Cascading annoyances

That wasn't particularly constructive. Well, at least I trained the basic skills, invented some blueprints and produced thirty T2 modules, which I don't think sold because I have no time or patience to play 0.01 ISK games. I will one of these days go to Dodixie and change the price. But I don't think modules are worth it for casual production after all, the profit per module is too small to bother. I have queued Mechnics V, so will check out ships during the week.

The annoyances which gave the post its title started on Saturday, when I tried to do some belt ratting in lowsec. It was in some ways even more empty than usual, except one guy who quite apparently stalked my ship. From curiosity I even backtracked and watched the gate cloaked, and it was Loki. Well, there are reasons why lowsec is mostly deserted, and it is mostly my fault by still not joining a corp or anything. If I was playing the, after all, massively multiplayer game as it should be played it would have been probably fairly easy to set a trap or something. But alas.

In any case, that was merely annoying, but then I chose to do some missions, because I started forgetting why I stopped doing them. That might have not been the reason at the time. I wanted at some point to bring up Caldari standings, so I started doing L3 Caldari missions. When did I get standings to five with Caldari Business Tribunal? Well, factoring the Connections skill, but still.

What I did forget was how long sixteen missions take. But once I started I didn't want to give up. So after several hours of missions, and I also forgot that L3 missions do not actually give all that much ISK per hour, I finally got a simple delivery storyline. And it brought my Caldari standing high enough that with Diplomacy skill it was positive.

What I forgot about was that I had Gallente standing at just above three, which gave me access to all Gallente L3 agents. Including the Roden Shipyards agent I started research at. It doesn't stop research, I think, although maybe it does, but definitely blocks those small courier missions R&D agents give. R&D is kind of crippled right now, what with datacores dropping from exploration and sold in Faction Warfare LP stores, but still. It just bothers me.

So, I started doing distribution missions for Roden Shipyards, while watching things on my tablet very near a keyboard. So, almost not AFK. It took hours and the corporation standing is still nowhere. I got one L2 storyline, but it didn't bring Faction standing above three. I still didn't get another one, but I probably just will. It will most likely bring Caldari standing back into negatives, due to the way these numbers work.

What I should have done is finally do the Bloodstained Stars arc, which I have never even started, since it apparently gives a standing bonus with a faction without penalty for other factions. And I could even read mission descriptions, because that is where part of the lore comes through. Why aren't there any intermediate epic arcs, anyway? Maybe I will start it, but first I want to get Gallente standing back above three, then use epic arc bonus to offset Caldari penalties.

Quick update: I decided to finish doing those L2 distribution missions to see how the storyline goes, and it did push me above three for Gallente while still barely above diplomatic zero for Caldari. And yes, I know zero standing isn't the actually significant point for anything, I just want the buffer. Also I remember reading that R&D agents require specifically corporation standing, but it seems to work anyway? Maybe that changed at some point.

Update update: so apparently you need corp standing two less than normal requirement. That works. Not that L3 agent produces many Research Points.

Science!

When I was writing the post last week I realized that I am finally getting close to invention skills. Well, actually I was looking at Large Armor Repairer II and apparently it requires Mechanics V. And then when checking what else requires it, I remembered that a number of science skills do. I looked at those when I started playing, because I like science in principle, but then stopped thinking about it because they were going to get so long to get to.

In the meantime my perspective on what a long skill has changed, especially after starting Gallente Frigate V, which I know is not even that long compared to some, but it is as long or longer than requirement for basic invention. And I trained Science IV at some point for some reason, Engineering V for obvious reasons, as well as Mechanics IV and Electronics IV, so the remaining time is both fairly short and I need those skills anyway.

So I read up on invention and it seems that it should be doable casually without a dedicated POS. There are some copying slots more or less available, and while a POS should work about four times faster, considering the queue times, even on lowsec, since I don't plan on focusing on invention to keep my slots occupied it doesn't matter that much.

