[AAR] HSC Magic Merlins Raid Low Sec! (Dec 10 1900)

[Yuri Levnik]

Soundtrack for the AAR - "Set Sail and Conquer" by Alestorm

Howdy all,
Today we set out to learn about PIRACY!!! We found some excellent content, got some great kills, won a fight and then welped gloriously against a gang of smart bombing Coercers (no, I am not making that up). Great times all around!

Thanks to Christoph Patrouette, we have video of all of our fights on Youtube! Thanks Christoph! I have included links to the appropriate parts of the video throughout the AAR. Thanks also to Christoph, Ersin and Ares for for arranging ships and refits for the fleet.

Pirates

Spoiler

Aeryn Tzun
Alcius
Arashi Shizukana - Vanguard
Ares Dodekatheon
Athelstan1
Athena Firefly
Auric Fulcrum
Blind Scion
Calder Ormand - 2 Scout
Calvin Fidard
Christoph Patrouette
Coaxster - Vanguard
Gaius Rel
Gemma Solett - Vanguard
Ghorram Reaver
Hamok Shah
Ivika Starfury
Jairenn Aideron
Jax Renalard
Jesse Xenoman
Kaefer117
Kannah Gindrejn - Logi
Kontxesi Buchanan
Laser Skaron - Logi FC
Lucius Septimus Severus
Min Nashira
Nathan Tamroc
Nelliver Cadigal - Vanguard
Paranoya1 Aideron
Raskyn
Rebulah Conundrum
Rider Isleman - Logi
Rohan Amadeus
Rose Macabre
Sone Eto
Space Warfare Development
SteveHarrington
Susan Wulf
Tsuwen Sun
Tyler Arnoux
Union Pivo - 2IC
Xander Kuha
Xivik Skord
Yrgrasil - Logi
Yuri Levnik - FC
Z0X Ambrye - Vanguard
Zako Maken
Zeon Alabel - 3 Scout/Vanguard
hazuma rourshank
shureer Yassavi

I gave the standard newbro speech and we made our way to the edge of high sec with a fleet of almost 50 Merlins, Bursts and other T1 frigates (plus a cruiser and at least one t2 frigate). I gave an extended edition of the newbro speech, covering gate guns, suspect timers, FW plexes, etc... Some of the expert pirates got bored and someone gave me a couple of excellent bumps while I was yammering away. Things did not stay boring for long, however! We jumped Oueletta and the content poured in...

Our scout caught an Algos to get us off to a modest start. Then we tracked down a Brutix who was at range in a large plex (why not docked up? there were 40+ Merlins in system!!!). Our brave tackle pilots chased him down while I landed the fleet. We were getting ready to chase the Brutix when a Stabber Fleet Issue landed behind us (maybe warped in after we initiated warp and couldn't stop in time?). I called for a target switch to the SFI while our scouts bravely held tackle on the Brutix. We got both kills though we did lose two hero tackle to the Brutix before we could burn out and get the kill.
(21:44:00Z) Ouelletta
Algos +18.28m
Condor -3.55m
Merlin -9.96m
Stabber Fleet Issue +89.37m
Brutix +92.03m

Apparently DSCAN was broken because people did not run away or dock up when they saw us engaged in vicious piracy. We saw a Tempest on D and I sent scouts/vanguard all over looking for 'em. We got eyes as the pilot jumped out to MEL and had tackle waiting on the other side while the fleet landed. I left folks behind in case the pilot tried to crash the gate but we got him/her locked down and got the kill. Very important note here - we fought a battleship with frigates under gate guns (pilot was not flashy) and did not lose *anyone* to gate guns. I am very impressed and proud of the fleet, and extremely thankful to our logi folks - y'all did an excellent job of staying alive!
(21:56:28Z) Melmaniel
Tempest +382.12m

We had a Confessor in system with us. Those things are cancer and I don't like them. We decided to chase anyway. Through some kind of scout sorcery, Sone and Z0X managed to get warpins, though my client locked up and I couldn't fleet warp us. Our scouts held tackle and we finally got in for the kill. We did lose a scout to the Confessor's cancerous ways...
(22:01:00Z) Ouelletta
Merlin -13.02m
Confessor +80.63m

