I thought to myself, 'Why not have a podcast'? This is my first crack at it. I discuss the fight I had in Providence yesterday, as well as some coverage of fanfest. I was debating on whether to release it as obviously the production quality is low (crappy mike, no intro music, some details wrong) however I figured what the Hek and released it as is. Next time I will plan out what I am going to say first and perhaps do some modicum of editing. Happy listening :).
Download this episode (right click and save)
Showing posts with label Eve Online. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Eve Online. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 4, 2012
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Back in Agony
So after spending a year wondering New Eden, I have returned to the only corp where I truly felt at home, Agony Unleashed. It has been an interesting year, I participated in 500 man Maelstrom fleets, asked for and received ransoms, failed at starting a noob corp (twice) and joined the carnage of Red vs Blue. But Agony is really where I belong. A null-sec corp that cares more about blowing stuff up then blowing up their ego. I seem to have joined at a good time too. Several old members are back. We live in Syndicate now, which, with Outbreak moving into our home system this past few days, should provide for much pew pew.
Just before I joined up Temprail (from Agony) completed a nice video called 'This is Syndicate'. Unlike the usual EVE video this one combines both great fights with an artistic eye. Well worth watching...
Just before I joined up Temprail (from Agony) completed a nice video called 'This is Syndicate'. Unlike the usual EVE video this one combines both great fights with an artistic eye. Well worth watching...
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Frigate vs Cruiser - Strategies
One of the more interesting 1v1 battles out there is a cruiser vs a frigate. From the point of view of an outsider it should be obvious who wins. A cruiser has both the firepower advantage and an advantage of being able to take a lot more damage. However the reality is that these battles are a lot more interesting then you would think. For me the first cruiser vs frigate battle I was in was way back in a DOS game called 'Ancient Art of War at Sea'. In that game sea battles were fought between 1800 era ships of the line, battleships and frigates. Battleships were slow and hard hitting. Frigates were fast and nimble, but not very powerful. Ships of the line were in between. Since these ships could only fire sideways a fast frigate could maneuver so that the larger ship could never hit it. By dashing in an out a frigate could, given a lot of time, eventually take out a larger enemy ship. Eve is similar. Frigates can use their speed and small signature radius to avoid damage from larger ships. However in EVE, the larger ships have some countermeasures. Drones, energy neutralizers being the most important. The most important thing however is to go into a fight with a plan.
Lets look at what weapon systems a cruiser might have that are a threat to a frigate. In order of ease to mitigation we have:
1. Guns: In most cases if the cruiser's guns can hit the frigate with anything close to full damage, the frigate is going to die. The trick for a frigate is to make a cruisers guns useless. This involves using a combination of high angular velocity and a low signature radius so that the cruisers guns can not track the frigate. In most cases this is going to involve getting into point-blank range, paralyzing the target, while orbiting as fast as possible on afterburner. The medium guns on most cruisers just can't hit an afterburner equipped frigate that is orbiting it. The cruiser will typically try to get range and kite the frigate, which breaks the orbit and crashed the angular velocity. Ergo it is important for the frigate to scram (take out the MWD on most cruisers) and if possible webify (further kill the speed) the cruiser so that it is unable to do so. Remember that a Warp Disruptor is pretty useless here as it does not shut down a MWD and most cruisers with a MWD are faster than a frigate with an afterburner. If the frigate fields a MWD as well, then it suffers from a sig radius bloom effectively making the cruiser's guns track 5x as fast. The exception to this is an interceptor. An inty may want to use it's high MWD speed and relatively low signature radius to mitigate damage.
2. Small Drones: Most cruisers have largish drone bays stuffed with light drones. It is pretty typical to face 5x Warrior II or 5x ECM drones. Either case is a big problem. #1 priority for a frigate is to start dealing with those drones once they are launched. The good news is that frigate guns can usually kill 5x Warrior II before it's tank fails, however it does take a lot of concentration so be ready for it. ECM drones are a different and possibly worse problem. Not only do they prevent you from firing your guns, but they also shut down you scrambler and webifier. All of a sudden the enemy can start manouvering, pull range and then kite you with warp-disruptor range. Death is soon to follow.
3. Energy Neutralization: All frigates have a capacitor disadvantage to cruisers. Energy Neutralizers allow a cruiser to suck the capacitor of a frigate dry. Even for frigates that don't use cap for weapons (autocannons and missiles), no cap means no afterburner, no warp scrambler, no stasis webifier and no armour repper. One way of avoiding neutralizers is to keep range. Unfortunately that is not usually an option (see point 1). Really the only way of dealing with neutralizers is NOS. A small NOS should suck enough cap from a target ship to at least power the scrambler and afterburner. As for repping.... forget it.
4. Stasis Webifiers: If there is one thing that a small ship fears... it is the Stasis Webifier. If the enemy can land a couple of these on you... the whole advantage of being small and fast goes out the window. This is why minmattar recons are so feared. One common 'Fishing' technique for a cruiser is to fit two webifiers. This pretty much locks down a frigate making it easy prey to medium sized guns.
5. Missiles: Missiles do damage with very different calculation than turrets. A small ship can reduce damage from a missile thanks to signature radius and speed, however it is pretty much impossible to drop the damage to zero and still be in a position to do damage in return. Also cruisers have the ability to fit assault missile launchers which are basically frigate based weapons with a higher firing rate. Assault missile Caracals are devastating to a frigate.
The good news for the frigate is that with careful target selection and effective piloting it is possible to successfully kill cruisers. The bad news is that if a frigate can not mitigate the 5 weapons listed above, a frigate will die very very fast.
Lets look at what weapon systems a cruiser might have that are a threat to a frigate. In order of ease to mitigation we have:
1. Guns: In most cases if the cruiser's guns can hit the frigate with anything close to full damage, the frigate is going to die. The trick for a frigate is to make a cruisers guns useless. This involves using a combination of high angular velocity and a low signature radius so that the cruisers guns can not track the frigate. In most cases this is going to involve getting into point-blank range, paralyzing the target, while orbiting as fast as possible on afterburner. The medium guns on most cruisers just can't hit an afterburner equipped frigate that is orbiting it. The cruiser will typically try to get range and kite the frigate, which breaks the orbit and crashed the angular velocity. Ergo it is important for the frigate to scram (take out the MWD on most cruisers) and if possible webify (further kill the speed) the cruiser so that it is unable to do so. Remember that a Warp Disruptor is pretty useless here as it does not shut down a MWD and most cruisers with a MWD are faster than a frigate with an afterburner. If the frigate fields a MWD as well, then it suffers from a sig radius bloom effectively making the cruiser's guns track 5x as fast. The exception to this is an interceptor. An inty may want to use it's high MWD speed and relatively low signature radius to mitigate damage.
2. Small Drones: Most cruisers have largish drone bays stuffed with light drones. It is pretty typical to face 5x Warrior II or 5x ECM drones. Either case is a big problem. #1 priority for a frigate is to start dealing with those drones once they are launched. The good news is that frigate guns can usually kill 5x Warrior II before it's tank fails, however it does take a lot of concentration so be ready for it. ECM drones are a different and possibly worse problem. Not only do they prevent you from firing your guns, but they also shut down you scrambler and webifier. All of a sudden the enemy can start manouvering, pull range and then kite you with warp-disruptor range. Death is soon to follow.
