Spoiler
Alene en Bauldry - Merlin
Ana'ander Lamora - Merlin
Bethany Cartharsis - Burst
Caladius - Merlin
Caleb Wihunglo - Incursus
Durnik Risalo - Merlin
Esca Sinak
Evelyn Webb - Merlin
Ged Sinak - Atron
Neemo Beer - Merlin
Penelore - Bantam
Space Warfare Development - Nemesis
Tori Moliko - Merlin
Ana'ander Lamora - Merlin
Bethany Cartharsis - Burst
Caladius - Merlin
Caleb Wihunglo - Incursus
Durnik Risalo - Merlin
Esca Sinak
Evelyn Webb - Merlin
Ged Sinak - Atron
Neemo Beer - Merlin
Penelore - Bantam
Space Warfare Development - Nemesis
Tori Moliko - Merlin
Here is a Youtube link to the engagement that provides the learning experience of this AAR. I don't know why, but it's pretty blurry for me. Although, it's very clear and crisp locally. I guess I'm going to have to do some research and find out what tricks Youtube requires.
First, let me thank everyone that came out for the fleet and especially Penelore and Ged Sinak for helping me put my first fleet together and run it. Ged Sinak sat in command with me so I could run some thoughts by him before I opened my mouth to the fleet -- which I did; he was a great help!
I was both happy and surprised at the turnout. We had 13 people in total containing 2 logi (and 2 newbros with less then 4 fleets). Space Warfare also brought his cloaky bomber. This was better than I thought might come out for a roam on a Friday (USTZ) night. Hopefully, I can get an even higher turnout in the future. The fleet composition was kind of in line with my thinking, although, I would love to have the numbers to have at least 3 logi, 1-2 ewar, and a few more damage dealers.
The content was not bad. Certainly, it could have been better, but there was content. And, based on zKillboard, there was content to be had -- had we more time. And of course, had we not lost so much of our fleet along the way.
- The Plan -
In running my first fleet as FC, I knew I would rather keep to small engagements. Ideally, I was hoping a few frigates, destroyers, and maybe a few cruisers would kindly offer themselves to the fleet -- preferably no more than two or three at a time. I was also hoping to explore the FW systems to try and learn system interconnections within the regions and the traffic/content they present from an FC point-of-view.
I planned to leave Stacmon and follow a route that took us to the far corners of Cal-Gal Faction Warfare space. However, after a pre-undock check on zkillboard of the FW regions, I saw that the planned route did not show as much content as I'd hoped. So, I built a new route: Hevrice > Heydieles > Reitsato. From there, I had a few options. I planned to decide where to go once I got there based on what zkillboard was telling me.
- The Execution -
Once we undocked, I checked ship names, had everyone set safeties to yellow, and had fleet "warp to broadcasted" planet. I think this was a useful exercise because a few people didn't know how to follow the broadcast commands. I then had them broadcast for reps. With the basics out of the way, we set off on our route. I actually got to move the fleet through 7 systems before our scout found us a target -- this was a good, low pressure way to start my first fleet; I was slowly getting over my nervousness.
We found content along our route. While some of it escaped our grasp, most of it fell to our might. But ultimately, a lot of us fell to a Kikimora in a plex. We then reshipped into a travel fleet in Ichoriya for the route back to Stacmon.
- The Lesson -
Each engagement provided me things to work on, but the Kikimora engagement really short-circuited my brain. I couldn't figure out how to properly extract the fleet from the engagement and I stopped giving the fleet direction. Thankfully, some others prompted me to act. I didn't make the right decisions and I certainly didn't make them quick enough. But, ultimately, some did survive.
Looking back, the following points would have helped:
1 Realize there are times you can't save everyone, but you most likely can save almost everyone
2 I need to make decisions quicker
3 I need to use all the resources at my disposal. Space Warfare was still alive... I could have asked him to provide a safe for the fleet
4 Even though I was afraid to have the fleet blindly jump into another system, it would have at least gotten us out of the "frying pan"
5 Aligning to extract fleet from grid is usually a pretty stupid idea in a brawl fleet... your gonna get picked off and you can't do anything about it
6 Managing two different conversations in two different mumble channels is difficult even in the best of times... and almost impossible under pressure
7 Knowing more about different enemy ship capabilities
8 In general, I think I may have waited a little too long on calling for fleet to warp into system once scout acquires tackle
9 I need to be more vocal about what I want the fleet to do; sometimes, I leave it to the fleet to assume what I want them to do -- and most (every?) time, they did exactly that. It is something I definitely want to change and improve.
