This month, I burned out…
…Happens, if you play EVE. In fact, EVE needs
nothing special other than “normal gameplay” to burn people out, but here are
some particular reasons that caused it to hit me this month:
1 – Had a bug where my ship would not load grid
and would get stuck after a jump, but after 1 minute it decloaked as usual. So
far so good, but I had been toying with some guys, separating them from their
carrier support for half an hour, and was about to engage. I died in a totally
powerless and useless way. CCP got me my ship back, but it did not paid out the
work I had to get the engagement to happen in my terms.
2 – My PC lagged to hell a couple critical
times. One of those times I had a 2 billion Tengu tackled with 1 Brutix, but PC
froze and Tengu slowboated away before my other toon got on top of him… Just
great…
3 – I had a couple other fights where I could
have killed very rare preys (couple Machariels, more faction Tengus, etc), but
in the end I managed to kill no other than a couple interceptors. Nothing out
of the ordinary really happened all those times, but if got frustrating… Then
again, I was aiming a bit too high, but still…
3 – CCP announced it would stop supporting
DirectX 9. I’m one of those guys with a somewhat old PC and it only works on
DirecX 9. Option is to spend real money (in a new PC or new Graphics Card),
because CCP wants it… Freaking annoying… I needed an upgrade that’s granted,
but I’d prefer to do it when I want and not when some bozos in a frozen Island
in the middle of the Atlantic say so!
4 – My tool used to keep track of market
profits broke!... So, now I’m “trading blind” and it gets on my nerves a bit as
I tend to be somewhat of a control freak. I had already subscribed EVE Mogul
V3, but as I rely on old stock, most numbers I have for this month are
inaccurate. More on this bellow.
5 – CCP decided to bring the CREST market thingie
down for the weekend I was going to dedicate myself to market stuff. I was
already annoyed because my market profit tracker was down and this brought EVE
Central and Evernus down too (even if for only a couple days). Bah…
6 – Stellaris came out. Hell, it was the
perfect opportunity for the carebear in me to grow an empire for personal
profit, while gloating to have a massive elite pvp fleet as I blob the sky with
my fleets, when in reality I’m just spamming mining/isk (energy) stations all
around. I even have to deal with unhappy crybabies that want to leave my elite
pvp empire for other dissident factions, and other empires even insult me! I
can have all the Sov experience EVE provides AND pause the damn thing when I
want! What more can I ask for?! Oh… ye… this meant less EVE.
7 – I went for a week of vacations with no
internet, and it felt really good. I did suffered a bit of an extra bloodlust
when I came back though… more on that bellow.
Let’s go onto the reports
PVP Report
This focus into my “Alone PVP” endeavours,
using usually 2 tons. I might eventually team up with the occasional friend
during my “Alone PVP” roams, but any kills/losses I achieve in a proper fleet
are not posted or analysed here.
I’m not even going to lie about my goals as an
”Alone PVPer”. I want to find people, deceive them and kill them. I’m a brawler
at heart, so dying is inevitable, but I want to make sure I manage to kill more
than I lose. While not trying to be an Isk Efficiency fanatic, I do prefer to
use cheaper affordable ships to kill more expensive ones
Carriers and carriers and carriers and carriers
and carriers all around. No matter if the locals have 10 Battleships or only 2
Frigates ready for me, they have to bring a carrier. While it makes getting
kills harder, I get a much bigger pleasure when I do finally manage to get a
nice kill, so it’s all good.
As I was kinda burned out, I changed my style a bit,
and cloaky camped a lot more. Usually as carebears round up some numbers, I try
to have them chase me, slipt them and run around in circles while trying
getting a favourable window of opportunity for me to engage. This ends up with
me being killed for sure, but also provides me with a few very nice kills. This
month, once the carebears rounded up more than I could handle, I’d just cloak
up and go play Stellaris instead of toying with them. This meant I’d stay for
several days in the same pockets getting less kills, but grooming up a lot of
hatred from the locals. Was actually a nice change…
COMBINATIONS FLOW
Next graph shows how many ships I killed and
lost, using my most usual combinations.