3. Energy Neutralization: All frigates have a capacitor disadvantage to cruisers. Energy Neutralizers allow a cruiser to suck the capacitor of a frigate dry. Even for frigates that don't use cap for weapons (autocannons and missiles), no cap means no afterburner, no warp scrambler, no stasis webifier and no armour repper. One way of avoiding neutralizers is to keep range. Unfortunately that is not usually an option (see point 1). Really the only way of dealing with neutralizers is NOS. A small NOS should suck enough cap from a target ship to at least power the scrambler and afterburner. As for repping.... forget it.
4. Stasis Webifiers: If there is one thing that a small ship fears... it is the Stasis Webifier. If the enemy can land a couple of these on you... the whole advantage of being small and fast goes out the window. This is why minmattar recons are so feared. One common 'Fishing' technique for a cruiser is to fit two webifiers. This pretty much locks down a frigate making it easy prey to medium sized guns.
5. Missiles: Missiles do damage with very different calculation than turrets. A small ship can reduce damage from a missile thanks to signature radius and speed, however it is pretty much impossible to drop the damage to zero and still be in a position to do damage in return. Also cruisers have the ability to fit assault missile launchers which are basically frigate based weapons with a higher firing rate. Assault missile Caracals are devastating to a frigate.
The good news for the frigate is that with careful target selection and effective piloting it is possible to successfully kill cruisers. The bad news is that if a frigate can not mitigate the 5 weapons listed above, a frigate will die very very fast.
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
No job for me at CCP
Like many EVE players my interest was peaked by an notice on the start-up screen talking about open positions at CCP. Being a programmer I have always wanted to work for a game company, and what better company than the one that produced my favourite game. In fact, ever since I have started playing EVE, I have wanted to get an inside look into the EVE database schema. There is no porn for me like database porn.
For most of the last 10 years I have been a professional database developer. My experience is split more or less evenly between SQL Server (wonderful database used by EVE) and Oracle (evil crap database used by most businesses). When I saw that one of the open positions was for a database developer, and that they use SQL Server, I took the plunge and applied.
What happened after that gave me very little faith in CCP.
Soon afterwords I received an e-mail from CCP saying that they had my application and wanted me to perform a technical test before proceeding in the interview. This is pretty common in the industry. When I interview people I always make them write a bit of code to show that they do more than talk good.
On Saturday at an agreed upon time the test arrived and as I started reading through it my heart sank. This test was crap for the position I applied for.
The job I applied to was for a database development position. This was a test for a 3-D programmer, or for a UI programmer, or for some other programmer that you would never want withing 100 lines of code of the database. The questions were pretty simple but totally irrelevant. The first was a geometry question. I thought about writing the answer in TRANSACT-SQL (sql servers main programing language) but it was written in such a way that I couldn't really do that. I quickly put together a bit of code in C# that performed the required task.
The next question however was downright absurd. It wanted me to move nodes around a linked list. I haven't done this sort of stuff in 15 years. A quick search on the internet and the complete solution was downloaded and ready. I suspect that this is what 99% of applicants do.
The third question involved writing a small text game. Of all the questions this was the most interesting since the game had to be written in such a way that the computer cheated, but tried to hide that fact. Again I through together some C# code that covered the basics. My solution was not very imaginative but it worked (certified as working on my computer).
In the end I decided that sending in the answer to the second question was cheating so I simply dropped it and sent my response back explaining that the test was totally irrelevant to the job I applied for. Not surprisingly I soon heard back that I was rejected :(.
I guess that my annoyance is more that this whole process reeked of massive fail. This was the case of simply filtering out unsuitable candidates rather than trying to get the best programmers they could. This is the sort of thing I would expect from the large IT departments of corporations trying to be just good enough not to get the CIO fired, not of cool boutique development studios on the cutting edge. EVE is a hard challenge. It needs really smart people who can do wonders with software. This position needs to be filled by someone who can rip data out of the multi-TB database with the minimal possible load. This interview process will give them run-of-the mill crap who when asked to do a filter will code a routine that loads an entire table into memory as a singly linked list using code copied off the internet, and then runs through it row at a time. And then they will wonder why they are having memory problems.
For those who are not familiar with databases, they are very different to program than conventional programs. Most coding in C++ or Python is explicit. You tell the computer to do one thing, and then another, and then another. With databases you program it using set theory. You tell the database what you want, and it does it for you. Unfortunately to do this requires a completely different way of thinking, especially for large databases where you need fast performance.
And yes, I am bitter, my current job uses Oracle and I HATE ORACLE! PLEASE CCP HIRE ME SO I DON'T HAVE TO USE ORACLE ANY MORE.
For most of the last 10 years I have been a professional database developer. My experience is split more or less evenly between SQL Server (wonderful database used by EVE) and Oracle (evil crap database used by most businesses). When I saw that one of the open positions was for a database developer, and that they use SQL Server, I took the plunge and applied.
What happened after that gave me very little faith in CCP.
Soon afterwords I received an e-mail from CCP saying that they had my application and wanted me to perform a technical test before proceeding in the interview. This is pretty common in the industry. When I interview people I always make them write a bit of code to show that they do more than talk good.
On Saturday at an agreed upon time the test arrived and as I started reading through it my heart sank. This test was crap for the position I applied for.
This is the CCP programming test. The entire test consists of three questions. Each question requires you to write code to solve a short problem. We expect the test to take two to four hours on average, but you may take additional time if necessary. Please read each question carefully and answer each to the best of your ability. Your solutions will be evaluated for completeness and correctness. While these questions are of a limited scope, please answer them as if they were production code. Your answers will ultimately answer the question, “Do we want this person contributing to our code base?”
You may provide answers in any language.
The use of a compiler is highly recommended to verify the correctness of your answers, but a compiler is not required. All code and algorithms must be your own; however you may use resources as a quick reference for formulas or syntax.
Good luck!
The job I applied to was for a database development position. This was a test for a 3-D programmer, or for a UI programmer, or for some other programmer that you would never want withing 100 lines of code of the database. The questions were pretty simple but totally irrelevant. The first was a geometry question. I thought about writing the answer in TRANSACT-SQL (sql servers main programing language) but it was written in such a way that I couldn't really do that. I quickly put together a bit of code in C# that performed the required task.
The next question however was downright absurd. It wanted me to move nodes around a linked list. I haven't done this sort of stuff in 15 years. A quick search on the internet and the complete solution was downloaded and ready. I suspect that this is what 99% of applicants do.
The third question involved writing a small text game. Of all the questions this was the most interesting since the game had to be written in such a way that the computer cheated, but tried to hide that fact. Again I through together some C# code that covered the basics. My solution was not very imaginative but it worked (certified as working on my computer).
In the end I decided that sending in the answer to the second question was cheating so I simply dropped it and sent my response back explaining that the test was totally irrelevant to the job I applied for. Not surprisingly I soon heard back that I was rejected :(.
I guess that my annoyance is more that this whole process reeked of massive fail. This was the case of simply filtering out unsuitable candidates rather than trying to get the best programmers they could. This is the sort of thing I would expect from the large IT departments of corporations trying to be just good enough not to get the CIO fired, not of cool boutique development studios on the cutting edge. EVE is a hard challenge. It needs really smart people who can do wonders with software. This position needs to be filled by someone who can rip data out of the multi-TB database with the minimal possible load. This interview process will give them run-of-the mill crap who when asked to do a filter will code a routine that loads an entire table into memory as a singly linked list using code copied off the internet, and then runs through it row at a time. And then they will wonder why they are having memory problems.
