Thursday 12 April 2012

Risk

Risk vs Reward is one of the great mantras of the eve playerbase - that a greater risk of loss should mean a more substantial reward for success. In most cases this is brought up from a purely financial standpoint, usually to justify or question why one way of making isk is more profitable than another. In my opinion though, it goes much deeper than that.

Most eve PVPers are risk averse, myself included. Nobody likes to lose, and when we're offered the choice between taking a risk and making a relatively small change which would eliminate that risk, it's only natural that most people choose the latter. How many times have you seen someone wait until they had overwhelming numbers before taking a fight that they could have won anyway, or reship from something comparable to their opponent into something larger or more powerful? We rationalise it as common sense - why would we risk losing when we could win? Fighting fair is, after all, not what eve is about.

However in my experience, some of the best fights come when we put ourselves in a high risk situation and come out ahead. By avoiding fights where there is a risk of losing, are we in fact cheating ourselves out of our own enjoyment?


Winning a fight against the odds is an incredible feeling, but would never
happen if you didn't engage against the odds in the first place!



I'll be the first to confess to this. I don't do it intentionally, but I have a tendency to overestimate my opponent and always plan for the worst. In a way, this is simply a survival instinct that eve instils in us - we learn from an early age that everyone is out to get us, and if we see something that looks too good to be true it probably is. You find an older pilot sitting in a belt with a really odd choice of ratting ship? It's a trap. You get engaged on a gate by a ship that you could easily kill? It's a trap. Ackbar would be proud.

The thing is though, a lot of the time it's not a trap. I can think of so many occasions where I've declined a fight because it simply seemed too convenient to be for real, or because I was convinced that I couldn't possibly kill X with Y, only to discover shortly afterwards that I was wrong - that the backup I was certain I'd find on the other side of the gate simply wasn't there, or or that the assault frig pilot I'd just turned down was un-tanked and died to a rifter two jumps later. I'm sure I've evaded my fair share of horrible deaths in this manner too, but probably far fewer than you'd expect - for every time I've saved my hide through caution, there's another where I've passed up a legitimate and a potentially excellent fight. And ultimately, it's not the losses that stay with you.

Unexpected Outcomes

I came to this realisation quite recently after I spent some time flying duo with ChildOfDestruction, one of Agony's crazier solo pilots (this is the guy who took on a zealot and a naga single-handed - using an exequror of all things - and killed both!). Within a fairly short space of time we had ourselves two epic fights, neither of which would have happened if I'd been following my own instinct on whether or not to engage. I made the decision early on that if Child decided to engage then I'd just follow him in and go down swinging, and that couldn't have worked out better!

We initially set out in a pair of blaster feroxes - no scout, mainly low meta fittings, strictly a suicide mission. A few jumps away we found a cynabal, naga and navy caracal sitting at sniping range from our in gate. On paper this seems like an awful gang for us to take on - their ships are significantly faster than ours, and should simply pick us apart from range without ever coming close. My wingman had other ideas of course, and immediately started burning towards the cynabal. I stuck to my word, and did the same for the caracal. Somehow Child's sluggish ferox managed to land a web on the cynabal, although it narrowly slipped away before he could scram it. If we'd be carrying t2 scrams, that would have been a kill despite common sense protesting that it should never happen. The navy caracal wasn't so lucky - I don't know whether he panicked or just wasn't watching his range, but we got a scram on and pumped him full of antimatter without any problem. Child's ferox was about to go down at this point and the cynabal, against all logic, decided to dive back into web range as he did. I switched my webs over, and as the caracal burst into flames I turned my guns to the cynabal. I was lightly tanked with a dual web fit, and it was going to be very close. I was already taking a sliver of structure damage as the cynabal hit armour, and then his ECM drones got a jam and he warped away. I was so surprised that I hardly noticed that the naga was still plinking away at me, and finally warped out myself with only the last little fraction of my structure remaining.

The thing that surprised me wasn't the result - trading a cheap battlecruiser for a faction cruiser is decent but not anything special, and if the cynabal had stuck around after he got his jam off we probably would have left two wrecks on the field rather than one. No, the thing that made this fight so great was that I went in expecting to lose horribly, only to find that it went completely the other way!