As we prepared to advance to the next system Union called a flashy Pontifex coming in to us. We nabbed 'em on the gate and got a pricey kill (;
(22:05:00Z) Ouelletta
Pontifex +122.1m
Capsule +0.01m

Following those kills, I realized we were already an hour into fleet, had killed almost 800MN in opfor and still had barely made it past our first jump into low sec. Crazy content!!! There were a couple of flashy targets on a station so I warped us in to have a look, more intending to dock up for a break than to actually try to get into docking games (I *hate* docking games). Sure enough, the flashies were playing evil games. I gave orders not to engage, but just a little too late for one enthusiastic tackler. We had received intel on a Confessor gang coming in behind us and they arrived as promised. We all docked up except for one pilot who had a weapon timer );
(22:10:00Z) Ouelletta
Merlin -6.85m
Capsule -0.01m

Following a break, we moved on from Ouletta. We found some targets in Renarelle but nobody we could lock down at first. There was a Brutix pilot in system who appeared about to dock up but then made a fatal decision to warp to a gate instead. I had pilots positioned at the exits already with enough tackle to jump through and catch on the other side. He decided to burn off the gate instead (?) and we swarmed in. Sadly, we lost a pair of noble tacklers to gate guns );
(22:42:19Z) Renarelle
Merlin -7.48m
Merlin -2.83m
Brutix +90.63m

Gemma tried to grab another SFI for us but it was too quick and we lost another tackle boat );
(22:49:21Z) Oicx
Atron -2.25m

There was a lot of activity on the way to Pynekastoh but it seems everyone cleared out ahead of us. We didn't find anyone else until we got to Pyne. Sone was in a plex trying to tackle a T1 something or other and an Astero landed behind him. We were in route and our vanguard landed around the same time as the Astero. I ordered a target swap to the Astero, leaving Sone to Bob's will (I think whatever he was fighting ran away). We got the Astero for a nice kill. Note the pilot's name and corp - we would see him/her again later.
(23:04:01Z) Pynekastoh
Astero +102.04m

I was about to call for a second break and had the fleet on a citadel when we had a Mercenary Coalition T2 frigate gang spike local. I put a halt to the break and decided to engage. We headed to a medium plex for a fight. They landed as we landed and I gave strict orders to slide *immediately* as I wanted them to slide into us and be forced into a brawl. I think we managed to get everyone into the plex (not sure if our first loss was on the inside or outside) and they slid in after us. After a couple hours of ganking, we had ourselves a real fight!!! Arashi pointed out that they had logi so I ordered an unlucky Scalpel as primary and started calling secondaries on whatever was close to me, hoping the fleet was nearby (though I did ask for a switch to a Keres because it in brawling range and needed to be taught a lesson). Once we ran out of targets within brawling range I warped the fleet out but the opfor had also decided to disengage so we went back to loot the field. One of us had managed to cram 124MN worth of modules into a boat that could slide novices so we did have an expensive loss but overall we handily won this engagement. Nice work everyone!
(23:07:00Z) Pynekastoh
Merlin -3.67m
Dramiel -123.87m
Scalpel +119.52m
Jaguar +64.22m
Merlin -8.55m
Keres +86.74m
Jaguar +53.33m

We took the break I had promised and while we were getting sorted the Astero pilot we killed earlier showed up with his buddies.

• [ 2017.12.10 23:17:05 ] Fat Elvis Presley > fight @ small

I decided to take them up on the fight. After all, what could eight Coercers do to a fleet of Magic Merlins? I figured they would try to kite us and snipe some folks or something. Nevertheless, I tried to convince Coaxster to face scout for us, as I failed to get him killed on our 8.4BN battleship welp. For some reason, he balked at this fantastic opportunity and I decided to face scout with the entire fleet instead. After all, what could go wrong!?

