Upgrading the old C4 Rattler

I feel that I have tried the plexing Vargur as much as I want to.

In fact, I have quite a lot of them, and the system is now clean and nice. I have my trusty Orca and closing Scorpion in here and could easily secure the system. I was on my way moving out since I already got a bit bored - 20 minutes per site is a bit to slow, even if salvaging as you go gives you a little bit more to do while the guns dispatch of the sleepers.

I decide that before I pull down the POS and leave for something else, I should at least clean the remaining sites. After all, it should be worth closer to two billion, even with the nanoribbon prices of today. I won't go through the pain of grinding them in the Vargur thou, instead I will just upgrade my Rattler-fit to be able to cope with Information Sanctums. One night of plexing should do it.

Since I used a pair of Rattlers for C4's last time, a few things have changed;

• The resist bonus is now 4% instead of 5% (per level). 
• The Omni tracking links now run scripts 
• I'm now going for Information Sanctums which is a little bit harder than Frontier Barracks I used to prefer.

I need to buff the tank a bit and maybe compensate lost range/tracking (have not checked exactly what the new Omni tracking links do to the original fit) with warpin-points for each site so I don't have to fight at 100km.

This is what I came up with;

Rattlesnake, upgraded C4 plexer

High power
2x Large Remote Capacitor Transmitter II
2x Large Remote Shield Booster II
True Sansha Large EMP Smartbomb
1x Drone Link Augmentor II

Medium power
2x Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
1x Dread Guristas Adaptive Invulnerability Field
1x Gistum C-Type EM Ward Amplifier
3x Federation Navy Omnidirectional Tracking Link + scripts

Low power
1x Damage Controller II
1x Co-Processor II
4x Drone Damage Amplifier II

Rig Slot
1x Large Egress Port Maximizer II
1x Large Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer II
1x Large Drone Control Range Augmentor I

Charges
1x Targeting Range Script

Drones
5x Warrior II
5x Hammerhead II
5x Garde II
5x Light Armor Maintenance Bot I
5x Bouncer II

The faction invulnerability field and two tech 2 shield transports instead of one should hopefully be enough to compensate for the lost tank. I really don't like to have to fit CPU-mods in the lows, but in this case I think it's worth it.

I have also replaced one of the Drone Links with one of those nifty smartbombs I had so much fun with on the Vargur (remember: Red Giant effects!). Yes, yes, I know, it is totally incompatible with using sentries, I guess I just have to either pull drones or range when using them. This is really just for clearing the 12 sites I have left.

Little did I know that I only would get halfway through those sites before my failure to be vigilant would punish me in the worst way possible.

Optimizing the C4 Vargur

Today I tested some new stuff while plexing my Red Giant C4 with the Vargur.

I tested what I would benefit from most when it came to drones; a flight of Hammerheads to help with dps or an mix of target-painting and webbing-drones to make my guns hit better. With the excellent tracking the Vargur have it looks like my biggest problem is range, so while I could not see any difference (I timed one site)  while using the e-war drones, the hammerheads shaved a minute or two off my normal time of 23 minutes. So hammerheads it is!

Also since I had two highslots over I decided to try out some salvaging while killing. Even if the Marauders still have their bonuses to tractor beams I wanted to try out the new Mobile Tractor Unit that will do the tractoring and looting for you. Sounds very nice. But would it keep up and would the sleepers attack it?

I discovered that not only did the sleepers show no interest whatsoever in the tractoring unit after I dropped it, it could keep up just fine. And with two tech 2 salvage on the Vargur, so could I. The result was that I could do the sites and salvage, with one pilot, and without the need for time consuming salvaging in that slow Noctis after/during.

As a bonus, I did not have to loose any loot if I had to abort prematurely due to unwanted company. Also, this meant I only needed to warp to each site two times (bookmark + Vargur) instead of three (+salvage) further simplifying things. Simple is good. That's what I'm all about now.

This might actually be a bigger deal than what it at first appears to be. I never liked the Noctis. Don't get me wrong, its a great ship and with skills it does a fantastic job of munching wrecks into salvage, but that's the only thing it does. It is also huge, and for me that's a big deal because I need to fit it into that Orca. Fact is, the function of savage takes up more than half of the ship hangar, and stops me from bringing other ships that would be more useful.