So I set Science V in the queue after Gallente Frigate V. Who needs focus. But once I get Mechanics V I will be able to train Assault Frigates, which would be my first T2 ship, and it should make pretty good lowsec belt ratter. At least with T2 guns, which I think need five more days of training. But that will wait a bit, because I want to play with invention first, so at least let Science V finish, train Production Efficiency IV, because while production efficiency doesn't seem to matter that much for most T2 items, it still matters. Of maybe it matters a lot and my numbers are wrong.

This is probably not the best time to get into T2 production, because the moon products were changed, and the prices seem to be in a state of shock, at least those that require the new moons, which don't yet have established production lines. Not to mention the whole war thing. And there appears to be plenty of stock with old prices. But right now I plan to just tinker, without sinking more that few tens of millions into this.

I played with EVEIPH a bit, and apparently there is still basically no ISK in producing any T1 module, at least without researched blueprint and Production Efficiency V. Which makes sense. I am hoping that since ME on invented blueprints is locked that matters less. And there should be some actual demand for T2 modules, because with many meta-modules usually available at reprocessing prices, why would there be for T1.

The other reason for thinking about trying invention was crashing decryptor prices. If I can't make ISK selling them, or finding them for that matter, even lowsec seemed stripped of sites when I tried it this week, then maybe I can make some using them. Not sure how worth it is will minimal invention skills, but I guess I will find out. Eventually. I have set copying for some blueprints, at bought some others of contracts, which should be researchable only with science derived from Engineering V. So maybe during the week I should try inventing something.

In the meantime I took out the Brutix I bought recently and did a bunch of anoms in lowsec. By which I mean two. It wasn't particularly constructive ISK wise, compared to even L3 missions, but more about that in a moment. Also did some belt ratting in Thorax. An assault frigate could really be better there, cost about the same, the effective DPS should be similar, much smaller signature, a bit better speed and much better agility. I haven't checked EFT for details, because I think I will leave that for after I have done at least some inventing.

Anyway, the belt ratting was actually better that anomalies, because I got lucky with high meta loot, and I got good twenty million in drops in an hour or so. Unfortunately no faction or tac4sec spawns, which could have pushed that into great category. One courier and transport spawn, but filled with tritanium, and didn't bother to bring an industrial into lowsec for a few million ISK. Maybe if I had a blockade runner. But that is something for the future.

Getting tired of missions and trying to do other things brought me to a realization what was bothering me about missions before. Everything else in EVE is a limited resource, at least on a time and system basis. Anomalies, exploration sites, belts rats, even asteroid in belts run out in most populated systems. If in any place there are too many people trying to do too much at the same time, the system becomes depleted, which exerts population pressure and encourages people to spread out.

But missions are not limited in any way. Anyone can go to an agent, well, anyone with proper standings, which is beside the point, press a button and a fresh instance full on bounties, loot, salvage, occasionally even ore asteroids springs into existence no matter what anyone else is doing. And then, no population pressure. No point in competing for limited resources. This really seem to be antithetical to the nature of EVE.

Of course nothing will probably be done because it would necessarily seriously nerf highsec, because missions are essentially the only thing that allow highsec to maintain its population density. Well, I don't actually know this, but how many people could actually make any ISK from anoms and sites in highsec? Mining and industry are a whole other thing, but at least they are nominally limited, even if they could support in high sec alone probably ten times more people. And they are not an ISK fountain.

What I would like to happen is contracts or something with agents, limited by new skills per agent type, analogous to R&D agents. Every agent would generate a number of missions per twenty minutes or so, put them in a pool, then send out the missions in a pool to randomly selected contracted capsuleers, giving the a notification in the same way storyline missions happen now. Only those who have no outstanding mission offer from that agent count, obviously, and missions that are declined or incomplete after say, four hours, go back into the pool. This way missions would be a limited resource, but they would be distributed fairly. And people not doing missions would not block other people from getting missions, because the pool of missions would keep growing until enough people who actually complete them get them. And if the proportion of missions available to people contracted was displayed in the agent finder it would encourage people to spread around. And it would make missions feel at least something that is actually happening in the universe, as it were, rather than getting triggered by button push.

