Shattered Wormhole Backpacking Trip Day 1

TLDR: I moved an alt into a C13 site with only the cloths on his back and a well thought out backpack. Wish me luck! 

Hello everyone, I'm very sorry to anyone still reading this blog. This past month its been very busy at work and I just haven't gotten any time to blog. But the hard times are over, for now, so on with the show.

One of my previous posts I talked about living in a C13 Shattered wormhole in a heavy interdictor. Yea well, that was dumb. The sleepers took forever to die and it was just dull.

I haven't given up! Just changed the equipment a little bit.

I introduce the backpacking confessor!


 [Confessor, "I Confess!]


Low Power

Damage Control II
Corpii A-Type Adaptive Nano Plating
Corpii A-Type Small Armor Repairer
Heat Sink II
Heat Sink II

Medium Power

Cap Recharger II
Cap Recharger II
Coreli A-Type 1MN Afterburner

High Power

Small Focused Beam Laser II x5

Rig Slot

Small Anti-Thermic Pump II
Small Nanobot Accelerator II
Small Capacitor Control Circuit II

Ammo

Gleam S x6
Radio S x6
Microwave S x6
True Sanshas Microwave S x6
Sisters Core Scanner Probe x8
Aurora S x6

About this fit. I would like to point out, this is my very first Confessor fit, ever. Also, I just learned how to use Small Beam Lasers. I have 100m + skill points.. all I can say is, I just never got around to it. :P

I'm not sure if thess lasers are crap or if there is a better way to fit it, I just know, I fit it and any mistakes I make are my own.. so there.


Iside the Backpack.... with Longinius Spear. 

The gear I'm bringing with me is:

1x Improved Cloaking Device II
5x Salvager I
5x Expanded Cargohold II
1x Small Inefficient Hull Repair Unit (thats what I had lying around for hull repair)
2x Mobile Depot
1x Mobile Tractor Unit
1x Data Analyzer II
1x Relic Analyzer II
1x Core Probe Launcher II
8x Sisters Core Scanner Probe
2x Large Secure Containers (they need to be packaged to haul.. they will be a 1 way trip)
3x Giant Secure Containers (they need to be packaged to haul.. the will be a 1 way trip)


Day 0: 

Short story, I found a random c13 hole and seeded a scanner alt in it. Isogen 5 the corp comes across hundreds of holes a week and so when we came across a c13 I just moved in a  scout.

Day 1: 

The following day after having purchased my confessor and its backpack. I then scanned out of the Shattered hole till I found a high sec connection. These Shattered holes btw, have LOTS of frig connections going all different directions. On this day there were 5 connections and about 30 signatures.

 The moment I got in that hole I started making safes. Each set of safe spots are for a different reason.

1st.-- Safe spots

5 Separate safe spots for each of my Large/Giant secure containers. Why 5 you ask? Well if someone gets it into their head that they want to find my loot stash, they can make that happen. I heard Wingspan spend 6 solid hours trying to find a giant can he came across in his travels. Only one of my cans will have loot in it, so this gives me a 4 in 5 chance of not getting my loot stolen by some autist that wants to fly in a straight line for 3 days. Honestly though, if someone does that for 5 cans, well they deserve the loot at that point.

1 Safe spot for 1 of my mobile depots. This depot will only be down while I'm running sites and doing stuff. When I decide to log off I'll go and scoop it up. I won't be dropping my 2nd depot EVER unless the first one is exploded or camped.

1 Safe spot for logging off. In the off chance that someone has combat probes off grid and can narrow me down in the 30 seconds I don't need them camping me at that point, or knowing where one of my cans are.. or one of my depots.


2nd. ---Sites

 Once all cans are dropped and anchored. Its time to run sites. The first site I tried was a Cosmic Anomaly Perimeter Camp. Nothing too tuff, just something to get my feet wet while I learn the ins and outs of flying a confessor.

Let me just say the confessor in a C13 Hole with its Wolf-Rayet Star effect is amazing. Just amazing.

This ship absolutely shellacks sleepers. No clue what it would do to another player vessel but sleepers don't stand a chance.

Armor HP Bonus of 100%

Small Weapon Damage Bonus of 200%~!!!

Signature Size of -50% !!!

Shield Resist -50%  (who cares about shields anyway)

My gunnery skills are spot on, but my laser skills are meh. 3's and 4s. I just don't use them. But even with crap laser skills my 6 little guns with Gleam S crystals are putting out 1000DPS!!

Combine that with being a destroyer targeting frigs and I essentially one shot Sleeper frigs and I paste cruisers. I haven't tried shooting a sleeper battle ship yet, but I'm moving up to bigger sites soon.

This ship also holds out well vs nuets, well cruiser nuets that is. No clue whats going to happen vs battle ships, but I could only assume the Signature bonus will mitigate a huge chunk of their dps. We shall see.

Site Step by Step.  

Step 1: Warp to site, fly right into the nest of sleepers. I want to place my tractor unit right near other sleeper objects. The goal of that is if a hostile cloaked ship does see me, he warps to my anomaly he might get uncloaked by a sleeper structure or wreck in the cluster of objects. Its a hope.. but its better than nothing.