But this new way of doing things makes the Noctis unneeded, and could potentially unlock a lot of other possibilities for my little setup.

WH-Intel: The contact labels

When you lurk around in w-space intelligence is king.

You often stumble upon scouts that jump through wormholes, PI-alt's that jump into Epithals, and nasty cloaked Proteis that jump... well, you if they can. As soon as I encounter something, I have the habit of not only getting "info" on the pilot, but also add him to my contacts and watchlist. This enables me to compare him/her and his corp to any POS'es I have found, or might find, thereby placing him/her in a known system in the chain. This might be useless info, but it might also be crucial. You simply don't know.

I used to also set their standing accordingly. This was an attempt to separate different groups from each other, more than to represent a real "threat level". Known, larger w-space alliances I have set red, just to quickly identify their scouts and their pilots in local, on those rare occasions when I'm actually in Empire. Temporary targets (neighbors and folks I'm currently in contact with) I usually set to orange. If you add them to watch list, you immediately get a handle on if they are online, if they just logged on or off, etc...

However, this way, one tend to collect a number of contacts that needs categorizing. One also need to occasionally remove old ones. This could be a real hassle if you don't have a system of some kind - enter the labels!

Since a Rubicon 1.3 you can add labels to your contacts when you add them, which makes it much easier to keep a system working. If you have not started to use contacts and labels in this way, you really should! At least if you want to be a provider of information for your corp and not just a consumer. Create your own system that suits your needs. Remember that one contact can be labeled with many different labels, so a system with mutual exclusive labels is not optimal.

I have currently two different types of labels going; to where pilots belong, and what they typically been seen flying. Something like this;

• Target - the current enemy, or the ones I'm targeting 
• Targets friend - the same alliance or somebody living in the same WH
• C2 Inhabitants, etc..  - a way to keep track of different groups in a chain

I also set a few labels when the pilot obviously have a focused skill-set; 

• Carebear - been seen flying only mining barges or industrials
• Scout  - your typical cloaky dude, easy to forget that he might be around 
• Fighter -  someone that been seen flying any kind of pvp ship. 

This way, I can easily get a good feeling for who is on and not, and what kind of threat the ones that are on might be. 

Marauder in jepardy

While getting tired of the Frontier Command Posts, I decided I would try a Frontier Barrack. The max damage one have to tank in those is a bit more than in the easy mode Command Posts, but I figured I was so overtanked I would hardly notice any difference. Well, you still have to avoid messing up yourself, there's no fit for bad judgement.

I had done dozens and dozens of Barracks before, but never in a Vargur, and never solo. It's a pretty bad site for the Vargur since most of the battleships are either spawning 100km out, or tend to orbit at 60km. With barrage and one Tracking computer running range scripts, my falloff was 100km. At 60km, the killing-speed started to get painfully slow.

Anyhow, when the second wave spawned, I made the mistake of not going for the neuting battleships (there's three of them) at once. After downing the second cruiser I noticed to my horror that my tank was actually breaking! And not only that, I was getting real close to peak recharge on my cap too... With no capacitor my tank would definitely fail, so quick thinking was required. After I had checked that everything was still running and boosts still was up I had to wait out the bastion (1 min cycle and no moving or warping while it's active) and warp back to my POS to regroup. Keep in mind that the bastion is the thing that make you able to tank in the first place, so if you cant tank with it running, you wont have much time when it shuts of.

Off with the Tracking computer (this was before my finalized fit and I ran with a single Invulnerable field and two TCs instead of the other way around) and instead fit a second Invulnerable field. There! That would hopefully give me the time to kill one of the neuting battleships to lighten the pressure on my capacitor enough to be able to stay on field. Which it did, I finished up the site, salvaged the wrecks the Mobile Tractor Unit had pulled in and limped back home to base.

In a C4, I would probably be better of running a cruise Golem, no range-problems there... Only problem is I'm liking the Vargur a bit to much to give it up just yet.

No plexing for Dominixes

Wait! Were there not eight sigs before? Now there are nine here in Gamma, my new C4 home. Well, I better get the old sisters out to find out what's new...

It turns out it's a incoming C4 with two towers and a bunch of Russian (I think) piloted battleships, mostly Dominixes. Now they are hanging there, but I have the distinct feeling they are gearing up for something. Could they have plexing in mind?

