Expanding my invention prospects

I may not have been able to manufacture many drones and modules from the two Tech II BPCs I was able to invent but the few I am able to produce all sell quite quickly at prevailing market prices, which seems to offer me a decent enough profit to consider my first Tech II opportunity a success. Ever one to be distracted I start to think about what other technologies I can try to invent.

The limiting factor for invention at the moment is the supply of datacores. Although I could buy any required datacores from the market they would really cut in to the profits, particularly considering the luck involved in the invention process. Ideally, I am looking for modules that use the same datacores and skills that my current invention jobs use, or at least share one of them so that I don't need to diversify my R&D efforts too widely. Or maybe not a module, but a spaceship.

I have two Caldari ship BPOs in the research facility at the moment having their material requirements examined, and both BPOs require the mechanical engineering datacore for invention, which I am already accumulating. Both ships also only need the Caldari starship engineering datacore as the secondary datacore, which means I will only need to work on one more source of datacores to increase my invention opportunities further. On top of that, because of the time it is taking to research the ME of the BPOs I may be able to invent and manufacture a Tech II variant of the ships before a standard Tech I can be built efficiently.

Lai Dai, the Caldari starship designers, seems the obvious choice to work with for datacores. Being of Caldari descent myself has already been a benefit as I've had a Lai Dai R&D agent working for me on mechnical engineering for a while, and it is quite simple to find a second agent who will start accumulating Caldari starship engineering datacores for me. I visit the low-level Core Complexion, Inc. R&D agent working on electronic engineering for me, grab all the datacores I can from him and then cancel the research. I have been working on electronic engineering for the longer than other research areas and still have dozens of those datacores ready for use, as well as a new level four agent working in that discipline, so I am happy to switch my limited access to R&D agents to one that produces starship datacores.

It is only when I make it to the Lai Dai agent that I realise my omission. I don't just need access to the R&D agent but I also need the relevant research skill, otherwise I won't understand any of the results. It's a bit of a slip but probably a good one, as cutting off research with the previous agent pretty much obliges me to get the ten million ISK skill book, so that I can start on the new field of research, rather than dithering about spending the ISK. I splash out on the skill book, quickly training to level one before talking to the agent again, who is now happy to start researching Caldari starship engineering.

I'll get some BPCs of my two ships, so that I have them handy, before continuing their ME research for general manufacturing use. A bit more work with Core Complexion, Inc. should see my standings rise to allow access to all their level four R&D agents, after which I can move my attentions towards improving my standing with Lai Dai. I may have got the inventing bug.

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Tags: eve online, industry, invention, mmorpg, penny ibramovic

Tweaking my Guitar Hero drum kit

Rather than get more frustrated at missed notes on my Guitar Hero: World Tour fake plastic drum kit I take some time out from practice to get the kit set up as best I can. This involves a little modification beyond changing the sensitivities, as detailed in a guide to modifying the Guitar Hero drums, handily linked to by Zoso using his amazing knowledge of fake plastic instruments. The guide mentions using hot glue to add a firmer physical connection between the transducer and the drum pad, which gives a better conducting path for the vibrations to be picked up.

I don't have a hot glue gun, so instead mix up the alternative methods of securing the transducers with tape and stuffing cardboard in to the cavities, on the understanding that it is improving the conduction path that is important. I am not going to use masking tape, though, as it perishes far too quickly, within a matter of hours, and leaves behind a horrible residue. I prefer gaffer tape, as it is strong, sticky and long-lasting. Again, however, the gaffer tape has a habit of leaving behind a residue, so rather than securing the transducers solely with tape I will mask the transducers with cardboard and use the gaffer tape to hold the cardboard in place. The gaffer tape should give a secure fastening for the stiffer cardboard to provide the necessary conduction path. All I need to do is take the fake plastic drum kit apart and apply the patches, so to speak.

The cymbals are easy enough to modify, the pads being separate from the main kit and the covers held by only a few screws. I would be reluctant to modify the main drum pads, because of the extra complexity involved, if it weren't for the blue pad exhibiting some dead spots that increasing the sensitivity doesn't fix. With some care I rest the unit upside down and remove all the screws, lifting off the base once that is done. It turns out not to be particularly problematic, merely time-consuming and a little fiddly, although the right screwdriver is definitely required. A bit more cardboard is securely stuck over the blue pad's transducer and I put everything back together again.

