Epic tale of WH pain. And gank.
Posted: 2010-01-26 Filed under: eveonline | Tags: c5, c6, capital, covertops, dominix, eve online, gank, industry, podded, pos, profit, pvp, ships, tower, WH, wormhole 7 CommentsMan…hoooo man… have I got a post today. It all started a few days ago….
We had run out of gravs n sites, so the idea to scan the neighboring C6s for a good move target came up and a’scannin we went.
First system sucked. Four ladars(It’s always #@*%ing ladars), our k162 and a static C6. Which went to a C5. Which went to ectera, ectera, ectera:
us->c6->c6->c5->c4->c5->c6->c5->c6->c5->c5
at which point I gave up and went to bed. Woke up, decided to try and close the static. Looked it up on WH thingy, says there’s 2.13 mil mass. Alright, I thought, that’s four orca passes and two BS passes. Easy!
Fitting a probe launcher to Blake’s domi, I jumped through and watched for 16 minutes as the orca went through n back, through n back. Finally getting to the last jump, I jumped the orca through….
And watched as the WH shrank to nothing, stranding me and Blakes t2 fit domi on the wrong side. Grumbling, I went to the last WH in the chain and started scanning. In a dominix. w/ tech one probes and launcher.
An hour later, I successfully pinned a nullsec. Not wanting to bear another hour of scanning, I hopped through. Setting destination, I got six jumps before getting the shit blown outta me.
Warping the pod out, I warped another four jumps before getting caught in an intricate warp bubble system and getting blown to bits, ruining my track record of three months in a WH with a full set of +3 implants.
Waking up in unfamiliar highsec, I made triply sure to update my clone and instructed the new guy on how to scan, and waited a few hours before he found the following route:
us->c6->c4->c3->highsec.
I made my way back in, we collapsed the WH without incident and scanned a new C6. I went through in my buzzard, and noticed that we had found a cataclysmic C6 WH, or as my reaction in corp chat was:
haav ->OMFG AWESOME 100% BOOST TO RR AND CAP!!!!
I then scanned, and found ->
haav -> OMFG TWO RARIFIED CORES AND FIVE OTHER GRAVS!
I then found the static.
haav -> oh boy, static C6. I love scanning an exit.
Well, two outta three is good enough for me.
Plans were made for a move. I went to the PoSes, unloaded all the reaction thingys, and started unanchoring.
Four hours later, one of the Poses was done being unanchored. I announced our plan to move by setting up the small tower first, then the two larges over the next two days. Our corp leader intervined:
corpleader11oneeleven –>umm…. dudes, I was gonna anchor a pos tomorrow.
I negotiated it to, we would set up one large tower today, he could set up his tomorrow, then we would setup the second the day after. So, I filled an itty w/ fuel, grabbed a dominix and gave the new guy a myrm of mine so we’d look intimidating, went into the C6, picked a nice looking moon and started anchoring.
The moment we started anchoring, scan probes appeared on scanner. “Shit” was the general thought.
Then two other scan ships showed up on the scanner over the next 20 minutes. With four minutes till the PoS was anchored, our dude watching the static C6 of our static C6 said, essentially:
Cheetapilotlollol –> my word, I believe these fellows do intend to assail us!
Cheetapilotlollol –> I do believe you good fellows should expedite your retirement from our large tower, less you be smited!
Cheetapilotlollol –> I do believe they have amassed a vaga, manticore, armageddon, an oneiros and phobos! How charming!
haav –> My word, the blighters have gone and disabled my warp drive! Come, my comrade, and let us see the blighters off!
myrmpilot –> My dear chum, how I would love to assist, but I do believe our attempt at flight has rendered me beyond our remote repair range! How disastrous! Fear not, I shall try to close the distance!
haav–> good show chap! Blake, what possible endeavor has blighted you from joining this rollocky amusement?
Blake –> no answer
haav –> My word Blake, you seem to have made a grave error! You appear to be in a Helios, a ship most unsuited for this rambunctious tomfoolery! My, but the blighters are tearing into you!
myrmpilot –> My word! Haav, despite your best efforts, it seems my armor cannot hold, despite your carefully well thought out tank and RR balance!