A few days later I was out roaming in my thrasher, with Child flying a thorax in the next system. He called out that he was about to warp into a drag bubble (intentionally) to fight the rapier that was camping it, and asked me to back him up. I'd passed through the system a few minutes earlier and knew that the rapier pilot had support from a fleet stabber and a malediction, although neither were on grid any more. However, if we could catch him without his backup there was a chance that Child and I could snap the kill before they arrived.

I came back into the system as quickly as I could, and immediately warped to Child at zero - a move that I knew would land me right in the bubble. Moments after I entered warp, I got the bad news - Child was down. I was screwed, but I was already committed - I wouldn't be able to escape the bubble before the rapier could lock me, so I had no choice but to fight. The two things I had in my favour were that the rapier's backup hadn't turned up yet, and that I would be landing at zero. I locked him up the moment I came out of warp, finding my target with a little over half shields remaining. I hit orbit at 500m with my MWD off, and overloaded everything.

When people discuss ships in 1v1 scenarios, you'll almost always hear things like 'X will win because it can dictate range' or 'X can't kill Y, because Y can just warp off'. The thing about this kind of statement is that it's purely mechanical, and assumes that both parties do everything right; the real thing rarely works out so cleanly. With webs, an autocannon rapier should have been able to pull range and hit my thrasher just fine - but it didn't. Its flight of ECM drones should have jammed me and let it slip out of scram range - but they didn't. What happened is that the rapier died. I didn't expect it to, but it did.

The rapier's backup arrived while the fight was still going on, but they warped to a bookmark rather than warping straight to the bubble - their caution despite having the odds on their side gave me just enough time to put the last few rounds into the rapier's hull, although not quite enough to warp off before the fleet stabber got me tackled (the malediction was wary and stayed at range, playing no meaningful role in the fight). While rapiers are hardly dps machines, fleet stabbers put out a lot of hurt and their tracking bonus makes them excellent for fighting small ships. I had nowhere to go but down, although even that didn't go as expected. As my shield buffer dropped, my autocannons started eating into the stabber's armour tank too. The stabber pilot had a strong fit with dual propulsion and a web, which meant I couldn't quite control range without pulsing my MWD which made me easier to hit. If I'd had an afterburner, I honestly think I might have soloed him too. That wasn't to be, but blind luck still had a card to play - as the stabber hit two thirds armour, a neutral wolf landed in the bubble and turned its guns to the task. I died with the stabber in low armour, but my new ally was able to finish the job. I warped my pod back on grid just in time to see the stabber reduced to space dust.

I don't think any of us expected that fight to go the way it did. Both fleet stabbers and rapiers excel at killing small ships, let alone a destroyer with neither an afterburner nor a web. Either one of them would probably have considered this an easy fight. Many things could have turned it around - if the rapier had damage drones instead of ECM, or if his fit had been a little better (he was heavily tanked with only a single web) I probably wouldn't have killed him. If the stabber had warped directly to the bubble instead of bouncing via a tactical, he would have saved his gangmate and killed me easily. The fact that both ships engaged at point blank, one after another, worked strongly in my favour. Maybe they were feeling overconfident after killing Child's thorax so quickly, or maybe they just made a poor judgement. Either way, those are hardly unusual mistakes.

These two fights, and the second one in particular, were some of the most fun I've had in eve. The fact that they should have turned out differently only makes the victory all the sweeter. However, I'm acutely aware that neither fight would have happened if I hadn't taken a risk, and engaged a target even when my instincts screamed against it. Since then, I've made an effort to change the way that I PVP, taking fights that I don't expect to win and generally just being a little more reckless. I can't recommend it enough.

What's Stopping You?

I'm sure we've all seen our fair share of epic killmails - the kind where some daring pilot (usually one of the same few) achieves a result so unbelievably against the odds that you can't help but be in awe of their internet spaceship prowess. If you think that fights like these are just the result of being awesome though, you're likely to be disappointed. It might seem obvious, you can't win a fight against the odds unless you actually engage against the odds in the first place. If you only take the fights that you think you can win, you'll never achieve this kind of unexpected outcome.