Before I attempt to play another track I use Red Octane's drum tuner software to ensure that all pads are registering adequately. The orange cymbal, where I had all the trouble before, is now fine. Whereas I had no complaints with the yellow cymbal before I have apparently changed it enough to warrant an increase in sensitivity, but this is easily accomplished. The modification to the blue pad shows a significant increase in sensitivity, where a simple strike now produces a double-hit, so a reduction is required. The remaining, unmodified pads are still registering well, so I disconnect the tuner software and try playing through a few songs.

A bit of practice shows that striking the blue and green pads together can wobble the shaky orange cymbal stalk and cause a fake hit to register, so a reduction in sensitivity is required on the orange pad. Otherwise I am getting a good response. There are still a few of dead spots on the kit, on the orange and yellow cymbals and the blue drum pad, but nothing serious. The dead spots are enough out of the sweet spots of the pads that I will take any false negatives as indication to improve my accuracy rather than the kit not being suitably sensitive.

As far as drum practice is concerned, I have worked my through all of the medium difficulty gigs in Guitar Hero: World Tour. I have aced a handful of songs and continue to show improvement in my playing when practicing difficult or favourite tracks, which is quite pleasing and a whole load of fun. I have tentatively moved on to the hard difficulty setting, playing through the first two or three gigs, although I mostly remain on the medium setting for practice on the more challenging songs. I am finding the learning curve for the drums in the game to be excellent, with the later songs on one setting approximating the difficulty of the early songs on the next higher setting, leading to a smooth progression in expectation of player ability.

One problem I have is in trying to work out which sets I have played at medium difficulty setting and which I have not, as the sets open up more quickly than I can play through them. Whilst this method of unlocking content allows me to play sets with songs I enjoy rather than working through them all methodically it is not helping me find what I need to do to unlock achievements. I then notice the skull on each gig poster, styled according to the highest difficulty setting on which the gig has been played successfully. Quickly skipping across all the posters confirms this is the indicator of completion at a certain level. It's quite obvious once known and looked for. I can use the skull as a quick way of tracking my progress through the hard difficulty setting.

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Tags: console, drumming, guitar hero, xbox 360

Getting back to encounter missions

I'm still working with my manufacturing agent for Core Complexion, Inc., aiming to improve my standings to gain access to level four R&D agents so that I can get a steady stream of datacores and continue pushing invention jobs through the laboratory. Most of the missions given to me by the agent are simple courier tasks, where the biggest decision I have to make is which ship to take, dependent on piloting the most agile ship with a hold big enough to haul the required volume of cargo. It's not more interesting than it sounds.

That courier missions are simpler and quicker to complete probably means there is some balance involved in the standing gains, but if they took the same amount of time and offered the same gains in standing I would rather fly a couple of encounter missions than a dozen courier missions. Encounter missions are more challenging, require interaction and experience, and are a more interesting use of my time. I can also refine all the mission loot in to minerals for manufacture, which works out much better than either having to find cheap minerals on the market or going to mine the ore for myself.

In the quiet time warping from stargate to stargate I browse the list of Core Complexion, Inc. agents to see if I can get a change of pace, but there are precious few opportunities to work for their internal security or non-existent navy in the hope of getting more encounter missions. However, there is an agent in the personnel division and, in my experience of EVE Online, personnel is more about resolving differences with brutal space combat than a chat over coffee and biscuits.

A quick check of an on-line resources confirms my suspicions about the higher probability of getting encounter missions with a personnel agent than my current manufacturing one and, to clinch the move, the new agent is in the region of my manufacturing and trade hub, which will make monitoring the market much more convenient. I throw eveything in to my pod and start moving ships again.

Of course, after I introduce myself the first mission I am given is a courier job, such is the bitter humour of a New Eden agent, but then I start getting encounter missions. It is not long before I am blowing up rats, enemies of the alliance, and a restaurant that once served the agent cold soup, taking out the Marquis of Granby to salvage the loot afterwards. I am going to be much happier and more productive working for this agent, I can tell.