Haav –> Oh dear!
Blake –> Oh my, for what reason do I find myself inside yonder station? I merely left my console for more tea and crumpets, and return to discover loss?
Haav –> Blake, dear boy, your absence could not have come at more an unfortunate time, the day is lost.
Blake –> How terrible!
So, everyone in the new static got podded, the tower was anchored and was under fire, we lost a cheetah somehow, and went to bed expecting to wake up to our home system in reinforced.
Waking up the following morning, both PoSes were fine, but our connecting wormhole had been closed. Somehow.
I scripted a plan to activley collapse our static wormholes until we found the C6 again, this was met with agreement once we got an exit and got all the dead people back in w/ replacement ships.
Everyone was in, my orca pilot was moving through the WH chain to home system, being escorted by an alt of mine, when they found the c4-C6 link gone. Turning around, the c4-c2 link was also gone. After some extremly AMUSING hours of scanning, my alt with four probes and no scan skills managed to get the orca pilot out, at which point my main scanned another exit route and got the orca back in.
One hour before we were going to start collapsing wormholes. At 3:36 in the morning, my time. Set times for 3 hours and went to bed. Woke up six hours later, cursed, and logged on.
Apparently we had had several k162s before I came on, but nothing had come out. We scanned a c6, warped to it, looked for the tower, closed it if it wasn’t there, scanned a new one.
Eventually, we spotted scan probes. We figured that we were collapsing WHs fast enough that they couldn’t get a good scan (stupid, stupid, stupid!). We watched the incoming WH for a while, and after a cheetah went through, and came back, and went through the static of the moment, we decided to pull a dick move and trap him in the static hur hur.
We all warped to the WH, and found a tengu waiting for us. We panicked as a group and jumped through the WH. I then panicked as a person and jumped my orca and dominix through, starting a 4 minutes timer until i could jump back through the WH and giving me a 40 second cloak right next to a tengu and a mega specifically specced to keep large ships and others from running away.
My cry of “SHIIIIIT” could be heard for regions in several directions.
Still cursing, I relayed my idiocy to the rorq pilot, who promptly logoffskied. On the wrong side of the static. I uncloaked, launched drones, turned on my tank, targeted the tengu with hopes that if I scared him off, the two warp stabs on the orca that seemed silly a few minutes ago could save my 400 mil ship, which I had just realized had about 1-200 mil of reactants and pos modules in it because I had forgotten to empty it.
Another cry of shit followed.
Then another tengu and a falcon warped in.
“shitshitshittityshittiyfuckfuckcrapcrapfuck”
Too late to decloak, I tried to make my domi as attention-grabbing as possible, launching hammerheads, priming guns and targeting everything I could.
I was then locked down w/ ECM and scrammed.
Figuring this was as good as I was going to get, the orca decloaked just as the typhoon we had been using to close WHs.
“fuckshit R**** I’m an idiot for the love of god web me”
He was jammed, of course.
Hoping that the four experienced russian pvper(Did I mention they were Russian?) would simultaneously go blind from vodka poisoning, I toggled my AB for a cycle and started to warp to the PoS. Twenty seconds later, I watched amazed as the orca warped to safety, and with even more amazement as it didn’t get stuck in a warp bubble halfway there.
Tabbing back to the domi, went through shields, armor, hull uneventfully, didn’t put a scratch on the tengu, as my track record could’ve told you (0 kills 38 losses).
Annnd now I owe blake another new domi, because I was using his because mine got killed trying to sort the large tower up that we were currently trying to get. I popped, warped to a planet, warped to the PoS, grabbed my scan ship and tore through them into the WH in case they collapsed it and left the Rorq in a C6 without scan support.
Yes, it had a probe launcher but that would take forever.
Anyway, the rorq pilot runs his typhoon through the WH and gets himself to safety. After the tengu and mega show up and start taking potshots at our shields(all the guns were taken down in preparation for the move), I send my scan ship back through, the rorqual comes back through the static, collapsing it and I web the Rorq to a planet where it promptly logs off.