It turns out they are. But not their own system. When they all start to align, to my surprise they do so towards my C4! The hole is relatively old, and I just got back home, so chances are they have not seen anything of me yet. That is, more than my small, poorly defended 4-man corporation POS with a single floating Scorpion, and that is not scaring anyone.

But, but, those sites are mine! They are my training-ground for messing around with a Vargur! We can't have this. Must, must stop Dominixes!

Since my entire "pvp-fleet" consists of two ships, with hardly 400dps between them, I'm somewhat limited in my response. But if I know carebears, they will be easily spooked. No shoots needs to be exchanged. I doubt they will have the nerve to plex an active system. Just for me to show some pretend muscle and they will probably change their mind.

When all 4 of their Dominixes land on my WH in their system I'm jumping after them with the Astro I'm flying. On the other side I decloak, orbits and throws an point on a random Domi. They must have been pretty surprised to see me there.

They hanged at the WH for a bit, setting up their cap-chain. I could almost hear them reasoning about what to do. They eventually decided to withdraw and jumped back.

Now I was left with a decision to just log for the night or mess up their hole, making sure they where not to come back later to steal my sleepers when I was not looking. Putting an Orca heavy back and forth through the hole would do it. Since I figure these guys was not that experienced, I betted I could surprise them and get away with a sneak Orca-attack against the hole. If they had a scout that was on the ball, they could potentially tackle me long enough for the Domis to come back and give me trouble.

I had Ashi in her Tengu on their side of the WH as I let Tashi throw the Orca at the WH. On return, a Anathema decloaked. I don't know if he tried to tackle me or if he just got scared about mass and wanted to get back home, but in any case the Orca got clear.  A few domis did land on their side of the WH when it did thou, so they where really trying to get it. "A" for effort, but my Orca live to see another day. 

After that they disappeared and I finished the night by closing the WH for them with my Scorpion.

First plexing with Vargur

Now I have done a fair bit of sites in my Vargur, and I must say, I really like it. I can't help but to compare it against my previous experiences with "solo" plexing C4s using two Rattlesnakes. Those chewed up any C4 site in between 10 and 15 minutes, whereas the Vargur needs at least 20 min for a Frontier Barracks. But that includes booth salvage and looting.

I discovered that the preferred site for the Vargur was actually the Frontier Command Post and not the Frontier Barracks. This was due to less battleships spawning out at 80km. Normally one would shy away from the Frontier Command Posts due to the first wave that is pretty much useless (frigs and sentry-guns). But with the short range, smartbombing Vargur it does not add many minutes to the total running time. However, for that I need a BM for the centre of the site, which brings me to the fits lack of Micro Jump Drive.

Marauders have a nice bonus to the reactivation delay of micro jumps The ability to warp to a non-bookmarked Frontier Barracks, aim the ships at he first two battleships 90km away, and just a few seconds later be able to hit them from 10km with high dps Hail would have been really nice. But without a much more expensive fit or boosts, I did not want to be without the second Invulnerable Field.

The Vargur costs more than both Rattlers together and is slower, but for me, the ease of piloting a single ship instead of two, not having to setup cap-bouncing and keep track of remote-reps makes up for it. It's simply a more relaxing experience for an old man with lousy multiboxing-skills like me.

It also unlocks one account for a scout, which is very important. With the marauders three utility-highs, the ability to kill frigs with a push of a button (I'm seriously in love with that smartbomb!) and two salvager to take care of the wrecks the Personal Tractor Unit (which really is more of a looting-robot) have dragged in range the whole endeavour is much simpler than all the hoops I had to jump trough to get the Rattlers setup and working.

Since a lot of the time is spent scanning, scouting and closing WH's the actual time spent shooting sleepers is actually quite low. At least for me. Final call is that 20 min/site incl. salvage using one pilot is better than 10 min for two - where you either need to go back for the salvage afterwards or have a third account just for the salvage.

I must say that the combination Red Giant and a True Sansha smartbomb rocks. All your frig problems are just a memory, they die like the pesky flies they are. With the effect of the C4 it gets a range of 12km, more than enough. I could even have used a normal tech 1 and it would probably have done the job. For the latest in overkill - use it on a Vargur in a C4 to kill the sleepers in the gas- and ore-sites. Even if you are not interested in the gas or ore, killing and salvaging the sleepers might be worth your time, I got 80M out of my 12 sites in Gamma.

