,261m3 with 2K EHP

My non-hauler hauling backbone is safe. I sadly did a little dance when I realised this.

Last of all – my Orca Gist C-Type 100MN Afterburner warp trick no longer works. With the changes to the afterburner skill, I no longer seem to be able to accelerate to 75% of my maximum speed before the single reduced length cycle completes. It still warps quicker than without, but this adds a second or two. I don’t think I will go back to the MWD trick however, just as it will require fitting mods.

Communal ships sorted, now what’s next on the To-do list…

Impact of the Barge Changes

I am sitting down drinking a cup of tea. I am using a mug with my previous Corp’s logo on it. It is like a reminder of my failure to socialise properly in game.

My list of things I want to blog about – generally just a one line note; has grown well past a full page again. Thankfully most of these never see the light of day as by the time I get around to them I’ve missed the boat and they are no longer topical. I did want to try and clear some of them though while I am enthused.

First off, I mentioned back on the 4th of December that the patch notes indicated DED 1/10 and 2/10 static complexes had been moved to the exploration system. I remarked that I thought it was fair enough, although a touch sad.

Turns out I hadn’t considered the big picture. Rixx Javix points out that they were a good source of PVP in low sec.

http://eveoganda.blogspot.com.au/2012/12/ded-bigger-questions.html

He also points to an EO Forum thread on the topic, with all sorts of suggestions on this topic, some better than others:

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=177254

So I have quickly had my mind changed – no issue with having the sites removed from Empire, but how about re-adding to Low Sec, or even considering some of the ideas such as having to sit in them like FW for a period of time before the spawn arrive to encourage low sec PVP.

Second, CCP released a great little DEV blog showing the impact of the mining barge changes:

http://community.eveonline.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&nbid=74033

I had been hoping to see something like this.  If you ever want to see the way Industrialists work, check out the production changes once the Mining Barge updates were announced. I suspect a few people are sitting on paper losses, given not all of those new hulls ended up being piloted.

In February 2012, the order of least to most logged in or activated Mining Barges was roughly:

. Skiff (< 1,000)
. Procurer (~1,000)
. Covetor (~5,000)
. Mackinaw (~7,500)
. Retriever (~12,500)
. Hulk (~30,000)

In November 2012, after the Mining Barge changes, the numbers have seen some real change. Again in order of least to most logged in or activated:

. Skiff (~2,500)
. Procurer (~3,500)
. Covetor (~6,500)
. Hulk (~16,500)
. Mackinaw (~22,000)
. Retriever (~28,000)

These are not precise of scientific, I’ve just eye balled the graphs to get a rough overview. But they clearly show more people are flying Mining Barges (up from roughly 57K logging into / activating them in February to 79K in November), and they are using a wider range of them. While some would argue the AFK aspect of Retriever mining is a negative (although it ignores the fact you still have to swap asteroids regularly as they are depleted), it shows that given a choice, people are tending towards the self-hauling / free from can flipping, lower yields of the Retriever and Mackinaw.

Mining volumes have increased in Empire, but not really anywhere else. That would reflect the mineral prices which make mining out of Empire not really worth the risk for many players.  That is not a problem so much with Empire, but how the rare minerals are priced / in demand.  Maybe you need a bunch of new ships which use much higher volumes of the rarer minerals.

It hasn’t encouraged Ninja mining outside of Empire as I would have liked to have seen.  While I am sure things can be tweaked, I think overall this has been a good, worthwhile and successful change.

Working through the Retribution To-Do List

My desk is a mess, covered with paper work delayed by too much time lately spent playing EVE, and copious hand written notes with in game To-do lists, POS and Moon Research, Market notes and so on.  I really need to do a cleanup, but not tonight.

I noticed the price of the new Destroyers had dropped to just above build cost in Amarr.  Seems the gold rush has ended.  The profit margins are still around 200% in my backwater, but the sales have dropped off and it won’t be long before people knock that price on the head.  It costs me a little over 1.4M to build each of the destroyers on a non-researched BPO.

I took a Corax out.  It seems like a fun little hull for PVE, although a little awkward to fit.  I picked up 20M in loot from a Sansha Forsaken Hideaway.  (One of the anomalies you can pick up on your onboard scanner which can drop a Faction Frigate in the last spawn, as it did this time.)  It did look slightly awkward in space though, as if its alignment time did not match its shape.

Still like the Missile effects

My first run fit using whatever I had spare:

[Corax, PVE Play 01]

Damage Control II
Ballistic Control System II

1MN Afterburner II
Small Shield Booster II
Cap Recharger II
Cap Recharger II

Salvager II
Rocket Launcher II, Inferno Rocket
Rocket Launcher II, Inferno Rocket
Rocket Launcher II, Inferno Rocket
Rocket Launcher II, Inferno Rocket
Rocket Launcher II, Inferno Rocket
Rocket Launcher II, Inferno Rocket

Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I

I must admit I was really impressed with the visuals and sound during this post Retribution NPC’ing.  I am sure I’ll soon be zoomed back out and ignoring them, but they should help with the new player “wow” factor and subsequent retention.

