Hello friends
On Tuesday, May 29th 2018 CCP is going to release more actual content to the game. YAY right?
Welllll, its got some goods and bads of course. Here's my take on the new stuff from a day of screaming at my computer screen.
My experience.
So on the 27th (yesterday) I figured I'd log on to Singularity (test server) and try out some of the new stuff. I didn't exactly know where to start so I did what a good boy should and actually read the patch notes.
These new instances begin with these little items you find in Data sites. Well, suppose to find in data sites. I don't know if they are rare as hell or CCP dropped the ball but I spent about 2 hours in my scanning ship flying around the test server hacking data sites and found 0. I hope CCP doesn't do what they did with Ghost sites and make these little nuggets as rare as hens teeth. Because after doing, not making this up, 8 data sites, I didn't find a single 'filament'.
That sucked.
Well, I thought to myself, 'Spear old boy, you should just go to the Null market and see if anyone is selling them', yea well they are, all of them, for 100.00 isk. ... /sigh...
So these little filaments are broken down into 5 levels of difficulty and 5 different flavors of 'bonuss' and 'penalty'. They work exactly like Wspace, but instead of expecting you to know what effect you're in, it just tells you with a little buff/de-buff symbol above your capacitor. Thats nice. :)
I suspect going forward, one type of effect filament item would be easier to run than others, thus the demand for those filaments would be greater. Where the really awful effect ones, would be cheaper.
Heres how the filaments work.
You get your cruiser, as far as I know right now, you must use a cruiser or smaller for these, fly to a spot in space away from other celestial ( just made a safe) and right click "Activate". Why you would try and use something smaller, I can't guess, maybe you just like punishment.
Once the filament is activated, a little window pops up with some warnings and a "are you sure" message. At the bottom is a little 'jump' button, which you push and whoosh, you are taken away to a a new area.
You're aren't in 'local anymore, or I don't think you are, I didn't confirm if you left local or not, but you are in a section of space with little unreadable squiggles for a name. So maybe you're there, maybe you're not. We should look into that, because it might be a cool way to hide a fleet by carrying these lv1 1 things with you on ops and teleporting your fleet out of local for 20 minutes.
I'll just say that the little Abyss area is Gorgeous! Its a maelstrom of rocks, ice, pointy bits, lighting, clouds.. all floating around with different colors. Very pretty. If you don't do anything, fly in there on a cheap one and just experience the graphic layers, it would be worth your pod.
Yes, I said pod.
If you die in these, you're podded. The rats pod you and you can't escape them once you've started. The entire event is timed 20:00. Rats take off and just dodge you to burn up time, dead. Can't dps frigs well because of your larger weapon system, dead. Can't break their reps because you have frig specific damage types.. dead. podded..
Someone said that this was intended for someone to just 'do as a quick thing' on a lunch break. HAHHAHAHA HAHHAHAHAH <-- sarcastic laugh.
Sure, maybe you could hop into your cruiser and knock out a level 1 on a lunch break. But a level 3 or higher, you better have put in your time on the test server to figure out what works with each combination of rats and effects.
The rats as far as I can tell are like sleeper rats, in that they shoot omni damage type and will kite your ass if they feel thats the best way to deal with you. They will kite your drones from you, which is nice... I placed two medium drones on a frig rat and watched as it turned around and ended up 30 from me. Its friends still pounding away on me.
The rats don't seem to follow the typical agro control methods we enjoy in other parts of space. they're smart, and very trolly. Its almost like they know the whole thing is timed and when they are down to 2 frigs about to die and you can go to the next room. The two frigs just fly off, they saw what you did to their friends, know you're going to explode in 5 minutes, so they just make your life that much more miserable before dying.
Worse, I'm fairly sure each room changes based on your fit or the weapon system you use. Perhaps I'm giving the AI more credit than is due, but I swear, if I did great in one room with my drone weapon systems, the next was tailored to do terrible vs my weapon system. After doing about 10 lvl 3s and dying 9 times out of 10... I could swear the game was hacking.
Not only that, but you're podded each time you fail.
The vibe I get from this isn't one of 'casual game play on a lunch break', the vibe I got is exactly like Hard Core mode in Diablo or POE. There is a sword of Damocles hovering over your balls, waiting for you to lose connection from a internet hiccup or the particular combination of resistance/room effects and NPC tower AOE that just places your scrotum exactly where it wants you, and drops the sword.
After 7 straight hours of screaming at computer screen about why a rat that died 3 times before with this type of weapon system, simply won't die now ,and watching the clock ticking down before reaching the end and exploding I gave up and tried to cure cancer in my basement with a toaster and box of rocks. Punishing, is close to the word I'm looking for, but masochistic (not the fun kind) is really more at the heart.