For those who are not familiar with databases, they are very different to program than conventional programs. Most coding in C++ or Python is explicit. You tell the computer to do one thing, and then another, and then another. With databases you program it using set theory. You tell the database what you want, and it does it for you. Unfortunately to do this requires a completely different way of thinking, especially for large databases where you need fast performance.
And yes, I am bitter, my current job uses Oracle and I HATE ORACLE! PLEASE CCP HIRE ME SO I DON'T HAVE TO USE ORACLE ANY MORE.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
A Rusty Roam
I know it has been quite a while since I last posted. TBH with a new baby playtime has been very limited which has meant that I just haven't had the inspiration to write anything. Skill training online is far from exciting.
However, yesterday I had a bit of time for a nice roam. I grabbed a Claw and headed out into the wild blue yonder. Unfortunately targets were light to say the least. After racing through Curse I decided to check out the land of major alliances and paid a visit to first Querious and then Delve. Expecting to find some big blobs (this is the land of thousand vs thousand battles is it not) I ended up finding almost nothing. Eventually in NPC controlled Delve a Harpy and an Armageddon started acting interesting. Figuring that with a bit of luck I could isolate the Harpy I managed to engage it at a distant planet.
A Harpy is an interesting Assault ship. With as much as a 50% damage bonus to four hybrid turrets, it can deal one hell of a punch. I believe that it is the highest dps AF in the game. On the downside it doesn't tank as well as a Jaguar or an Ishkur. Still, to my claw, it represented quite a threat.
I choose to try and get nice and close and get under his guns. Probably a foolish idea (a webber would have pretty much fracked this plan up too much). As I started my orbit fighting for transversal it was a little scary seeing my shields blasted off within seconds. I consoled myself that I had an armour tank so the shields didn't matter as much. In anticipation I cranked on the armour repper before the shields even dropped. Armour reppers act at the end of the cycle so I was confident by then I would need the repair. Fortunately his fit was unconventional. Instead of a webber he was dual prop. As a result I slid under his guns nicely, and once there his DPS dropped to a trickle. Meanwhile my tracking bonused 150mm AC II were pummeling him.
At this point I have to admit to an embarrassing mistake. For some reason seeing a Harpy I thought harpy = blasters = gallente = armour tank = woops. As a result I was shooting RF fusion ammo, far from ideal against a shield tanked ship. However once his shields finally did crack his armour and structure were obliterated in moments.
Picking up the loot I docked in a nearby station. I placed everything up for sale cheap (This ship was not coming home) and headed out again to see what more trouble I could get in.
However, yesterday I had a bit of time for a nice roam. I grabbed a Claw and headed out into the wild blue yonder. Unfortunately targets were light to say the least. After racing through Curse I decided to check out the land of major alliances and paid a visit to first Querious and then Delve. Expecting to find some big blobs (this is the land of thousand vs thousand battles is it not) I ended up finding almost nothing. Eventually in NPC controlled Delve a Harpy and an Armageddon started acting interesting. Figuring that with a bit of luck I could isolate the Harpy I managed to engage it at a distant planet.
A Harpy is an interesting Assault ship. With as much as a 50% damage bonus to four hybrid turrets, it can deal one hell of a punch. I believe that it is the highest dps AF in the game. On the downside it doesn't tank as well as a Jaguar or an Ishkur. Still, to my claw, it represented quite a threat.
I choose to try and get nice and close and get under his guns. Probably a foolish idea (a webber would have pretty much fracked this plan up too much). As I started my orbit fighting for transversal it was a little scary seeing my shields blasted off within seconds. I consoled myself that I had an armour tank so the shields didn't matter as much. In anticipation I cranked on the armour repper before the shields even dropped. Armour reppers act at the end of the cycle so I was confident by then I would need the repair. Fortunately his fit was unconventional. Instead of a webber he was dual prop. As a result I slid under his guns nicely, and once there his DPS dropped to a trickle. Meanwhile my tracking bonused 150mm AC II were pummeling him.
At this point I have to admit to an embarrassing mistake. For some reason seeing a Harpy I thought harpy = blasters = gallente = armour tank = woops. As a result I was shooting RF fusion ammo, far from ideal against a shield tanked ship. However once his shields finally did crack his armour and structure were obliterated in moments.
Picking up the loot I docked in a nearby station. I placed everything up for sale cheap (This ship was not coming home) and headed out again to see what more trouble I could get in.
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Projectile Ammo - Choices other than EMP
If you look on the Jita market for projectile Ammo, one thing really jumps out as odd.... EMP is by far the most popular ammo type. Most days twice as much Republic Fleet (RF) EMP ammo is bought and sold than RF Phased Plasma and RF Fusion combined. This does not really make logical sense. It did make sense before the Dominion Expansion last fall. Back then RF EMP did more damage any of the other ammo types. However with Dominion that changed. Here is the new base damage for short range projectile ammo:
* Short Range (0.5 range modifier - 12 damage)
o EMP - 9 em / 2 explosive / 1 kinetic
o Phased Plasma - 10 thermal / 2 kinetic
o Fusion - 10 explosive / 2 kinetic
Ever since last fall all three types of short range ammo now have the same range and deal the same amount of damage. The only difference is the damage type. In general I always carry all three types of ammo and try to tailor what I am shooting to what I am shooting at. If I am going up against an armour tanked ship (say a taranis) then I load up the fusion, if I am going up against a shield tanked ship (say a Drake) then I load up the EMP. Otherwise I use Phased Plasma since it does good damage to both shield and armour.
So don't just load up EMP because that is what you are used to... try out the other projectile short range ammo, especially against armour tanked ships you won't be sorry.
* Short Range (0.5 range modifier - 12 damage)
o EMP - 9 em / 2 explosive / 1 kinetic
o Phased Plasma - 10 thermal / 2 kinetic
o Fusion - 10 explosive / 2 kinetic
Ever since last fall all three types of short range ammo now have the same range and deal the same amount of damage. The only difference is the damage type. In general I always carry all three types of ammo and try to tailor what I am shooting to what I am shooting at. If I am going up against an armour tanked ship (say a taranis) then I load up the fusion, if I am going up against a shield tanked ship (say a Drake) then I load up the EMP. Otherwise I use Phased Plasma since it does good damage to both shield and armour.
So don't just load up EMP because that is what you are used to... try out the other projectile short range ammo, especially against armour tanked ships you won't be sorry.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Hydra Reloaded and Providence Take 2
A couple of weeks ago I (and most of Eve) noticed that Hydra Reloaded was busy mass recruiting corps and preparing to invade Providence. At the time I thought this was interesting but I had my doubts as to what they could do against the now established residents of New Providence. Between UK, Agony, BDEAL, Daisho, Noir, CO2 and others, not to mention the endless station grinding that would be required, it seemed unlikely that a new entity could break into Providence without a lot more organization then the glued together alliance that HYDRA was becomming.
