It's crazy to think that I was 17 when I first started playing EVE, and now it's over a decade later. Seraph, my first main and frankly the name I've most associated with my online "persona" was born on the 3 July 2011. Over 11 years! His "brother", my second main, Zendrak (or just Zen to my friends) was born just over 6 months later in September 2011. True, I've been the king of on and off playtimes, but I don't think I've played any other game anywhere near as long (even inconsistently).
So all this to say that, although things have changed alot, theres still something pulling me back to EVE, and by extension this little blog.
Previously on "I suck at EVE"
So what have I been doing in the last week or so?
Mostly re-learning things I've forgotten, finding out new changes since I've been gone (often by running facefirst into them) and making incredibly dumb mistakes while trying to move stuff that was put in asset safety.
Yeah that was painful, but considering it was the first PVP I'd experienced in a couple years, I don't think I did too bad, plus my Orca actually survived a lot longer than I expected. Plus I was able to be positive about it, a few years ago the thought of losing 4bil in the space of 30minutes would be enough to have me literally sweating.
Immediately after my ships popped I said:
"Well that was stupid" and laughed.
Besides losing billions of ISK over stupid mistakes, I've also been checking out the Crimson Raider Halloween event and trying out the sites (both combat and hacking).
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| Spooktober etc |
Frankly the hacking sites have not impressed me. While the scenery is nice and I appreciate all the loot is in one can, the difficulty level to scan them down plus how tough some of the cans are to open vs the rewards you get seems very lopsided. I've got max scanning skills on Seraph (thanks Wormhole living era), a fully rigged out scanning Astero with T2 scan modules etc, and the sites aren't "easy" to scan out compared to most HS/LS data and relic sites I encounter, and the cans can actually be tricky even with max skills. I rarely fail hacks except on some Sleeper Caches or really tough NullSec sites and yet these event sites have had me fail a hack or two in a row often enough for me to be like... "hmm".
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| This is a particularly bad can but it proves my point |
I wouldn't mind if the rewards were 20-30mil per site but the average I've been seeing (and I've easily done 30-40 of them by this point of both Tetrimon and Crimson Raider sites) is closer to 5-8mil, which for the difficulty of the hack seems a bit shit. Maybe there's NullSec versions that pay better (I haven't checked) but the HS/LS sites aren't great. If the average ISK per site was higher, even if that meant hacking 2-3 cans instead of one, I'd probably like them more.
The combat sites however (both Blood and Tetrimon) have definitely been worth it. The average loot I've been getting from site bosses is 45-50mil, but I've had a couple big boosters drop that were 100mil+ on their own which is pretty sick. My site completion time in a Paladin is around 10-15mins, the only thing that sucks is actually finding enough to run them consistently. If you're lucky with spawns or play in a quiet timezone you can sometimes find systems with 2-3 or even 4 sites in them, which is a nice little earner if you can keep them to yourself, or you're running such an overkill fit that you can easily contest people who show up to kill the boss (like a 3k DPS marauder).
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| Lol, early morning (6am) EUTZ |
After doing three sites in a row the other day I had an EVE estimated 180mil in loot which took me about 40-45 mins to complete. Admittidly I'm definitely on the "higher" end of PVE players running these (maxed skill marauder, bling DPS mods, running with an old Incursion clone with 5% gunnery implants etc) but even a conservative ISK/Hr estimate is 200mil+ which is in the same ballpark as T5 Abyss runs. T5 Abyss runs are FAR more dangerous/risky for your ship than this event so my recommendation is to milk these sites during quiet times as much as possible if you've got a ship that can run them. I'll post my Paladin fit at the end of this post but I'm toying with switching to a Kronos because so many of the rats are between 8km-20km, perfect for being slapped with Neutron Cannons. However the event ends in a couple days and it seems like a waste of money to be buying and fully fitting a Kronos to literally do 10-20 sites with it and then have it languish in a random hangar for a year until the next event. There's not many things you can use a Kronos for that I enjoy doing often, so maybe I'll try it out next year.
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| Around two and a half hours of mixed Tetrimon and Raiders sites this morning, over 250mil ISK/hr! |
What's next?
Definitely some more PVE to get me used to EVE again before I dip back into PVP. I've heard FW is getting a change to mechanics, so maybe I'll head over into my old haunts in Black Rise and try a little solo PVP again. I've already lost 4bil, what's a few Thrashers and Taranises going to hurt?
I'm wanting to do some more "experiment" type content, I actually quite enjoyed doing the Amarr Epic Arc and I'm toying with the idea of an Abyss "What I got in x number of Tier 4/5 Firestorm/Electrical/Dark Abyss Runs", which would have the dual benefit of building me up some ISK and also giving me content for this blog. Plus I've been doing a lot of exploring recently, so maybe set myself a challenge of earn "x" amount of ISK in a day/two days etc from exploration sites (data/relic and combat) would be interesting.
We'll see what RL allows and what I actually manage to achieve of course.
Paladin fit
[Paladin, Event Pally]
Imperial Navy Heat Sink
Imperial Navy Heat Sink
Imperial Navy Heat Sink
Multispectrum Energized Membrane II
Multispectrum Energized Membrane II
Centus C-Type Large Armor Repairer
Syndicate Damage Control
Republic Fleet Large Cap Battery
Heavy Stasis Grappler II
Republic Fleet Stasis Webifier
500MN Y-T8 Compact Microwarpdrive
Mega Pulse Laser II, Conflagration L
Mega Pulse Laser II, Conflagration L
Mega Pulse Laser II, Conflagration L
Mega Pulse Laser II, Conflagration L
Bastion Module I
Salvager II
Small Tractor Beam II
Small Tractor Beam II
Large Energy Collision Accelerator II
Large Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Hobgoblin II x5
Hobgoblin II x5
Salvage Drone I x5
Conflagration L x8
Scorch L x8
Imperial Navy Multifrequency L x12
Mobile Tractor Unit x1
So quick mention of the Paladin fit, Conflag for cruiser and bigger, Multifreq for destroyers and frigates. Frankly this thing is overtanked, the Syndicate Damage Control is more for anti-gank peace of mind than actually needed for the site. If you're just T2 fitting this, which would work totally fine, then you could probably switch this for a Tracking Enhancer II.
I have Hobgoblin IIs but barely use them, with the dual grappler/web combo you can track close in frigates and I hate dealing with my drones being aggroed. Tractor beam lets you grab the boss wreck (and loot) while you wait for Bastion to run down.
With all V related skills I'm doing the sites in 15mins or less which is decent, the main trick is timing your Bastion cycle so when the gate opens and the next wave spawns you don't get tackled on the gate during Bastion and waste time.
Thanks for reading this far if you're still watching my blog, but otherwise I'll probably have another post up in a few days
Fly safe!
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