I did get to loot each 'can' in each room though, which I think makes the experience worse for me. See if the loot was in the final room only, you wouldn't really know what you lost if you failed, but the fact that you can hold the loot in your hot little cargo hold and know you can't take it out of the Abyss if you fail.. Then DYING with the potential loot in your cargo hold and seeing it go from gotten to lost... yea, that's seems to raise the stakes that much higher and make the experience that much more punishing when you fail it.
After as much time, ships and, pods as I spent on the test center, I have abandoned any hope of doing these on release. No loot is worth this abuse.
I'm rich enough to pay other people to punish themselves with this shit.
Monday, May 28, 2018
Friday, May 4, 2018
Battle of the Serengeti
As you all maybe aware, I'm back playing EVE and having fun with a great crew in Wspace.
Some of my most memorable fights are desperate small gang fights that involve both sides reshipping, warping out, dying, putting mass on holes, using wormhole mechanics to your advantage and just going totally nuts like ship loss isn't a thing!
Though my least read posts are always my battle reports, they are by far my favorite to write... so if you don't like stupid PVP don't bother reading any further.
Battle of the Serengeti
I call it this because of the mild shit talking I did while I was trying to get a fight with a newly rolled static connection.
Its early EST and I'm the only one on other than some guy that was just logged in long enough to do PI.
I jump my cloaky legion into the newly rolled hole and see a Rorq on scan. Now I can't hope to solo one of those, even if I did ping, my EUTZ / AM EST TZ is minor at best. So, I do what any person looking for a hopeless fight would do, ship my alt into an Incursus and fly around their wormhole trying to start shit.
While I'm flying around their hole, I see a Loki and Cheetah jump from their static connection. They drop probes and quickly find our K162 to their home. In random hopes of possibly killing a Loki with my incursus and scout legion, I proceed to bait on our K162 with the incusus. Maybe they didn't see the Legion, but I'll take a T3 scout vs T3 scout fight with incursus assist any day of the week.
They don't bite, they just jump the Cheetah into our home, so I figure I'll chase with the Incursus.
This is the local chat after I miss the decloak.
NOTE: I was kind of punchy, hadn't had my coffee yet and was feeling weird.
[ 2018.05.04 14:37:35 ] Sir Lomax > the deadly incursus stalks its prey...
[ 2018.05.04 14:38:49 ] Sir Lomax > its prey, completely confused by the incursus's use of speed and cunning, hides.. doesn't drop probes, yet watchs.. and waits.. for the axe to fall...
[ 2018.05.04 14:39:57 ] Sir Lomax > is it a solo hunter? or does it have a pack of deadly fellow incursus to assist in the kill, only an excessive amount of time will tell
[ 2018.05.04 14:40:43 ] Sir Lomax > will its loki pack mate assist? or leave it to die on the sarengetteee?
[ 2018.05.04 14:43:15 ] Sir Lomax > Confused by its preys lack of movement or action the deadly incursus retires to its den
[ 2018.05.04 14:48:10 ] Hisoka Abre-Kai > So. Ya gonna tell stories all day, or actually come shoot at something with that frig?
[ 2018.05.04 14:48:53 ] Sir Lomax > :) i like stories haha
I saw a dare devil jump into our home while watching with my cloaked Legion. I figure what the heck, and warped there with my Enyo.. I honestly wasn't awake enough to know that wasn't my Incusus anymore, I brought the Daredevil into structure and it jumped out.
Realizing that my incursus shouldn't be doing as much damage as that, I looked again, and realized, wait I'm in an Enyo! O ffs... then I reshiped back to the incursus and warped back to the hole.
I'm not kidding, I honestly felt I was in the incursus the hole time. I think this is what schizophrenia feels like.
O well, reset.
I see on Dscan a malediction warping in, then a confessor... Sure I can take that! Its an Incursus after all!!
I announce in local that I see the confessor.
[ 2018.05.04 14:55:06 ] Sir Lomax > oohh.. a confessor, that looks spicy :)
[ 2018.05.04 14:55:13 ] Sir Lomax > 1v1?
[ 2018.05.04 14:55:19 ] Sir Lomax > incursus vs confessor?
[ 2018.05.04 14:55:57 ] Sir Lomax > but who will jump into who.. does the confessor falter?
The confessor just sat there for a bit, not wanting to be the first to jump in, but I guess he was waiting on the malediction to tackle me first, because the malediction jumped in first. I just ignored it. I got reps and he's got shit dps.
Malediction points me.. Confessor jumps...Uncloaks and I just turn on the old afterburner, scram web and orbit like a boss.
I'm tanking both just fine, but its grinding on and on.. the Confessor knows hes screwed when he clearly sees hes applying little to no DPS. We are both on the hole, so it was going to be dual side fight anyway.
