[AAR] Solitude BLAP Vexors REVOLUTIONS

[Yuri Levnik]

Howdy all,
We went on a Vexor roam tonight. We started out by heading up to null and chased off a gate camp near NSC and then we went back down and roamed low sec in Soli. We didn't find much PVP content, so we ran a Mordu's anomaly and a couple of the event sites. We finished an impromptu fight with the Cavemen. They won, though we did at least get one kill to make us feel better about ourselves (;

We had a good turnout:

Spoiler

Ahlwen Anders - DD
Amira Evolta - Scout
Arashi Shizukana - DD, 2IC
Atticus Vex - DD
Crimson Herring - EWAR (Griffin)
Elihugh Beecher - Boosh!!!
Etchard Yarghol - DD
Matt Ross - DD
Simeon Snowlocke - DD
Sophia Canarius - Logi
Trevor Grambling - Logi
Yuri Levnik - DD, FC
Z0X Ambrye - 2 Scout

We heard rumor of a gate camp in JH- M2W on the PC9-AY gate to the Nullsec campus. We formed up, I gave the newbro speech and then we made our way up. We found the gate camp and got a pilot to aggress our scouts, but when we proved that we knew how to warp onto him he warped out. We stole his drones and proceeded to patrol the area and scare off all remaining gate campers.

Having run out of content in Null, we headed back to Solitude and roamed west toward Aridia. We couldn't catch much of anything, so we decided to run a couple of the new event sites. Alas, they dropped garbage. We also ran a Besieged Covert Research Facility, which is a particularly dangerous Mordu's Legion combat anomaly. Again, the drops were not very good, and we lost a Griffin when the rats alphaed him off the grid in the blink of an eye.

Babirmoult 03:36
Griffin -2.7MN

It was getting late so we headed back to Yveve and convo'd the Cavemen to see if they wanted to fight. They did! After trying to decide on a comp, they settled on autocannon Ruptures, which are pretty similar to our BLAP Vexors. They had three Ruptures and two Exequrors to our six Vexors, one Exequror, one Griffin and one Ares. As is tradition, we met in honorable combat at the sun!

They landed first and Z0X told us they were at zero. I made my first mistake, warping the entire fleet in at zero as well. This put our logi and EWAR both within optimal range for their damage dealers. Their logi pilots had flown out a bit, and were at 30km from us. I called a logi pilot primary, but our gun application was very poor as I had ordered the fleet to load antimatter ammo. Our drone damage was good, but not enough to break the logi pilot. Meanwhile, the Cavemen blasted our poor Griffin to bits and started to work on our logi pilot. Seeing that we weren't breaking the logi and the pilot was well out of our optimal, I called for a target swap to a Rupture who was within optimal, who we burned down before the Exeqs could save him. However, we had already lost a logi pilot and a Vexor and our next Vexor was dropping quickly. I called another Rupture as primary, but the Caveman logi wing closed in so I called another target switch to the first logi pilot we primaried. Alas, we could not break him, and lost another pair of Vexors trying. Realizing things were not going to get any better, I called for the fleet to scatter as the Cavemen burned me down.

Overall, this was a fun and educational fight! We definitely didn't win, though we did give the Cavemen a run for their money - their logi pilots nearly burned out all of their modules trying to stay alive (; Thanks to the Cavemen for putting together a gang and engaging us once again in honorable combat!

Yveve 04:27
Griffin -2.6MN
Exequror -14.7MN
Vexor -19.2MN
Rupture +24.5MN
Vexor -18.4MN
Vexor -23.3MN

Following the fight we made best speed back Gravity Well and called it a night.
Stats
ISK Destroyed: 24.5MN
ISK Lost: 80.9MN
ISK Delta: -56.4MN
Efficiency: 23%

What went well

• -I feel like a broken record saying this, but once again the fleet flew extremely well. Excellent work y'all!
  -Arashi, Z0X and Eli all provided excellent support to the FC throughout the fleet.
  -Our 1 scout was fairly new to scouting and did a great job, nicely done Amira.
  -I had an EWAR wing!!!
  -We got to play around a bit with booshing, though we didn't have a chance to use a boosh in PVP yet.
  -We scared off gate camps in null sec. Very rewarding for the FC, even though we didn't catch anything.
  -We had a good fight with the Cavemen.

What could have gone better

• -I wish I had asked the logi pilot who had to dock up for the night to leave his ship with another pilot so we could have had two logi, as that would have greatly improved our odds in the fight. One logi pilot cannot repair himself, so the opposing fleet can primary him and he has to sit there, repair modules off, until he gets blown up.
  -I need to set up separate wings for Logi/EWAR (instead of squads) and then wing warp the DD wing into combat so I don't drop my logi and EWAR directly on the opposing DD.
  -I made very poor use of my EWAR wing in general. Sorry, Crimson, I'll do better next time );
  -Not much content in space.

