More ratting in 0.0

Not much has been going on so far TBH, I've been getting more used to ratting in 0.0 picking on the single Battlecruiser spawns where I can in my Thrasher O doom or cleaning up other people wrecks and cans if they don't want them (always ask in local first kids).
The Alliance has had a few ops going on but I've held off getting involved until I get more nullsec savy as far as general flying about is concerned.
One of the boring jobs I've been doing is flying about setting up safe spots. When I've been travelling into a new system I set up a 200km off gate SS, one warping to the next gate and a 200km gate SS before I warp off. Taking some advice from Corp chat I'm now renaming all the gate SS's as
[distance from gate]-[direction from gate]-[gate name]
. e.g.
200km below V2 gate.

I never knew I'd need so many safespots for everything TBH, I was only planning on 1 per gate but when I was talking in corp chat about it people were saying "what about when you have SS's at different ranges" Eh? I didn't know I was supposed to be doing more?
So in lieu of spending the next 6 weeks SS'ing one constellation I think I need to get on a roam with someone/some people who already have them set and go nuts with the People & places tab.

Oh and I can now fly a Battlecruiser. Wooooooo. I just cant afford one yet.


Lessons learnt in 0.0 this week:-

• You can never have enough SafeSpots.
• Keeping up with all the intel channels is Apache pilot levels of multitasking.
• Getting under a rats guns with a Thrasher will work but takes time.
• Ask and someone will let you have the loot.
  

Day 2

I like forums forums are great and I read them, a lot of them.
Occasionally I post too.
Logging back into Eve I took the MSCS forum advice and asked if someone would go ratting with me and almost instantly got a few offers. I like this "being in a corp" thing already.
A couple of hours in my Thrasher later and I'd racked up a few bountys and put the salvage towards constructing a new ship. I'd decided I need something bigger so I can rat solo, having corp mates to help is great but PvP'ing costs money (RvB taught me that) and I don't want to be the guy always begging for favours in corp chat so my first aim is to get a measure of self sufficiency.
Along that note I was determined to kill something solo so once the Ratting trip was over I set off try and kill a rat spawn on my own.
First asteroid belt, battleship, no chance.
Second, 2 battleships...nope
Third, a battlecruiser and 3 frigates..maybe.
I sat and thought about it for a while, and decided to try and take the frigates on atleast. One of them had locked me and was MWD'ing my way so was already ahead of the BC by about 30km (it was now my standard practice to warp in at 100km to check what was there) so he seemed like a good start. I cycled my MWD and webbed the frig, hit my orbit button and let rip with everything I had. He didn't last too long so I was feeling more confident.
The other 2 frigs had dropped back a bit but the BC was getting close now. Eff it I'm going in I lock the BC at 30km and hammer the MWD. The shields start to drop on the way in and I start to wonder if it was a good idea. Too late now and its only a Thrasher. Getting close I drop the mwd and try to settle into a tight orbit sticking to advice I'd been given and trying to get "under the guns". It worked pretty well and I was dishing out damage to the BC, the other 2 frigates had locked me by now and were MWD'ing my way guns blazing so I was taking damage. I thought I'd stay until I was in structure.

The race against time began.
The shields didn't last long but I fired up the damage control and the damage I was taking slowed, his shields failed before mine did and I was feeling good. By now the frigs were sitting at 10k and the fire was a constant drain on my armour, me and the BC both hit structure at the same time and I though about gambling but chickened out warping back to station. Repairing my armour I went straight back out, I could do this. I dropped a gyro stabiliser for an armour repairer and warped back to the belt wasting no time and hitting the mwd straight for the Cruiser. My shields had gone completely by the time I got in orbit so I waited to take damage before I cycled the armour rep a few times to heal me back up the BC had full shields again so I had to get those down plus he'd armour rep'd as well so the war of attrition began again. With the npc frigates closer I was taking damage from all 3 ships a lot quicker this time but now I had an armour rep I was topping up whenever I had the capacitor to spare and the BC was going down. As he hit structure I edged forward on my seat my eyes fixed on the red bar that grew longer in short bursts. The "capacitor empty" message snapped my back to the state of my ship for a minute but I was pretty safe, I could do this. A few seconds later and the BC finally fell with a cheer from me and I hit the MWD for the nearest frigate before taking down the last one.
I had done it, I'd ratted solo and killed a whole spawn. For me its still a big step maybe I can survive in 0.0.
What a difference a day makes.