Since my non-marauder pilot happens to be both my Orca-pilot and a fully skilled siege/armour booster, I simply had him refit the trusty old Orca to a booster. Not that you absolutely need it, not even for the Information Sanctums, but the margins goes from need-to-be-on-the-ball-and-not-make-too-much-misstakes- to can-leave-vargur-tanking-worst-spawn-while-on-the-phone -level.

I started with some Frontier Command Posts since I think those are the easiest ones. My Vargur turned out to be a bit overtanked for C4s (as expected) so I really got no need for boosts. I was planing on using the Orca as booster since Tashi, my Orca-pilot, got pretty good skills for that. Just a quick refit and some 22% bonus to resists, boosting and cap efficiency - not bad considering I get it "for free" with just a quick refit of a ship I need anyway.

At some point I even left the Orca cloaked at a WH to have ears on it and to be able to de-cloak and boost if I totally messed something up. But usually I just had it boosting from the POS.

A C4 Vargur

Ever since I came back to eve after the Rubicon patch, I have been wanting to try the new marauders. With the "mini-sige" mode the bastion module offers, they're now a totally new ship. Perfectly targeted for mission-runners, or maybe even more so for anybody that want to kill some sleepers efficiently.

Back in my mission-running days (yes, I actually did that for a brief time) I used to run a torp Golem, and since then i have skilled both Minmatar and Amarr battleship 5. Skill-wise I was therefore quite well setup to try them all out. Well, except the Kronos then, but with the engagement range of the sleepers in C4s, I don't see how that would work. Rails? Nah.. never liked them much.

ISK wise it looked dire. When I came back to game I had 5B in my wallet, but now I had almost blown half of it on different stupid ships, implants and stuff… I could fit one marauder and try, but I would not have ISK for a good C4-fit for a Vargur, Paladin and Golem. I decided to start with a Vargur, find a good C4 and simply run the sites, making the ISK for the next ship. After all, the whole point of the marauders was to make ISK, right?

I guess there's plenty of different schools when it comes to how to fit, but what I did was just take the fit from Lord Planck and his C5 Vargur, and scale that down to work in a C4. I wanted an enjoyable experience, calm and relaxing, with as little micromanagement as possible. I wanted a fit where I could perms-run a 1.5K tank and that would reach out to 80km with as much dps (obviously!) as possible.

This is what I came up with;

C4 Solo Vargur
High power
4x 800mm Repeating Cannon II
1x True Sansha Large EMP Smartbomb
1x Bastion Module I
2x Salvager II

Medium power
1x Gistum C-Type Adaptive Invulnerability Field
1x Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
1x Gist B-Type Large Shield Booster
1x Shield Boost Amplifier II
1x Cap Recharger II
1x Tracking Computer II

Low power
3x Republic Fleet Gyrostabilizer
1x Damage Control II
1x Tracking Enhancer II

Rig Slot
2x Large Capacitor Control Circuit II

I will not go into details about the fit, it's not that interesting or unique in any way. The variations I tried was small, and mostly focused on the three high-slots. A nos for the cap-conscious plexer, or two smartbombs instead of one for more effective killing of frigs? In the end the faction large smartbomb both had enough range and dps to clean the frigs just fine. It was possibly one of the better investments I have done for this ship.

Since the introduction of the Personal Tractor Unit, the life of the solo-plexer have drastically gotten better. Even if a Noctis still is more effective, there are something really nice about salvaging as you go. You don't have to dual-box, and having to visit each site just once is nice too. Especially if you are "ninja-plexing" under the nose of somebody else (with smart scouting of course) you really appreciate that you can just pick up and bail whenever, not leaving your hard earned wrecks behind.

What I said about just visiting each site once showed to be not quite accurate. Unlike lasers or missiles, the nature of projectile guns means that they will work almost totally in falloff. Unless the sleepers are so close they block the light from the sun, you will not do full damage - hence; the closer the better. To achieve this you really need a bookmark for the sites so you can warp to the center, not ending up 90km from the first wave.

I found a C4 system with a lot of sites to try my new toy in, and set up a small tower, and got to plexing. I like the small POS'es because of the short ancho/un-anchor times, if I want I can pick it up and move it to another system in under one hour.