Leaking money

Didn't play EVE a lot this week. But I did spent ten minutes mining ice in a lowsec system, just because it was there. Not something particularly sustainable, even if it wasn't very boring, because there are too many people passing through the system. Or apparently jumping in and out every few minutes, as the case might be. Scouting I guess? Also mined a Retriever hold-full of ore in highsec, just to remember why I gave up on mining. Because it is boring.

It might still gives more ISK than anything else I can do in EVE, now that exploration loot prices crashed. Even with decreased prices of highsec ores. Although a proper lowsec exploration pass should still be better per hour. And I guess L3 missions might make more, if done properly. But I am still mostly burnt out on missions after getting the jump clone rating, and don't really want to build up to L4. I am relatively close, I think I need Mechanics V and Hull Upgrades V for full T2 tank, and a long range Dominix build should be viable, although it might need T2 drones. Or at least Drone Sharpshooting V for whatever module boosts drone optimals and just hit them with micro jump driver and sentries.

I should have bought a Dominix before the Odyssey hit. I was even aware that the mineral cost was going to be risen as part of tiericide changes, but since I didn't really plan on hitting L4 missions I just decided to wait. And now it about tripled in price. I still have enough ISK for that, but it would take a lot.

I am considering L4 missions more because I bough and fitted a Brutix, nominally for lowsec ratting. But seeing the ISK counter dropping made me worried about losing it too much. Especially since it is probably a bad idea, a blaster Brutix that is, because rail Myrmidon could kite rats while keeping alignment if necessary. Assuming a Brutix with my skills can even complete lowsec anoms. It should, since I beat one of those very slowly in a Thorax, and probably definitely if I finally train for T2 armor tank, but who knows.

It is fit with a cloak and a microwarpdrive, so it should be able to jump through most gatecamps. Or at least most opportunity pirates. Which works on a Brutix much better than on cruisers, at least Gallente cruisers, since I didn't really look at other ones, since it has an utility high slot. And an improved cloak costs almost as much as cruiser. But I am sort of afraid to find out. Which is silly, since I could afford about five more of those before I ran of out ISK. I would feel better though if I could afford to replace it without dropping below half-billion ISK. Which while I don't need for anything, since pay subscription normally, and for now shelved the idea of plexing training for the second character. I mostly gave up on FW for now.

Not that I even expect lowsec anoms to make that much ISK. But really, I just want enough to replace the ship I'm flying, so that I don't play extremely defensively. Right now somehow lowsec feels overpopulated, despite there still being between zero and ten people in most systems. What would be neat, and more explicit than the security rating, is just straight up put on player profile time since last getting suspect/criminal flagged. Not that that would guarantee anything, but it would allow at least a degree of risk management. Honestly, the systems in EVE start feeling very small once you start feeling threatened by other players. Between d-scan and combat probes an enemy can be dropping on you with no warning inside warp disruption range within seconds.

I think I might be leaning towards the opinion that L4 missions should be removed from highsec, or at all, because their presence tends to loom over everything else that I can be doing. I suppose it would be different if I cared about PvP, but I don't that much, and solo PvP in EVE doesn't make much sense anyway. It would also be different if I joined a properly run player corp, but I am this week in even less of a mood to interact with people that usual, and the usual is not very high, so that will have to wait even more. In any case, I was doing things because they are fun, rather than because they make ISK, but then I saw my ISK dropping… well, such is life in EVE.

New Eden

My general impressions on Odyssey are in a previous post. This is my "what I did in EVE last week" post. Which, with an expansion coming out during that week, is quite related. The first thing I did, as a lot of people, is get a scanning frigate and go see how that changed, since it was, after all, ostensibly a focus feature of the expansion.

