Nanotrasen Inc Needs You! (EVE online)

ColonicAcid · Post by **ColonicAcid** » Fri Sep 19, 2014 9:21 pm #29767

Bottom post of the previous page:

I'm Caldari.
I fit Missiles and Drones.
I'm a Shield tanker.
I want to fly a interceptor.
I currently fly both Frigs and Cruisers.
I want to go for a crow and stuff like that.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Fri Sep 19, 2014 9:28 pm #29771

I don't have any racial allegiance. I have the most points in Gallente hulls but I have a good amount in everyone.
I have the most skills in drones, then missiles, then blasters.
I have twice as many SP in Armor tanking than Shield tanking. ~900k vs. ~450k.
I'll fly whatever is needed most. I'll probably wind up in a carrier or a command ship soon.
I can fly every T1 sub-capital ship. I can fly every T2 frig except for interceptors.

For simplicity sake our decision for the moment is whether we ought to focus on Caldari or Gallente hulls.

My vote is for Caldari, since it seems like most of our newer players went Caldari and almost all of our experienced players are familiar with them it'll be the easiest adjustment.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Fri Sep 19, 2014 9:55 pm #29778

Well we could go dual race, race neutral, or focus on one race.

Caldari-Gallente combos pretty hard in terms of their ewar ships MASSIVELY increasing the effective tank of Caldari interceptors for example, and from a logistics standpoint it isn't too painful to handle. Especially because if our vets are Gallente then they can generally provide their own ships.

This is getting a bit too much into combat doctrine talk which you didn't want to do. I could easily go to Jita and get some BPOs for a shitfit in both Gal and Cal without breaking the bank and researching them out wouldn't be hard at all. Especially if we started with a blaster boat from each of them and then eventually spread out to have the specialist ships of both factions.

Ricotez · Post by **Ricotez** » Fri Sep 19, 2014 10:20 pm #29786

I originally trained Minmatar because I enjoyed the idea of only needing a roll of duct tape to maintain my ships.

But I went back to my own race, Gallente, and have a Domi drone boat. Though to be honest, probably so many skills and stats changed that I have to completely redesign my fit.

Reyouka · Post by **Reyouka** » Fri Sep 19, 2014 10:32 pm #29789

Spoilered because long copypaste shit from EVEmon.

Spoiler:

Drones and railguns are what I normally use. I have a Vexor atm.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Fri Sep 19, 2014 11:10 pm #29792

REJOICE BROTHERS FOR WE HAVE OUR FIRST SHITFIT ROAM DOCTRINE CREATED BY GLORIOUS CEO

If you go look at the corp fittings you'll see our new poster boy for imminent self-destruction, labeled

"Merlin - Lo PVP"

This is an all-in-one tackler/DPS boat. It features 5k EHP and roughly 120 DPS at shotgun ranges. It goes SANIC fast at max speed of 2.8km/s. It costs a total of 4.17m per ship + fits. It's companion ship is the...

"Bantam - Lo Logi"

An ugly little fucker that skulks around the battlefield at ~20km or so barfing shields all over anyone who needs it. It may not look like much, but it only costs 3.06mil and reps a constant 81hp/s. I mean just look at it all hunched over like it's watching the fight unfold through a locker-room window and jerkin' it real hard.

Anyway look over those two fits and make sure you can fly them. It should be easy as fuck to get in both and the skills to maximize them are skills you'll probably either already have or want to pick up on the way to something better regardless.

The idea is to get one scout, 2-3 Bantams, and then pile everyone else into those Merlins and plunge into Nullsec like a five dollar whore and come out just as wrecked. Depending on testing we may be able to option in some destroyers and cruisers, but for now let's just keep it simple and stupid.

The glorious part: any idiot can join us on these roams for free. I'm pretty sure you can easily train up the garbage you need to fly these fuckers during your trial period. Within a few days at most.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Fri Sep 19, 2014 11:59 pm #29801

Okay at the urging of our Research Director I also added

"Griffin - Lo EWAR"

The hunchback's nerdy cousin. Rather than bother to rep our merlins we'll just jam the fuck out of anyone who wants to shoot at them. Crunching some numbers these shitfits will roughly have a 33% chance to jam a battleship per cycle, 46.6% chance to jam a cruiser, and a 77.7% chance to jam a frigate with my shitty skills. These guys are a little more skill intensive, and maybe putting up a "Lo" version of them is kinda silly considering the investment it takes to get good in one of them but hey whatever fuck it man. You blob 2-3 of them together following a group around and shit'll happen. Also they only cost like 2mil a pop so who cares?