Step 2: Once all the sleepers are dead. This happens REALLY fast, faster than my mobile tractor unit can tractor them in. I warp to another site leaving my tractor unit there to finish its job. I want all the wrecks to be on top of each other to lessen the amount of time both my cofessor and my wrecks are on scan.

I start on the next site book marking a wreck.  After this site is done... I warp back to the first and scoop the mobile tractor unit and fly back to site 2's wreck. Drop it.. I then warp back to my mobile depot and refit my lasers with salvagers. I then warp back to site one, salvage all the wrecks and warp to site 2.

I want to make sure I only leave 2 sites worth of wrecks on scan in case someone is watching me. I figure from start to finish, your average PVP gang would have formed up enough interdictors and H Assault frigs to own my face. I then log off.

I may get more bold in the future, doing more sites per log in, but I want to be super careful and not die right off the bat. 

So far, its worked out and I haven't died in a fire, but the day is young :)

My Goal

My over all goal is see if this type of life style is "possible".  Everyone knows on paper, its possible but I haven't heard of anyone living long term in a shattered C13 hole. There isn't anywhere to put my POS and there are about 5 frig hole connected to it nearly all the time.

I'm not bothering to scan out my chain or scout at all. My plan for if (when) I get jumped is to simply Overheat my AB, blap tackle and pray.

So far I have done 5 Perimeter Camps and made off with 160m in the stash can. When I eventually do get smoked, I'll cash out that can with a scanning alt and see if I break even.

Right now, my total investment for this ship and all equipment is around 300m + isk. If I could make that back, I would feel much better doing really really dumb things in the future. Staying on grid and fighting gank fleets and what not. Trying sleeper data and relic sites! In a confessor! We shall see.

I look forward to telling the story. 


O and if anyone wants to watch it live on twitch.. follow me at http://www.twitch.tv/crushinbeats/

3 Bored Pilots, One poorly defended POS

TLDR: We shoot at a POS, we extort a ship from some w-space pioneers. Threats were made, laughs were had... Welcome to Wspace :)

So back story; I was scanning out our chain and saw there was a Mobile Tractor Unit on scan. I asked Lotor to combat probe it down and we both blew it up.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43535417/

Shortly after we blew up that random MTU, the owner of the MTU tries to open a convo with me. At the same time he tries to open a convo with Lotor our CEO. I figured I would let Lotor sort it out.


2015.01.01 20:43:37 ] Lotor > greeetings friend
[ 2015.01.01 20:43:56 ] Timoxa Zero > why did you spok my mtu
[ 2015.01.01 20:44:18 ] Timoxa Zero > ur spooking me (
[ 2015.01.01 20:44:28 ] Lotor > not sure I have ever spok anything



Right at this moment I told Lotor there was a lone pod with the name "Timoxa Zero" on Dscan. We assumed the guy was trapped in the hole. Maybe we could sell him an exit.

[ 2015.01.01 20:44:36 ] Lotor > are you trapped !!!
[ 2015.01.01 20:44:45 ] Timoxa Zero > no
[ 2015.01.01 20:44:46 ] Timoxa Zero > i mlve in here
[ 2015.01.01 20:45:28 ] Lotor > why?
[ 2015.01.01 20:45:48 ] Timoxa Zero > well i mean
[ 2015.01.01 20:45:49 ] Timoxa Zero > its a nice place
[ 2015.01.01 20:45:52 ] Timoxa Zero > pretty good view
[ 2015.01.01 20:45:57 ] Lotor > but its a c2 ?
[ 2015.01.01 20:45:58 ] Timoxa Zero > our pos is right by the duck pond
[ 2015.01.01 20:45:59 ] Timoxa Zero > etcetc
[ 2015.01.01 20:46:34 ] Lotor > good money?
[ 2015.01.01 20:46:41 ] Timoxa Zero > not bad
[ 2015.01.01 20:46:54 ] Timoxa Zero > im new to wormholing so figured id start here and etcetc
[ 2015.01.01 20:47:00 ] Timoxa Zero > did you scan in from metropolis?
[ 2015.01.01 20:47:12 ] Lotor > I live there as well
[ 2015.01.01 20:47:32 ] Timoxa Zero > in metroplis?
[ 2015.01.01 20:47:52 ] Lotor > nope j162700
[ 2015.01.01 20:48:20 ] Timoxa Zero > really?
[ 2015.01.01 20:48:31 ] Lotor > yup
[ 2015.01.01 20:48:39 ] Timoxa Zero > since when?
[ 2015.01.01 20:48:40 ] Lotor > I live out of a cloaky orca


Not exactly true, in fact we just rolled into there from one of the holes in our chain. But they didn't need to know that :)

[ 2015.01.01 20:49:19 ] tikor Aivoras > hey
[ 2015.01.01 20:49:23 ] Lotor > howdy
[ 2015.01.01 20:49:24 ] Timoxa Zero > nospookpls
[ 2015.01.01 20:49:25 ] tikor Aivoras > I hear you live in this wormhole?
[ 2015.01.01 20:49:29 ] Lotor > yeah man
[ 2015.01.01 20:49:38 ] tikor Aivoras > wow... for how long?
[ 2015.01.01 20:49:48 ] Lotor > on and off for a few months now
[ 2015.01.01 20:49:49 ] Timoxa Zero > why dont you run anomalies?
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:01 ] Lotor > i let them build up to bait people in
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:04 ] tikor Aivoras > but you don't have a pos set up
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:12 ] Lotor > cloaky orca and alts boss
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:18 ] Timoxa Zero > protip
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:28 ] Timoxa Zero > when someone tells you the wormhol you're buying is empty
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:30 ] Timoxa Zero > its never really empty
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:35 ] Lotor > yeah man
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:38 ] tikor Aivoras > uuuuuuuggggggghhhh
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:40 ] Lotor > its crazy
[ 2015.01.01 20:50:42 ] tikor Aivoras > WHY?
[ 2015.01.01 20:51:10 ] Timoxa Zero > EOL is last 4 hours of life iirc, correct?

