AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Locked
User avatar
Gergoran Moussou
Member
Member
Posts: 372
Joined: 2019.04.09 05:16

AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Gergoran Moussou »

Form-up was a bit awkward. We didn't get the ideal numbers, but I decided to undock anyway. I'd rather fly a sub-optimal composition than cancel the fleet and sit docked up. I had hoped to get two Stilettos, three Ospreys, a good number of Caracals, and hopefully some secondary tackle (two Jaguars and a Keres, ideally). Since Yrgasil has a bit more experience than I do, I asked him to anchor so that I wouldn't forget to either anchor or call targets like I did in my last fleet. He brought a Cyclone for that. We had four Caracals, three Ospreys and one Slasher. I was concerned about the fairly low damage from there being barely any Caracals in the fleet, but I wanted to get rolling.

I intended to get going by 22:30. We were still figuring out roles by then, undocked around 22:40.

Scout was new, so I had to explain to him how to look for targets, but he did fairly well for a first-time person. Biggest issue that he had at first was that since he was new, I wanted him to stay +1 and he kept going +2 until I explained why I wanted the first-time solo scout to avoid getting too far ahead.

Early on, it was a fairly empty. I figured out why when we found a SNUFF capital fleet in Vey. I didn't want to fight that and it didn't look like anyone else did either.

In VLI, we found a Nereus, but a destroyer gang killed it before we could get tackle and the destroyers understandably decided that they wanted to be somewhere other than in space with a Caracal gang. By this point in my fleets, I generally just set a few waypoints going to Tama if we haven't had any fights.

We encountered a flashy TEST gang of a Svipul, two Bantams, and a Hawk a few times on the route. We tried to engage, but they jumped the gate pretty quickly and got off. Aggression timers are probably the most disappointing thing about heading back into K-Space and having to deal with gates.

We didn't find much until the scout reported a Brutix at a POCO while we were in Pynekastoh. While he was moving to get tackle, I saw a flashy Drekavac warp to the out gate, so I ordered the fleet to jump and engage on the other side since the scout reported the in-gate was clear. The Drekavac belonged to WANGS, a few other people from WANGS showed up to assist, including the Brutix, an Astarte, a Loki (Yrgrasil asked for the fit after the fight, it was extremely blingy), and an Ashimmu (along with a couple more T1 ships which showed up later). I switched target to the Ashimmu since it seemed to be the easiest to break.

I was a bit late in ordering an extraction from the fight, so they were able to spread tackle on us and kill all nine of us. I ordered an align when my magazine ran out, but by then, most of us were either tackled or dead (and I was tackled right after). If I had two interceptors and people with experience flying them, I would have had my standing order for the fleet be for one to burn off and make a ping, for the Caracals to break off from the anchor and MWD at that interceptor when reloading, but we did not have that.

What went wrong:
1. Logi anchor did not call for logi to form up on him (he pointed out this problem).
2. We encountered a group which vastly outmatched us.
3. I didn't order an extraction fast enough to get some people home (either way, we would have taken losses).
4. I like Caracals, but the BLAP doctrine doesn't work very well unless we have larger numbers than I ended up having available. We didn't have enough damage to break anything with just four Caracals and a Cyclone. Yrgrasil commented that Caracals don't work very well without a T2 fit, but I've had fairly decent experiences with E-Uni Caracals even though it's probably not up to the standards of the NullSec group which he was in before he recently rejoined E-Uni.

Overall, I think I did fairly well considering the circumstances except for the extraction issue, and the more experienced FC who was in the fleet seemed to agree with that assessment. The main thing that I think could have allowed us to do better would have been more Caracals so that we could do more damage.

https://br.inyour.space/?s=45345&b=8799780&e=90&t=e


Roam members (10)
Spoiler
Batto Ashitaka - Osprey
Callum Aishai - Caracal
Gergoran Moussou - Caracal
Jasonn Smith - Caracal
Titus Empire - Osprey
Tyrion Edwardes - Caracal
Vishnael Skyhunter - Osprey
Yrgrasil - Cyclone
Zmeja - Slasher
Kills and Losses

(23:39:58) Hirri
Osprey -19.95m
Osprey -9.94m
Caracal -13.28m
Slasher -1.61m
Caracal -28.55m
Cyclone -77.09m
Caracal -29.18m
Caracal -21.86m
Osprey -9.37m
Capsule -0.01m

Stats
ISK Destroyed: 0
ISK Lost: 210,850,763.57
ISK Delta: -210,850,763.57
Efficiency: 0%

Overall evaluation
  • (Positive stuff)
    (Negative stuff)
9th CCI medalist

Image
User avatar
Budda Sereda
Member
Member
Posts: 1591
Joined: 2016.01.20 02:45
Title: Manager (Fittings), Mentor, Lieutenant, Graduate, Management

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Budda Sereda »

I did not have a chance to look and pyfa Cyclone fit, but I assume it had the same speed/agility as Caracals?