With that in mind, why is it that so many people tend to avoid risky fights? I think there are a number of reasons, but I'd like to talk about a few of them in particular.

The first of these is our attitude to loss. Losses in eve are real - when your ship is destroyed you lose the real time and effort associated with replacing that ship. However, there's more to it than that; give someone a ship that's fully insured and paid for, and they probably still won't want it to die. The truth is there's a stigma attached to loss in eve - we associate losses with bad players and wins with good ones, rather than taking the more realistic view that victory or loss is often the result of the circumstances we put ourselves in and our willingness to take risks. Someone who roams solo and takes difficult fights will lose far more often than someone who only flies on fleets, or who spends most of their time camping a gate and only engages safe targets. What makes the stigma worse is that we know any losses we take will be immortalised on killboards for all to see - everyone will know just how bad we are!

The truth is though, making any assumption of skill (or lack thereof) based on killboard stats is a dodgy science at best. To demonstrate, go to your public killboard of choice and look up a few people who you consider to be really good PVPers - usually you'll see a lot of kills, but also plenty of losses. Next, look at someone who you recognise from attending fleets fairly regularly, but who never really does anything to surprise or impress you - you'll probably find fewer kills, but very few losses in comparison. The thing to realise here is that losing fights is a natural consequence of challenging yourself as a PVPer, and that it's generally those people who learn to embrace this fact that achieve greater success.

The second significant factor is a psychological one. There's an axiom known as Hanlon's Razor which says 'Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.' In eve, we learn to follow exactly the opposite - when we see something that looks like a mistake or an act of stupidity, we're immediately suspicious. As I mentioned earlier, this is something of which I'm especially guilty. I find I'll often put myself in my opponent's shoes and ask what I'd be thinking in their position - would I want the fight if our positions were reversed? In doing that though, I'm assuming both that my opponent is acting in a rational, considered way and that they have the same level of experience and competence that I have myself. I overestimate my opponent, despite history clearly showing that one or the other of those things probably isn't the case.

I can't deny that this kind of paranoia isn't good for your long term survival, which is great if you're a scout and you just need to stay alive to do your job. However, it's not conducive to getting fights and it tends to result in long roams without ever finding something that you consider to be a viable target. Sometimes opportunities are brief (particularly if your opponent actually doesn't want to fight you), and if you play things safe you'll quickly find you've missed your chance.

As a reader of this blog, it's fair to assume that you're more informed about PVP than your average eve player. You might not feel above average, but trust me - there are a lot of people out there (including active PVPers) who simply don't understand how to fit and fly their ships, and who have never really made an effort to change that. Even if your opponent is experienced, mistakes happen - watch a few of the better known PVP videos (which it's worth noting generally feature fights which went particularly well) and you'll still see people forgetting to turn on hardeners, not noticing a tackler getting too close, or making some other piloting error. These things aren't unusual - they happen all the time, to everyone, and that makes the outcome of any fight far less predictable than it might at first appear. There are many reasons why a given fight might not turn out the way that you expect, and if you don't take the risk you'll never know.

In the end, the attitude you take towards risk in PVP is your own choice, and it's always tempting to choose the easy option. Even if it's not something you feel comfortable with all the time, I do recommend that at least every now and then, you just go for a fight that you're not sure you can win - you may well surprise yourself, and the victory will be that much more rewarding because of it. Worst case scenario, all you have to lose is pixels!

22 comments:

  1. As a pilot with a fairly limited amount of in-game time due to RL responsibilities I find that I frequently fall victim to over cautiousness.

    When you're only afforded 30min here and there to log in and roam, there's a natural tendency to gravitate towards engagements where you're more confident of a positive outcome -- so that you can keep roaming (and not be forced to re-ship and start over) but also to keep your ISK efficiency and KB stats up. It's a crappy state-of-mind to fall into (KB/stat obsession), but I'm certainly guilty of it.

    This post has inspired me to attempt to shed that mindset and enjoy a more balls-out approach to PvP -- thanks for the kick in the ass.

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  2. Another psychological factor: Lack of a literal killer instinct (as incongruent that may be in a PvP game). However, people like that should seriously consider full-time scouting.

