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[AAR] WHC Harvest Fleet Gets DUNKED

Posted: 2019.01.10 19:34
by Penelore
So sometimes you just have to post an AAR to get it out there so you can think about the encounter.
That is the case here.

On a Harvest fleet last night, WHC got absolutely dunked.
2 ships escaped, 4 MTUs were recovered... and The Dark Space Initiative did actually SRP us for losses. We were the content Bob provided.

https://zkillboard.com/related/31001209/201901100500/

We had scanned down a fresh Bacon two hours previously and checked all our connections. A new sig had popped and we did NOT stop to scan it down since we were close to being done. It turned out the fleet came through Innuendo (where there was nobody home) via a random Z connection. Regardless, we had no pickets out at the time, unless you just consider Marcus and his cloaky bloodlust the ultimate picket.

Some background, this was a fairly long harvest fleet, we had been going over an hour, maybe 15 anoms in.
I was flying the scythe, Vincent was calling the fleet, we had 2 Osprey logi and 4-5 dps, Marcus was out scouting around us in a T3C. Ticerium had JUST headed home to get a salvager and get started on that since we only had a few sites to go.

It went down something like this. From my perspective...

SABRE
SABRE
SABRE

Typed out in chat by our cloaky scout. I remember it was three times before I saw it.
I immediately called Sabre in coms, told everyone to align out to *Bacon.
Seconds later the Sabre landed on grid. I called to kill the Sabre as fast as possible.
At the same time Ticerium starts calling. Bubbles up on *Bacon. Huge fleet of Gila on *Bacon.
I immediately call people to warp off to Planet 5 @ 100 instead.
Sabre gets a bubble up and then dies.

A few more seconds go by and still nothing has landed and I have managed to get out of the bubble and warp off.
I land at Planet 5 and no one follows.

This was very frustrating for me and I made so many mistake here. The biggest one was not just telling someone on grid to start making calls. Instead I was asking questions... whats going on? did you get off? did anyone die? link kills?
And nothing happened. Two minutes earlier I had to YELL clear coms to get an order out and now no one was telling me what was going on.

But regardless, I was out of the fight and I should have passed the baton to someone there. At least call a target and overheat and kill someone if your going to go down. Kill the Kitsune for the love of god... they brought a Kitsune to dunk.

In the background here, Marcus is desperately looking for an exit for us. And I am desperate for him to find one. Two of us survive... myself (the fastest ship in our fleet) and Vincent. Marcus find us a fantastic connection... the low sec exit in Bacon is 2j from a low sec entrance into Innu from our random WH Z.

Vincent and I feverishly start to burn back to Innu. About half the team is podded out.
Now I am calling that everyone needs to get back to Innu as fast as possible, get in an interceptor and get as much blue loot out of those MTUs as possible. They have combat probes up now and we are in a race to save some isk from our last two hours.

When I arrived back in Innuendo safely the team was frazzled. People who had been podded out were not starting the trip home yet, TDSIN had a Broadsword sitting on ALI and we had no one online who could shoot at it. So that is when I finally pinged slack. Eventually enough of us jumped into interceptors and recovered some of the blue loot. Once they saw us coming in ceptors and grabbing up our MTUS they gave up combat probing and left. Then they sent SRP iskies to the people they killed.

I'll publicly admit here, I was shaken as hell. I barely slept all last night. No fun... no fun at all.

Re: [AAR] WHC Harvest Fleets Gets DUNKED

Posted: 2019.01.10 19:40
by Penelore
One last thing I thought about.

There were only 3 people on the killmail of the sabre. Maybe if there was all the dps he would not have gotten the bubble off...

If there is a sabre on grid ... KILL IT NOW

Re: [AAR] WHC Harvest Fleet Gets DUNKED

Posted: 2019.01.10 21:01
by Durnik Risalo
I don't have too much to comment on... I wasn't there, and I've never been on WHC fleets -- so my knowledge is limited/non-existant on your procedures.

However, one thing that I caught that surprised me. You said you gave the command to warp to Planet @ 100km... does WHC not have a procedure to have everyone save the same BM safe in any particular system in which you have multiple anoms/whatever -- or would it not be better to have it?

So, what I mean is... everyone warps into system, someone finds a safe, everyone else warps to that safe and saves a BM, everyone names the safe BM the same name, then if you ever have to scatter, you can command everyone to warp to "Safe A"?

If this is what you already do, then sorry... I didn't pick that up in your write-up.