We saw them shipping into drakes and we thought they might fight. Which is good for us, because we love to fight!

[ 2015.01.01 20:51:20 ] Lotor > so yall ready for some pew ? now that we are wormhole buddies?
[ 2015.01.01 20:51:31 ] tikor Aivoras > oh god no...
[ 2015.01.01 20:51:37 ] Lotor > some friendly pew ?
[ 2015.01.01 20:51:51 ] tikor Aivoras > bruh... we are new to this stuff... PLS leave us alone...
[ 2015.01.01 20:52:03 ] tikor Aivoras > maybe we can be... FRIENDLY?
[ 2015.01.01 20:52:17 ] tikor Aivoras > like... hunt ppl TOGETHER?
[ 2015.01.01 20:52:24 ] tikor Aivoras > and not shoot each other
[ 2015.01.01 20:52:29 ] Timoxa Zero > lots of capitals here
[ 2015.01.01 20:52:30 ] Timoxa Zero > im confused
[ 2015.01.01 20:53:25 ] Lotor > i might have a dread logged off


Not exactly true... but plausible.. we "Might" have a dread in there..

[ 2015.01.01 20:55:28 ] Lotor > how much you pay for my hole?
[ 2015.01.01 20:56:32 ] Timoxa Zero > you really gonna be like this?
[ 2015.01.01 20:56:33 ] tikor Aivoras > we paid a ton of isk
[ 2015.01.01 20:56:40 ] tikor Aivoras > come on... we can be friends
[ 2015.01.01 20:57:07 ] Lotor > how did you pay ?
[ 2015.01.01 20:57:31 ] tikor Aivoras > Lotor someone was selling this "empty" wormhole
[ 2015.01.01 20:57:37 ] tikor Aivoras > we bought it
[ 2015.01.01 20:57:43 ] Lotor > how much ?
[ 2015.01.01 20:57:54 ] Timoxa Zero > 650
[ 2015.01.01 20:58:06 ] Lotor > thats not to bad
[ 2015.01.01 20:58:10 ] tikor Aivoras > yes...

[ 2015.01.01 20:58:20 ] Lotor > i feel i should have gotten a cut
[ 2015.01.01 20:58:32 ] tikor Aivoras > BUT it cost us a ton of isk, and we would really appreciate it if you could be our ally in here
[ 2015.01.01 20:58:41 ] tikor Aivoras > we have powerful friends moving in...

The old "powerful friends" ploy. We had a really good laugh at that. Most powerful friends aren't willing to come defend your POS from 3 dudes in stealth bombers.

[ 2015.01.01 20:58:52 ] Lotor > o snap
[ 2015.01.01 20:58:56 ] Lotor > but its my wormhole
[ 2015.01.01 20:59:12 ] tikor Aivoras > you did not set up a pos
[ 2015.01.01 20:59:17 ] tikor Aivoras > you merely brought in a ship
[ 2015.01.01 20:59:19 ] Timoxa Zero > technically
[ 2015.01.01 20:59:20 ] tikor Aivoras > and said it is yours
[ 2015.01.01 20:59:23 ] Timoxa Zero > its nobodys
[ 2015.01.01 20:59:26 ] Timoxa Zero > because you cant claim sov
[ 2015.01.01 20:59:28 ] tikor Aivoras > yes... that
[ 2015.01.01 20:59:39 ] Lotor > so who are your "powerful" friends
[ 2015.01.01 20:59:42 ] Lotor > i might know them
[ 2015.01.01 21:00:06 ] tikor Aivoras > ... and why are we telling you this?
[ 2015.01.01 21:00:30 ] Lotor > cause its the normal im scared reply
[ 2015.01.01 21:00:34 ] Lotor > "i have friends"
[ 2015.01.01 21:00:44 ] tikor Aivoras > lol

Some guy from Goonswarm enters the channel.. Guess that was the Bigger friends we should have been worried about.

