[AAR] Solitude Talwar Treachery (Sep 28 02:00)

[Yuri Levnik]

Howdy all,
Well... "Ouch" is probably the right way to start this AAR. I had avoided running Talwars down in Soli as I figured Caracals would be better in pretty much every situation we would see down here. Tonight's fleet definitely didn't do anything to change my mind about that. With large numbers and a bit of luck you can get kills like this, but in fleets of 15 pilots or less I'd rather have cruisers.

We had a good turnout, though not nearly the 20+ pilots one is supposed to have for Talwars. Roam members:

Spoiler

Amira Evolta - DD
Arashi Shizukana - DD
Calder Ormand - DD, 2IC
Dgdsgy Foobar - DD
Dj UNOHOO - 1 Scout
Imad Gratia - DD
Kirsid Tannaway - DD
Meph Lutrai - DD
Sturym - DD, 3IC, Anchor
Talman Drak - Snowflake
Tom Endares - DD
Yuri Levnik - FC
Z0x Ambrye - 2 Scout

The flight started out with the following exchange RE Drakes:

Spoiler

[ 2017.09.28 01:42:17 ] Kirsid Tannaway > FC, can I bring my Drake?
[ 2017.09.28 01:42:31 ] Yuri Levnik > a drake is kind of like a big slow talwar so sure
[ 2017.09.28 01:42:42 ] Kirsid Tannaway > >sure
[ 2017.09.28 01:42:49 ] Kirsid Tannaway > I did not expect that answer.
[ 2017.09.28 01:43:04 ] Yuri Levnik > lulz

So we had a Drake and our Talwars, plus two scouts, a Keres and a heavy tackle pilot. Meanwhile, Arashi Shizukana had a fight lined up for us near LSC, so we did our usual newbro speeching and then headed "north" through Syndicate on the way to the fight. Not surprisingly, our Drake lagged a bit behind us. Normally not a problem, as space was empty as we passed through, but our noble battlecruiser pilot got unlucky and a Saber/Coercer showed up seemingly from nowhere and tackled the Drake. We flew our Talwars back to join the fight but by the time we landed at the gate at 50 the Drake was down and a lot more opfor had showed up. We got blown up pretty badly, with only a small kill as a condolence. We almost killed a Sabre, but he/she warped out at 0% hull, which is the kind of thing that happens when your weapon cycle time is super slow. In hindsight, when I saw the number of pilots in system I should have assumed they were working together and left the Drake to die (sorry Kirsid) since we were not equipped to fight what actually showed up... Anyway, we found content and welped pretty hard.

8-JYPM 02:36
Drake -79.2MN
Capsule -0.01MN
Keres -45MN
Talwar -7.7MN
Talwar -10.6MN
Talwar -10.4MN
Ares -33.3MN
Coercer 20.2MN
Talwar -7.1MN
Talwar -16.6MN
Capsule -0.7MN
Capsule -0.01MN
Capsule -36.6MN
Hurricane -77.9MN
Capsule -0.01MN

We staggered back to Gravity Well and reshipped, then set out into low sec. We found very little in space, though we took a swipe at a Caveman friend in a Stabber (he jumped to safety) and got chased by a Stratios/Kronos combo that was way too big for our Talwars. We ended up killing a single Clone Soldier Negotiator and calling it a night.

Stats
ISK Destroyed: 20.2MN
ISK Lost: -325.1MN
ISK Delta: -309.4MN
Efficiency: 6%

What went well:

• -We flew well! We anchored up on our anchor, landed where I wanted us to land, and escaped the Stratios/Kronos that chased us.
  -We found content, even though it was a lot more than we could fight.
  -We had some new to uni-fleets pilots and some folks fly in new roles. Hopefully y'all learned a thing or three (;
  -We tried out a new doctrine. And there's SRP for it...
  -We had a Draek zomg!!! But now it r explod-ded );
  -I had fun!

What could have gone better:

• -I took a fight that was way more than we could handle and we lost a lot of ISK worth of ships. That 6% efficiency is not a good either.
  -After a couple of pilots dropped following our welping we no longer had the alpha to take anything larger than frigates in 1-2 missile salvos. Frigates basically don't exist in Soli, so that put us in a bad spot where I felt like hunting for content was likely to be a waste of time.

I'll take out Talwars again next week and see if things turn out differently. Perhaps we'll find some smaller fry to fight. I'll be honest, I'm not as optimistic as I would like to be, but I figure it's worth a shot. If we can get more like 15 Talwars we'll have the alpha to wipe some stuff out.

Come out for arty Trashers tomorrow!
Yuri

[Sturym]

Here's my take on a few items to note:

* The distress call from the Drake came in over Fleet chat. I almost didn't catch it myself, but when we did, we made a decision to 180 and return to try and pull his fat from the fire. During this return, there was almost little to no-communication of OpFor, which obviously lead to us running straight into a trap scenario. While I'm certainly not calling out our Drake pilot as Kirsid is a great pilot, not having him on Comms (Mumble) made it quite difficult for us to assess the threat, receive intel, and make a tactical decision to fight or flight. Food for thought...

* While enroute to our stranded (and pointed) pilot, I noted a Caracal in system named Brent McBride. I thought it was odd he was following us, so I pulled up his ZKIllboard and immediately stated that he had recent kills, in this reigon, with a team. I know we were looking for a fight, but knowing our Drake was tackled and engaged by at least 1 additional DD, this was signs that we were heading for a trap. I didn't state my gut feeling that this was going to go south, but in hindsight I'll speak up next time.

* I feel once combat hits (as it does in real life), the crap hit the fan quickly. I locked as many targets as I could to monitor damage. We did call primaries, however it seemed like multiple Tangos were taking damage. Primaries switched quickly, even when one was almost destroyed. At one point, the Flycatcher was low, then warped off. By the time we lost 1IC and 2IC, I called Coercer as it was closest to death. Amira and I pounced, I overheated, and we managed to get it. I think there should be a emphasis on focused fire and what calling Primaries actually means. I say this, keeping in mind that we had 2 (if not 3) NewBros in fleet with us. Just another thing to possibly discuss prior to departing when we're expecting combat.

* I mentioned this afterwards, but felt like maybe I could mention it here too for someone to provide input on the thought. During the RAPID check, we mentioned clean clone. I wanted to emphasize this: You can install a clone in a Citadel, jump to it WHILE IN the Citadel, and have a clean clone with no cool-down timer. The process is instant, and if you do it at Gravity Well, it's 10k ISK versus 900k ISK elsewhere. I actually did not know that's how it worked, nor did I know the timer wasn't present. I had tried to jump in station at a non-Citadel one time before, which prompted me it was going to destroy my clone (with +3 implants) at that time. Ever since then, I was afraid... Not any more. (Thanks, Elihugh!) GW is perfect for this, as it is instant, fresh clone, and you can jump back as soon as you return from flight. One of the members of the fleet said they KNEW about clean clones, but weren't quite sure on how to do it. So perhaps this would be a good thing to spend 2 extra minutes discussing during the RAPID check.


Sorry for the book... I feel as I fly more and more, I'm learning new things that I had never learned before and therefore want to help the rest of the team understand. Maybe I'm just newer than I thought, but I feel all of these are good points. Either way... glad we got SOMETHING out of last night... if not experience.

Until we fly again...

[Yuri Levnik]

I'd agree with all of that - good insights. Thanks also for stepping in as 3IC and getting a kill so we had 6% efficiency instead of 0% (;