Also, I realize that doing this wouldn't've changed the outcome at all :(

Re: [AAR] WHC Harvest Fleet Gets DUNKED

Posted: 2019.01.10 23:23
by Zako Maken
Durnik Risalo wrote: However, one thing that I caught that surprised me. You said you gave the command to warp to Planet @ 100km... does WHC not have a procedure to have everyone save the same BM safe in any particular system in which you have multiple anoms/whatever -- or would it not be better to have it?
(
Not something we do, but not a bad idea. Generally we only run bacon WHs that we can run security on. So ideally it will only have 1 connection (the static) and then we can place an alt on that hole and listen for activations. So a safe is not the rally point, knowing someone is coming and getting back to Innu is the goal. In this case the attackers came from a connection off Innu which made it a bit more tricky.


For Pen:

Sorry to hear that you lost sleep over this. WHC is lucky to have a few people like your self willing to step up, take charge, and make things happen. People like me who have experience need to step up more often and take the weight off you few.

As far as feeling bad DON'T!! There's plenty of money to be made in WHC and with insurance very little was lost. I think people would rather go out and do something and die then sit and do nothing.

Overall I think you did the right things: kill tackle, run away, recover assets and/or fight. The main lesson seems to be if there's an active connection off innu, if should probably be picketed and possibly bubbled.

Re: [AAR] WHC Harvest Fleet Gets DUNKED

Posted: 2019.01.10 23:24
by Robnik Charante
gf friends :) I was the one who found you folks and was boxing scout/sabre/Gila during the gank. Couple tips:

(1) Consider fitting MJDs to all your ABCs. If you get sabre bubbled you can easily moonwalk. Honestly was a bit surprised you didn't have MJDs fit as that's a big part of the ratting meta right now for better or worse...
(2) Do keep an eye on your backdoor when ratting, it's actually easier to catch ratters running home than it is to catch them in site. I knew some of you would panic home so I parked a second sabre on your return.

Sorry for the scare but I hope you folks get addicted to w-space; some days you eat the bear and some days the bear eats you :D it probably seems like a lot of ISK to lose right now but if you keep at it you'll soon be pretty wealthy!

Re: [AAR] WHC Harvest Fleet Gets DUNKED

Posted: 2019.01.10 23:43
by Anducio Grandoli
Best advice I can offer as an unskilled WHC-FC (having narrowly avoided a similar fate one bearing fleet) is to remember that as soon as something leaves the station it was bought in, it could be as good as dead.

Other things that maybe could have gone differently:
1) Recognizing and reacting to the confusion once off-grid by voluntell'ing someone to be 2IC, unless someone steps up, and then accept you can't do anything remotely.
2) Assign two someones as d-scan bunnies - this gives them the feeling of helping fleet more and possibly paying better attention.
3) If you have a no-comms scout, make sure someone who is not FC is consistently watching their chat.
4) Never, not even once, trust that Bob has your back. Everything in spooky space is out to kill you.

The only bad-FC is one who refuses to try and learn. :)

Re: [AAR] WHC Harvest Fleet Gets DUNKED

Posted: 2019.01.11 00:25
by Marcus Arilia
Sorry I know this is like 4 times longer than the actual AAR.

Some thoughts from the “I guess I’m now scout” scout. Just some background. I was off doing stupid things and losing ships in silly ways while they beared. About when they were done I heard the bearing FC call a new sig and headed over to check for them. Scanned it down, it was just a data site, BM’d it and was just chilling for a sec.

Sabre jumped and immediately warped. I put it in fleet and bearing FC caught it pretty much immediately and called it on coms. By the time everyone had processed the Sabre had landed. At this point FC switched and it was called to kill the Sabre. Not sure if everyone knew to burn out and kill if they could on the way out, so that would be a good to be clear on next time.

Coms immediately got messy. Some was good info like “Bacon is bubbled in Innu”, but everyone was talking over each other. Combat FC eventually got frustrated and screamed to clear coms. Maybe next time doing it immediately upon the threat would help ease that. Then the bacon intel could be given with a quick “check check”. It was hard too because the person giving that info unknowingly crossjumped the Sabre so it happened all at once.

Once combat FC was off grid a 2IC wasn’t designated and no one stepped up, which unfortunately left a lot of silence and a concerned FC.

Now it came to scouting out. This is where I want to emphasize the importance of mapper and BM discipline. I looked at BMs first and nothing was labeled as a K Space connection. So I immediately went to the mapper to look at the +1 statics, which all sucked. Randomly in clicking systems I accidently clicked Bacon. I instinctively glanced at the sigs and saw a low sec and was confused as there wasn’t a low BM and there wasn’t a black system with a low name. Turns out the sig was scanned, but not extended to a blank system, and wasn’t bookmarked with the L. I warped to it anyway and sure enough it was a low. I likely burned through a good 3-4 minutes figuring this out while people bounced. No one died from the delay but before Bacon was run everything should have been mapped, and correct naming would have gotten us out faster. Bugging people when there are mistakes isn’t about being a dick, it truely can be about joint survival.

