User:K950/3P38 Sleeper Nexus
Among man's more adventurous and exciting, if risky endeavors he regular embarks upon, exploration and discovering the unknown are definitely one of his more distinguishing characteristics, among many others. In EVE, exploration remains an interesting passtime or primary activity for many players, and I feel that it is important at this time to begin to chronicle and explain some facets of this particular pursuit. It appears that at some time or another, a few select individuals embark on a similar text wall on this subject -- and with that, here is mine!
In this thread, I will pass on some of my knowledge and experiences which I have laboriously explored and mapped out. Specifically, I will have posts to this thread which will entail the following topics in some detail:
- Ghost sites
- A preamble about Sleeper Caches
- Limited Sleeper Caches
- Standard Sleeper Caches
- Superior Sleeper Caches
- General exploration tips
I'm not one to explain or elaborate on my own personal resume or length of tenure of a particular subject, as I firmly believe that neither of those two factors is exclusively indicative of competence. Instead I will rely on my peers and superiors to judge if I am considered an authority on the subject, so in that respect, I am open to good, solid commentary about my methods, techniques or procedures. For that matter, with some exceptions, the details explained here are not "the way" but "a way" of doing it.
Ghost Sites
A rather convenient upgrade from the regular data or relic sites you get in low, null or wormhole space, these sites are rather dangerous. You can, however, be assured there will not be any cloaked interdictors lurking in the site.
There are four classes of so-called "Ghost Sites", for lack of a better term, in order of ascending difficulty:
- Besieged Covert Research Facility
- Lesser faction Covert Research Facility
- Standard faction Covert Research Facility typical contents
- Improved faction Covert Research Facility good site
- Superior faction Covert Research Facility
In the beginning, these sites had to be scanned down like an ordinary cosmic signature, but then it was changed to a cosmic anomaly, which then got changed back to a cosmic signature recently. There isn't any specific danger inside the site in most cases, however the hazards that are there, are rather harsh.
Besieged Covert Research Facilities are common in low security space and are merely combat sites, and have no particular relationship to our subject here other than the name being analogous to regular Ghost sites.
By name, the Ghost sites are named according to the pirate faction which is associated to that particular system. In the area around Amarr space for instance, they will be named something like Lesser Blood Raider Covert Research Facility, whereas with Minmatar space they will be named something in the order of Lesser Angel Covert Research Facility. The name itself of the site (in respect to the pirate faction name) has a relationship between the pirate faction and the type of implant blueprints one can possibly obtain, along with the type of NPCs that spawn inside the site, but that's pretty much it.
In high security space, on the Lesser grade of Ghost sites will be available, in low security space, the Standard grades are usually the kind that spawns. In null security space the Improved variant is common, but only in wormhole space are the Superior sites present. As for the difference between the sites, the higher the site "rating", the higher the likelihood of good implant BPCs, mobile depot BPCs, mobile tractor unit BPCs, Covert Research Tools (used for making implants) and Shattered Villiard Wheels (also used for implant construction). Lower-grade sites will most likely have Low-Grade or Mid-Grade rated implants, while the higher ones such as the Improved and Superior sites most likely will have the High-Grade blueprints.
Additionally, the higher the site rating, the more NPC pirate rats show up (when they do), the more damage they do, and the more damage a container does when it detonates. Site containers explode when they are shot at by the NPC pirates (which they do) or when a hack is failed. Thus, the specific dangers to these sites are:
- Limited time frame
- High damage received upon failure of a container
- The NPC pirate damage.
Let us discuss the merits of each point I mentioned here:
- Limited time frame: Ghost sites are all about speed and efficiency. The less time you spend moving around the site, the faster you hack, and a couple of other parameters are critical towards success. The use of a Data Analyzer II is strongly recommended, because it has a higher base virus strength, which means hacking is faster and safer.
- High damage received upon failure of a container: The Lesser grade Covert Research Facilities (i.e. Lesser Serpentis Covert Research Facility) can be handled with a Tech I exploration frigate, such a Heron with a medium shield extender, a damage control and an active explosive hardener. That vessel however, can only eat one detonation, and should the pilot not evade the damage of the NPC rats, probably won't be able to survive if he does not escape immediately. The higher rated sites, such as the Standard Guristas Covert Research Facility, should be done with a different ship.
- The NPC pirate damage: They hurt pretty hard if you get caught. In an Improved site, they do healthy cruiser-level DPS. Your best bet is to get out immediately when they spawn.
Practically, there are three ways of running Ghost sites:
- Fit for tanking any damage that you may receive, from failure of a container
- Fit for the lowest cost, based on the assumption that failure is expected (usually just a MWD and an analyzer, with nothing else equipped)
- Bringing a friend to hack the other containers. Having recently lost a Merlin to an Improved Serpentis Covert Research Facility because of rats, if you want to tank the rats (a Scythe with reppers staggered was not enough to sustain the DPS) then use a Moa. Overheated staggered cruiser reppers might be able to allow a teammate to tank the damage of 8 NPC rats that show up long enough for the rats to warp off, but not if you're using a frigate: it just doesn't have the buffer to take it. Last resort? Use a pair of Ospreys in a 2 Medium / 1 Large / 2 Capacitor Transmitter configuration. Have the logistics warp at range to the site, about 30km. May need to overheat the remote repairers.
Running the Site
With this lovely preamble out of the way, I will then begin to discuss the specifics of these sites, and how I run them. I'm not going to say the way I do it is the "right way", but rather "a way" which I recommend you follow. Let's start with the procedure I use when I do these sites:
- Scan down the site. Decide if I want to run it or not.
- Prepare my ship. For the Lesser rated sites, I use a Heron, the fit of which will be shown later. For the harder ones, I earnestly recommend the Merlin, but the Moa is probably the best for tanking. I don't know how well it does versus a horde of null-sec rats though, yet.
- For my Heron, I strip the ship of drones, cloaks, cargo and everything I don't need. Normally I do this in a safe spot with a mobile depot (refitting and clearing the ship out).
- Warp to a bookmark OR a celestial close to the site. Less than 4 AU is ideal, but I like 2 AU.
- Align to the bookmark made of the site or the scan result. Always align first. Activate the explosive hardener, make sure all my needed kit is online and ready to go. Wait for the capacitor to recharge if necessary. Set the Keep at Range distance to 2250m.
- Warp to the site.
- Select a random container, lock up all containers, choose Keep at Range (2250m) on the container, active the Microwarpdrive for one cycle, which is usually close to putting to me within hacking distance.
- While I am approaching that container, run a cargo scanner on the other containers. If not equipped (Merlin) then don't bother cargo scanning.
- Hack the chosen container, loot it.
- Having identified the next container I want to hack, I approach it for one or two Microwarpdrive cycles. Highsec sites will have green-blue cores, lowsec on upwards will be either blue-green, yellow or red, though red is usually the can with the good stuff in a null or Wh grade site. The site timer is close to running out by now.
- I hack the other container: if time permits (it usually does not) I might get another hack off. Normally I only hack two containers then GTFO.
- Warp off anywhere. I then refit at my mobile depot and continue on.
Let's move down the list of things I discussed in my order of operation for these sites, for which I will elaborate further.
- 1. Scanning down the site. While I'm not exactly aware of the probe strength required to scan down each site, they are not as difficult to scan down as a Superior Sleeper Cache, which requires a probe strength of at least 104. I've scanned down an Improved Serpentis Covert Research Facility with 65.6 probe strength.
- 2. Preparing my ship. Here are the fits I use, and recommend you use. They are cheap, capable and appropiate for the job. If you cannot fit or equip any one of these modules, I do not recommend running the site. The stakes are too high, especially in the harder sites.
- The rigs for the Heron the default ones I use because this vessel is commonly used for running Sleeper Caches. The use of a Tech II Data Analyzer is essential because failure of the container causes it to detonate. For the Lesser grade Ghost sites, this fit can survive one detonation, and no more. If you fail one container, abandon the site and warp off. It's just not worth it to continue.
Heron - Ghost Site Survivor
Data Analyzer II
Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Type-E Enduring Cargo Scanner
Limited Explosive Deflection Field I
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Damage Control II
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
- Only suitable for high security space sites.
- Can survive one high-security space container detonation.
- Cannot tank rats if they are close.
- Rigs are based on the author's choice of rigs for running Sleeper Caches: they do not particularly matter for this application.
Merlin - Ghost Site Runner
Medium Shield Extender II
Data Analyzer II
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Explosive Deflection Field II
Damage Control II
Type-D Restrained Overdrive Injector
Type-D Restrained Nanofiber Structure
Small Core Defense Field Extender I
Small Core Defense Field Extender I
Small Anti-Explosive Screen Reinforcer I
- Rated to survive three explosions of null-sec rated Ghost Sites (Improved).
- Will not tank rats, and remote repairs from one Scythe or similar will not be sufficient to tank the rats. Warp off instead.
- 24.4K EHP against explosive damage, 22.7K EHP in shields.
- Now for the Standard, Improved, and Superior Covert Research Facilities, or if I really don't feel like loosing a Heron, I recommend the Merlin, as shown. Because the containers deal exclusively Explosive damage, it's important to be tanked to that specific damage type. This vessel, with my present skills (Shield Management to IV) has 21808 explosive damage EHP. for a net total of 23499 EHP against explosive damage. Having tested this vessel on the test server in an Improved rated Ghost site, it has survived two deliberate failures (with the explosive hardener overloaded) and could probably eat a third.
- Remember to overload your explosive hardener if you know you will fail the container.
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Remember to turn off the Microwarpdrive while hacking. The increase in ship mass means that warping out takes longer, and any damage taken from rats will be amplified. |
- While you could upgrade to a Moa, I would still recommend this vessel because it is faster, does the job fine and is cheaper. If the ship you'd like to use is not here, it's because I don't recommend it. If the fit is not quite to your liking, feel free to change it, although I will also not recommend it. Here is a Moa fit you can use; one for speed, and the Maller is if you'd just like to laugh it off:
Moa - Ghost Site Boss
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Large Shield Extender II
Explosive Deflection Field II
50MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Data Analyzer II
Damage Control II
Overdrive Injector System II
Overdrive Injector System II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Medium Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Medium Core Defense Field Extender I
- 33.5K EHP overall (not overloaded), 68.3K EHP against explosive damage.
- You may elect to insert an armor tank in the lows with a 1600mm plate and hardeners if you are really intent on not loosing the ship to the rats.
- A scout to scan containers and provide the warpins makes this fit a lot more useful rather than soloing it because of its slow speed.
Maller - Ghost Sites
50MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Data Analyzer II
Type-E Enduring Cargo Scanner
1600mm Steel Plates II
1600mm Steel Plates II
Armor Explosive Hardener II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Damage Control II
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
- If, for various reasons you cannot fit or equip any one module, then I recommend either skipping the site or going for a cheap-as-dirt barebones fit with just a cheap Microwarpdrive and Analyzer with nothing else on the vessel. Cheap meta overdrive injectors and nanofibers are possible -- they're so cheap because nobody else uses them.
- Moving on...
- 4. Stripping the vessel. This is pretty straightforward. Drop a mobile depot in a safe spot, refit to the proper fit, strip the other goodies like the cloaking device and probe launcher, transfer everything from your cargohold into the mobile depot, double check everything, then proceed to the next step. A station or Citadel works too.
- Of all the ships I have lost in Ghost sites on the main server (3 Herons and 2 Merlins if I am correct) I never lost more than 5 million ISK per ship. As always, the Data Analyzer II never drops...tsk tsk
- 5. Warp to a bookmark or celestial close to the site. This is important because the site timer is initiated when any player initiates a warp to the site (and gets the pop-up message), whether or not they actually landed inside the site. (Ships that warp while cloaked do not activate the timer until they decloak on grid.) Rather than warping 70 AU from across the whole system, and thus burning up half the site timer before you get there, warping to a spot close to the site means you have more time inside the site.
- 6. Align to the site and prepare. Aligning saves time warping to the site; double checking that the explosive hardener is equipped saves ships; capacitor level might make a difference, and double-checking the fit saves the site from being abandoned.
- 7. Nothing to elaborate on here.
- 8. Beginning to run the site. Here is where the particulars really start to matter. Let's pretend that one of the four containers present has something good in it: such as a blueprint for a 'Wetu' Mobile Depot. Cargo scanning can provide a preview of what the site holds: in that respect, picking one at random provides a one in four chance of that one good can being on your way anyways.
- Picking a Keep at Range distance of 2250m is important not only for hacking sites in dangerous space (I like to call it fun space though, because that's what it is) but it also neatly positions the ship so you won't bounce off the container so fast that the hack auto-aborts by reason of the high velocity of the ship pushing itself away from hacking control range.
- Conversely, for those who do not run cargo scanners, just hack at random. Some say the odd named container (i.e. 3x Secure Mainframe and 1x Secure Vault, so the Vault is the odd one out) always has the best loot, but I have not found that to be so.
- Anyways, once on the first container, hack fast, efficiently and accurately. Familiarity with hacking principles and cool speed are essential. On the Lesser and Standard classes, those only have green hacks (blue-green cores); Improved and Superior are yellow cores (but usually only for the one with the good stuff) and can have the usual restoration nodes/virus suppressors.
- 9. Nothing further to elaborate on that was not explained in the previous point.
- 10-11. Ibid.
- 12. Normally, the timer for the site is about two minutes, which can vary quite a bit. The shortest I believe have seen was just over 60 seconds. Two minutes is enough for two fast hacks and a quick high-tail out; three minutes and fifteen seconds is just about enough for four excellent hacks with a close exit time. When the timer runs out, the NPC rats instantly appear at the warp in spot: however there is a short time (about 8 seconds or so) before they start getting nasty.
Therefore, by most estimates, two containers is practically attainable out of these sites: three is better, and four is wondrous. If I get 3 cans hacked out, I simply warp off anywhere quick (except in null if there are bubbles known to be someplace) and then warp back to the mobile depot, refit and continue on the exploration path.
To handle one of these sites like a proper crew, you may use logistics as earlier, or just use the Maller fit and a covert ops pilot, probably in a bomber for the lack of cloak recalibration time. Using a cargo scanner on the bomber, have the cruiser pre-aligned to the site, and initiate warp at the same time as the bomber decloaks. The bomber pilot then quickly locks up all the containers, and being a squad commander position, tags the good container, as usually only one container has the blueprints while the others are just Villard Wheels and Covert Research Tools. All the hacker cruiser has to do then is burn an overheated MWD cycle as he lands, hack out the good can, the burn around to hack whatever he can hack afterwards. The bomber should be clear to warp off as soon as the cargo scans are complete. The bonus is that there is little risk to the bomber pilot at all, the Maller should survive (at 105K EHP with all V) just fine and is ready to be used again for your next cyno hot drop ship or usual bait ship that everybody recognizes.
As shown in an image up above, attacking the rats is possible, though they have very good tank, even for the high security space ones. In the time the Stratios was attacking them, I was able to drop one of them down to low shield, but that was about it, and he warped off anyways even with two warp scramblers and two webs. (Calling all Vindicators and Vigils?) They warp off whether they are warp disrupted or not (bubbles are untested). Obviously the ones in nullsec space, as shown, number more rats than the lower grade sites.
I found a video on YouTube which is fairly good at demonstrating the basics in a more visual form. Through the content of this post, some experience of having run these sites yourself (I recommend a couple high-sec attempts before you do the more dangerous ones), and this video, you should find yourself adequately familiar with the site itself.
Sleeper Caches: A Preamble
These may appear by name to be an intimidating retreat where ships go, and then they don't come back, but in reality, these cosmic indications within EVE Online are actually fairly straightforward. They by default, more difficult versions of the data or relic sites you get normally. There is additional risk involved because of various hazards, but you can get some sizable reward for your trouble should you decide to run one, which after this, I hope to convince you that you should.
I should start off, appropriate, with a list of cautions and advisories:
- Do not attempt these sites without Tech II analyzer modules. This being the Relic Analyzer II and the Data Analyzer II. You can technically get away with just a Data Analyzer II, but without a Relic Analyzer II, you're going to be spending more time inside the site than if you just had it in the first place.
- Your first four to five times inside these sites should not be done with shiny ships, like the Astero or the Stratios. A T3 is also not worth risking in the upper grade of sites.
- Should you run the site completely, you might have some nice gank-worthy (or ambush-worthy if in lowsec/nullsec) cargo in your hold. Exercise the appropriate cautions: gank limits, using blockade runners, a hauling alt, et cetera.
- Do not rush these sites, at least until you're quite familiar with them. Ships get lost on these sites every month because of carelessness.
There are three kinds of Sleeper sites: Limited, Standard, and Superior; in this order is their typical difficulty in the same fashion. Unlike regular data and relic sites, Sleeper site loot is held in storage depots, which are accessed with the Relic Analyzer. Site-related functions, such as switching off sentry guns, turning off toxic gas clouds, resetting timers, and so forth are all data hacks which use the Data Analyzer. While failing certain Data hacks can be decidedly unpleasant, nearly all the Relic cans can be failed repeatedly without ill effect. Superior Sleeper sites do have a different mechanic in the Archive Room.
Polarized weapon BPCs, Storyline BPCs, random manufacturing materials (usually worthless in most contexts), skill books, "Blue loot", and random "meta" level weapons and modules is pretty much standard fare as far as loot goes for these sites. The "Blue loot" and the BPCs is where the money is at.
From there, the R.A.M. stuff isn't worth bothering with, the Meta modules or weapons are usually worthless, and the BPCs are sometimes useless too, in this case they were. Selling the BPCs can be problematic depending on the item. Polarized Torpedo Launcher BPCs sell for bank though, because they're one of the few Polarized weapons that people actually use. The Electric Conduit and the Talocan Molecule are some examples of some "fluff" that is the reason you should always bring a cargo scanner with you to make sure you don't hack a can only to get 1 Limited Light Ion Blaster I out of, or 100 R.A.M. junk.
The so-called Blue Loot items are typically sold to NPC buy orders at most stations. Head to a normal trade hub (there is one place 1 jump from Jita, Amarr EFA, ...may need to make a jump or two away to get the proper price) and check that the icon on the right of the sale has a white (=) to indicate that you're getting full value. You can expect to make anywhere from 10 to 300 million ISK off of blue loot depending on the site: Standard and Superior Sleeper sites tend to have more blue loot.
