Missions & Complexes

Dearest fellow capsuleers!

I have the goal that someday, I can live in a wormhole, on my own, with at least some measure of self-sustainability. I've dabbled a lot in wormhole exploring, about 90% of my wormhole 'raids' happening on my own. I've made hundreds of millions of ISK, and I want to prepare for the next step.

What I want to know, is what are all the things I need to have, be aware of, etc?

I know some things I'll need (some of which I already have or am on track to getting) include:

-good scanning skills (duh)
-having a POS
-having a scanning alt in system in case I get podded.
-The proper PI setup to make my own POS fuel would be nice.
-some measure of industrial ships to support the logistics of moving supplies, and, well, space stations.

And beyond that I'm really not sure. I need your help, o experienced wormhole dwellers! 

I have almost no experience with operations of POS's (I still need to train the anchoring skillbook) and very little with PI.

What advantages are there to living in you own wormhole as opposed to simply raiding wormholes on your own? One that comes to mind is you can have multiple ships at your disposal, making sleeper-farming and salvaging faster, more efficient and more effective.

I should also mention I imagine I ought to look for a C2 wormhole with a static lowsec and another static going to another C2 or perhaps a C3, but I'd be more than happy to hear recommendations from those of you more experienced.

Thanks in advance for any help and advice!

Omi

Location - I spent some time living in a C2 and now live in a C1 (unfortunately). I think your choices are sound - a C2 with low sec static, although having another static to C2 or C3 may be a little hard to find.

Ships - Again you are clearly on the right track, I'm sure you know what you need to kill sleepers, plus a bespoke salvage ship, plus an industrial that can warp cloaked (so low sec travel is never an issue), plus a bespoke scanning ship (cov ops). Clearly you could combine some of these in one ship but given that your ship bay is in the same system I think bespoke ships are worth it. On top of this I have a destroyer set up for gas clouds. You might also want a miner, I don't. Top tip would be to stay cheap - no need for anything other than tech 1 ships and tech 2 mods. I use a drake (boring but effective) and know that 2 average anoms in a C1 will give me enough isk to replace it.

Skills - I think you have it - a good range of skills if you are on your own for POS, PI, shooting stuff, hauling, scanning, mining (!?)

POS - bit of a pain. A large is probably overkill and eats too much fuel. Realistically the choice is between a small and medium and I would prob go for small. If a decent size corp wants to blow it up it will anyway so less lost and it uses less fuel. You can build most of the stuff needed for fuel (not sure 1 char can do it all) but it may be easier to bite the bullet and just bring the fuel blocks in. It will save a lot of micromanagement and hassle, although it isn't the most isk efficient method.

As you say scanning alt essential, although I don't think many gankers use bubbles in WH so you should very rarely, if ever, get podded. Maybe I've just been lucky so far!

Lastly I would say the big disadvantage of living in your own WH is that you can run out of stuff to do so I would strongly recommend a ship that you can take into low sec (or even null if you get access) and run sites there. This might be the one case where you might go for a non-tech1 ship to give all-round capability (HAC or T3)?

Hope that helps.

All of the things you brought up in your OP are valid. It all depends on what you want to do. When I was a mere 5 month old pilot, I moved into a C1 with LS static. It was great fun. I went in with barely enough isk to buy the POS etc. I emerged some months later with about 20bil in assets, including a fleet of T3's. I'd do it again, but right now real life is taking too much of my time.

There are many ways to approach w-space life, even if you’re going it solo. You’ll probably get lots of different opinions on what’s best. My thoughts, below, are based on solo living in w-space for most of my eve-life C2 => C3 => C4 => 2 x C3 => C5 => C3.

Income, and balance of effort-per-isk, has kept me coming back to C3s. Despite what others might believe you *can* solo everything up to and including C5 sites … it’s just that the time and effort for the higher level sites makes them not great economically. A good C3 is fantastic for a solo operator. The stuff I harvested either fed my wallet directly or our (hisec) T3 manufacturing facilities.

Obviously my view of ‘solo’ is not just-one-toon, so could easily also translate into ‘small group’.

I used every resource that my home system provided, anoms / radar / mag / ladar / grav / PI, altho did not mine minerals a lot in the end. I rarely raided neighbouring systems except for PvP purposes. If you setup solo in a decent C3, and run it well, you will have no problems popping tens of billions of isk into your wallet. My long-term estimate was an average of 1 – 1.5b isk per week. Sometimes I’d clear 3b in a weekend and sometimes I’d go days with little beyond the PI.

The people I used included:
- 2 x DPS toons. They could each clear any site solo but it’s much quicker with both in the site. Also means one, usually me, could head off somewhere else for a while without the income stream falling too far behind.
- 1 x combat fleet booster toon (not so necessary in C3 but pretty well essential to work C4s and C5s a little more quickly).
- 2 x miner / harvester toons.
- 1 x orca miner / harvester booster toon.
- 1 x perfect scanner, plus several backup not-so-perfect scanners.
- Haulers able to use T2 indies as well T1.
- POS gunners and bubble anchorers.

Of course that’s still only a few toons, with extensive cross-training. For example my main DPS toon is also my orca pilot and able to provide mining boosts when the others are harvesting. Conversely my main miner is also T3/Command ship pilot providing perfect fleet warfare boosts. Every toon, even the backup emergency scanners and PI experts, fly covops and most are also trained as POS-gunners.