FC made a great call to hop in Intis to scoop your own loot, however those that were podded didn’t and had depots still on the field so some of those got popped as they came back at shuttle speed. The Broadsword was also hanging out by Ali and no one with pew permissions was on so he got to just keep hanging. This is also again where complacency hit. One most of the fleet left people assumed they all left. Always assume there’s still a T3C still out there waiting to blap. A legion was brought out to loot the MTU by the battle and I cringed a little since if there were still stragglers they both had the BM and a pretty target. Or at least that’s what I would do. I suggested a safe with a jet can drop and other intis moving from there, but the legion ended up staying on to loot the MTU.

Biggest group takeaways: make sure you’re always D Scanning, May even be good to have a dedicated D scanner. Move from harvesting chatting to combat coms a little quicker.

Now on to self reflection. As a scout I know the challenge I create by being ears-only and typing. FC caught my Sabre call pretty much immediately, but in planning our route back it caused issues. We were extremely lucky (see Bob was watching over us) to have our Bacon exit be only 2 jumps from 1z1 but I had some trouble articulating that to FC, a few other guys in fleet helped out though. I often have trouble deciding between speed of getting communication out and amount of clarity. If I’m on the same wavelength as FC short and fast works, and luckily some of the fleet guys got it and helped me out. When I need to be clearer I know it frustrates FC to have to wait to read intel. It also means a clear fleet channel sometimes to not break the intel flow which can lead to FC not seeing all losses and cause problems in knowing fleet comp.I need to find a balance between taking time to give all intel and short bursts of things.

And to our gankers, you guys are truely a classy bunch. Not only were you extremely generous in personal SRPing, not killing all the MTUs or camping our system, but you hopped on our forum to give feedback. I sent your SRPer a note thanking you guys I hope he got it. You gave us a reminder to be on our toes, and we needed it. I hope we have a chance to fly a joint op or fleet with you guys sometime, I think we could all learn something.

Re: [AAR] WHC Harvest Fleet Gets DUNKED

Posted: 2019.01.11 00:39
by Urban Oxide
First thing is first it's great to see you guys out and about doing things, so what you lost a couple of ships worth peanuts... experience and social stuffs are worth far more.

A few mistakes were made indeed but learn from it and move on.
Penelore wrote:A new sig had popped and we did NOT stop to scan it down since we were close to being done.
Always assume a new signature is a WH with a fleet on the other side and prep to GTFO. Soon as something naughty appears on scan you warp the fleet out even if someone is pointed by the site, it's not worth losing the fleet for 1 guy (sorry).
Penelore wrote:I immediately call people to warp off to Planet 5 @ 100 instead.
Never warp a fleet to a known visual spot in space whereby the enemy can follow. A previous site BM would have been far better.
Penelore wrote:It went down something like this. From my perspective...

SABRE
SABRE
SABRE

Typed out in chat by our cloaky scout. I remember it was three times before I saw it.
I should state the obvious about relying on non-mumble scouts.

Did anyone else vocally call it out from scan or chat?


To answer the question on non-MJD use. this is a conscious decision made in-light of the PVE doctrine performing optimally. WHC has to account for many factors including SP and pilot skill. My concern with MJD fitting is dropping tank on what is essentially glass cannons and most people MJDing out of the site simply to warp back to static allowing enemy tackle to follow and kill. Keep in mind that only the BCs would be able to do this leaving the utility alone to die, and just as in this case would not guarantee survival. Getting free from the site is only half of the mission.

Re: [AAR] WHC Harvest Fleet Gets DUNKED

Posted: 2019.01.11 01:20
by Eir Geiravor
Robnik Charante wrote:gf friends :) I was the one who found you folks and was boxing scout/sabre/Gila during the gank. Couple tips:

(1) Consider fitting MJDs to all your ABCs. If you get sabre bubbled you can easily moonwalk. Honestly was a bit surprised you didn't have MJDs fit as that's a big part of the ratting meta right now for better or worse...
(2) Do keep an eye on your backdoor when ratting, it's actually easier to catch ratters running home than it is to catch them in site. I knew some of you would panic home so I parked a second sabre on your return.

Sorry for the scare but I hope you folks get addicted to w-space; some days you eat the bear and some days the bear eats you :D it probably seems like a lot of ISK to lose right now but if you keep at it you'll soon be pretty wealthy!
That was a good fight, it was an exciting end to our night bearing. I won't speak for the rest the group last night, but from my perspective while it wasn't the outcome I wanted it was good content, sorry we didn't get a few more of you guys, but thanks for coming out to play - see you next time for sure!