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  3. I have a slightly different take on this issue.

    I am hardly a risk-averse person. I've flown billion-ISK bpo's through low-sec in shuttles. I've lost a ridiculously-fit 2 billion ISK drake taking it unscouted through a low-sec pipe trying to get back to hi-sec after getting stuck on the wrong side of a WH. I've jumped through an EOL WH in an orca with neutrals in system, no backup and no idea what the timer of the WH was. These reckless acts were fun and gave me a nice adrenaline spike, but they were not wise decisions. I acted alone and bore the possible consequences alone.

    I like flying in gangs that are led by people who make wise decisions. Anybody can fly gate to gate through nullsec if they want to blow up. Anybody can self-destruct their ships. Anybody can be impatient. Anybody can let their boredom and lack of discipline induce poor choices. Anybody can take 100 fights they expect to lose and then post a video showing the 1 fight they win.

    My rule is, if the fight (after factoring in all the known variables) looks even or better, take it. If they start the fight with the advantage and they have back-up, an uneven fight becomes a slaughter. Why waste the time (and ISK, but mostly the time) of 10 or 20 guys on a mismatch when maybe waiting a few minutes will get you a really good fight? Why give the enemy easy kills and tell him 'I'm too impatient to turn down a fight, no matter the odds.'? Will that make him less likely to blob me the next time he sees me?

    I particularly cringe when I see you write 'it's always tempting to take the easy option'. The easy option is taking the bad fight. The easy option is saying 'I told you guys I'm a terrible FC'. The easy option is spamming 'Don't fly what you can't afford to lose' and pretending that's synonymous with 'Only fly what you're happy to lose.' The hard option is to (if necessary) say 'Well guys, the fish weren't biting today, but wasn't it great to be out on the lake? Let's head home.'

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    1. As far as gang/fleet goes... agree on a level of risk you all want to take. If an FC simply ups the risk-level without warning, then - yes - he is a bad FC.

      But as Azual said, "the attitude you take to risk in PVP is your own choice". He wasn't bashing a cautious approach - just saying that there is another option - the riskheavy approach to pvp - that is quite often scorned. Yet why should it be? It is as valid as a cautious approach.

      So, even in a fleet/gang setting, why not make a case for all of them going for a little bit more risk? Getting more fights, finding out something about engagements you hadn't previously considered desirable, etc. Much fun and experience to be had.

      Yes, there are many reasons not too. But it is an option. And it isn't a "waste" even if you get routed. You do not HAVE TO fear giving an enemy "easy kills" (there may be strategic reasons for not doing so, but those do not apply to everybody, and even then there might be more to be gained by going ahead).

      It may not be YOUR style, but it is a valid approach for pvp in New Eden. Never forget, we are immortal.

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    2. Fair point regarding the 'easy option' - I think for some people, the easy option will be to take risks without thinking. It really depends what falls within your comfort zone - if you're naturally aggressive, you might find you fall for traps too often and it takes discipline to dial that back. For me, the easy option is definitely to play it safe. Whichever side you learn towards, you'll probably find you err on that side more often that you should.

      The real message I'm trying to get across isn't that you should take losing fights - I've flown on plenty of suicide gangs and hate the idea of thowing our gang into a fight we can't win just 'for the lulz'. What I want to help people realise is that many of the fights that you currently turn down because you don't think you have the advantage, are actually fights that you would win if you took them. Being too cautious can often lose you more opportunities than it saves you losses.

      When I talk about taking a risk, I don't mean taking a fight you expect to lose (even though in the examples above, I *did* expect to lose), nor do I mean taking a risk that has no potential to benefit you (like flying your 2 bil drake around unscouted). Those are unwise decisions, as you rightly point out. For me, a risky fight is one where the outcome is uncertain - you could win, but you don't *know* that you will win. You're taking a chance. It might mean engaging a ratting battleship with your assault frigate, or taking on an older player in a frigate duel. In an FCing sence, it might be where you jump into the opposing gang rather than setting up at range and hoping that they jump into you.

