[AAR] [HSC] Meliodas Zateki Inspires a Roam - 2019-01-25

[Drebin 679]

On January 24th, Meliodas Zateki was given a Punisher and received bets from two unistas following a guided lowsec tour. If he got on the killmail of his first PvP encounter, one person would give him 10 million ISK. If he died in his first PvP encounter, the other person would give him 10 million ISK. He had a day to get into some PvP, and was ready to go solo into lowsec on the guidance of Psychotic Fickity. Little did he expect that there were also a bunch of unistas that were down for a roam at the same time!


Roam members (9)

Spoiler

Abhishek Banyal - [REDACTED]
Atticus Vex - Condor
Drebin 679 - Navitas
Ievos - Tristan
Jessica Farrish - Incursus
Meliodas Zateki - Punisher
Philos Aideron - Incursus
Rogue Ozran - Incursus
Vulcann Rin - Cormorant

This was a kitchen sink fleet form. We tried getting a generic armor frigate fleet, but some people didn't have the skills or the ships for an armor tanked ship. Abhishek even brought a [REDACTED], which was a bit big for our frigate fleet, but it had a cov ops cloak so it would work as a cloaky scout. Rogue Ozran initially offered to FC, but he had to take care of IRL stuff, leaving me to lead the fleet. This was my first time FC'ing a fleet more than one gate, and I was also logi FC, so it was pretty awkward for me. Nevertheless, we were able to get going smoothly.

Kills and Losses

The fleet made its way from gate to gate, going up to Frarie without much content. We almost had a chance on a low standing Incursus that jumped into us, but I warped the fleet off before I could process that information and get set up on a gate. In Frarie, we did get split up a bit because Abhishek's [REDACTED] couldn't slide novice gates, so Atticus Vex offered to scout as well. He went and scouted Eugales, while I had Abhishek scout Renarelle. I had the fleet warp to the Moc gate, and once there I had heard that both scouts had found a Merlin in their systems. Thinking that Atticus would have the best chance at getting the Merlin, I asked the fleet to warp to the Eugales gate, and later to jump. This lost a couple of people in the fleet, and Atticus' find warped off from its plex. Thankfully, Atticus had a bunch of safes set up, so we were able to get the fleet to reform at Eugales without any losses. Once reformed, I designate Atticus as the scout, and have Abhishek act as a surprise [REDACTED] in case we came upon something that he could help us in.

We went a couple of jumps, when our scout noticed a Catalyst in a small plex. He's able to snag the Catalyst, we jump gate and warp to him, and it out.

(04:07:47) Renarelle
Catalyst +2.01m

At this point, one of the people who bet on Meliodas won their bet, since he was able to get on this killmail! With regard to the Catalyst, it seemed like it only seemed to redbox my Navitas after I was well outside of its optimal. It seemed weird, and I felt like convoing the person or giving them some money (I instructed the fleet not to pod). I ended up doing neither, though, and I wonder if I should have.

Just in case the Catalyst was bait for something else, I had the fleet scatter, and reform back at a safe.

We then move on further into Black Rise. While getting intel on Hirri, an outlaw Retribution jumped into us. I was unsure if we could take it on, as I didn't really have a grasp on our odds against an Assault Frigate. It crashed gate once, then came back. We chased it through the gate a couple more times, but we weren't able to catch it. It then came back to us. We did some damage to it to see if it would crash gate again, but it turned out it wasn't tackled, so it was able to warp to a tactical 400km off. I get the fleet to scatter as I didn't think we could chase it, but it chose to warp back to gate. I accidentally warp off to a celestial, as Ievos take a lot of damage. I eventually come back, see that the Retribution is 50km off, and call the fleet to scatter once more. Around that time, there was a gang of criminals that had roamed into the system (in Merlins I believe), and I was afraid that they might've been working with the Retribution. Atticus has another safe we went and congregated at, and I go rep Ievos back to full armor.