I got cocky:
[ 2018.05.04 14:58:25 ] Sir Lomax > whats tracking... how does it work?
But wait.. a second confessor warps to the other side of the hole. I guess he didn't want to lose a fight 2v1 in a confessor vs a T1 frig.
He gets low and jumps back into his home. Figuring that any kind honor fight was ignored at this point, I uncloaked the legion. I hold cloak on the incursus till the confessor uncloaks (he did jump first afterall) he uncloaks.. I point him in the Incursus, and get blapped into nothingness by the new confessor.
Lost the Incursus :( https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758144/
[ 2018.05.04 15:00:32 ] EVE System > Channel changed to Local : J130039
[ 2018.05.04 15:02:06 ] Hisoka Abre-Kai > Oops
But I got the confessor! https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758153/
So.. who oopsed who.. SIR!
Now the Loki shows up.. at this time one of my corp mates joins voice coms. I'm holding my own just fine while I reship my Incusus pilot.
What happens next is the most chaotic 45 minute fight over a C5 connection I've ever been apart of.
Ships warping out.. ships blowing up.. me reshipping, them reshipping... drones everywhere.. pandemonium in the streets, cats and dogs living together... END OF THE WORLD Type shit.
Naww.. but the battle report is slightly hilarious.
https://zkillboard.com/related/31001803/201805041500/
Yes I flew all those ships at once, I'm THAT good.... (reshipping occurred)
I'm flying a solo rep bhaal, supported by god only knows what.. jumping back and forth from hole fighting vs 2 Armageddons, multiple dictors, loki and they had a wolf rayite star effect Cerb/Caracal death camp firing squad on the other side of the hole...OMG they did so much damage in that hole, but we kept chasing each other back and forth into structure.
It was bananas.. !!!
Some of the kills...losses.
Kill Machariel https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758904/
Kill Loki https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758743/
Kill Proteus https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758573/
Kill Flycatcher https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758353/
Loss HEE-La https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758202/
Now.. the reason I lost that HEE-La is because I jumped into there not realizing it was a Wolf Ryate Star effect.. which vs.. that firing squad of small weapons and my lack of real shield... I died in a fire while only 10 seconds on my Polarizing timer remained.
To be totally honest, every loss the other guys sustained was entirely because they fucked up on their polarization timers. They chased when they shouldn't have, they over committed when they didn't need to..Good on them for bringing the fight for so long, mad tip of the hat to them.
Wormhole mechanics are the great equalizer in Wspace.
All in all, it was a great set of engagements that used up every single drop of mass on that wormhole connection. Nonstop fighting that ended with us having a trapped Mach stuck on our side.
No quarter was given.. None was asked:)
Some of my most memorable fights are desperate small gang fights that involve both sides reshipping, warping out, dying, putting mass on holes, using wormhole mechanics to your advantage and just going totally nuts like ship loss isn't a thing!
Though my least read posts are always my battle reports, they are by far my favorite to write... so if you don't like stupid PVP don't bother reading any further.
Battle of the Serengeti
I call it this because of the mild shit talking I did while I was trying to get a fight with a newly rolled static connection.
Its early EST and I'm the only one on other than some guy that was just logged in long enough to do PI.
I jump my cloaky legion into the newly rolled hole and see a Rorq on scan. Now I can't hope to solo one of those, even if I did ping, my EUTZ / AM EST TZ is minor at best. So, I do what any person looking for a hopeless fight would do, ship my alt into an Incursus and fly around their wormhole trying to start shit.
While I'm flying around their hole, I see a Loki and Cheetah jump from their static connection. They drop probes and quickly find our K162 to their home. In random hopes of possibly killing a Loki with my incursus and scout legion, I proceed to bait on our K162 with the incusus. Maybe they didn't see the Legion, but I'll take a T3 scout vs T3 scout fight with incursus assist any day of the week.
They don't bite, they just jump the Cheetah into our home, so I figure I'll chase with the Incursus.
This is the local chat after I miss the decloak.
NOTE: I was kind of punchy, hadn't had my coffee yet and was feeling weird.
[ 2018.05.04 14:37:35 ] Sir Lomax > the deadly incursus stalks its prey...
[ 2018.05.04 14:38:49 ] Sir Lomax > its prey, completely confused by the incursus's use of speed and cunning, hides.. doesn't drop probes, yet watchs.. and waits.. for the axe to fall...
[ 2018.05.04 14:39:57 ] Sir Lomax > is it a solo hunter? or does it have a pack of deadly fellow incursus to assist in the kill, only an excessive amount of time will tell
[ 2018.05.04 14:40:43 ] Sir Lomax > will its loki pack mate assist? or leave it to die on the sarengetteee?