I scanned down a Combat Site right in the system I base myself in, switched to my trusty cruiser, and for once completed it first. Someone went to it after me, but they left after I grabbed the pass items. I am not entirely clear how that works, but I got to the end, and got a Daredevil blueprint! I manufactured the ship and it is not in my hangar. I could sell it, but I don't need ISK that much and maybe someday I will use it for something.

After that I realized that since NPC were supposed to be removed from lowsec Relic/Data sites, I could try my luck with that. Since I still get attached to ships, even little T1 scanning frigates, I bought a new one. For a change, a Heron, since apparently I trained Caldari Frigate IV at some point. And it does have an additional middle slot, which I put a scanning upgrade in, nano structure in low, no tank or guns, and went for lowsec.

In particular went along the path to New Eden. I am not very strong on EVE lore, since the sandbox approach minimizes the impact really. But why not. There is stuff there, like the monolith and the violent wormhole thing. And not very many players there. In three hours or so I managed to run quite many sites and get about hundred million ISK worth of loot. Fairly good success in going though second difficulty level minigame, although occasional failures happened. Managed to return without incident.

The ISK per hour might not be that great, compared to min-maxed mission running or whatever, but considering I got all than in a T1 frigate with three levels in most relevant skills it is pretty great. Exploring is now a viable career for new players, and encourages them to get out of highsec.

Speaking of lowsec, I got back to the cruiser I stashed there, and hit some belts. On the second one after Odyssey I encountered the new tags4sec NPC. And the tag sold for twenty million. After a few days. I haven't seen them afterwards, so that might have been very lucky, but then I don't clear belts very efficiently, because there are too many people around.

There is also the blue ice anomaly in one of the system. Which no one seems to mine ever, because lowsec. I am kind of tempted to get a Procurer in there. I actually bought one, because why not, but there seem to be a perpetual gate camp on the route. Today they even locked and scrambled my frigate as I was moving though. Using a frigate rather than a shuttle because I want to carry at least some of the loot from ratting. I got away, because I used two stabilizers and they didn't have a faction scram, but still, annoying. Sooner or later the frigate is going to get it, which is not a problem as such, but losing the implants would be worse, although what are the odds of losing the pod in lowsec not AFK? Unless they bring out the smartbombs, which is possible since I think there was at least on battleship there.

Mining ice doesn't seem to be very constructive, ISK-wise, especially in lowsec, but it is just something I want to do because it is there. Hopefully a Venture can carry ice in its ore hold, because otherwise I am not getting a block out of there. Assuming I can get a procurer to the system at all. It is often completely empty, so I should be able to mine a block or three. Just because.

I wonder if moon changes combined with the nullsec war will increase the price of T2/T3 ships and components enough that people will start to actually care about their ships. Or maybe gatecamps are so low risk that they don't lose their Tengus and stuff like that ever. But I looked at the prices, and right now you can make, with a high-skill character, enough money to buy and fit one of those with few hours of L4 mission running. Which seems like it screws new players who can't fly those things. I know right now I could afford better ships than I can fly. But on the other hand I can't afford to lose best ships I can fly repeatedly. Risk management in EVE is all kinds of wonky.

Although one of these days I want to move a battlecruiser into lowsec and do some of those anomalies. Assuming there is a hole in the gatecamp. Not on a weekend, I guess. I could go somewhere else, but that would require effort and reading maps. For the number of lines maps in EVE have there is an amazing number of chokepoints.

I guess I am annoyed by gatecamps because they make moving though lowsec not so much impossible, as really tedious. Especially without a second account. And I don't plan on paying a second subscription or playing the game enough to get a PLEX a month, at least not anytime soon. Moving not in the sense of travelling, where you can scout a route once and then travel fit and have a good chance of getting where you want to go if you are paying attention, but moving between systems to rat or whatever.

