[FLEET] Solitude raids Black Rise

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Budda Sereda
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[FLEET] Solitude raids Black Rise

Post by Budda Sereda »

That was a blast!

Nevertheless to minor issues, together with Yuri we got Solitude guys (together with few NSC and LSC pilots) and went into Black Rise.

The doctrine was Arty Thrashers, adapted for traveling through the nul-sec, with an option for any destroyers to join. In this fleet we did had a chance to exercise 'alpha' capabilities of Thrashers, also we got a chance to shoot and kill expensive ships. More details are here: https://forum.eveuniversity.org/viewtop ... 6&t=106584.

In the fleet we got 3 Navitas with ReSeBo (but I believe we lost 1 logy due to disconnect quite early in the fleet), Hyenna with 2 webs, instalocker, around 10 Thrashers, and 1 Cormorant.

(I can't pull reports from ZKillboard so will put those kills I remember about and add missing a bit later if report starts working).

First kill of the day

We went from Gravity Well in Boystin towards NSC: I spotted interesting composition for us to engage, but they were quite tough for us and while fleet arrived they logged off.

We went into LSC, where Z0X reshipped from a ceptor into a Thrasher. The fleet was sitting in Stacmon on the OST gate, I was sitting in OST on a tactical near the Stacmon gate and was going to explain low-sec mechanics to nul-sec pilots when we got some first content: Black Bird, Stabber FI, and something else (don't remember exactly)... ceptor I believe...

Without explaining low-sec mechanics, I warped to the gate and called fleet to "Jump, Lock, Align-out, Shoot, ... warp once start taking damage".
I did want to try how blappy are Thrashers. My intention was first to 2-shot Blackbird and switch to Stabber FI (if it decides to take a fight). If I primary Stabber first, Blackbird could just jam the half of the fleet.

Unfortunately, as soon as I landed Blackbird warped away, but Stabber FI stood, as a saw fleet started decloaking, I called SFI to be a primary. He has not tried to shoot anybody of us and tried to crash the gate. It appeared to be a tanky beast, I don't believe anybody in a fleet had scram and that guys was very close to jump through. I needed to warp off been half in armor, but Hyena made what it was supposed to and we killed it and lost NOBODY! Excellent guys!!!

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64968393/ +69.8M

After that, I did a speech about low-sec mechanics :) and promised to welp at least the half of the fleet (as it traditionally happens during my fleets :) ). I never do that on purpose, it just happens :)
Actually, there is one exception: Crazy 8's - https://forum.eveuniversity.org/viewtop ... 6&t=106516 - when we lost nothing and killed 300M worth of ships.

Welcome to Black Rise!

We went towards Black Rise, in Hikkoken we found a plex with quite a bit of content: Garmur, Flycatcher, some other ships in one of small plexes. I wanted to alpha something. Don't remember exact details, I feel I lost a bit control on what was going on the grid. Now I think I was relaxed that with 3 logies and strong alpha we can alpha that Garmur. But somehow logies appeared to be spread out and Thrashers' targeting range was quite low... so:, but instead, we lost 2 of us:
https://zkillboard.com/kill/64968718/ -11.2M
https://zkillboard.com/kill/64968733/ -2.3M

But, Z0X and I landed few shots on Flycatcher who was killed by 3rd party a bit later:

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969069/ +90.1M

Further, we popped NOmen: I believe Glen engaged him on the gate, we joined and pretty much alphaed him:

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64968809/ +121.8M

After that, we had some shenanigans with Cinabal, Orthrus, and Stiletto. We tried to warp between wrecks, BMs, etc. Glen was flashy and he did 'something' (Glen, please share details) which made Stiletto to aggress him literally 1 second after he lost a suspect timer....

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64968864/ +52.1M

Glen kept trying to catch Cinabal, but with low success,... after some waiting I called fleet to move further. At this very moment small gang of non flashy ships landed on us: 2 Thrashers, Cormorant, and Slasher. Instinctively I called "jump, jump, jump". But Glen called about Chimera tackled in one of plexes and I decided to come back.
When we jumped back small gang was still sitting at 0... I called: we alpha cormorant and warp on top of Chimera. :) I thought this worked well because we alphaed the Cormorant:

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969078/ +13.4M

Unfortunately, later I learned that we lost Yuri because he was flashy and got decloaked a bit earlier than we engaged:

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969081/ -11.6M

And only now I learned that we lost logy as well.
https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969086/ -2.2M

Now I see that we should not run away, but keep killing those guys on the gate even they were not flashy: we did have plenty of time to kill them all 4 and disengage from guns.

Anyway, while we landed and prepared to align on Chimera, but it disengaged... and.. in few seconds those guys from the gate landed on us. That was quite a bit of a surprise: we had more ships, why would they go on us... Maybe they assumed we were bad (ok, I just did let them the reason to believe that FC was stupid)? Anyway, I called primary. They primaried me, but died all before I got even into the structure:

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969107/ +20.7M
https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969109/ +13.5M
https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969111/ +8.5M

At some point we split DPS: I called primary a Thrasher, broadcasted it, but we had 2 Thrashers on grid and I called the name of the primary a bit late... Please do follow broadcast guys. In my turn, I could call the pilot name from the very beginning. Anyway, this time no extra loses.