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Tags: eve online, mmorpg, penny ibramovic

Putting a price on Tech II invention

I have a couple of Tech II BPCs! I had better make modules out of them, so that I can begin to reap the profits of my medium-term industrial venture. Checking the manufacturing tab of the BPC I get a list of the parts required to produce the drones and modules, which have a few more components than only the simple minerals that Tech I modules require. I understand that although some items are bought from NPCs there are components that can be manufactured. However, I am far too eager in my renewed pursuit of Tech II production to want to waste time now buying new BPOs, putting them in for ME research and manufacturing them, so I'll just hit the market and buy what I need.

The prices for the Tech II manufacturing components are all relatively cheap too. At least, compared to the market price of Tech II items the actual manufacturing costs are but a small percentage. Of course, the real cost is in the invention. Even ignoring that an expensive data interface needs to be used, the datacores are consumed and the random nature of invention means there is no guarantee of a useful Tech II BPC at the end of the process. The datacores, wasted or otherwise, cannot be considered as 'free', because although they only cost time to accumulate—and passive time at that, like skill training—they can be traded on the market. If it is possible to sell the datacores for more profit than manufacturing Tech II items then it would be of more benefit to sell them for others to use. So even with the cheap component cost of Tech II manufacture I am left with the complication of calculating the market price of my manufactured modules.

Working out the market price for Tech I items is mostly straightforwards. I take the cost of the minerals used in manufacture, add the production cost of the installation, and include a margin both to include a worthwhile profit as well as to cover the costs associated with buying and researching the BPO, with the latter cost being a minor complication. Even ignoring that the R. A. M. component is only partially used in manufacture, having to account for the random nature of invention and the arbitrary cost of the datacores makes setting a market price for Tech II items somewhat more complex. Well, except that it doesn't, not really.

One benefit about being a latecomer to Tech II production is that the market prices have already been set. The datacores are traded on the market for fairly standard prices, giving me a good indication of the involved invention costs, and even if the datacores weren't traded the Tech II items themselves are freely available everywhere. It is almost immaterial what costs I think I am absorbing because if I try to sell my products at a price far above the market price I won't make any ISK, and I would be a fool to sell far below the market price, even if I were able to delude myself in to believing my costs were that low. I don't actually need to work out the market price of the Tech II items in any detail, I only need to determine whether the current market price is reasonable for me to sustain production.

It could be argued that working out my costs and deciding the market price is sustainable are the same calculation, which I suppose they are, but at least the current market price gives me an extra datum point. Or, at the very least, I can throw the items on the market at a nominal, competitive cost and leave the calculations until later, perhaps when I have more invention jobs complete to determine the success probability with more accuracy. Some rough figures indicate that if my modules sell I should make enough ISK to cover my initial costs as well as the rather nebulous cost of the datacores, given a slightly better rate of invention success on subsequent jobs.

Content with the outlook I install my two manufacturing runs and scan the market for the systems offering most potential profit, happy to continue my efforts towards industry and Tech II invention. I am even already thinking of expanding, as I once again browse the market for BPOs. Maybe I can manufacture a Tech II spaceship or two.

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Tags: eve online, industry, invention, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, tech ii

Tech II invention doesn't greet you with open arms

With some time available in high-sec space to run my industrial operations I think it is perhaps time to try inventing some Tech II modules, if only to convince myself that I am not simply flitting from one short-term goal to another and am making overall progress in my desired aims in New Eden. Checking my journal I see that I have accumulated enough research points with my three R&D agents to provide datacores of both types for a small number of invention jobs, it's now a matter of getting everything together.

Collecting the datacores involves a bit of flying around to meet with each agent, which is simple enough. I have a small number of suitable BPCs lying around that I made a while back for convenience. All that's left, checking the invention tab of the BPC, is the data interface. From what I've read, I understand the data interface is not consumed with the invention job, so I only buy one for each of the two designs I intend to put through the invention process for now. Despite all the much appreciated advice from some wonderfully helpful capsuleers I am still a little unsure about some aspects of inventing, partly because it has been a while since I started towards invention, but there is no better way to learn than doing it myself.

With everything in place my first discovery is that I need a specific installation for invention, separate to manufacturing. The science and industry interface makes locating one straightforwards, though. When prompted to select an installation I simply expand the desired location to include the current solar system, which then shows me all suitable installations in that range. If none had been found I could have expanded it to the constellation or region, but an invention laboratory is available in my current system, with available slots, which is splendid.