Still addicted to Dual Hull Brutix. Killed 38
ships while losing 14. Really bad by my usual standards. Reason is simple… Once
I came from 1 week vacations with no EVE, I had a bit of an extra bloodlust and
got a bit more reckless. Once I came back home, within 24 hours I had already
lost 6 Brutix…
I did used a couple of Dual Cloaky Navy Hull
Brutix (finally!). They performed ok, killing 12 ships, but in reality, I would
have managed the same kills with just regular Brutix. My problem with the Navy
version of the Brutix is that I really only gain extra EHP. I already mitigate
the lack of tracking from the regular Brutix with some Drop Booster, and I have
bigger problems than the ship’s EHP that need addressed, like the lack of a 5th
mid slot for cap injection. Also, people tend to be more afraid of a Navy Brutix
and I can expect to find even more carriers in the field against me.
HOSTILES KILLED
Let’s take a better look on the hostiles I
killed. Next graph shows what ships I killed and how many.
Most kills were Stratios, Vexor and Brutix. I
was really puzzled…
Why so many Stratios?... I seem to have found
several guys looking for ratters that decided to go for my Brutix hoping for an
easy kill. One of them even stated in local he was so damn bored because all
ratters ran away from him… A Neut PVP Stratios will kill one of my Brutix easy,
as I don’t have cap injection, but 2 Brutix manage to take care of themselves
really nicely in those cases.
This month I only killed 31 different ship
types, as I killed overall less.
Following graph shows the Isk value per ship
type.
Largest spike is the Stratios, by a large
margin, followed by the Orthrus and Pilgrim. Faction Cruisers dominating the
Isk chart once again, but no Gila for couple month strait… I’m unaware of
changes that might have caused people to use the Gila less. This is probably
just a luck related factor.
Even though many ship types killed might attest
for a good variety on the field, I created some Categories in order to
understand better the different ship classes I managed to kill.
Faction Cruisers back on top of my prey, as I
like it, considering they do provide for very nice killmails. Then we have T1
DPS Cruisers, because they do actually make a great cheap disposable PVP choice
and finally Combat Battlecruisers along with Interceptors.
For me it’s official, Combat Battlecruisers are
back and are dislodging HACs as a PVP choice. People are slowly but surely
turning to them for the odd engagement.
How about isk wise, in what categories I’m able
to inflict more economic pain?
Faction Cruisers lead by a LOOOOOOOOOT as
pretty much expected now.
Was somewhat surprised to see Battleships as 2nd
top isk prey… looking better I did killed 3 Battleships and that is highly
unusual. I got my hands on an old school ratting Arty Tempest (an easy kill), a
Typhoon where my ECM drones jammed his ass for most of the fight, and a
Megathron with the help of some wormholers that teamed up with me for a small
bit. It’s unlikely I’ll kill as many battleship in the near future.
HOSTILES KILLING ME
Equally important is the notion on what ships
are being used to kill me. Solo players always complain about being “blobbed”
all the time. Well… I WANT for my foes to try to “blob” me, I WANT to fight outnumbered,
I WANT for them to bring their best, so that I can outsmart them and kill them,
just before I bail out teasing them!!... or die trying… Of course, once my foes
bring too much it’s time to safe up and let them vent in local on how I’m a
coward because I’m not throwing myself at their 15/20 men fleets for their
leisure.
1st thing I checked was how large
were the fleets that actually killed me, or in other words, how many people are
in my losses killmails.
Generally speaking, if I died to a gang of more
than 10 people I was probably simply ganked.
If I died to a gang with 5-10 people, I was probably
surprised by unexpected backup.
My preferred targets are mostly gangs with less
than 5 people, and if I died, it probably means that I made serious mistakes
and/or assessed the situation very badly and that there is a lesson to be
learned around on how to make better next time.