Well, they seem to have succeeded beyond expectations. As should have been predicted they managed to take over a sizable chunk of Providence, not through fighting, but through the metagame. A mole with director level access in UK booted most of the corps out of UK and now a shell of UK is effectively a part of HYDRA complete with numerous key stations and systems.
Providence, yet again is burning. On one side you have the remains of UK, HYDRA joined by CVA, and on the other side you have the booted corps from UK (most seemed to have now temporarily joined CO2) combined with the other members of new providence. Support from Atlas and AAA is also expected.
Unlike some other invasions we have heard about following disbanding this one should be a lot more interesting. Almost all of the corps in Providence are in it for the Pew Pew. HYDRA certainly wants to have a good fight, and the rest of Providence is more than willing to go along. No fail-cascading here for anyone. If anything the booted members of UK are more active then ever in their drive to win back what they have lost.
If I am disappointed by anyone it has to be with CVA. Despite being a long-time enemy, UK was quick to support CVA when CVA was disbanded. That disbandment was overturned (turned out to be an account hack) but I would have thought that CVA would have had the honour to remember that act of respect for UK. Turns out now, CVA has gloated about the destruction of UK and is now joined with the invaders.
Well, they seem to have succeeded beyond expectations. As should have been predicted they managed to take over a sizable chunk of Providence, not through fighting, but through the metagame. A mole with director level access in UK booted most of the corps out of UK and now a shell of UK is effectively a part of HYDRA complete with numerous key stations and systems.
Providence, yet again is burning. On one side you have the remains of UK, HYDRA joined by CVA, and on the other side you have the booted corps from UK (most seemed to have now temporarily joined CO2) combined with the other members of new providence. Support from Atlas and AAA is also expected.
Unlike some other invasions we have heard about following disbanding this one should be a lot more interesting. Almost all of the corps in Providence are in it for the Pew Pew. HYDRA certainly wants to have a good fight, and the rest of Providence is more than willing to go along. No fail-cascading here for anyone. If anything the booted members of UK are more active then ever in their drive to win back what they have lost.
If I am disappointed by anyone it has to be with CVA. Despite being a long-time enemy, UK was quick to support CVA when CVA was disbanded. That disbandment was overturned (turned out to be an account hack) but I would have thought that CVA would have had the honour to remember that act of respect for UK. Turns out now, CVA has gloated about the destruction of UK and is now joined with the invaders.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Tricks of the Trade - Kiting
Simply put kiting is using range to mitigate the damage that your opponent is doing to you. To do this effectively in PvP several conditions must be met...
1. You must be able to prevent your enemy from warping away.
2. You must be faster/more maneuverable then your opponent.
3. Your damage must be less affected by the range then your opponent.
If you have all three of those conditions then you can 'Kite' the opponent.
A classic example of this would be a fight I had in a Stabber against a blaster fitted Vexor. By setting my orbit to around 15km I was able to keep safely out of blaster range while keeping him within the falloff of my barrage loaded autocannons. I was even able to keep his medium Hammerhead II drones from getting close enough to kill me The hard part was managing my cap since I was not stable with the MWD on.
So the next time you find yourself in a fight, think to yourself, what sort of weapons is the opponent likely to have, and how can I use range to reduce his damage?
1. You must be able to prevent your enemy from warping away.
2. You must be faster/more maneuverable then your opponent.
3. Your damage must be less affected by the range then your opponent.
If you have all three of those conditions then you can 'Kite' the opponent.
A classic example of this would be a fight I had in a Stabber against a blaster fitted Vexor. By setting my orbit to around 15km I was able to keep safely out of blaster range while keeping him within the falloff of my barrage loaded autocannons. I was even able to keep his medium Hammerhead II drones from getting close enough to kill me The hard part was managing my cap since I was not stable with the MWD on.
So the next time you find yourself in a fight, think to yourself, what sort of weapons is the opponent likely to have, and how can I use range to reduce his damage?
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Alliance Tournament 8 Match 1 Commentary
I have decided to start a new project and provide alternative commentary to the matches of the 8th Alliance Tournament. The idea behind this is to watch the video with the sound muted while listening to my description of the match. I have timed it so you should press start on the commentary at about the same time as pressing start on the video. Then mute the video and watch it with my commentary. Sounds easy right....
Rather then give a play-by-play, I am going to provide a discussion of what is going on and the strategies in use. I thought that the official commentators did a pretty good job under the circumstances. Things happen very fast in the tournament and doing this project has given me new respect for their ability to convey what is happening in real-time. I fortunately have the benefit of hind-site and the ability to watch the whole match first before discussing it.
Anyways, this is my first time doing something like this. Hopefully I don't make too many mistakes.
Download the commentary (right click and save)
Rather then give a play-by-play, I am going to provide a discussion of what is going on and the strategies in use. I thought that the official commentators did a pretty good job under the circumstances. Things happen very fast in the tournament and doing this project has given me new respect for their ability to convey what is happening in real-time. I fortunately have the benefit of hind-site and the ability to watch the whole match first before discussing it.
Anyways, this is my first time doing something like this. Hopefully I don't make too many mistakes.
Download the commentary (right click and save)
Friday, July 23, 2010
Blog Banter #19: War has come to EVE
Welcome to the nineteenth installment of the EVE Blog Banter, the monthly EVE Online blogging extravaganza created by none other than me, CrazyKinux. The EVE Blog Banter involves an enthusiastic group of gaming bloggers, a common topic within the realm of EVE Online, and a week to post articles pertaining to the said topic. The resulting articles can either be short or quite extensive, either funny or dead serious, but are always a great fun to read! Any questions about the EVE Blog Banter should be directed to crazykinux@gmail.com. Check out other EVE Blog Banter articles at the bottom of this post!
This months topic comes to us from @evepress, who he asks: The CSM: CCP's Meta Game? The CSM, an EVE players voice to CCP. Right? In the grand scheme of things yes, the players bring up issues and the CSM presents them to CCP. But in its current iteration the CSM was supposed to be given small authority to assign CCP assets to projects that the CSM thought needed work on. As it has come out, this was not the case. So fellow bloggers, is the CSM worth it, has the CSM improved the game in any way, or is it just a well thought out scam by CCP to give us players a false sense of input in the game? What's your take?
Wow, my first installment into the blog banter and it is about a topic was trying my best not to talk about much ... the CSM.
Personally I think that the CSM is really a victim of it's own success. For the first few CSMs nobody really took it seriously. It was correctly assumed that the CSM was just a PR move from CCP to be used in marketing and to defuse some of the T20 scandal. CCP spun the CSM as an innovative and unique concept where players have input into the development process. It made for great marketing and drew additional players to EVE while helping to retain old ones.
The first two expansions out in the CSM era were quite good and well received. The Quantum Rise and Apocrypha were both excellent expansions that fixed issues and added great new content. However then came Dominion with its fleet fight crippling lag and finally Tyrannis with its near total lack of interesting features. Players became unhappy and the CSM was purpose built for them to vent their frustrations.
The meeting minutes from the last CSM summit reveal a disaster. Basically the CSM asked CCP to fix problems that exist in the game. CCP responded by saying that they were going to concentrate instead on developing new features.
In response to the summit there was a dev-blog from CCP-Zulu outlining the current development priorities of CCP and the resources dedicated to them. Like the CSM summit this was mostly a song and dance about how great the new features we are working on are going to be and that there are no resources to spend on fixing old features. That the development team at CCP thought that the post would lower tensions is an indication of just how out of touch they are with the player base.
