Roles in Incursions

Basic roles for Vanguards

Below are the basic roles for Vanguard incursions, damage dealers and logistics, what their functions are and what you can do to improve them. The finer details on more specific roles are covered in the next section. These roles and definitions are based on how we run incursions within the EVE University Incursion Community and may not reflect that of public communities.

The suggested skills are listed in order of importance, from the skills having the most impact on your efficiency on top, to those that help but are less critical at the bottom. See recommended skills for more information about what skills you're expected to train.

Damage dealers

By spreading webs the fleet won't end up putting all webs on a single target, while still having more than one web on a target.

Primary function:

• Doing damage.
• Supply the dronebunny with combat drones.
• Applying webs.

Secondary functions:

• Backup capacitor transmitters (formerly known as energy transfers) and remote shield boosters (formerly known as shield transporters) if your ship has utility highslots.
• Backup logistic drones.
• Target painting.

Ways to improve

Skills:

• Tech two weaponry (increase your damage projection).
• Ship or subsystem skills (most ships have combat-related bonuses tied to the hull bonus).
• Gunnery support skills (increase your overall efficiency through increased tracking, range and damage).
• Target Management and Advanced Target Management (to be able to lock up more targets).
• Drone skills for tech two drones (increase drone damage) and maintenance bots (as backup).
• Biology and Cybernetics to be able to use drugs and implants to improve performance.
• See honing your skills for more information.

Ships & modules:

• Trade in your old ship for a better one (look for ships with two damage bonuses).
• Upgrade tech two damage and utility mods to faction mods (improve efficiency).

Gameplay:

• Listen to the fleet commander and target caller (follow tags and target calls).
• Lock up all primary and secondary targets as you land on grid (figure out order after).
• Assign your drones to the dronebunny as quickly as possible, they usually type 'DDD' when ready.
  • Make sure your drones are assigned to the dronebunny (hover over them in the drone window, says assigned).
  • Let the dronebunny know if your drones are idle (ask them to cycle guns).
• Keep pre-locking targets throughout the site (always have max number of enemies locked).
• Past four webs or painters (alternatively two bonused webs or painters) on a single target, the returns are largely wasted.
  • In general, if you have two webs put one on the primary and one on the secondary target.
  • If your primary target is already sufficiently webbed down, put your webs on the secondary or tertiary target. That way they will already be webbed down by the time you finish your primary target, speeding up the process considerably.
  • You can also keep an eye on whatever target the drones are shooting at and apply your webs on that.
  • In short, an unused module is a wasted module, so make sure yours is put to good use.
• When the Sansha rats spawn at a distance, they'll use their microwarpdrives to burn straight at you until they hit their preferred orbit. If you can lock them fast enough while they are doing so, you'll have a ship with blown up signature and no transversal (very easy to hit even for battleships).
• If you cannot hit the primary target (due to range issues or tracking issues), let the fleet commander know (mostly they'll tell you to hit secondary targets until the primary is within range or dead already).
• Add "Angular velocity" and/or "Velocity" columns to your overview, so you can sort by that and name (will sort primarily by name, then velocity).
• When in doubt what to shoot, look at the velocity columns and shoot whatever has the lowest velocity (it will be the target that is already webbed). This is especially useful in "free fire" mode when you're supposed to shoot all the remaining ships and you have no tags, just shoot them in order of velocity for greater efficiency.

Logistics

Primary function:

• Keeping the fleet alive with repairs and logistic drones.

Secondary functions:

• Capacitor transmitters if required (Basilisks and Guardians).
• Adding utility through remote sensor boosters or remote tracking computers.

Ways to improve

Skills:

• Logistics V (to be able to fit 5/1 instead of 4/2, use more utility midslots etc).
• Support skills (like Shield Emission Systems, Remote Armor Repair Systems, cap skills).
• Utility skills (Capacitor Emission Systems if you use capacitor transmitters, Sensor Linking if you use remote tracking computers).
• Droneskills (to be able to use light and medium tech two maintenance bots).