Looking at the graph, I was ganked by large
fleets 2 times… This is very acceptable!
I died 8 times to gangs with 6-10 people. Could
have chosen my fights better.
I died 4 times to 1-5 man Fleets… These are my
intended targets and I seem to find these a lot, so I still believe there are
good opportunities to a solo player/small gang out there.
Let’s take a look to the ships that actually
managed to kill me
Largest spike are the Caracal and Cerberus, as
they are the most popular T1 Cruiser/HAC and can even to the same fleets
together. They are used in both fleets and small gang warfare, so not a big
surprise.
Then we have the Vexor with the Hecate. Vexor
is also a pretty standard T1 Cruiser around but the Hecate was a bit
surprising… It’s usually SvipulSvipulSvipulSvipul, but I suppose that if it’s
not T3 Dessy A, it’s T3 Dessy B…
There are also many many ships that show up in
my Killmails once or twice only. A total of 46 different ship types were used
to kill me. I pretty much think this shows that EVE is healthy when it comes to
variety and small gang PVP.
Let’s look at the Categories used to kill me
My top killers were T1 Cruisers, Combat
Battlecruisers and T3 Dessys and that is really not surprising, but today I
want to focus on other ship classes.
I been dying a lot to Battleships, HAC and HIC…
In fact, I did not manage to kill any HAC or HIC. I already know that HAC are a
torn my foot, but I can manage them decently 1 or 2 at a time.
HIC are becoming an issue though. Not only I
cannot kill them before they deagress or before more backup arrives, but also, they
do tend to have cynos… This month I escaped the HIC/Carrier combo a couple times.
Also a HIC takes on the form of a support ship, and people only bring it if
they have a cyno or if 10 other guys are ready to also engage. This month I’m
adding the HIC to the “Do not engage at any cost” class. I already have this
attitude with Logistic and ECM cruisers, but these tend to be somewhat rare.
HIC and Carriers (separately or combined) are proliferating like crazy these
days, so need to take extra caution.
Things will only get better once carebears
start losing some carriers to make them think twice before dropping them on
each solo cruiser moving around, but aegis sov mechanics will prevent that from
happening any time soon. The only groups that can really kill carriers in all
regions, on a regular basis, will be wormhole people, so let’s see if wormhole
people can improve a bit the small gang PVP landscape concerning carriers.
Ships that completely dominate solo wannabe
PVPers, like ECM Cruisers and Logistics, aren’t really used all THAT much. I
find that extremely good news for me and other solo guys out there.
That’s all I remembered to take a look at in a
PVP Report. Make sure to undock and go out there!
TRADING REPORT
MARKET PROFITS
As I was burned out this month, went on
vacations with no internet and played more Stellaris than EVE, so I made a lot
less isk… Not only that, Eve-Profit broke and I have no reliable means of knowing
how much Isk I made. I also subscribed to EVE Mogul V3, but many transactions
are marked at 0isk profit, due to me having a lot of old stock…
Eve Mogul says I made 5.5 billion profit… Im
pretty sure I made more, probably in the vicinity of 7 billion or so, but you
know what, for the sake of avoiding declaring too much profit, I’m going to say
I made 6 billion profit this month.
As for interesting stuff, a couple Citadels
showed up in Hek. I dedicated myself a bit more to Skill Extractor/Injectors
trade in this new Citadel. In fact, I’m pretty sure I was among the 1st
10 or so guys to trade those items at the Hek Citadel. It was funny to see how,
in the period of a week, pretty much most of Skill Extractor/Injectors and even
Plex trade moving to the Citadel. And I don’t mean “offshoring” like in other
hubs where you cannot have a Citadel in your hub system. In Hek, those items
are really traded at the Citadel with better prices than the NPC station,
circumventing buy order and sell order taxes all together.
Initially I made good Isk on those items, but
as I burned out, as I went on vacations and as competition settled in, profits
plummeted as expected. Still, once I had a break from EVE, I’ll invest more on
those items at the Citadel.
