My first PvP kill, quickly followed by my first solo PvP kill

Took an incursus out on a small gang roam around some FW areas last night, eventually got into a fight and we scored our first kill in a week long small gang tourney, unfortunately that one kill resulted in all 4 of us dying.

We were doing OK until the confessor turned up, one of the Tristans was this close > < to exploding, honest!

We'll only get better, last longer and put out more damage as we get more practice and in particular as my skills increase.

This morning I decided to get some practice in before work and set out on a short roam.  I soon found a breacher at a small plex, I warped to it and saw the breacher at the gate.  I took the gate and waited to see if he would follow me, he did but I didn't manage to land my web & scram and he pulled range, released his drones and started in with his missiles.

I set my drone onto him, targetted and killed his drones and tried to close distance.  He was maintaining range at 18-21Km.  My Optimal was 6K, falloff at 11K

He killed off my drone, I tried burning away from him then closing distance again but couldn't get close enough to land my web or scram.  I was able to keep repping his damage though by pulsing my repair module...until I ran out of paste. at which point I switched to continuous cycle.  My armour whittled down pretty slowly.

I tried OH my AB to either close distance or get out of scram range...and burnt out my AB.

Then his mate turned up in another breacher and landed 2Km from me.  I switched targets, landed web & scram and OH my guns.

I then noticed my cap was pretty much gone so spent a few cycles of having repairer, web or guns going.

Pretty sure I got the 2nd breacher into hull, but he was able to bring his shields back up. Then the inevitable happened and I warped my pod out.

Definitely a good fight!

lesson learned - bring a mix of ammo so I can vary my range.  more paste - that fight lasted long enough for a reload of the repairer I think.

Anyway, I reshipped and went out again.  this time I found a lone Atron at a large plex.  I warped in at 10 (forgot there isn't a gate for larges), landed 14Km away and burned towards him fully expecting him to warp off.

I landed OH web & scram, set my drone on him and opened up with my guns.  Took off the OH to web & scram once I was close enough.  Everything went straightforward, he didn't even take down my shields.

My first solo kill!

Not a great fight, but I'll take it and a nice way to start the day.

incidentally, I received an evemail from Crake Gaterau (who annihilated me a few days ago in his Stratios that I thought would be piloted by someone with much lower skills).  It was a short note offering encouragement, letting me know he was around for any advice I needed when it comes to PvP and accompanied a 20million isk donation to keep my PvP going.

Much appreciated Crake, I bought some more hulls and modules this morning, they'll all be used in PvP!

a couple more fights

Just a short post about a couple of fights I got into recently

Firstly I went on a short roam around some FW areas, avoided cruisers this time, jumped into a small plex and orbited the button hoping someone would come for a fight.

They did.

I lasted a little longer than my previous fight, fumbled with my ancillary armour repairer, managed to loose my Drone on him, thought i was orbiting at 500, but when I checked his distance saw he was at about 28K.

I think I need to avoid Screaming Hayabusa pilots for a while :)

I then went on a longer, meandering roam through lowsec and ended up in Everyshore (?) before docking up for the night.  no fights, did't find any other ships at any celestials, boring.

This morning before work I decided to head back through lowsec to the FW area and my staging system. 

I was running late but found a Condor in a plex.  Myself and 2 other pilots in local.  I decided to warp in with my Atron and see how it went.

Closest I managed to get was 15K, I was able to rep my armour back after each of his volley's landed, but couldn't get close enough to hit him with my blasters.

I pulled range and warped off, chucking in a gf afterwards.  He agreed it was a good fight until I ran off, but seemed to take it good naturedly when I said there was no point hanging around to explode when I couldn't hit him.

I was fairly pleased that I managed my modules ok, I was able to recognise that it was likely to end up with me exploding if I continued and I was able to disengage and escape.

Thinking about it afterwards, if I'd overheated my Web I wonder if I could have burned close enough to him with my MWD, to stop him running so I could get closer to hit with my blasters.

I was also running with a warp disruptor for the longer range, probably may have been better with a scrambler instead (not sure if he was running a MWD or not).

I should also have thought about swapping out ammo to a longer range variant as I was managing to keep my armour repaired OK.

on to the next!

Back in the Uni

I put my 7 days outside of the Uni to good effect and went on a spending spree resulting in a hangar full of ships (Algos', Incursus', Atrons and Merlins mainly, with a few Tristans for good measure) with lots of mods and ammo, as well as a jumpclone all installed in a station in Stacmon.

These ships will all die in explosions whilst I attempt to give PvP a go.

I then decided that I should focus on manufacturing etc as that was my initial intention when joining eve, with some combat on the side, rather than combat as the main focus with occasional industry on the side.

