The High Sec Carebear has finally moved to 0.0, Adventures with TEST awaits.

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Incursions, part one.

Not had a chance to log in much these last days, been a little to busy with things, so today I was welcomed by a new and shiny log in screen.
Incursions has dropped it seems, or at least the first part of it.  I have to say again, I really like the fact that CCP decided to release it in stages with more of a "when it's done" philosophy rather then on time.
Seems there aren't too many drastic changes as of yet, the things I welcome from this first part is the ability to show probes on the overview, that's a long time coming in my opinion.  I never use the "unofficial" way to get them on the overview in the past, I wasn't sure if it was "safe" or not, but this new ability has great potential.

I'm also welcoming in the changes to various T2 ammo, and the rockets among them, or I will appreciate the rocket boost at least when I train up for them on Evv.
The Noctis is looking really sweet, but a little expensive as of yet, I'll either opt to grab a BPO or wait for the price to drop before I grab one.
Either way I'm gonna wait a little bit, I'm sort of asuming that the Outer Ring area is swarming with people right now, I'm also asuming they don't have my welfare in mind.

The addition of a Meta column on items also makes hangar/loot sorting a little easier, it's a nice touch.
Seems the "nice touch" thing is the thing of this first patch, several small things that are not revolutionary, but nice additions.  I will eagerly await the changes to PI, the actuall Sansha content and I'm really looking forward to having my SP from learning skills reimbursed.

Fly safe all.

Monday, November 22, 2010

Nerfing the Drake?

There's been rumors lately about some incoming nerfs for the Drake battlecruiser, pride of the Caldari Navy and cherished favourite of newbies and missionrunners everywhere.
Personally, I don't fly the Drake to often, Evoran has one Drake in his hangar set up for the occasional combat site or mission, the one time a year he does that stuff.  Evv flies armor, armor all the way, he's trained for Gallente and Amarrian ships and shield tanks are'nt really their natural element.  I have trained some shield skills on him recently though, but mostly just for the buffertanked speed/shield extender ships, and mostly just for the shield extenders themselves.  There should be no need to state that Evv does not fly shield tanked ships very often.
I do have some experience flying a drake, and my impression is as follows, massive and impressive tank, not quite so impressive DPS and it handles like a beached whale.  The Drake is in short a massive brick, and quite an impressive looking brick at that.  I do understand the appeal it has to missionrunners as it seems to be a very AFK friendly ship with a big tank, it's also quite an impressive ship considering that it does not take to long to train for.

Recently though, word has come in from the lawless regions of null security space that the Drake has become a very popular addition to alliance fleets.  So popular in fact that CCP is looking at nerfing it.
There are different reasons for the nerf, but the biggest one at the moment seems to be lag, or rather the fact that a hundred Drakes all firing missiles at once starts to create quite a bit of lag.
The popularity of the Drake in null seems to be much the same as in high sec, big tank, easy to get into, cheap and very replaceable, and excellent counter to armor HAC's.  Seems the the change of the old doomsday had some "unforseen" effects on warfare allowing for bigger fleets of smaller craft, along with the changes to the scanning system making it very easy to get hits on BS sniper fleets, the BS fleets are all but extinct it seems.  Armor tanked HAC's with logi and CS support tore things apart in nullsec for quite some time and then people started countering it with Drakes.  Why Drakes one might ask?  they are  a good counter to the AHAC's, they have huge buffers making it easy for Logi pilots to keep up, they have great alpha strike damage in a fleet of them, the missiles have great range and an easier time of hitting AHAC's then BS turrets have and they're cheap.  You can probably loose about four Drakes for every Zealot isk wise and in a war of atrition that accounts for quite an advantage.  You can also commit more pilots to a fight since you can get fresher pilots willing to loose a BC in your fleets.

Now, I'm not a fan of nerfing ships, people have invested time, money and practice in flying these things (whatever ships is the current big thing).  I think it's a little "cheap" to take this away from them and it's not like the Drake trains are some invulnerable death machine that can't be stopped.  This is EVE, adapt or die.