War has come to EVE. But it is not war between players, but war between CCP and the players.
Who will win?
These are the two options:
1. If the players loose then players stop paying CCP $180 per year and CCP looses. :(
2. If the players win then CCP keeps getting $180 per year per account so CCP wins. :)
Should be an easy choice for CCP but the IT industry is littered with the corpses of companies who chose option one. let's hope that CCP does not make the same mistake.
See other participants:
- Growing Pains | CrazyKinux's Musing
- CSM: Hoax or Serious Business? « Lost in New Eden
- CSM-Power to the people or puppets of CCP « A whole lot of Yarrrr!!!
- Gaming the CSM | A Mule in EvE
- A Taste Of Democracy | StarFleet Comms
- CSM: Player Power or Paper Tiger? | I Am Keith Neilson
- Governance Thrash Redux? « The Ralpha Dogs
- CCP Doesn’t Care: Blog Banter 19 « OMG! You're a Chick?!
- The Cataclysmic Variable: It's Crunch Time!
- The 19th EVE Blog Banter is upon us… and about the CSM and CCP | Victoria Aut Mors
- CSM: Lame Duck from the beginning?
- Blog Banter #19 <<>
- Be careful what you say, Roc « Roc’s Ramblings
- Exchange Fraking Phone Numbers « Scrap Metal & Faction Ammo
- Blog Banter #19: Assumptions
- More to come...
Thursday, July 22, 2010
How to play EVE when you can't play Eve?
Do any of you relate to this post? - You may play too much Eve if:
There are times when obsessing about this game can get out of hand. Most of the time obsessing about our little pastime is fine. However there are times when RL has to take the priority. My wife is about to give birth to my second child. Obviously the next 6 months are going to be a little crazy.
Playing Eve under these conditions can be quite a challenge. It is rather hard to explain to the Dramiel powering towards you to just hold on a minute.... the kid just burped all over me :(. In fact I think I am going to declare a new Law of Eve...
Given a two hour period camping a gate, the odds of a target showing up is proportional to how many of the following (wife, child, neighbor, phone, parents) trying to talk to you and get your attention.
So what sorts of Eve related things can I do? Firstly my plan is to keep on with this blog. There is no need for a pause button. Secondly I think I am going to concentrate on building up my industrial character. I am trying to get a char setup for invention and the like. Again, with the exception of some moving stuff around in low-sec, this should work just fine.
My questions for my few readers is.... What do you guys do in Eve when you don't think you can devote enough time to it to do some PvP?
There are times when obsessing about this game can get out of hand. Most of the time obsessing about our little pastime is fine. However there are times when RL has to take the priority. My wife is about to give birth to my second child. Obviously the next 6 months are going to be a little crazy.
Playing Eve under these conditions can be quite a challenge. It is rather hard to explain to the Dramiel powering towards you to just hold on a minute.... the kid just burped all over me :(. In fact I think I am going to declare a new Law of Eve...
Given a two hour period camping a gate, the odds of a target showing up is proportional to how many of the following (wife, child, neighbor, phone, parents) trying to talk to you and get your attention.
So what sorts of Eve related things can I do? Firstly my plan is to keep on with this blog. There is no need for a pause button. Secondly I think I am going to concentrate on building up my industrial character. I am trying to get a char setup for invention and the like. Again, with the exception of some moving stuff around in low-sec, this should work just fine.
My questions for my few readers is.... What do you guys do in Eve when you don't think you can devote enough time to it to do some PvP?
Sunday, July 18, 2010
My First Solo Kill
Who doesn't remember their first solo kill. IMHO the first solo kill in Eve is the most intense gaming experience ever.
It starts with the hunt for a ship that looks possible to kill. Once found then the heart starts pumping as the adrenaline kicks in. You power towards the enemy trying to activate modules that seem to take forever to turn on. Finally you have point and your weapons are blazing with all their might. Tunnel visions sets in as you notice that his shields and armour are dropping faster than your own... and finally you see the explosion.
For me my first solo kill was an older character called Johny Trigger. He was in a Rifter and I was in my shiny new Stabber that I could barly use the 220mm Autocannons on. At the time I had been recently kicked out of the Minmattar Militia (friendly fire) and I was now flying in a wannabe Mercenary corp called Frost Company Mercs. The corp was based out of the Uisper system in Metropolis low-sec space. Mostly we just ratted and docked up whenever anyone was in system with us.
Anyways I had just gotten enough skills and money to put together a Stabber so I headed of to Hek to go and put one together. When I came back into my home system there was one other pilot in local so I thought why not, and I tried to hunt him down. After a few minutes ineptly using my directional scanner I found him at a belt so I warped there at zero. His Rifter was about 80km off of me when I landed so I started powering towards him. I mostly expected him to bail but instead he powered towards me and the battle was on. I aggressed first, taking a hit on my sec status. However he made the mistake of trying to orbit me at 5km, within the tracking and range of my 220mm 'Scout' Auto-cannons. He probably wasn't expecting me to be armour tanked and fitted with scram-web (WTF kind-of fit is that!) and he soon went down.
All I really remember of the fight was feeling like I was having a heart-attack my heart was pounding so fast.
Icing on the cake was killing him again several days later, this time in a Thrasher :)
It starts with the hunt for a ship that looks possible to kill. Once found then the heart starts pumping as the adrenaline kicks in. You power towards the enemy trying to activate modules that seem to take forever to turn on. Finally you have point and your weapons are blazing with all their might. Tunnel visions sets in as you notice that his shields and armour are dropping faster than your own... and finally you see the explosion.
For me my first solo kill was an older character called Johny Trigger. He was in a Rifter and I was in my shiny new Stabber that I could barly use the 220mm Autocannons on. At the time I had been recently kicked out of the Minmattar Militia (friendly fire) and I was now flying in a wannabe Mercenary corp called Frost Company Mercs. The corp was based out of the Uisper system in Metropolis low-sec space. Mostly we just ratted and docked up whenever anyone was in system with us.
Anyways I had just gotten enough skills and money to put together a Stabber so I headed of to Hek to go and put one together. When I came back into my home system there was one other pilot in local so I thought why not, and I tried to hunt him down. After a few minutes ineptly using my directional scanner I found him at a belt so I warped there at zero. His Rifter was about 80km off of me when I landed so I started powering towards him. I mostly expected him to bail but instead he powered towards me and the battle was on. I aggressed first, taking a hit on my sec status. However he made the mistake of trying to orbit me at 5km, within the tracking and range of my 220mm 'Scout' Auto-cannons. He probably wasn't expecting me to be armour tanked and fitted with scram-web (WTF kind-of fit is that!) and he soon went down.
All I really remember of the fight was feeling like I was having a heart-attack my heart was pounding so fast.
Icing on the cake was killing him again several days later, this time in a Thrasher :)
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Ships I fly - The Armour Cane
Although I prefer flying the shield tanked Nano-Cane for solo work and fast moving cruiser gangs, it is not really appropriate for bringing to a gang using armour logistics. You should always try and match your tank to the logistics available if any.