We reparied some damage on citadel, started speaking about reshipping... while I heard in comms:

Check-check: Gila in Warzone site

reported Z0X from Kedama.

I was sure that Gila will dispatch even few Thrashers easily... but luckily we had Glen in Stabber Fleet Issue so I asked him to join Z0x for tackle. They land the scram and I called fleet to jump and join the party.
What makes this interesting that as soon I slid the accelaration gate, I've noticed another Gila landing on the gate too. Few moments later Rapier joined it. Majority of the fleet did took the gate, but Crimson who was caught outside. We could not save him:

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969299/ -8.4M

I called everybody to focus and overheat on Gila (obvious, no really needed to ask for, but as FC you need to keep people focused and you never know who missed what part of your order). At some point I've noticed my guns have high heat level so I called people to pay attention to the heat.
Few guys started getting heavy damage and a single logy was not able to hold it so I called some guys to warp off: one of them was Wokum and I'm glad he is not on the killed list.

Gila was half in shield while that 2nd Gila, together with Keres, Rapier and Pilgrim landed on the grid. I called fleet to stay. It was clearly a risk: we could lose everybody, but not even kill anything. I tried to lock Keres, but he warped away and removed from me pain of making choice whom to focus. Gila was low in shield when we lost Z0x:

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969305/ -15.8M

I called fleet to start aligning out to pod savers and overheat if they still had any buffer left. We lost logy:

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969318/ -2.35M

At this moment Gila popped and I called everybody to warp out:

https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969322/ +459.2M

Clearly, some of us were pointed:
Kirsid in Cormorant https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969323/ -13.7M
and Glen in SFI https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969340/ -76.8M

What is really interesting is that while we were warping off, Glen was still in fight... Glen, again I'm asking please to share your perspective, but I feel like at this point we probably should have stayed. And try Rapier's tank. And we may even would kill the 2nd Gila? Yes, we would risk 3-4 thrashers, but the prize would be fantastic. Unfortunately, I made my mind while those guys just landed on grid.

Many interesting things puzzled me after this fight:

1. Why Gila was fit in such a weird wasy, don't use it. If you want passive shield regeneration you do need to fit Purger Rigs, not Extenders. Also, you benefit more from increasing EM/Thermal resist (depending on opponent preferred damage type).
2. Why it took so long to kill 1st Thrasher? GIla with almost 700 dps could kill it in few seconds...
3. Why it took 30 seconds for 2 Gila + Rapier + Pilgrim to kill Thrasher, 30 more seconds for Navitas, 30 more seconds for Cormorant. What did they do?
4. That Gila was most likely PvE fit on purpose. Did it watch dscan and Grid? Most likely not.

It was quite an intensive hour... which went essentially with no any breaks. At this moment we made a pause and I transferred FC role to Yuri. In order to wrap the AAR up, I will add that while Yuri's FCing further we killed a Vexor and lost a Thrasher.
https://zkillboard.com/kill/64969726/ +26.7M
https://zkillboard.com/kill/64970133/ -24.9M - quite expensive for Thrasher I guess due to picked up from one of engagements.

Yuri: would you mind filling in the rest of the report please?

Totally killed: +806.0M
Totally lost: -169.3M

Learned lessons:

1. Thrasher fits that were supposed to be armor plated did not have plates.
2. With 3 ReSeBo logies we have no need to instalocker.
3. In both Arty Thrasher fleets, I did not encounter any situation when fleet REALLY benefited from having high alpha. For the gate-camping setup, or better to say "to be able to catch things on the gate", we do need an instalocker. But instead of disposable t1 frigate, we can use pretty much ANY ship, but apply to it ReSeBos.

Lessons for pilots:
1. Let FC know if you flashy and your gate cloak is going to expire
2. Let FC know if you pointed on the gate

Gratitude
I'm thankful to:
- Glen for support, help with many decisions and sharing his experience
- Z0x for been our scout, eyes, and tackle (this is hard job, especially in a Thrasher)
- logy-bros - Arashi, Meph, and Iswjnek - for helping us staying on grid.

And my biggest thanks come to Yuri for helping with organizing the fleet and trusting me to lead it into low-sec. Thanks Yuri, hope you will have another one and lead it yourself - will gladly join. My few main advices to you are:
1. Do take fights on gates: many E-Uni FC avoid this, dunno why.
2. Don't be afraid of Tama: it is a warm and welcome place for pirates :)
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Yuri Levnik
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Re: [FLEET] Solitude raids Black Rise

Post by Yuri Levnik »

This fleet was a blast, literally and figuratively! Thanks for suggesting it, Budda!

I initially FC'd a fairly quiet trip up from Solitude to Stacmon, then got my first bit of combat for the night when Budda had to warp off in the fight with the Stabber Fleet Issue. I kept us on grid until the SFI was down and then made the call for a "tactical retreat" as we had other ships on D and landing on grid. Great start to the evening!