We got into bombers and started shooting at their badly defended POS. It had 6 medium autocannons and no points, so why not? We might get them to fight, better yet, they may call in some friends and get us a fight too. A fight was what we really wanted. Shooting a poorly defended POS is just a great way of saying hello :)

[ 2015.01.01 21:01:01 ] Ayuren Aakiwa > Hello
[ 2015.01.01 21:01:07 ] Lotor > sup boss
[ 2015.01.01 21:01:27 ] Lotor > I'm suspose to be scared of null bears
[ 2015.01.01 21:02:03 ] Lotor > you do realize goons get facestomped every time they come in w space
[ 2015.01.01 21:02:30 ] tikor Aivoras > Lotor we would never ally with goons...
[ 2015.01.01 21:02:58 ] Timoxa Zero > i dont see why this is your wormhole just as much as ours
[ 2015.01.01 21:03:19 ] Lotor > Cause I was here first
[ 2015.01.01 21:03:40 ] Timoxa Zero > so in that respect
[ 2015.01.01 21:03:45 ] Timoxa Zero > anyone else in this wormhole before you
[ 2015.01.01 21:03:48 ] Timoxa Zero > since they were added
[ 2015.01.01 21:03:52 ] Timoxa Zero > owns this wormhole as well
[ 2015.01.01 21:03:58 ] Lotor > sure but im here they arent
[ 2015.01.01 21:06:22 ] Lotor > I feel I should have beenconsulted
[ 2015.01.01 21:06:25 ] tikor Aivoras > Lotor well, if you stop shooting our pos we will keep on talking
[ 2015.01.01 21:07:12 ] Lotor > k?
[ 2015.01.01 21:07:17 ] Lotor > what we talkinga bout?
[ 2015.01.01 21:07:29 ] tikor Aivoras > we paying you isk to leave wh
[ 2015.01.01 21:07:34 ] Lotor > who much ?
[ 2015.01.01 21:07:34 ] Ayuren Aakiwa > I'm going to hop out of here it seems I was a bit misinformed about what's occuring
[ 2015.01.01 21:07:39 ] tikor Aivoras > but only if you stop shooting our fucking pos pls
[ 2015.01.01 21:07:49 ] tikor Aivoras > btw nice manti kill
[ 2015.01.01 21:07:53 ] tikor Aivoras > or loss rather

One of our bombers somehow managed to get shot by the POS... DOH! O well.

[ 2015.01.01 21:08:05 ] Lotor > its i have more
[ 2015.01.01 21:08:07 ] Timoxa Zero > i feel like
[ 2015.01.01 21:08:11 ] Timoxa Zero > even if we pay you
[ 2015.01.01 21:08:13 ] Timoxa Zero > you wont leave
[ 2015.01.01 21:08:24 ] Lotor > i'm a man of my word
[ 2015.01.01 21:08:29 ] Lotor > going to get bubbles now
[ 2015.01.01 21:09:31 ] Timoxa Zero > you claim to be a man of your word
[ 2015.01.01 21:09:39 ] Timoxa Zero > who do i know, who will vouch for that word
[ 2015.01.01 21:10:06 ] Lotor > its ok ill just bubble your pos
[ 2015.01.01 21:10:15 ] Timoxa Zero > thats not even related to what i said
[ 2015.01.01 21:10:54 ] tikor Aivoras > Lotor that sounds like an awful idea... you will bubble your own ships and stop them from escaping
[ 2015.01.01 21:11:11 ] Lotor > I've got orcales coming
[ 2015.01.01 21:12:07 ] tikor Aivoras > Lotor look, if you stop shooting us, we will pay you. But first you have to stop shooting us

I would like to point out, it wasn't our idea to ransom, it just kind of worked out that way. :)

[ 2015.01.01 21:12:19 ] Lotor > kk
[ 2015.01.01 21:12:20 ] Timoxa Zero > no, he'll just keep on shooting
[ 2015.01.01 21:12:27 ] Timoxa Zero > this is classic scam talk
[ 2015.01.01 21:12:31 ] Timoxa Zero > happens all the time
[ 2015.01.01 21:12:38 ] Timoxa Zero > you threaten to evict us, show your hand etcetc
[ 2015.01.01 21:12:39 ] Timoxa Zero > we pay you
[ 2015.01.01 21:12:42 ] Timoxa Zero > you still evict us
[ 2015.01.01 21:12:44 ] Timoxa Zero > the end
[ 2015.01.01 21:12:48 ] Lotor > wow
[ 2015.01.01 21:13:20 ] Lotor > kk
[ 2015.01.01 21:13:29 ] Timoxa Zero > is that not your plan
[ 2015.01.01 21:13:31 ] Timoxa Zero > i feel like it is
[ 2015.01.01 21:13:38 ] Lotor > na
[ 2015.01.01 21:13:48 ] Lotor > its will be more fun to just harrass yo for days

So I made the suggestion to Lotor to have them give us one of the drakes for us to go away. We knew they had a drake and if we asked for money... they might just say.. "we don't have any". I mean we did lose a bomber up till this point.