Modules:

• Upgrade to tech two remote shield boosters or armour repairs.
• Upgrade to tech two remote tracking computers and sensor boosters, perhaps even faction variants if you feel comfortable with the cost.
• Consider faction Power Diagnostic System modules (cheap and improve cap and powergrid as well as shield hit points).

Gameplay:

• As soon as you enter a site, start orbiting the beacon that sits in the middle of the fleet (for vanguards), or the anchor (assaults and up).
  • For vanguards, set a manual orbit range of 3,500 m - 4,000 m so that you orbit just outside the cluster of friendly ships. That way you don't risk bumping them while still being close enough to the fleet not to push enemies further out than necessary as well as to be within range of emergency remote shield boosters and capacitor transmitters.
  • For assaults and up you can allow yourself some further range, up to 7,500 - 10,000 m orbits to take full advantage of your speed.
• Keep in mind some people might call capacitor transmitters (CT) "energy transfers" or "ET" for short, as that was the name of those modules prior to the Odyssey expansion.
• Remember that your ship warps much faster than battleships, so remain stationary when you land on gates, don't align with the battleships. Just remember to align with the rest of the fleet when leaving the site.
• Make sure your logi buddy is always next to you landing on a gate, or arriving on a site.
  • Immediately let the fleet know if, for whatever reason, you'll be late on grid. Whatever you do, do not wait and see if you get stuck or not. Every second counts to get maintenance bots out and get emergency capacitor transmitters in place.
  • Similarly, if you don't see your logi buddy on grid, call out on mumble right away. Don't wait and see what happens. Get confirmation that the other logi is coming.
• Always prioritize your fellow logistics before anything else when repairing. If a logistics ship goes down, the entire fleet risk going down.
• On Guardians and Baslisks, even without incoming capacitor transmitters you have enough cap to run one remote shield booster or armour repairer indefinitely, possibly two pending on your skills. Remember that.
• If the one taking primary aggro is taking damage rapidly as you land on site, put one or two reppers on them before sorting out the capacitor transmitter chain (then apply the rest of your reppers if needed).
• Pre-lock everyone in Vanguards (Advanced Target Management III allows you to lock all 10 members).
• Locking from the watch list is incredibly fast and efficient (CTRL + leftclick).
• Have your fleet members on your overview, so you can see if you have members in the fleet that you haven't locked up (the icon will tell if it's a locket fleet member or not).
• Use only as many reppers as you need, don't over-repair because then you'll be too slow to respond to shifting aggro.
  • Make sure you use enough reps to initially fully repair all damage taken, stagger the reps if you have time.
  • Once the reps are under control, start taking reps off if they are no longer needed, but continue to fully repair all damage. This will allow you to quickly change repair focus without leaving your former recipient with unrepaired damage, as well as avoid pulling aggro from the new wave.
  • Drop reps at the end of each wave, don't tie them up on someone who isn't taking damage anymore.
• If you are jammed, always call out "<name> jammed, CT down" (leave out the CT down part if you don't have one).
• Keep an eye on the jamming icon over your hud-display, you're not always jammed until all Niarjas are dead, sometimes it's only one of them who are jamming you and you get unjammed long before all Niarjas are down.
• Always turn off your capacitor transmitters if your energy transfer buddy is jammed and pending on the situation request backup cap from your damage dealers.
• Keep the capacitor transmitters up and let them drop automatically when the fleet warps out of the site (that way you and the recipient will drop at the same time and neither will risk capping out).
• Pay attention to the watch list and your locked fleet members. You should be able to spot incoming damage even without broadcasts. Remind people who take damage to broadcast for repairs (if possible, hold off reps until they do so they learn ... but don't risk the safety of the fleet).

Specific roles

Below are roles you should assign to different people. By delegating these roles everyone will be able to focus on their role without being distracted. These roles and definitions are based on how we run incursions within the EVE University Incursion Community and may not reflect that of public communities.

Dronebunny

Primary function:

• Carry out your basic role as a damage dealer.
• Direct all drones on the field.

Requirements:

• Any non-logi can fill this role.

Ways to improve

Previous recommendations for damage dealers apply to the dronebunny as well. Being the dronebunny doesn't mean you should sacrifice your regular damage dealing capabilities.