Although I have to try that once. Is an overheated afterburner enough for a cruiser at least to jump back before they can apply enough DPS to kill me? Depends on who "they" are, I guess. I still don't really have a good feel for how much DPS is a lot, how quickly it can be applied, and so on. The numbers seem to vary wildly between sources, and there are too many variables to calculate anything with any degree of accuracy. The general consensus though seems to be that damage has increased faster than effective hit-points, and most player-versus-player fights will end very quickly, to the point where a small gang can one shot smaller ships.

Odyssey

My first EVE expansion arrived. Although expansion seems to be overstating it, but if CCP wants to call their biannual major patches that, then why not. It's good that EVE is still changing after ten years running. It is kind of a pity I didn't start playing earlier, when I had more time. But less money. Such is life. Anyway, onwards to Odyssey.

Shiny!

Cosmetic things first. I like the new radial menu. The old one I immediately moved to the middle mouse button and then forgot about it, since it was a set of small, I think either unlabelled or labelled with a twitchy tooltips small icons, which only got in the way of navigating in space. The new one I still keep under the middle button, but with zero delay, which allows issuing commands with quick gestures. And it both looks nice and is labelled. And you can fluidly adjust navigation command ranges by dragging from the center, which is neat, if not extremely useful.

Jump animations are also nice. And the UI seems to working the whole time, rather than freezing for a moment during loading. Or disappearing completely, which I read was what happened on the test server when the feature was introduced. The undock button makes more sense where it is now, even if I still habitually move the mouse to the corner of the screen. I imagine that must be much worse for players who are playing EVE for years.

Scanning

Apparently the scanning effect annoys some people, but I barely even notice it. Even when it glitches and the arc just kind of jumps back repeatedly. I also barely notice of pay attention to brackets in space, because why would you. The list is infinitely more convenient. Especially since why would anyone care where in space the anomalies or signatures actually are? You just jump to them, and the only thing their position affects is the few seconds of warp time more or less. I guess it could matter for aggressive d-scanning. Also the exploration brackets and their window popup look completely different than everything else in space. But who needs consistency. Maybe they will change everything else to big colorful icons. What could possibly go wrong?

The scanning is streamlined, which I on the balance of things is a good thing. It means more competition, but after a few days most people appear to have gotten bored, and I like the saved time on initial scan, both for anomalies, and initial position of signatures. Automatic probe formation and scaling is also fine, since it only saves the tedium. And in some cases for very faint signatures I still had to adjust the position of individual probes manually, which is good.

Removing NPCs from Relic/Data sites was great in that it makes it possible to explore low/null in a T1 frigate that anyone can afford to lose, rather that a Tengu or some sort of multiboxed setup.

The hacking minigame is, at best, serviceable. Restoration nodes seem extremely unbalanced. Why do they increase coherence of defenses beyond initial values? I think someone doesn't quite grasp the definition of the word "restoration". Otherwise the minigame requires a minimal amount of pattern recognition, and with that the only remaining factor is luck and character skills/ship loadout. I guess that's fine. The loot appears to be a bit better from both relic and data sites, although I didn't do that much exploration before Odyssey to have a good comparison base.

The can spew is less annoying than expected. Apparently it was adjusted late during the testing to reduce the speed and number of cans. This makes it possible to most of the time capture all cans of a given type. And after cargo scanning the container before you can know which type of cans actually contains the valuable loot. I think I miss what I want about one in five times, which is tolerable. I guess this changes in nullsec, where there can be multiple types of good loot in a single container, and probably they spawn more of them moving faster.

Will Tag For Sec

I don't really plan to do anything that would drop my security status, so this doesn't affect me outright. But it is still a thing, especially since I recently tried to do things in lowsec. One issue I have is that it makes security statuses below zero essentially equivalent, since the only things it means now is how much someone cares about not having low negative sec status. Before, it was at least a vague indication of how much time someone is spending attacking other players to shooting NPC. On the other hand, it is a nice lowsec belt ratting loot.