EDIT:

I crunched some numbers and found that the percentage chance of success for jamming when you have four slots available to you is better if you just run four multispecs and run activate them on the target in a ripple or cascade, not all at once. I've added a "Griffin - Lo EWAR" with the aforementioned ECMs and with my shitty skills recalculating the percentage it should be 88% to jam a battleship per cycle, and the other two ships should be a sure thing. Of course there are still dice rolls involved so nothing is guaranteed (and my percentages from the paragraph above were slightly lower than they would be if you just spammed the incorrect racial jammers on the target as well) but it seems like if you can mass ECMs multispecs are the way to go.

ThanatosRa · Post by **ThanatosRa** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 12:14 am #29803

Makes me swell with Caldari pride...

Of course now I remember that I never intend to go back unless CCP stops fucking up and stops it's idiotic budgeting scheme internally which was responsible for causing the WoD MMO to become stillborn.

Which is a pity because I was going into Caldari Black ops cruisers.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 1:13 am #29807

I just realized we'll have a small squad of guys harassing enemies flying in Griffins.

Even in fucking spacewars, we are GRIFF.

EDIT: And all our doctrine ships are grey.

God dammit.

XSI · Post by **XSI** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 3:05 am #29822

You guys are making me seriously consider getting back to EVE
I still have a jumpclone down at highsec to go back to. Pretty much everything else I had was in nullsec stations though

M0nsoon · Post by **M0nsoon** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 4:32 am #29828

Ricotez wrote:I originally trained Minmatar because I enjoyed the idea of only needing a roll of duct tape to maintain my ships.

But I went back to my own race, Gallente, and have a Domi drone boat. Though to be honest, probably so many skills and stats changed that I have to completely redesign my fit.

Well since you flew a good amount of Minmatar, can you tell me why when I hide wrecks on my overview I still see their ships?

I'm also learned to use all the factions frigates but mostly Gallente, I'm learning how to fly more Amarr ships because I like laser beams

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 5:55 am #29837

In rust we trust.

Minmatar have great ships for solo ops. They fit a really specific theme though, and if you don't build around their strengths at the exclusion of everything else they fall apart. Where-as the other three empires can all play somewhat nicely with eachother, Minmatar just plain don't.

But damn if they don't have their strengths. The hurricane and thrasher are both phenomenal. The rifter, the hound, the wolf, the stilleto, the stabber, the vagabond, the loki...

They just don't get a lot of love in big ops because they don't fit into most outfit's fleet doctrine very well. You can't really remote rep someone's speed tank. Their EWAR is arguably the worst. Their fluff is that they're a bunch of guerilla commando fighters that use hit and run tactics but neither their racial stuff nor the way the game works really support that. They are to missiles as Amarr is to drones. Yyyyeah they CAN use 'em, but most of their best options don't.

Everytime I see a Cyclone gang or a Loki gang smashing the shit out of something on the killboard it makes me smile though.

Dollar for dollar they're the most efficient sons of bitches in the game. If only had 600,000,000 to kit out a fleet without regards to pilot count, you could fit 6,000 shit rifters and rule the galaxy.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 6:55 am #29844

An0n3 wrote:They are to missiles as Amarr is to drones. Yyyyeah they CAN use 'em, but most of their best options don't.

You fucking wot m8? Amarr pilots basically have to learn how to use drones to be viable and most end up specializing heavily in them.

Many of Amarr's most iconic ships are known for being amazing drone boats that beat out Gal. Their drones are not as offensively strong but many of their drone ships are considered more vital to fleet operations. The Armageddon is one of the few viable hybrid EWAR battleships in the game, they have the best carrier up against the Caldari, and the curse is honestly probably one of the most powerful ships in the game. All of their drone boats fly full redundant wings like Galentee and while their damage and support utility is slightly lower on average their defense and offensive utility usually makes Amarr droneboats more commonly sought out in PVP than Galentee by specialist pilots. Which is kind of a theme with Amarr. It is all about sacrificing everything to get every last ounce of specialization out of your fit. Shit is a nightmare to skill for as a non-combat pilot but the results are amazing.

