We had a little issue a while ago where we had a pair (Redeemer + Falcon) of guys plaguing our space with their presence. The biggest issue was the fact the Falcon would roam around through gates cloaked and what not, and the Redeemer would sit by idly inside of black ops jump bridge range to strike on targets. The Falcon, when a target is sighted, would decloak, pop a covert-ops cyno and jump the Redeemer in for the strike. This was particularly effective yet in-effective at the same time. As far as I’m aware, most pilots generally stop ratting/mining if a neut or red pilot enters their system and warp out to a safe somewhere.

So the idea of the gang is innovative, it utilized stealth to the extent of being able to show up on your doorstep when you aren’t ready and take a kill quickly, then fade away into the stars somewhere. Its ingenious and is a fantastic idea, however as all good tactics does have some drawbacks.

• Firepower is limited
• Not truly Stealth but as good as stealth gets in Eve

So how do you combat such a situation. Well it is very difficult. So to ensure we get an engagement, we had to employ a ratting ECCM strategy. We ensured a fleet of ships was in system ready to go and staged a Cerberus in one of the belts. The Cerberus was ratting away quietly when suddenly the Falcon appeared, the Falcon struggled to get a jam cycle off on the Cerberus as it was fitted for ECCM due to the local rats being Guristas Pirates. Worked a charm, the fleet warped in on the Falcon and he was quickly dispatched. Unfortunately we did loose our bait and the Redeemer got away :’(. Sad panda.

Sufficed to say the Falcon pilot retrieved a new Falcon and quickly cyno’d his buddyback home to empire space as fast as he royally could.

One particular tactic that has been employed recently by many alliances are remote repair battleship gangs. These gangs are designed to come to the battlefield and “spider-tank” any damage thrown at them while engaging the enemy. This has presented many problems for the conventional strategy of bringing firepower and tackle to the field, those problems include, having to switch primaries very quickly and having to draw down or distract the enemy from forming an effective spider to kill even 1 ship. Read the rest of this entry →

I’ve been flying the Manti for quite some time now and have mostly figured out the best fit for me.  I’ve dropped bombs on people (or tried) and so I feel good about writing up a short treatise on the proper deployment and fitting of a Manticore for PvP operations.

Overview

The Manticore is a powerful ship and a cheap one, making it an extremely important part of a gang.  The Manticore’s biggest assets are:

• Speed:  As a Frigate, the Manticore is inherently faster than any other class of ships.
• Stealth:  Able to warp while cloaked, the Manticore is the premiere multirole scout/bomber.
• Firepower:  If you’ve ever been hit by a bomb, you know exactly what I mean.

The Manticore’s biggest problem is that it’s paper-thin on defenses.  If you are targeted, you’re toast.  This ship can just barely survive a bomb hit, if you got hit by two, you’re dead.  If you get attacked by drones, you’re dead.  There are not a lot of ways out if you’re in a Manticore.  Your best defense is the cloak and make like a hole in space.

Tactical Roles

Scout

The Manticore’s ability to cloak makes it an ideal scouting ship.  It’s not quite as capable as a normal covert ops frigate is due to their bonuses to probes, however, for most situations all you need is for a gang member to scout ahead or keep an eye on the rear to ensure that there are no enemy gangs coming from behind.  The Manticore’s stealth is key.  I’ve happily watched enemy gatecamps of 70 pilots in battleships in complete safety.  The know I’m in the system, though they have no idea where.  I could be hiding in an asteroid belt or relaying detailed information about their fleet composition to my FC.  They just don’t know.  And because I can warp cloaked, I can bug out without ever letting them know I was even there.

And for the record, bubbles do NOT decloak ships.  POS shields do, but bubbles do NOT.

Courier

You might not think about it, but the ability to move through enemy territory on a whim is really useful.  You could go back to hisec during wardec and buy more skillbooks or blueprints and ferry them back to your space in near complete safety.

Bomber

Quite obviously, this ship drops bombs.  Bombs hurt.  They’re also expensive, so wasting them on trivial targets is stupid.

The Manticore’s torpedo’s are almost completely useless, bordering on irrelevant.  If you have a bomb launcher, you use that.  Torpedoes… have no real use.  I suppose you could use them in POS sieges, but beyond that they cannot do enough DPS to actualize the ship in a firefight.  If you are decloaked too long while firing torpedoes, people tend to shoot you and in the tiny Manticore that has a tendency to leave you floating home in a pod or not at all.

So if you don’t have bombs, you can scout and that is really about it.  If you don’t have a Covert Ops Cloaking Device II, this ship is almost useless.

Suggested Skills

• High Speed Maneuvering
• Bomb Deployment
• Cloaking IV (for Cov Ops)
• Battleship-level Engineering skills (for cap)

Even so  you’ll need a lot of luck and skill.  The Manticore isn’t an easy ship to fly and it’s often very boring waiting for the right moment to ruin somebody’s day.  But if you keep at it and drop those bombs at the right time you can make as opposed to break a great gank.

Until next time,

Necro

Sankkasen system The Citadel region

After collecting a set of +4 implants and Happy Face, I make my way here to talk to the new Spacelane Patrol agent. He gives me some missions shooting at Guristas and I’m on my merry way.

You might be wondering why a Brutor would be out here in Caldari space, working for allies of the Amarr Empire that enslaved my race, et cetera, et cetera. The short answer: They pay well and the missions aren’t that difficult. The longer answer: I find it advantageous to be able to fly through all of highsec without being labeled a Criminal and thus Kill on Sight (KOS). So every year or so, I fly out to Caldari space, run a few (hundred) missions while my Social skills do their magic to bring up my standings with the Caldari (and by extension, drag up my standings with the evil Amarr Empire that enslaved my race)

Another question you might have is why I’m using a rather expensive Eos-class command ship to run missions. As I mentioned earlier, the missions out here aren’t that difficult, usually variations on the theme of  “Fly here. Shoot Guristas. Fly back.”  Since Guristas like to use Kinetic and Thermal weapons, a ship that can fit a 95% Kinetic, 90% Thermal resistances would be the cat’s meow, as they say.

Time to reload the blasters and shoot more Guristas!

I have just finished a bonus eve online theme, its almost identicle to the Caldari Theme, just with the Eve Online logo instead.  You can preview this theme by clicking on the image below.

Eve Online theme

All the racial templates have now been installed.  They might recieve a little bit of tweaking, but for the most part they are now all done.  Check them out by clicking the images below.

Angry Amarr

Cool Caldari

Green Gallente

Minimal Minmatar