Whew.
*miningzen is now listening to: We built this City*
The dudes leave (presumably) and we start anchoring some guns again. Guns go up without incident.
R*** scans the new static, two cores, cataclysmic variable so we move right in, setting up everything else.
Fly paranoid. Cause they’re out there.
Hulkamania running wiiiiiild!
Posted: 2009-12-19 Filed under: eveonline | Tags: history, hulk, industry, mining, profit, scanning, ships, wormhole 8 CommentsPlease don’t throw something at me, but I’m going to draw a comparison to WoW and Eve. In WoW, each server has about 2-3 thousand people. The equivalent of our market is an auction house, of which there are three of. There is no “Want to buy” option, and you can only post auctions, with buyouts.
Here’s where I’m going with this: cornering the market is fairly easy. For those who enjoy shooting things instead of making spreadsheets, let me explain: cornering the market is basically where you feel like increasing your wealth by 30% or so, by making other people complain. The only requirement to do this is to have so much ISK or gold pieces or whatever that a new player would sell a kidney to get as much as you have. In Eve, by comparison, with fifty thousand players online on a good day, you need so much cash a new player would murder a small town for their organs before you can think about cornering. Add to that that the issue I’m griping about today cost 100 mil before the cornering, don’t wonder if you see 3-4 towns go off the map soon.
Where were all these rich players when I was mining in a navitas?
The base concept is simple: pick something that everybody wants, say, hulks, or something, and buy all of them on the market, and relist them at 120% of the price you paid. As regular people see your sell orders for 120 mil, they will either undercut you by a little or a lot. If it’s a lot, like, say, 105 mil, then buy their order and relist it at 120 mil. If it’s around 119.5 mil, either buy it or ignore it if you’re low on funds and might need to buy more of the ships at 100 mil. Anyway, what this does is make all the miners very upset because they still really, really badly want hulks but they have to pay more, and since you have all the hulks, they have to buy from you. eventually, your strategy makes critical mass and you either run out of money and the price goes back down, or the new price becomes the norm and you get rich and everyone poorer than you whines when you pour that money into cornering the exotic dancer market or whatever.
Anyway, according to marketeers who enjoy making spreadsheets and some normal people, the cost of hulks first rose to 140 mil because the moon rebalance made some new goo expensive and the old expensive goo cheap, but no-one wants to sell the old goo cheap, so the prices now include twice as many expensive components as before. The fact that hulks are now at 190 mil is because jerks (read: players) with lots and lots of isk want more isk for some reason so they are all cornering the market AT THE SAME TIME. As such, hulks are spiraling high.
Way, way back in my life, my dad told me a story about the zebra… tulip? I forget. Anyway, the story was that people sold the tulip to other people, and the other people would sell it to other people for more, and on and on and on until one dude said “Why the hell am I trading my house for a case of flowers”. And the price went back down, to the sadness of all the flower sellers.
Since I mine in WH space with several friends, all in hulks, we’re being more careful than usual with our scanning tomfoolery, since 200 mil to replace a hulk doesn’t sit well with any of us. A quick check of EFT shows hulk max yield at 1360, and my yield at 1166. Covetor max is 1234, and 1019 for me.
So, according to that, first:
My mining yield is really sub par, so I should stop training drone interfacing and get back to ABC IV refining skills.
and second:
A Covetor isn’t that big of a step back, and I can certainly weather using one until hulk prices balance back out. God, I hope they balance out. WH mining is stressful as it is without feeling like you’re flying a ming vase.
As a parting note, why the heck can’t I moon mine in WH space? Seems reasonable to me. I suppose the counter argument would be that no-one can attack your PoS without a goodly time investment and luck, but considering we’re limited to one system before the logistics increases exponentially while tied to a fuggin rocket ship, woudn’t that balance things out a bit?
Fly… very carefully.
I see local spiking!