I picked up FCing again after the fleet had dropped to just a few pilots left. Calder graciously agreed to scout and Budda reshipped to a Hecate with combat probes. Budda probed down the Vexor kill at a DED signature, though he and Calder had to kill the target before the rest of us could land. No hard feelings!

A bit later on we blapped an unfitted Venture that landed on us while we were on a gate and just sat there. It didn't make it into the original kill list, but a 250k venture isn't really going to change the stats:
Venture +0.25MN

We landed on grid with the Confessor that killed Calder just as the Thrasher popped, very sad that we missed secondary tackle. Props to Calder for the hero tackle though. Other than that, the trip back to Stacmon was fairly uneventful, though we did chase around a few different targets without luck.

Overall, FCing in FW space was very, very different from FCing in Solitude low sec or Syndicate null. I have flown with a lot of LSC fleets, but FCing one is a whole different cup of tea. I'm used to small numbers of very dangerous targets in Solitude. FW space has large numbers of pilots (by my standards anyway) and ships of all different sizes. I'll be honest, it was a little overwhelming to have so many different kinds of targets to choose from as we were making our way back to Stacmon. It was also a fairly new experience to run into a gang/fleet that wasn't going to kill us all immediately (see my AARs for the many times I've been BLOPSed, lulz). I have fought some arranged fights with the Cavemen, but for those I always new what I was going to be fighting. Not so in Black Rise!

Overall, very educational and a lot of fun!

What went well (for my part of the fleet)
  • -We stuck together and flew competently.
    -Calder did a great job scouting and hero tackled a Confessor almost long enough for us to land on grid. Swapping the gyrostabilizer for a plate probably would have made the difference between a dead Talwar and a dead Confessor.
    -Budda combat probed down a target and Calder was able to get on the kill too.
    -We fought under gate guns and didn't die.
    -I had fun!
What I could have done better:
  • -I'm not very confident on my target calling in FW space. I'm used to having a very short list of targets who are all travelling together. Having a longer list of targets, plus the complexities of third and even fourth parties in a fight, left me struggling to decide on what to engage and what to primary.
    -There were a couple of points when we could have moved faster if I had been more on top of my game.
    -My security status took a beating. Time to hunt some clone troopers!
Thanks again for suggesting the fleet Budda. Let's get to work on the next one!
Yuri

PS: Thanks to Eli for bringing the Hyena, very cool boat.
ImageImageImageImageImageImageImage

"He's like a shark; a shark doesn't eat you because he hates you. He eats you because he's hungry and you're there." - Elihugh Beecher
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Budda Sereda
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Re: [FLEET] Solitude raids Black Rise

Post by Budda Sereda »

Please share your feedback either here in the topic or via the feedback form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIp ... w/viewform
Choose FC your feedback is applicable, if you want to say something to both of us... I guess either submit it twice or post here.

And the last thing guys: we lost NONE ships to gate guns in a gate camp fleet.
Kudos to all! Somebody would say that is not a typical E-Uni fleet. I will say: that is a new standard! Keep it high!
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Re: [FLEET] Solitude raids Black Rise

Post by Glen Burney »

Thanks Budda for this fleet, it was alot of fun.

1. You asked about the Stiletto. When we started playing with those ships (stiletto, orthrus and cynabal i think), I had about 3 minutes on my suspect timer, and had not previously engaged anyone on grid. As you know, if you shoot a non-flashy on a gate you will take gate guns. So, my plan was to allow one of them to aggress me right after my timer expired. I really wanted it to be the Cynabal or Orthrus, because it a bigger kill, but I settled for the Stiletto. He had been chasing me around grid for a bit, so I set it up to warp to a gate gun, which is ~50km from the gate, JUST as my timer expired. The stiletto landed, my timer ran out, and he locked and pointed me, while at the same time probably activating his MWD and approaching, or starting to spiral.

As soon as he did that, his fate was sealed. Unless he got lucky and chose something else to warp off to, he would be dead within 6 seconds. Which is what happened. I didn't even get to scram him :)

Basically in his mind, he saw me as flashy and just wanted to tackle. But when I lost my suspect status, he failed to notice, and was just intent on tackling. Something changed on the field, and it didn't register...

Now a more advanced technique may have been to let HIM catch me while I was flashy, but then to lose suspect as his buddy in the Cynabal came in. Then the gate guns would be on the Cynabal and I might could scram him for a bigger kill. The thrashers in my gang could help drive off the Stiletto...


As for the Gila, I was confused to as to why the other gang took so long to get in. I think they were trying to pick off stragglers outside as first priority. That was nice because it allowed us to burn up the Gilas shield. I nearly made it out myself, but the gang focused me when they did finally get in to the plex.

Again, great fleet!

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Re: [FLEET] Solitude raids Black Rise

Post by Budda Sereda »

Ok, now I understand what you did. Thanks!
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Re: [FLEET] Solitude raids Black Rise

Post by Zeerse Solaris »

The Gila fit is due to the rats in the warzone sites being neuters so you must use a buffer tank. It was probably a botched fit with rigs from an active tank.
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