Don't get too excited about storyline modules. That 500MN Digital Booster Rockets blueprint is deceptive. It doesn't have a officer-grade price tags, but it's still fairly expensive, and it doesn't even have the benefits of the deadspace X-Type 500MN Microwarpdrives. The reason why they are so expensive on the market is that COSMOS items are required to build them. There are 4 COSMOS "sectors", one in each empire space, and those COSMOS missions can only be run once per character: (Source)
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COSMOS item sourcing |
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Once per character. Also you have to work on your standings, and other things, such as the poor design of the overall COSMOS system, the various annoyances of the system and other factors make these items very expensive indeed, such as Sleeper Profound Research Notes. Most of the time, those storyline modules are trash anyways: 'Censor' Medium Cap Batteries are used by people with really whacky fits on frigates because it's the only medium capacitor battery that can fit on a frigate; the 'Greaves' Medium Armor Repairer is actually fairly good, being the one with the lowest powergrid requirement but still equivalent to the T2 otherwise; the 'Investor' Tracking Disruptor used to be better than the T2 version but that got whacked down awhile back, so it's effectively worthless; and so on. Check the specifications and compare the module in question very carefully to determine if that particular storyline module is really worth it -- more often than not, it's unnecessary, more expensive than a faction module, or just equivalent to a Meta 3 or even Meta 0 module!
Right -- now let's get to the site! First you'll have to scan it down -- and I'll say it's not easy. With extensive scanning experience, you can figure out if it is one without even pulling out the probes. How do you tell if you have a Sleeper site in the system?
- Looking at the signature as you scan it down. If you're at 1 A.U. and it's still only showing Data Site as the classification, you're probably looking at one. That is assuming good scanning skills.
- Normal cosmic signatures almost always spawn within 4 A.U. of a celestial. (Certain signatures like M555 wormhole connections are sometimes out to about 4.5 AU-ish, but never is any regular signature more than 5 A.U.) This can be a moon, stargate, planet, station or the Sun. But Sleeper sites, as I have come to understand, may spawn 5 or more A.U. away from a celestial, though less than 8 A.U.
- As far as I know of, Sleeper sites only spawn in Known Space. If you like real adventurous PvE content like this stuff, you should look at C5 and C6 wormhole "combat data sites" which have a nice Sleeper presence to welcome you. Bring lots of friends.
- Sleeper Caches seem to spawn at a higher rate in NPC empire space versus sovereign nullsec territories. Early in making this Guide I went on a 100-odd jump route through nullsec in the far East and only saw one Standard Sleeper Cache. Never seen one in my hunts through the Drone Lands either.
Payouts. Each site pays out mostly on the factor of blue loot. Limiteds have the least, Standards can be low or high, and Superiors can also be low or moderate.
Limited Sleeper Caches usually have anywhere from 20-30M in blue loot, although I've seen less than 10M. Standards are typically 40-220M, but normal is usually around 120-ish. (Security status has no bearing on the loot therewith.) Superior Sleeper Caches I can't say too much about because I don't do the Mine Room or the Archive, but for the other two rooms, anywhere from 60 to 300M is typical, with the average usually about 130 to 180-ish.
Before I go anywhere else, I should probably mention probe strength. You can find out your probe strength by pulling up the Fitting Window, usually ALT+F. Hover over your probe launcher, and choose the little (i) that says "Show Charge Info". Go into the Attributes tab of the window that opens and your probe strength is there before you, under "Base Sensor Strength". Pyfa and EFT can also display this information under Show Charge Info of the launcher (EFT) or Charge Stats (Pyfa). As part of the recent Ascension expansion, probe strength is now show directly by hovering over the probe launcher itself.
I have scanned down a Limited Sleeper Cache with 85.8 probe strength. That is with a Tech I frigate and all Tech I equipment. If you have the following:
- Racial Frigate V
- Astrometrics V
- Astrometric Rangefinding IV
- Core Probe Launcher II
- Sisters Core Scanner Probes
- 1 Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
- 1 Scan Rangefinding Array I
... you should have a probe strength of 107.135, which is enough to scan down a Superior Sleeper Site, the hardest site to scan down, with just a basic Tech I exploration frigate. Findings from multiple Superior Sleeper Caches indicated that 104 probe strength was the minimum. A basic rundown of the minimum probe strength required to scan down each site is listed below: tight cube formations are pretty much required:
- Limited Sleeper Cache: 85.8 (approximate: less most likely won't work)
- Standard Sleeper Cache: 92 (approximate: 91 didn't work)
- Superior Sleeper Cache: 104
Some trick, you say? And why not use a shiny ship? Well, I'm a cheapie, and my reasoning is if I can do it with a Tech I frigate, why not do it with a Tech I frigate? Indeed, you can run all the Sleeper Sites, to a point, with just a Tech I frigate.
First to scan the site. While the Dual Triangle Formation can yield, according to my testing, the strongest strength, it is rather difficult to set up. You may have heard of custom probe formations before, and while scanning Sleeper sites down is an excellent time to work on two formations: a generic cube formation, and a "max strength" cube formation. The cube formation is the easiest formation to make that yields the best scan strength. How did I make mine? Well, awhile back I couldn't scan down a Sleeper Site, but I still found one to set my probe formations up and test them. There's also the Diamond formation, but I find that the cube formation has been the easiest and has worked every time.
Here's some fancy images to show you:
Looking at those images above, the one on the far left: There is a Sleeper Cache there, and I can tell without even scanning anything. It's not the one on the far left, nor the one one in the middle. The other images are helpful images that demonstrate what distinguishes a Sleeper Cache from other signatures in the system: if you're at 1 AU and still not even 50% scanned down, it's probably one, particularly if it's more than 4 AU from a celestial.
So when I identify a Sleeper site, I normally start with 4 A.U. regular old default pinpoint formation. As you might imagine, my astrometric skills are somewhat high, so I don't have as much of a problem as back when I was wandering around in wormholes on my trial days. (I actually did hack a relic site or two back then.) I then jump to 1 A.U. size, refine, scan, then .25 A.U. and really make sure I get the location accurate. Once I get that result, I switch it over to the maximum strength cube formation preset, center it up nice, and scan...boom, result. No fancy costly Sisters launchers needed -- why would I buy one of those, when if I lost my ship, that module alone would cost more than three times the total value of my ship? I don't know why people buy those. Too shiny for me.
After you have scanned down the site, you'll want to make sure it's safe to run in the first place. Are there 8 war targets in the system? One of them might break out the combat probes, warp to the first room and join you in a rather interesting partyfest. As they've said before, in nullsec and lowsec (and in w-space, with other players detected in system), you should never hack with unknowns in local. Well, you can, but you are taking a considerable risk. He might have bookmarked the site and is waiting for you to come to him. (The Spatial Rift having been activated before you got inside is a clue that someone has been there before.)
However, Sleeper sites, like most mission sites, have a first room with an acceleration gate (renamed "Spatial Rift" in Sleeper sites). You cannot take an acceleration gate with an active cloaking device. Monitor D-scan with 2 AU range? Your call. Do be advised, Sleeper Caches do eventually get pulled from the probe scanner window after a few relic containers are hacked: in that case, the usual two minute despawn timer is initiated. That said, in low sec and nullsec, always ALWAYS keep an eye on Local and the directional scanner.
Ships -- now's a very good time to start talking about them. There are two Tech I exploration frigates I recommend, and frankly, if it's not listed here, there is a very good set of reasons why it is not.
The Heron is what I normally use for exploration. It is both cheap, capable, works good for combat probing detail, and works well enough for the job. Its slightly longer targeting range (it's not much, but I do like it) and higher top speed (with a MWD, about 300 m/s versus the Magnate) means that combined with the other purposes I use it for, makes it well suited as my default exploration vessel.
The Magnate is the alternative. Its abilities are slightly different than the Heron, but can mount a respectable armor tank, though it doesn't do as much in the DPS department because it has less powergrid than the Heron. I think it's a fine vessel, although I have a much harder time fitting an expanded launcher for high security space drone recovery work, which is part of my regular operations.
The Probe and the Imicus...where do I start: first the Imicus is beyond ugly, and it is beneath me to fly it for that reason alone. But really, these vessels are not suitable for Sleeper Caches because they do not have the slot layouts to handle either the proper shield tank OR armor tank requirements. It would be better to conscript a buddy to run a logistics frigate to help you with repair needs if, by some reason, these vessels are all you have.
The Astero is a fine, capable hull that can do well as a stiff tanky drone boat for PvP, an impromptu site runner or just a basic exploration purpose. The nice thing is the fits that I have created for the Magnate cross directly over to this boat, the not-so nice thing is a lot of the people that fly this vessel or aspire to fly it shouldn't (that included me at some point). There are those who say "well just one good container and your ship is paid for" -- and that is valid argument, but that same "one good container" is a rather huge caveat, leaning heavily on the "if you get out alive" factor. Loose one of these clumsily inside a Standard Sleeper Cache, and you'll know why I recommend the Tech I hulls to newcomers and regular runners.
But don't get me wrong -- I think it is a fine ship, it's just that it doesn't offer any particular advantages I need inside these sites, or for general exploration. Even in nullsec with the usual bubblecamps and in wormhole space with the cloaked Interdictor inside the site (your Magnate with 4 warp core stabilizers won't last with that thing on your tail) I just prefer the basic default frigates -- they are cheaper and work just fine.
The Stratios and Tech III Strategic Cruisers are more in the realm of those who can fly them, generally, but not always, know what they're doing. Would I use one in the future if I had a chance inside a Standard or Superior Sleeper Cache? No. I would be entertained by the prospect of a Stratios hacking out the entirety of the Archive Room with two Guardians, but otherwise, no.
Other pointers before I get started on the posts for each site:
- Don't forget to make sure all the hacking analyzers are set to Auto-Repeat Off. Otherwise they will needlessly continue to cycle, wasting capacitor.
- A squad commander of a fleet can tag items with various characters in the alphabet or numerical indications, and this is one of the ways I identify cans that should not be hacked because of lack of sufficient value in them. A fleet of 1 member is fine.
- I can't think of anything to put here for now, so I'll just ... draw a blank.
Read on for posts on each individual site.
Limited Sleeper Cache
A rather easy-going site, this particular gem is the first taste of Sleeper Caches that many can take in -- with some risks, but not as dangerous as the other sites are. Although this site doesn't usually pay as well as some of the other sites do, it's still worth checking out. Do be advised that nothing above the Frigate level can enter this site: so Destroyers are unable to take the Spatial Rift to enter the site, as are Stealth Bombers.
If the initial Hyperfluct Generator container has been hacked, with the requisite Spatial Rift out and about, someone has probably been in there before. Check zKillboard or your favorite site for any recent losses.
Here's a general overview of what to do in this site, in the order that is what I have found to be the most efficient:
- Hack the entry can. Enter the site.
- Cargo scan all the cans, and evaluate the value thereof.
- If the wreck Storage Depot has good loot inside it, hack the Remote Pressure Control Unit and then extract the loot out of that container. Alternatively, tank it.
- Disable the Remote Defense Grid unit. This only has to be done to disable the Forcefield Generator guarding one specific container. You may try a different approach, detailed below.
- Hack the remaining worthy cans.
With that out of the way, let's get right to the ships to use.
Limited Sleeper Cache Fits
Generally, all these fits have a Mobile Depot, spare probes, three drones in the drone bay, a hull repairer (armor fits), an armor repairer and a hull repairer (shield fits), and all the kit necessary to handle the encounter in the cargohold. Refitting inside the site, occasionally more than once, is normal and expected.
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Do not downgrade or alter these fits. They have been thoroughly tested and verified multiple times to be the minimum. If, by reason of skill levels or ISK you cannot fit them, then do not attempt the site. Hacking modules may be downgraded but site difficulty will increase notably; and T2 Analyzers are strongly recommended. |
Logistics vessels (a single self-sufficient capacitor stable Tech I logistics frigate is sufficient) can provide remote repairs if available to get around the requirements of local repair modules. That said, maintain a local buffer and resistance module(s) as normal.
As the reasons have been outlined before, only fits for the Heron and the Magnate will be shown. The other ships are not shown because they are not recommended. The Astero can be fit identically to the Magnate, though the normal rig configuration (Gravity Capacitor/Anti-Explosive Pump/Auxiliary Nano Pump) is good enough because the hull has a bonus to armour resistances.
Use a Mobile Depot to swap the Relic Analyzer II in place of the cargo scanner once all undesired containers have been identified. These fits are not sufficient to wander into the Area of Effect (AoE) damage cloud near the wreck alone. Both of these fits can survive a detonation of the Remote Defense Grid Unit or a run-in with a Unstable Plasma Chamber, as long as the pilot does not remain inside the AoE cloud for too long. If you have a buddy with a Logistics Frigate, then these two fits below are appropriate to use for such a scenario for the entire site itself.
Heron - Limited Sleeper Site
Data Analyzer II
Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender
Type-E Enduring Cargo Scanner
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Limited Adaptive Invulnerability Field I
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Damage Control II
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
- The fit to use for a Limited Sleeper Cache, when hacking the Remote Defense Grid Unit.
- Swap the Relic Analyzer in when needed.
- If turning off the damage cloud near the wreck with the Remote Pressure Control Unit, swap the cargo scanner for a Relic Analyzer II.
Magnate - Limited Sleeper Cache
1MN Monopropellant Enduring Afterburner
Data Analyzer II
Type-E Enduring Cargo Scanner
400mm Crystalline Carbonide Restrained Plates
Damage Control II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Anti-Explosive Pump I
Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
- The fit to use for a Limited Sleeper Cache, when hacking the Remote Defense Grid Unit.
- Swap the Relic Analyzer in when needed.
- If turning off the damage cloud near the wreck with the Remote Pressure Control Unit, swap the cargo scanner for a Relic Analyzer II.
For those players with all Level V capacitor skills (Shield Compensation to IV required for the Heron), try these fits to skip hacking the Remote Pressure Control Unit entirely, and head directly into the storage depot inside the wreck field.
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You must be able to sustain at least (as in more than) 60 Effective Hit Points per second (EHP/sec) for a ship to survive inside this damage cloud. Capacitor stability is very much ideal: if less than 4 minutes, you should not run these fits. Additionally, make sure the Relic Analyzer is set to Auto-Repeat OFF. Allowing the module to continue to cycle needlessly while hacking can result in an empty capacitor and a wreck if not properly managed. |
Heron - Limited Sleeper Wreck
Relic Analyzer II
Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender
Eutectic Compact Cap Recharger
Small Shield Booster II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Damage Control II
Type-D Restrained Capacitor Flux Coil
Small Capacitor Control Circuit I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
- EFT tells me this fit can handle 68 EHP/sec: for Pyfa, you must add the passive recharge rate to the shield boosted rate (21 EHP/sec passive regen plus 47 EHP/sec active for a total of 68 EHP/sec for my character).
- If you are fast, you may skip the Capacitor Control Circuit, but you have to know what you're doing so you can skirt out of the damage cloud to let the capacitor recharge when the capacitor runs out.
- By upgrading the Flux Coil and the capacitor recharger to T2 equivalents, you may have enough capacitor (with Shield Compensation IV) to run for almost 4 minutes if you skip the Capacitor Control Circuit, which is what I do.
- A cap battery isn't really practical because of fitting reasons. However, you may elect to use a Shield Boost Amplifier and a small cap battery: if you have both capacitor skills to IV and Shield Compensation 0, it could be cap stable with a T2 Flux Coil and won't need a CCC rig. Always use your fitting tool to confirm.
Magnate - Limited Wreck Fit
1MN Monopropellant Enduring Afterburner
Relic Analyzer II
Eutectic Compact Cap Recharger
Small Armor Repairer II
Damage Control II
200mm Crystalline Carbonide Restrained Plates
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Small Anti-Explosive Pump I
- The Astero is fit pretty much identical to this vessel, or the "standard" rig configuration.
- The addition of a fourth mid slot can be handy, but isn't necessary. I'd prefer the Magnate for its lower cost to begin with.
- Swap the Relic Analyzer II in for when the Data hacks are completed. The cargo scanner will have to be offlined for this fit to work (it should be swapped out for a Relic Analyzer II after the intial cargo scan of the site has been conducted anyways).
- The variant of the afterburner is specifically chosen so the user doesn't have to bring two afterburners in his cargohold. It may be advisable to bring a Tech II Micro Auxiliary Power Core.
Additional notes for the Magnate:
- Because I have Astrometric Rangefinding V (yawn that was a long train), I don't need the Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I to scan down a Superior Sleeper Cache with the Magnate, instead I bring two Scan Rangefinding Array Is. Otherwise, my Magnate has the same rigs as shown above. As before, you will need all capacitor skills to V (which you'll need eventually anyways) and Repair Systems V to match the minimum of 60 EHP/sec to last inside the wreck field. Overheating may be required if the armor gets a bit low.
- Use the afterburner sparingly, only to get to the container and back out a little bit faster. Leaving it on can be a death sentence: pulse it. Do not run this fit if you are not capacitor stable with the afterburner and the analyzer off. I am capacitor stable at 33%, and this fit has worked well. Feel free to swap out the afterburner for another capacitor recharger.
There may be some concern from the EFT warriors about the buffer module. The reason for such a module is to better buffer out the slight damage variations from damage tick to the next (much more noticeable with armor) and thus make the most of each shield or armor HP boost. For those who have a hard time with the hack inside the wreck field (sometimes I've had 7-8 failures) the buffer of the shield Heron allows it to usually stabilize around 50% shield capacity, and the natural regen of the shield starts to help a bit. For armor, it allows the pilot some more room for error if needed, particularly if overheating is necessary.
Site Introduction
Having covered the fits, let's get right to the site. Before I talk about the details of the site itself, I should divulge a bunch of images to help newcomers get familiar with the basic layout of the site, and its hazards.
Use those images to get a basic idea of what the site looks like. Below there are images that highlight various hazards and objects.
So specifics of the damage that is incurred upon detonation of a Plasma Chamber are hidden below, but it's not too serious unless the ship is untanked. When I first wanted to run Sleeper Caches, I found an Astero at a site that I could not scan down, so I switched to combat probes and probe out his ship. Then I wandered in and didn't know what was going on, and nearly lost the ship, warping out in 20% structure. Those were the days...
Normally the container inside the wreck and the one just to the left of it (also noted as "NOTE A" one of the pictures above) are the ones with the most value. Make sure you don't wander into the damage proximity of the wreck field when hacking that container.
Off to run the site we go!
Running the site
Once you warp to the indication, you'll land in the entry room. You should see a Hyperfluct Generator present. If it has been hacked and a rift is activated, then someone is there, or has been there. If not, it's your turn! Go ahead and hack that Hyperfluct Generator. I will list the outcomes possible below:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: A new spatial rift (acceleration gate) is opened to the main area, which is called the Ransacked Storage Site.
FAILURE: You have two minutes to attempt a successful hack of the can. Should you fail within that time, the site will despawn.
