Warfare & Tactics

A few word up front first

No, i do not ever fly a ship i can't afford to lose (actually, i only fly ships i can afford to lose twice)
Yes, i am aware that this question is probably been asked many times over
No, this is not a rant, but i do hope to get some tips, if possible
I LOVE PvP a LOT, just not 3, 4 or more versus 1


OK here goes

I was flying my Scorpion Navy issue, just picked something up at a station in 0.4 sec
I undock and immediately get targeted and warp scrambled by a Mechariel
I check local for any other possible hostile activity, but there seemed to be nothing alarming there
I was stuck, couldn't warp out and my cap was being drained, so eventually, i would have lost my boat

So..... i make the decision to fire back (even though i only had cruiser sized launcher fitted, cause i was being lazy and doing level 3 missions with it)
Right at the point where the aggressor has just 20% armor left and is pretty obviously on the losing side, 1 Tempest, 1 Megathron and a Baalghorn warp in and join the fight
Pow pow pow, ship gone, end of story


So..... what should i have done instead

Could i have actually tried to wait and redock, or would they just have enough time (seeing as it's 0.4 sec) to jump on me anyway? (even if i didn't fire back)

Every time i lose out in PvP, it's because of being outnumbered, are there any tricks (non exploit ones) i could pull to avoid losing my ship

And last but not least, why the hell do the corp-mates of the person that has started the fight, get kill rights on me for defending myself
I personally think it would have been more logical, if everyone is responsible for his or her own actions (like EVE actually claims), if i get fired upon for no reason (isk making aside of course :P) i am allowed to fire back, without repercussion
If i win the fight, end of story, if i lose the fight, i keep kill rights

Just for a funny comparison with real life
A serial-killer tries to shoot you, you shoot back in self defense, now the killer and his friends are allowed to kill you, does that make sense

Anyway, hope to get some answers on this, cause i would really like to avoid fighting battles that are lost even before you started them.

the 1 minute window would be a good reason for not being able to redock, but yes i probably should have tried to wait it out.

Yes i do know what low-sec is and yes i think i know about 80% of what i need to know about the PvP mechanics, but i wouldn't be asking these questions here if i knew it all would i?

Well i was bashing the button often enough, but it kept saying i had to wait a little longer.

That is actually the best advice i heard in years, awesome, thanks a lot, i feel stupid that i didn't come up with that.

I stopped reading after you said you had cruiser sized launchers on your faction battleship.

When you undock to a hostile that engages you and are not in a ship you know will be able to warp to an escape bookmark (or similar) before locked, immediately hit "stop ship" (ctrl-spacebar by default IIRC), wait out the session change timer (15 s - you can set it to be visible in the top left of your window from somewhere behind esc menu), and then spam the dock button. Do not engage any other actions or modules. Stopping ship does not make you vulnerable during session change timer - anything else does. Engaging aggressive modules will delay your docking. More often than not, you can manage to dock back up before you go down.

If after docking and thinking about it a bit you think you actually want to fight, adjust your fit, undock again and do it. But remember he more likely than not has backup in neighboring systems.

Mistake #1: Never fly anything that shiny AND slow in a place where anyone can aggress you at any time for any reason.


Mistake #2: Never assume that the "other guy" has no back up. If you really are in doubt, set the hostile's corp red and see if anything pops up in local. If you decide to engage anyways, keep a close eye on local and disengage when you see local's population number "spike."


Mistake #3 and #4: Your ship was ill equipped for PvP in any form (even sounds like a fail-fit... "cruiser" launchers?) and you fired back despite having doubts about the situation you were in. Next time just dock up.


Mistake #5: You didn't watch the numbers count in local and didn't have your D-scanner up to check for inbound ships. Knowing what is coming allows you more time to deaggress and dock back up (you need 1 minute to "cool off" after your last "offensive" action)



- Don't fly anything that might attract killmail-hungry people (Faction and T2 ships attract a lot of attention in low-sec).
- Fly stuff that is fast and/or mobile. Unless you have your own vanguard that can come and rescue you in under a minute, you need to be able to "run away" at a moment's notice.
- Fly with "friends." Not only will it dissuade the random solo hostile, but it increases your chances of survival if you are engaged and allows you to finish missions/plexes faster... so you don't have to expose yourselves to risk for as long.
- The "Direction Scanner" is your friend. It's that little "probe" box to the left of your capacitor hub. Input it's maximum range (just throw 999,999,999,999 and it will automatically set to about 12 AU) and scan every so often to know what's in your general area.

Mark Androcius wrote:
And last but not least, why the hell do the corp-mates of the person that has started the fight, get kill rights on me for defending myself
I personally think it would have been more logical, if everyone is responsible for his or her own actions (like EVE actually claims), if i get fired upon for no reason (isk making aside of course :P) i am allowed to fire back, without repercussion
If i win the fight, end of story, if i lose the fight, i keep kill rights

Just for a funny comparison with real life
A serial-killer tries to shoot you, you shoot back in self defense, now the killer and his friends are allowed to kill you, does that make sense
__________________

Counter "comparison:" A serial-killer tries to shoot you, you shoot back in self defense, the serial killer's friends come in and kill you before you can kill the serial-killer. They scoop whatever valuables you have and run away as wanted men/women.

The hostile's backup that warped in on you probably didn't have any "kill-rights" against you... they just went GCC (i.e. "criminal") and killed you. You can do that in 0.4 security space.... join in on fights that aren't yours and have no rights to... provided that you are willing to take the security status hit (which I most certainly would for a Navy Scorpion killmail).

In the future... see 0.4 to 0.1 space as the "back alleys" of EVE online where "the law" merely "contains" the problem and nothing more.

Your mistake was flying a PVE fitted faction battleship into lowsec to "pick something up". That's pretty much the stupidest thing you could do in a sub capital ship.

I keep coming back to "cruiser sized launchers" on an expensive faction BS.

Just--- wow.

The Forum software needs to have a "FAIL" button...

But, the machariel gets down to 20% armor from these cruiser launchers. That's almost as much fail if it's true.