The Armour cane gives up a lot of maneuverability and some DPS potential to the Nano-cane. However it has several significant advantages. The overall EHP (buffer tank) on the Armour cane is about 40% greater than the buffer on the Nano-Cane. This means that in battles you can last a lot longer without logistics support. The other huge advantage of the Armour Cane is that it has three mid-slots available for a variety of e-war. The value of this should not be underestimated when taking on a larger gang.
These two advantages also make this ship better for bringing to gangs running no logistics and/or is light on dedicated ewar ships. A half-dozen armour tanked battlecruisers with lots of e-war in the mids can often take on a much larger shield tanked gang with less ewar and come away clean.
The below example is setup for when I am running as FC. When I run as FC I like to keep the e-war simple by using a target painter. It just gets placed on the primary target and helps myself and the rest of the gang track and do damage. Additionally I fit an ECCM module because it makes target calling difficult if I can't target anything. If not running as FC it makes sense to co-ordinate with the other gang members for a balance of Sensor Dampers and Tracking Disruptors.
Also note the use of double tracking enhancers. These two modules greatly increase the range of the guns meaning that this slow ship does not have to power around between targets. If you are able to engage at close range however, it makes sense to switch to Republic Fleet short range ammo for additional damage.
[Hurricane, Armour Cane]
Damage Control II
Tracking Enhancer II
Tracking Enhancer II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
1600mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
10MN MicroWarpdrive I
Warp Disruptor II
Conjunctive Ladar ECCM Scanning Array I
Partial Weapon Navigation
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
SV-2000 Assault Missile Bay, Caldari Navy Bloodclaw Light Missile
SV-2000 Assault Missile Bay, Caldari Navy Bloodclaw Light Missile
Medium Projectile Collision Accelerator I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Warrior II x5
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
See the fitting on a ship in your hanger without boarding - almost
Looking through the minutes of the last CSM summit (a very controversial one) I came across this rather nice tidbit:
This is a really useful feature that no-one seems to have heard about before. In the past if you several ships of the same type with different fits (say one shield and one armour Hurricane) and you wanted a particular fit, you would have to board each ship one at a time to check the fittings. Since boarding a ship activated a session timer this could be rather time-consuming, especially if trying to rush out for a response fleet. Now you should be able to right-click on a ship (either in you hanger or in your inventory) and choose show info. The last tab in the show info window will be labeled modules and will show what is actually fit on the ship.
That is the theory at least. In practice unfortunately the idea is bugged.
Here is how it works. (slightly differently then described by CCP in their response) While in your hanger you can choose show info from the right-click menu as below...
And this should give you a list of modules under the modules tab as shown below. In the example below I am on-board the Merlin and am looking at the fitted modules on my Ibis. I now know what is fit without boarding it. Yeah!..
If I now look at the Merlin while on-bard the Merlin I get to see what is on it as well...
So far so good. Sometimes it doesn't work so well. When I am on board the Ibis and select the Merlin, this is what I get :( ...
Back to the drawing-board CCP.
View ship fittings in hanger without boarding ship. If you have several ships of the same type in your hanger but with different setups it isn't possible to see which is which without boarding them. A potential solution is to name the ships differently, however Eve has a habit of resetting ships names on session changes. CCP’s response: This is currently possible to do with ships in hangars in other locations (Asset window, Right Click ship, View Content). Adding the option for current hangar will be investigated and implemented when time allows. Session discussion: CSM asked why no one knows about this functionality; CCP acknowledged that it should have been better documented – however the information has been available in the patch notes since Dominion was deployed (http://www.eveonline.com/updates/patchnotes.asp?patchlogID=194).
-CSM CCP Meetings 23-25-06-2010 (page 27)
-CSM CCP Meetings 23-25-06-2010 (page 27)
This is a really useful feature that no-one seems to have heard about before. In the past if you several ships of the same type with different fits (say one shield and one armour Hurricane) and you wanted a particular fit, you would have to board each ship one at a time to check the fittings. Since boarding a ship activated a session timer this could be rather time-consuming, especially if trying to rush out for a response fleet. Now you should be able to right-click on a ship (either in you hanger or in your inventory) and choose show info. The last tab in the show info window will be labeled modules and will show what is actually fit on the ship.
That is the theory at least. In practice unfortunately the idea is bugged.
Here is how it works. (slightly differently then described by CCP in their response) While in your hanger you can choose show info from the right-click menu as below...
And this should give you a list of modules under the modules tab as shown below. In the example below I am on-board the Merlin and am looking at the fitted modules on my Ibis. I now know what is fit without boarding it. Yeah!..
If I now look at the Merlin while on-bard the Merlin I get to see what is on it as well...
So far so good. Sometimes it doesn't work so well. When I am on board the Ibis and select the Merlin, this is what I get :( ...
Back to the drawing-board CCP.Friday, July 9, 2010
Failed Gank and then a little 1V1
As I have been doing these 'Ships I fly' articles I noticed I haven't really been flying any cruisers. So I threw together a Rupture and went on a little roam through providence. Unfortunately things were a little quiet. There was a report of a small group of shock and awe (AWE) ratters up towards YQB-22. A sort of hodgepodge fleet assembled to take them on and I joined up. The trick with ratters is to land on them before they notice that you are there. I stayed a couple of jumps out keeping an eye on F-YH5B where there was a large Circle-of-two (CO2) presence. As things started to come together for the gank... an AWE rifter came our way and the gig was up. The ratters pos'ed up and we gave up. Around this time CO2 started to make a move in our direction so there was some tension as one of our slow moving BS almost came upon them. Fortunately our BS got out of system just as CO2 entered so they were none the wiser.
Frustrated with the lack of action I switched to a Rifter and challenged another Rifter from Ushra'Khan to a 1v1. I brought my usual shield tank rifter but I fit it with an AB instead of a MWD. Interestingly my opponent also went shield tank and he tried to kite me using barrage. A little bit of overloading the AB and I was back to PB range where he melted once his shields were through. He never made it past the 1/2 way on mine. Barrage just doesn't have the same DPS as RF fusion. My main surprise was his shield tank. I assumed (as UK mostly armour fits their rifters) that he would be armour tanked so I was using RF Fusion. If he had noticed that I am almost always in a shield tank (I had fought him before) and used EMP then I would have likely come out on the short end of the stick.
Anyways, that was my evening. I am going to try and get the Rupture in a few more fights before I write the 'Ships I Fly' article for it.
Frustrated with the lack of action I switched to a Rifter and challenged another Rifter from Ushra'Khan to a 1v1. I brought my usual shield tank rifter but I fit it with an AB instead of a MWD. Interestingly my opponent also went shield tank and he tried to kite me using barrage. A little bit of overloading the AB and I was back to PB range where he melted once his shields were through. He never made it past the 1/2 way on mine. Barrage just doesn't have the same DPS as RF fusion. My main surprise was his shield tank. I assumed (as UK mostly armour fits their rifters) that he would be armour tanked so I was using RF Fusion. If he had noticed that I am almost always in a shield tank (I had fought him before) and used EMP then I would have likely come out on the short end of the stick.
Anyways, that was my evening. I am going to try and get the Rupture in a few more fights before I write the 'Ships I Fly' article for it.