By taking the Spatial Rift, the first room is made available to the player. Initially, it's important to cargo scan the containers to evaluate the value of the site. Those inexperienced with the site should probably run it anyways if there isn't much value for the experience. Drop the mobile depot to get the counter counting down. Let us assume the container inside the wreck field has good things inside it: there are two approaches of dealing with it.
| The can difficulty numbers do vary slightly each time, because of the way that the random hacking minigame is generated. For reference, high-sec rookie practice cans (in the Rookie Systems) are 1/10. Regular high sec easy-peasy cans are 3 or 4/10. Low-sec, null-sec, and wormhole space cans are 5 to 8/10, depending on the value of the can, in most cases. Generally, I've found them to be about 6 to 7/10 in difficulty. |
The first is to hack the Remote Pressure Control Unit, cook a Microwarpdrive (afterburner is not fast enough) to the container inside the wreck cloud, quickly hack it, then burn the Microwarpdrive back out before the timer runs out. There is enough time for 2 "standard paced" hacks, 1 "slow hack" or 3 really fast hack attempts, depends how good the hacker is and ... luck. Normally it's a red hack, which means all the usual Virus Suppressors and Restoration Nodes. The problem with this approach is both the limited timeframe and if a player cannot survive the incoming damage after the timer is up, there is a chance of explody bits.
The second approach is to fit specifically for surviving the area of affect cloud. All toxic gas clouds, both the prespawned ones and the ones that are generated upon detonation of an Unstable Plasma Chamber do similar damage per second, omni-damage types. This approach is recommended, though it does require excellent capacitor skills and proper tank skills. The advantage of this approach is the hacker can hack the container at his leisure, with little personal risk to himself before the hack can be completed.
The first method, drawn out:
- 1. Refit for the primary site fit shown up above. On a Magnate, a MWD will fit if the plate is downgraded to a 200mm variant.
- 2. Hack the Remote Pressure Control Unit (a Data hack):
- CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
- SUCCESS: The area of effect damage cloud surrounding the wreck is turned off for two to three minutes.
- FAILURE: No specific site penalty, a small amount of damage is absorbed by your ship -- in the test case, 96 damage against a Heron with a MSE, Limited Adaptive Invulnerability Field and Anti-EM/Anti-Thermal rigs. It's not severe enough to warrant any particular concern.
- CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
- 3. Immediately apply Keep at Range (2250m) on the Storage Depot inside the wreck cloud, then turn on the Microwarpdrive. Turn it off when you get close enough to it. Lock it up if not done so already, and immediately begin hacking it with the Relic Analyzer II.
- 4. Watch messages in local: if not successful by the 30 second mark, just align back to the Remote Pressure Control Unit (or straight up/straight down) and burn the Microwarpdrive. Otherwise, loot it and burn out with the Microwarpdrive to a safe direction away, probably best towards the Mobile Depot, which should be near the site warpin beacon.
The Area of Effect damage cloud near the wreck does roughly 100 DPS to a standard unmodified resistance profile of a Tech I vessel. Its approximate dimensions, measured from the Storage Depot within, is about 12km in radius.
File:3P38 Limited 2.png This is why T2 Analyzers are a must (the early days) |
Now onto the second approach. The specific fit must be able to rep more than 60 EHP/sec and capacitor stability is a must. The Relic Analyzer II does not count in the capacitor stability checks: keep it off in EFT/Pyfa whilst checking for capacitor stability.
- Refit to the appropriate capstable local repair module fit.
- Approach the Storage Depot inside the wreck field. For shield tank, activate it when you are 15km from the container: for armor, activate it as soon as all the shields are gone.
- Hack the Storage Depot, loot it and go back to the Mobile Depot.
Refit back to the main site running fit. Looking at the site, look for an easy route to access the Remote Defense Grid Unit. On the way, there are area of effect damage clouds (similar DPS as the wreck field) and Unstable Plasma Chambers. The slower the vessel goes, the closer it has to be to trip the Plasma Chambers, causing them to detonate. Flying all over the place recklessly with a Microwarpdrive on is asking for trouble. While the activation distance does vary a bit, it is about 7-10km, depending on how fast you're going. While blitzing around the top or underside of the site is fine, well away from the hazards, moving slowly (200 m/sec is fine) inside, navigating the damage clouds is highly advised. Use the tactical overlay and move slowly if it's your first time.
It is possible to power through the damage clouds if they get tripped accidentally. With a Microwarpdrive active, one will only eat about 700 HP after resists...assuming the ship is immediately powered out of the wreckage field. More facts about the plasma chambers:
- Moving slowly, such as 100m/sec, allows one to get fairly close to them, nearly touching them.
- Higher speeds, such as 330m/s, the chambers can rupture from a distance of about 7km.
- Slow-boating out with a propulsion module, assuming decent 60%-ish resistances, means the player will eat about 1200 HP total.
- The area of effect damage measured from the approximate middle of the debris is 9km.
- Flying right through the cloud with a MWD on means the player will only sustain about 350 HP damage (after resists).
These figures are generalistic to give you an idea of their damage potential. A fit that can repair indefinitely, such as the ones shown earlier, will do just fine sitting inside the AoE clouds.
Now let's go back to the remainder of the site. To the far left of the site, there is one Storage Depot with an Active Forcefield Generator next to it. When a player approaches to within 10km of the Storage Depot, the Generator kicks in and fires up a EM Forcefield, which has a radius of about 14km. The other Storage Depots around the site do not have this feature and can be hacked with the Relic Analyzer II at any time without any specific concerns. For this reason, if there is just junk in the aforementioned Storage Depot, then don't bother hacking the Remote Defense Grid Unit, instead just hack the other worthy containers.
There are two approaches of going about dealing with the Forcefield...to prevent the Forcefield from being activated (activates when a ship gets to about 10km of the Storage Depot), or to turn it off after it has spawned, navigate the vessel around the AoE damage clouds and plasma chambers, then hack the the Remote Defense Grid Unit (RDGU):
CAN DIFFICULTY: 8/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The defensive forcefield generator is disabled near the far left of the site.
FAILURE: This is a very interesting topic. There appear to be two possibilities:
- Nothing happens. I once waited for one hour inside the site for "something to happen", and nothing happened. If this occurrence happens, then it seems that the can be hacked repeatedly, but be prepared for (b).
- The container explodes. A Heron with an Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer, Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer, Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender, a Limited Adaptive Invulnerability Field and a Damage Control II ate 1225 damage (dropped shields to about 25%), while Keeping at Range (5000m) from the container. After this, the other containers did not have any forcefield generators spawn to inhibit hacking attempts, which was distinctly unexpected. The container seems to explode about ten seconds after the hack attempt is failed.
File:3P38 Limited 25.png Setting up for a deliberate failure |
File:3P38 Limited 13.png Results after 1 hour: Nothing happened |
File:3P38 Limited 14.png RDGU explodes: damage in Log |
As for the second approach, given that the the Forcefield Generator itself spawns a Large EM Forcefield, it does call for some DPS. It's not exactly difficult to destroy it, however the 150hp/sec regeneration is a problem. 110 DPS is not enough: and given that Destroyers and Stealth Bombers cannot enter the site, this is a job for either multiple people or a high-damage frigate, such as an Assault Frigate or something like a Taranis. A test with an all-damage fit Taranis which did 304 DPS unheated using Void S (36 rounds exactly, with two Hobgoblin IIs) took it out handily in 20 seconds.
Shoot the Large EM Forcefield, not the Generator. The Generator cannot be damaged. The Generator will not spawn another Forcefield after the first is destroyed, so the container is open to grabs. Because an Astero does about 115 DPS with all level V skills, it's not going to be enough to overcome the self-regeneration shield value of the Forcefield.
Moving on. Hack the rest of the Storage Depots as desired. Move around the damage clouds, and take things slowly for those unfamiliar with the site:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 - 8/10 [YELLOW TO RED HACKS]
SUCCESS: The loot inside the Storage Depot can be acquired.
FAILURE: No penalty.
With all the good containers scooped up, run over to the Mobile Depot, refit to the travel fit, pick up the Mobile Depot, and warp off to continue on the Grand Journey that is exploration. A rather tidy video which should help with some visual understanding of the site can be found here.
Like cheap ships? The Incursus is what I normally use if someone messes up a site: it can tank the damage clouds fine, swaps easily for a 240DPS blaster fit for shooting the EM Forcefield, and does just fine. Hacks are more difficult but not impossible -- in fact, the image to the right where I challenged myself to do the site in an Incursus was the best Limited Sleeper Cache I've ever done.
Continue to the next post to read about the next sizable upgrade to this site, and definitely more dangerous version, the Standard Sleeper Cache.
Standard Sleeper Cache
I like to think of this site as the first real upgrade to exploration and a nice, if dangerous, integration of PvE content to make sure you stay well alert and aware. Indeed, this site is the first one which has the potential to make your day go wrong, especially if you're in deep null sec far away from a home base.
Obviously the stakes go quite a bit higher if you operate in a region of nullsec or lowsec where you have unknowns in local. Having a buddy on standby in a covert ops ship that is capable of scaring off possible party-breakers is a very good idea. Given that you know where the warpins to the site are, it's an easy ambush site to take out the guests, or make a nice ambush of your own in a bomber or Stratios. Because of the above-average chance of loosing your ship, I think this site and its brother the Superior Sleeper Cache make a good case for running them with a Tech I Frigate. I have run all of the Sleeper Caches with a Heron, which is a Caldari Tech I exploration frigate.
There are no Sleeper NPCs inside any Sleeper Cache. The hazards are merely AoE damage and Sentry Towers. Profiles for the guns follow: Vigilant Sentry Tower (the weakest), Wakeful Sentry Tower, and the Restless Sentry Tower (the strongest).
On to the fits.
Standard Sleeper Cache Fits
The standard fit for running around the site just has a Microwarpdrive, Medium Shield Extender, both Analyzers and a cargo scanner. It's only useful for after all the Sentry Towers are down, for it has no specific hardeners to resist a couple of whacks from those things. It's also the fit for running the Hidden Room.
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These fits are here because they have been proven to work. They do not need to be modified, other than certain meta modules can be upgraded to T2 equivalents (such as hardeners) to taste. |
Heron - Std. Sleeper Cache Site Run
Data Analyzer II
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender
Relic Analyzer II
Type-E Enduring Cargo Scanner
Damage Control II
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
'Integrated' Acolyte x3
- Not for skirmishing with Sentry Towers: it doesn't have enough resists to survive a couple of whacks from those guns.
- Drones are chosen because they are the cheapest non-T1 drones. Use as preferred.
Magnate - Std. Sleeper Cache Site Run
Relic Analyzer II
Data Analyzer II
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Damage Control II
Small Armor Repairer II
200mm Crystalline Carbonide Restrained Plates
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Small Anti-Explosive Pump I
'Integrated' Acolyte x3
- Swap an unneeded Analyzer out for a cargo scanner as needed.
These fits are specifically for handling the two Sentry Towers in the back room while hacking the local Remote Defense Grid Unit. Feel free to upgrade the hardeners to T2 equivalents, along with Electron Blasters (AutoCannons for the Magnate) if you can fit them, as they will do more damage than railguns. Same fit is useful for shooting the Restless Sentry Tower in the middle area:
Heron - Std. Sleeper Cache BackRoom
75mm Compressed Coil Gun I, Antimatter Charge S
75mm Compressed Coil Gun I, Antimatter Charge S
Data Analyzer II
Limited 'Anointed' EM Ward Field
Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender
Limited Thermal Dissipation Field I
1MN Monopropellant Enduring Afterburner
Damage Control II
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
'Integrated' Acolyte x3
Antimatter Charge S x1
- As it has only buffer, proper flying is essential to avoid taking too much damage.
- Upgrade to Electron Blasters as room permits (requires Advanced Weapon Upgrades).
- T2 Hardeners are optional.
Magnate - Std. Sleeper Cache Turret
125mm Light Gallium Machine Gun, Phased Plasma S
125mm Light Gallium Machine Gun, Phased Plasma S
1MN Monopropellant Enduring Afterburner
Data Analyzer II
Cap Recharger II
Armor EM Hardener II
Small Armor Repairer II
200mm Crystalline Carbonide Restrained Plates
Armor Thermal Hardener II
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Small Anti-Explosive Pump I
'Integrated' Acolyte x3
Phased Plasma S x1
- You may elect to swap out the Data Analyzer for an extra Capacitor Recharger, this will help with repair module usage, and/or swap for T2 Energized Thermal and EM Membranes.
- Be ready to overheat the Armor Repairer.
This one is designed for the approach to the Hidden Room wherein the Restless Sentry Tower has not been destroyed. The Small Ancillary Shield Booster, with all 9 Navy Cap Booster 25 charges used up, does fix the entirety of 1 hit from that Tower. It's not much, but it's better than nothing. I still prefer to take the five minutes it takes to simply shoot the gun rather than the risky Microwarpdrive pulsing game.
Heron - Std. Sleeper Cache HiddenRoom
Small Ancillary Shield Booster, Navy Cap Booster 25
Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender
Limited 'Anointed' EM Ward Field
Limited Thermal Dissipation Field I
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Damage Control II
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Navy Cap Booster 25 x9
Magnate - Std. Sleeper Cache Approach
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Armor EM Hardener II
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
400mm Rolled Tungsten Compact Plates
Armor Thermal Hardener II
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Small Anti-Explosive Pump I
'Integrated' Acolyte x3
- May elect to overheat the hardeners properly: it's slower than the Heron so takes longer to get to the Rift.
An Astero would be fit pretty much exactly as the Magnate, but I still wouldn't recommend the Astero for this site. Because the Heron is faster than these two, it is the typical vessel I use, among other reasons, but the Magnate does fine.
Basic Site Procedure
Let's now GET ON AND RUN THIS SITE! Here's the basic procedure to run the site, I will elaborate on each step afterwards:
- Scan down the site.
- Hack the Hyperfluct Generator to spawn a Spatial Rift, which is just the same thing, functionally speaking, as an acceleration gate. Battleships and below can take the gate: battleships are not recommended though because of their slow speed.
- Drop the mobile depot at the warp in. Hack the Remote Defense Grid Unit. Warning: Two successive failures may trip the alarm: watch messages in Local. Hack slowly and cautiously. Same goes for the Coordinate Plotting containers.
- Hack the 3 Coordinate Plotting cans. Place the Coordinates into the Long Distance Calibration can. Head back to your mobile depot.
- Refit for a Afterburner fit with a buffer tank with EM and Thermal hardeners. Make sure you have guns or drones. Activate any active hardeners; take the nearby Spatial Rift.
- Upon landing, you will be aggressed by two Sentry Guns. Immediately active your afterburner and make haste towards the Remote Defense Grid Unit. Orbit it at 2500m and hack it.
- Using a spiraling approach on the remaining Sentry Gun, approach it and engage it. Burn the Afterburner while spiraling in to the middle Restless Sentry Tower, and destroy it. Then head back to the Mobile Depot near the warpin.
- Refit for a Relic Analyzer, cargo scanner and MWD, then take the rift again and hack the cans at your leisure. When finished, warp out of the site and back in, or just burn the MWD back to the main area. At the main site warpin, hack the two closer storage depots, but not the farther one. Refit for both analyzers. Pick up the mobile depot. If you are carrying blue loot of considerable value (more than 50M ISK), it may be best to anchor a small secure container and pack it inside there. Bookmark the container: they cannot be probed down with combat probes.
- When you land, look for the depot container about 30km from the warp-in beacon. Hack that can with the Relic Analyzer. Immediately loot the can and look for the Defense Alarm Unit can, and attempt to hack it. It's a rough hack, and speed counts too: be prepared to fail it. If you do fail it on the first attempt, do not attempt to repeat it. Immediately align the ship straight upwards (on the Z axis) and burn the Microwarpdrive. When you're about 120km away from the area you just were, you may turn off the MWD and wait. If you succeed in hacking the Alarm Unit, then the alarm must be triggered manually. After hacking the Pristine Depot nearby, take the Spatial Rift to the back area. Look for a structure named "Sleeper Enclave" (there are two such named objects). Lock it up, burn the MWD out of the area (straight up is fine) and aggress it with a hostile module such as a web, target painter, a gun, or the like. Drones will not work.
- Let the Engineering Stations do their thing. After about 20 seconds, a rift will spawn in the middle. Burn around the highly dangerous gas clouds (80km away from them is fine) down and between them to the rift. Take it.
- Move around a bit to activate the Remote Defense Grid Unit. Hack it.
- Immediately lock up the loot cans and cargo scan for the two most valuable ones. Burn with the MWD to one, then hack it. Then make your way over to the self-destruct can and hack it. Then go hack the second most valuable can, then the third. By then the fourth can is a bonus. Warp out and pick up your container after the site despawns(or dock up if you had that option), refit to your travel fit, and make your way home.
Well that was a lot wasn't it? Maybe so. It's not an easy site to run at first, and any apprehension or nervousness is understandable. But by your third time it will all make sense, and you'll be more confident. I still get nervous here and there because the Sentry Guns hit hard. We shall now move on to the detailed discussion of the site. Before we do that, let's have a look at few images to get familiar with the site.
Those images above quick a quick preview of the site. Examine the images below for detailed notation of most site features:
Running the site
So you scanned down the site, which is good. You will warp to the first room, which contains one can, named the Hyperfluct Generator. The possibilities are below:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: A new Spatial Rift is generated, which is just the same thing as an Acceleration Gate. It will take you to the main area, which is called the Logistic Depot. (The site makes references to "frontline" and "backline" but that is not particularly important.)
FAILURE: You have two minutes to attempt a successful hack. Should you fail to hack it successfully within that timeframe, the site will despawn. Take your time and work slowly on the first hack to make the most of the first attempt.
In dangerous space, you should look to see if the Hyperfluct Generator has been hacked already, and if the Spatial Rift is there. If it has, then someone has been there before. How far they got can be up in the air: however, if there are neutrals (even 1) in system, it could also be an ambush.
When you take the acceleration gate, you land in the main area. You are in no immediate danger, but you have a couple of important tasks to perform. Anybody who scans you down with combat probes will land at the first room where just were, then they'll take that rift to where you are now. You can use that property to make some rather amusing and unique ambushes here.
If the Alarm has already been tripped, your ship will land at a different Beacon than when it is not, as the warpin beacon is relocated once the Alarm is tripped and the Extermination Units spawn. Your ship may take some slight damage as it warps through the damage cloud: it is not enough to warrant any concern. The new beacon ensures you won't be immediately destroyed upon entry, however be very aware of the damage cloud sizes, and stay well away from them. If the Extermination Units are already out, then you will need a beefy active tank to continue the site, or just head for the Hidden Room (discussed later).
| If you were looking to spoil the day of someone you don't like who got here first, you could try shooting the Sleeper Enclave in the back area to raise the Alarm Level (discussed later) to 5, for which then the Sleeper Extermination Units will spawn to create some nicely-sized AoE damage clouds which can wipe a frigate off the field handily. Then you can sneak around and go into the Hidden Room to run that yourself. |
At the warp-in where you just landed, you should drop your mobile depot. Bookmark it. While the timer on that is counting down, head over to the Remote Defense Grid Unit nearby you:
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WARNING: Failure of the data hacks can cause the sitewide Alarm Level to increment. At Level 5, the Alarm will trip, however it may also trip at lower levels. I have obtained alarm trips at Level 2 and 3. An image of the Alarm tripping at Level 2 is here. |
CAN DIFFICULTY: 8/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: In the back area which you'll be warping to in a bit, one Sentry Gun will be deactivated (1 out of 3) and its place, another one near the Tractor Beam will be activated. You won't be going over to the Tractor Beam just yet.