I was usually multiboxing. So when I was clearing a C3 site I usually had two DPS guys in the site and my main scanner watching the system with a deep-space probe, in case any new K162s spawned or any unwelcome visitors arrived. Sometimes I’d also have my fleet booster in a minimized window sitting in the POS pumping out those boosts.

IMO a good C3:
- Has a lowsec static. Then it’s easy enough to run logistics via the static if you absolutely must, but also less accessible for day-trippers who’re usually searching for K162s in hisec. For major logistics it’s just a matter of waiting for the spontaneous outgoing hisec wormholes or incoming hisec K162s.
- Has excellent PI. Much as I detest the click-fest aspects of PI it is a very good source of additional income for a w-space dweller.
- Has no effects … you don’t need them in a C3 and positive system effect makes you a more attractive target for hostile takeover.
- Has very few moons … especially if they’re few enough for you to be able to place a small tower on all the moons you’re not using.
- Has a very good outlying moon for setting-up your main POS and can-spam bubble protecting it.
- Is a relatively compact system. I’d never thought of this until recently, when I am PvP hunting throughout w-space, but a small system is much safer … because everything is within DS range from throughout the system. Conversely, as a hunter, I very much appreciate the larger systems where I can find a safe spot outside of DS range of the celestials, to do stuff that requires being uncloaked (like logging-off and back on again).

Ships?
Here’s what I ended up having in my last few systems. Absolutely possible to get by with less, but this is my basic fleet.
- Sleeper killer ships x 2 (or 1 if you’re only using 1 DPS toon). I settled on expensive-fit tengu in the end. They could cope with C5s and would laugh at C3 DPS. For my next C3 I may well stick to a pair of drakes … more than enough and way less troubling to lose.
- Noctis. Love that ship.
- Fleet warfare boost ship. I started with BC, then command ship, and finally a T3. T3 gives stronger boosts in specialist mode, but less modes at once.
- Haulers for PI. I used T1 haulers but next time round will use deep space transports … having now learned how hard it is to opportunity kill a DST.
- Gas harvester ships (I used dedicated battlecruisers).
- Mining ships (I used hulks and skiffs).
- Orca (harvesting support, big-hauler, wormhole collapsing, and emergency logistics support).
- Can-opening ships (for mag/radar sites). I had dedicated battlecruisers and a backup multipurpose cheetah for when evil doers were trying to hassle me.
- A few covops taxi ships just for getting ppl out to empire space and back when needed.
- Dedicated scanner ships. My main scanner in a nullified covops scanner T3 and the backups all in covops frigates.
- HICtor for fine tuning WH closure and for PvP efforts.
- PvP ships to choice.
- No capitals. I know lots of ppl who build capitals in their C1, C2, and C3 w-systems. IMO they’re a liability making the system a more attractibe gank target and making it more difficult to onsell when you’re done. Needing a capital for home defence purposes is very unlikely if you manage your system well … don’t upset too many ppl too much, don’t mount faction-fit faction-tower POSes, don’t leave pirate BSs lying in the POS force-field to advertise their presence. The only times I’ve wished I had capitals is when we were killing the customs offices.

p.s. A few good replies since I started writing mine. Bubbles are used, a lot, in w-space. Both anchorable ones and HICtir/DICtor based ones.

Once again a very good post from Substantia.

I head a small corp living in a C3, and would only like to add that I think she is a pretty hard core player :)

There's a lot of stuff that needs to be done, and I very much prefer to have a group of others I can rely on... and even there's a handful of us online every night, I still find myself dual- or tripleboxing (I have a swiss army indy/fleet booster "main" alt, and an elite scanner/bomber alt) most of the time to make things smooth and safe.

Also living in a wh is really good for corp team spirit. You learn to trust each others and operate as a team, turning the corp into a tight, family-like unit- so why not find a few like-minded pilots and do it together?

very good post, though POS system is really tough to ensure trust between corpmates and it's a pain to set up correct roles to everyone.

Its as simply as that do what Barnie Nator and the other Large POS guys tell you and you will for sure be killed ...

Dont listen to those get a Large POS guys .. if a corp wants you dead all your defenses are worthless simply becouse you are allone .... a large POS just makes them take a bit longer to kill you.

Instead of going for the Big guns try to use what most people use in low sec, its called low profile.
In other words, you want to look like a waste of time to attack and you will survive because of that.

WH:

1) Take one with a lowsec entry => you can run a POS through it and many gankers only scan in High Sec for WHs.

2) Take a WH with unwanted effects (basicly everything that doesnt support Shield Tanks like a Wolf Ray System) =>
This will simply mean it will be a bit harder for you, but it also means fewer people want to get the system as their own ...

3) C1 to C3 Max => BS as biggest ship make the POS kill take longer and add to the waste of time factor.

POS:

1) Use a Medium Amarr POS => Enought Energy and enough to fight of the we have 4BS and to much time guys.

2) Be a minimalist: Equip the POS with Hardeners to get the Resis between 43 and 50 %, a SMA and a Ammunition
Assembly Array rest goes into a few ECM and Guns.

3) Place a Orca into the SMA, use it as a Storage for you loot and Escape Ship.

4) Dont use to many ships, basically you want to be able to place the most valuable ships into the Orcas Bay,
this way you can simply get you valuable stuff into the Orca and log out if the POS gets attacked.


This way you are "safe" against smaller groups and minimize the loss if attacked by larger group, which you cant fight of anyways .....

Seems you have some work to do.

Wow umm you need to take your meds.....


Nope never been into a WH, they don't do them in my NPC corp

Four months in a C3. Small tower.

Some people know.....some people just say they know.