0.0 day 1 & 2

Applications & Interviews
I've been thinking of moving into a 0.0 corp for a while, it was always my 'plan' to get stuck into the general to'ing and fro'ing of nullsec space and fuelled by stories from forums, blogs and podcasts I started hunting for a Corp that would accept a sub 2mil SP character like me.
This in itself is not an easy task.
Not only are you rubbish at...well everything but you're always going to look like a spy alt trying to get in just to ruin intel channels or pass back fleet info to your 'main'. Luckily I am deft at the art of multi-tab web browsing and soon enough I started compiling a list of possible candidates.
I knew from RvB I liked the small scale skirmish stuff, and for a while I toyed with the idea of Pirating (thanks in no small part to a few certain blogs) but I thought that might make it tricky if I ever wanted to leave so I'm dismissing the life of yaaar for now.
Small skirmish, hit and run, I like Rifters, cloaking's just cool. It was all pointing one way TBH so I joined a few Ushra'khan recruitment channels started chatting and waited to see what happened.
MSCS was the first to get in touch with me and I chatted to one of their recruitment guys for a good while about this n that. I was unsure how it was going for a while but i was well aware I probably looked pretty suspect so I tried to stay upbeat about it and kept answering any questions as truthfully as I could.
I didnt have much of a sales pitch TBH "I'm a noob, I've got naff all skills, I want to be part of a 0.0 corp and I'm not afraid to get podded" was pretty much all I could offer.
Eventually I got a provisional thumbs up and I went away cautiously happy.

Day 0
Today was the big day, moving from the RvB hunting ground of Tourier/Alentene to the system I'd been told to get to ready for my big move to 0.0.
It was a long way to go so I doubted I'd be back for a while so I spammed the local markets with sell orders (its surprising how much stuff you accumulate in such a short time) moving from one system to the next selling everything I couldn't carry. Loaded up my Thrasher with all the stuff that might be useful (small AC turrets,MWD's, AB's, warp scramblers etc.) waved one last goodbye to Tourier III and set the destination to Agil.
It took all night to sell up and move, about 5 bloody hours. I can add logistics to the list of Eve careers I don't like..
 
Day 1
There I am floating in space with a jump gate right infront of me and a warning box pops up. I let out a breath and inhale slowly before klicking okay.
"welcome to nullsec" pops up in fleet chat.
I've never been in 0.0 space before, infact I've only been in lowsec 3-4 times and at least 2 of them were short dashes to get somewhere, so its safe to say I am now kacking my pants and feel like I have a big noob target painted on the top of my ship.

One of the guys in my new corp, Rye Contini, guides me through space zipping off and cloaking while I just feel like a rabbit in the headlights just hoping I can get to where we're going with my cargo of odds and ends before a blob appears out of nowhere and vaporises my pod which is what I believe happens in nullsec all the time.

Its a day of first, I get to use a jump bridge and I see a POS as well (yes I know that's pretty weak but I'd not seen a POS before) but I kept my eyes glued on fleet chat as Rye walked me to my new home thankfully still in my ship. I docked and updated my clone location before relaxing.

But just a little.


"oh and read these guides" Yeah I saw that coming but I'll welcome anything that helps me not get podded (as much).


I wanted to do something before I logged off so I dumped the stuff I had into station and went ratting, it was always a pretty safe income before and I was skint so I picked a belt and warped off.
Holly kack the rats are big out here. First spawn was a couple of Battleships with support. Lucky I warped in at 100. As I started to get agro of the, now approaching, Battleships I warped back to station.

Maybe I've bitten off more than I can chew with this whole 0.0 idea.

I've moved

Quick post (because I'm busy today) just to say....I've moved to nullsec! Yup my character, and Eve career, is only about 30 days old but I've taken the plunge and moved to 0.0 space.
No I've not gone alone I've joined MSCS so am now part of the Ushra'khan alliance. I look forward to much cloaking fun and a big thanks for the Corp. for taking on such an utter utter noob.

Stuff I've found useful pt1

Eve's a cold and scary place as a newbie and once the career tutorials have finished you're all alone. Youve got menu after menu of information at your fingertip that you know means something but you dont know what a UI staring back at you like it wants to pick a fight and when you finally pluck up the courage to ask for help (on the handy channel) its like everyone speaks a different language.
So now what?
I turned to the internet for help and found that the Eve community is a pretty helpful place to the new kid.