Thursday, July 8, 2010
My Worstest PvP Loss Ever
Well, I have now done it. The old Eve rule is don't fly what you can't afford to lose. Well I have managed to effectively loose 75% of my (small to begin with) net-worth across both accounts over the last few days. Nearly a billion isk is pretty much gone with no hope for a quick recovery :(. And I didn't even get to see a pretty explosion.
I got pwned in Jita 4-4, in station. Of the many kinds of PvP in Eve the market is probably the most dangerous. Fortunes can be created and lost in a heartbeat. In my case I had found a nice little product that could be purchased by missioners in their LP store. It typically sold for around 200 thousand - 300 thousand isk on the market. I discovered that I could put in a buy order for 100-125k and then flip the items. At that price most of the mission runners seemed perfectly happy to sell me most of the stuff, and I would re-sell it back to PvPers who used the items for twice the price. Over a period of several months I had pretty much cornered the market. Anytime someone else tried to compete, I dumped the price down, they followed and then I bought their stock up at a pittance. Then I would drive the price up again and the money would flow in. It seemed like every day I was making 10-20 million isk with the one item. Oh what happy times...
Unfortunately over the last week things started going from bad to worse. First someone entered the market with a hauler full of product. I am not sure where they got it from. Possibly from LP, or a nice loot drop in PvP. I tried pulling his price down, but he would not move significantly. Sure if I posted 10 isk less he would follow, but I just couldn't get his price down. Meanwhile as a few more players started entering the market and I had lost all control over the price. I managed to buy most of it out, but then more and more would show up. Nearly a billion isk was sent down the rabbit hole and now I am sitting on a mountain of product.... that my characters don't even use. In the end I just gave up, posted my entire stock in a massive sell order (below what I paid for it) and will check on it in a month or two to see if I get some of my money back.
Back to ship pvp... what is the worst I could loose, a T2 fitted Battleship ... no problem.
I got pwned in Jita 4-4, in station. Of the many kinds of PvP in Eve the market is probably the most dangerous. Fortunes can be created and lost in a heartbeat. In my case I had found a nice little product that could be purchased by missioners in their LP store. It typically sold for around 200 thousand - 300 thousand isk on the market. I discovered that I could put in a buy order for 100-125k and then flip the items. At that price most of the mission runners seemed perfectly happy to sell me most of the stuff, and I would re-sell it back to PvPers who used the items for twice the price. Over a period of several months I had pretty much cornered the market. Anytime someone else tried to compete, I dumped the price down, they followed and then I bought their stock up at a pittance. Then I would drive the price up again and the money would flow in. It seemed like every day I was making 10-20 million isk with the one item. Oh what happy times...
Unfortunately over the last week things started going from bad to worse. First someone entered the market with a hauler full of product. I am not sure where they got it from. Possibly from LP, or a nice loot drop in PvP. I tried pulling his price down, but he would not move significantly. Sure if I posted 10 isk less he would follow, but I just couldn't get his price down. Meanwhile as a few more players started entering the market and I had lost all control over the price. I managed to buy most of it out, but then more and more would show up. Nearly a billion isk was sent down the rabbit hole and now I am sitting on a mountain of product.... that my characters don't even use. In the end I just gave up, posted my entire stock in a massive sell order (below what I paid for it) and will check on it in a month or two to see if I get some of my money back.
Back to ship pvp... what is the worst I could loose, a T2 fitted Battleship ... no problem.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
BREAKING NEWS - Ankhesentapemkah booted from CSM for NDA violations
In the history of the Council of Stellar Management (CSM) there have been few delegates more controversial than Ankhesentapemkah. She had created the Take Care party that had been quite influential in the CMS for the past few seasons and now she was a member. She ran on a PvE/anti-PvP platform and had some 'interesting' ideas for how eve should work. Today CCP has released a statement 'member removed from csm' removing her begin in breach of the NDA.
Personally I am not surprised. Ank' seemed to be walking a very fine line working for one company developing games while serving on an official player council of another one. Although the specific violations leading to her removal have not been disclosed the possibilities are endless. One thing I do know is that she claimed her past experience on the CSM as employment for CCP on her resume, something that is misleading if not actually false. Since claiming to be an employee of CCP is a bannable offense in Eve, I am sure that the CSM also had such restrictions that she was clearly in violation of.
It is also possible that she was removed for using information to gain an in-game advantage like the Larkongate scandal. If true then this is the least serious reason for her removal. However Larkonis has said on Scrapheap...
I will say this. When I commited my little infraction the CCP dudes were obviously upset and pissed but they were pretty chill and willing to work it all out with me (ie, not threatening legal action, not forcing me to reimburse them for flights, letting me issue a statement, allowing me to graciously fall on my sword etc). One thing that came out during my interview without coffee was 'At least you weren't selling data or information to our competitors'. Given that Ankh works for a game development company and this all appears quite hush hush...
-Larkonis Trassler
This implies that something much more damming may have happened. If it turns out that she had done something revealing secrets to another game development company then it is much more serious. If true then that is it for the CSM ever having access to any real information about future developments. It also means that she will have a huge DO NOT HIRE ME mark on her resume. She may also be sued by CCP.
Anyways sucks to be her, sucks for the CSM, sucks for Eve in general that such a twit was elected, and hopefully this is just a minor incident and not a CSM destroying one.
And for you you who voted for her... just vote for teadaze next time, he actually cares about the CSM for more then a reason to pad his resume and get free trips to Iceland.
And also to see why she was so bad... here is the vote on improving the overload interface so that it would be easier to click on overload and not turn off a module instead. How anyone who has ever used overheating could be against this is for you to figure out.
Edit: Thanks to the Ecliptic Rift Blog for catching the following on Massively:
When reached for comment, Eva had the following to say: "All I can say at the moment is that out of respect for the CSM, the players of EVE, as well as the good people at CCP, I cannot give any details besides my personal conviction that CCP's statement is not in relation to any of my recent publications, and that I do not share CCP's conclusion that there has in fact been an NDA breach. I am currently engaged in following up this situation with CCP." Eva plans to keep her followers updated on her situation via her CSM blog as the situation develops.
Personally I am not surprised. Ank' seemed to be walking a very fine line working for one company developing games while serving on an official player council of another one. Although the specific violations leading to her removal have not been disclosed the possibilities are endless. One thing I do know is that she claimed her past experience on the CSM as employment for CCP on her resume, something that is misleading if not actually false. Since claiming to be an employee of CCP is a bannable offense in Eve, I am sure that the CSM also had such restrictions that she was clearly in violation of.
It is also possible that she was removed for using information to gain an in-game advantage like the Larkongate scandal. If true then this is the least serious reason for her removal. However Larkonis has said on Scrapheap...
I will say this. When I commited my little infraction the CCP dudes were obviously upset and pissed but they were pretty chill and willing to work it all out with me (ie, not threatening legal action, not forcing me to reimburse them for flights, letting me issue a statement, allowing me to graciously fall on my sword etc). One thing that came out during my interview without coffee was 'At least you weren't selling data or information to our competitors'. Given that Ankh works for a game development company and this all appears quite hush hush...
-Larkonis Trassler
This implies that something much more damming may have happened. If it turns out that she had done something revealing secrets to another game development company then it is much more serious. If true then that is it for the CSM ever having access to any real information about future developments. It also means that she will have a huge DO NOT HIRE ME mark on her resume. She may also be sued by CCP.