As it turns out, lots!!! These guys had fitted into something I have never seen before - a destroyer edition of the Rooks and Kings classic smart bombing battleships. We warped in and the smartbomb spam began. Quoting me, "Smartbombs!? ...Wow!" We lost 22 Merlins and a couple other folks alarmingly quickly - I called a scatter but it was too late for most folks by the time I called it. We would have lost the ISK war for sure except that one of their pilots forgot to take out his implants and lost a 105MN pod (; (; (; Tragically, I failed once again to get Coaxster killed though I got killed and podded back to Solitude.
Kills: 185.10m
Losses: 173.50m
Delta: 11.6m
Efficiency: 52%
(23:21:39Z) Pynekastoh

Spoiler

Crucifier -1.94m
Tormentor -6.61m
Merlin -2.85m
Merlin -3.11m
Merlin -2.8m
Merlin -4.44m
Merlin -2.86m
Merlin -3.47m
Merlin -3.51m
Merlin -8.12m
Merlin -3.1m
Merlin -3.15m
Merlin -8.22m
Merlin -7.95m
Merlin -4.81m
Merlin -3.1m
Merlin -7.34m
Merlin -8.72m
Merlin -3.81m
Merlin -2.78m
Burst -6.61m
Merlin -5.16m
Merlin -4.28m
Coercer +16.01m
Merlin -7.08m
Capsule -0.56m
Coercer +23.75m
Capsule -47.78m
Capsule -4.24m
Capsule -0.55m
Capsule +105.88m
Coercer +16.13m
Coercer +23.52m
Merlin -6.65m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule +0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule +0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.01m

At this point I was dead and back in Boystin - Gravity Well. Arashi took over and got the fleet home, picking up a nice Algos kill on the way back with minimal losses. Thanks for padding our kills after the welp (;
(23:27:46Z) Pynekastoh, Abune
Merlin -4.85m
Capsule -0.01m
Capsule -0.02m
Algos +30.57m
Capsule +28.98m

(23:45:28Z) Ostingele
Atron -4.99m

Stats
ISK Destroyed: 1,545,889,638.51
ISK Lost: 367,646,757.99
ISK Delta: 1,178,242,880.52
Efficiency: 81%

What went well:

• -We blew up a ton of stuff and then got blown up! Awwwww yeah!!! Obviously, PVP fleets undocking from Amygnon can succeed in glorious combat
  -I think we had attendees from every campus (except maybe AMC?), including a great turnout from HSC and LSC.
  -We won a fight against Mercenary Coalition.
  -We took a PVP-fit battleship under gate guns and did not lose *anyone* to gate guns. Y'all made me a very proud FC - that's not an easy thing to accomplish.
  -Logi did a fantastic job (;
  -Scouts did an excellent job of getting tackle and providing intel.
  -Very few lemmings (;
  -Lots of fun and explosions!!!

What could have gone better:

• -I did not realize that smart bombing Coercers were a thing. I now know about them. Painful lesson.
  -Hero tackle of the night was Gemma with three ships lost tackling our enemies, FC is very thankful for your sacrifice.
  -There was a bit of a slow patch in the middle of the fleet but things picked up again.
  -We had folks get a little trigger happy. I don't really like toying with my prey so that doesn't bother me too much, but we had some folks get weapon timers when I was hoping we could avoid timers for jumping/docking.

Overall, this was a heap and a half of fun. Thanks for coming out y'all!
Yuri

[Arashi Shizukana]

5/5 Stars, would be 6/5 with a carrier drop.

More seriously, for a bunch of merlins against the stuff we fought, that's a really good ISK positive-ness (I'm tired, grammar is non essential at this point). Ouelletta's fights were very per-plexing though, did not expect all the Tempest and other stuff to stick around. Now if only that Sleipner attacked us on station...

Great fleet Yuri, looking forward to the next one

[Ersin Oghuz]

This was fantastic read and watch Yuri! That was solid turnout and very good fleet as far as i read and watch.
Thanks for leading this fleet, and thanks Ares for all the background work.

[Capt Steele]

Absolutely amazing read and with HD video! (Seriously, we need to record all our roams now haha) Great job o7

[Christoph Patrouette]

Just dont mind anything i am doing in the fight after 21:00 ... i had no idea what to do there because 90% of the enemy ship names were unfamilier to me. Harpy, Jaguar, Scalpel, Hyena, Wolf....

[Jax Renalard]

A really good eventful and exciting fleet Yuri. Thank you letting me tag along and for taking out the fleet out of HSC. HSC is close to my heart and really appreciate you including and encouraging newbros from HSC to join pvp fleets. Really good formup and patience to brief the fleet. Good discipline in calling out targets and clear commands.