There's no point me reinventing the wheel here, there are people out there who have already written stuff and done it better than I could so I'll slap up a few links

• 10 posts for eve online newbie CrazyKinux blog has a shedload of useful stuff on there and this is just one so look about.
• New Citizens Useful threads over at the EveWiki, again its rammed full of useful info and links to more useful info so even just those 2 should be able to give you a good start to Eve life.

Of course its not all hard work and toil so to keep you motivated its always good to find out about the stuff you'll be getting up to in the weeks/months/years to come.
Mynxee's Blog Life in Lowsec is always good for a read about the pirate life but also has a well rounded view of the Eve 'metagame' as well, and she shows a lot of passion for the Council of Stellar Management (Eves player elected council that can help shape the future of the game). You don't have to just limit yourself to text either and I've really enjoyed listening to the Podded podcast for all kinds of Eve info and general banter.

Lastly I've got to put up a link to Red Vs. Blue. PvP is perhaps the most scary thing I found when I started out about 4 weeks ago but I wanted to throw myself into it as soon as I could before it developed a stigma and the RvB guys not only welcomed me in but enabled me to get right into a fight with other players very very quickly. You'll loose ships, you'll probably loose a pod (its not that bad, no honestly its not) and you'll certainly loose ISK but you will learn and get to meet some top people along the way.

This is by no means all the info you'll want but I dont want to add to the overload so its a good start. Read, digest and learn. As a new guy its a pretty intimidating place to start off with but stick at it and pretty soon Eve becomes a fun place to loose yourself in.

In the beginning

Hi. I'm a pretty new Eve player and felt it'd be better starting a blog instead of being an Evebore over Twitter & emails every day. I'm hoping this blog will be an account of what I learn (rightly or wrongly) as I start out my Eve career and so wont so much be a series of well structured and thought out articles as some of the other Eve blogs out there.

So I'll start off with a "story so far" style recap I suppose.
I first played eve a few years ago where I did a free trial as a Gallente pod pilot, went as quickly as possible to a Catylist and flew about admiring my ship. Unfortunately my pc chugged along and Walking In Stations was scant weeks away (or so they said) so I decided to cut my losses before my limited hardware made the game unplayable and never logged on again.
Dust 514. Controversial at times but it was the lure for me back to Eve. I'm mainly a console gamer and the idea of Dust is very appealing and reading up on the limited info for it let Eve get its hooks back into me.


Eve take 2
My character is called Norsechiild and he's Minmatar. I started off like all good newbies doing the initial tutorials then a few of the introductory occupation tutorials which gave me a selection of frigates and a couple of Wreaths to play about with. I went mining for a bit of ISK in the wreathe.
Sooooo slllloooooooowwwww.
This bored me so I read about a bit on forums and tried JetCan mining using a burst with 2 mining lasers and the money rolled in at a quicker rate until the inevitable happened. Someone flipped my can. I kept my cool and did not engage did a bit of light smack in local and left it at that.
So what have I learnt so far? Mining was not for me, so I loaded up a Wreathe with everything I could get on it and set off to Anon to try the Sisters of Eve Mission arc.

For the Teapot
So far I was still on the trial but I'd made my mind up to give Eve a shot and got a timecard. In my mind I had 2 months to see how much I actually played Eve and find out if Eve was the game for me. Up until this time I'd only really mined and run missions and I knew I was missing out on a big chunk of the Eve experience, I needed to get into a Corp.
I ran a few of the Sisters missions and browsed a lot of Forums, joined the Eve Uni public chat channel and looked up the recruitment details fully meaning to join. The idea that someone could take a total bleach white noob like myself under their wing and show them the ropes, plus the chance to join others in my situation, appealed to me and I had images of making a rookie Corp. and building from there with my new Eve Uni friends.
API...what the hells that? Turns out I couldn't get an API key yet as my character wasn't old enough so I went looking for a stop gap solution. I knew I wanted to try PvP and searching about time and time again up popped Red Vs. Blue. I had a couple of million ISK (hey I'm a noob thats still good money to me) a Rifter and though I'd give it a shot. Red Federation HQ was only half a dozen jumps away in Tourier so off I went.
 I've been in RvB for a few weeks now with a whole 0 kills to my name. That's right Zero, none..nothing. I rock. But my fellow Reds and Blues have been very understanding and welcoming despite my noobness and happily offered advice, guidance and even ISK to help keep me fighting along at my sub-par skill level.

So that's where I am, charging about between Tourier and Alentene in 10-20 frig-cruiser fleets loosing Rifters at an alarming rate. But the main point is I'm enjoying it.