Ships & modules:

• Never down-ship or compromise your ship's combat effectiveness in an attempt to be a better dronebunny.

Gameplay:

• Post 'DDD' (common tag for dronebunny) in fleet chat when it's time for people to launch their drones and assign them to you.
  • In Override Transfer Arrays you should wait until all the eysturs have spawned before you call it. Perhaps even call out on mumble when it's time, since you delay in launching drones for that site.
  • In the other sites, just post 'DDD' when you land on grid (not before, as you cannot assign drones to someone who isn't on grid).
• Pay attention to the fleet commander's target calls (they sometimes ask the dronebunny to hit separate targets).
  • The order is situational, see utilizing drones and flexible dronebunny for more information.
  • (MO)NSTRE is something you can try to remember. It stands for a basic order of killing enemy frigates; Niarjas, Schmaeels, Tamas, Renyns and Eysturs. That doesn't mean you always shoot frigates, or in that specific order. See the above two links and listen to your fleet commander's orders.
• Try to improve the efficiciency and responsiveness of the drones you command.
  • Use webs to increase the damage potential of the drones.
  • Group your weapons and stagger them if your cycle time isn't fast enough (improves reaction times for drones, as you'll be able to switch twice as fast).
• Keep an eye on idle drones.
  • Remember that drones react to any offensive module being activated (turrets, launchers, webs, painters etc).
  • Turn off and on your weapons a few times at the start of a site, to catch drones assigned to you after you last activated an offensive module.
  • Remember that not everyone has the same drone control range, so turn off and on weapons as enemies approach if you started shooting at a distance (most will have around 45km while some can have up to 60km drone control range).
  • Speak up in Mumble if you still see idle drones after checking those.
• Don't forget to manually control your own drones (or assign them to another damage dealer), they will not automatically follow you since you're the dronebunny.

Hacker/Scout

Primary function:

• Find empty sites and broadcast them for the fleet before they finish their current site.
• Hack the logistics tower in the Override Transfer Array sites.

Requirements:

• Able to operate the onboard Directional Scanner.
• Data Analyzer I or II fitted.
• Microwarpdrive fitted.

Ways to improve

Skills:

• Train Hacking to IV or V (to improve hacking chance).

Modules:

• Try to fit as many Data Analyzer I or II modules as you can to reduce the hacking time.

Gameplay:

• While ideally you should combine both hacking and scouting into one role, you can compromise by having members in the active fleet fit a propulsion module and a data analyzer. This is an undesirable compromise however, as it wastes precious utility midslots.
• You gain very little by excessively fitting a hacker/scout, keep this ship as cheap as possible (see Heron).
• Learn the positions of the logistics control towers (they are placed roughly 30km away from the warp-in point, position and activation sequence remains the same in all sites, beginning with the control tower to the left).
  • The hack lasts for about six minutes and is usually more than enough for a decent fleet to finish the site. The control tower to hack will be available in a repeating sequence; Control tower to your left, then the one to the right closest to the battletower, then the one to the right furthest away from the battletower.
• Wait until the fleet has landed on grid and are fully engaged, then jump in and burn to the tower and hack it. Remember to turn off the microwarpdrive once you reach the tower (usually one cycle is enough).
  • Right-clicking your microwarpdrive and selecting the option "Set auto-repeat off" is a good way to make sure you only run one cycle of the microwarpdrive, thus avoiding any embarrassing issues like forgetting to keep it on and capping out before you can hack the tower.
  • Warp out once you've hacked the tower and fly back to the gate (in case the fleet isn't fast enough to finish the site before the tower becomes functional again). Otherwise proceed and scout for the next site.

Offgrid booster

Primary function:

• Provide the fleet with Warfare links bonuses.

Requirements:

• Battlecruiser, Orca, Strategic Cruiser or Command Ships.
• Able to safely stay in space, uncloaked, links running (cannot be at war).