I was actually considering skilling for a Curse to go out with you guys until I realized I had to be the scout. Those things are monstrous and can render multiple battleships completely helpless with the help of a tackler. Though for our needs the Falcon would be the clear winner as its a stealthy jammer that basically makes small fights impossible to win.

Mimnitar themselves are fucking weird. As in while a lot of their team modules are lackluster in the intended role of the ship (Target painting for EWAR? Really?) they end up having really unique functions that almost demand they work with other factions or that completely remove their ability to. The Huginn for example is a god damned sniper tackler with target painters that could support a Caldari cruise missile team rather well, but then you got stuff like the scimitar which does god knows what and serves no real purpose. There is a reason you don't recognize a lot of Mimnitar ship names in terms of battleships but you probably remember the names of more specialized support oriented ships like their tackle interceptor. In some ways I can understand the idea of them as rebel insurgent types, most of their ships are really good for ganking or extreme short term lethality or being super vestaile cobbled together hunks of junk, but the way they go about it is so weird its hard to fit them into a traditional warfare module at all. Which is problematic for Mimnitar missile ships because missiles are pretty much all about traditional warfare models: long ranged standoffs with smart defined battle lines and sniping out logistics.

It also really sucks how easy a mimnitar ship is to shut down in a real fight. Every form of EWAR is hyper effective against them. Combined with the point you made about speed tank not making sense from a logi perspective and its easy to understand why everyone is afraid of small to medium Mim pirate ganks and doesn't talk about that time a Mimnitar fleet totally busted up their op.

But to get off of that tangental essay: I am going to start scouting out potential areas we can cut our teeth on, and setting up nulsec safepoint highways to get there. Before we even consider this though we would need to have a bootcamp in fleet operations, how to move through nulsec, set up everyone's UI's, and most important a talk about communications protocol. Nothing kills a gank fleet faster than people not knowing what "battle-coms" means.

ColonicAcid · Post by **ColonicAcid** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 10:38 am #29862

To first learn about oneself one must learn about the tengu spam.

Comrade Leo · Post by **Comrade Leo** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 11:14 am #29869

dezzmont wrote:
But to get off of that tangental essay: I am going to start scouting out potential areas we can cut our teeth on, and setting up nulsec safepoint highways to get there. Before we even consider this though we would need to have a bootcamp in fleet operations, how to move through nulsec, set up everyone's UI's, and most important a talk about communications protocol. Nothing kills a gank fleet faster than people not knowing what "battle-coms" means.

This so much.

I'll take a look at that griffin fit and see if it is in any way similar to the one I use.

Comrade Leo · Post by **Comrade Leo** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 11:31 am #29870

[quote="An0n3"]Okay at the urging of our Research Director I also added

"Griffin - Lo EWAR"

Mine has a ionic field projector rig for targeting range against cloakers instead of the particle dispersion augment. I use two hypnos instead of the DC, I also got 2 rockets for short range dps. My fit was from a nullsec roam fleet doctrine from a while ago though. With my skills I get a 4.2 jam strength with the multi vs 7.6 on the racial dedicated ecm, 49km range with 31 optimal.

ColonicAcid · Post by **ColonicAcid** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 12:36 pm #29875

Comrade Leo wrote:
dezzmont wrote:
But to get off of that tangental essay: I am going to start scouting out potential areas we can cut our teeth on, and setting up nulsec safepoint highways to get there. Before we even consider this though we would need to have a bootcamp in fleet operations, how to move through nulsec, set up everyone's UI's, and most important a talk about communications protocol. Nothing kills a gank fleet faster than people not knowing what "battle-coms" means.
This so much.

I'll take a look at that griffin fit and see if it is in any way similar to the one I use.

Are you implying that I shouldn't talk about my life troubles while we are trying to primary targets?

wow
Yo real talk tho anon since you can fly a rattlesnake you should fly that while everyone else is frigates.