Anyways sucks to be her, sucks for the CSM, sucks for Eve in general that such a twit was elected, and hopefully this is just a minor incident and not a CSM destroying one.
And for you you who voted for her... just vote for teadaze next time, he actually cares about the CSM for more then a reason to pad his resume and get free trips to Iceland.
And also to see why she was so bad... here is the vote on improving the overload interface so that it would be easier to click on overload and not turn off a module instead. How anyone who has ever used overheating could be against this is for you to figure out.
Edit: Thanks to the Ecliptic Rift Blog for catching the following on Massively:
When reached for comment, Eva had the following to say: "All I can say at the moment is that out of respect for the CSM, the players of EVE, as well as the good people at CCP, I cannot give any details besides my personal conviction that CCP's statement is not in relation to any of my recent publications, and that I do not share CCP's conclusion that there has in fact been an NDA breach. I am currently engaged in following up this situation with CCP." Eva plans to keep her followers updated on her situation via her CSM blog as the situation develops.
Ships I fly - The Nano-Cane
For those that think versatility is a four-letter-word in eve I give you the Nano-Cane. The general rule in Eve is that ships with lots of low slots are best Armour tanked, and ships with lots of medium slots are best shield tanked. According to that logic the Hurricane, with 6 lows and 4 mids is best armour tanked. The nano-cane turns that entire concept on it's head and places a shield tank on the Hurricane.
The reasons for this are three-fold:
1. The Nano-Cane without armour plates and a nanofibre II is faster and more maneuverable then most cruisers.
2. With all those extra low-slots not needed for tanking, a lot of weapon modifications can be installed. This, combined with the double damage bonus, results in really nice DPS with good range.
3. Even fully fit out with 6 425mm Autocannons, there is still room for two medium energy neutralizers and a full flight of light drones adding even more versatility against smaller ships.
In fleet this ship really shines. With a max speed of 1386m/s (1966m/s overheated) this ship can quickly move from target to target. The 6 autocannons belt out 617 dps with selectable damage types. Switching to Barrage lowers dps slightly but range is extended to over 25km into falloff. The main weakness of the nano-cane is the mediocre tank (45k ehp). Compared to the other race's battle-cruisers it comes off a bit lacking. However fit as below it has good resists and can prove tough as nails with scimatar / basilisk support. Without logistics support going with extender rigs is preferred.
In solo work this ship can also perform admirably. With it's speed, neuts, drones and damage it can take on multiple cruisers and/or frigates and emerge victorious.
[Hurricane, Shield Cane]
Damage Control II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Gyrostabilizer II
Gyrostabilizer II
Gyrostabilizer II
Tracking Enhancer II
Large Shield Extender II
Invulnerability Field II
Y-T8 Overcharged Hydrocarbon I Microwarpdrive
Warp Disruptor II
50W Infectious Power System Malfunction
50W Infectious Power System Malfunction
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Medium Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Warrior II x5
The reasons for this are three-fold:
1. The Nano-Cane without armour plates and a nanofibre II is faster and more maneuverable then most cruisers.
2. With all those extra low-slots not needed for tanking, a lot of weapon modifications can be installed. This, combined with the double damage bonus, results in really nice DPS with good range.
3. Even fully fit out with 6 425mm Autocannons, there is still room for two medium energy neutralizers and a full flight of light drones adding even more versatility against smaller ships.
In fleet this ship really shines. With a max speed of 1386m/s (1966m/s overheated) this ship can quickly move from target to target. The 6 autocannons belt out 617 dps with selectable damage types. Switching to Barrage lowers dps slightly but range is extended to over 25km into falloff. The main weakness of the nano-cane is the mediocre tank (45k ehp). Compared to the other race's battle-cruisers it comes off a bit lacking. However fit as below it has good resists and can prove tough as nails with scimatar / basilisk support. Without logistics support going with extender rigs is preferred.
In solo work this ship can also perform admirably. With it's speed, neuts, drones and damage it can take on multiple cruisers and/or frigates and emerge victorious.
[Hurricane, Shield Cane]
Damage Control II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Gyrostabilizer II
Gyrostabilizer II
Gyrostabilizer II
Tracking Enhancer II
Large Shield Extender II
Invulnerability Field II
Y-T8 Overcharged Hydrocarbon I Microwarpdrive
Warp Disruptor II
50W Infectious Power System Malfunction
50W Infectious Power System Malfunction
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
425mm AutoCannon II, Barrage M
Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Medium Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Warrior II x5
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Whoo Hoo - I am now on the Eve Online BlogRoll lovefest
So as my blog is now part of the massive (over 500 blogs) CrazyKinux's Eve Online BlogRoll lovefest. This is not to be confused with the CrazyKinux's Eve Online Blog Pack which contains a selection of the best blogs from the blog roll.
What is impressive about CrazyKinux's efforts is how he has really motivated the Eve Blogging community to work together. Eve players are usually stereotyped as a bunch of suspicious, self-serving anti-social types. Just look at the junk posted on Scrapheap or in COAD. However, instead of the blogging community heading that way, Eve bloggers have risen above the fray with a general commitment to respect each other and grow the community. The Blog Banters are a good example of that.
So good work CK and thanks for listing me....
Oooh and looking at page views, this blog now has had over 600 page impressions.
What is impressive about CrazyKinux's efforts is how he has really motivated the Eve Blogging community to work together. Eve players are usually stereotyped as a bunch of suspicious, self-serving anti-social types. Just look at the junk posted on Scrapheap or in COAD. However, instead of the blogging community heading that way, Eve bloggers have risen above the fray with a general commitment to respect each other and grow the community. The Blog Banters are a good example of that.
So good work CK and thanks for listing me....
Oooh and looking at page views, this blog now has had over 600 page impressions.
Monday, July 5, 2010
Great July 3 Class Roam
As many of my readers may know Agony Unleashed runs the PvP university. These are basically courses in PvP that we teach most weeks for a small fee in isk. We claim that the purpose of these classes is to provide education in PvP to New Eden. In reality Rells (the founder of Agony) came up with these classes so we could have a big fleet of T1 frigates go around and kill everything. As a result each class has a lecture part and then a roam component where we do just that.
This last run was quite epic. I joined up near the end after a 60 minute long battle with over 40 kills was over (note that the killboard does not handle the class well due to multiple corps.... everything in red is in fact a kill for us). Nevertheless I joined up in a Jaguar and helped out on several nice ganks against superior fleets. Unfortunately the Agony ticker does make me primary a little faster then the classmates but I managed to warp in and out of the battle a couple of times allowing my shield to recharge. (Tip: When in fleet taking serious damage don't die if you can help it ... try and get away so you can come back again) All in all it was a lot of fun and recommend these classes to any new (and old) pilot.
Feedback Thread
This last run was quite epic. I joined up near the end after a 60 minute long battle with over 40 kills was over (note that the killboard does not handle the class well due to multiple corps.... everything in red is in fact a kill for us). Nevertheless I joined up in a Jaguar and helped out on several nice ganks against superior fleets. Unfortunately the Agony ticker does make me primary a little faster then the classmates but I managed to warp in and out of the battle a couple of times allowing my shield to recharge. (Tip: When in fleet taking serious damage don't die if you can help it ... try and get away so you can come back again) All in all it was a lot of fun and recommend these classes to any new (and old) pilot.
Feedback Thread
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