I throw all my datacores, BPCs and the two data interfaces in my ship to make the short trip to the new station and open the science and industry interface again. I can now select an appropriate installation and available slot and can move on to the other options. I could choose an item to base the invention on but choose not to for now. I think that the higher meta-level the base item is the better the Tech II BPC will turn out, but as the modules with a good meta-level can cost millions individually I'll skip this for now. I also do not have a decyptor, which Karox Lominax's guide shows can affect different aspects of the resultant BPC, but that too is optional. I'll keep with the basics for now.

It looks like I can install my job. I am given a quote from the installation and an estimated completion time, both of which are satisfactory, so I agree to the quote and my job gets installed. Now I see better how the process works. A single invention job consumes a single BPC and the necessary datacores, but the data interface is only required to start the job and remains in my hangar even as the invention job runs. This allows me to install further invention jobs that need the same data interface, up to my skill-based limit of simultaneously allowed research jobs. With a good number of cores and BPCs I do just that, filling up my quota of research slots with invention jobs.

The invention jobs I am running are fairly quick to run too, which is also helped by the immediate availability of invention installation slots. Even though I hit my research job cap I only have a couple of hours to wait before I can deliver the inventions, both seeing whether I produce any Tech II BPCs and freeing up the slots for more invention jobs, until I run out of datacores. Or, judging by my initial luck, until I get depressed at throwing expensive datacores down the drain. My entire first batch of invention jobs produces no results, but I know that there is a random element in inventing so I remain undeterred and install a second batch hoping for better luck.

And I get better luck when I deliver my second batch. Although it is still a poor return on investment I manage to produce two Tech II BPCs, one for Tech II drones and one for a Tech II module! Both BPCs are delivered with a maximum run of ten units and negative ME/PE values of four. It's not a great success, but it is still a success. All I have to do now is put the BPCs in for manufacture. Everything is coming together nicely.

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Tags: eve online, industry, invention, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, tech ii

Removing server boundaries

Twice recently, for City of Heroes and World of Warcraft, I find getting together with a friend in an MMORPG thwarted by being on different servers, even on a different continent and different Supermicro computers. Even if there were a way to transfer a character to another server my friends list or guild would not follow and either situation would only result in a continued separation of players. I am hoping the time will come when disparate server populations and continent separations will no longer be necessary and anyone can play with anyone else in the same game, and perhaps this can be made possible with some clever and innovative use of instancing and phasing.

I have to admit that I know little about the hardware that runs MMORPGs, so I shall state some assumptions I use. Each server holds its own population, with separate servers used for instanced areas, where characters can be passed between world and instance servers. I assume EVE Online is able to maintain a single population by its use of stargates that provide a convenient method of breaking up the virtual galaxy in to manageable server-sized chunks, essentially making each constellation instanced, with exceptions for highly populated single systems like Jita and where large-scale combats are occurring.

Along with the standard instance model, where a separate instance of the environment is loaded for each group to offer an individual experience, World of Warcraft has now shown some excellent use of 'phasing'. With phasing, the same PCs, NPCs and mobs can inhabit the same virtual area with only characters in the same phase being able to interact. Phasing allows different realities to be presented to different players depending on their relative experiences in the game world and makes for a much richer environment. As it also allows many characters to exist in the same virtual area whilst only displaying a subset of the total number of characters I wonder if phasing could be used to remove server boundaries.

The game could still use multiple game servers, to cope with large populations, but present itself to the client as a single server. Logging on, the player is shown his character and a selection of the population that is 'in-phase' with him. Any other character is 'out-of-phase' and so cannot be seen or interacted with directly. Friends can be made either through external or internal channels and a friends list maintained, as well as guilds forming. When this inevitably occurs the server starts to select characters to show in-phase that are connected to your own character, either from the guild or friends list, such that the people who you are most likely to interact with are always available, phasing out distant and unconnected characters to maintain optimal populations.

When a mature character—that is, a character in a guild and a populated friends list—logs in an initial network of phasing can be established by the server. A new character can be distinguised as being either from a new account or an established account. The character from the new account can be assigned an initial arbitrary phasing, the one from an established account can use guild and friends list information to determine a likely pattern of required phasing for the session.