[ 2018.05.04 14:43:15 ] Sir Lomax > Confused by its preys lack of movement or action the deadly incursus retires to its den
[ 2018.05.04 14:48:10 ] Hisoka Abre-Kai > So. Ya gonna tell stories all day, or actually come shoot at something with that frig?
[ 2018.05.04 14:48:53 ] Sir Lomax > :) i like stories haha
I saw a dare devil jump into our home while watching with my cloaked Legion. I figure what the heck, and warped there with my Enyo.. I honestly wasn't awake enough to know that wasn't my Incusus anymore, I brought the Daredevil into structure and it jumped out.
Realizing that my incursus shouldn't be doing as much damage as that, I looked again, and realized, wait I'm in an Enyo! O ffs... then I reshiped back to the incursus and warped back to the hole.
I'm not kidding, I honestly felt I was in the incursus the hole time. I think this is what schizophrenia feels like.
O well, reset.
I see on Dscan a malediction warping in, then a confessor... Sure I can take that! Its an Incursus after all!!
I announce in local that I see the confessor.
[ 2018.05.04 14:55:06 ] Sir Lomax > oohh.. a confessor, that looks spicy :)
[ 2018.05.04 14:55:13 ] Sir Lomax > 1v1?
[ 2018.05.04 14:55:19 ] Sir Lomax > incursus vs confessor?
[ 2018.05.04 14:55:57 ] Sir Lomax > but who will jump into who.. does the confessor falter?
The confessor just sat there for a bit, not wanting to be the first to jump in, but I guess he was waiting on the malediction to tackle me first, because the malediction jumped in first. I just ignored it. I got reps and he's got shit dps.
Malediction points me.. Confessor jumps...Uncloaks and I just turn on the old afterburner, scram web and orbit like a boss.
I'm tanking both just fine, but its grinding on and on.. the Confessor knows hes screwed when he clearly sees hes applying little to no DPS. We are both on the hole, so it was going to be dual side fight anyway.
I got cocky:
[ 2018.05.04 14:58:25 ] Sir Lomax > whats tracking... how does it work?
But wait.. a second confessor warps to the other side of the hole. I guess he didn't want to lose a fight 2v1 in a confessor vs a T1 frig.
He gets low and jumps back into his home. Figuring that any kind honor fight was ignored at this point, I uncloaked the legion. I hold cloak on the incursus till the confessor uncloaks (he did jump first afterall) he uncloaks.. I point him in the Incursus, and get blapped into nothingness by the new confessor.
Lost the Incursus :( https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758144/
[ 2018.05.04 15:00:32 ] EVE System > Channel changed to Local : J130039
[ 2018.05.04 15:02:06 ] Hisoka Abre-Kai > Oops
But I got the confessor! https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758153/
So.. who oopsed who.. SIR!
Now the Loki shows up.. at this time one of my corp mates joins voice coms. I'm holding my own just fine while I reship my Incusus pilot.
What happens next is the most chaotic 45 minute fight over a C5 connection I've ever been apart of.
Ships warping out.. ships blowing up.. me reshipping, them reshipping... drones everywhere.. pandemonium in the streets, cats and dogs living together... END OF THE WORLD Type shit.
Naww.. but the battle report is slightly hilarious.
https://zkillboard.com/related/31001803/201805041500/
Yes I flew all those ships at once, I'm THAT good.... (reshipping occurred)
I'm flying a solo rep bhaal, supported by god only knows what.. jumping back and forth from hole fighting vs 2 Armageddons, multiple dictors, loki and they had a wolf rayite star effect Cerb/Caracal death camp firing squad on the other side of the hole...OMG they did so much damage in that hole, but we kept chasing each other back and forth into structure.
It was bananas.. !!!
Some of the kills...losses.
Kill Machariel https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758904/
Kill Loki https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758743/
Kill Proteus https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758573/
Kill Flycatcher https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758353/
Loss HEE-La https://zkillboard.com/kill/69758202/
Now.. the reason I lost that HEE-La is because I jumped into there not realizing it was a Wolf Ryate Star effect.. which vs.. that firing squad of small weapons and my lack of real shield... I died in a fire while only 10 seconds on my Polarizing timer remained.
To be totally honest, every loss the other guys sustained was entirely because they fucked up on their polarization timers. They chased when they shouldn't have, they over committed when they didn't need to..Good on them for bringing the fight for so long, mad tip of the hat to them.
Wormhole mechanics are the great equalizer in Wspace.
All in all, it was a great set of engagements that used up every single drop of mass on that wormhole connection. Nonstop fighting that ended with us having a trapped Mach stuck on our side.
No quarter was given.. None was asked:)
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