FAILURE: Overall, the Site has a "sitewide" Alarm Level. Failing this hack (or the other one down below) will raise the Alarm Level by 1. You start out at 0 out of 5. At Alarm Level 4, you should slow down and think carefully. At Level 5, the Sleeper Engineering Stations will spawn in each mini-room (the warpin, the Tractor Beam mini-room, and the Back Room mini-room) to generate highly dangerous Area of Effect Damage Clouds. But it appears that the alarm can be sounded at Alarm Level 2 for the Coordinate Plotting Devices, so pay close attention to messages in Local. As there is no time pressure on these first early hacks, take your time.
How long will you last in one of those damage clouds with a frigate? Well, I attempted one time I ran one of these sites, very green to these sites back then. I put my ship so it was fit with a Medium Shield Extender, and not much else, and aligned my ship towards a distance celestial, so all I would have to do is hit the Warp to 0 button as soon as I would take damage. A few seconds past, I took a bucketload of damage which took me all the way down to about half structure, and within 0.25 second I hit the button. And my ship was wiped off the field. Less than 2 seconds. Still curious?
| Guardian Extermination Unit Damage |
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| When the Extermination units first spawn, they generate a smaller radius cloud. I don't know the exact radius of it (it's not as big as the expanded clouds are), but I do know the damage per second. Here is the damage report of an Astero with just an Anti-Explosive armor rig and a Damage Control II equipped (near the end I dip into structure):
[ 2016.06.24 14:37:38 ] (combat) 44 from Guardian Extermination Unit - Hits 160 DPS. Now, once the damage clouds have enlarged, their radius of damage effect is about 67km. I was in a battleship, so I couldn't just fly around at will to test it from all sides, but 67km is about the cutoff. Assuming roughly 63% resistances to all damage types, the expanded cloud does about 354 damage per second. Using EFT or Pyfa's calculations of Effective Hit Points per Second (EHP/s), 900 EHP/s won't get you killed right away (the fit I used which tanked the damage shown below repped 963.9EHP/sec with one repair module) and was...Okay. 1200 EHP/sec is probably quite sufficient to tank the clouds indefinitely. Curiously, the Spatial Rift near the Calibration containers didn't work with the Engineering Stations spawned...Also if you want to MJD to the back room while tanking the damage clouds, you must account for the sentry tower damage. Output from the expanded clouds (image for reference): [ 2016.06.20 01:08:53 ] (combat) 94 from Guardian Extermination Unit - Hits |
Now, head over to the three Coordinate Plotting Devices on your right as you landed in:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The coordinate for the can which you just hacked is added into your cargohold. You do not need to "Open Cargo" on the can as you normally do.
FAILURE: It seems that there is a chance for the failure itself to trigger an increment in the Alarm Level. On a test run, two deliberate failures of the first can raised the Alarm Level from 0 to 1. Another two deliberate failures raised the Alarm Level from 1 to 2, and in that moment, a message in Local advised that Guardians will deploy in 30 seconds. (I have had the Alarm trip at Level 3, as well.) So in that case, the worst case result is that you only get to run the Hidden Room. Or, bring a mate with a logistics frigate (make sure to keep the usual EM and Thermal hardeners) and just burn an afterburner all the way to the back room. Go high and around the middle area (60km is the activation radius for the middle Restless Sentry Tower, the ones in the back are rated to 250km) and just tank the ones in the back enclave, or bring a DPS ship (should be able to rep at least 250 EHP/sec against EM & Thermal damage, assuming a cruiser, and be capacitor stable. That is enough to tank two sentry towers, but certainly not three: see the Superior Sleeper Cache section for possible fits to specifically tank EM and Thermal damage) to shoot the towers in the back.
Obtain all three coordinates. Place those three Coordinates (there should be X, Y, and Z Coordinates) into the High Power Calibration Unit can, which is near where you are. Just get within 2500m of the container (it looks like a jetcan), do an Open Cargo on it, and place the Coordinates from your ship's cargo hold into the container. A message on the screen will inform you of the event. Go back to your mobile depot. Remove all unnecessary cloaks, probe launchers, unnecessary cargo, and travel-fit modules. Refit into one of the fits specified above for running the back room with an afterburner.
The reason why we must take the Spatial Rift is because simply burning 200km to the back room will not go unnoticed by the 3 Sentry Towers in the back enclave. At the distances involved, your effective transversal will be low, and they can strike out to 250km, meaning that frigates will be toasted before they even make it halfway. In fact, a frigate with a Microwarpdrive on when the initial alpha strike happens could just alpha the frigate into a smoldering wreck. Also be warned: There is a hidden Restless Sentry Tower that can be activated by proximity to the Tractor Beam zone, right next to the Tractor Beam itself. It is activated by a ship being somewhere around 20km of that object, although the exact activation proximity is uncertain. If the first Remote Defense Grid Unit is hacked in the main area, which moves one Sentry Tower to the middle Tractor Beam zone, then a new Sentry Tower will not spawn in that same place (as it's a duplicate).
As I discussed earlier, those fits shown up above are specific to this next room you'll be warping to. The Afterburner is vital for keeping yourself moving; the EM and Thermal hardeners are there to resist the damage types of the Sentry Guns hostile to you: the buffer tank is there to absorb one or two or maybe 3 hits at the most. The Data Analyzer is there to hack the can. The guns and the drones are there to kill one of the Sentry Guns. By the way, I have used a fit for a Heron using a Medium Ancillary Shield Booster, you can try that if you want. But don't forget that your buffer is what makes your resistances worthwhile, as the damage has to sink into something: frigates and destroyers don't really have the native HP to make tanking unbuffered alpha damage worthwhile (that's a cruiser and above concept); therefore it's easy for one solid whack to alpha your ship off the site. You could also try using two Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcers and one T2 active EM hardener, which might make it so you can fit a shield booster. Start with my fit first and see how it works for you. Experimenting with a friendly Bantam or Inquisitor pilot can help, or bring a Scythe for extra drone damage. (Use light drones. The 50m signature radius of the Towers means medium drones can hardly track them.)
Having refit the ship, head to the area rightward of where you warped in. Double check that you are ready: drones in the bay, ammo in the guns, hardeners are on, Orbit distance set to 2500m (for the Orbit button on your Selected Item window) and otherwise ready. Read my directions first before you take the gate: There is a Remote Defense Grid Unit that you need to hack. It'll be just forward and to your slight left of your warpin on that spot. As soon as you land, you'll need to Orbit the Remote Defense Grid Unit (if you don't know where it is, just move any direction for now) and immediately turn on the Afterburner.
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Warning: An active Microwarpdrive on a frigate can be fatal if a Sentry Tower secures a good hit. The frigate fits cannot absorb too many errant strikes: failure to keep moving and good transversal can likely be fatal. |
Does that make sense? Good. Then take the rift. Do as I have instructed above. Hack the Remote Defense Grid Unit:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 8/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: One Sentry Gun (the one to your left) is deactivated, and one Sentry Gun in the Tractor Beam area is activated.
FAILURE: The Alarm Level for the site is raised by 1 for each failure. Messages in Local will inform you of your progress.
IMMEDIATELY after you land, turn on your Afterburner and orbit the Remote Defense Grid Unit. Hack it. (Speed Tip: Lock up the Sentry Tower further away and put your drones on it for now. If you don't have the skills for a T2 Data Analyzer, now is when you'll start regretting it. I know it's long train. But it's worth it.) Once you've hacked that one can, start approaching WHILE MAINTAINING SOME TRANSVERSAL to the nearby Sentry Gun. Do NOT approach it head-on: manually pilot towards it at an angle. It fires once every 15 seconds like all Sentry Guns at these sites: you can creatively overheat your hardeners if you know what you're doing. Once you get within range of your drones and weapons, start engaging it. You can orbit it safely at 7500m or whatever and it will hardly ever hit you. Its tracking is terrible, fire rate is very slow, but hits very hard when it does. Be careful.
If the Alarm Level gets a little too high, like Level 3, you should abort the hack and instead shoot all the Towers until they're all destroyed. As shown below, you may elect to swap out for a DPS ship or call someone else to whack the Towers. Cruise missiles are not a good choice because of the 50m signature radius of the Towers. To be honest, the time spent reshipping is hardly worth it versus just using the same ship: although if a corpmate is bored, it'll give them something to do.
Once the Sentry Gun is down, which can take awhile (No shields, 40% armor resistances to all 4 damage types, no resistances on structure), burn the Afterburner towards the middle area Restless Sentry Tower. Using the overlay, head straight for the Tower until about 80km separates your ship from the Tower. Then begin spiraling in: if you do not spiral in, you will likely loose your ship. Shoot the Sentry Tower, you may orbit the Tower at 2000m with the afterburner off (so the guns will track) and finish it off. Then head back to the main area where the Mobile Depot was dropped.
Some other random images follow below. For damage, the Maelstrom with 1200mm Artillery was...Eh. Not the best, but given the circumstances, it was suitable enough. Not a lot of ships can project 300 DPS+ past 80km against targets with a 50m signature radius and apply full damage. A Gila wouldn't work because medium drones are terrible at tracking the Towers.
File:3P38 Standard 48.png Burning a MWD high and over the middle |
File:3P38 Standard 24.png Shooting remaining Sentry Tower |
File:3P38 Standard 25.png Using a Maelstrom with 1200mm Artillery |
File:3P38 Standard 14.png Easy way: Call in someone else |
Refit for a Microwarpdrive and Relic Analyzer, as it's time to collect. Take the nearby Rift again. As you land, you'll see Impenetrable Storage Depots on your Overview (you might need to look at your ALL tab). When you get somewhere within 10km of them, they'll transform into either a Mangled, Dented, Pristine or Intact Storage Depot:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 5/10 to 9/10: [YELLOW to RED HACKS]
SUCCESS: You may collect the loot as you normally would.
FAILURE: No penalty.
You may find that a cargo scanner can be helpful to identify which cans are worth your effort. I have had junk R.A.M. or other useless stuff inside Pristine and Intact Depots (with nothing else!). Generally, the Pristine and Intact Depots have a higher chance of having the good stuff inside. When you have finished, warp out of the site, then warp back in. Remember that if the Signature for the site has disappeared from the Probe Scanner window, the site will despawn in two minutes if you cloak up or warp out and fail to ensure that a ship is inside and active (not cloaked) inside the site to hold it open. You could burn the Microwarpdrive 200km or so but it takes less effort to just warp out and back in.
So. It's now time for Phase 2 of this site. Assuming you're back at your mobile depot, you'll want to cargo scan the nearby containers: there's usually 2 Mangled and 1 Dented Storage Depot. Here's a critical detail: The farther Mangled Storage Depot (at about 26km versus 10-14km for the other two relative to the warp-in beacon) is very important. Don't hack it yet. Hack the other two if they have good things inside them. Before you hack the farther one, you will want to get ready with the fit for both analyzers and a Microwarpdrive.
From there, read the directions first before you do them, as the particulars for this next part are extremely important. You have a good chance of loosing your ship from this stage onwards. If you don't feel confident, you can skip it, for your first or second run of this type of site, it's understandable. But on your third you should definitely try it.
| The warp-in beacon for the site is moved once the alarm has been tripped. |
Again, read all this first, before you do it. Make sure you understand what you're going to do, and what you're about to do, and what you're supposed to do. Hack the "farther" Mangled Storage Depot:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 6/10 [YELLOW HACK]
SUCCESS: A Defense Alarm Unit can is spawned, and the loot can be scooped up.
FAILURE: No penalty.
Immediately loot the container, and quickly look for a Defense Alarm Unit can. Hack it with the Data Analyzer:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 10/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The alarm is suppressed. You are rewarded with a Pristine Storage Depot. I've had junk in this container, but confident and capable hackers in in T1 exploration ships can break the alarm unit.
FAILURE: No penalty immediately, however the alarm is not suppressed. You should not attempt a second try. The alarm messages in Local will inform you of what's happening. Sleeper Engineering Stations will spawn in each room area which do massive DPS.
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Do not spend too much time on the Defense Alarm Unit hack. Experienced hackers may be able to squeeze in a second attempt but those inexperienced with these high class hacks should not attempt a second try. The important thing is to save the ship first. |
This hack is very difficult. It's worth a shot, but don't take it too seriously if you can't. Don't spend too much time on the hack: just work quickly, and if it appears to be buried behind some impenetrable fortress of hostile nodes, you should just abort and move on. The most pressing matter is to GTFO if the System Core is not easily accessed within 20 seconds. MAKE SURE TO WATCH LOCAL: messages will tell you when bad things are about to happen.
If you fail your first attempt, or feel you've taken too long (more than 25 seconds), immediately manually direct your ship straight upwards. Activate the Microwarpdrive, and if you think you ran a little late that time, you may want to overheat. The idea is to get as far away from that area as possible: you should be at least 100km by the time the Sleeper Engineer Stations spawn: your goal is to be already at least 30km away burning the MWD when it says "Elevated alarm. Guardians will deploy in 30 seconds to clear out area."
Wait for the middle area Station to blow up. The detonation activates a rift which takes you to the Hidden Room, as one Guardian Extermination Unit malfunctions, failing to expand its gas clouds to full size. Getting there without getting blown up is the next part. If you still haven't hacked the Mangled Storage Depot yet, go ahead and do that, then get to this point.
Let's get to the next phase. Your main concern is not getting plastered by the gas clouds, and the one lone Sentry Tower. Again, read the text below first, understand it, then execute it.
Burn to an area high and between the two gas clouds. Avoid the lone Sentry Tower in the distance: I approach high and at a strong angle to the Rift so the Tower never concerns me.
Now that you've taken the rift, you're safe for now. Drop your mobile depot. Don't move yet. Refit for a cargo scanner, data analyzer and relic analyzer, if necessary. You'll definitely want a Microwarpdrive too. (This is why the Heron is still ideal for this site.) Pack up the mobile depot. Read the instructions first, understand what you need to do, then conduct them according to the instructions, as time is limited, and the hacks are difficult.
Move around for a little bit (orbit the beacon at 7500m if it doesn't show up right away): a Remote Defense Grid Unit will activate:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 8/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: Four cans with loot will spawn, along with a Self Destruct can. Sometimes 3 will spawn initially, with the fourth following shortly.
FAILURE: No penalty.
Here's what you'll want to do: Immediately lock up all four loot cans. Quickly identify the one with the most valuable loot in it:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 6/10 - 8/10 [YELLOW / RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The loot is up for collection.
FAILURE: No penalty.
Go ahead and hack it, loot it, then approach the Self-Destruct can. Hack it:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 8/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The count-down timer for this little room is reset to 3 minutes.
FAILURE: The count-down timer is set to 60 seconds, in which case the containers will self-destruct unless you can attempt a successful re-hack within 60 seconds, in which case it will be set back to 3 minutes.
You can only hack the Self-Destruct can once, meaning the timer can only be reset once. Make haste towards the other two cans which you inspected and identified as having valuable cargo. When the clock is up, the cans not hacked detonate like they normally do in a regular data/relic site, but you do not incur any damage when that happens. If you cut it close, don't feel bad -- this is basically the bonus room -- I have had the cans blow up while I was just finished with a can and pressed the Open Cargo button, but before I could loot it. D'oh.
Warp out of the site to your bounce point. If you had your Mobile Depot left behind in the area where the toxic gas clouds are, just wait for the site to despawn entirely, which it should do shortly (2-3 minutes). Collect all mobile depots and jetcans, if any, refit to your travel fit, and enjoy your victory. Don't get plastered at a gatecamp. If you are in nullsec or lowsec, you may have additional precautions or escorts to undertake: smart gankers or lowsec ambushers know that exploration vessels can sometimes be packed full of costly cargo, and are extremely fragile. Don't be that guy.
Your next quest is the Superior Sleeper Cache. Hunt on!
| The high speed, high risk approach |
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| The alternate approach for those who don't shoot the middle Restless Sentry Tower is as follows:
Having refitted, you want to burn with the Microwarpdrive till you're somewhere directly above the rift, between the gas clouds. That Sentry Gun near the rift can, as I have discovered, alpha your frigate off the field. Here's what I know: It does lots of damage; it fires (like all the others here) once every 15 seconds; it does EM and Thermal damage; and you need to get to the rift as fast as possible. I also know that it typically engages you when you get to about 60km from it. The basic idea is this: Burn with the Microwarpdrive till you hit about 85km, then turn it off. Continue to slowboat. You then have to make sure you can see your combat log (make sure it shows misses and hits) carefully on your screen. Having your Combat Log window pulled up helps too. The gameplan centers on the fact that the Sentry Gun fires every 15 seconds, yet your Microwarpdrive cycles once every 10 seconds. So you'd wait till it fires (and hits, or misses) the first time, then immediately activate the MWD approaching the rift ONCE. And only once: if it is set on auto-repeat, you might be dead within 10 seconds. You may want to turn that off for now. Then when it fires (and misses, or hits), you then hit the MWD again for one cycle. You repeat that until you get within activation range of the rift. It's dangerous. Very dangerous. If you're good, you could overheat your active hardeners for the period just before they fire, given that hardeners cycle faster than the sentry guns fire, at least shield ones do. But once you have taken the rift, the fun starts, and it's definitely part of the club of daring explorers you can count yourself amongst. (Well, maybe not quite as dangerous as ninja-running sites and ninja-mining in sov nullsec or occupied Wh space with people hunting you, but it's up there.) As I felt compelled to provide some images, please excuse the format of the images below, as there is no way I know of to put a table inside this element. |
Bonus Section: The Tractor Beam Approach
Back when you put the X, Y and Z Coordinates into the High Power Calibration Device, you may have observed the Low Power Calibration Device. Once you put the coordinates into one can and calibrate the rift, you may not re-calibrate it for the other type. Leave the Remote Defense Grid Unit alone near your warp in area: you won't want to hack it, because you'll need it to forcibly trip the alarm for the Hidden Room.
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This approach exposes your vessel to long-range damage, which by reason of the range, means your transversal relative to the distant Sentry Towers is low. Although the Sentry Towers may not aggress, they also might and frigates have a very hard time tanking the damage. |
When you have calibrated the rift using the Low Power can, this sends you over to the middle area by the tractor beam. When you land, you will be presented with a couple of challenges:
- A hidden Sentry Tower will spawn and aggress you. (Activation proximity roughly 15km.)
- You will also be aggressed by Sentry Towers (I was aggressed by two out of three) in the back room. While you can avoid damage from the nearby one, your low effective angular velocity for the far distant ones means you will eat damage from them.
- The nearby Remote Defense Grid Unit.
- The Tractor Beam "can".