[ 2015.01.01 21:14:15 ] Lotor > let us have that drake and we will leave
[ 2015.01.01 21:14:22 ] Lotor > ill take my ocra out
[ 2015.01.01 21:14:47 ] Lotor > drake seems fair
[ 2015.01.01 21:14:55 ] Timoxa Zero > does it?
[ 2015.01.01 21:14:58 ] Lotor > yeah
[ 2015.01.01 21:15:04 ] Timoxa Zero > why only a drake?
[ 2015.01.01 21:15:30 ] Lotor > you want me to want more?
[ 2015.01.01 21:15:37 ] Timoxa Zero > i dont
[ 2015.01.01 21:15:40 ] Timoxa Zero > im just confused why you want so little.
[ 2015.01.01 21:15:49 ] Lotor > well you said you were new to w space
[ 2015.01.01 21:15:55 ] Lotor > and just bought this worm hole
[ 2015.01.01 21:16:01 ] Lotor > figured you were on the broke side
[ 2015.01.01 21:16:05 ] Lotor > and im reasonable
[ 2015.01.01 21:17:09 ] Lotor > sound good ?
[ 2015.01.01 21:17:27 ] Timoxa Zero > hmm
[ 2015.01.01 21:17:32 ] Timoxa Zero > how would i give you this drkae
[ 2015.01.01 21:17:42 ] Lotor > just warp it to planet one
[ 2015.01.01 21:17:54 ] Timoxa Zero > thats some pretty obvious bait
[ 2015.01.01 21:17:58 ] Timoxa Zero > hows about
[ 2015.01.01 21:18:04 ] Timoxa Zero > i leave outside the pos bubble
[ 2015.01.01 21:18:10 ] Lotor > some times you have to trust bro
[ 2015.01.01 21:18:36 ] Timoxa Zero > and you dont trust me to leave my drake outside the pos bubble
[ 2015.01.01 21:19:20 ] Lotor > just planet 1 boss, I Swear your pod will be ok
[ 2015.01.01 21:20:10 ] Lotor > I can bring all kinda of people in here say im good for my word but wont do any good
[ 2015.01.01 21:20:58 ] Lotor > ok if you want to put it out side the shield its fine
[ 2015.01.01 21:22:35 ] Lotor > aight man bubbles it is
[ 2015.01.01 21:22:54 ] Timoxa Zero > i never said no.


It looked to us like he was stalling so we added some pressure to the conversation.

[ 2015.01.01 21:24:54 ] Lotor > 2 drakes?
[ 2015.01.01 21:25:59 ] Lotor > last chance before we step up
[ 2015.01.01 21:26:26 ] Timoxa Zero > and what exactly does stepping up signify
[ 2015.01.01 21:31:03 ] Timoxa Zero > alright alright

At this point we lost another bomber and said fuck it.. we needed something bigger, we shipped up to 2 ishtars and a scythe. It worked even though the POS was starting to wreck us again, but the show of force was what was important, if we were going to get our drake ransom.

[ 2015.01.01 21:31:07 ] Lotor > ?
[ 2015.01.01 21:31:22 ] Lotor > drake planet one?
[ 2015.01.01 21:32:02 ] Timoxa Zero > in a minute
[ 2015.01.01 21:32:06 ] Lotor > now ?
[ 2015.01.01 21:32:51 ] Timoxa Zero > yea just give me a minute fuck
[ 2015.01.01 21:33:23 ] Timoxa Zero > can i leave it outside the bubble?
[ 2015.01.01 21:33:33 ] Lotor > yeah
[ 2015.01.01 21:34:11 ] Lotor > just eject it and change the password it will kick it
[ 2015.01.01 21:35:20 ] Timoxa Zero > it didnt eject
[ 2015.01.01 21:35:23 ] Timoxa Zero > how am i supposed to do it
[ 2015.01.01 21:35:25 ] Lotor > o werid
[ 2015.01.01 21:35:32 ] Lotor > just boat it over
[ 2015.01.01 21:35:39 ] Lotor > yall must have the pos set up for corp use
[ 2015.01.01 21:35:42 ] Lotor > rather than password
[ 2015.01.01 21:35:49 ] Timoxa Zero > yup
[ 2015.01.01 21:36:54 ] Timoxa Zero > you're watching i presume?
[ 2015.01.01 21:36:58 ] Lotor > ya



Drake delivered.. Ransom Paid.  We said our goodbyes.

[ 2015.01.01 21:40:44 ] Lotor > thank you sir
[ 2015.01.01 21:41:19 ] Lotor > fly safe

 Conclusion:

So we didn't get a fight out of them, but we did get a ransom drake, so thats better than nothing. It did cost us 2 stealth bombers, but it was a fun way to spend some time.

Special thank you to all who participated and please enjoy your time in W-space. 

Hunters Theatre

TLDR: I babble on about how tricking, hunting, shooting players is OK, because not too would breed weaker/dumber players. 

Wspace to me is a microcosm of society and nature. Some of the same behaviors that are observed in  nature could be analogized into Wspace. The behavior I want to talk about today is what I like to call Hunters Theatre!

Humans have been practicing theatre or story telling since before we could even speak. It was and still is, a way of communicating to an audience through actions, speech and symbolism. 

Animals in the wild do the same thing. Some birds will often try flapping around on the ground to  lure a predator away from vulnerable offspring. They are creating theatre for predators to benefit the prey. 

Predators are no different in their attempts to deceive. Sometimes a crafty predators will  wiggle an evolutionary adaptation appendage, that resembles a common food source to lure in prey to a hungry waiting mouth.

Well, EVE is no different in the predator and prey relationship.

Isogen 5 practices the play style of being hunters of players. We kill without mercy because it is what we do. We respect our prey, because without them, our play style wouldn’t exist. 

We aren’t the apex predator in the pond of W-space, in fact we are small time in comparison to other hunters. We frequently become the prey for larger more fierce predators ourselves, but we do our best to not get eaten, just like our prey. 