Initial sales of my ship hulls and containers have been surprisingly ok, particularly as some are still competing against pre-retribution priced stock.

Now that the rush is over, I need to focus on the little things.  Tonight I start with buying for my various Toons the new skills Mining Frigate, Radar, Magnetometric, Ladar and Gravimetric Sensor Compensation, Salvage Drone Operation and Micro Jump Drive.  They are all at a nearby school station.

Next I need to source all container BPO’s.  They are under Deployable Ship Equipment in the market place, which is not immediately obvious.  The original DEV Blog included the corporations who sold them – none of which had stations in my home region.   I hunt down high sec stations for Amarr Constructions and Ishukone Corporation in Domain, Roden Shipyards in Sinq Laison, and Boundless Creations in Metropolis.  It ends up being a 70 odd jump trip to gather them all, although I notice the Survey Probes are for sale in Perimeter as I pass through, so grab those and mark another item off my To-do list.

I contemplate seeding them in my local region, but I can’t be bothered.  Why make it easy for the competition.

As I warp across the galaxy I ponder the use of some of these containers.  What I would like to see is a container that is subdivided into sections; displayed as tabs, such as having all your BPO in one container, but split into sections for ship hulls, modules, ammunition and such.  I think I have mused over that before.

The price of the Venture Blueprint is down to under 4M in Jita.  I grab two for 4.5M in Amarr on my way through to tick yet another item off the To-do list.  I expect it will get even cheaper, but I’m happy to pay that price to have it now and start the ME research.  I already have a Venture – grabbed by running the Industry Tutorial Chain of quests after a tip on CCP’s Facebook page.

I have to stop at another station to offload my BPO temporarily before docking in Amarr, so that I don’t look like a target when I undock from the trade hub.  I remember to go back and pick the rest of them up afterwards.

I throw up some extra containers on the market, put aside some for Corp use, and put one of the Venture BPO in the POS for ME research.  I then move some of the blue prints I had sitting in a NPC Research Station over to the system where the research POS is anchored, where I do some sorting.

New BPO

I will have to now go to the Retribution release notes, and look at everything I have highlighted, to test / understand / update settings and the like to make the most of things.

I know my last series of updates might seem mundane, but it is keeping me focused.  I also figure it is pertinent at times to show a picture of what a Carebear Industrialist can get up to.  It wouldn’t be for everyone.

Initial thoughts on Retribution

All my Retribution preparations have been concluded – with manufacturing and research ticking over and all related stock now up for sale.  Even if nothing more was to shift, my Corp has 600M ISK extra in its coffers.  There is no risk with the remaining items on the market – their costs are comfortably covered by their refined value, so any sales are just cream on top.  Considering the small scale I was operating at, and the hours of game play it provided, I can already call it a success.

I still have plenty of things to do – there are various items in the release notes I want to check out, skills and BPO to chase down and such, but nothing that is time critical.

So far my initial impressions of Retribution are positive.  There are certainly a few issues:

. The Splash Screen between the Launcher and Log-on still shows Inferno
. My GPU is working much harder with two clients on screen at the same time (from averaging around 80% to 99%)
. Once a week while playing EVE I will have my nVidia driver crash on me. It has happened half a dozen times today.
. Once a week while playing EVE I will have a socket error disconnection. It has happened half a dozen times today.
. Not uncommon to have Shield, Armour and Hull showing 25% damaged, but mouse over shows 100% healthy
. Occasional issues with how lock icons were working
. I haven’t bothered with PI since there is a known bug with customer offices
. I can’t remotely transfer Corp purchases to Corp Members

That last issue saw me having to fly through low sec in a shuttle to put all those Station Containers on the market.

The things I really like:

. The compact inventory view, and the fact windows have better memory and more consistent behaviour
. The clear alert when you have a flag which makes logging off dangerous
. Resistance Modules visually show what attribute they are buffing
. Being able to move each individual lock icon around
. The fact you can see people who have current suspect flags in local. That could really add game play options going forward.

I have a set of the new destroyers and a new mining frigate to have a play around with too. All told, a positive start.

A late night

I can see one particular issue coming up with the Retribution release – not having access to manufacturing slots. I’ve noticed over the last couple weeks that it is not uncommon to have to wait 12 or more hours to get one in my local area. Not ideal if you want to make some quick ISK on turning over the new ship hulls.

Ahhh – but I have a POS now.