      Sometimes it's even simpler than that - it might be making a quick decision rather than waiting until you've scouted every possible reinforcement route to make sure the opponent has no backup. It might be gambling on the fact that an opponent's backup won't make it there in time (often something that people underestimate). These aren't dumb choices, they're opportunities which wouldn't be available if you approached the situation cautiously, but they all involve an element of risk.

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  4. Thank you.

    I hate people citing killboard statistics for skill.

    Or being called a loser because I warped to zero on a taranis and hurricane in an AC-scram/web/mwd-thrasher solo, thinking i could kill the ranis before I died (he survived in very low structure). I considered myself dead already when i hit the warp-button, but still went in. I had a good chance to get the kill I wanted - so close :( - and some experience. (I learned quite a bit from that very short fight, one or two minor mistakes avoided, and I would have gotten that kill. lossmail: http://eve.battleclinic.com/killboard/killmail.php?id=16023525)

    I've also been called stupid for continously engaging Arty-wolfs in my AC-Thrasher (mind you, burning to them from range, not jumping in on zero). Well, I've killed three so far (e.g. http://eve.battleclinic.com/killboard/killmail.php?id=15825183 or http://eve.battleclinic.com/killboard/killmail.php?id=15774188 where it actually became a 1vX and i died, but got the wolf) - and lost four (maybe five) thrashers on the way. I think I'll continue to go for that particular matchup.

    Yes, I am still new at this. And neither engagement might sound very challenging for a skilled veteran, but I AM a newbie. And while I can take criticism for mistakes I have made in a fight or tips on how to improve my position for the engagement (when and where to engage), I do not like the sentiment of... "you are loser, why did you go for that fight" or "don't do this, you are the underdog". So what? Next time tell me why I am the underdog and how I could improve my chances and get a chance at coming out on top.

    I will continue to engage everything and everybody, unless I know for certain it would be pointless (I am unlikely to go in for a Myrm' kill in a solo Rifter.) It's probably the fastest way to improve my actual skill.

    Obviously everybody has the right to be cautious and there are many good reasons to be: being space-poor, role-playing, not being able to reship quickly and many others. If you aren't flying solo, check with your gang/fleet what kind of risk they are willing to take. You do not want to be responsible for putting somebody else in a position of (from his point of view) excessive risk.

    But you aren't making sense if you are snubbing somebody else simply because he is taking "big" risks. Rather: Hail, and glory to the heavens, a pvp-engagement that almost wouldn't have been. And somebody (most likely) got a kill, even more people learned something.

    *me stops ranting

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  5. IRL, I'm a Fire Lieutenant.

    I've made decisions for and that directly and immediately affected myself, other Firefighters, civilians, and fire apparatus worth a hell of a lot of RL-ISK.
    I also spent a lot of time studying leadership, especially psychological and sociological issues that apply to it.
    Basically, there's a couple fundamental issues at work here:
    1) Zero-defect mentality: "there is NO such thing as an 'ok' loss", aka "return with your shield or upon it". That was nice for Sparta. Last I checked, we don't run around in loincloths waving swords and spears whilst engaging in homoerotica that makes porn stars blush. Also, EVE is a game.
    2) Personal attribution, a variation "Hanlon's Razor", or "Hong's Narcissistic Asshole Theory": smart people don't make silly/stupid mistakes. Actually, smart people don't make mistakes period, because they always find some excuse or scapegoat to pin it on. If all else fails: "I didn't really care about that ship/POS/system/region anyways. *sniffle*"
    Corollary to this (part Deux of the Narcissistic Asshole Theory): Only stupid people make mistakes, and only really truly fucktarded ones who should be excluded from reproducing (or perhaps euthanized outright as a service to the Greater Good of Mankind) ever ADMIT to making said mistakes, or attempt to discuss them in a rational manner. <--- these things are what narcissistic assholes think. Lots of people these days are narcissistic assholes, including a vast majority of EVE players. ;-) Something about the game seems to bring them out of the woodwork.

    I like the Tuskers attitude: KB efficiency is too high, ergo we are not taking enough risks or "hard" fights.
    I only wish more people would adopt that mindset.

