Alright. So since last week, I've gotten access to make my own Fleet Activity Tracker (FAT) link, I got access to the old AAR tool to actually use instead of faking its style manually. Things are on the up and up. But I still got that krab mentality and fight-or-flight instincts being balanced towards 100% flight that need to be adjusted for, and filament confusion that I need to get clear in my head. So let's walk through it.
Roam members (21)
Spoiler
Alex EpicPotato - Harpy
Alex Maillar - Burst
Amfion Bravais - Harpy
Amon Ijonen - Merlin
Dev Terran - Merlin
DockSau - Merlin
Drebin 679 - Jackdaw
George Goodman - Merlin
Grafien Saari Utama - Burst
Higas Utama - Merlin
iProphet2k - Merlin
Irith Allyrin - Merlin
Kitava Stardust - Merlin
Sang Woo-Krang - Burst
Sytze - Burst
Tron401 - Merlin
Turlough Dominian - Merlin
Wither M - Burst
Zhandris - Stiletto
Zoups Urden - Merlin
iProphet2k - Merlin
yeoj - Merlin
Alex Maillar - Burst
Amfion Bravais - Harpy
Amon Ijonen - Merlin
Dev Terran - Merlin
DockSau - Merlin
Drebin 679 - Jackdaw
George Goodman - Merlin
Grafien Saari Utama - Burst
Higas Utama - Merlin
iProphet2k - Merlin
Irith Allyrin - Merlin
Kitava Stardust - Merlin
Sang Woo-Krang - Burst
Sytze - Burst
Tron401 - Merlin
Turlough Dominian - Merlin
Wither M - Burst
Zhandris - Stiletto
Zoups Urden - Merlin
iProphet2k - Merlin
yeoj - Merlin
While this was the same doctrine as last week, I switched out the Hecate for a Jackdaw. A rocket Jackdaw can only do half the paper DPS of a blaster Hecate, but it gets to deal any damage type it wants. And when we were fighting things like Ishtars or Guristas rat-tanked ships, being Kin/Th locked isn't the funnest thing. So tried that out for a change. Can also slap some utility on the thing, which I opted take advantage of with a pair of Tracking Disruptors.
Kills and Losses
The Spire
Our first filament, a noise filament, takes us to The Spire, a dronelands region. And we just so happen to land in a system with a Rattlesnake and a few ratting Ishtars. I was interested in seeing if having the Jackdaw would have us fare better against a Rattle, but the Ishtars end up being easier finds. We catch and kill one at an anom, and then bust out combat probes to get another at a finished site.
(15:49:49) U1-VHY
Ishtar +328.32m
Capsule +0.01m
Ishtar +344.84m
Capsule +0.01m
A very lucky filament for us. Looking at the map, I see some ratting going on in No Value space in Cache. We start proceeding down there. Zhandris, +1ing, bumps into a Wolf, who aggresses on our in gate. Pulling a uni staple, I have the entire fleet jump over and blob it. It didn't feel great.
(16:00:19) DVN6-0
Wolf +41.79m
Capsule +0.75m
Then, on the out gate, Zhandris +1s and calls out a QRF of a Crusader, Sabre, and Harbinger, presumably having formed because we killed a few of their ships at this point. I have us align and burn away from the out gate so that we wouldn't be immediately bubbled.
Zhandris crashes back, and the QRF fleet trickles in, eventually being formed of a Crusader, two Sabres, Caracal, Nosprey, Harbinger, and Tornado (at the end). Initially, it's just two Sabres and the Caracal. The Caracal burns to about 25 km from the gate, and I have the fleet collapse back on it. We're able to kill it while losing two Merlins in exchange. I call for a Sabre to be secondary, but I neglect to actually point it instead of the bubbled Caracal, and spending 3 seconds to right click broadcast it afterwards. It warps off, and the Caracal and Nosprey RLML pressure got me down to 33% armor before reps fully caught.
(16:03:47) DVN6-0
Merlin -3.46m
Caracal +35.26m
Capsule +0.01m
Merlin -5.48m
Capsule -0.01m
At this point, I felt happy that we were #IskPositive, but also with me dinked a bit, my inner krabber flight or flight instincts landed on "flight", so I had the fleet burn out of bubbles and extract. With my main instinct set to "run", I have the fleet run back into The Spire. The Crusader follows us for a few jumps, but eventually falls back after seeing that we weren't looking like playing.