Overall, it was a good night out. Thanks to everyone who came!
Yuri

[Etchard Yarghol]

Had a great time, thanks for FCing.
You where very patient and explained everything clearly from the beginning, answering every question I had. Even before making my way down to Solitude. I appreciate it! I've even installed a jump clone down that way for next time! Can't wait to go out again!
First fleet where I survived, 3rd fleet overall! Fighting cavemen was definitely a cool experience, and interesting to experience how two similarly strengthen groups brawled.
Also special shout out to Z0X Ambrye! Thanks for guiding me down to the gravity well so I could participate!

[Crimson Herring]

This was my first time actually flying EWAR, and it was a pretty good learning experience.

The biggest lesson is that I need to learn how to exempt myself from fleet warp, otherwise I land smack in the middle of the enemy and will probably be the first to die.

All in all, I had a fun time, and look forward to the next fleet!

[Oy TheBrave]

Greetings, I fly with Cavemen now though this alt spent some time in EVE Uni back in the day, so I can give a bit of feedback from the other side of this engagement, hopefully it's worth the time I'm spending to type it. I know I certainly like reading about engagements so that I can improve (or just relive the moment).

Anyhow, I was in one of the Logi hulls for this scrap. One of our line members relayed a request from your end to honor fight, one of our scrappier members offered to take you on in a battleship + 1 other ship on his side but that morphed, via a few back and forths with you all and our online/ready members, into the fleet comp both sides agreed upon.

Your side of the story matches 100% w/r/t agreements/honor/warpins.

As you said we warped in first and pulled some range, knowing things would be tough on the logi out of the gate and hoping we could cope with the incoming DPS. We saw the Griffin land and were not expecting it, our FC promptly blasted it as a priority target, it really could have ruined our day had it been at range and bouncing when in danger. Griffin impact, nil, but you know that already.

All the while I was taking primary damage from you lot, I was breaking, no doubt, but FC (and common sense) dictated that I just burn like hell away to stay alive. I did and y'all switched to the Rupture, which melted as my range had just caused my lock to break and the other logi couldn't save him. -1 ship our side (I had no idea we'd killed anything but the griffin, as I carry shield maint bots when I'm logi). I returned to the fray and was re-primaried, webbed, damped, and (I assumed) soon for the scrap heap since I hadn't been eating webs before and didn't account for the fact that my lot had dropped one or two of yours by that point to make incoming damage manageable for the remaining logi and my (often overheated) hardeners and AB.

We noticed your side preparing to GTFO so points were spread to get what we could and the fray ended with GF all around.

Things that would have mattered, possibly alot, on your end I think:

- The EWAR thing: yep, ewar should nearly always land at range (doubly so in frigs) and should be bouncing in and out at a moment notice. I love flying ewar but it's challenging not to let yourself get blapped as you attempt to maximize your help to the fleet.
- You mention that you had 2 logi and reshipped to 1. If that was to encourage engagements, I understand completely but it would have helped you survive here by a wide margin. It's likely you know this already.
- I know eve uni isn't chock full of veterans, been there/done that, but T1 drones are what we saw for the most part, T2 drones might have wiped me off the field before I could disengage the first time, then you would have took the field and killed all of us I think. Again, nothing you can help in the short term but worth noting as well.

Enjoyed the Scrap, glad Cave has a reputation of honor and gud fights, I'm really having a positive experience here. Eve Uni is a good lot for neighbors.

Oy

[Yuri Levnik]

Hail Caveman!
Your feedback is much appreciated, and definitely worth the time you took to type it! Glad to hear that I did a decent job figuring out what happened in hindsight, even if I didn't do such a great job when we were engaged... Our second logi pilot had to log out for the night, and I had forgotten that he was a logi bro. He was already docked up and offline by the time I remembered. Sure do wish I had asked him to swap ships with a Vexor... Regardless, it was a good fight - exciting and fun!

I hadn't thought about the T1 vs. T2 drones. I looked at the numbers in Pyfa and T2 drones make a significant difference in damage. Unfortunately, we don't have all that many pilots on our Soli roams who can launch T2 mediums, or even T2 lights. That's something for me to encourage folks (including myself) to work on...

For me, the brawls with y'all Cavemen are the highlight of our roams. I think a lot of the folks on our fleets would say the same. Bob willing, we shall meet in honorable combat again soon!
Yuri

[Oy TheBrave]

Glad to hear it, come see us more often, I'd be surprised if you ever left without a fight as we usually have folks around to brawl on demand within reason. I'll spread the word to be sure that we stay to the straight and narrow and continue to keep the reputation we have for honoring fair-arraigned fights, outside of that we'll gate camp the heck out of each other and ambush to our hearts merry content.

Fly fun,
Oy

[Yuri Levnik]

Cheers to that! If you see me land in your gate camp, please feel free to instalock me and blast me to pieces... In a friendly way (;
Yuri