Drones are hella strong right now and in the alliance tourny Rattlesnakes + frigate support was the metagaem

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 5:36 pm #29920

We should avoid doing things just because they won the alliance tourny. Its good to learn from them but the tourny is kind of a silly event, and doesn't represent a real fleet situation too well. I remember one year an alliance did very well just by bribing everyone.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 5:48 pm #29923

My rattlesnake has way too big a price tag attached to it for me to want to bring it with us on our first roams.

Maybe down the road, but not right now.

dezzmont wrote:-Amarr pilot explaining how great Amarr is-

You missed my point completely to rant about your favorite empire. In terms of pure drone damage and drone utility Gallente rule. Amarr use drones as well but not with the singular focus Gallente do. Like how in terms of pure missile damage and missile utility Caldari are king, though the Minmatar do have ships that use missiles as well it's not the same singular philosophy.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 6:29 pm #29930

You missed the point. Amarr actually use drones as a primary combat mechanic to the point many of their drone ships can be considered better than their Gal counterparts. Mimnitar basically don't use missiles at all on serious warships. You are more likely to see an Amarr with missiles in a serious battle than a Mimnitar. You need to be a drone user to fly any non-frig Amarr ship because so much of their combat ability comes from drone skills.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 9:18 pm #29956

Again you are not getting what I'm laying down here. Let's compare two typical ships, the Gallente Dominix Battleship and the Amarr Armageddon.

The Dominix is the basic Gallente drone-boat battleship. Per level in Gallente battleships it gets +10% Drone Hitpoints and Damage, as well an additional 7.5% to Drone Optimal Range and Tracking Speed.

The Armageddon is the Amarr drone-boat battleship. Per level in Amarr battleships it gets +10% Drone Hitpoints and Damage, but instead of another drone buff it gets +10% to Energy Vampire and Energy Neutralizer range.

That perfectly exemplifies what I'm saying, that Gallente ships are more focused on drones while the Amarr split that focus to do drones and something else (typically that other thing is cap warfare). It's right there in their ship design. The Armageddon is also the ONLY Amarr battleship that gets ANY drone bonus. FWIW I see a lot more Apocs showing up in fleets and just hanging around in space than I do Armageddons, but that's just what I see and who knows if that's true for the whole universe.

Anyway enough of that shit. If you want to get the last word in go for it but I think I've proved my point.

FOR EVERYONE ELSE:

BEEP BEEP WE GOT CHEEP DEEPS

"Cormorant - Lo DPS"

...joins the fray. Roughly 200dps with shitty fits and almost 6k EHP. Doesn't go fast. Doesn't do anything fancy. Just rails on things at 10km real hard. Dirt cheap, too, at roughly 3mil. If we have a few merlins and a few griffins ready to go, this guy would make a great filler. It's tougher than the other two ships and does more damage, but it's also slower and doesn't do anything fancy. All pew pew, no bullshit.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 9:40 pm #29960

Do you think you could throw together a cruiser capable of doing level 3s in small gangs and supporting a battleship in L4s? Its a tall order but if you could pull it off it would be a great source of income.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 10:32 pm #29973

Yikes. I'm trying to stick with a Lo/Hi concept both in terms of costs and SP investment, kind of like how our airforce does it with jets and shit. Some hulls might get used for both, but sometimes not.

A cruiser that can run L3's in gangs is a job for a lo-concept ship. A cruiser that can solo L3's is a hi-concept.

A cruiser trying to show up to help run L4's is a suicide-concept. You should be in a Tech 2 hull or a Battlecruiser. Preferably a Battleship. Ideally a Maurader or Pirate Faction Battleship.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 10:52 pm #29974

Well I mean it is possible to do L4s in a T2 frig if you skill hard enough. I was just wondering how high a mission level we could get 5 people doing alone together and how cheap we could do it. I know we could get them into 4's with BCs for example, but those are hard for newbies to buy for themselves.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 11:02 pm #29978

I honestly don't know. I have no idea what would happen if you dragged like, four combat cruisers and one logi cruiser into an L4.

I'm brewing up a blaster cruiser for L2/L3 ops right now. In case people want to keep with the blasters rather than move to missiles. If anyone is one of those guys, you really really ought to think about getting into missiles though. The Caracal, Drake, Cerberus, Raven, and Golem are all really great.