My first thought is that as characters get phased-in other characters with no connection can be phased-out to maintain the overall 'server' population, but that is perhaps not being ambitious enough. Instead of attempting to maintain an overall server population of phased-in characters, each zone or region in the game can have an 'ideal' population figure. Rather than deciding that, for example, the Northrend server has a maximum connection count, instead work it out per region or city. Determine that Dalaran can hold a population of a certain number, before causing latency issues or being too crowded, and then spread the total number of players currently in Dalaran between the relevant number of phased instances to meet that ideal population in each instance, respecting guild and friend connections.

We are likely to see on any given server most of the population crowded in the current levelling environment, with sparsely populated areas in the areas holding older content. Plenty of players have already lamented the lonely process that is levelling in a mature game, but imagine if the entire game population, across all servers, could be taken in to account with phasing. The designers set a population cap on a low-level region like Westfall and rather than each server only containing one or two lonely alts the entire game population is split amongst a few phased instances, creating lively and vibrant zones to quest in. Preference, but not exclusive access, can even be given to phase together characters within a level range margin for the region to help prevent problems with balance, for example, should a guild take advantage of a scenic area for a meeting.

Fewer instances of Westfall and similar regions of low population would need to be run, along with more instances of heavily populated areas like Dalaran and Icecrown, whilst maintaining similar visible population levels for each player. And settlements and quest areas can have different ideal populations, so that cities can still bustle without quest locations being over-camped.

There are some obvious problems. Selectively showing characters from guilds and friends lists could become difficult when friends of friends of guild members all come together, but I imagine it can be reduced to a solved mathematical network or graphs problem, and friends lists are already limited. A network also could be simplified by examining frequency of communications to determine stale relationships. The problem of character namespace across the entire game should be a simple matter of allowing extended names. The main issue may be how to handle chat servers, as a hugely popular game could have an unmanageable number of players in the same zone. One idea would be to restrict the locality of the general chat channels, maybe even to have a chat channel character limit, and rely on custom channels and better designed group configuration and selection tools.

As for phasing characters in and out, which would likely have to be handled by passing them across instance servers, this could be done intelligently. A population could have dual minimum, optimum and maximum settings, where there is a server limit and a phase limit. The server limit is the number of characters the server is capable of managing, the phase limit the ideal number of characters to inhabit each zone, with the server limit being much larger than the phase limit. This should make feasible phasing characters in and out as required by changes in player networks, with server limits handled by re-evaluating optimal player network phasings during occasional instance changes.

It would no doubt take some nifty code to implement a single phased reality across a server cluster, but being able to remove any boundaries to friends playing together as well as addressing issues with relative population densities must be a tempting reason to overcome any technological hurdles. Not only that, but there is surely a huge incentive in allowing everyone to play on a single server, removing all boundaries currently restricting friends in the ever-shrinking internet-enabled and blog-connected gaming world from playing together, as a game to get this right would have a distinct advantage over the old model of multiple geographical regions and servers.

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Tags: mmorpg

One-way to known space

I find myself alone at the corporation's POS in w-space with information that a new wormhole to known space has opened up and that we should start shipping out, preparing to move to a new system. The wormhole leads to low-sec Caldari space, but only a couple of hops to high-sec, making it quite suitable for me. As it is a couple of hours before the daily galactic shut-down I consider it a good time to get myself out and to try to haul some ore with me.

Scouting ahead seems like a good idea, as I don't relish finding out how safe the low-sec systems are between the wormhole and high-sec space in a cargo ship filled with valuable ore that belongs to the coporation. I am not convinced that my Drake is the best ship to be navigating low-sec either, but at least it is my ship and if I get caught and destroyed I won't have too much paperwork to fill out. Besides, with a solid tank and plenty of warp core stabilisers I should be relatively safe. I warp to the wormhole and jump through to low-sec, which turns out to be surprisingly busy.

My first task is to get my ship in to a safe-spot, preferably one where I can monitor the relevant stargate to the next system in my route. The wormhole exit itself is fairly safe, being an arbitrary point that needs to be scanned to be found, but it is possible that other capsuleers already know its location so it is best that I move. I have my EVE Online Strategic Maps handy, offering an overview of the systems and linking stargates at a glance. The constellation I have jumped in to through the wormhole couldn't be much better situated for getting out in one piece. There are plenty of stargates connecting the low-sec systems together and two potential exits to high-sec. Indeed, one of the low-sec systems even has a gate to each of the high-sec systems, so I am confident that there will be an exit route for me.

