Timezone

It's currently 8:35 AM local time as I type, and I've been gaming for an hour and a half. I'm hauling ore for a mining fleet with a dozen people from Europe and the US. We are chatting on teamspeak; they are sorting out dinner as I brew my morning coffee.

As an Australian player, I've gotten to know some of the guys involved in Eve Down Under. As they say, AUTZ = best tz... but i'm rarely on in our primetime, local evenings, to take part in the shenanigans. I usually prefer to game in the morning or during the day. So that ends up leaving me online during late EU or US tz - right now. Our regular fleets start at 20:00 Eve time, which in daylight savings means 07:00 local.

This does make it difficult to game with the few other Aussies I've been in corp with, since I'm usually on while they are at work and vice versa - but it's a great opportunity to make friends from all over. Those of us with matching schedules get to know each other pretty well, and SLYCE has a pretty good casual culture - we run sites or missions while having a laugh on comms.

Shoutouts: The Carebears

So this will be an ongoing series of shoutouts to those who are out there in the Meta doing something I consider to be representing the "carebear" playstyle. Some of these peeps might not consider what they do "carebear", but they are people who I've looked to for inspiration and ideas on the way I play.

Firstly, to Mike Azaraiah, CSM member, owner of the blog A Missioneer in Eve, and frequent podcast guest. His style of narrative posting is very interesting and unique, and he often sees a side of the story that other, more direct players might miss when it comes to upcoming changes or the kind of content creation going on in the game.

Secondly, Von Keigai, owner of the blog Deep in EVE, for this interesting post on high sec ice mining. The reasoning and philosophy behind it applies to other forms of gankable mining (basically all of them) just as much as ice. Otherwise he's also a wormholer, which is a place I find myself ending up more and more these days (pretty much 100% of undocked playtime during our current wardec and the previous couple too), and he's documenting some of his more exciting adventures there.

That's it for now. There will be more.

Dominix Fit - The Droneboat

Ahh, trusty space potato

Here is my Dominix level 4 mission running fit. The Domi is a warhorse of EVE, for both PvP and PvE. It has one of the biggest drone holds of any battleship, a very solid armor tanker with seven low slots, and six high slots to pack a punch. For an idea on common fits look no further than Eve Uni. This is what my sniper fit looks like:

And here it is in EFT plain text (I hope this means people can copy and paste it into EFT; if you are too lazy to put all this in manually, Eve mail me: TrickyH Shazli and I'll send you the fit).

[Dominix, Domi latest Serp]
Damage Control II
Armor Kinetic Hardener II
Large Armor Repairer II
Armor Thermic Hardener II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Sensor Booster II, Targeting Range Script
Omnidirectional Tracking Link II
Cap Recharger II
Heavy Electrochemical Capacitor Booster I, Cap Booster 400
Large Micro Jump Drive
Drone Link Augmentor II
Drone Link Augmentor II
Large 'Solace' Remote Armor Repairer
425mm Prototype Gauss Gun, Antimatter Charge L
425mm Prototype Gauss Gun, Antimatter Charge L
425mm Prototype Gauss Gun, Antimatter Charge L
Large Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Large Sentry Damage Augmentor I
Large Capacitor Control Circuit I
Hammerhead II x5
Hobgoblin II x5
Warden II x5
Garde II x5
Salvage Drone I x5

Why a big space potato like the Dominix? Firstly, there's a logical progression in Gallente skill training through smaller ships like the Vexor and Myrmidon. You can use a lot of the same basic modules and skills for your tank, guns, and drones as you work your way up. As missioner ships go, the Dominix is on the cheaper end, and it can be skilled for at tech 1 within 30 days, so even if you progress onto something more blingy, it's a good ship to aim for if you're interested in missioneering.

Most of my DPS with this boat comes from the drones, which is par for the course with the Domi. Longer range sentry drones hit out comfortably to the 102km drone command limit using two Drone Link Augmentors (and 7 mil SP in drones, mind). Sentries are fantastic for DPS, but they can get a bit painful to come back for and pick up, especially in a slowboat like this, so you end up sitting in space while they go to work. When I first started on a battleship I tried flying without using them, with heavy drones instead, and it's WAAAY tougher tactically.

The Droneboat in action

My standard tactic for a l4 mission in this ship is pretty simple: if the 'rats are within 50km of the warp-in point, I microjump out to around 100km range, load up some Iron or Lead charges, drop the Wardens and start picking off the frigates while they are busy moving straight towards me, working my way up in size until everything has gone pop. So long as you carefully manage pocket aggro, most missions can be completed this way without ever needing to warp out.

I fly for Gallente corps at the moment, which means a lot of Serpentis, who basically can't hit you at 100km. Angel Cartel can be a pain - especially the bonus room on Angel Extravaganza, in which I often have to warp out after taking out the turrets, which means a 5 minute slowboat back through all the other rooms. Another note on corporations: unlike the Eve Uni fit with Energized Adaptive Nano Membranes providing across the board resistance increases, I fit two active modules. The two in the example are tailored to Serpentis - Thermic and Kinetic - but I swap them out based on the advice of Eve Survival.

You'll notice I have Salvage Drones in there, but using Cap Booster 400 to keep that tank running means you'll only just have enough room for the MTU, so you definitely need to keep another looting ship handy. I have a Vexor fit with salvagers, and just use the Domi's salvage drones when you have some sort of slowboat distance to travel, or when you're in a fleet and helping to chew through a room before moving onto the next mission.

Flying with a Domi like this in a fleet is very powerful. It's got a solid tank so it's great to take aggro while newbro corp-mates bring in cruisers or destroyers and pick off targets. Multiple Domis can tear through tough missions like AE or the Epic Arcs. I'll be trying the Gallente arc for the first time soon, so look forward to reading about that :)