I do have a concern to point that I find very important from my experience. This is about having Arashi in fleet flying an armour cruiser in a shield frig doctrine fleet. From what I remember on comms he relayed that he was just flying around solo and just relaying immediate intel for the fleet. For the remainder of the fleet he was present in fleet for the duration constantly ahead of the fleet relaying intel. I felt he undermined the assigned scouts and is not a good example for the several new players. This was “Megoste” level of flying over the doctrine and flying beyond the fleet that should never be encouraged especially in a newbro fleet.

The most egregious event was in Pyne when we were about to engage a t2 frig fleet with logi support. Arashi suggested the fleet move into a medium to accommodate his cruiser in the fight. I found this a very unwise decision as we already had the advantage of being about to contain the fight in a small but the FC allowed the fight to be in the medium at Arashi’s recommendation. This allowed the enemy fleet to bring in T3Ds into the fight which I did not see how that was in any way beneficial to the fleet. Granted we fortunately were able to disengage with minor losses thanks to early call of the FC, it was a good fight.

My point is that doctrines exist for a reason, to educate newbros on fleet discipline and to show the strength of uniform size of ships especially in FW lowsec. Arashi on several fleets have insisted on flying size above doctrine and display similar actions of not flying with the fleet and moving on his own accord. I do see the advantages of having a forward “bait” ship, but this in my opinion just teaches several bad habits in fleet. As a learning corp I find its important to teach newbros fleet discipline, the structure is there for a reason. Granted I also am known for flying special snowflakes but as a tool to the fleet (ewar or special role) never above hull size and influence the fleet to accommodate my off doctrine ship.

Otherwise it was a really fun fleet. We had tons of kills and once again I sincerely appreciate you taking out the fleet out of the HSC and being so accommodating and patient with newbros. I applaud your dedication in involving several campuses to fleet activities.

[Yuri Levnik]

Thanks for the kind words and for flying with us, Jax! Everyone was a newbro once and I was glad to get some green on the killboard for folks who hadn't PVPed very much.

I will admit that I am very lax about discipline on my fleets. I don't like enforcing rules and telling people "no". This can definitely be a problem... I know another pilot asked before fleet if he could bring a t2 frigate and I replied with something like "I want to be able to slide novices today so I would prefer folks bring T1 frigates. If you bring something larger you run the risk of getting stuck outside a plex and getting blown up." In other words, fly at your own risk. With that said, I don't make special accommodations for off doctrine snowflakes. Arashi suggested we use the medium. However, I made the call to use the Medium not for him but rather because my plan was to engage their entire fleet and force them into a brawl after sliding the gate. I correctly guessed they were kiting and would struggle under our blob of tackle. So, it didn't matter to me which plex we used as long as we could make them slide it. I honestly didn't think of trying to split their fleet with the small. I had forgotten that T3ds can't slide smalls ); If we used the small and they chose to engage that would have worked extremely well for us - an excellent idea for me to remember next time (;

As for "too many scouts and bait", I'll let y'all sort that out amongst yourselves.

Speaking of the Mercenary Coalition fight, I got some excerpts from their AAR from their FC:

• - As we're about to wind down, we spot a 30+ man EVE Uni fleet, merlins primarily 3j away heading in opposite direction. Fleet consulted, and decided to take it. In Pyne we warp to a site where we think they are, then warp to a medium with a plan to slide in and use the home field. As we land at the Medium, so does their fleet. (Horrible luck). Someone calls "Slide" and I go with it and we all slide in. What followed was an absolute mess, we traded Scalpel, Keres and 2 Jags (including another couple of Jags) for several Merlins and a Dramiel. I call for disengage. We safe, citadel, then head back. We stand down in Akidagi.
  -----------------------
  - The EVE Uni fight was part bad luck, part mistake. We literally landed at exactly the same time they did, which is just unfortunate or good perception from the EVE Uni FC. The second part was the mistake - we could have held off slide and pulled range since some of them were sliding at the same time, so we could have split the fleet that way. My target calling on site quickly broke down (was triple boxing), so gave order for pull range down and to broadcast any who get pointed - the fire might be split but we had DPS to fry them through reps. Ideally we would have had them at range and forced them to charge us - with our range and speed we could kite them to hell and back. Sadly we traded slightly worse, but lessons learned.