There are several ways, I've heard, of countering these Drake fleets.  Snipe BS does a great job of stopping them, disciplined AHAC gangs, Zealots in particular also rips through them in a lot of cases.  The point is that they're not invulnerable, instead of nerfing I think we should just sit back and wait for the mastermind FC's to come up with an effective counter to the whole problem.  I would certainly not be happy if a ship I've trained for, bought and fitted got nerfed because something that happened in a particular theater of war.
Either way, all you Caldari mission runners, now's your time to shine in the lawless lands of 0.0.  You're beloved Drake is no longer scorned and primaried by friendly FC's, imortality awaits you, take it.

Fly safe.

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Skill Training Completed : Exhumers V

I'd say finally, but it's more been a case of not bothering until recently, I have however "finally" completed Exhumers level 5.  I trained it straight to 4 when I first trained for the Hulk's and it's just been sitting there ever since, it was only after my last skill completion that I decided it was about time to max it out, even though I don't mine as much any more.
I usually trade for my minerals these days, buy cheap, sell high or keep for production.  I've been making some decent money since I got my freighter and started some inter regional mineral trades, there are some good deals to be had out there if you look for them.
Can't say I really feel the difference of those last 3%, but I have been hitting some belts lately, zoning out to the "zen" of the strip miners humming.  Either way, it's a skill I feel I should have as a proper industrialist/miner.

I've also spent some time on SiSi with Evv these last days, testing out some of the sansha stuff, or rather getting me behind handed to me by the Sansha stuff.
I've been flying solo so far so I've not gotten into the sites, I did however head off to an invaded system with the intent to check the belts for the new residents.
So, I fitted up a Sacrilege, figured I'd want tank over gank if I wanted to see anything, tanked it up as best i could and set a destination for Lermireve.  The new journal page is rather handy, it shows you the invaded systems, effects present in the system, the influence ratio and buttons for easy autopilot settings to systems or staging systems.
I arrived in Lerm, checked the gate for nasty pirates, even though there should'nt be any, I'm paranoid, and was immediately greeted with the effects thingy on the left saying your tank, damage, and bounty rate sucks now.
I was however not intimidated by some lowly rats and pointed my noble Sacrilege to the first belt i could see.  There were several beacons in the system, but I wasn't stupid enough to solo warp in on them.

I hit belt and I'm greeted by 2 non descript frigates, a named cruiser and a named battleship.  I lock them all up and fire a volley off at the first frigate, asuming they're the ones that will tackle me I want them dead first.
The Sansha was not impressed however and within a few seconds I was jammed out by the cruiser and neuted dry by the battleship.  I did get another missile volley off at the cruiser between jam cycles, but a few seconds after that my tank was hurting bad and I had to bail out.  The Sansha means bussiness I guess.

Incursions should be very interesting and certainly make high sec a little less safe, I've heard rumors of Sansha gatecamps, but I've no idea if they will scram you or otherwise force a fight.  I do know that I will not be taking my freighter through invaded systems without a heavy escort.
I sure will try to check out the sites on SiSi aswell, and maybe even attempt to kill one of the things this time.

Very pleased that CCP pulled the release of the expansion, opting to do it "right" rather then on time, all in all it's looking pretty good as far as I can see.

Fly safe.

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Empire wars, PI and other stuff.

I've bought a freighter, yay me.  I'm the proud owner of an Obelisk class freighter now, and have been for a month or so in fact.  I buy the freighter and three days later we have a wardecc on the alliance, good timing indeed.
Anyway, two wardeccs later, we had one declared a day after the first one expired, I still have my freighter and I'm eagerly awaiting the Incursions expansion.  The reason I'm so anxious for it is summed up simply with two letters. PI!!
I have three planetary colonies, they've been dormant for ages, I mean ages.  I've not had the will to keep them running, but hey, I figure I'm missing out on iskies here so I go to fire them back up just now.
I suddenly remember why they've been dormant for ages.
The amount of clicks needed to do anything is horrible, but I do at least get a yellow circle now on the ones that have been edited.  I've been promised a better PI system in Incursions and I really hope they deliver, cause I am missing out on iskies here and I don't like it.

Either way, lifes been pretty quiet here in high sec lately, haven't done much exciting things for a while.
Been finishing up on some industrial skills, getting my freighter, working up the courage to manage my colonies and thinking of trying my hand on T2 production.

Fly safe.