EVE General Discussion

mmhmm...

Ok, Now I have actually read through this hole mess of a thread. It seems although a few people have agreed freighters are a little to easy to gank. Nobody has agreed that running a shipment that would drop over 20 bil in loot is a wise idea.(take note OP)

Some have asked what sort of support fleet would have helped this situation. Well with such a high profit potential this load was doomed before it undocked. But there are ways of successfully supporting a freighter in high sec and beyond.

The best you can do for support on a freighter is not logistics to rep it up if it gets attacked. Usually just a waste. Most gankers will bring enough to pop it in the first volley.

You can use fleet boosts and implants to give a decent boost to your tank. Your ehp may be higher than the gankers expected.

Combine this with a scout who also has triple webs fitted.

Do not auto pilot, manually pilot and warp to zero/jump. you will not be on grid long enough to get targeted as you will jump through the gate.

your scout who jumped through the gate first will then hit you with the triple webs allowing you to warp within a couple seconds.

This set up is as safe as you can get. and with a few extra scouts watching stations, gates, and checking your route several jumps out, will even be a fairly safe way of moving through low sec. At least as safe as it can get.

I have done this in high sec and through low sec into null when needed. Planing, scouting, and preparation can keep a freighter fairly safe even traveling into null. But that involves waiting for the right time when you scouts can find you a clear route.

Running a freighter in high sec is very low risk. having an escort to scout and web you into warp drops that risk to near zero.

Unless of course you are dumb enough to run a freighter load worth more than 10 bil out of a trade hub through system known to contain gankers.

Do not be fooled by the misconception of the level of ganker risk. the risk to gank a freighter does not really fluctuate much. It is a very static risk and static cost to the gankers. any group looking to gank a freighter knows exactly what it is going to cost then in ships long before the first shot is fired.

The cost in ganknados minus the expected returns in loot and salvage from the gank ships and the basic freighter hull puts the max cost a little over 1 bil. As soon as there is a chance of over 1 bil of loot dropping your risk of getting ganked goes way up.

A gank squad using scouts and passive targeting modules can scan you several jumps before the gank and you will not even know you were scanned.(at least it used to work this way, I assume it still does.) and they select their targets well in advance. Even this risk can be reduced by not taking the most direct route. Most freighter ganking is done at pinch points where you have to pass through when traveling between trade hubs or heading to common destination systems out of Jita.They may scan dozens or even hundreds of ships before selecting a target.

A freighter with over 3 bil in cargo is juicy and pretty much guaranteed to drop move in loot than what the gank cost in ships. A freighter holding over 10 bil in its cargo is a very high risk any where near a common trade hub or highly traveled pipe. traveling these pipes with such a cargo AFK is not only high risk but insanely stupid. You are just asking to get ganked as even a poorly planed and executed freighter gank would be profitable with that kind of loot drop.

If you do not want to get ganked follow these simple rules.

1. do not ever run a freighter with more than 2 bil worth of stuff in its cargo hold. freighters are meant to hold high volume low value goods, not huge stacks of high value goods.

2. never never auto pilot. Manually warping to zero and jumping has been a good freighter pilots practice for a very long time. Now it is much easier as you can manually just select jump and you will auto warp to zero and jump. If you just find freighter piloting to be too boring and must afk a long trip, keep your cargo to high volume low value good with a total cargo worth less than 1 bil. The chances of getting ganked just for luls is almost zero.

3. If you must run a load of high value cargo such as high end battleships put some effort into minimizing the risk.

-If you have over 3 bil worth of cargo chances are you will get ganked if you are scanned. plan your route to avoid common pipes and choke points where gankers are known to operate.

-get a friend or alt to scout ahead looking for potential pirates and gate camps. use a friend or alt to web you from each gate to get you into warp faster.

- get a friend or alt with leadership and ganklink skills to fleet you and run the shield, armor, and agility gank links

-(in high sec all three of these can potentially be the same ship. you just need a ship that can fit all the mods, warp to and jump through the next gate while the freighter is still in warp. T3 cruiser work well for this but there are other cheaper ships that also work.) the friend/alt is then in next system looking for potential gankers, with the gank-links running, and ready to web as soon as you jump through. Provided you are manually piloting(warp to zero and jump) you will jump as soon as you reach the gate before they can target you.

- You can also buy the agility, armor hp, and/or hull hp implant mods. even the 1% hull hp adds a fair bit, but the 3% is still fairly cheap. this will significantly increase your ehp likely above the planned alfa allowing you to survive the first volley if you do get ganked. surviving the first volley is often all that is needed(at least when the gankers use ganknados) as CONCORD should show up before they get a second shot off.

Lets see the km then.

"Big Kills"
http://eve-kill.net/?a=home&m=09&y=2012&view=kills&scl_id=501

Just find the freighter km with lots of trit in it
(spoiler there isn't one)

Whats the point of wraping trit? It basicly makes you appear more juicy no?

So either it was an idiot or he was hauling a contract I guess.

I would love to see this play out in the real:

Guy walks down the street with a backpack full of 100$ bills all the while screaming "dont hurt me, dont hurt me, dont hurt meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!"

No, its definitely the cost.

Yes but all the other freighter ships are insured and will never get destroyed, so the iskies leave the system again. And by those freighters I mean pilots who can fly them without getting ganked.

Not that the GOONS need on even want me to defend them. I'm sure they would rather just blast me. But I would think that anyone who war decs the GOONS makes themselves a primary target to hunt down. There are plenty of bored GOONS looking for something to do. being able to attack war targets in high sec freely, would be like christmas to a GOON.

I can tell you it is not the cost, many alliances who hate the GOONS could afford it. Perhaps knowing they would have their arse handed to them repeatedly is the real deterrent to war decing the GOONS. The GOONS certainly are not afraid of a fight.

There is just no alliance currently in game with enough clout to stand up to the GOONS, at least not one that has a reason too. I am not saying there is no alliance that could defeat the GOONS, but only that of the few there are, all are either friends of the GOONS or would stand to lose to much in such a war for it to be worth while.

In fact based on what I know of the GOONSWARM, I would think that most if not all the GOONS would be very happy if such a war was to happen. It would result in an abundance of PVP. I believe one of their moto's is "A GOON with someone to shoot is a happy GOON".