EDIT: Done, there's a servicable Moa in there now that should be able to stomp all over L2's and solo most L3's without a lot of trouble. If you fit it, I recommend using EVE Survival (google it) reports to let you know what kind of opposition you're looking at in a mission before you get there, and swapping the adaptive invul for a specific damage type to improve the tank. Shouldn't be necessary for L2's but you might want to do that before taking on L3's. It's got like 15k EHP reps stable 100hp/s and can afterburn all over the place stable while dumping out 300 something DPS with drones. Change ammo types if you want to hit at further ranges. Blah blah blah.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 11:17 pm #29979

I was thinking less 4 combat cruisers and one logi cruiser and more 4 combat cruisers, a logi cruiser, and a battleship. The combat ships likely fitting heavy tank with long ranged missiles to take out other cruisers in the mission.

4 combat cruisers and a logi cruiser almost certainly should be able to clear 3s alone.

Comrade Leo · Post by **Comrade Leo** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 11:44 pm #29983

I already have a Drake with passive tank and caracal with active shield tank, drake can handle any L3 and should be able to tag along in a L4.I already have L4 access with Caldari, best place is in Ikami. If you want mega bucks from missions, someone needs to fly a cheap salvage destroyer and hoover up afterward. I've done L4s before with a basic raven (something i don't have with this account or skilled for) with cruise missiles, I've even done them in a stealth bomber with another raven.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sat Sep 20, 2014 11:52 pm #29984

Getting a cheapo salvage destro will never really be an issue. Me an an0n3 can both fly them and I really don't get to make money on my own as a researcher.

I have personally flown BCs in T4s. It isn't hard, you just have to be a tank build, and while a cruiser would objectively not be as helpful they can still do it. I know my T2 Assault Frig can contribute now too despite having no solo potential.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 12:38 am #29986

I added a Kestrel fit to the corp. The Kestrel is a weird ship.

"Kestrel - Lo PVP"

It's interchangeable with the Merlin for fleet composition. They're our two tacklers. The Kestrel has less DPS on paper, but don't dismiss it immediately.

It may output less DPS on paper, but it has the advantage of being able to select different damage types. Hybrid Turrets will always deal 50/50 thermal/kinetic damage split. Missiles of all kinds can easily swap between 100% EM, Thermal, Kinetic, or Explosive. Which makes them really great for PVE, but also makes them handy if you know ahead of time what kinds of ships your enemies are flying, or you want to mix up the damage type your fleet does to prevent others from countering it. We should probably use EMP when we have the choice. Anyway...

They also never miss. Missiles will always do SOME damage to whoever they're fired at. There's no tracking involved like with turrets. Tracking dampening does nothing to them. So while the Merlin does more DPS on paper than the Kestrel, in practice the two should be more evenly matched. The Merlin is going to fire and not hit sometimes, or get glancing hits because there's a tracking "to hit" roll being made behind the scenes. The Kestrel just rolls damage based on factors like target velocity and signature radius.

Mostly I put it there as an option for people who want to start training / have trained missiles and don't want to use hybrid turrets in the fleet. It's babby's first pvp missile ship.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 1:07 am #29987

Missiles also happen to be fucking awesome in nearly every way and at every level of skill and see more use in every aspect of EVE than hybrids. Not that hybrids are bad or worthless. Their on paper DPS is higher after all, and good gunners can go nuts with them. Its just missiles have a lot more utility and usability in most fits and don't take as much intense training, and overall have more advantages in PVE due to damage type switching. In PVP blasters and such see more use, as highly skilled gunners can deal serious damage and they can hit targets under their weight class better, so we probably will see more use from them during ganks, but in high end warfare and PVE efficiency you will want to seriously consider being a caldari missile pilot.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 1:54 am #29988

We should plan some night this week to hve a trial ops roam.

When are folks free?

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 2:20 am #29991

Any day after 4 PM for me mostly.

M0nsoon · Post by **M0nsoon** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 5:47 am #30007

I'm on mostly at night, but I'm free wednsdays and thursdays

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 6:20 pm #30064

Wednesday night would work for me but let's not decide yet. Tentatively wednesday night but we'll see what others say.

The thing to keep in mind with roams is that, if everything goes well, they can be very profitable.
We catch a single T3 cruiser running sites in lowsec, or lone battleship that we can swarm effectively and we get paid big in the form of their fittings. Even a random T2 frig or cruiser can be a cache of profit when single dedspace fittings cost more than our entire fleet.