Yet, having a point of your anchor assumes/forces whole your fleet to stay at 20-24km to the primary. With BLAP Caracals, whose whole idea is to kite, that's a very questionable move.

Tbh, considering lack of experienced scouts, I'd ask Yrgasil to be a scout at least in a Slicer, or better Stiletto.

Second thing: from the moment I tried FCing blap Caracals I concluded for myself: they either need a strong tackle, or are not for roaming, but for some sort of fights were you need to push opponent from the grid and don't keep to kill.

When you have 2 points in fleet...and one is on Slasher... it's hard to kill anything.

The fact you did not have ceptor should not stopped you from getting fleet move out of the gate. Pick any celestial, broadcast it, call people to align to it and heat MWD for 2 cycles. Also, ask logy to delay decloaking for 2-4 seconds. With this, unless they have lots of small ships with scram/web the majority of your fleet will pull the range.

I'm not sure about winning such fight, but I think you should be able to kill a Hurricane, a maybe Brutix (assuming logies are lucky and burn away fast).

I assume you engaged Drekavac and later you saw other ships on dscan?

I think switching primary to Ashimu was not a good idea: usually they they quite tanky, one of fits I have is 75k ehp. I believe that a Hurricane would be a better option.

Also, one thing you should have done better was to stay at 40km range or so. They seems landed slow ships on you, so your fleet should be capable tanking that.

Thoughts?
User avatar
Budda Sereda
Member
Member
Posts: 1591
Joined: 2016.01.20 02:45
Title: Manager (Fittings), Mentor, Lieutenant, Graduate, Management

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Budda Sereda »

And, don't worry too much about whelp.
Everyone who had a doctrine ship ended up to be isk positive.

Just reship and undock again!!!
User avatar
Gergoran Moussou
Member
Member
Posts: 372
Joined: 2019.04.09 05:16

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Gergoran Moussou »

Those are good points. The BLAP Caracal fleets which we've run since I joined have had anchors and that's generally been the case for non-Uni Caracal fleets which I've been on, so I decided that since I don't have much experience, I'd go with how people who have done this more than I have do things.

In Pyfa, I'm getting 32m/s faster velocity and 0.61s slower align on the Cyclone than the Caracal with my skills, so it is fairly similar speed/agility. Looks like it's within the margin of error that it might do both better or worse between two pilots depending on their skills.

I definitely see what you mean about it not being a roaming fleet. In the future, I'm thinking I'd not be interested in running this sort of fleet unless I can make sure that there are people able to fly tackle beyond just a Slasher and Cyclone (as well as more Caracals). I was trying to see if I could get a Keres and a couple of Jaguars but there weren't really any people able to fly them. I didn't particularly like being out-kited by the people who I encountered when I ran a blaster Thorax fleet as my first cruiser fleet, but everyone had a scram and a web.

The first time that I ever flew in a BLAP Caracal fleet (actually, it might have been my first-ever real PVP engagement) was to fight off a P I R A T structure bash in May (I'm sure they weren't intending to get a fight, but they got one). I saw an issue with the lack of tackle when two of the Guardians and all of the Leshaks and T3C's got away even though I wanted some Leshak kills. That probably falls under your example of something where the primary goal is to get the adversary off of the grid.

I engaged the Drekavac first because it was on-grid first. The Ashimmu, Loki, and Brutix (someone mentioned an Astarte in voice, but I can't find it on the killmails) showed up on D-Scan and arrived soon after, then the other ships.
9th CCI medalist

Image
User avatar
Jasonn Smith
Member
Member
Posts: 2
Joined: 2019.09.18 04:00

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Jasonn Smith »

I had fun that is the main point.
The caracal is only about 35 km with high average skills
If we were aligned some may have got off.
I think we could have burned off some then approached. We had a lack of points to hold anything for long think we had prob 2 or 3
Run away could of been called sooner but as was said they had a lot of points webs and scrams.
I think we did best we could of done with the experience of people in fleet.
I was 2ic and soon as fleet lead died i got scrammed webbed pointed and cooked lol by then logi was all gone and no one left.
The fleet that engaged us was blingy and vastly more experienced.
I do like that you were not timid about taking a fight as sometimes that is my issue.
Do not get discouraged hope we get more people in future
Again thank you very much I will gladly fly with you again. :D
User avatar
Budda Sereda
Member
Member
Posts: 1591
Joined: 2016.01.20 02:45
Title: Manager (Fittings), Mentor, Lieutenant, Graduate, Management

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Budda Sereda »

No complains or blames from my side, but you should not have stayed in point range.

And, I u understand unistas issue with skills, but even if some fleet mates could not apply that would be better than be pointed/webbed. Keep in mind, Ashimmu has bonus to web range, and is often fit with faction, so it might reach up to 32-ish km.
So... it means... you are done.