Ways to improve

Skills:

• Train Siege and Skirmish Warfare Specialist V (for tech two warfare links).
• Train Cybernetics V (for the mindlink implant).
• Train Warfare Link Specialist V (for Command Processor I modules to fit more links).
• Train Command Ships or Defensive Subsystem for Strategic Cruisers.
• Train Wing Command and Fleet Command to allow for multiple boosters.

Ships & Modules:

• Upgrade to tech two warfare links.
• Get a Republic Fleet Warfare Mindlink implant.
• Fit Command Processor I modules in order to run 5 - 6 links.
• Upgrade to a Strategic Cruiser or a Command Ship.

Gameplay:

• Find a suitable place to boost from, orbiting a station (easiest to dock), in a safespot (less visible) or some other place of your choosing.
• For larger sites, like assaults, headquarters and mothership sites, it makes sense to combine the primary booster with a secondary booster. A Damnation with an Imperial Navy Warfare Mindlink implant would make an excellent choice for a secondary booster, adding maxed armour and information boosts.

Ore runner

Primary function:

• Carry out your primary role (usually a logistics).
• Run the ore in Nation Mining Colony sites.

Requirements:

• 306 m3 room in your cargo hold for the Lyavite (255 units per stack).
• Able to fullfill their role while moving 50km+ away from the fleet (no unbonused energy transfers with 9km range to or from you).

Ways to improve

• Make sure your stack is exactly 255 units of Lyavite, no more, no less.
• Fit an afterburner or a microwarpdrive (the faster you are, the better).
• Make sure you have a stack of ore in your cargo hold (ask others to drop for you if not).
• Start running the ore according to your speed and how fast the fleet completes the site.
  • If you have no propulsion module, you might have to start at the end of the first wave or middle of the second.
  • If you have an afterburner, you can usually start after the last wave spawns or near the end of the second wave.

Picket

This role is only needed when the university is at war, public communities doesn't have anyone picketing.

Primary function:

• To keep an eye out for war targets.
• Also keep an eye out for griefers, suicide gankers etc.

Requirements:

• Able to see the local window.

Ways to improve

Ships & modules:

• Keep the ship cheap (shuttle, rookie ship, cheap frigate at the most).
• Fit a cloak on your cheap ship.

Gameplay:

• Pay attention. It's a very boring job but it has to be done. If you find yourself loosing focus, just say so and remove yourself. No harm, no foul. it's just that we'll count on you looking at local.
• If you don't have a cloak, sit docked in a station with the local window up, that'll be sufficient. Alternatively sit at a safespot in a cheap shuttle or a rookie ship.
• With a cloak you can sit on grid, in view of the gate you're picketing, to combine both local and a visual on the enemy capsuleer or fleet. That way you could not only announce to the fleet that a war target is coming, but also what ship he's flying.
• If war targets are active in the nearby systems, it would help if you reported to the fleet commander on a regular basis.
  • Whenever you hear the fleet commander call for the wing warp out of their current site, chime up and say something like "Picket reporting in, all quiet.
• If the corporation has very few members, keep them watch listed in your contacts list.
• Have the intel channel up, for extra information about enemy movements.
• If you're an out of corp character, make sure you have all the war targets set to a standing that's unique (-5 means they are orange, -10 red etc), so you don't risk confusing them with other personal corporations or characters you've set to a bad standing. For example, if you use -10 for your own personal use and -5 for uni war targets, you'll know that all the people with orange tags are uni war targets.
  • Be sure to update your standings when wars end or new wars become active.

Sniper

This role is not needed for vanguards, only for assaults and headquarter sites and to some lesser extent, the mothership site.

Primary function:

• Carry out your primary role as a damage dealer.
• Engage targets at long range, up to 150km.

Requirements:

• Able to lock and shoot targets up to 100 - 150km away.
  • For assault sites you'll need the maximum 150km range.
  • For headquarter sites the requirement is slightly less, 120km.
  • The mothership site has a much lower requirement with roughly 100km range needed (which can usually be filled by most regular damage dealers fitting long range weaponry like tachyons, railguns or artillery, even with short range ammo).

Ways to improve

Previous recommendations for damage dealers apply to the sniper as well.