As far as the actual profit sharing goes I was thinking we'd just keep that shit simple and reimburse people for ships first, then split what's left evenly among the gang. I should have enough liquid ISK on hand if everyone trades me all the loot to calculate it all on evepraisal and just pay out shares on the spot, then handle the actual selling later. If anyone wants to forego their share so others get more or donate it to the corp wallet that's easy to do as well. We DO have corp bills to pay I've been paying for out of pocket this whole time. Not a huge deal, but ideally the corp is supposed to sustain itself.

Comrade Leo · Post by **Comrade Leo** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 7:28 pm #30067

I'll do a wednesday, as long as it's not 5am in my timezone or something equally as silly.

ColonicAcid · Post by **ColonicAcid** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 8:23 pm #30076

Wensday night for us europoors is quite late.
Like midnight late maybe.

If we're going to do nights for you americans please do it on a friday or a saturday so I can come in without going to work without any sleep.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 8:54 pm #30084

Wednesday evening for us, then? If we go on a roam at 4pm EST that's only 9pm GMT.

Looking at who is reporting in already, I've fudged the fleet makeup a little bit.

Dezz can fly a scout and scan down targets running sites in lowsec for us. Our targets for now will be frigs, destroyers, and cruisers. Preferably ones that don't use drones.

I'm not entirely sold on Caldari EWAR but we'll roll with it. We need two people to fly those Griffins.

After that, we'll need at least one person to fly one of our merlins or kestrels, and from that point onward it's all free for DPS or more tacklers. I'm personally planning on showing up in a test Caracal DPS fit to give our fleet some more punch, to keep us from hanging out in space for too long and bouncing off some big bad ship.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 8:59 pm #30085

It may be smart to try to hunt in nulsec rather than lowsec. Targets can be worth more, and people feel safer in nulsec. Also there is no sec standing loss and its harder to tell if people are in system. That said many targets in nul don't fly alone.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 9:26 pm #30098

I want to stay close to home. If not low, then a nearby wormhole might be nice to poke our heads into.

I don't trust the fleet to remain composed yet over an extended series of jumps through hostile space. We need a shakedown sortie. While hunting in null does have a lot of advantages, it's a terrible idea for our first outing.

I know where a series of lowsec systems are nearby that are usually pretty empty. I go run through them every so often when I want to go relic/data hunting. The biggest gate camp I've seen was two cruisers.

Also...

"Caracal - Lo PVP"

Is up if you're curious what I'm looking at. It's not cheap but it's not breaking the bank either at roughly 50mil. It's nothing to write home about. With my skills and the modules running it gets 260dps with 20k EHP. It's not quite a real "Lo" concept cruiser, it's got too much Tech 2 stuff on it. It's a work in progress but I thought I'd share it for now.

It does have one warp disruptor on it, which isn't really covering tackle duties all by itself but one more merlin paired with it should do alright.

To re-iterate:

Scouting duties: Dezz, filled
ECM Griffin duties: Two needed
Tackle duties: An0n3 + One needed
DPS duties: at will, after other roles filled

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 9:51 pm #30106

It would actually be amazingly easy to get the other tackler to be part of the team's DPS, as most tackle ships are also close range brawlers, aside from the rare and hilarious sniper tackles. You could just slap a web on the mid alongside some shield mods and be good.

Also my scout can handle some light cargo hauling and salvage work. Could even finish off hacking and relic sites of people we nab, one of the best times to bushwack people is when they are knee deep in the hacking minigame.

If it turns out we don't have enough people to have two dedicated ECMs we could always seed the entire squad with ECM to aid our dedicated EWAR ship.

ColonicAcid · Post by **ColonicAcid** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 10:11 pm #30110

I'll tackle ye. Is it cool if I bring my condor even tho its not part of our doctrine? If not I'll just fly dps caracal.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 10:23 pm #30112

ColonicAcid wrote:I'll tackle ye. Is it cool if I bring my condor even tho its not part of our doctrine? If not I'll just fly dps caracal.

I think a Condor would be appropriate as long as its well fit. It isn't expensive. Just remember that you have a 50/50 shot of losing it.