Even at 40 you are not 100% save as it might OH MWD and jump
User avatar
Budda Sereda
Member
Member
Posts: 1591
Joined: 2016.01.20 02:45
Title: Manager (Fittings), Mentor, Lieutenant, Graduate, Management

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Budda Sereda »

And even worse if they web an anchor. In this case he should call it and fleet reanchor to another anchor
User avatar
Yrgrasil
Member
Member
Posts: 262
Joined: 2017.08.26 11:23
Title: Solitude Officer, Ensign, Sophomore

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Yrgrasil »

So yeah the Cyclone is basically at around the same speed/align etc as a max alpha pilot caracal, its minimal amount faster in both points. The point is around 34km with heat, and is actually more to hold tackle inplace when you try to escape or for the rare occasions as heavy tackle on ratting ships.

Anchoring worked decently, Gergoran told me in the beginning to stay around 30km so i basically did that. I had to remember him two times to call for mwd that we can get into position. I said also at fleet formup i can't fly a scout since i could not talk a lot because of reasons.

For whatever reason eve don't saved the complete fitting of the Loki, but for the missing mids it was a 100mn + some cap modules

Loki fit:
Spoiler
[Loki, Loki]
Corpus X-Type Armor Thermal Hardener
Corpum C-Type Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane
Dark Blood Capacitor Power Relay
Centum A-Type Medium Armor Repairer
Centum A-Type Medium Armor Repairer
Corpus X-Type Armor Explosive Hardener
Corpus X-Type Armor Kinetic Hardener


Armor Command Burst II
'Love' Medium Remote Armor Repairer
Corelum C-Type Medium Remote Armor Repairer
Corelum C-Type Medium Remote Armor Repairer
Corelum C-Type Medium Remote Armor Repairer
Corelum C-Type Medium Remote Armor Repairer
Corelum C-Type Medium Remote Armor Repairer

Medium Ancillary Current Router II
Medium Ancillary Current Router II
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I

Loki Core - Augmented Nuclear Reactor
Loki Defensive - Adaptive Defense Node
Loki Offensive - Support Processor
Loki Propulsion - Intercalated Nanofibers


Warrior II x5
Hornet EC-300 x5

Rapid Repair Charge x285
Agency 'Hardshell' TB9 Dose IV x1
Strong Exile Booster x1
Standard Mindflood Booster x1
I don't know if the ashimmu was a better target as the cane or brutix, i think all of them will have at least one eanm + active rep or dual eanm fit, so it would not have made a difference with our dps in my opinion. Just the ashimmu will probably still have lower ehp then the both bc.

So yeh, in my opinion we should have burned directly away in the beginning as soon as we recognized that we were not able to able to break them. Also i agree that an keres is kinda crucial, and i would probably have dropped all Logi and just used caracals + keres + scout with this amount of people. If anyone would have engaged us then, since its definitly an hit&run gang is some other story.

Nice to know for me (again) is that BCs actually not fit in a medium plex, but yeh i'm normally not in Low, and it was thankfully not important :)
User avatar
Yrgrasil
Member
Member
Posts: 262
Joined: 2017.08.26 11:23
Title: Solitude Officer, Ensign, Sophomore

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Yrgrasil »

Since i just remembered; there was basically no broadcast for targets, only one i saw was some seconds from me after FC confirmed that we switch on the ash. In such smallish fights its not really that important, but its normally a good habit to just do it.
User avatar
Titus Empire
Member
Member
Posts: 27
Joined: 2015.08.27 06:01

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Titus Empire »

I was the logi anchor and i pulled the distance quickly after which I was preoccuiped with manual flying (which was my first attempt at this) to stay at a distance from the main engagement, about 50km off. However in that I lost the multitasking and didn't really think/notice that the other logi were not at my six, the first logi was down before I even noticed (or had pulled range in the other direction as I lost lock at some point). My reps of the remaining logi was not nearly enough to stand tank and shortly thereafter I was pointed and neuted and simply left to wait for my fate.

While I believe the outcome was assured, I am left to wonder how much longer we could have stayed on the grid had the logi be correctly positioned.
User avatar
Yrgrasil
Member
Member
Posts: 262
Joined: 2017.08.26 11:23
Title: Solitude Officer, Ensign, Sophomore

Re: AAR: They're Taking the Caracals to Isengard

Post by Yrgrasil »

Mh, i checked, or tried to check the fits they used regarding to zkill. If i saw it right with optimal calls and logi support we could have just kite them out and they would only have got 1-2 with the long range webs of the ashimmu at max. All their ships were at least 3-400m/s slower.

Only Long range ship they had was actually the drekavak + all their drones, i assume two logi would have been enough or at least on the edge to keep the fleet up at this point.

The caracals were actually after they switched to logi in a decent position, but we should have pulled more range, 40 instead 30 earlier. So as they finished the logis they basically heated in and spread points so that we all died.
Locked