With my minerals all finally rounded up and the Ravens built and sold, its on the road once again. While the initial ordering balls-up was indeed annoying, I don't particularly regret my enforced stint as a mercantile ship-builder in EVE Online. It was a good opportunity to practice my marketeering and generally poke about in the guts of one of the more esoteric aspects of the game, and I've always been partial to a good spreadsheet on occasion.
The final tally for the episode was a profit of about 30 million ISK, which was about 4.5% of the capital I put into the endeavour in the first place. Given that it took me the best part of a month's casual play to earn, with a lot of legwork, that's hardly a record profit, but at least it was a profit, which was my main worry once the 670 million had evaporated into minerals. I put it down to simple lack of patience on the buys and sells, and a rather slack attitude toward book-keeping. Sir Alan Sugar would not be impressed.
30 million is also about the amount I'd earn on a good juicy Rogue Drones Agent 4 combat mission (Duration; aprox. 1.5 hours), and its no coincidence that I've now liquidated all my Tash-Murkon depot assets, shut up shop and I've now headed home, to The Citadel, and the smugly knowing grin, open arms and bottomless pocket-book of the Caldari Navy.
Its not just the cash mind you, and there's a bigger goal I'm now finally getting around to; a Jump Clone. Available from any NPC corp once you're well liked enough (8.0+ Standing), this miracle of modern science will allow me to quite literally be in two places at once. Once crated, I can swap my consciousness between either of my 'versions', on a 24hr cooldown timer, and these different selves can be anywhere. This is particularly handy in my situation, as most of my Corp are out in Rockpool, which is quite a pain to get to from Empire the Old Fashioned Way, and takes most of an evening's session, just making the trip. Being able to park myself simultaneously in both the Rockpool office, and also in the heart of Empire, where all the decent amenities are, will make life in EVE go a lot more smoothly.
So it's back on the mission circuit for me, and some serious knuckling down as an auxiliary of the Caldari Navy. Any corp would do, but Caldari Navy is my highest standing to date, at 5.77. Naturally, the bigger risks impress them the most, so its the Agent 4 missions, and for that, you really need a Battleship. (Some people have a great deal of success in Battlecruisers, but I'm not quite that brave!)
I've chosen the Megathron for this latest phase of my EVE-life, in defiance of my cultural heritage, and the mighty Raven. For some reason, I already have Gallente Battleships V trained, so it'd be a shame to waste those 60-odd days I once put in. Much shopping later, I'm all set and off to the first job.
The HMS Last Train To London, majestically powering up an ancient acceleration gate, on her way to bring a Victorian-style thrashing to a remote pocket of Blood Raider savagery!
I've always liked the Megathron, aesthetically. Most of the Gallente ships are an organic, blobby, asymmetrical mess, but the Megathron is practically symmetrical! It also really looks like a Battleship, particularly the raised bridge section on top of the stern. Much as it pains me to be so reliant on technology of French origin, it does feel very satisfying to fly, and anyway, CCP forgot to put a race of eccentric top-hat and monocle wearing boisterous imperialists in the game, so it'll have to do!
I've never actually flown one in anger though, so the first mission was a bit dicey. Here's the fitting:
- High Slots: 6x 425 Railgun I (Antimatter L), 2x Heavy Missile Launcher I (Widowmaker)
- Mid Slots: 100MN Afterburner, 3x Cap Recharger I
- Low Slots: Large Armour Repairer I, Damage Control I, 2x Thermal Armour Hardener II, 2x EM Armour Hardener II, Co-processor I
- Drone Bay: 5x Hammerhead II, 5x Hobgoblin II, plus spares of each
- Rigs: None
The Co-pro is a bit embarrassing, and is the CPU fitting equivalent of a corset or truss, but the thing is really a tight fit and I didn't want to drop down to 350 Railguns if at all possible. Eventually, I'll be looking to replace most of the above with Tech 1 'Named' variants. These are more powerful and use less Gird and CPU, allowing a seventh gun, but tend to be quite pricey, being found only as rare drops from NPC rats.