I do not recommend this approach. I tested this approach using a Heron, and overloaded EM and Thermal hardeners. I could last about a minute or so before I was forced to warp out. By orbiting the nearby Remote Defense Grid Unit, you won't take damage from the nearby Sentry Tower, but the distant ones hit hard. If you have a buddy with a T1 Logistics Frigate (use T2 remote shield boosters, and use T2 hardeners on the "patient" ship: look for at least 250 EHP/sec capacitor stable, which will handle two Towers. Three will be too much), you should be able to sustain the damage just fine with an oversized buffer fit against two distant Sentry Towers. Without the buffer, you'll probably get alpha'd off the field in short order. That dual-rep Omen seen above tanked 187.5 EHP/sec omni-damage, 220 EHP/sec against EM & Thermal (50/50 split) damage.
But let's pretend you want to try this approach anyways. Quickly orbit the nearby Remote Defense Grid Unit. You must work quickly. Hack it:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The nearby Sentry Gun near you is switched off.
FAILURE: No penalty for failure. I attempted multiple attempts until I was forced to warp out and nothing happened when I deliberately failed the can.
You may need to warp out. If so, then warp back to the site, repair your overloaded hardeners if needed, fix up, and go back again. Hack the Tractor Beam Unit. Doing so will pull all of the loot cans to an area just forward of the Tractor Beam. Having recently switched off the Remote Defense Grid Unit near the Tractor Beam, that should mean (it was so in my case) the Sentry Guns in the back room enclave should not aggress while you loot the cans.
CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The Tractor Beam will commence teleporting storage depots to your area near you.
FAILURE: No penalty for failure.
Now, the Hidden Room. In the first approach outlined earlier, you get aggressed by one Sentry Tower on your approach. In this method, you are aggressed by two. This makes it more dangerous than the first. Obviously you'll need to trigger the Sleeper Guardians to activate the hidden rift. There are two approaches, as earlier:
- 1. Hacking the farther Mangled Storage Depot, and successfully hacking the Alarm Unit. I have succeeded in hacking this can only a few times. If this happens, then go to the nearby Remote Defense Grid Unit which should not have been hacked earlier (as doing so provides no particular benefit here), and deliberately fail it repeatedly. Just activate the Data Analyzer II on the can, wait a couple of seconds, then just abort the hack by closing the hacking window. Be ready to move far away, as before, with your Microwarpdrive.
- Aggressing the Sleeper Enclave structure in the back area (which is probably extremely dangerous to approach considering 3 Sentry Towers present back there with this method) will trigger the alarm level directly to 5. Apparrently a web works. Drones will not.
- 2. Failing the Alarm Unit hack. In this case, just burn out with the Microwarpdrive, and wait for things to develop.
It is considerably more dangerous than using the first method, but it's important for me to discuss this method for those who are curious.
Superior Sleeper Cache
Of all the hacking sites, this one by name asserts itself as the most difficult and challenging. Actually, it's not an impenetrable fortress as some might presume, but it does make a good candidate for an easy and costly lossmail if you are looking for one, and a rather amusing ambush site at that, too. If you're diddling around in the Archive Room, there is a chance that you may just trip the alarm in the Turret room(if not done so already) to shake down visitors.
Like the Standard Sleeper Cache, which I am operating under the assumption you read that guide first, which you should, there are a number of points where you can loose your ship rather handily, but coming prepared and informed, your personal risk is actually rather low. Obviously that does change a bit if you are in dangerous space, but otherwise, given the difficulty of scanning one of these sites down, you can operate with some degree of safety.
I said scanning, and I may as well get that out of the way first. You need a probe strength of at least 103-ish to scan one of these sites down. 102 probe strength is definitely very close but not enough. I can scan one down with a tight cube formation with 104 probe strength. If you don't know how to see your probe strength, just press ALT + F to bring up the fitting window, and hover over the probe launcher. Look for the "Show Charge Info" icon and click it. Under the Attributes tab, you should see "Base Sensor Strength", and there is your probe strength there. If someone is already there, you could switch to combat probes and give him a visit or "share" the loot, if you know what that means. I try to respect the concept of site ownership, however if people abandon the site, I'll usually finish it.
As far as ships go, your choices have been explained suitably in the Preamble. I used a Heron for all my attempts, and it worked just fine, with the conditions being that it is not suitable for:
- Checking if the Alarm has been activated in the Sentries on Duty room
- Running the Archive Room
- The Mine Room is possible, but should you fail, you will loose your ship
Otherwise, the Heron or Magnate are perfectly suitable vessels.
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These are proven fits. Alteration may result in failure of site completion. |
There is one fit that you will need for the Solray room, but that will be explained in a bit. Otherwise, the fits are pretty generic.
This is the fit I normally use for the Solray Room after the Power Terminal has been stabilized.
Heron - Solray Room Fit
Relic Analyzer II
1MN Monopropellant Enduring Afterburner
Small Shield Booster II
5a Prototype Shield Support I
Eutectic Compact Cap Recharger
Damage Control II
Type-D Restrained Capacitor Flux Coil
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
- As long as you have Capacitor Systems Operation and Capacitor Management to II, you may simply swap the capacitor recharger for a Small Compact Pb-Acid Cap Battery, but the Afterburner will have to be used only when needed.
- As long as the fit can sustain about 40 EHP/sec (EFT/Pyfa figures) indefinitely, it's good enough.
- Also make sure the Analyzer(s) are set to Auto Repeat OFF.
- Cargo scan the containers before you use this fit to identify which ones are junk and which ones are not (use a fleet of yourself to allow tagging of containers)
Magnate - SolRay Room
1MN Monopropellant Enduring Afterburner
Relic Analyzer II
Eutectic Compact Cap Recharger
Small Armor Repairer II
Damage Control II
Type-D Restrained Capacitor Power Relay
Experimental Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Small Anti-Explosive Pump I
- You may need to swap the afterburner for a Small Compact Pb-Acid Cap Battery to achieve capacitor stability.
Otherwise, to run the Sentries on Duty room (Turret Room), I use this:
Heron - Std. Sleeper Cache Site Run
Data Analyzer II
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender
Relic Analyzer II
Type-E Enduring Cargo Scanner
Damage Control II
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Magnate - Std. Sleeper Cache Site Run
Relic Analyzer II
Data Analyzer II
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Damage Control II
Small Armor Repairer II
200mm Crystalline Carbonide Restrained Plates
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Small Anti-Explosive Pump I
Nothing particularly fancy. Use a cargo scanner if possible after the two Data hacks are done in the Solray Room. It pays to use a Small Secure Container (anchor it and set a password!) more so with the Magnate than the Heron. Just leave the Secure Container in the Solray Room and bookmark it, stuff the loot and shiny cloaks and probe launchers inside it, then bring the Mobile Depot with you into the Turret Room to refit for the Cargo Scanner after the data hacks are finished.
We will now continue with the rest of the process of walking through the site. I won't go over shiny T3 or battleship fits for the Archive Room because that will be discussed later in more generic terms and details.
Let's get to the procedure layout:
PHASE 1: ENTRY
1. Scan down the site.
2. Hack the entry container. Enter the site.
3. If you land in the Turret Room, take the nearby Spatial Rift to enter the Solray Power Plant. If you're already in the Solray room, proceed to #4.
4. If you land on the farther side of the site, near the Remote Reroute Unit, then take the nearby rift. You may incur some damage as you warp through the Solray Unaligned Power Terminal. Always run the Solray room first.
PHASE 2: SOLRAY POWER PLANT
5. Hack the Solray Observational Unit. Open container, and observe the "disc" it grants you. It can either be Infrared, Gamma or X-ray. There are three containers in this room, and you place the "disc" into the container which matches the name of the disc.
6. Having aligned the Solray Power Terminal, you'll take considerably less damage in its presence. Approach the container in between the two rifts near the Solray Observational Unit. Drop your Mobile Depot there, while it is working, hack the Storage Depot. Loot it. Refit to your capacitor stable local repairer fit.
7. Approach the Solray Power Terminal and hack all containers. You could cargo scan them first while the Mobile Depot is up, if you desire, to skip unworthy containers.
8. Refit back to your generic fit. Bring a Microwarpdrive. Drop all loot and unneeded modules in the Mobile Depot. Bookmark it. Leave it there for now.
9. If you're in a frigate or cruiser that has less than 70,000 EHP of omni-resists, then skip Phase 3 and proceed to Phase 4. Take the Spatial Rift near the Gamma Ray container into the Turret Room. Otherwise, take the rift near the Solray Observational Unit.
PHASE 3: MINE ROOM
10. DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS ROOM WITH LESS THAN 70,000 EHP.
11. In the Solray room, hack the Remote Reroute Unit. Take the Rift nearby to head back to the Rift near the Solray Observational Unit. Take the rift near that object (the Infrared Alignment Unit container is nearby).
12. You may incur some damage upon entering. That is fine. Move around a bit in the same direction slowly (no MWD) until a Remote Defense Grid Unit spawns. Hack it.
13. If successful, hack the nearby Storage Depots. Align back to the Solray Room, visible in the distance (or warp out and back in immediately) and burn the Microwarpdrive or Micro Jump Drive. Continue on to Phase 4.
PHASE 4: SENTRIES ON DUTY
14. Upon entering, look for the nearby Remote Defense Grid Unit. Select Keep at Range (5000m) on it. Start hacking it. WARNING: Failure could mean the loss of your vessel. Warp out if so and do not re-enter without a stiff active tank or solid remote repairs with a strong local buffer.
15. Upon successful hack, immediately burn with the Microwarpdrive to the right towards the Sentry Repair Station. You have enough time for about 2 hack attempts. Hack it. Wait for all Sentry Towers to be eradicated.
16. Hack all loot containers at your lesiure. Do not approach the Plasma Chambers nearby. Use Keep at Range (2250m) for the can closest to those chambers: and approach slowly with no propulsion module active. WARNING: Do not aggress the Plasma Chambers unless specifically instructed to do so. They have enough power to wipe a battleship clean off the field.
17. If you are in a frigate or any cruiser/battleship that cannot handle extreme Damage Per Second (DPS) then you have completed the site. Go back to your Mobile Depot, refit to travel fit, collect all loot, pick up the Mobile Depot, and proceed on. Otherwise, continue to Phase 5.
PHASE 5: ARCHIVE ROOM
18. For this site, it's good prudence to drop all loot and unneeded modules in a Small Secure Container or nearby station. Make sure to bookmark the can: containers cannot be scanned down with combat probes. A safe spot works nicely. Bring the mobile depot.
19. You will need a T3 crusier or Nestor, to handle this room, with at least 2000 EHP/sec active reps and a good 50K EHP of buffer, minimum. You must be able to repair considerable damage and be able to tank a lot of damage. Frigates need not apply, although a super tanked cruiser (Maller comes to mind) with proper use of the Vessel Rejuvenation Batteries could probably hold out for a bit. Eject loot as you get it if that is the case.
20. Starting from the Turret Room, hack the Hyperfluct Generator. If it is successful, take the rift.
21. If not, then Keep at Range (5000m) from the Vessel Rejuvenation Battery. Lock up one of the Plasma Chambers. Hack the Vessel Rejuvenation Battery, make sure you are within its protection cloud (and wait two seconds after the hack is completed) and then IMMEDIATELY THERAFTER aggress one of the Plasma Chambers. Then immediately proceed back to the revived Hyperfluct Generator. You have just SIXTY SECONDS before the alarm is sounded, which will spawn 16 new Sentry Towers. Hack it quickly. Take the rift.
22. There are a number of damage clouds in this area. Be mindful of that. Approach the Archive Cerebrum Chambers. A propulsion module helps: straight in from the beacon is fine for now. Don't hack any of them yet.
23. Hack the Remote Targeting Defense Augmentation Unit. Take your time and try not to fail that one. A Pristine Storage Depot may spawn nearby. Hack it and loot it.
24. Start hacking the Cerebrum Maintenance Chambers. You will need three (3) Intravenous Oscillation Fluid objects. Failure of these hacks may trigger additional Sentry Towers. You may elect to shoot them: I recommend light drones and Light Neutron Blasters (they have a 50m signature radius).
25. Ensure everything is ready, that ship is fit properly and prepared.
26. Approach the Central Archive Cerebrum. Place only the 3 Intravenous Oscillation Fluid objects inside it.
27. At this point, start watching the messages in Local more intently. Storage Depots will begin to spawn nearby. Damage from Shockwaves will also commence after a short time, and increase in magnitude. There may be one Depot which is distanced afar from the regular group. You may cargo scan containers to evaluate their worth. When finished (or dead!), warp out of the site, wait for it to despawn. Warp back to any bookmarked containers left inside the site, and continue on.
Right. So with that outline out of the way, let's continue on to the specifics of each room, but before we do that, I'll drop these images to help newcomers understand the site.
PHASE 1: ENTRY
Having scanned down the site, warp to the result.
Look for a Hyperfluct Generator can. If a Spatial Rift is already up, then someone is there, or has been there.
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WARNING:
If the site has already been accessed, quickly check the Directional Scanner in a 1 AU radius to check for wrecks. If there is one at the site, DO NOT ENTER. (Could also check zKillboard.) The Rift in the entry room might send you straight into the Turret Room, which might have had the alarm tripped: unless you have a T3 or Battleship with stiff resistances (an overtanked Maller with two EM and two Thermal hardeners works too), you'll be alpha'd off the field by 16+ Sentry Towers. There is no opportunity to warp out, cloak up, or escape through the nearby rift -- they aggress almost immediately. |
Otherwise, continue on with the hack of the Hyperfluct Generator can:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The Spatial Rift is spawned, which leads into either the Sentries on Duty area or the Solray Power Plant. Capsules, Dreadnoughts, Carriers, Supercarriers, Titans, and Freighters cannot take the rift.
FAILURE: You have two minutes to attempt a successful hack of this container. If a successful hack is not completed by that time, the site despawns.
Go ahead and take the rift. If you land in the Turret Room, don't panic. Approach and take the nearby Spatial Rift to head to the Solray Power Plant, as the gameplan indicates that is the first room to do first (in case of a catastrophic failure in the Turret Room). Conversely, if you land in the Solray room, there are three places you may land. Look carefully for three containers, and based on which one you landed near, take the appropriate action:
- Solray Gamma Alignment Unit: Stay here for now.
- Solray Infrared Alignment Unit: Approach the Solray Infrared Unit.
- Solray Radio Alignment Unit: Take the nearby rift which will send your vessel over to the Solray Gamma Alignment Unit zone, although it can also direct you over to near the Infrared Alignment Unit. The destination is random for each site and changes from one site to the next, although it remains consistent in any one site.
PHASE 2: SOLRAY POWER PLANT
Near the Solray Gamma Alignment Unit container, there is a structure named the Solray Observational Unit. This structure, when hacked, allows the hacker to collect a trinket which, when placed in the proper container, reduces the strength of the damage cloud nearby, created by the Solray Power Terminal. When warping through the Power Terminal's damage radius, vessels may sustain some damage but it's not too serious to warrant much concern.
Go ahead and hack the Alignment Unit.
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Stay on the side opposite the Solray Power Terminal -- it does about 600 DPS omni-damage without being aligned. If someone has been there before, but you can't tell if the Power Terminal is Aligned, the name is changed for one thing, but also you can inspect the Alignment Unit containers to see if the correct disc was placed inside. Last resort - bring in a cruiser that can tank OR a friendly logistics cruiser in: ~650 EHP/sec or roughly 250 HP/sec is enough. |
CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The hacker is free to open the container and collect the alignment disc.
FAILURE: No penalty.
Zoom out of the site until you find the correct jetcan to place the alignment disc. There are three: Infrared, Radio and Gamma Ray Alignment Discs. The Infrared Alignment Disc goes in the Solray Infrared Alignment Unit, the Gamma Ray Alignment Disc goes in the Solray Gamma Alignment Unit, and so on. Collect the disc and burn over to the appropriate container: if it's the Radio Alignment Disc, then take the rift near the Solray Observational Unit to warp over to that container, then take that rift back over to the main area.
With the Solray Power Terminal aligned, it does considerably less area of effect (AoE) damage while a vessel is in its proximity, which is about 14-17km in radius from the object itself.
Drop the mobile depot near the lone (Dented or Mangled) Storage Depot which is between the Solray Gamma Alignment Unit and the Infrared Alignment Unit. If your Relic Analyzer II is equipped, hack it while the mobile depot is setting up. Otherwise, wait near it (do not cloak, lest the site may despawn) and after it is ready, refit into the capacitor stable self-repper fit with a Relic Analyzer II. It may be prudent to cargo scan all nearby containers including the ones inside the Power Terminal's proximity to check for dead-end worthless containers. (I have had Intact Storage Depots that were empty.)
CAN DIFFICULTY: VARIES [YELLOW TO RED HACKS]
SUCCESS: The loot is ready to be looted.
FAILURE: No penalty.
With decent 50% resistances to all damage types across the board, the damage cloud does about 15 damage per second. As long as you can repair more than 30 Effective Hit Points (EHP) per second indefinitely, it's perfectly sustainable.
Afterwards, refit back to the generic site running fit with a Microwarpdrive and both Analyzers.
For the frigate pilots, skip the next Phase and go right to Phase 3, below. Tech III Strategic Cruiser and the Nestor battleship may attempt the next step. An overtanked Stratios (2 plates and 2 large shield extenders) should be fine. Frigate pilots should expect to loose their ship.
| Specifics of the Power Terminal |
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| Normally, without being aligned, the Power Terminal area of effect damage cloud does 600 DPS to a regular Tech 1 resistance profile, assuming no hardeners. When suitable hardeners are fitted which provide reasonable 65-ish% resists to all damage types, the DPS is about 150 in total, on a Stratios. The Moa which was used for a certain test of the cloud ate 228 DPS, and that had a 62/59/69/74% resist profile. The area of effect radius is approximately 14km from the Power Terminal unit itself.
Placing the incorrect alignment disc in a container initially announces the message that it has been aligned: "Using the crystal disc, the alignment is now correct and the Solray Power Terminal is stable." But shortly thereafter: "Seems you used the crystal disc incorrectly, the Solray Power Terminal is losing its alignment fast! The solar flare around the Terminal will increase again in approximately 30 seconds." From my findings, that did not actually happen, and the damage per second remained identical. A disc that has been placed into a container cannot be extracted back out again. |
PHASE 3: MINE ROOM
It has been said before that 70,000 EHP is a recommended figure for tank before attempting this room. Sure it can be done with less, but given the stiff penalty for failure, it's not something that is something that can be absorbed by a frigate hull. On the test server, I deliberately failed the primary container with an overtanked Astero with about 13,000 EHP. It didn't last two seconds. If you had ships to loose, then just use the cheapest T1 exploration hull (the virus strength is a requirement) and stick a Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender, a Damage Control I, perhaps a Limited Adaptive Invulnerability Field I and a Data Analyzer II, with nothing else whatsoever. In that case, do this room AFTER completing the Turret Room. Good luck.