Posted: 2009-12-18 Filed under: eveonline | Tags: capital, carrier, gank, industry, killed, mining, nullsec, profit, pvp, ships 4 CommentsWell, today has been a very, very laggy day. I have been told that there has been massive fighting in nullsec, and according to a brief message that flashed on my screen, gates have been shut down.
I’m kinda wondering if the fighters filled out CCPs new “hugeass bitchin fleet fight” form.
Anyway, since the nullsec before Dominion was like a bucket of squirrels fighting over a bunch of acorns, Dominion seems to have effectively covered the acorns in grease. Lots and lots of lovely fighting, and all the squirrels losing body parts which stimulates the squirrel body part market so the cyborg squirrel manufacturers can sell bionic arms to the squirrels…..
Tortured, yet funny extended metaphor aside, the freighter ganks were interesting, but the amount of sovereignty gain and loss over the last few days, now easily viewed from the yellow sovereignty button, is fairly unnerving:
Hurray for MS paint. Anyway, All this fighting has been expected for a while now, but one thing is for certain: these warring dudes are gonna run outta ships eventually, and then the power shall return to the place it belongs: the miners! muahaha!
In all seriousness, I’m a bit worried that this will only make t2 prices rise, as pvpers are gonna want ships NOW, immediately, before the dreads finish cynoing into their home base. Where Eve goes from here, no-one knows, but following chaos theory I predict AAA and goonswarm wiping each other out, being beaten to pieces by xxdeathxx, who form an alliance with atlas, while a relative unknown manages to establish a nullsec trading post and manages to keep it going by the policy of setting all station campers to red so they can’t use the station and letting everyone else come and sell/buy. And maybe, just maybe, they call the station…Milliways.
Predictions/dreams aside, we had a very, very nice day in the WH and made quite a bit, top of the head calculations gives 230 mil apiece between 6 people(or however much 3.1 mil m3 of bistot goes for nowadays). One of these people is a new member in the corp, new to the WH op, so as is our custom he can’t take from the hangars and has to end and begin every sentence with the word “sir”.
From a personal standpoint, I’m suspicious of every new person regardless of background, and now that I have an orca I’ve moved everything that I consider mine into a GSC, given it an eight-digit password, put it in the secure box of the orca and log off with it at a safespot, with my blockade runner and hulk inside.
I give it… 3-4 weeks before I trust anyone new to the corp, because after 3-4 weeks, the wait has reduced their profit-time ratio to below mining veldspar in an osprey :). This is countered, unfortunately, by making about 100 mil per day in the WH./facepalm
Trust is a very, very good thing to have. I can count the number of people I truly trust in eve on one hand, mainly because I’ve known them for over a year now. It’s my philosophy that if you can’t physically punch someone in the face, then they have no reason to not cheat you in a game about internet spaceships.
P.S. hulks at 175 in Jita, what the hell? Also, I really wish I could write less time-sensitive blogs so that I could stagger them better than three in a day after 5 days of nothing, but life’s an isk spammer. I’ve got 2 more slightly less time sensative posts in drafts, and should be able to get back to a one every 2 day schedule, assuming goonswarm doesn’t dissolve in the next week or two or something amazing like that.
This post written while WH mining, apparently I have a death wish >.<
Dominion nullsec mining
Posted: 2009-12-10 Filed under: eveonline | Tags: c5, freighter, industry, mining, pos, profit, pvp, rorqual, scanning, wormhole 6 CommentsDominion has me worried, not on how nullsec will become more interesting, but on how it will affect nullsec mining. As I said earlier, WH space mining is arguably the riskiest and profitable way to make isk in eve. It’s balanced that way, because after you mine the ore while looking over your shoulder every few seconds to make sure a Loki isn’t behind you, you have to either compress or refine the ore, then get it out of the WH itself which usually equates to pulling teeth while very carefully watching local(if you get a nullsec link) and the directional as you go through C2s, C3s and nullsecs. Getting supplies into the WH is a hassle, seeing as you need to haul any large amount of equipment in an industrial, and unless you have the isk/time invested in a covops blockade runners, gate camps are a pain.