The top row is mostly really big guns, which given my largely drone and missile based past, are suitably noisy and it feels like I'm 'doing it properly' at last. Optimal is about 30km and fall-off to about 60km with that ammo, which is ideal for the kinds of ranges found in most missions. The guns have trouble tracking frigates once they start orbiting, even with the +37.5% tracking bonus my ship skill gives me, but this is as expected, and the two launchers carry Cruiser sized ammo, which does a fair number on frigates too.
The mids are just power regeneration for the rest of it, although the inclusion of an afterburner is a matter of preference. On the one hand, its hungry and is using a slot that could be used for another cap recharger, but on the other, I find the increased mobility a big plus, allowing the otherwise sitting duck of a Battleship to attempt some limited form of kiting if mobbed too heavily. Heading 'away' on full burn results in the big cloud of red crosses stringing out in order of max speed, allowing the Battleship to break the mob up into smaller chunks which can be more easily dealt with. (Its also handy for getting to the next gate in multi-pocket missions, a process that can be excruciating in an unaided Battleship!)
The low slots are the classic armour tank; Rep and Hardeners, which should be swapped as appropriate for the damage type you'll be expecting. The Damage Control is a bit of a wimpey choice I suppose, but being able to double your effective structure HP when in a panic, shouldn't be sniffed at, and it also adds extra bits of resistance to the shields and armour, all for the low low cost of 1cap/60s. Ideally, once I don't need it anymore, the Co-pro can be replaced with either a large armour plate (for extra base armour HP), or a Magnetic Field Stabiliser (to make the guns do more damage).
One of my previous EVE Training Fads has been Drones, in which I am more than proficient, so the drone bay is a significant weapon in my own setup. Unlike it's more specialised cousin, the Dominix, the Megathron can only just fit 5x Ogres in the bay (Heavy Drones, suitable for Battleship targets), but I already have that class of target covered by the Railguns, and instead, I've gone for Cruiser and Frigate sized drones, giving me flexible options for taking down the small-fry - something I'd have trouble with otherwise.
This is crucial, even in a Battleship, as at the Agent 4 level, most missions come complete with super-frigate NPCs with warp scramblers. This is the number one cause of lost Battleships at the Agent 4 end - an overconfident pilot plunges in, gets mobbed, their tank collapses and when they try to escape into warp, find that they're scrambled and can't, and worse still, they have nothing on board that can actually hit the tiny resilient scrambling ships orbiting them. At that point, the rest of the NPC fleet can take their time and dismantle the hapless and ill-prepared soon-to-be Ex-Battleship Owner, at their leisure, and the poor chap has to just sit there and watch it happen.
As I'm still rather rusty at this kind of thing, I've not bothered forking out for Rigs just yet, as they're quite pricey things, and not covered by the Platinum Insurance I was foresighted enough to actually buy, this time...
It soon comes back to you though, and the mission went flawlessly. It wasn't one of the handful of real nightmare missions, but was ideal for me, learning all over again how to handle multiple spawns of assorted pirates; the subtle psychology of aggro, the efficient management of energy, the delicate dance of spatial positioning and optimal range, the analytical prioritisation of targets. There were a lot less Cruisers since I last did these, and Battlecruisers instead, a change I think I prefer. The biggest problem I always had with these missions in the past was the huge number of Cruiser enemies; not dangerous in individually, but capable of a terrifying DPS en masse. The new Battlecruisers are quite fierce, but much more manageable.
I must admit, I did bounce the next mission offered; Enemies Abound (1 of 5), as I still have nightmares about my poor lost Dominix last time around; the flames, the klaxons, the screams of my crew as I callously ejected my pod and left them all to burn and suffocate in the cold uncaring vacuum of space, orbiting the tumbling, detonating wreck of my ship like so many frozen moons... Ahem! Yes! The (5 of 5) is a bitch! The next 'normal grade' mission went well though, and after only two of the things I'm now 6.0 with Caldari Navy.
As long as I watch for my old nemesis, Mr. Hubris Esq., stand up to my agent and say 'No!' when it looks like he's actually trying to kill me, and don't get too distracted by some other shiney aspect of gameplay I've not tried yet, I should be clone jumping in no time!