Players often confuse malice for other players as our driving force, it’s not. The driving force or challenge of our actions is what draws us in. The desire to be the best hunters in the game. Not the biggest, but best, in proportion to our size.

Since we don’t have size on our side, we need to rely on our wits. Enter Hunter Theatre!

Everyone knows the term “Bait”. That’s just the simple term for theatre, but it doesn't describe the activity to the degree that's needed. It’s like saying a 4^th grade school play is the same as a Broadway production. The crafty hunter must attempt to put on a show, that removes all reasonable doubt from the prey’s mind. That show must convince the prey, that something, some activity is exactly as it seems. We need to fool or bring a level of illusion to the prey’s minds just long enough to strike.  The goal isn’t to be 100% convincing, it’s to be 100% plausible.

Example.

The drake. The drake is the actor, his activities the plot, the stage is the class of wormhole. If the drake is to convince his audience, that is isn’t totally out of place, he needs to follow the plot and be on the correct stage.

A drake sitting still on a C6 wormhole is as convincing to the audience as Hamlet driving a car. Though the actor may be correct, his stage and activities are wrong.

A drake with drones out, in a C2 site, creating sleeper wrecks is a probable situation. This isn’t a 100% convincing scenario, but it’s a 100% probable or plausible scenario.

A skilled player or someone paying attention to detail can see through the ruse. They could check his kill board history and see that this actor has used this seemingly PVE drake two other times that week, with 8 other ships, to kill a fooled target. The lazy/foolish/inexperienced get caught, the suspicious/intelligent live.

Eventually if the bait is used too often or too frequently word gets around, that nearly all drakes doing c2 sites with drones out are in fact bait. The interesting thing is, not all drakes are bait and not all bait are drakes. So even if the prey doesn’t adapt, he may not encounter the same situation twice. This is to the benefit of all players who both bite bait and legitimate drakes who aren’t baiting.

In w-space the stage is always changing, the plot doesn’t always work for the audience and the actor is frequently questionable. Making a plausible theatre scenario, is what separates a crafty hunter from a sloppy one. This in turn keeps hunter corps at a minimum and doesn't totally extinguish the food supply. Its a delicate balance that has ways of self correcting.

Example.

The paladin. The paladin is the actor, his activities are ratting/traveling and the stage is an occupied C4 with pilots ships on scan. Now its plausible that a paladin can be in a C4, and its plausible that the paladin could be traveling from one hole to another or even site running, but in an occupied C4? No one with that level of ISK is going to be solo in a C4 with piloted ships on scan. People who make those choices don’t keep paladins long. Theatre unconvincing. The only way for the theatre to be convincing is to act like someone who has that ship and doesn’t want to lose it.

The problem is, if the people we are baiting aren’t 100% on the ball, they will miss the bait, which is how people keep ships like that. 

The actor could warp from one hole to another and try and get out of danger as quickly as possible. I’ve done it, some of you have done it.. This makes it plausible. What if the paladin sits 20 off the hole? Have you done that before? Never when my intention was to keep my paladin intact. That one little factoid could shatter an illusion.

What’s worse is, when Isogen5 did this very tactic… the prey/targets had no real interest in biting the bait in the first place. My dad would say, “that’s why they call it fishing and not catching, now shut up and get me a beer before I dress you like your sister again”.

One of the really great things about EVE and theatre is, what I (Spear) find convincing or plausible isn’t what others may find convincing or plausible. That’s what makes this process so enticing for both predators and prey. 

Now do you see why we do what we do? The pure challenge of it. Not because we had a hard day at work and want to beat up on some newbies with our T3’s.

We aren't chasing people out of EVE (as suggested in some after action conversations I have had in the past), we are adding the danger of consequence to every plausible situation.

The T3’s are the teeth and they are efficient as hell on chewing up poor hapless newbies. But the theatre… the hunt.. .the out witting of your fellow man… That’s something...

Typical weekend for Isogen 5

A good weekend for our small W-space pvp corp. mining corp. Special thank you to Foedus Latro for being one of the best W-space FC's in the game! Awesome content generator with his creative shenanigans and his ability to withstand my level of trolling/bullshit. We are recruiting experienced W-space pvpers, miners, send convos/mails to Foedus Latro. Or join "Isogen5" channel in game.

TLDR: I give a weekend battle report for some wormhole based activities, videos, kills, tactics and story telling from the perspective of a grunt in an active W-space PVP corp. 

I'm sorry for the length of this post, I know some people feel that blogs are for just five paragraph essay based ramblings. Usually they are... but I was on a roll, so FU.

For the Newbies--- 

I know we have a bunch of newbies in EVE recently and I don’t think many of them know about this type of play style. With that in mind, I’m going to try and describe the ins and outs of being a w-space PVP gang.  

Bob(w-hole god of destiny) and his glorious randomness shined on Isogen 5  this weekend. Billions were destroyed in fight after fight, I’ll do my best to recall the details of each one but the point of this post is to show you that W-space small gang warfare is alive and well.