Corp fits are for both letting newbies know good, strong, cheapo fits, and they let me get the BPOs for stuff I know people will want.

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 10:35 pm #30113

Worst case scenario I have a Keres that can dampen people's sensors, but it's not perfect at all.

If I futz around with the fittings a little more I can cut people's targeting ranges down to like...somewhere in the 10% range. So if we can all fly ships that can do everything we need to do at 10km+ ranges than we'll be untouchable. We'd definitely need some scrams and webs to keep that up though.

ColonicAcid wrote:I'll tackle ye. Is it cool if I bring my condor even tho its not part of our doctrine? If not I'll just fly dps caracal.

Yeah. The doctrine fits are there for reasons like Dezz said. If you fly one and it blows up, chances are we can get you reimbursed for some or all of it. If you show up in some 200mil random pirate faction ship and it explodes that's your loss. Don't be that guy.

That being said, the condor is okay but our two doctrine fit pvp frigs are better. If you aren't going to fly one of the hulls look at your modules and make sure you're in line with the philosophy. You need to be able to fit a medium shield extender, a warp scrambler, and a stasis webifier, or else you aren't tackling well enough. The MSE insures you wont just get vaporized if the target alphas you, thus losing our point and giving them the chance to run away. The scram and webifier shut down their propulsion systems as well as preventing them from warping out. As a tackler, we're counting on you to do both of those things. If you can't, then you aren't a tackler.

ColonicAcid · Post by **ColonicAcid** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 10:39 pm #30114

I've got tackle and tracking disruptor in my condor. It also has a missile range of 29km so I can tackle at 20-26km

Timbrewolf · Post by **Timbrewolf** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 10:46 pm #30115

A real tackle is a Warp Scrambler and a Stasis Webifier.

Not a Warp Disruptor but a Scrambler.

The Scrambler has much shorter ranges but it has a destab strength of 2, which means your target needs to fit two warp stabs to still be able to run away. It also shuts down people's Microwarp Drives, preventing them from closing the gap on us or trying to speed tank.

The Stasis Webifier shuts down Afterburners in addition to killing people's normal velocities. It also prevents people from closing the gap but combined with the Scrambler it slaughters people's transversal speed so all our various weapons will hit dead on and hit really hard.

They are literally dead in the water when they're properly tackled.

Comrade Leo · Post by **Comrade Leo** » Sun Sep 21, 2014 10:48 pm #30116

I'll Griff.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Mon Sep 22, 2014 4:43 am #30158

Also: Everyone should learn the skills needed to fit webbers. Just as a rule. A rank or 2 in the skill is enough.

M0nsoon · Post by **M0nsoon** » Mon Sep 22, 2014 6:51 am #30177

We don't really need EWAR unless we run into another small group of misfits, at the most we should have a logi ship to help keep us alive. and I doubt any of us would like to play such a fun role

How experienced is everyone at pvp anyways? I have a pretty bad track record myself, but that's mostly because of my ghetto fitted Atron's that I only used for PLEXing while I do have a few kills myself and I know I helped on some kills back in my last corp. But all in all I'm pretty scrub and need to git gud.

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Mon Sep 22, 2014 7:01 am #30179

As someone very experienced skulking around nulsec and leading gangs like this, and t2 gangs, you need ewar. EWAR is the difference between everyone dying and successfully leading a covert ops fleet in taking out T2 battleships. As An0n3 put it, EWAR is the rag of chloroform you put over someone's face as your friends beat them to death, though I like to liken it more to the concept of the SS13 changeling parasting causing you to become totally helpless, yet still aware of the massive amount of suffering you are about to be put through. In fact the only time EWAR is not supremely helpful is if we run into another gang, because it will be unlikely that the EWAR can protect us against multiple targets.

The idea of using logis makes sense at first until you remember the point of a lowsec roam gang is to kill stuff WAY above the cost of your ship. Anything worth ganking is going to probably blast you to bits before you can be healed anyway. With EWAR they can't do fight back, and with proper tackling you can prevent them from running. If they fight back it means we failed as an outfit and something went very wrong.

