I’m an organization and planning freak. Before I can really get going with anything, I must have a plan. EVE Online (EO) is a playground for people with that kind of approach to things. I completed my move to Arnon Sisters of EVE (SOE) station. I started doing missions with the local NPCs and began my first Story Arc Mission. I like these arc missions. They provide a cohesive story that links the activity together more like the traditional quest chains found in fantasy MMOs.
When Tipa gets her mining operation under way, I’m going to be her security / wing-man. We’re not anticipating PVP. I will mostly be there to deal with the rats and do salvaging. Regardless, one of my personal concerns was that I don’t have a lot of combat experience. When I was flying frigates, I had to pay attention during missions. I jumped from frigate to cruiser while still doing level 1 missions. I could do nothing but launch my drones and complete a mission. It’s that’s simple in a Vexor.
I’ve tried doing them all in the Tristan but that gets tricky and sometimes impossible to do in a single encounter. The higher quality missions I’m receiving tend to have waves of NPCs. Warping in and out of the area to complete it with a Tristan consumes time. To do the missions in a ship that’s more level appropriate, which will give me more practice at active combat, I purchased a Destroyer (Catalyst).
Actually, I purchased multiples. I want to run missions in them and change over to doing my salvaging in them too. Because I’m organization crazy, I then spent most of my EO time refitting my ships for basic PVE, NPC ratting and protection, full salvage, PVE + salvage and eventual FW. The new fitting features added with the Apocrypha expansion really shine in this area.
I was able to fit the ships, take them out for a test drive and then save the configuration I liked best. If you want to start from scratch, you can completely strip all fittings with one click. You can also re-fit a ship with one click from configurations you’ve saved, if you have the equipment available. This is great for me. Once I like a particular fitting, I always keep two to four copies of the equipment in my hanger for quick replacement. To me, there’s nothing more annoying than losing a ship and then having to fly all over the place, buying equipment to refit it before you can get back to what you were doing. This is never truer than when engaged in PVP. For someone like me, who routinely keeps multiple copies of ships and fittings, these new features are wonderful.
I’m all set and ready to rock out of Arnon SOE. Running PVE missions continues. I’ve started ratting in the asteroid belts for better salvage than what a lot of the missions NPC wrecks drop. I’m looking into my options for small-scale (personal consumables) manufacturing. My ships are ready to fly with and defend Tipa’s mining operation once she gets started. And we have our Wednesday static PVE group. Not bad for a few evenings of effort, I’m locked-n-loaded in EVE Online.