Ships & modules:

• Try to aim for as much optimal range as possible, although not more than needed.
  • If your optimal is above 150km, try to use a different ammo type with less range and more damage and tracking, or swap out tracking enhancers for direct damage modules.
  • If you cannot get your optimal high enough, try to at least get your optimal plus half your falloff to 150km. With an optimal of 120km and a falloff of 60km for example, you'll perform at around 75% efficiency.
  • Bring short range ammunition as well, as you will be shooting normal targets once the sniper targets are dealt with.
• Some ships will have better base locking range than others, consider running your sensor booster unscripted if you get enough range without the targeting range script. That way you'll get a minor boost to your locking speed as well.

Gameplay:

• Pre-load the correct scripts before every site and wave.
  • Remember that you only need to keep the targeting range script in the sensor booster to have ships locked up at range. If you've swapped to scan resolution for faster locking speed during "short range" waves, you can pre-load the range scripts once you've locked up all the ships in the wave, in preparation for the next wave.
• Most fleet commanders will tag sniper targets with letters, A through Z.
  • Don't confuse Juliet (J) as a sniper target, it is a common tag for things you're not supposed to shoot.
  • Once you're done with primary sniper targets, swap to short range ammo and follow regular numeric tags.

Tagger

Primary function:

• Carry out your basic role as a damage dealer or logistics.
• Tag enemies for the fleet.

Requirement:

• At the very least, Leadership V, preferably Wing Command II - IV (to be Squad or Wing Commander).

Ways to improve

• Learn the order so you can tag on your own, without having to wait for the fleet commander's orders.
• Put up the first tag as you land in a pocket, before anything else, so people know what to shoot.
• Continue tagging the rest once the primary tag is up and you've started locking and/or shooting).
• Remember that not all fleet commanders have the same targeting order, so pay attention to your current fleet commander's preference.
• A common way to avoid too much tagging is to only tag one of the two, or two of the tree primary targets, leaving the last one untagged (and thus last in order).
• If someone arrives on-grid late, re-tag one of the ships. This will refresh all tags and make them visible to the newcomer.

Waitlist manager

Primary function:

• Carry out your basic role (preferably a damage dealer).
• Keep track of the waiting list.
• Double-check that people come in properly fitted ships (shield tanks for shield fleets, armour tank for armour fleets etc).
• Make sure out of corp alts and alumni do not have outstanding wars endangering the fleet.
• Since you typically have the boss star, watch Fleet History for disconnects and if the Wing Commander disconnects, thus removing wing boosts, put someone else with appropriate Wing Command skills in the Wing Commander spot until the WC reconnects.

Requirements:

• None.

Ways to improve

• Ask to be made Boss, that will allow you to move people around and invite them to the fleet, making your job easier.
  • Utilize the drag-and-drop feature for both fleet invites and for moving people into new position.
  • Be sure to enable free-move so people can move themselves in and out of positions when needed.
• Make note of fits and ask for advice if you are not sure if the fit is adequate or not. See fitting principles for guidance on tank and don't forget that you could easily ask the pilot what their resist profile is, their raw shield hitpoints, their engagement range and so forth, if it's not obvious from the fit itself.
• Separate people who are ready and in system from those who are still making their way there (or simply ask them to X-up when they get there).
• Catch up in the incursions.e-uni channel and update the waiting list between sites, then post the updated waiting list to remind people you are still forming/active.
  • Keeping a copy of the waitlist in your ingame notepad is a good idea, for easy editing and copying (font-formatting isn't copied over).
  • You can also use the CTRL + Up/Down function in your chat-window (keeps the formatting, allows editing, but is somewhat unreliable/unpredictable).
  • Make sure to let people know if it's a shield or armour fleet, what type of sites you're doing, if the fleet is forming or active etc.
  • Keep track of whether or not people have spare energy transfers and logistic drones, if they are logistics IV or V, what logistics they can bring (or both) etc.
  • A short waitlist has the benefit of not completely spamming out everything else in chat.
    • Useful shorthands: +l (dd + any logi), +s (dd + scimitar), +b4/5 (dd + basilisk, logistics 4 or 5) or just l/s/b [b4-5] (any logi or scimitar/basilisk only), T3/sc (strategic cruiser), Sn (sniper).
    • You can usually omit if someone is a battleship because unless they are either of the above mentioned ships or roles, it doesn't really matter.
  • A short SFWL (shield fleet waitlist) abbreviation works for a shield fleet doing vanguards, since that's what we do most of the time.
• When drops are announced ahead of time, get the replacement(s) ready.
• Remember that you can invite people from local (where they should be, ready to go, if they are on the waitlist) even though they haven't spoken up recently in incursions.e-uni.
• If someone isn't responding on mumble or in incursions.e-uni, you could always try initiating a conversation with them (it'll fail if they are offline for example). Or you can just skip them and go for the next person in the waitlist, because it is not your job to make sure they are ready.
• Keep the MOTD updated with the following information.
  • Type of fleet (shield or armour, vanguard or assault etc).
  • System the fleet is running in.
  • Name of the on-demand channel on Mumble.
  • Optional: Who the anchor is.
  • While there are other important things to know about a fleet, who the logistics are, who the dronebunny is and so forth, these things aren't best promoted in the MOTD. Logistics 'L' up each site and you can have your dronebunny 'DDD' up every site instead, as that would be a constant reminder not only who the dronebunny is, but also to actually launch your drones and assign them.