Other stuff

I am not playing long enough to be affected by ship balance changes, so I nothing much to say about those. I can now fly Iteron V, which is nice. Although Iterons makes even less sense now than before. I only dabbled in mining, so I have no idea how mining sites being moved to anomalies will change anything. Probably increase the amount of nominally lowsec minerals coming from highsec, because the anoms will be now mined out quicker, and so respawn faster. No clue about ice changes. Even less about moon changes, although I guess a null-sec war is something to read about.

So, in general the expansion didn't seem to break anything that affects me, it improved a bunch of things that do. That, I suppose, is a success.

More rally points

I bough a Thorax some time ago with a plan to try to in it into lowsec sometime. But instead I tried chasing after anomalies. And then I thought that if I lose it I wouldn't have anything to chase anomalies in. I could just use the battlecruiser, but the cruiser is a bit faster to align, and I decided to collect loot from anoms after all, since it is fast in a reasonably agile ship and it adds up.

So, I bought a second Thorax, and this time, moved it into nearby lowsec region immediately. Almost, there was a two Proteus gate camp on the way, but they went away after an hour. So now it sits in the station in the middle of somewhat small lowsec region. But I don't really want to move permanently, so it has to be nearby. It is still very empty most of the time. It is kind of amazing actually, how the population drops immediately from twenty-sixty to zero-five. Not really unexpected, considering how a single pirate can shut up all non-PvP activity in a system or five.

Not that this was particularly constructive. In a T1 cruiser I can clear belts of rats, including the single battleship spawn I saw once. which could be handy once Tags4Sec arrives. Although the system I parked my ship has relatively few belts. I could jump to a neighbouring systems, but I am too afraid of gatecamps. Should stop worrying, because where is the fun in that? Also the cruiser cost about twenty million, so why worry. And I could just scout and then assume no one set up a camp in the last hour, because scouting without a full alt every time would get old really quickly.

Also tried anomalies, but there are mostly Rally Points, which I still can't complete in a cruiser. At least a blaster Thorax. I probably should rethink that. The main problem is that I have not nearly good enough tank. If I fit a medium armor repairer I will run out of capacitor extremely quickly. With a small I still run out of capacitor, if slower, and it can't really keep up. I finished a single Rally Point to see how long the spawns are, but it took me several trips back to the station.

On the other hand I fit in a way which should maybe, in principle, make it easier to escape from attacking players, with a Damage Control and and Explosive Membrane, which gives me about 50% of an armor omni tank. Replacing that with active kinetic/thermal hardeners should cut incoming damage from Serpentis rats by half. Which should make it sort of doable. And honestly, if someone actually scrams me then I probably won't get away, especially if already damaged from fighting rats. Hard to tell without trying, though. How much DPS do pirates usually mount? Considering one guy dropped on me in a Sleipnir, probably a lot. I warped of before he locked me, at least.

Maybe I should buy a third cruiser, since I for some reason don't like to completely reconfigure ships. Between PI and highsec anomalies I almost have enough ISK. I even got a twenty million faction module, although from an unrated complex, not an anomaly. A faction cruiser rat spawned on a Serpentis Den, but it only had ammo and a tag. Highsec anomalies are somewhat rare, or more likely, overharvested, so at least half the time I spend jumping. That was part of why I tried moving into lowsec.

I did buy a second scanning frigate, fitted with warp stabs and a nano, and used it to carry loot from lowsec back to highsec base. Lowsec belt cruisers seem to drops more stuff than anom cruisers. Which makes some kind of sense. When I was doing that there was a gatecamp with two Tengus and a Hurricane, but fortunately no instant-lock shenanigans, so the frigate got though without problems. Where do they get ISK for those, anyway? Also did a scanning sweep, but there were no signatures whatsoever. Disappointing. Oddysey makes scanning easier, which will make signatures even more scarce. At least it will be quickly obvious when there aren't any.

In general, still not bored of EVE, and there are things I want to do. Hopefully Oddysey won't break everything.