    Then again, with the upcoming nerfs to, well, pretty much everything not mining (and only because it's impossible to nerf mining any further), and the apparent economic collapse looming on the horizon, I doubt you're going to see many people willing to take MORE risk. If anything, at least until markets settle and all, people will be even LESS likely to take any perceived risks.

    If things really get that bad, I plan to quit -- first wasting every last single ISK on ships and mods and getting them all blown up in glorious and potentially "stupid" fights.

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  6. I sort of suspect that with the craziness of the mineral market we might encounter more frigates and wolf-packs running around as opposed to the standard t2/faction cruiser and BC gangs. We might even start to see more t1 frigate wolf packs instead of assault ships. That would be an interesting twist, where the dominant fleet comp switches from high end cruisers and BCs to cheap-ish frigates.

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  7. Tackle first worry later.

    I a lot of r1fta pilots fly by that doctrine, in fact I'm one of the more cautious ones and I will still happily tackle a ratting maller, from experience only about a third are traps the others just idiots (or really clever ratters thinking; "nobody will go for a maller" ofc :P ).

    Anyways our killboard is a testament to the fact that the stuff you can kill as long as you just engage it is remarkable. If you never punch above your weight epic killmails never happen either. And when you loose? Well it's just pixels man ;-)

    Anyway I personally think one of the main reasons people are risk averse is that people are taught in fleets that 'isk efficiency matters' or that 'k/d ratios matter' where really they don't matter (not to me anyway). I'm just this dude that comes home from work and wants to relax having fun fighting in spaceships. What does matter to me is if I have fun, and while loosing isn't as fun as winning not getting a fight at all is even less fun.

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  8. The only way you're going to get good at PvP is to push your boundaries - reading or watching other people will only get you so far via imitation.

    Also, in a fleet environment it's about trust. Trust in your wingmate(s) that they know what to do without the FC having to hold their hands, telling them where to burn, how fast to burn etc. etc. As a Tusker, I'm perfectly willing to go fight a 15-20 man gang with another Tusker or two by my side and see what happens, since I know they can function independently, shoot the right targets, move in the correct fashion etc.

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  9. In my experience, in all PvP games (of which I've played many), close wins and close losses are always the most enjoyable and memorable, and I go out of my way to arrange for fights that might give that result. I'd much rather almost win or almost lose than anything else.

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  10. As always, a great article. It's something I notice about myself from time to time, and something I try to overcome whenever possible. (I'm still amused that I was so surprised that a friend of mine took down a T3 BC with a 125mm Rifter, but only because I didn't really understand the mechanics involved at the time. I know, however, that back then, I wouldn't have gone for that fight, thinking the T3 BC would definitely have blown me up.)

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  11. One of your most encouraging and thrilling blogs. Thanks a ton.

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  12. mysteriouse benefactor
    i was piloting that wolf and got in tha fight cuz i like ur posts...and i hate goons lol
    still got in mind that fight

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    1. You sir, are a king among men. Thanks for the help!

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  13. ChildofDestruction13 April 2012 at 07:12

    Hey Mate, I am really surprised and happy to see that you have all those fun out of our fight. Just a little touch from your wing man:

    If you ever ask me what is in your mind 6-7 months ago before and engagement, I would say stay alive first. Then I found out that this is not the fun part of EVE and PvP. I decide to chance my mind and methodology for PvP. My approach switch from survival math to predator mind.

    Now before engaging a group or a person, The only math I do is the look for the remote chance of success. Such an example is;
    http://www.agony-unleashed.com/killboard/index.php/kill_related/75391/

    I was out for Fishing in my bait exequror (yes the tech 1 crappy gallente logi) and got his Naga sitting on the gate at zero. Now that are the odd for your to get him with 220 small hybrid gun fitted double web scram 1600 plate fitted fishing ship.

    There come the point where you start having fun. Say what the hell, pop an STD X-Instictive and try...

    I approach 30k with MWD while spiraling and acquire a close orbit and start engaging with everything. I wasn't expected to win thought a Nemesis also joing in and start hitting me. So I send drones after him while slowly chewing the Naga. I was socked with the result when naga blowed and nemesis was on grid fleeing with structure. I thought to my self, It is the best day every but hold on a second. A Zelot from same corp declocked and I pissed to my self for not realizing the local up and gate activation.
    My armor was at 85% and I got my fun.