Anyways, to access this room, take the rift near the Solray Observational Unit. (Note: The Solray Power Terminal must be aligned first for the rift to work properly, even if the Reroute Unit has been hacked.) It leads next to the Solray Radio Alignment Unit. Hack the Remote Reroute Unit:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 7/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The rift is recalibrated to point towards the Mine Room.
FAILURE: No penalty.
What this does is change the direction of the rift near the Solray Observational Unit to point towards the Mine Room instead of near the Radio Alignment Unit. Take the nearby Rift to head back to the main area, then take the rift near the Observational Unit into the Mine Room itself.
Expect to eat about 800 damage upon landing or shortly thereafter from a hidden mine. Upon landing, you should see a Remote Defense Grid Unit. DO NOT activate a Microwarpdrive if you have one equipped as you approach the container. It is approximately 7km off the beacon, some slow manual piloting may be required:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 10/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: A Pristine Storage Depot and possibly one or two lower grade containers are spawned.
FAILURE: Expect to take 10000-25000 damage.
Continue by hacking the containers if successful:
CAN DIFFICULTY: VARIES [YELLOW TO RED HACKS]
SUCCESS: The loot is available to be scooped up.
FAILURE: No penalty.
When finished, you may Micro Jump Drive back to the main area, burn a Microwarpdrive, or just warp out and warp back in. Continue on to the Turret Room.
| Mine room damage |
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| This room fascinated me for awhile. At least it was easier to figure out than the Archive Room and the intricacies of the Sentries on Duty room.
Upon landing inside the site, even while still in warp, expect to eat 2100-ish damage from a mine, or probably a handful of mines. An Astero with just a Damage Control II, 200mm plate, and an Anti-Explosive rig ate 2135 damage, which put it into 65% structure. After failure of the Remote Defense Grid Unit, my Maelstrom (don't laugh. I had *just* gotten into my first battleship) ate 11760 damage the AIF overloaded (59/56/67/72 resists). Log: [ 05:43:10 ] (combat) 560 from Minefield - Hits 560 is a nice number. If 11760 is divided by 560, the answer is 21. 21 mines? Possibly. The damage put the vessel into 62% shields, which was a brick tanked Maelstrom with 79K EHP of shields. Now you know why your Astero got blown up. |
PHASE 4: SENTRIES ON DUTY
This room can be definitely challenging, but for frigate pilots, this is where the good stuff generally is. There can also be some spectacular failures here too.
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WARNING:
1. If the Alarm has been tripped in this room, there can be in excess of 16 Sentry Towers active, and frigates will not stand a chance. Overtanked Mallers and other hardened ships can survive the initial damage and subsequent DPS. |
Prepare your eyes for a massive overflow of images. All of them are relevant and in some respects, fascinating.
Starting from the Solray Room, leaving the Mobile Depot near the lone Storage Depot, make sure to do three things before this room is attempted:
- Bookmark the location of the Mobile Depot in the Solray Power Plant.
- Drop all loot and unneeded modules into the Mobile Depot.
- Refit into the appropriate fit.
After that, take the Spatial Rift near the Solray Infrared Alignment Unit container. Upon landing, don't worry: the Sentry Towers will not aggress unless a player strays too close to the loot containers. However, all players must play close attention to these instructions.
Straying too close to the loot containers in a frigate, or even perhaps a Stratios cruiser, could be fatal. In a frigate, you'll most likely get alpha'd off the field. The Sentry Towers, like the ones in Standard Sleeper Caches, do heavy EM and Thermal damage. In a shiny T3 Cruiser, it's perfectly possible to just ignore them (and perhaps attack them with medium drones whilst hacking the containers) and continue on your way, however ten additional Sentry Towers will spawn, according to your precise location (more spawn the deeper you go).
Initially, there are 6 Sentry Towers. By hacking the Remote Defense Grid Unit, one of the nearby ones gets switched over to a friendly tower. Take your time on this hack, and try to do it right the first time: there is no rush. It will then aggress the other 5 Sentry Towers, and in turn take damage itself. But it can't sustain the incoming damage for long, so by hacking the Sentry Repair Station, it will provide armor and shield reps to our friendly Tower.
Start by hacking the Remote Defense Grid Unit:
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WARNING: A present bug in the site seems to indicate that failure of this next hack will spawn the Sentry Towers regardless of whether a successful rehack has been completed. So the countdown to the perimeter Sentries will not be actually canceled, no warning in Local that they are about to spawn, instead you will find 16 Sentry Towers will spawn anyways. In a frigate, warp off the site immediately if you fail the hack. Do not attempt a retry unless you are in an overtanked EM/Th cruiser with excess of 900 EHP/sec active reps against EM/Th damage. I have already lost two Herons because of this fact. |
CAN DIFFICULTY: 9/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The closest Sentry Tower becomes friendly, and aggresses the other Sentry Towers to blow them up.
FAILURE: You have 45 seconds to attempt a successful hack. Failure to do so spawns additional Sentry Towers, for a total of 22 Sentry Towers. And they hurt like a truck: a test on Singularity in an overtanked active Astero ate just one volley, and was gone the next. (Don't bother another attempt. I've already lost a Heron when I was able to successfully hack the RDGU before the Alarm counted down. There is a message in Local with red text that says "10 seconds..." before the perimeter defense Towers spawn. That never happened. Just warp off.)
If you fail this hack, you should call the site completed unless you have the capability to sustain some serious damage with heavy active repair modules. Or, Guardian/Basilisk logistics. If that is the case, you could as easily ignore this container and hack whilst local repair modules fix all the damage. Based on analysis with good EM/Thermal resistances, expect around 2500-2700 damage per firing cycle, which does seem to stagger out after time. As the Towers fire once every 15 seconds, and damage can be mitigating by moving, it should be tolerable with capable reps, but not on any frigate level hull.
IMMEDIATELY after hacking this container, active the Microwarpdrive and burn towards the Sentry Repair Station located near the right of your present position. There is enough time for 2 hacks, maybe 3 fast hacks:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 8/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The Station will provide shield and armor repairs to the friendly Rewired Sentry Gun.
FAILURE: No penalty, although if a successful hack is not completed before the hostile Sentry Towers destroy the friendly Tower, then some Towers will remain.
At the present time, I have not seen the hostile Towers aggress my vessel after failure to hack the Sentry Repair Station in time. Instead the hostile Towers seemed to keep incurring damage and eventually destruct, even with the Rewired Sentry Gun destroyed. This could be a bug. Should it be fixed in the future, some reps, decent buffer tank with at least 75% EM and Thermal resists will be required on a cruiser hull, and frigates are out of the game.
Assuming a successful hack of the Sentry Repair Station, simply sit near the Repair Station and wait for the hostile Towers to be eradicated. There is a rather serious hazard to the north of the warp-in, namely 3 Unstable Plasma Chambers. Getting too close to these could be fatal, and will trip the alarm on top of that. (Hacking the Sentry Repair Station before the RDGU does nothing, although a message appears in Local: "Hacking the repair station has no discernible effects on anything in the vicinity. The station continues to provide repair services to to the nearby sentry guns.")
When all is clear, the loot is there for the taking, and one may loot and hack in peace with (aside from the nearby hazard) no particular danger:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 6 - 9/10 [YELLOW to RED HACKS]
SUCCESS: The loot can be scooped up.
FAILURE: No penalty.
Do NOT hack the Hyperfluct Generator container yet.
For the more nefarious minded, who might be hunting someone in one of these rooms, bring a Data Analyzer II, a cloak and some kind of long range weapon which is not a drone. By hacking the Vessel Rejuvenation Battery and then IMMEDIATELY shooting at the plasma chambers, it's possible to destroy the site runner when he warps into the site by pre-tripping the alarm, or when he's running the containers closer to the Plasma Chambers. Drop a bomb with a bomber, and warp out of the site? A suicide Rifter or something, using a warp disruptor to get on the killmail? (At least CONCORD won't have time to respond if you do this in high security space. Bookmark his wreck and come back to steal his dropped items, too, if the site despawns, or that overtanked Maller after your criminal flag has lapsed, or have the alt fly it in. Sent a polite WiNGSPAN Delivery Services styled mail afterwards.)
Anyways. As you're working on the hacks, avoid using the Microwarpdrive, use Keep at Range (2250m) on the last can near the group of Plasma Chambers. With all those done, in a frigate, this site is done. Take the Spatial Rift to head back to the Solray Room, refit to a travel fit if needed, scoop up any contents inside the Mobile Depot (if it is scooped to the cargohold directly, a jetcan is left behind), pack up the Mobile Depot and depart.
| Technical details of this room |
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| {{{1|If the Alarm has been tripped by someone else or by yourself, expect to eat anywhere from 2500 to 3500 damage per sentry volley, which is once every 15 seconds or so. The actual numbers will vary because not all Sentry Towers will be in range, because of resistances, the chance of a miss, not all of the fire at the same time and other minor factors. Depending on the local damage received, 1000 EHP/sec or more active reps should be sufficient. Make sure to specifically tank against EM and Thermal damage: 70% resists against both types is pretty much the minimum.
The Towers themselves have an activation range of 120km. Beyond this point, they will switch from a red box to a yellow box, but will re-engage if a player approaches within that 120km limit. Because of this, a sniping battleship can be used to clear out the Sentry Towers if desired, however this does take some time. To do this, when landing on the beacon, immediately turn the ship around 180 degrees from the area near the Storage Depots and then hit the Micro Jump Drive. (This allows for the maximum distance jumped from the rest of the Towers: hopefully only three or four Towers will still have active aggression.) Use 1400mm Artillery or Sentry Drones. If the Alarm has been tripped and a player wishes to continue hacking, he may consider two options:
Hacking the Remote Defense Grid Unit does something very interesting: it prevents additional Sentry Towers from spawning when a player casually approaches the Storage Depots. These Sentry Towers are independent of the ones generated by the Alarm activation. (Both sets of Towers at the same time can add up to some healthy DPS. Now is when you'll wish you had brought the correct hardeners.) 1800-2000 EHP/sec against EM and Thermal damage is sufficient enough to tank both sets of Towers, although the mainly test run indicated 1000 EHP/sec was ...okay. This scenario, along with the Archive Room, heavily favors armor tanks, not just because of the native resist profile, but because armor tanks are easier to make capacitor stable and are more efficient. Tengus with large capacitor batteries and oversized battleship-sized repair modules are more or less excepted from that rule, however Tengus do have a sizable EM hole. If the Alarm has not been tripped, and a player wanders over to the Storage Depots without regard (the activation zone for Sentry Tower spawn and aggression for that scenario is roughly 10km from the Hyperfluct Generator), there can be (it appears to be a maximum of) 10 additional Sentry Towers that will spawn. Initially, there are 2 Vigilant, 2 Wakeful, and 2 Restless Sentry Towers assuming nothing else is touched, and those will also aggress the ignoble player who does so. It is not that dangerous though, if you have 90% resists to EM and Thermal damage, as my test Maller did, in which case my damage taken was about 315 DPS. That is something two Augurors can handle. A good Oneiros could probably handle that itself. With no repairs, the Maller itself will last for about six minutes. Here's the fit:
Maller - Sup. Sleeper Game Over + LogiMaller: Maller - Sup. Sleeper Game Over + Logi
EFT
[Maller, Maller - Sup. Sleeper Game Over + Logi]
10MN Monopropellant Enduring Afterburner Relic Analyzer II Type-E Enduring Cargo Scanner Armor EM Hardener II Armor EM Hardener II Armor Thermal Hardener II Armor Thermal Hardener II 1600mm Steel Plates II 1600mm Steel Plates II Medium Anti-Thermal Pump I Medium Trimark Armor Pump I Medium Trimark Armor Pump I   FITTING DIFFICULTY
EVE VERSION
YC118 1.0
ALPHA CAN USE
UNSET
RECOMMENDED SKILLS
NOTES
TwoMaelstrom: Two
EFT
[Maelstrom, Two]
Large Shield Extender II Large Shield Extender II Large Shield Extender II Large Shield Extender II Data Analyzer II Adaptive Invulnerability Field II Reinforced Bulkheads II Reinforced Bulkheads II Reinforced Bulkheads II Reinforced Bulkheads II Damage Control II Large Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I Large Core Defense Field Extender I Large Core Defense Field Extender I    FITTING DIFFICULTY
EVE VERSION
YC118 1.0
ALPHA CAN USE
UNSET
RECOMMENDED SKILLS
NOTES
The explosion radius itself is also big. To test this, I made a line of Atrons from 100km out to 240km. All of them were blown up. Eventually after some time I found another site (hopefully the last site I have to find on the test server...ugh); in that site I made another line of Atrons from 240km out to 350km. For that case, only the 240km Atron was popped, but not the one at 250km. So it's probably very safe to say that the detonation radius is 249km, or 250km: the Atron might have been on the raw edge of the line. As for detonating it, any hostile module will work, such as a target painter. Even a gun or missile doesn't have to actually inflict any damage to the Chambers: the mere act of aggression is enough. A rather unimportant detail: The Sentry Repair Station will repair damage on the friendly Rewired Sentry Gun to the tune of 6% per second (shield, armor and hull). The Rewired Sentry Gun cannot be repaired with remote logistics. A rather important detail: Aggressing any one of the default Sentry Towers in the room will instantly trigger the Alarm, and the 16 supplemental perimeter Towers will spawn at once. Do not engage the initial Sentry Towers. Lastly: A damage log of ... a lot of Sentry Towers spawned. Should give you a basic idea of what kind of damage we're talking about here. [ 2016.07.05 23:26:49 ] (combat) 1192 from Wakeful Sentry Tower - Penetrates I don't know what ship that is...unfortunately. The Maelstrom was able to tank most of the damage with just one repairer at about 950 EHP/sec. That is 4743 damage taken over 45 seconds, which turns out to 105.4 DPS incurred. Consider these two fits:
Maller - About Face (Turret Room)Maller: Maller - About Face (Turret Room)
EFT
[Maller, Maller - About Face (Turret Room)]
Large Cap Battery II Large Cap Battery II Relic Analyzer II Medium Armor Repairer II Medium Armor Repairer II Armor Thermal Hardener II Armor Thermal Hardener II Armor EM Hardener II Armor EM Hardener II Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I Medium Anti-Thermal Pump I    FITTING DIFFICULTY
EVE VERSION
YC118 1.0
ALPHA CAN USE
UNSET
RECOMMENDED SKILLS
NOTES
Myrmidon - To Tank A Few SentriesMyrmidon: Myrmidon - To Tank A Few Sentries
EFT
[Myrmidon, Myrmidon - To Tank A Few Sentries]
Cap Recharger II Cap Recharger II Large Compact Pb-Acid Cap Battery Large Compact Pb-Acid Cap Battery Relic Analyzer II Medium Armor Repairer II Medium Armor Repairer II Armor Thermal Hardener II Armor Thermal Hardener II Armor EM Hardener II Armor EM Hardener II Medium Nanobot Accelerator I Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I   FITTING DIFFICULTY
EVE VERSION
YC118 1.0
ALPHA CAN USE
UNSET
RECOMMENDED SKILLS
NOTES
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These images below cover the detonation of the Plasma Chambers.
For the T3 Cruisers, Nestor and other similar battleship-level tanked ships, if there was no Mobile Depot left behind anywhere in any other room, you may now proceed to the vaunted Archive Room.
PHASE 5: THE ARCHIVE ROOM
It may be very worthwhile reading this before this room is attempted, and watching a video of someone else running it. It's pretty dangerous.
Starting from the Sentries on Duty room, there should be a Hyperfluct Generator container. Hacking it produces two outcomes:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 9/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS:
First case: A Spatial Rift is generated, which allows immediate access to the Archive Room.
Second case: A Spatial Rift is not generated, so you'll have a harder time. Here's what needs to be done:
- Lock up one of the Unstable Plasma Chambers. Make sure you have some kind of high slot weapon: drones will not work. Even a 125mm Autocannon on a Nestor is enough. Do not shoot it yet.
- Start hacking the Vessel Rejuvenation Battery, but do NOT finish the hack. When you find the core, and are 1-2 clicks away from success, get ready for the next bit below.
FAILURE: No penalty.
CAN DIFFICULTY: 8/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: A cloud is generated which approximates the area of healing reps. It evaporates after 10 seconds, so timing is important. The cloud will protect even a frigate from the incredible power of the explosion.
FAILURE: No penalty.
Just after you finish the hack, quickly shoot the Plasma Chamber. The Vessel Rejuvenation Battery's mad reps will protect you. Quickly turn on the Microwarpdrive over to the now-revived Hyperfluct Generator. There are just 60 seconds to attempt a successful hack before the Perimeter Defense System comes online. When that happens, 16 new Sentry Towers appear. Frigates won't last. Ships that can run the Archive Room fine will be okay to repeat attempts until the Rift is generated.
Assuming the hack goes through in time, take the rift into the Archive Room itself.
Landing in the vaunted Archive Room, it's time to take in the scenery. There is plenty of local attractions which cause hurt: Sentry Towers, damage clouds, and then Shockwaves. There are a number of tasks to perform in this room.
Begin by approach the Defense Targeting Augmentation Unit. From the beacon, a straight line approach is fine. Go ahead and hack it. Before we go farther, any failed hacks in this room may spawn additional Sentry Towers. May:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 8/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The Sentry Towers, which already have atrocious tracking ability, suffer an additional tracking penalty.
FAILURE: Standard failure result of any can in this site: May spawn additional Sentry Towers.
A successful hack also has the opportunity to spawn a Pristine Storage Depot nearby. You may hack it and loot it. Proceed on to hacking the Cerebrum Maintenance Chambers. Each functions like a normal data or relic site object: it must be hacked first before it can be opened. Same hacking difficulty and failure results as before, red hacks. For the Central Archive Cerebrum to begin operating, three Cerebrum Oscillation Fluid objects are needed, the other items like the Self-Regulating Machine Gears and what not are just scrap. Therefore, hack enough Cerebrum Maintenance Chambers to get what is required:
CAN DIFFICULTY: 8/10 [RED HACK]
SUCCESS: The contents may be extracted.
FAILURE: Additional Sentry Towers may spawn.
I like to shoot the Sentry Towers that lie around the perimeter. As they have a 50m signature radius, Light Neutron Blasters and light drones work good enough. Depending on your fit, their absence can be enough to make sure your tank lasts long enough.
Having 3 Oscillation Fluids (or more) in your cargo hold, go ahead and Open Cargo on the Central Archive Cerebrum.
Place 3 of those Oscillation Fluid items into the Cerebrum; more is not necessary, but 2 won't work either. (The E-UNI wiki says an explosion can occur if foreign material is inserted into the Cerebrum. A test run did not incur such an event.) At this point, a couple of things are initiated: first, the Central Archive Cerebrum will eject Storage Depots of varying grades, and Shockwaves will start coming. The first set are tankable fine in a standard Tech III Strategic Cruiser, though the double massive Shockwaves will most likely be more than most fits and skills can handle. The basic idea then becomes a question of how many cans can be hacked and looted before the incoming damage is more than can be safely tolerated.