But if you all collectively agree to not use EWAR I will watch and laugh as I don't mind. After all, he can't target me anyway when I am in cloak. But make no mistake: EWAR ships are amazingly deadly beasts. Nothing is more terrifying than knowing you can do absolutely nothing to save yourself even as you are aware that your death will be slow and painful. If anyone was still trying to figure out what specialties to look into and are Caldari I highly recommend considering becoming our EWAR specialist. I would do it but energy neutralizers tend to be less useful in gang ambushes and more useful in open combat. EWAR specialists also tend to learn other extremely fun and terrifying skills like cloaking and bombing, they are the guys who are out to stab you in the back and drag you into the night and are the guys who spearhead ganks, and most of their ships are cruisers and frigates, with the ultimate ship of EWAR specialists being the covert ops frigate.

Two other things: Anyone doing tackling or EWAR needs to train the skill that improves your lock times, signature analysis, and absolutely no one in the gang is allowed to pop a pod. Lock times allow the EWAR and tacklers to tackle and EWAR faster than the enemy can warp, and podding someone in lowsec is supremely stupid as while Concord isn't going to send the cops into that neighborhood they still saw it happen. Your sec standing gets nuked really hard and that is problematic even for the most hardcore nulsec or wormhole pilot.

M0nsoon · Post by **M0nsoon** » Mon Sep 22, 2014 7:23 am #30180

Ah alright that makes allot more sense then on how the other corp explain it to me, but then again they were all about using only Gallente ships.

And for the Caldari EWAR, are they the ones that reduce sensor range or target break?

dezzmont · Post by **dezzmont** » Mon Sep 22, 2014 7:38 am #30183

Caldari ECM prevents you from locking any sort of target for the duration. It is considered so standard and powerful that almost no gank fleet runs without them. Even in small scale war engagements ECM can completely wreck a fight.

On the large warfleet level its a different beast, and specific racial fleets use their EWAR in different ways. Caldari EWAR breaks down from being the smothering force that it is and is instead used more often to completely destabilized enemy logistic ships or, better yet, break a logi chain, which allows caladi missile ships to blow everyone away quickly as their tank fails. Mimnitar EWAR, the target painter, is generally considered the weakest and most mimnitar EWAR ships are actually used as sniper webbing platforms, though it should be noted that target painters are fantastic for missile fleets as they increase the signature radius of small ships which massively increases missile damage. Also target painters allow big ships to hit smaller ships, as you can bloom an interceptor's signal radius to match a battleship. This isn't too great for Mimnitar's already schizophrenic combat doctrine, which is why Mimnitar is rarely flown exclusively and is instead used to add to other fleets. Galente use target dampeners and reduce the enemy targeting range or speed. Like the Mimnitar they are often used as sniper tacklers instead for warp distruptors, for which they get a range bonus, but they see straight use sometimes too, especially because sniping with warp scrambling isn't too useful. Of course they can always use EWAR drones. Amarr get two EWAR gimmics, they are generally the best at capacitor warfare, which allows them to either steal some of your energy or just destroy it, and they get tracking distruption boosts. Tracking distruption makes it so your guns have less optimal range and are more affected by traversal velocity. This doesn't mesh at all with Amarr combat doctrine, but luckily capacitor warfare is insanely strong in large scale engagements, helped by the fact that both the Amarr get one of the strongest capacitor EWAR ships in the game that can single handedly win fleet battles and the fact that their drone boat battleship is also a cap-warfare ship. However energy neutralization tends to break down if you are not in a T2 EWAR ship and are fighting something larger than yourself. Like Galente they also get good use out of EWAR drones which is why EWAR is more core in Amarr and Caldari fleets: Caldari is singularly powerful and Amarr just get so damn much. It is important to note that while I disagree with An0n3 that the Galente are significantly better than Amarr at drone use based purely on their hulls because, this is where the Galente usual range bonus on drones seriously shines compared to Amarr. Amarr ECM drones effectively don't get any benefit from Amarr hulls besides the fact that Amarr have huge drone bays that allow them to store a multiple types of drones at once, and range matters on ECM.

I am personally trained in the use of energy warfare modules due to my history as a nulsec scout, the skills overlap a lot, but I haven't ever personally fired a single shot in nulsec after my initial solidarity training gank my old corp made the scouts and support ships do. If we go to highsec war it will almost certainly be what I fly, but my role is definitely not a combat one. Scouts are there to basically guide the team to their target safely and keep them aware of danger.