    There comes the second decision point; I say what the hell, I got my fight, let see How interesting it could get, may be one or two tech 2 fright joing and I could kill them while dying. So Rush to close orbit while overheating everything and deploying all that I have to him.

    He was head of me and then decide to de-agress and approach the gate, I was already overheating the guns like hell. After bearly 1.5 half minute his tank broken and he hits the structure.

    What if I didn't engage that naga or zelot ? what if that zelot friend of naga decide to come earlier? What if that zelot decide to keep engaging (which would probably killed me) ? Within all these odds the real ones are to try doing something against common odds and being too cautious to have fun and try to bail out.

    At the end all I would say;
    1- Go out with cheap stuff that you can effort which you would not care to lose and also not looks intimidating to others to get more fights!
    2- Stop calculating your survival but start looking for bites you can get. (the best fun is to kill something like this in between 20 ships while his friends are trying to understand what hell you are doing (http://www.agony-unleashed.com/killboard/index.php/kill_detail/78745/)
    3- Don't forget the fact that eve is not a fair place and you will lose more then you win but the fun is always there both the times you lose or win.
    4- And my personal touch (though you might have other ideas which is still valid) Earn the respect of you opponents (nobody is my enemy but all of you are my opponents whether you respect me or not) and then again you will have more fight and fun.

    I guess its enough torture with my lack of writing skills. This is a great article Azual and I really missed out non solo "solo roams". BTW you own me few gallante stuff and I want either their loss mails or them back. So please start losing them :D

    Happy Hunting
    Child (ofDestruction)

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    1. ChildofDestruction13 April 2012 at 07:21

      little correction: That exequror was not using MWD but an AB. SoI have to go 30 km with my mwd to that Naga :/
      o7

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  14. Great post!

    It's a topic I've thought a lot about. In general, the evaluation of risk is somewhat arbitrary. Once you realize that, you can willfully manipulate it to increase your overall fun and to defeat enemies.

    I blogged more about it here

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  15. When people discuss ships in 1v1 scenarios, you'll almost always hear things like 'X will win because it can dictate range' or 'X can't kill Y, because Y can just warp off'. The thing about this kind of statement is that it's purely mechanical, and assumes that both parties do everything right; the real thing rarely works out in such an absolute fashion.

    This is an intuition I've had for a long time, but never figured out how to put it into words. Seeing it in "print" has given me a chance to revisit my entire perspective. Thank you!

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  16. I totally agree with this post. As someone who lives in space that is currently under war-time CTA problems, it can be funny to see super safe players who only ever roll in 200-300 man fleets bragging about all the kills they can tag in a fleet fight. Personally I have been flying outside of ships in "substandard" ships with the specific goal to find better fights, for example flying a cyclone instead of a hurricane, or any other underestimated ship. Fighting things that may be bait, are the best chance for some really fun fights. For every time I am baited/cov ops hotdropped, I find two good fights.
    I totally agree with this article.

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  17. I seam to have a split personality in eve when it comes to this, if im solo every ship is a cyno and a gang is behind every gate. but give me even 1 wing man and ill take on 5 BCs. I'll admit i have passed up on many good fights out of caution, but i have taken a hadfull and have made some of my best eve friends by havign a good fight and convoing them after and talkign about how good it was, and how we should do more against or with eachother.

    I also ocasionaly FC 0.0 roams for a friends corp, I request a very specific, and sometimes random ship type for fleet and we roam till we kill something, regaurdless of losses. If the fight looks like we can squeeze 1 kill out of it we put all our chips in. last ngith it was a pure raiper/arazu roam, with one link cain and a scimi. we lost the BC and a recon fightign a 10man nano BC gang, but we killed 2 of them, and had had wiped a 5man kitchen sink gang 10min before that. Its hard but if you can force down the "your all in 170mil ships fighting 60mil ships" feeling, you can get great fights.

    great read btw, keep it up

    ReplyDelete

The Altruist is the Eve Online blog of Azual Skoll, PVP instructor and small gang PVPer.

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