On that note, losing 100 mil to a lowsec gatecamp while holding 6000 m3 has persuaded me to upgrade from my faithful, infinitely customizable Iteron mark V to a Viator which, had I been smart enough to use it previously, wouldn’t have lost me a total of 200 mil worth of modules over the last month. Anyway, Dominion.
What we’ve seen so far has been what we’ve been told, a moderately smooth transition from the old to the new, and funny people to laugh at when they lose freighters. On the freighter topic, my fingers are crossed that that will fix the megacyte market. and by “fix”, I mean “make my WH mining more profitable”. On this topic of profit, the news on grav sites scares me. Quoting a recent devBlog:
“Ore Prospecting Arrays: These are hidden asteroid belts and you get one site guaranteed for every level of upgrade to a maximum of five. These are not the typical hidden belts though. If you’ve ever been into wormhole space and seen some of the riches there, then you have an idea of what to expect. Within these hidden belts reside mythical beasts such as ‘King Arkonor’ and many of his closest friends. These sites will re-spawn every downtime, so even if you do not mine out every rock, there will be fresh ones waiting for you the next day.”
In the WH space I like to say I live in, the roids are, coining a phrase, fuggin monsterously huge. Some unforeseen circumstances arose and it was just me in my hulk , my alt in a hauler, and an orca pilot who had fallen asleep in the pos a few hours ago. Timing myself, in about 7 hours of sitting there suspended between being scared and being bored out of my skull, I mined about 55,000 units of bist and the roid I was working on did not die. I have no head for the market, mostly because a good friend manages the selling of the refined ore, but i’m gonna assume that 880,000 m3 of nullsec ore is worth a hella lot. The immense wealth I am sitting on is still at risk, we could get bubbled getting it back to jita, hauling it out through connecting WHs and nullsec, and then a jita gank. But that’s what makes this whole lovely world balanced. If we wanted titanium, we’d mine in highsec for hours and make 3 mil per jetcan instead of the lovely 15 mil per jetcan nullsec ores bring. But in highsec you have local and there aren’t people activley seeking your murder. Except goons or hulkageddon or some dude in a destroyer killing you and still making enough isk to buy a new destroyer and do it all again. Anyway, its all a beautiful graph of risk verses profit.
I feel that nullsec changes are going to take that graph and break it over it’s knee. In friendly nullsec, which is where miners would usually go, I’d assume, there is very little risk. Admitted, you can’t AFK mine, but you’ve got local and you’ve marked every space-tree for 5 systems in every direction. If someone who wants you dead even thinks about scanning you out and killing you, you have about 5 minutes notice to warp out and maybe go back and get the jetcans too. This safety while still getting nice lowsec ores and the occasional nullsec, depending on how deep you are, is again balanced by you having fought tooth and nail for every damn inch and someone could bring in a fleet of dreads at any second and kill everything you’ve ever worked for. If I’m reading this change correctly, then for every system you control and upgrade, you’ll be able to get up to five very, very rich belts full of ABC, which can then be mined at much less risk than WH mining, which then can be hauled out through friendly nullsecs and sold, or used to build more dreads that can be used to scare the hell out of your neighbors or be used as space-lawn furnishings or whatever.
Bottom line, I expect the ABC market to start lowering prices or for everyone and their dog who can mine in nullsec to have enough ships to use them as torpedo ammo. So, in scenario one, the bottom falls out of the ABCs and WH miners start getting richer slower and new corps start getting money faster. Scenario 2, the market holds and everyone builds more blobs with the influx and there’s more Internet spaceship fighting hurray. Taking a step back, there’s a chance that this will all just end up with happier new corps and more ships to bash against each other, but there’s also a chance that things could go downhill.
I’m expecting the market to react in 3-4 weeks, since right now people are more concerned with actually getting the upgrade thingys into the nullsecs :P. Let me know if I can put one of those up in a wormhole, I’d guarantee we’d appreciate some minin love. Or maybe some sort of… incoming wormhole detector, which playes a sound file that sounds like a little girl screaming whenever an incoming WH appears.
k162space 