Wing Commander

Primary function:

• Carry out your basic role as a damage dealer or logistics.
• Wing-warp the fleet.

Requirements:

• Wing Command II (preferably III or IV).

Ways to improve

• Train Wing Command up to III or IV for larger fleets, like Assault fleets.
• Make sure people are aligned.
• Make sure you get paid before warping the fleet out, unless it's an emergency.

Fleet Commander

Primary function:

• Carry out your basic role (preferably a damage dealer).
• Keeping it all together.
• Making sure all roles are filled.
• Be the single voice of command when needed.

Requirements:

• A working mic.
• Fairly good at multitasking.
• Knowledgeable about Incursions (or have a backup who is, if you're in training).
• Decisive (be able to make a decision, not necessarily the best, in any kind of timely fashion).

Ways to improve

• Delegate what you don't need to do yourself, so you can focus on the rest.
• Be proactive to prevent things from spiralling out of control.
• Be decisive, make clear commands and target calls.
• Repeat important commands.
• Require confirmation for separate commands (like ore runner, specific drone targets etc).
• Always know your fleet composition (engagement range, emergency energy transfers and maintenance drones, offgrid boosts etc) so you can make educated decisions.
• Know your enemy (differences between the NPCs, what they can do, what danger they pose).
• Some ships are easier to hit than others (signature, resists, speed and prefered orbit). Tamas for example as much easier to hit than Schmaeels, Renyns and Eysturs. Romis, while having higher resists, are easier to hit than the close orbiting Augas, but at the same time the Augas come closer and if sufficiently webbed can be taken down much faster.
• Decide whether you want to reduce the DPS as soon as possible or if you'd rather want each ship to fire at the most suitable ship in order to be as effective as possible in the long run.
• Don't forget the broadcast target functionality for when you want people to focus on a specific target with short notice or out of sequence. It is usually faster and easier to do it like that, instead of (re)tagging.
  • A good example of that is the "Slave" or "Citizen" NPC in the fourth wave of the assault-site Nation Commander Stronghold.
• For a more comprehensive guide to leading an incursion fleet, see Anatomy of Incursions.

Unpaid roles and tipping

Several roles like offgrid boosting, scouting and picketing are excluded from the ingame payout mechanics, so they will not automatically get paid as you're running sites. As such, we recommend that you tip these roles to show your appreciation for the service they provide.

As a general rule of thumb a tip of 10% in total is decent, which can often be rounded up to 1,000,000 ISK (one million) per site. You can then decide if you want to split that up equally among the unpaid roles, or have your own weighted system if you think the different roles contribute more or less to the fleet.

For example, if you run 10 sites you'd tip a total of 10 million ISK out of the 96+ million ISK you just made. You can then split it up and pay the offgrid booster 5 million and the scout another 5 million.

Naturally at the end of the day it's up to you how much you want to tip.