Kills and Losses
(02:26:09) Muetralle
Atron +5.77m
Vexor Navy Issue +87.23m
Capsule +0.01m
Ged Sinak reported a Vexor Navy Issue and an Atron in the Muetralle system. He found the Atron in a large plex. Once he had point, I told the fleet to jump and warp to Ged Sinak. There wasn't much the Atron could do. He went down fairly quick once we applied damage.
Once the Atron popped, a VNI landed on grid. I called for the fleet to spiral in and get tackle. This kill took a little time. I called for overheating guns: repeat hot/cold cycles of 3 hot followed by 2 cold.
For both of these, I think my performance was ok. On the positive side, we got two enemy killmails and no friendly losses. Plus, Penelore said everyone was really good on calling for reps. On the negative side, not everyone got on both killmails -- even though I made a point to wait some time for everyone to get there before I called for damage application. On one hand, I want to give everyone time to get on killmails, but on the other, I don't want to lose a "given" kill. I chose to take what we were "given" before we could lose it.
Looking back, I got tunnel vision on the VNI. It took us some time to kill the VNI; so, I should remember "seeing" the fleet, but I don't. That is something I need to work on -- and I'd think, with time, I will improve.
(02:59:14) Deven
Maulus +0.31m
Ged Sinak found a Maulus in a large plex a few systems later. Like before, Ged got tackle and I jumped fleet. I told them to warp to Ged and slide the gate. The Maulus didn't last long. Again, I waited a little bit and saw that not everyone was on grid. But, like before, I didn't want to wait too long and told fleet to start damage. So, unfortunately, not everyone was on the killmail.
(03:11:57) Reitsato
Atron -3.94m
Merlin -7.02m
Merlin -7.35m
Merlin -3m
Burst -4.66m
Merlin -9.74m
Ged Sinak found a Kikimora in a small plex in Reitsato. I sent the vanguard in to help the scout prior to jumping the fleet into the system. When the fleet got inside the plex, the scout was dead and one (of two) vanguard was soon to die. The skirmish was about 60km off the beacon, so the fleet had a distance to fly. Here are some points about the engagement:
1 I called for fleet to engage; first vanguard died; second vanguard was pointed
2 Fleet was getting spread out, the Kikimora was still over 50km away, and we weren't making much headway getting within range
3 I called for the fleet to anchor on FC (I forgot second vanguard was pointed)
4 When I noticed the vanguard was pointed, I called for fleet to get tackle and engage
5 The last vanguard went down; iirc, I then called for fleet to anchor on FC
6 I knew I wanted to extract the fleet from the engagement. However, I didn't have a safe in system and there were no structures/stations. I was also afraid to blindly jump into another system. Consequently, I froze with indecision
7 I was trying to decide what to do, where to go, and how to extract. I don't know strict timelines, but within 30 seconds to 1 minute, I think it went like: aligning to outgate, reengaging target, warp to outgate, I died, and warping to safe.
I think that knowing more about the Kikimora's capabilities would have helped. Maybe I would have disengaged at the acceleration gate once our scout had died -- especially since the Kikimora has better speed, range and damage than our Merlin brawlers. And if I had continued into pocket, then maybe I would have disengaged sooner and saved even a few more of us. But, now that I think about it, once I knew that the scout was down and the target was ~50km away and there was a decent chance he had range on us, I should have known then we needed to disengage our brawling frigates.
So, basically, the 2ic (Scout), 3ic (Logi), scout, and vanguard all died fairly early in the engagement and I died last after everyone else made it off the grid. My indecision -- going back and forth on calls -- really fried my brain. I don't think my brain fully recovered until we got to Ichoriya and the fleet's conversation allowed it to recover.
Stats
ISK Destroyed: 93,308,561.6
ISK Lost: 35,701,245.6
ISK Delta: 57,607,316
Efficiency: 72.327%
Overall evaluation
- ✔ (Positive stuff)
* We had fun.
* We found content.
* I don't think I got anyone lost; I don't think I left anyone behind.
* I learnt a lot.
✘ (Negative stuff)
* I need to make quicker decision.
* I need to improve my enemy ship capability knowledge.
* I need to be more vocal and "think aloud" to reduce/eliminate any confusion in the fleet.
* I need to vocalize my thoughts more to help keep the fleet informed in uncomfortable situations.
* I need more experience to help alleviate my deficiencies
. However, as the situation changed (vanguard being pointed, kiki being at range and then within 30km, etc) I kept going back and forth with my calls -- and the calls were not very clear, at that.