It is fairly straightforwards to create some arbitrary safe-spots sitting within scanning distance from the stargates, although I find I have to get relatively close to provide some separation between the gates and nearby asteroid fields. When positioned, I get an accurate reading on what ships are on the gate and which are just in the general chunk of space I'm scanning. All gates appear quite clear and it is not long before I am back in high-sec space with a handful of safe-spots in the low-sec systems bookmarked for safe travel on subsequent trips. It is only now that I realise my first task should have been to bookmark this side of the wormhole when I jumped.

I have only just been rewarded a decoration by the corporation for my services to wormhole operations, and as it is my first decoration I am really proud. Then, like a muppet, I forget one of the fundamentals. My plan to start hauling materials out of w-space falters when I make the newbie mistake of failing to have a bookmark on both sides of a wormhole, a mistake I have successfully avoided making so far. At least I am 'stuck' in high-sec known space rather than deep in w-space, I suppose, and as the wormhole is known to others in the corporation I just need to wait until more people turn up before continuing the operation. For now, I may as well head back to my base of industrial operations and take care of business, putting modules on the market and creating new manufacturing jobs to replenish stocks.

As luck would have it, later on in the day, when everyone is around, a wormhole leading directly to high-sec space is found. My earlier error is forgiven by the vagaries of wormholes. Ships are mobilised, the POS is dismantled and the task of moving everything back to high-sec is in full swing. I grab a Badger and make the trip to help with what I can, ending up taking a ship maintenance hangar and packaged ship back through to known space with me. I believe the plan is to find a new system in w-space to start exploiting. Although I don't know how soon the second operation is expected to begin I am certainly going to volunteer for further adventures.

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Tags: eve online, low-sec, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, scanning, w-space

On considering a second build for my warrior

In the midst of the Azerothian midsummer celebrations a guild friend invites me in to a group that is heading to the Slave Pens, where Ahune the Frost Lord awaits. As we get coordinated and ready to fight it is interesting to find myself at odds again because of my preferred rôle, like when I felt I had to steal tanking duties from a shieldless warrior. I travel to the Slave Pens to be the tank, maintaining high threat and soaking up damage as others deal the damage, so am a little nonplussed when the strategy is announced that the warlock's Felguard will tank Ahune.

It is my own expectations to blame for my confusion. Despite being an experienced protection-build tanking warrior I am far from renowned as one. I am also joining a rather tight-knit group and they clearly have a certain way of achieving their goals, one that no doubt works quite well for them. It must be difficult to shift in to a different way of approaching familiar situations, in the same way that I find myself almost lost when asked to do anything but tank. But after some clarification and volunteering we get an effective dynamic working, and Ahune is as efficiently defeated as a 70th level world event boss should be by five 80th level characters.

The low difficulty of the encounter means that however I approach the fight we will be in little danger of failing, but my concern is more that the specific mechanic of my chosen rôle is to generate threat and that mechanic simply does not transfer well to a more general situation. I have even trained myself in the single rôle to the point where I don't know any high-damage attacks that also do not generate large amounts of threat. I find I cannot modify my combat so that I am not automatically causing singificant threat without simultaneously being close to useless. This is when I realise I finally have a good reason to consider training in dual-builds for my warrior.

When the option of dual-builds for characters was released I thought it might be a good idea to have both a tanking build and a DPS build for both of my characters, warrior and death knight. But the more I thought about it the less it seemed necessary, as I would call on my warrior if I wanted to tank, my death knight to DPS. Whilst I could no doubt crank out some higher damage with a specific DPS build for my warrior I have no problem fighting in defensive stance when outside of a group, enjoying the disruptive options available to me fighting with a one-handed weapon and shield.