                                                                                                                                                                              

Friday-

Well the below post made while I was a little inebriated right before I went to sleep. It is what it is.

http://www.invadingyourhole.blogspot.com/2014/12/salvaging-other-peoples-stuff-while.html

Backstory:

Iso5's goal is to seek out targets in W-space and sometimes null. When we find people in our scouting travels, we try our best to interact with them in some way, even if they outnumber us. Even if it seems like a lost cause. Our play style is totally dependent on players interacting with us.

How we accomplish this, is by rolling (intentionally closing) our hole connection to create a new exit. Once the new connection is found less than a minute after the old connection was closed. We then send out scouts in all directions possible to try and find targets. Once we get about 3 connections away from our home, we return and do it again.

Well on Friday, one of our scouts came across a crit wormhole(significant mass/ships have used this connection to reduce the integrity of the connection) connected to a C5.

A few things that make this find significant. First, why is it crit? Second, are the people who made it crit, still around? Wormholes don’t just crit themselves so someone clearly interacted with this connection within the past 18 hours. As a scout, you look for these types of traces to find your prey.

The most common reason why a hole would be crit is a defensive tactic used by wormhole groups to limit the amount of ships that could possibly use it to attack them.

The main downside for us to finding a crit connection is; the pure amount of ships/firepower we can use to attack people is very limited. 200 million mass or less.

So our scout jumps in and finds sleeper wrecks on scan. Wrecks on scan means potential targets have interacted with sleeper NPC’s within an hour or less. Not only that, but they will most likely be salvaging  the wrecks soon due to how much work it is to create them and their NPC loot.

Well we can’t really kill the people who made the wrecks because of the crit hole, so we decide to try and steal or destroy the wrecks themselves.

Bombers.

We start by moving into the crit hole and forming up on one of the players who is salvaging the precious NPC loot.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43397770/ -- Catalyst destroyer fit for salvaging.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43397792/ -- Mobile tractor unit #1

Right around that time we noticed a hostile Rapier on scan and then cloak up. This Tech 2 cruiser is designed for removing frigates/bombers from the universe, if it was so inclined. Lucky for us the owners of these wrecks don't shoot at anything other than red crosses.

Now before you start to feel bad for the poor C5 residents. That we just exploded and took their stuff. I would like to point out, we are there with frigate ships only. They are paper thin and our entire fleet could have been chased off/destroyed by a single Tech 1 Cruiser. That solo rapier would have ended us... instead it hid in some force field.

The thing is, the residents of this C5 have become so pvp risk adverse, even attempting fights grossly in their favor are off the table for them. That’s their play style. That’s OK, but we won’t sit around and wait for them to conform to our play style.

Now if you recall I said I had been drinking. Well when Foedus our FC tells us to go to the next MTU to destroy it, and explicitly says the correct one… well I wasn’t paying enough attention.   

My little bomber exploded because of sleeper NPCs. I then spent the remainder of my time trying to bump hostile ships with my pod, then Foedus tells me to leave or face his punishment.

We got one more MTU.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43397920/ --- Mobile Tractor unit #2 – notice the pod.

I returned back to our home system and got into my own salvaging destroyer. 

I then flew back to the C5 with the intention of salvaging some remaining sleeper wrecks to recoup my loss of a bomber. 40 million isk was salvaged and this more than covered the cost of my bomber.  

Net result + 10 million some ISK and a funny story.

Saturday:

The annual W-space battleship roam, lead by Lazerhawks!

Lazerhawks has been doing this for a few years now, with different levels of success. Iso5 was invited to bring some battle ships and have some fun. To sum up the activity; We waited an hour to jump 2 times and get blobbed by 3x our numbers. Op success!

 Here are some kills I was a part of. 

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43418175/ -- Dominix

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43418183/ -- Dominix

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43418387/ -- My Megathron.. I don’t have skills for most T2 large long range weapons because I live in W-space and most situations don’t call for it.

I bought full insurance for the ship and had every intention of losing it. After insurance costs/Mods/Rigs.. the ship might have cost me about 100m isk.

Later that afternoon…

I was headed back from K-space into the warm embrace of W-space and I was reminded again of how dangerous high sec can be.

It seemed like some dastardly criminals in catalysts were attempting to take out a Bowhead. So, I did what all decent person should when surrounded by criminals, shoot at them.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43421025/

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43421053/

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43421068/

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43421072/

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43421079/

When I finally made it back into our home, we had a direct connection to Curse (0.0 Null Sec) that required our inspection.

Thankfull,y some null sec folk in this area liked to fight too!

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43423020/ -- Cynabal

They liked to fight so much that they found our wormhole, jumped in and started shooting one of our towers.

Not many k-space folk do that. We responded in such a way, that we showed them exactly why, not many do that.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43424987/ -- Jaguar

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43424992/-- Jaguars POD.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43424964/ -- Sabre

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43424981/ -- Sabre’s pod.

They ran all the way back to their Null sec, and we followed them with bigger ships!