I applied for a Industry mentor when I got back into the Uni and started my PI alts training Industry skills.  I also moved their cheap office to a not quite so cheap, but still inexpensive office in a station with a full suite of Industrial facilities.

I traded over all of Zeb's blueprints and resources, as these guys will now be making stuff instead.  I also splurged on some new original blueprints and put out some buy orders for cheap resources.

Both these alts will be in cloaky haulers within a couple of weeks, with decent production & trade skills.  Alt#1 will then continue training for an Orca.

In the meantime I went out for a roam around lowsec FW with a couple of corpies, but we didn't manage to find a fight.

I then went out solo later, managed to avoid obviously experienced characters and didn't hang around in systems filled with guys from the same corp.

Eventually I spotted a cruiser piloted by a new character. Hoping he had a lousy fit I warped to the plex he was in.  The cruiser was there as expected, but piloted by a much more experienced pilot who appears to be PvP focussed. As he was sat at the warpin point (I landed about 3K away) I engaged anyway and lasted about 3 seconds (seriously, I launched my drone, but didn't get time to hit the F key to send him in!).

Lesson learned, don't believe everything you read.  At least I didn't freeze this time, I had a plan and executed it...just wrong opponent.

I left EVE Uni!

So, last week I dropped out of University...but don't worry, it's only temporary.

I realised that it would be cheaper in the long run to have two accounts and to move Zebulon's character onto a new account.  This way I can keep Zebulon training and at the same time I can train one of my alt accounts.  And all for less than the cost I have been paying (a plex per month for multi character training).

I'd like to get both PI alts into cloaky haulers (39 days each) plus at least one of them able to fly an Orca (another couple of months training at least).

However, in order to swap a character between accounts they have to be part of a NPC corp (cheaper to transfer Zebulon to the new account than it would be to switch both alts to a new account).

So I left EVE Uni, started a second account via a buddy invite, converted that 30 day trial to a full account with three months training (there was a sale on so only cost £23.99).  The upgrade also gave the new account 1 each of the 4 scanning frigates, a couple of blueprints (yacht & diplomatic shuttle) plus the 2 Mordu's Legion jackets (his & hers).  As an added benefit, by using a buddy key and updating from the trial to a full account, I also received 821 million isk :)

What I hadn't realised was that swapping a character between accounts also requires you to pause training on that character, and once the transfer is initiated neither account can access that character until transfer is complete (about 12 hours).

Ho-hum.  Anyway, that meant that the superfluous character that I had to create on the second account got about 12 hours of basic combat training...I hope she appreciated it as she's not getting any more!

Due to the way WAR! mechanics work, if you drop out of a corporation which is currently embroiled in a war, you can't rejoin that same corporation until you have waited 7 days (I guess to stop people constantly dropping and rejoining corps to get around war targets etc).

All being well I should be back in the Uni in about 3 or 4 days.  Until then I've been on a shopping frenzy (821 million isk does burn a hole in your spacewallet).

I've decided to dip my toe into the murky waters of PvP and so have bought a bunch of ships and fittings (most of which I can't fly for another few days).

However I did take a not particularly well fit Tristan out to lowsec for a while yesterday to see if I could get into a fight.  It was harder than I thought, but when it did eventually happen I partially froze, didn't execute my plan and got blown up.  However it was great fun, my heart was pounding and my opponent offered me words of encouragement.

What I'd planned on doing was trying to keep an opponent at about 15-18Km and let my drones do their thing.  As it was I orbited at about 2k and didn't attempt to take out their single drone until just before I died.

I'll try and remember for next time.

How is EVE different to other games?

I was browsing around the official EVE Online forums at lunchtime when I came across this and felt the need to keep it and share it:

CCP Falcon wrote:
Okay, so what follows is entirely my personal opinion.
It's not a case of not "catering to the tearfilled entitled", it's a case of us staying true to the core of what EVE was built on.
Some of the people complaining in this thread have valid points about the fact that they don't feel safe. Simple fact of the matter is, that you're not suppose to feel safe in New Eden.
Eve is not a game for the faint hearted. It's a game that will chew you up and spit you out in the blink of an eye if you even think about letting your guard down or becoming complacent.
While every other MMO starts off with an intro that tells you you're going to be the savior of the realm, holds your hand, protects you, nurtures your development and ultimately guides you to your destiny as a hero along with several other million players who've had the exact same experience, EVE assaults you from the second you begin to play after you create a character, spitting you out into a universe that under the surface, is so complex that it's enough to make your head explode.
The entire design is based around being harsh, vicious, relentless, hostile and cold. It's about action and reaction, and the story that unfolds as you experience these two things.
True, we're working hard to lower the bar of entry so that more players can enjoy EVE and can get into the game. Our NPE (New Player Experience) is challenging, and we're trying to improve it to better prepare rookies for what lies out there, but when you start to play eve, you'll always start out as the little fish in the big pond.
The only way to grow is to voraciously consume what's around you, and its your choice whether that happens to be New Eden's abundant natural resources, or the other people who're also fighting their way to the top.
EVE is a playing experience like no other, where every action or reaction resonates through a single universe and is felt by players from all corners of the word. There are no shards here, no mirror universes, no instances and very few rules. If you stumble across something valuable, then chances are someone else already knows where you are, or is working their way toward you and you better be prepared to fight for what you've discovered.
EVE will test you from the outset, from the very second you undock and glimpse the stars, and will take pleasure from sorting those who can survive from those who'd rather curl up and perish.
EVE will let you fight until you collapse, then let you struggle to your feet, exhausted from the effort. Then when you can see the light at the end of the tunnel it'll kick you flat on your ass in the mud again and ask you why you deserve to be standing. It'll test you against every other individual playing at some point or another, and it'll ask for answers.
Give it an answer and maybe it'll let you up again, long enough to gather your thoughts. After a few more steps you're on the ground again and it's asking more questions.
EVE is designed to be harsh, it's designed to be challenging, and it's designed to be so deep and complex that it should fascinate and terrify you at the same time.
Corporation, Alliances and coalitions of tens of thousands have risen and fallen on these basic principles, and every one of those thousands of people has their own unique story to tell about how it affected them and what they experienced.
That's the beauty of EVE. Action and reaction. Emergence.
Welcome to the most frightening virtual playground you'll ever experience.

source :- https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=400977

A Milestone reached.

Actually, possibly more of a milepebble, rather than a milestone.  Today I breached the 2 million skillpoint mark!

I didn't even notice when I passed the 1 million skillpoint mark.

I still have more skillpoints in Drones than anything else, but it looks like Engineering & Shields will overtake Drones during the next week or so.

Incidentally, my current training plan is about 520 days.

I did say I was here for the long haul, didn't I?

my first major cock-up

I'm sure I've probably made others, but just not realised it yet! However, last night I made a bad call, then reacted too slowly and lost my first expensive (for me) ship.

I'd been doing other stuff the last few days (some scanning, data & relic sites, working on L3 distribution missions for SoE with my alt) whilst waiting for my training to get me to the point where I could fully fit a L3 running Vexor.  I was specifically waiting for Tactical Shield Manipulation 4 so that I could fit an Adaptive Invulnerability Field II.

I had the T1 variant on there, but missions required a bit of warping in & out, still.

Skill finished training Monday morning, but I didn't get a chance to login until Monday evening, I swapped out the Invulnerability fields and headed out to test my Vexor in a L3.

Oh, and Avengers Assemble was on the TV.

I forget the name of the mission now, but it had some towers that repaired the NPC ships, plus at least one Stasis tower.

The stasis tower was quite a distance past everything else and webbed me pretty early on so I headed in it's direction intending to take it out asap (though only moving at about 60m/s) I started taking down the other ships on the way.

My shields were dropping slowly, but everything looked manageable.

I was getting distracted by AA on the TV, but paying enough attention to swap my drones onto their next target when each ship went down.

I realised that I wasn't going to take out the stasis tower before my shields were gone so I started to recall my drones with just under a quarter of my shields left, selected a station to dock up at, and then my final shields evaporated! Turns out I'd missed that there were a couple of Heavy Missile towers too and they'd started firing on me.

Drones were in, armour was dropping, so I hit Dock and watched nervously as my armour disappeared.  I've been in this situation many times before I gotten out in 15-20% structure.  This time I was soo close.  I'm pretty sure I got to warp speed just as the last sliver of hull vaporised - "Capsule Ejected" flashed on the screen and then immediately warped to the station.

Poor Vexor.  Poor mobile tractor unit which I'd forgotten to deploy when I started the mission.

Bugger.

Luckily I had followed the golden rule of EVE "Don't fly what you can't afford to lose" and I had a replacement Vexor already fitted in my hangar, I jumped in, renamed it "Vexxed" and headed back into the mission.  This time I paid full attention, warping out as my shields dipped to 50%. I finally cleared the field, looted and salvaged all of the wrecks (including my own).

A valuable lesson learned I hope.

It's still another 4 and a bit days before I get Mechanics 5, another 4 days or so to get T2 drones, but in the grand scheme of things that isn't so long.

I'm still under 2 million SP, I still have over 700 million ISK of the 745 million ISK I started this game with.

And I'm still having a blast :)