Meliodas went the wrong way at a point, and was a bit behind the fleet. We asked him to warp to one of us, but the Retribution was able to tackle him. After taking a good while on our end (>5 seconds) to confirm that he was aggressed, I call the fleet to warp back to him. Unfortunately, the Retribution kills him as we land on grid. We start jousting with the Retribution right as a trio of Snuffed Out/Pen Is Out T2 Cruisers warp onto the gate. We most certainly couldn't take on a Curse by itself, much less one with a Huginn and a Lachesis as backup. I call the fleet to scatter once again, and everyone (save Ievos who was tackled by the Retri) are able to get out. The Recon ships take out the Retribution, which happened to have a pretty blinged out fit.

(04:33:11) Pynekastoh
Punisher -2.18m
Tristan -5.36m
Retribution +291.73m

I got the fleet to hang out at another safe, as Rogue Ozran returns to take over the fleet. Having had enough excitement for the night, Rogue safely takes us back to Amy.

Stats
ISK Destroyed: 293,738,506.65
ISK Lost: 7,540,556.51
ISK Delta: 286,197,950.14
Efficiency: 97.497%

✔ (Positive stuff)

• Nice to have some Late USTZ fleets!
• Good composure from everyone, despite the fleet's slapped together setup
• Good scouting
• Having safes from Atticus helped a lot in reorganizing our fleet!

✘ (Negative stuff)

• I talked too fast at points, and people couldn't understand what I was saying. I have a tendency of doing that
• Could have done better keeping the fleet together.
• Having more resolve would have helped too, especially during the Retribution fight. But I guess that's due to my flight over fight nature, something that will hopefully improve as I do more fleets.

= (Other stuff)

• It might be beneficial for HSC to have armor frigates available on contract in the same way that Merlins are available, so that there's always something for someone in a lowsec roam!
• The Retribution fight was too hectic for me to keep track of where Abhishek was with his [REVELATION]*. Would it have helped to bring it in?
• I wonder if Meliodas technically won both bets...

* He was really in a Proteus. Dunno if this whole [REDACTED] shtick was worthwhile putting in...

[Penelore]

It seemed weird, and I felt like convoing the person or giving them some money (I instructed the fleet not to pod). I ended up doing neither, though, and I wonder if I should have.

You can always convo them and invite them to EUni to learn more about EvE.

Looks like your first fleet went pretty well. There was a lot of taking the fleet to safes or scattering on gate called later in the fleet. Okay... so... here is my "do as I say, not as I do speech" since I have a reputation for having safes everywhere and playing my engagements overly safe also.

Running from an overpowering enemy can be fun, especially for you as the FC who feels the adrenaline rush of the escape more acutely. But squeezing in some kills on targets of opportunity in those situations is the real challenge, your fleet is after kills. Driving yourself to take those engagements your not sure of, and risk the welp to learn, is an important part of FCing.

[Mike Kingswell]

Great read! Very detailed AAR!
Great to see you guys had a lot of fun with the little bet me a d Ringo had going on. I shall transfer the funds later today and I am sure Ringo will as well, since you are technically correct about winning both bets...and as we know that's the best kind of correct!

[Ievos]

I know my reply is a few days late, so my apologies for that.

I think you touched on the main concerns we had, but we all knew it was an impromptu fleet, that was pure learning for all. Decisiveness and clear communications are key to success, which you acknowledged you can improve on. But, everyone learned and had fun, and you did get us some fights.

I am hoping we can get some more such fleets in the future; low cost fleets with people willing to fight/learn/lead regardless of skill.

[Marcus Arilia]

I love the level of detail in your AARs, please keep it up. My biggest thing would be just take the fights anyway. T1s are cheap, and there's some SRP if need be. More than anything it will teach you what you can take. When I solo one of my favorite things to do is YOLO just to see what happens. You never know how well your prey is paying attention and you will be surprised at what you can kill (I've solo'd a Brutix with both an enyo, and a catalyst on separate occasions, because they didn't know what they were doing).