To manufacture Frigates and Destroyers at a POS you need a Small Ship Assembly Array. The Ship Assembly provides 10 manufacturing slots which are 25% faster than station slots. It requires 250 CPU and 100,000 MW, which I have room for on the POS. Even if it is not strictly necessary, it falls into the category of “useful to have”.

Someone must have had the same thought in Amarr, and the price was at an abnormally high level. Jita worked out to be far cheaper. It is a 75M ISK 10Km3 module – so a slight risk to haul. I grab the blockade runner for the speed and hope no one felt like gambling on that sort of drop.

I open the Market tab while on my way to Jita, just in case I come across a cheaper price on my travels, but have no such luck. I dock in Jita 4-4, purchase an array, load up, undock and warp to an aligned celestial. I’m clear and manually fly home without issue.

In the background I am busy buying up Station Containers in every station within half a dozen odd jumps for resale after the patch goes through.

Once back I online the new Array at the POS, and then consider one last preparation. I send out 4 of my Toons and sit them in stations where the new destroyer BPO should seed, which are between 8 and 22 jumps from home.

Ok Retribution – that is as much preparation as I am going to do for you.

…

In the good old days an expansion would take 8 to 24 hours. Retribution was in under 2.

Feeling somewhat foolish at the amount of effort I was making, I grab 5 copies of each BPO and start the process of manually flying them home.

Meanwhile I try to remotely deliver all those Station Containers I had purchased on behalf of my Corporation to my Trade Alt – only to find it won’t work. First Retribution bug hit. I resort to manually flying to stations to put the sell orders up.

As each of the BPO arrive, I put up 3 on the market for re-sale, and kick off a single build on the remaining 2. I am first to market with the BPO, and they all sell over the first 6 hours with a margin of around 150%. I shouldn’t think anyone would complain about that for the convenience, and they were far cheaper than the 500% margin sell orders I notice today.

I am again first to market with 2 of each of the destroyer hulls, and put them all up at 350% margins.

I then throw 1 set of the BPO on for ME research at the POS, and start cooking another 3 of each hull with the remaining set of BPO.

I get to bed well past midnight thinking I am too old for this stuff, with about half the Station Containers on the market.

I wake in the morning to find everything sold, with the market prices for the new destroyer hulls sitting at between 700 and 1200% margins, with nothing available. I put up my extra 12 hulls at the original 350% margins, and they sell relatively quickly.

I know it might sound silly – but while I am happy to be paid a healthy premium for my effort, I am not trying to milk this for every ISK.

So – remembering this is only small fry efforts in a backwater system, my Industry Efforts for Retribution have seen so far:

Clear Profits:

330M on Blockade Runners
280M on New Destroyer BPO and Hulls
20M on Various Containers

New Assets:

51M in new Destroyer BPO
75M in a Small Ship Assembly Array

Up for sale:

750M of Station and various other Containers, Logistic Cruisers and Frigates

 

Most of the items up for sale are not there for a quick turn around.  They have been seeded on the market as convenience items with generally large margins.  They are low risk – refining them will cover any costs, so they will be very much set and forget.  For example – making sure there are Station Containers for sale in Low Sec systems with no factory slots.

Oh – love the new Retribution log in screen.

Also amused by the number of people asking “Is there any way you can avoid getting a Bounty on your head?” – which normally sees a no answer and a stream of bounties being applied.

Fuel

It can be a bit of an art lining everything up perfectly

It is odd logging in and not having the Corporate Channel constantly flashing away with conversations. As was remarked by Red on my last post – I am back to being a real EVE Hermit.

On the plus side, the guilt level has fallen away. I don’t have to feel bad any time I am off doing my own thing.

So the POS is up and running, but nothing is anchored and I only have about 45 days’ worth of fuel.

I look around for a POS setup tool, but the URL of the main one people are commenting on is blocked by both Google and my Anti-Virus software as being a source of malicious software. I decide to just use a spreadsheet.

The Small Dark Blood POS I am using isn’t the best option for Research Labs. It only has 1350 CPU. Your standard Mobile Laboratory for Blueprint work requires 500 CPU, while the Advanced Mobile Laboratory requires 600 CPU, limiting you to just two labs on that POS. If my notes are still valid, the Minmatar POS variations give 1500 CPU, Gallente 1688, and Caldari 1875.

However on the plus side, I already had it, it uses 20% less fuel than standard POS, and the fuel is local.

I plant a Standard and an Advanced Lab, giving me access to 5 Material Research, 3 Time Efficiency, 4 Copy and 7 Invention Slots. That will cover me for what I want to do, and makes the POS slightly less of a target. I really do appreciate how much quicker it is to anchor and online these.

I’ll work out what defenses to anchor on it later.

