Cypher Decypher
Elite United Hard Moose
Moose Alliance
1
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Posted - 2011.10.12 10:35:00 -
[1] - Quote
My twopence worth:
I've lived in a C2 with C3 static for almost two years. I've made great isk from the C3, mainly using a T2-fitted Legion to solo the anoms with a maxed-skilled armor gang booster in system pinging with a deep space probe, which IMHO is the lowest-risk setup I can achieve (previously I've lost two faction-fitted boats to gankers). How this pans out in practical terms over a day's play of 5-6 hours is that if I have earned 400m, it's been a very "good isk" day. On a bad isk day, that may be nill. Hostiles, logistics etc. may simply be the order of the day. However, that all adds to variety as well so I never begrudge it.
So - yesterday I was finally persuaded by one of my w-space dwelling corp mates to try some incursions. I have Logi 5 and pretty much maxed associated skills, but I've never sat in a logistics hull before. He told me which channel to open and what logi to fit up. Barely 40 mins after jumping out of our C2 in a shuttle, I'd bought a Guardian, fitted it (total 300mill) and was sitting in an Incursion constellation posting my availability. I was snapped up in less than 20 seconds by a 10-man Legion/Guardian gang.
That was at 00:51 Eve time.
By 01:51 Eve time we had run 11 Vanguard sites and I'd earned just under 110mill and 13,000LP. I thought I was lucky - The FC was good and we were pretty much aligning-to-next as we completed the ongrid site. However, I'm told that there are a lot of good FC's, they're always in want of high-skilled logi pilots, and the isk/hr ratio I'd just achieved (as a complete noob) was a bit sub-par.
I could not believe what a piece of cake these Vanguard sites are. Compared to C3 farming, it's a child's game. Vanguards are absolutely pillaged by a T3 gang, and now that there are more & more Mach gangs coming in, it's apparently possible to complete a vanguard site in 4 minutes. No scanning down, no checking of exits for activity, no probing, no dscan-spamming, and no salvaging. All the grind was done for me. All I had to do was warp, activage gate, targets fleet members, transfer cap to other logis and cycle my rr. Rinse and repeat. None of the dps ships ever lost more than 15% armor. It was that easy, it actually got boring after 4 sites. The interest was maintained by the fact that I was fleeted with a bunch of guys I didn't know from Adam, so the chat was interesting.
Half the time I was in this fleet, were were desperately running for new spawns, racing to get there before the other two fleets in system. The competition is fun - but it's there because this has become, pure and simple, the fastest easiest way to make isk in Eve. And it IS safe. DC's etc are a threat whatever you're doing, but they are rare and easily managed. The corpmate who'd suggested I try Incursions actually had a Guardian ganked a couple of weeks ago. The FC paid him 390mill for his loss.
The single drawback is that when you commit to an Incursion gang, you really need to put in at least a good hour of nonstop focus as a minimum. Running Vanguards in particular means no bio-breaks or distractions. It's all go-go-go in order to maintain that precious 100m+ isk/hr. The way incursions are set up, a fleet needs to maintain exact numbers or it starts losing money. You can't just safe up & cloak or warp back to POS to have lunch or go pick up the kids 20 minutes after you've started. From my impression, the Incursion guys (particularly the FC's) are a close-knit bunch. You're pretty soon labelled as capable & reliable - or not.
From my point of view, after just one session of exposure, I'll now be keeping an alt in highsec to run Incursions, but keep my main in w-space because the s**ts and giggles are more frequent there.
I've no doubt there are a lot more wormholers planning the exact same thing.
Do Incursions need nerfing? Absolutely. But please don't :D |