A dual-build is even less attractive to my death knight, even with a frost talent build. The switch between presences is much more flexible than a warrior's stances and Gnomesblight can become an effective tank, with more armour and threat generation, simply by changing to frost presence, whilst attacking in blood presence produces excellent DPS without excess threat. Whilst my death knight can happily fulfil the dual rôles of tank and DPS with a single talent selection and simple change of presence, my warrior doesn't have the benefit of being a class as polished as one introduced with the second expansion. A second talent build is required for my warrior to have the extra proficiency endowed by talent-specific abilities for both tanking and DPS, which will give me the versatility for convenient grouping outside of my small circle of friends.

It is time to revisit the arms or fury talent trees and devise a suitable build that would complement my tanking abilities. It won't be straightforwards, though. Just as switching rôles with a frosty death knight is a simple matter of changing presences the spell rotation also only needs minor adjustments, but a DPS warrior and protection warrior will be quite different in nearly every aspect. The process of creating a second build will be educational and involve some training time. Looking on the positive side, at least it is not an urgent requirement, so I can take my time learning the ropes, and I have the gold to spare to pay for the dual-build training, now that I have my swift flying mount and cold-weather flying paid for.

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Tags: gnomesblight, mmorpg, sapphire, world of warcraft

A passive tank must still be quite active

Stopping only to pick up and fit a new configuration for my Drake, as well as some warp stabilisers on the sensible suggestion from a colleague, I find myself on the border of low-sec space, heading back to w-space. My cloaked escort helps me get through the couple of low-sec systems without any threat and I am soon jumping through the wormhole to 'our' w-space system. It is good to be back and I am quite looking forwards to seeing how my new Drake set-up will work. I hope there are plenty of sleepers ready to be woken in to an agitated state. Indeed, it seems that a suitable site has been scanned and found already. My escort changes ships in to a Ferox battlecruiser, I change my fitting to replace the warp core stabilisers and install a remote shield repairer in a high slot for my Caldari companion, and we head off for adventure and profit.

Warping in to the scanned area we encounter a fairly standard perimeter site, with sleeper frigates and cruisers patrolling to repel intruders. The first wave poses little bother but when a battleship turns up with some more cruisers we warp out to take a little time to let our shields replenish. Warping back in creates a problem when a large and quite ugly rock gets in the way. Luckily, my on-board collision avoidance systems are working. I get pushed away violently from the rock and begin to re-engage the sleepers. My colleague isn't quite so lucky, however, as her Ferox snags on an outcropping. It seems more of an embarrassing annoyance than a hindrance until we want to warp out again owing to heavy incoming fire.

My Drake gets away cleanly and the shields get a chance to recharge nice and quickly with nothing draining them, but the Ferox is still stuck. Hearing this, I turn the Drake around to get back in to the sleeper site and provide covering fire, but the Drake is not particularly agile and I return to see a Ferox wreck and my colleague's pod floating alongside. The ugly rock is a harsh mistress. The pod warps back to the POS and with only my battlecruiser left to engage a sleeper battleship and two cruisers I turn tail and warp back out to a planet, at least to let my shields recharge further.

I am asked if I can at least get to the wreck of the Ferox to recover the cargo. I am happy to do this but mention that my hold is mostly full of missiles and will be unlikely to be able to carry much. I give it a go anyway and warp back in, a dozen kilometres away from the wreck. As I push through the profound emptiness of space that my battlecruiser manages to make feel like treacle, a smaller ship warps in and uses a tractor beam to pull the wreck towards it, my colleague wisely having commandeered a salvaging destroyer to recover what she can. However, the sleepers don't much like this and start shooting on the destroyer, so I lock-on and light up all my launchers to provide a more threatening target for them to focus on.

My diversionary tactics work and I am soon under fire from all three ships. Despite the battleship being the largest source of damage it will also take much longer to destroy compared to the cruisers. My experience tells me to reduce the number of sources of damage as quickly as possible, so I concentrate all my damage on one of the cruisers. The wrecked Ferox is salvaged and the destroyer safely warps away but as my shield is holding and the cruiser is almost destroyed my bravado, and curiosity about my capabilities, holds me to the battle. I bombard the second cruiser with missiles as my shield continues to deplete, not so quickly to present a significant threat but enough so that I align my ship to a planet in case I need to warp away in haste.