Vessel Rejuvenation Batteries will also be ejected from the Cerebrum itself. These are cool. Details are below: they are Data hacks.
Make sure to check for other containers around the area, for those looking to complete the room fully. When finished, warp out. Those who left Mobile Depots in other rooms may need to warp back to collect them and refit for a travel fit.
Congratulations: you have completed the most challenging Sleeper Cache the game has to offer.
| It's time to get gnarly |
|---|
|
Ahem... You may have heard of the damage of this room, and having explored it on the test server, it's imperative for me to communicate my findings for future reference. Starting with the Smoldering Archive Ruins. These minor damage clouds line the area around the central Cerebrum. From their center, they seem to have a damage radius of about 4km, although certain clouds may have a larger radius. A damage log: [ 2016.07.06 00:02:34 ] (combat) 34 from Smoldering Archive Ruins - Hits 151.6 DPS average there, although 131 seems more about right. That hit for 146 throws the average off. A dual-rep Stratios with roughly 350 EHP/sec lasted about a minute before it failed to repair enough, and exploded. They can cause borderline tanks to break when the Colossal waves hit. On to the damage waves. There are four types of waves, and you'll recognize them in Local. "A massive shockwave is approaching the area. ETA is 15 seconds." ...is a single Massive. Two of those timed at the same time is a double massive, three of them at the same time is a triple massive and "A colossal shockwave is approaching the area. ETA is 15 seconds." ...is a colossal wave. Those are the ones that do the most damage, quite a lot actually. A colossal plus a double massive is very intimidating and most tanks will break at the huge DPS overload. The only relief comes from the fact that there is often 15-30 seconds of peacetime between waves, although the period is random; though at least one wave every 20 seconds of some kind of magnitude is expected. This is the damage log of one massive shockwave. [ 2016.06.20 07:03:18 ] (combat) 136 from Shockwave - Hits 4390 damage taken over 5 seconds equals 878 damage per second taken. On the Maelstrom, one X-Large C5-L Emergency Shield Overload repairing 1095 EHP/sec was comfortably sustaining this damage. Two of these simultaneously was not too bad, nothing one repper couldn't fix before the next wave came through. Three definitely needed both shield boosters running. A colossal wave. [ 2016.06.20 07:02:58 ] (combat) 181 from Shockwave - Hits 15005 damage over 9 seconds. 1667 damage per second taken. That's a lot. My thoughts. First I used a Maelstrom. It was fit with the following:
Maelstrom - Sisi Sup. Tester Active copy 2Maelstrom: Maelstrom - Sisi Sup. Tester Active copy 2
EFT
[Maelstrom, Maelstrom - Sisi Sup. Tester Active copy 2]
800mm Heavy 'Scout' Repeating Cannon I, Republic Fleet EMP L 800mm Heavy 'Scout' Repeating Cannon I, Republic Fleet EMP L 800mm Heavy 'Scout' Repeating Cannon I, Republic Fleet EMP L 800mm Heavy 'Scout' Repeating Cannon I, Republic Fleet EMP L 800mm Heavy 'Scout' Repeating Cannon I, Republic Fleet EMP L 800mm Heavy 'Scout' Repeating Cannon I, Republic Fleet EMP L 800mm Heavy 'Scout' Repeating Cannon I, Republic Fleet EMP L 800mm Heavy 'Scout' Repeating Cannon I, Republic Fleet EMP L 5a Prototype Shield Support I X-Large C5-L Emergency Shield Overload I X-Large C5-L Emergency Shield Overload I Adaptive Invulnerability Field II EM Ward Field II Heavy Capacitor Booster II, Navy Cap Booster 3200 Damage Control II Expanded Cargohold II Expanded Cargohold II Expanded Cargohold II Expanded Cargohold II Large Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer II Large Core Defense Operational Solidifier I Large Core Defense Capacitor Safeguard II           FITTING DIFFICULTY
EVE VERSION
YC118 1.0
ALPHA CAN USE
UNSET
RECOMMENDED SKILLS
NOTES
Seriously though, because of the extreme tanking requirements here, armor is the way to go. First, armor repairers are more efficient at converting capacitor gigajoules to hitpoints. Secondly, they don't interfere with vital midslots for capacitor mods. Thirdly, buffer modifications work better for the reason stated above. On the downside, shield boosters are easy to oversize, and shield boost amplifiers are cool. But armor is the way to go for this site. So I pulled out a Hyperion, which was fit with dual reppers and three 1600mm plates. While it had enough buffer, it didn't have the capability to fix it fast enough before the next wave. I mean, it was fine for the massives and the double massives, but while it could eat a colossal, it couldn't fix it all up in time. You really need triple reppers on a battleship to get the armor fixed in time for the buffer to work properly to sustain most of the damage of the wave. The Russian bloke used two fits in his videos. This is his Legion:
Legion - Triple Rep Superior Sleeper StableLegion: Legion - Triple Rep Superior Sleeper Stable
EFT
[Legion, Legion - Triple Rep Superior Sleeper Stable]
Relic Analyzer II Dark Blood Cap Recharger Dark Blood Cap Recharger Dark Blood Cap Recharger 1600mm Steel Plates II True Sansha Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane True Sansha Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane Corpum A-Type Medium Armor Repairer Corpum A-Type Medium Armor Repairer Corpum A-Type Medium Armor Repairer Legion Electronics - Emergent Locus Analyzer Legion Defensive - Nanobot Injector Legion Engineering - Capacitor Regeneration Matrix Legion Offensive - Drone Synthesis Projector Legion Propulsion - Chassis Optimization Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump II Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I Medium Capacitor Control Circuit II           FITTING DIFFICULTY
EVE VERSION
YC118 1.0
ALPHA CAN USE
UNSET
RECOMMENDED SKILLS
NOTES
Here's my Maelstrom skirmishing with the Archive Sentry Guns: [ 2016.06.20 06:41:48 ] (combat) 442 from Impaired Archive Sentry Tower - Hits So to put into numbers, a ship with at least 50K EHP of raw buffer in its chosen tank style (again, armor is the way to go here) and can repair at least 1500 EHP/sec is fine, though 2000-2300 is much better.
Hyperion - Sup. will it work?Hyperion: Hyperion - Sup. will it work?
EFT
[Hyperion, Hyperion - Sup. will it work?]
Light Neutron Blaster II, Federation Navy Antimatter Charge S Light Neutron Blaster II, Federation Navy Antimatter Charge S Light Neutron Blaster II, Federation Navy Antimatter Charge S Light Neutron Blaster II, Federation Navy Antimatter Charge S Light Neutron Blaster II, Federation Navy Antimatter Charge S Light Neutron Blaster II, Federation Navy Antimatter Charge S 100MN Monopropellant Enduring Afterburner Relic Analyzer II Large Cap Battery II Large Cap Battery II Heavy Electrochemical Capacitor Booster I, Cap Booster 3200 1600mm Steel Plates II 1600mm Steel Plates II Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II Large Armor Repairer II Large Armor Repairer II Large Armor Repairer II Large Auxiliary Nano Pump I Large Auxiliary Nano Pump I Large Nanobot Accelerator I        FITTING DIFFICULTY
EVE VERSION
YC118 1.0
ALPHA CAN USE
UNSET
RECOMMENDED SKILLS
NOTES
The Vessel Rejuvenation Batteries are ejected periodically. When they are hacked, they generate a cloud which provides serious repping power. It was enough for my Hyperion to tank a colossal wave (and more) and not take a lick of damage to my shield. The shield would stay pegged at 100% regardless of the Shockwave damage, and it also fixed armor as well. They last for about 90 seconds before they expire. And one other thing, which they won't tell you elsewhere: The area of effect damage radius on the shockwaves, measured from the Central Archive Cerebrum, is about 55 to 56km. If you orbit the Cerebrum at 60km, you shouldn't take any damage at all. I ran a battleship in a orbit around the Cerebrum at 60km orbit for about half an hour and didn't take any damage at all. |
Pictures. Let's see them.
Videos. Everybody loves them. Here is a video of a Nestor being used (note the hack failure in the Mine Room); a triple rep Legion (also shiny); and finally, another Legion video where the turret room has all the sentry guns spawned.
General Exploration Ramblings
When a newcomer to the harsh, brutal world of EVE Online enters the door, he often finds himself in the Exploration avenue of job descriptions. Everybody has to do it to a certain capacity, whether it's hunting deadspace modules, running Sleeper Caches, running wormholes, it's pretty much the same core concept. In this post I'll chronicle some of my findings and knowledge: I'm not going to be an expert, but I've done a little bit of it.
I first started exploring wormholes and just general exploration while I was still in trial period. I'm not the most experienced explorer or knowledgeable about wormhole life though. There are other players with greater levels of experience.
In those images, that was the first wormhole I went into, and discovered what a POS was. The last one was when I desperately wanted to run a Limited Sleeper Cache, but couldn't scan it down, so I had to combat probe the Astero inside it. That...was long time ago.
I also want to get these images down somewhere, so here they are...
Thera is a gateway wormhole system that has many links to Known-space systems and is good for diving into deep nullsec to explore. Try to make it back before the wormhole collapses. Have a look at this useful Reddit post about living in Thera. By the way: the largest warp from one side of Thera to the other is about 370 AU. Otherwise (as I'm told) the largest system in EVE is 9-266Q in Venal and the smallest is OM-24X in Etherium Reach.
SCANNING
Scanning is one of the core tasks required in exploration. At some point, everybody has to do it, and for those who live in wormholes, it's part of the daily activities. For a video, the first one I watched which gave me an idea of how to scan was this video. Bear in mind that it is made for the old Odyssey map interface, which is what I presently use and will use until the new one is refined into a more efficient interface. The concept of scanning is the same.
I could elaborate on all the specifics I know about scanning, but instead I will talk about matters that I have not seen in other guides.
By default, when scanning for basic cosmic signatures in a system with a large number of signatures, sort the signatures by ID. Work from the topmost signature down to the bottom. The reason for this is if you have two scanners working at the same time, using a out-of-game mapper tool to keep track of signatures. One works from the bottom, and another works from the top. Normally, if there are only 3-4 signatures in the system, 4 AU is a good starting probe size because ordinary signatures spawn within 4 AU of a celestial, although recently that has been slightly edged out a bit but I have yet to see an ordinary one past 5 AU. Sleeper caches almost always are at least 5 AU from a celestial, but not more than 8 AU. Therefore, if one signature bubble is near a distant celestial, just put a pinpoint formation at 4 AU around the celestial and press the scan button.
Formations are a rarely discussed subject. In pre-Odessey days, where probes had to be launched individually (launching the probes didn't launch all 8) and positioned manually each time (there were no such thing as pre-formed formations), the 7 probe diamond formation was very popular. It basically looks like a giant 3D + (plus), with one probe in the north, one in the west, another in the south, east, one up high, one down low and finally one in the middle. With 8 probes, just put the 8th one near the middle, but just off-centered a bit.
Besides the pinpoint formation, the cube formation is one that I use a lot for Sleeper caches and when scanning harder signatures with unbonused ships, such as bombers in wormholes. The cube formation gets its name from its basic foundation block, a cube, with one probe on each corner of an imaginary 3D cube. Make one that is pre-fixed at 4 AU probe size, another at 0.5 AU (for combat probes) probe size and finally another one for maximum scan strength. The cube formation is the easiest custom formation to make that can extract the maximum possible strength from any one given set of probes: to make a 0.25 maximum scan strength probe formation for Sleeper caches, just find a Sleeper cache first. (If your skills are very high, downgrade the probes or even the ship until the maximum probe strength is at the minimum or close to it. Limited: 85.8-ish. Standard: 92. Superior: 104.) Start with the 0.5 AU probe size, reduce the probe size to 0.25 AU, then fine tune the formation until the cube shape is perfect and equidistant between all the probes. Using the signature of the Sleeper cache as a reference, center the new 0.25 AU cube formation exactly in the middle of the signature dot. Reduce the probe distances with the ALT key (new mapper uses a different key. I don't use the new mapper, as it is unusable for my purposes) just a small amount, then scan again. Repeat the distance reduction and scan procedure, taking your time and using small increments each time until the probe scanner shows the maximum possible strength you can get out of it. Save the formation.
Above are pictured three basic formations. As mentioned before, the 7 probe Diamond formation was extremely popular before the Odyssey expansion, but nowadays most people don't use it. Picture it as a three dimensional "plus" with one probe in each end with one in the middle. The 8th probe, if used, is placed offset from the middle one. The cube formation is highly recommended to save as a formation.
Other formations include blanket formations (used for stealthy combat probing stuff), the Dual Triangle Formation (too difficult to make for the value, especially compared to the cube formation) and specialized combat probe formations meant for specific systems so that the probes are positioned in a specific way to cover the whole system without actually having a probe show upon the directional scanner. That's about all I know about formations: pro scanners are usually very tight-lipped about their secrets. Even I have to refrain from too much elaboration on the technique of scanning a ship down with just one scan run. That technique has gotten a little bit easier with the new directional scanner cone feature of the new probe scanner, but the old-fashioned way does work faster because the old probe scanner interface is easier to use when combat probing, particularly under heavy pressure. It can also be more accurate, but that is mostly a factor of distance. (Gee that was cryptic enough)
The "Two Dot Pattern" is a frequent occurrence to scanners. Referring to the image above, the observer can note that the probe "center" is near one of the dots, yet the signature was not resolved adequately. When this happens, it must be the other red dot -- because if the signature was closer to where the probes are concentrated, it wouldn't have shown two dots.
Whenever I enter a new wormhole system, I try to follow a certain protocol. Although my procedure below is not fully established, and there is probably a couple of other things that can be tweaked about it, it works well enough. Let's just say I have no idea what this wormhole signature in the system is, and I've landed at the wormhole entrance.
- 1. Check that my ship and fit is ready for the task. Entering a wormhole blindly in a Retriever with no probe launcher is asking for trouble.
- 2. Look at the Signature ID of the wormhole on my local overview. It might say "Wormhole N110"...okay, I use this page to give me a quick idea of what that ID corresponds to.
- 3. Show Info on the wormhole itself. Is it End of Life? I don't go in there. Is it "nearing the verge of collapse"? I don't go in there.
- 4. I enter the wormhole.
- 5. I look at my local overview. Are there 30 ships surrounding the hole? Well, guess I'm not doing much here. Am I in a bubble? Are there a bunch of wrecks on the hole? If it looks bad, I just bounce back into the previous system.
- 6. Bookmark the exit wormhole. Don't bother naming it: time is of the essence.
- 7. I use my directional scanner to look for: Ships, Probes, active Force Fields, Citadels, Wrecks, Mobile Depots and Tractor Units, Drones, and bubbles. If all is clear, I proceed to the next step.
- A system with a Fortizar, two Austrahus citadels and a moonlocked system has a 100% chance of a corporation living there. A bunch of Sleeper Medium Wrecks on Dscan indicates that someone is ratting or has been ratting in the past two hours. An Elite Gallente Frigate Wreck on Dscan means someone got blown up recently in a frigate. Drones out mean the same: someone is there or has been there recently. Three Control Towers, but only one Force Field indicate that two towers are offline, but one is online. A Mobile Depot and a couple of Freight Containers out in space means that someone is living there, to a certain extent (most common in Shattered wormholes). If there are 16 Mobile Warp Disruptors, someone has been doing something relatively important recently. And so on.
- At this time I also pull up the probe scanner window if it's not already up. If there are just two or three cosmic signatures in the system (and interpreting the same for the cosmic anomalies), then I know that someone either lives here, or has been here somewhat recently, as wormholes that have not have been "cleaned out" usually have a dozen or more signatures. (CREST used to provide information for NPC kills in the same way as known space. That has been removed. That would be another point of intelligence.) Looking up the system in this site can provide useful intelligence on the possible wormhole connections.
- 8. I look up the J-Number in zKillboard. If it has been quiet for a week or so, it's probably okay. Probably. If there have been 50 kills in the last hour, ... I'm backing out. I may also elect to check something like this to see what the likely statics are, system effects, and so forth.
- 9. If I am in a Covert Ops ship, I may elect to scoot around the system cloaked to look around at any POSs or Citadels, or move to areas where my initial Directional Scanner range was not sufficient. Should I need to launch core probes, I'll do it right after I recloak, then quickly yank the probes way off my map so they're off the directional scanner.
- 10. If I intend to run any sites, it's usually prudent to check the other wormhole connections for: critical holes (someone has either been rolling them or brought a bunch of ship mass through recently); where they lead to and other information on the neighboring wormholes. Running a couple of combat sites in a Rattlesnake without scouting the neighboring systems for a nasty T3 gang is asking for trouble.
- 11. The best way to know how to live or operate somewhat safely in wormholes is to hunt in them yourself (you'll know the ways of the trade) and working with other knowledgeable players who are familiar with the methods.
There is some confusion about the signature ID K162. Here is some explanation I dug up:
| “ |
K162 appearance only on first jump A 'K162' is the 'out' end of a wormhole link, and historically has spawned when someone has initiated warp to the 'in' end of a wormhole link. Wormholes that have not been warped to only exist in potential; warping to one end of the link is what actually creates the link between the two systems. This is an extremely significant change with two obvious ramifications. The first is that people inside the system that is being connected to will have significantly less warning that there is an inbound wormhole. Beforehand they had the length of a ship warp to the 'in' side of a wormhole during which the 'out' signature was visible but before anyone had jumped through. Post-Hyperion, the link will only appear after a ship jumps. This tips the scale significantly towards the hunters in wormhole space, particularly in higher-class wormholes where capital ships in siege or triage mode are frequently used in site-running. The second is that pilots will be able to find out what an outbound link is before opening it. Currently you need to be on grid with a wormhole to verify where it leads - but being on grid with it means that you have warped to it, which means it is activated. After the Hyperion release, if you find that it is not a link you want to have active, for instance a wandering wormhole to higher-class space, you can just not jump through it, and the far end of the link will never spawn. This has the ability to significantly reduce the interconnectedness of wormhole space and counterbalance the increased number of wandering / random wormhole links. |
” |
Learning how to use the directional scanner to locate targets and pinpoint areas to combat probe are essential techniques to learn as a scanner. A good place to start is searching for drones in high security space, especially congested areas. Two Vespa IIs buried in a huge cloud of red dots -- practice digging them out of the flock. It also makes for good incomes, or collections...
GAS MINING
Among the more profitable and low entry barrier jobs in EVE is gas cloud harvesting. At this writing, C5 and C6 capital escalations got whacked pretty hard, so a number of C5 and C6 wormhole corporations have shuffled over to other places, or have disintegrated into various bits. This means that running gas sites in the aforementioned holes should be somewhat safer...but that is more of a factor of "reduced ambush possibility" rather than "safe". Instrumental and Vital Core Reservoirs can be very profitable. Indeed, the first load of C5 gas I pulled out, which corresponded to a full load of a Venture, paid for the 24 million ISK skillbook and the fully fit hull. Anything after that is raw profit, and to date I haven't lost any of my Ventures.
