Warfare & Tactics

Okay so... storytime.

I played on and off a few years ago, but got bored constantly and finally quit around the time Projectiles were getting funny-looking bonuses. In principle the game still seems interesting to me, so I've decided to come back and just try a completely different approach: attacking people. A lot.

I don't really care what happens after that, but I want it to last more than the time it takes to get CONCORDokken'd, so I'm ruling out “suicide ganking for fun and profit” before it even gets going. At the same time, I don't want it to drag on either, so lag... er... large fleets are out.

So that's what I don't want. What I do want is something I can do whenever the mood strikes me, with minimal (if any) time spent recovering ISK for my next battle, so small ships that aren't tech 3 are good, and at first I think just tech 1 frigates. I also don't want to feel like I'm logging in because I have to in order to save such-and-such space from being invaded by the evil forces of so-and-so, so I don't plan on joining any particularly serious corps and will probably start out (and maybe remain) alone. Easiest way to spoil anything I enjoy is to make it feel like work.

What I already have is about 355 million ISK and 25 million SP, mostly in Spaceship Command and Gunnery, in that order. Spaceship Command isn't going to be terribly relevant because starting out in tech 1 Frigates gives me a chance to catch up anywhere I'm lacking in short order. As for Gunnery, I have most skills in Projectiles and Lasers, plus most of the random do-a-bit-more-of-something skills to IV and the Weapon Upgrade stuff to V (adv. might be at IV, I forget). I believe Small Hybrids are at V, but without a specialization, which again shouldn't take long. Missiles can go screw themselves.

What I need is Thermodynamics. Everywhere I've read says this is important for PVP especially in small ships, and I have all of no skills in it whatsoever, so I'll have to train that.



What I don't know... this is where the thread comes in. Naturally, I've missed a lot. There's a Salvage ship that isn't a Destroyer. Learning skills evaporated and left me some SP to allocate to the random things I inexplicably abandoned before they were done training. There's a room to walk about in and... walk about in. Okay, so I'm unclear on the room, but at least my character is vaguely less ugly.

I've heard that Hybrids were recently brought into line with other weapon systems. I like simplicity, and latching onto my foes and vomiting damage at them is about as simple as it's going to get, so one of the first things I want to know is: did it work?

I've been thinking of buying a fleet of Merlins because they look funny and their name reminds me of old Arthurian films. Are these any good, or should I invest in more traditional things like Rifters and tape?

On the skills front, what are the things (Thermodynamics aside) that I absolutely need? What things are nice to have after that? And what sort of IRL skills do I need to make this work? I've heard for example that scanning is useful in finding things to shoot at without simply wandering about at random.

What about areas? Any specific places I should look, or avoid?

Another concern I've had is my security standing. Is it much harder to operate once CONCORD decide to banninate me from Hisec? Enough to warrant ratting or something to bring it back to levels where I'm not shot on sight?

Feel free to mention things I've missed or misjudged as well (implants, boosters, etc).

Declare war and random terrible corps that you see, find where they live and kill them with your merlin.

It will work, really, a properly set up frigate is legitimately difficult for terrible highsec carebear corps to kill and wait and see what you can do to them in a battlecruiser.

People usually drop corp after you kill them, before you kill them they think "Oh it's only [X quantity of people] I'm sure the elite PVPers in my corp will take care of it" and go out and run missions or mine as usual completely ignorant to the fact that your prober just got 100% on them and you're warping to 0 right now.

Wars are easy to evade, but most people are either too stupid or too lazy to do it and some legitimately want to try and fight your spaceship.

in EVE there is no real solo work, try going with a standard rifter fit.

have a backup guy with a merlin 2 blasters or auto's with 2 small nuets

both standard tanks etc.



but if you want to go up[ from frigate get into a cruiser or battlecruiser

get some guys to recomend some ships for you.





happy pirating
thats what you want to do, its also mandatory to "yarrr!" in local after you've killed something

Re: probing out mission runners, I'm assuming this is done with an alt? Or are there people out there who ignore the war so entirely that they don't notice hostiles in local while flying missions? Okay, so I suppose there have to be some people who ignore it, but enough to fight frequently?

Regarding ships, you could go Rifter -> Rupture -> Hurricane for FOTM Minmatar, but if you like to keep it simple, consider the less popular but still tenable Merlin -> Celestis -> Drake. Hurricanes and Drakes are excellent bread-and-butter PVP sweetspots. The advantage with the Caldari route is you don't worry so much about ranges and ammo types; Minmatar pilots are always aiming for precise ranges and sometimes changing ammo in mid-fight as their range changes or as the opponent drops form shields into armor.

In highsec, from what I hear Red vs. Blue is an easy way to get good fights, with plenty of 1-v-1's to be had on top of the "nonconsensual" pvp. Lowsec is no problem if you train up an alt for hauling supplies and loot.

Jolo

You will progress to BCs if you're doing any kind of PVP where you don't have previously agreed terms and you are legitimately trying to inflict harm on the people you are fighting, they are pretty much the most generally useful class of ships around.

Sometimes you might want to be in something faster than a battlecruiser and some other times a battlecruiser won't have enough tank or DPS, but a battlecruiser is the type of ship most suitable for the widest array of different combat scenarios.