I also tried to do offshoring in Dodixie for
PLEX and Skill Injectors/Extractors, but generally, only avoiding the buy
orders tax is not good enough for me. I
aborted this experiment, but I do have buy orders set to Citadel only and sell
those items at the same Citadel, 1 jump out of Dodixie. Slow moving with more
profit, so probably suits me better. We shall see.
MARKET HAULING EXPENSES
All my hauling was done by public contracts,
paid 250 million reward for 5 contracts. All contracts are fulfilled in less
than 24 hours and this suits me fine.
PLEX EXPENSES
Paid my 2 accounts with 1 PLEX each, costing me
a total 1,7 Billion. All standard and PLEX is going slightly down.
BLUEPRINTS
Due to being burned out, I took a slight deviation
concerning BPOs and BPCs.
Citadel Mods
I did not worried too much about making BPCs
from citadel mods and instead worried more about getting them to ME/TE 7/14. I
will not develop BPOs more than 7/14 with some exceptions to couple rigs and
maybe the Medium Citadel itself. Once I got the Citadel Mods BPOs to 7/14 I got
them to my usual NPC station in hi-sec where I’ll focus on creating BPCs, until
the day I decide that those BPCs are just too cheap to make it worth.
Next month, my next move is going to be purging
all those “non 7/14” BPCs I still have available. I don’t want to deal with
selling several researched level BPCs and they are mostly “free” and I just
want to offer the best I have anyway.
For now, Citadel Mods BPCs still means good
isk. Depending on market conditions, a BPC can sell for 3-10 mil, and this is
quite good in my perspective.
Last month I stated the “Standup Cloning Center
I Blueprint” and “Standup Guided Bomb Launcher I Blueprint” to be a huge
disappointment, but gave them an opportunity as they are Large and Extra-Large
Citadel Mods. As those began to show up around, I expected those BPCs to sell
more. How did it went 1 month after?
Sold 5 “Standup Cloning Center I Blueprint” for
a total of 75 mil. Better than nothing, but not good. There was already too
much competition settled in when people started to buy these BPCs. Would have
sold more but as I burned out, I didn’t bothered.
Sold 5 “Standup Guided Bomb Launcher I
Blueprint” for a total of 370 mil! That’s better!! Reason is quite simple… for
a week or so I was the only person in all EVE to have these BPCs available, so
I asked 75 mil for each BPC, because why not? I’m the one setting the price,
not my competition. Would have sold more but as I burned out, I didn’t
bothered.
Medium Citadel BPO.
Still being researched and copied in Curse NPC
station. In fact, it’s the only BPC I have there, as all other are, once again,
in hi-sec.
BPC prices are as down as 15 million or so, but
I noticed people are starting to pay a bit more for researched BPC instead of
just going for cheap ME/TE 0/0 BPCs. Just not sure how much more they willing
to pay…
I sold 3 Medium Citadel BPCs for 15 mil each in
less than 24 hours… This is too low. I’ll need to define the price I really
want and see if people buy them for a bit more, as they are also somewhat
researched.
BPCs and BPOs Balance
I made 860 million selling BPCs and 1,2 billion
selling low tier researched BPOs. After considering all expenses, I kept 1,9
billion, sold 107 contracts for an average of 20 million per contract.
Made 1 billion less than previous 3 month or so
(about 1/3 less), but considering I didn’t spent more than 30 minutes in the
whole damn month worrying about this crap, I still consider it pretty good. It got
to the point where ALL my contracts expired… It’s going to be a hell of a ride
putting them back up next month. Sigh…
My PVP toons can now research BPOs in Curse but
I still have no idea what! As I’m proving to be too lazy about this subject,
might just go for a bunch of T1 Cruisers, research them for a couple month and
collect and extra isk.
MISCELANEOUS INVESTMENTS
Did not bought any Capital BPOs in order to
resell them…