Gas mining is easy to get into. Because Gas Cloud Harvesting is a 1x multiplier skill, it only takes about 5 days to max to Level V, which really isn't much training time and is worthwhile. The other skill to train is Mining Frigate: level IV is good enough for most cases. After that, just fitting, navigation and scanning skills are all that's left.
The Prospect is the boss of mining in dangerous space. It has a large number of good features. A low signature, which can be used for gnarly "sig tanking" NPC pirates; a similar concept can be used in K-space with mining lasers. The ability to fit a covert operations cloaking device. A good tank is easy to fit. It has a larger cargohold and a larger ore hold than the Venture. Two schools of doctrine concern the ship, the first is no medium shield extender (or double small shield extenders) or a medium shield extender.
Here is a good, stable, viable fit:
Prospect - Default
Gas Cloud Harvester II
Gas Cloud Harvester II
Covert Ops Cloaking Device II
5MN Microwarpdrive II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Medium Shield Extender II
'Stoic' Core Equalizer I
'Stoic' Core Equalizer I
Damage Control II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Small Low Friction Nozzle Joints I
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Core Scanner Probe I x16
- Bring T2 or Scoped Mining Lasers in the hold, along with a probe launcher and small armor and hull repair modules with the Mobile Depot.
- Always keep the cloak. Swap out one of the lasers or harvestors for the probe launcher if needed.
Now the Venture is a little bit easier to get into. Most people get into amusing skirmishes about how to equip their Ventures. I must say mine is not exactly the norm, and I will explain every element of it for that reason. Here is my fit:
Venture - Proper Gas Collector
Gas Cloud Harvester II
Gas Cloud Harvester II
Improved Cloaking Device II
5MN Quad LiF Restrained Microwarpdrive
Medium Azeotropic Restrained Shield Extender
Small C5-L Emergency Shield Overload I
IFFA Compact Damage Control
Small Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Small Low Friction Nozzle Joints I
Small Cargohold Optimization I
Hornet EC-300 x2
Core Scanner Probe I x16
- Always keep the cloak. Swap out one of the lasers or harvestors for the probe launcher if needed.
- Shield booster is for cap dumping, not fixing damage.
- Low slot may be changed to suite: an extra warp core stabilizer, damage control, nanofiber or inertial stabilizer are all common and viable.
Alright. Module by module:
- 1. Low slots: The damage control is mainly by preference. A warp core stabilizer, a nanofiber internal structure, or an inertial stabilizer are all good options for the low slot. IFFAs are pretty expensive as of right now so I would probably switch to a nanofiber.
- 2. Mid slots: Microwarpdrive is obvious. Crashing a gate, burning to the next cloud, cloak plus Microwarpdrive trick, or other purposes. Shield extender: Some buffer. Shield booster: This is for dumping capacitor to land short of a long distant warp to check the exit for bubbles and gatecampers. Sure you can use Control + space, but if you top capacitor skills, Warp Drive Operation IV (as I do) and a system just wide enough for that to not work very well, then it can be extremely difficult to execute. A shield booster however, is reliable and predictable. Because this ship cannot warp while cloaked off-angle to a bubble which may be "dirty", the only way to be safe is to cap-dump to see if one is there. An example is shown in this image of a larger wormhole: the principle also applies to known-space system where a constellation or regional gate is (as usual) isolate from the cluster of planets or otherwise off directional scanner range of an easily accessed bounce spot.
- I choose the shield booster if I'm in a fleet, where there has not been tacticals on the wormhole exits and safe spots shared. If I'm by myself, and did all that above in a covert ops vessel, I use a meta Adaptive Invulnerability Field. Some people also like to put ECCM arrays (the old days) or a sensor booster with a ECCM script (nowadays) to make themselves harder to scan down with combat probes. For that I have but one answer: A cloak.
- Other options have included: A survey scanner, which is useless for solo, as the Sleepers will show up before you'll mine all of it out. It's only good on fleet ops, and of those participants, only one is needed that the FC can call for a quantity check every now and then.
- 3. High slots: Gas Cloud Harvesters can be replaced to suit the skills or job required. For mining in dangerous space, I prefer the EP-S Gaussian Scoped Mining Laser because I can remain aligned longer by reason of the extended laser range. Always leave the cloak fitted.
- 4. Rigs: One to make it slightly more efficient at scanning, the second for increased agility, and the third (which is unique about my fit) allows a Mobile Depot with a probe launcher and 16 core probes to be carried in the hold, which is otherwise not possible.
- 5. Cargo: For scanning, or in case of an emergency, warp to a safe spot. Drop the mobile depot, orbit it at 5000m. Cloak and wait for the depot to anchor. When it has finished, drop one of the mining lasers or harvesters, and swap in the probe launcher. Scoop everything up, reload the launcher in warp to another safe spot, cloak up and scan an exit. In hostile space, do not drop the Mobile Depot if you see combat probes out or if you know they have a ship that commonly features them. Just sit cloaked in a safe spot and come back in two hours.
This fit is chosen because it's a cheaper version of the Prospect, and because of the Prospect's native cargo size, it doesn't have a problem carrying a mobile depot and probe launcher. But the Venture does, as without the cargo rig, it can't fit the probe launcher in the cargo with the mobile depot. Most people prefer to put shield rigs in the rig slots to increase the tank. But the thing is, if you are caught, you are almost always dead. Okay so there have been a lot of close shaves, but most of those wouldn't have been close shaves if more awareness and discipline was exercised. A Sabre paired with a stealth bomber fitted with two warp scramblers -- you're not going anywhere. No tank modules or rigs you can think of will survive that. So, given that survivability in dire situations is hardly favorable, it only makes sense to be fit for escape and utility. Given that the Venture has low EHP and terrible resistances, it only seems reasonable enough to at least make it more useful.
Once a suitable system is found, checking the killboards for recent kills and checking the directional scanner across the whole system girth is most prudent. A POS on every moon and a Fortizar owned by the same corporation or alliance? No gas mining today: it's bait and they live there. Make tactical bookmarks, cloaked, with a covert ops ship of all the exit holes. Check the other holes, and where they lead to. Only then is it prudent, after such intelligence has been appropriated, to mine gas.
In the Instrumental and Vital Core Reservoirs, which is where the money is at (lesser gas is not really worth going after unless you need it for manufacture), there is a smaller gas cloud and a larger one. Assuming a proper gas fleet of a dozen members or so (the new Command Destroyers make excellent boosters, since there is only one link that works with gas miners, namely the Laser Optimization link to reduce the cycle time), just congregate all members on the smallest cloud. The squad commander, or wing commander, then bookmarks the larger gas cloud, and positions himself so he is just about 151-152km away from the cloud (right click on the bookmark pin and move away slowly until it registers Warp to Location within 0m). Have all members anchor up on the commander. When the smaller gas cloud is finished, just warp all members directly to the next cloud.
Make sure to not warp to Ordinary Perimeter Reservoirs in Ventures or Prospects (latter if decloaked by accident). The alpha from 5 Sentry Towers is no joke for frigates. Also, from the image gallery just above, notice how one Relic site is called "Forgotten Perimeter Power..." and that is a clue that it is a combat relic site, NOT an exploration site for Herons and Probes. Compare to the "Ruined Blood Raider Monument"...there's "Blood Raider" in the name, which is a pirate faction, which indicates there are no NPCs in the site. Players however...may be cloaked or off-grid in Combat Recons and may just be watching as well.
Back to gas clouds...
Most folk like to sit very close to the middle of the gas cloud, near the icon of it. This makes the cloaked ships who must creep very close to your ship have to work harder (the gas cloud's object size changes as the gas is mined, apparently) to do their business. Corpses can also work to orbit at, as they are not the same thing as a jetcan, which can be directly warped to.
The site itself has a timer that counts down from the moment an uncloaked ship initiates a warp to the site OR if a ship fitted with a covert operations cloak decloaks inside the site. By default, this timer is fifteen minutes until the Sleepers show up, or could show up. Every minute thereafter has an increased chance of spawning the Sleeper NPCs. Some good wormhole groups like to clear out the Sleepers because it seems (from my research) that the Neurotoxin Control and Recovery skillbooks can drop from those Sleepers. That is not something I can confirm myself though. You will need logistics cruisers and respectable DPS ships to clear out the site's battleships. Ninja mining consists of watching directional scanner persistently until the fifteen minute timer is up, then the FC primes himself by holding open the menu to warp the fleet to either the next site, a safe spot, a tactical on the wormhole, or the wormhole itself so that the very second the Sleeper NPCs spawn, he initiates the warp. This is a good deal because more of the gas is effectively harvested, which means more players are able to profit from the endeavor, and more eyes are available to watch the directional scanner.
The other strategies involve coming back to clear the rats out, and continue the harvesting, or to tank them with a specialized fit like this one. Neither are for the unprepared and requires capable pilots.
COMBAT SITES
A relatively popular and somewhat profitable venture that a lot of individuals in EVE engage in is running combat sites. There are a couple of types and nuances involved here, so I'll explain. This is a variation of "ratting": engaging Non-Player Characters (NPCs): NPCs, computer-controlled-players, or bots in the vernacular of other games. NPC Pirates gets shorted to pirate, so "rat" describes an NPC pirate ship. "Ratting" is the practice of shooting NPC pirate ships.
First, Combat Anomalies are known as "green sites" because when the Probe Scanner window is pulled up, and Combat Anomalies are enabled, they are warpable directly, without the need to scan them down, by any ship. When these sites are run, there is a chance for the site to "escalate", which means that it can either start a short mini-arc (storyline) which entails running to a handful of systems, warping to a site in those systems, shooting some NPCs, and continuing on. Or it can escalate to a higher grade site, which is nice because it is your own personal site, and nobody else has it, neither can they enter unless they combat probe something or someone inside that said site. Escalations are basically like "Part 2" of the site you may have just ran: and certain escalations can be sold to other players. Apparently 50-75% of the going price of the Overseer's Personal Effects of that site is usually considered acceptable starting pricing. Some escalations into dangerous space (such as sovereign nullsec from a high sec green site, as I've had) are best abandoned or sold to the locals. Trust and not getting blown up enroute or back out make for some interesting moments for sure. You definitely don't want an escalation into a key battleground system, such as HED-GP unless you live there.
Typically, a large number of green sites have to be ran for an escalation, which makes them not only boring, but uninteresting for a number of people. Aside from the escalation chance itself, and the chance of a faction NPC spawn (which can drop faction modules, such as Dread Guristas Thermal Dissipation Field), there's not much to them. Green sites get better as the lower the system security status becomes: the best are in sovereign nullsec and wormhole space. Sovereign nullsec is great for running the sites, and a suitable pilot can make good money from the bounties running those sites -- and snatching any cool faction modules from those said sites. Within the classification of green sites and all their variants, some sites are better to run than others in the same system.
In wormhole space, green sites, as all combat sites in wormhole space, have Sleeper NPCs which are nicely souped-up versions of the kind you see in regular Known Space. In higher classes of wormholes they are no joke and are not to be trifled with in inappropriate ships and inexperienced pilots. Sleeper NPCs can drop "blue loot" which is sold to NPC buy orders in Known Space, and the wrecks themselves can (and usually are) salvaged for additional profit. Check out this site for site profiles.
Now for Cosmic Signatures. Combat sites classified under Cosmic Signatures are sometimes nice because they can shortcut around the raw boredum of green site escalation hunting. As Player versus Environment (PvE) sooner or later turns into a question of efficiency and speed, experience and a good overall setup with the right ship and fit comes in handy, as does knowing the site itself. Googling the site name itself can usually pull up a nice profile of the site which allows a player to evaluate the hazards and proceed as needed.
Anyways the combat sites found through scanning can either be raw trash or quite valuable. Looking at this page, it's important to know what sites are even worth running. Let's take Guristas Pirate space, which, for high security space, is confined to The Forge, The Citadel and Lonetrek regions. Those said regions are also relatively highly populated, the number of site runners large, and competition can be fierce. For said high sec space, you'll want to run the Gurista Guerilla Grounds and the Guristas Scout Outpost sites. The Lookout and Hideout sites are just about worthless. The value in these sites comes from the chance for the faction NPC pirate ship to drop goodies worth selling or keeping: in the Gurista Guerilla Grounds sites, the kicker is probably a Pithi A-Type Small Shield Booster, which can sell for about 100 million ISK, and maybe a Worm frigate blueprint copy. (That shield booster is popular on PvE Jackdaws and certain Tengu fits for PvE.) In the Guristas Scout Outpost site, the kicker is would be any decent Pith C-Type deadspace modules and -- a Gila cruiser blueprint copy.
Certain quiet low-sec constellations can make good areas to look for these sites too, although looking at that table will give you a good idea of what to expect, and you should look up the site to see if you can effectively run it and if the loot that can drop from those sites is in line with what you're interested in. DED 5/10s and their close equivalents in the Unrated categories can be very dangerous for unprepared and uncapable pilots: a frigate will have a very hard time running the site effectively, for instance. (This is coming from someone who used to run DED 3/10s and 4/10s in a T1 frigate. Still does, on occasion. Used a Breacher to run an escalation into Rancer. Didn't get blown up, either.)
Running combat sites on an alternate NPC corporation character is the best for highsec and some lowsec operations, as it allows freedom to navigate around areas without fear of war targets. When contesting a site, it's better to not engage the contestant who has gone suspect: he is doing so because he has a good idea what he's doing, and is most likely more than capable of destroying your ship. You may use an MTU to pull the wreck of the faction rat in the last room (if that's the way the site is laid out), but keep in mind that he will not be CONCORD'd for shooting your MTU. One option is to counter-bait him (works best with friends of your own) to kill him instead: a neuting Vexor can work nicely.
From these images above come various illustrations of some of the concepts mentioned. As I'm hardly an expert on the matter, and don't do it full time, there are more authoritative persons on the matter. Dedicated ones will make "routes" to optimize their searches, and from there, run every "green site" or cosmic anamoly combat site hoping for an escalation or a faction rat spawn, whilst also scanning down any scannable combat sites as well. Most are tight-lipped about their methods because of competition reasons. Gilas are very popular for a multitude of reasons, however they are not as fast as select Tech III Destroyers like Confessors and Jackdaws with certain sites -- considering that T3Ds are quicker, this sometimes works out quite favorably compared to Gilas and Stratios cruisers.
When looking for exploration based combat sites, remember to avoid systems under active Incursions. Belt rats are replaced with Sansha ships which are useless to shoot at, eat drones quick, and are extremely dangerous with lowsec or nullsec gatecamps. Those gatecamps, particularly under high influence (meaning their affects on capsuleer vessels which reduces resistances, hitpoints and damage to dangerously low levels) can easily make mincemeat of battleships, Tech III cruisers and other respectable ships like Vagabonds and Deimos vessels.
But save any useful deep safe spots from them for future needs.
Shown above is me running a Bantam to provide friendly reps to two others in a C2 Perimeter Transponder Farm. It's not a difficult site to clear out. It's an example of a "Combat Data Site" whereby the hostile NPCs must be eradicated before the hacking containers are unlocked. The contents of said containers increases in value as the class of the wormhole goes up. Bring a cargo scanner to see if they're worth hacking anyways - in those sites we ran, the contents were just about worthless. The value of Sleeper combat sites as mentioned before comes from the Blue Loot and salvage components, though certain Talocan ship wrecks can hold some very valuable components.
In low security space and some nullsec regions, hybrid combat data sites classified as Gas Sites may appear. These are a little bit different than normal, because there is no gas to begin with. Rather the loot comes from what's inside the spawn containers. Bring a cargo scanner to see if there is anything useful inside them first. Neurotoxin Control and Neurotoxin Recovery skillbooks can sell for some nice cash: the rest is just fluff.
But there's more. Certain containers will be locked until the NPCs guarding it are eliminated. This brings up an interesting problem. As seen above, there are a number of Elite NPCs which are rather annnoying to deal with (i.e. they take a long time to eliminate), although the total DPS of the room isn't that bad as long as you're moving. A dual-rep Myrmidon tanked perfectly fine, but was low on damage. But if the container are not locked, then there are two approaches: the first is to pull the rats about 100km away from the containers using a frigate with a Microwarpdrive, then warping back to the containers at 0 and hacking away before they slowboat on back. The second approach is to tank them directly -- as shown above, a double Medium Shield Extender Heron was fine enough. The vessel was only in half shield by the time the site was half completed -- if you're nervous, just bring a Scythe in to fix the damage back up again. Orbit the containers to reduce incoming damage considerably: do not sit still.
HACKING
Hacking is a learned game, best practiced first in easy high sec sites, then graduating to low, null or wormhole space hacks. Dedicated explorers will appreciate Tech II analyzers above everybody else -- even then, a casual explorer can usually do fine with related skills to IV and good hacking practices, such as learning about the Rule of 6, the "Corner Core" principle and careful avoidance to avoid attacking nodes which do not need to be attacked.
The images below will have to be opened individually, however they provide a detailed analysis of how I progress through the hacking game.
I would earnestly recommend watching this video by Chance because it was very enlightening for me and shows how an experienced hacker works.
DRONE LANDS DATA SITES
The Drone Lands is a unique area in New Eden for a couple of reasons, but for explorers, the area is definitely different.
First, native pirate named data and relic sites do not spawn there. Rather, in their place, scattered about fairly widely, are Abandoned Research Complexes. These sites are interesting and have some interesting properties about them:
- There are only 3 containers
- There are two High-Security Containers and one Research and Development Laboratories containers
- Failure of any one container can spawn rats. They don't hurt much, and can be handled in a few minutes even with just a single small pulse laser (ideal) on a covert ops frigate. The rats must be removed before any of the containers can be accessed, even if they've be hacked already
- Generally, the good stuff is found in the R&D Lab container. See below what constitutes "good stuff"
- The site, after all containers have been hacked, may escalate to another site somewhere else which may drop "good stuff"
Refer to this Reddit post for details about what regions have what. Basically, the initial site itself will usually have just some drone components and merely 'Integrated' drone blueprint copies, 60 run copies. The R&D Lab container can have a 120 run 'Integrated' or if in "Gallente" space of the Drone Lands, 'Augmented' drone BPCs. Usually it's empty. Although rare, a nice solid blueprint with a healthy number of runs can sell for some serious money -- especially 'Augmented' Infiltrator drones.
It may appear to some that the area is a bubbled nightmare of a place, but really, most of it is barren and most places are not bubbled up much. There are exceptions of course, but those cases are rather isolated to "Bear Lands" home systems where ratting carriers and what not are used frequently.
The End
That is all. I have more to say and discuss, but for now, I'm finished.