In hindsight, I think this was a mistake. With the logi and DPS that we had, I'm sure that we could have taken out one of their Battlecruisers or dictors, which even if it cost the fleet a welp would have probably felt worth it. That Nosprey could only pick off so many of us, and we could have gotten under the guns of the two BCs. I also had Tracking Disruptors on the Jackdaw, so I could have had the fleet collapse on one of the BCs and range disrupt the other. And if I were worried about having to burn back towards the gate and into those guns, I could have just jumped the fleet once, then held in the next system to see if their gang pulled in. We also had a designated 2IC to take over in case I died, so I didn't have to be so worried about my own health. But alas. I've got skittishness that I've got to work through...
We end up searching around The Spire for a bit, but don't find anything of note, so we end up filamenting out with a signal to:
Period Basis
"Alright, we're going to Valhalla, folks! We're in Goon space."
Except, uh, we didn't. Because I'm skittish.
So, as advertised, the signal filament brought us to an area of heavy activity. Problem was that said activity was created by a ratting Hel, which was just a tad outside of our engagement profile. Ignoring that, we search around Period Basis, but don't find too much. Searching around, Zhandris scouts a Marauder that is also probably outside of our engagement profile and also ignore. Eventually, we settle on a dead end pocket, where Zhandris blind warps into an Ishtar. I have the fleet jump in and warp, but the Ishtar is able to kill Zhandris and warp off with a second to spare.
nop indeed. An MTU was left, though, so we just burn that as a consolation prize.[16:47:46] Abbey Smallwood > nop
(16:47:29) E2-RDQ
Stiletto -49.39m
Mobile Tractor Unit +28.38m
The rest of period basis was slim pickings. In one system, we found a Vagabond that had an array of safes that it was bouncing around. Eventually, we contemplate going to Delve, but Amfion, once again taking backup scout, walks into a Goon gatecamp with four Caracals, Gnosis, Cane, Flycatcher, and Scythe in the border system of TN25-J. Knowing that the Caracals alone could probably roll us, I didn't want to welp to something we had little chance of killing something. Which I guess is too much prestige guarding for a freaking Merlin fleet, but alas, I was being quite skittish. Two hours had passed, and not sure whether to go home by filamenting or welping to the gatecamp, the fleet puts it out to a vote, and filamenting eeked out a majority. So filament we did.
And then I forgot which filament to use.
Okay, so first thing, we had 18 people alive still. Pochven filaments max out at 15, so I had the fleet split up with Merlins staying and the Bursts splitting off into a new squad. But wait, some of the logi couldn't filament, because they repped Amfion who got plinked a bit by the gatecamp. So they split off into a third fleet to wait out the timer. For ease sake, I should probably have called for all the logi to stay with Amfion to wait out the timer to minimize hubbub.
Pochven
So we begin waiting out our timers, but turns out, I brought the wrong extraction filament! I brought the Devanas (Pochven -> Trig Minor Victory), rather than the Extraction filaments (Pochven -> nearby system). And instead of just consulting the straightforward wiki table, I try parsing which one's the right one off of the market list. End up buying some Border filaments (wrong), and spending a few minutes of confusion and logistics of delivering filaments to one of the other fleets. Eventually, we all just use Devanas. The Merlins and half the Bursts end up near Jita, while Amfion's fleet is dumped in Amarr space
. A whole lot of shenanigans for not a whole lot of ISK in Merlins that could have been spared if I just got the right filaments, even in Pochven. But that person from last week whose Merlin survived four roams had now survived a fifth. So got that story going still, I suppose!Stats
ISK Destroyed: 779,372,077.65
ISK Lost: 58,342,014.66
ISK Delta: 721,030,062.99
Efficiency: 93.036%
Given the stats, I guess my retelling is a bit pessimistic, isn't it? I guess it's just because I felt there were many missed opportunities, so that clouded my view. I knew I was being too skittish, but at the same time I didn't have the gumption to... not be. So there's that internal tension coloring things a way...
Oh, and I did forget to make an SRP link until after the fleet, which was a downer.
Overall evaluation
✔ (Positive stuff)
- Zhandris is a great scout as always, making my FC life easy
- Fleet was able to follow through instructions in the Cache QRF fight quite well!
- Fleet was also very cooperative with my filament skill issue
- Presided over a 40 minute form again
- I was being too apprehensive to take fights, I feel
- I had a filament skill issue
- I think the Jackdaw worked out OK. It's still a T3D, though, so it struggles if one or two RLML boats look at it funny. Don't know how the Tracking Disruptors worked out, or if I should tank it more...
- If I can't cut down on the form time, I'll just make it a 3 hour roam instead to try get one or two more filaments in...