We found ourselves sitting on a null sec gate attempting to get the enemy fleet to commit to our side of the gate. I jumped through the gate just to see what was on D-scan. Sure enough and their entire fleet was 1 AU from the gate waiting for us to jump on an Absolution bait ship they put out. I bubbled their side of the gate and jumped through to kill the bait Absolution. Good thing I put up that bubble there because the escalation fleet was forced to burn through the bubble while we burned down the absolution.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43425197/ -- Absolution

The resulting fight was EPIC! We didn’t totally kill their fleet because we were slightly outnumbered but we did get a few notable kills before one of the archons arrived.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43425307/ -- Enyo

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43425360/ -- Zealot

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43425379/ -- Zealots POD

When the archon finally showed.. the FC told us to GTFO. At just the last moment I was pointed/webbed/scrammed and exploded.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43425385/ -- My Cerberus.. O well

Just when we thought the fight was over, the Null sec guys warped archons x2 and a fleet to our Null sec hole.  We shipped up again, bringing 3 guardians, Nag and T3’s. No fight was had, the null guys left. 

I'm not making that up. From a later conversation with one of the null sec guys, they said we out shipped them with guardians. So we responded "Should we have brought two archons instead?"

Good on them for bringing the fight to us! You guys are making inroads to becoming actual people. 

This wasn’t the end of our Saturday fun.

Remember those guys on Friday we stole the sleeper loot from? Well we just happened to have a scout in that hole from the previous night, and they were back at it. They even used the exact same tactic of critting the hole. We mustered the troops from both Iso5 and Skyfighters and build an epic bomber wing!

We seriously thought we could take down a Moros with a bunch of well-placed bombs and persistent torpedoes. We had 17 brave bombers to shove through that crit hole to try and murder those risk adverse site runners.

As it so happened while we were waiting for the perfect time to strike, an entirely different group of people had been prepping a log in trap for the site runners.

Not wanting to be left out, we 3^rd party'ed and chaos ensues. The video tells the tail better than I ever could, but I’ll attempt to summarize the events.

Our bombers were equipped with range damps and target lock damps. The log in trap fleet had minimal logi support, and the support it did have, were spread way out. What made it worse for them was they attacked in the middle of an escalation wave. The sleepers did most of the heavy lifting for us and the site running defenders. Bombs were launched and wrecks, ships and pods were destroyed.

Watch the video and you will see chaos.. o and me learning to not get stuck on POCO’s with my bomber. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f04RSTM38cE

Here are some of the kills I was on.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43426207/ -- Typhoon

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43426231/ -- Loki

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43426266/ -- Proteus

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43426408/ -- Some dudes pod.. that was stuck on a poco with me.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43426423/ -- And of course .. their mobile tractor units.. lol

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43426479/ -- Mobile tractor unit

I stopped the recording mid-way because I thought the fighting was over, turns out Foedus scanned out the log off attackers, log off spot. We tried to kill 2 bhaalgorns and a guardian with some bombers. It didn’t work out well for us, but it was one hell of a fight!

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43426523/ -- My bomber

Sunday:

Well Sunday started out slow, so Andrew was like “Hey lets bubble a gate, in our Null sec connection and see what happens”. My normal view on gate camping isn’t a positive one, but we were that bored and our chain was being scanned by some other guys at the moment. Since it was directly connected to our home, what could go wrong?

To put it plainly, I’m not good at gate camping, I’m not very good at EVE either, so when a solo Phantasm approached me to break up my camp, I should have run.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43447344/ -- My Enyo…

Lucky for me, Andrew uncloaked his Rapier at just the right time(after I died) and picked up where I left off. Since our direct connection was to our home, some other guys came in to sort out the Phantasm menace.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43447420/ -- Phantasm

This pilot was angry that we would dishonor him so much by using a falcon so he called us names and left. Seriously, null sec residents are filthy honor-less animals, so fairs fair imo.

We sat there a while longer, till our Phantasm pilot came back in another ship.

Which we promptly killed.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43447845/ -- Scythe Fleet Issue

I’m guessing he didn’t notify his intel channel we were camping that gate, because a dominix jumped into, and died.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43448585/ -- Dominix

I had gotten another ship from my stash… and then lost it. https://zkillboard.com/kill/43448505/ -- Crow – didn’t want that ship anyway. O well.. Dominix dead.. op success.

I’m guessing that dominix pilot didn’t want to save his null sec buddies the experience of being killed, because a second dominix jumped from the same system one minute later… and died.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43448626/ -- Dominix

It was raining domi’s … so when we saw +1 more in local chat and gate fire, we thought .. “Another dominix?” Nope. The previous 3 pilots killed by us in the exact same spot, wasn’t enough for us to be put onto their intel network. … and a Thanatos decided to test the water – and died.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43448847/ -- Thanatos

And again.. I died https://zkillboard.com/kill/43448749/ -- Tristan.. – I was running out of better tackle ships or I was getting tired of trying to save them.. who knows.. but shit exploded and I was happy.

After all that excitement, the day wasn’t over yet!

Foedus managed to trap out his Orca, while rolling the hole and was forced to come back in through our new connection. This worked to our favor because the people who lived in our static thought the orca was alone… and vulnerable. It wasn’t, it was bait.

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43452586/ -- Proteus

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43452605/ -- Proteus

https://zkillboard.com/kill/43452606/ -- One of the pods

Foedus later said he felt bad for ganking those guys. Which is crazy to me, because if our “Orca Rescue Response Fleet” ORRF for short wasn’t there, he would have lost an Orca. We were going to use that Orca to haul our mined Isogen. We are a mining corp after all.