The second cruiser is destroyed, leaving only the battleship. I feel confident now and reload my launchers for a full onslaught on the remaining sleeper ship. I am bolstered by my shields not only holding but now steadily recharging under quite heavy fire from the battleship, my new fitting clearly working well. I change my ship's alignment from the planet and towards the battleship, closing the distance between us in the hopes of being able to use my drones to increase my DPS a little. But drones are not needed, as once the armour of the sleeper battleship is depleted its hull is rapidly ripped apart and the sleeper perimeter site is cleared.

All that remains is to clean up after ourselves, for which I jump in to salvaging destroyer to retrieve all the cargo from and salvage the sleeper wrecks. I am quite happy with the new tank on the Drake, as it took an awful lot of damage without failing and with much less management needed because of its entirely passive nature. The three-and-a-half million ISK or so that the shield amplifiers cost is ISK well spent. My only problem now is working out what to do with the spare capacitor charge the Drake has, all 99% of it. It seems like such a waste.

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Tags: drake, eve online, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, sleepers, w-space

Refitting my Drake battlecruiser

My last undertaking before departing for w-space was completing a storyline mission for Core Complexion, Inc. The promise of significant standings increase was enough not only to hold me back briefly in order to complete the mission but also to almost cause me to falter, as it gave me that moment I didn't want where I could think about my actions. Luckily, I was bold and ventured to the system with the wormhole and jumped through, having some exciting adventures for my efforts, either by battling sleepers or being hunted by PvP capsuleers.

Now I am back in high-sec Caldari space, at my Core Complexion, Inc. mission base. I remember the standings gain from the storyline mission was impressive, enough for me to jot down the increase—4.37 to 5.21 according to my notes—if only because I also made a mental note some time back that I could move to a much improved quality level three agent once my standings reached around the 4.80 mark. Having surpassed that target and again ready to run missions I check what agents are available to me now. Sadly, the level four R&D agents that offer research relevant to my future proposed invention needs still won't work with me, but a level three agent with a quality level of 18 is only one system away from my current base, which will surely offer better gains for mission successes. It's time to move!

Moving a single system in high-sec is hardly a chore, even with several ships to transfer. Packing my shuttle, I take it inside my Badger II for the first trip, then realise that I will only be wasting time if I keep assembling and repackaging it at each end, and instead throw my naked pod one way to bring the rest of my ships back the other. My Cormorant salvager comes across, then Fido, my Retriever mining barge, before I pull the Drake battlecruiser, Lightness of Being, last. I leave my Osprey mining cruiser behind, what with it having been somewhat superceded by the mining barge. Maybe I should sell it.

Whilst I am making the move with my handful of ships I ponder on my Drake's performance in combat, both against the sleepers and in general, wondering if I could improve its fitting. The shields hold up to a considerable amount of damage but the active shield hardeners require foreknowledge of damage types or use of multiple invulnerability fields for broad-spectrum resistances to be effective. Unless I am lucky enough both to be facing a single damage type and to have the correct specific hardener installed the ship's capacitor is drained by running three or more hardeners within a few minutes, which can leave me vulnerable. I have neither luxury out in w-space. A quick look at some suggested fittings and a browse of the market makes me want to experiment, so I order some new modules and make a rare trip to Jita to pick them up.

I keep my large shield extenders and shield power relays, but instead of the active shield hardeners, despite most suggested configurations relying on them, I decide to try out shield amplifiers. Looking at the prices on the market and noting my healthy wallet I splash out to buy the Tech II versions of the modules, fitting four amplifiers in total, one for resistance to each type of damage. Fitting my first Tech II modules makes me tingle a little, as does knowing that my capacitor's stability is ensured now that my tank is entirely passive. The only question I have is how well it will absorb damage, which is rather crucial.

It is as I am in Jita that news reaches me of the appearance of a new wormhole leading to the POS and is not too deep in low-sec. I have manufacturing jobs either ready to be delivered or outstanding and a new agent to introduce myself to, but the lure of w-space hits me again and I request an escort through low-sec, abandoning my new mission base before I have even settled in. At least I'll soon get a chance to see how the new fitting for my Drake works, which isn't guaranteed when working with a manufacturing agent, even if I feel like Egon Spengler as I rush off to fight sleepers without giving my new configuration any kind of test. But convenient wormholes to specific w-space systems cannot be relied upon to appear regularly, which is why I am heading back in whilst I can.

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Tags: drake, eve online, mmorpg, penny ibramovic