Now for Fuel. I have researched Fuel Block BPO’s and a stack of the ingredients, but I don’t feel inclined to chase down what is missing and manufacture them. I’ll do that later. I log my Price Check alts on and look at Amarr fuel block (and charter) prices in Ren’s, Amarr and Jita, plus locally. Not surprisingly Amarr is the cheapest. I check the price history to ensure it wasn’t at a price spike (it wasn’t), and put a hole in the Corp Wallet by purchasing 6 months’ worth of fuel. Again I could have saved some ISK using buy orders, but I just want everything sorted and in place, so pay a premium for it. For the next 6 months the POS will in effect cost me 2.5M ISK a day to run – or 77M a month, or 925M for a full year.

That is a substantial chunk of my current Corp’s profits. I look back at my old spreadsheets, and find at one point my POS fuel costs were under 35M a month. Am I allowed to say “those were the days..”?

The timing of the Retribution update later today means I won’t be in a position to make the most of the market opportunities (being asleep, and then having to work), so I’ll be in no rush to start buying BPOs and building the new Destroyers and such.

While I haven’t remarked on it, I have been reading the various DEV Blogs and Patch notes that are available on Retribution. I noticed this little bit in the Release Notes:

“1/10 and 2/10 static DED complexes have been moved to the exploration system”

While that makes sense, and the static sites were indeed farmed heavily, it will be a touch sad not to see them on your overview.

 

And back to solo play

Long time no see

The 24 hour delay after dropping roles passed, and I went back to my personal Corp. I meekly left with not many people remarking on it.

I mothballed my two carriers. I left a useful collection of ships stored within them, some supplies and ammunition, and enough fuel to get me most places in EVE. When I next have use for them, they will be ready to roll.

An Alt was logged in half the day scouting my movements in and out of low sec. It was interesting watching the comings and goings. The system is well placed and used for Logistics by quite a number of Alliances. There seems to be some unspoken (or spoken, what do I know) truce – as I watched a steady procession of capitals and cynos move through, all apparently politely ignoring each other.

I grabbed any leftover spares and fuel, and moved them, and my mining base, back to where my Industry Alt operates.

I believed I had to wait 7 days for the standings of my main and Alt to impact the Corp – but they don’t appear to have changed since I left over a year ago. (Neither Alt left in the Corp had any standings.) I’m not sure if that is a bug or what, but EVE is telling me I should be able to anchor a POS immediately.

So the next step is to test that theory. I can’t anchor a POS in the home system, so I need a system within 3 jumps, with a free moon, a station with a free office slot at a reasonable price, and hopefully not a huge amount of traffic.

I scout 8 systems, which takes a number of hours. Some are discounted due to office slots or rent, and some are discounted as they have no free moons. Now remember I am in a relatively quiet region, yet I found one system with over 30 moons, every one of which had something anchored on it. I use probes to scan down POS in one system (6 on 30 moons), but otherwise am forced to just warp to each moon in turn to take notes as generally at least 75% of the moons have something on them.

I must admit I was surprised by this. There was a suggestions I read recently which was to allow offline POS to be looted / unanchored / Hacked by anyone. After my travels today, I am inclined to support such a thing. Around half the POS were offline.

It Lives!

So I picked a system, a station, and a moon. Not entirely trusting what the EVE client was telling me, I was pleased to see the anchoring and onlining of my research POS occurred without hick up. Now to work out the fit and stockpile some supplies.

Thanks for All the Fish

Earlier this week, to mark the end of the Orca’s rein as the safe hauler, I visited Jita and spent up big.

Included in the buy up were a Worm, Gila, Hookbill and Osprey Navy Issue, just to give myself something different to fly. (They were also at a low in their price cycle.)

I picked up 4 Inner Zone Shipping Catalysts for 20M a piece. Two days later they are going for over 100M each. I purchased these for myself, but in the long term I might consider selling a couple.

I purchased 30 odd new BPO, mostly POS related. These are the first BPO I’ve picked up for quite some time.

I turned over the blockade runners, clearing 330M in profit.

I kept two for my Corporation’s fleet – getting them before the price spike.

My manufacturing preparations for Retribution have finished. I can see on the market others (expectedly) had the same idea. I am in no rush to turn stock over, so I will sit on them and wait and see how things pan out.

I’ve restocked my mineral supplies at good prices.

I’ve decided to re-anchor a High Sec research POS. To do so requires me to temporarily leave my current Corp. After long consideration I’ve decided to make the move permanent. There is some Low Sec related stuff I want to do that requires me to be able to anchor another POS down the track.

I evacuated all my assets from NPC 0.0, and am in the process of mothballing my carriers.

There is a lot I appreciate about my current Corp, but I haven’t been in a position to make the most of it.  I won’t have left a lasting impression, and I won’t be missed – which doesn’t reflect well on my MMO credentials.