My thoughts - it was a bit of luck and a bit of skill to get us to the plex before they had a chance to set up inside. I heard they were landing and took us in promptly, which was necessary to prevent them from sliding ahead of us and setting up at range inside. As you hear on the video, I give orders to slide regardless of whether or not they were sliding, so I will take credit for avoiding their "easy win" situation where we fight outside the plex as they pull range. I have enough experience with both Merlins and kitey T3Ds to know better than to chase.

Also, they had a lot of kills on their roam prior to our fight and their FC was *triple boxing*. I struggle plenty just running one account when I FC!
Yuri

[Arashi Shizukana]

Hey Jax,
Thanks for the feedback on my piloting! The Exequror really was me just hanging around in Ouelletta while the fleet formed up, and I only asked for assistance as I thought we might be able to get a juicy kill (since fleet was near finished forming up). After that I swapped out to a shield Thorax to better match with the fleet's engagement profile, and to have something that can take gate guns. Since we were already at 50~ people, I figured that having a snowflake in fleet might be good. As the Tempest kill shows, it was quite nice, as I was able to hold it comfortably until fleet got secondary.

In terms of the T3D fight, I actually did not realize that there were a significant number of T3Ds (3+) in that fight, and had I known that, I definitely would not have called for the medium. I thought they were an Assault Frig fleet, and so picking the small or the medium wouldn't have had any effect on the battle's outcome, except to bring in a bit more DPS for us.

I was planning on roaming solo, but we managed to pick up a lot of action, so I tagged along for more than I initially planned.

I actually wouldn't say I fly snowflake roles a lot, perhaps its just coincidence (I'm snowflaking when you're in fleet), but I normally fly doctrine ships. Sorry for any confusion this may cause the fleet, I'm happy to fly doctrine roles. Having newbros learn how to play Eve is definitely the central role for Uni fleets (especially newbro-targeted ones), and as such that should take priority.

[Christoph Patrouette]

https://www.reddit.com/r/Eve/comments/7 ... _of_magic/

Just leaving this here

[Yuri Levnik]

We undocked this fleet exactly two weeks after the last time I made the front page of r/eve for welping a fleet (; (; (;

[Ivika Starfury]

Thanks Yuri, Scouts, Logi and Vanguard for such a great fleet and such a great fleet; I could not believe that so much content was available so quickly into fleet.

Positives:

+ Great scouting brought a lot of good fights!
+ FC instructions were clear, concise and easy to follow
+ General fleet participation and command adherence was very disciplined and effective
+ A very good balance of authoritative and concise leadership and informal atmosphere created a very good learning environment and a very engaging fleet (The content probably contributed a lot to this too)

Negatives:

- It feels like we walked right into the Coercers. It was a fleet formed by 2 people we had blobbed earlier and so knew our doctrine exactly. I didn't notice this at all when we were setting up the flight - did anyone else? Or were we just at a point where it was the end of the night and we just wanted to see some fireworks to celebrate a successful fleet? It just feels like we could have done more to set that fight up on our terms rather than theirs I guess (My lesson learned is that MWD = death when in faced with a smart bomb blob)
- Some lack of discipline/trigger happy peeps when hold fire was called (This is a very minor gripe I'm having to dig deep)

[Yrgrasil]

(My lesson learned is that MWD = death when in faced with a smart bomb blob) (This is a very minor gripe I'm having to dig deep)

Nah, you want to turn on your MWD and get out of range as fast as possible. Sigradius doesn't affect the Smartbomb Damage.

[Alcius]

Thank you Yuri (and the fleet mates) for the fleet. It was fun especially the gate slide action.

[Troven Smalvard]

(My lesson learned is that MWD = death when in faced with a smart bomb blob) (This is a very minor gripe I'm having to dig deep)

Nah, you want to turn on your MWD and get out of range as fast as possible. Sigradius doesn't affect the Smartbomb Damage.

Bombs from Bombers you want your MWD off

[Nelliver Cadigal]

Excellent fleet. One day I might even learn not to fly aimlessly around in PvP action, but getting a kill on first show (0.1% dmg) was worth it.
Benefit of hind sight will now teach each FC not to storm a plex with a sizeable fleet inside. Actually, I would suggest to never attack at a place of their choosing.

Thanks for the fleet, it was memorable for all the right and wrong reasons