Hauling: how not to die

1. You probably won’t die, unless you’re carrying something worth lots of iskies or sentimental value, at which point Murphy’s law kicks in and it explodes half a kilometer off the station.
2. Try to make sure that the isk required to destroy your ship is more than the isk you currently have in your ship. example: Covetor BPO in a shuttle, bad idea. Covetor BPO in a freighter: silly, but good idea.
3. Freighters, although big and awesome, can be killed. It doesn’t happen often, but it will. Don’t autopilot with more than a bil in cargo.
4. Tech 1 haulers explode when a rookie ship coughs at them. Make sure you’re either good at running away quickly or never carry things that even LOOK valuable.
5. Making a courier contract and doing it yourself will not stop people from seeing into your cargo.
6. Nor will putting your stuff in GSCs (Giant Secure Container)
7. A cloaky hauler is not invulnurable, a blockade runner is fairly invincible w/ the right strategies.
8. The best defence against suicide ganks is an Orca (Industrial Command Ship). Would-be gankers can’t see inside it’s corp hangar so they won’t risk the time it takes.
9. If you have to AP to Jita, AP to one or two jumps before Jita. A smartbombing BS costs about 3-4 mil after insurance.
10. A BS can kill your hauler. Most BSs, after insurance, cost under ten mil, fittings included. Be very nervous while hauling more than ten mil in a T1 hauler.
11. A typical highsec gank of a deep space transport takes 4-5 BSs. Be careful when hauling more than 50 mil.
12. A typical highsec gank of a cloaky hauler never effing happens, because you’re cloaked.
13. Autopilot and going AFK are the two most easiest way to spray paint “hot fresh iskies” on the side of your ship.
14. A deep space transport can fit a goodly tank at the expense of cargo.
15. If you fit your deep space transport for tank you’re either trying to get past a gatecamp where you KNOW a Heavy Interdictor is not present or you’re being an idiot.
16. The people with brains will look past the deep space transport’s tank bonuses and note that it has enough powergrid to fit a microwarpdrive.
17. It is a perfectly legitimate use of game mechanics to align to a gate, engage cloak and MWD, then disengage them after one cycle and engage warp to produce an insta-warp effect.
18. Freighters are slow as frozen molasses. Ask a corpmate nicely for his webbs.
19. Freighters are essentially giant cardboard boxes. If you get wardecced, do not take them out of station.
20. Skate around wardecs by keeping your freighter alt in a newbie corp. This may make #19 difficult.
21. To let an out-of-corp person web you, have then jettison ammo and have the freighter take from it.
22. Oh wait.
22. Have the freighter pilot in another ship take from your can, then webb. Pay very close attention if you get concord threats.
23. when hauling through lowsec, use a blockade runner (warp cloaked), occator (Mwd/cloak trick), Orca (MWD trick, very expensive and skill intensive), or a freighter (with several friends)
24. The cloak/MWD trick will not help very much against Warp bubbles in nullsec. Use a cloaky hauler.
25. When caught in a warp bubble, find the closest edge NOT on an align point with anything. Approach, turn on AB/MWD and cloak. Slooooowly make your way to safety.
26. Drones decloak you. IF you get decloaked for any reason you’re probably dead, burn out the bubble and try to align to something.
27. When in a T1 hauler/cloaky hauler, be wary of smartbombing gatecamps. Silly as it seems, have a tank on your cloaking ship.
28. If you find yourself screwed downriver, like protocloaked w/ no velocity next to a ten man gatecamp, sit there and wait for someone else to get caught, THEN try to run.
29. Evade station gatecamps by having a BM about 1,000 km away from the station on a line with how you undock. Instawarp happens every time and foils gatecamps, assuming no bubbles.
30. Jita IV moon four station has a moon and planet that fits this criteria.
31. In a fight between haulers and combat ships, there can only be two endings: the hauler dies or the hauler lives. Try to avoid the former situation by being verrrry careful.
32. Having a hauler that can warp cloak or protowarp scout for a hauler that can’t is a good strategy when traveling through lowsec.
33. Using two haulers that can cloak is a much better strategy.
34. Despite what your friends say, using a scout in null and lowsec is not “unmanly”.
35. JFs make all your lowsec hauling problems go away, unless you don’t know how to use one, in which case you shouldn’t get one.
36. If you’re too “noobish” to understand any of the above, then what the hell are you doing w/ over 100 mil and/or ask a corpmate.

[March 9 Addition]

5.4 B Iteron V (Gallente T1 Industrial) killmail

1.2 B Mammoth (Minmatar T1 Industrial) killmail

0.59 B Madger Mark II outside Jita 4-4 killmail