User:Breeze one/Sandbox

Introduction

Introduce yourself

This will be a practical session, although others may listen in if they wish.

The purpose of this class is to provide an introduction to solo tactics and strategy in Low Sec Faction Warfare PvP. I will give a short introduction to plex mechanics, then we will be travelling to a specially set up arena at the LSC.

Once there, I will give a brief overview of the key archetypes in PvP, and I will begin posing practical situations to the group. After we have briefly discussed as a group the theoretical strategies which could be used in that situation, some brave volunteers will test out the scenario to see how our tactics have played out.

If you are familiar with Faction Warfare PvP already, or have attended this class before, feel free to join us at the arena in 15 minutes.

We will only fight to hull. You are not to destroy any ship in this session.

What to bring

Everyone should be in a T1 Frigate hull of their choice, equipped with at least a tackle module of some kind (Scram or Disrupter). The rest of the fit is entirely up to the individual.

Location

Form up at Uphallant at LSC home station. Most of the class to take place at an in-system arena of bookmarks

Basic Plex Mechanics

Faction Warfare space contain arenas, known as “Plex”, which appear on your overview and probe scanner window as beacons which all players can warp to with names such as “Gallente Novice Outpost” or “Caldari Large Installation”

The key factor to note is the “size” of the plex, as denoted by the middle word in the description. This indicates the size of ships which are able to enter the arena for fights

• Novice: Frigates only
• Small: Frigates & Destroyers
• Medium: Frigates, Destroyers, Cruisers
• Large: Any ship

When you initially warp to any plex other than the large sized variant, you will encounter an acceleration gate. Only the appropriate sized ship will be able to activate the gate and enter the plex itself. Large plex have no gate and allow any ship to enter.

The reason these arenas are so important for PvP is that:

• They provide a fixed point in deadspace for people to fight at

• The size limitations mean that you can, to a limited extent, control the fights you take, and ensure that when looking for a fight in, say, a frigate, you are not immediately jumped on by a T2 Cruiser for instance. This is a key reason why most Low Sec PvP is done in frigates which can fit into any plex.

NOTE: The gate limits ship sizes, however it does NOT limit the number of ships entering the plex. You can still be overpowered by a gang or fleet of ships if you are not aware and careful.

The Beacon

When you initially activate an acceleration gate and “slide” into the plex, you will arrive within 2.5km of a “beacon” in space. This beacon should be visible on your overview as you land, if not, adjust your overview settings to display it, as this is a key factor in plex combat.

Any ship entering the plex will also arrive within 2.5km of this beacon – there is no way to warp in at range. The exception is large-sized plex, which have no acceleration gate, and therefore can be warped to at range as with any normal cosmic object The beacon is key to fighting in a plex, as it means that when inside a plex, you know almost exactly where an enemy ship will enter. Likewise, when entering a plex where an opponent is already within, they will have positioned themselves knowing where you will appear. This always gives a slight advantage when fighting to the ship which is already inside the plex, and a large part of the various strategies for fighting in a plex is based around this mechanic.

Basic Ship Achetypes

Brawler

Brawlers use high damage, close range weapons, such as blasters or pulse lasers. Because of this, they rely on quickly getting into close range, and preventing opponents from pulling away.

When defending a plex, they will orbit the beacon very closely, and immediately try to scram and web any incoming ship to hold them at close range and prevent them pulling away.

When attacking a plex, they will need to try and swiftly close the range between them and the defending ship to get into their optimal range.

Due to range being key, fast brawlers like the Atron or Federation Navy Comet are very useful here due to their raw speed, as well as the damage boosts to brawling weapons. An alternative is a ship which carries dual stasis webs, such as the dual-web armor Kestrel or the Caldari Navy Hookbill. These are relatively slow ships in general terms, however the double web effect applied to your opponent will remove the speed advantage of almost any other ship, and allow you to dictate range despite being the slower ship on paper.

Scram-Kiter

An effective defence against a brawler is to fight from outside their optimal range, but still within warp scrambler and web range, normally between 7–9km. This is called "Scram Kiting". At this point, brawling damage will be minimal, however mid-range weapons such as beam lasers, railguns or rockets can still hit an opponent for substantial damage.

Once again, this tactic relies on relative speed to maintain range. When defending a plex you will likely orbit the beacon at your optimal range, however a brawler could quickly close range if they have a notable speed advantage.

Likewise, when attacking a plex, if a brawler is waiting at the beacon you will need to pull range before you take too much damage, which requires your ship to be faster overall than the brawler, as well as being tanky enough to survive the initial damage long enough to pull out of range.

For this reason, scram-kite ships often still fit speed modules and rigs to try and maintain speed advantage. Common scram-kiters include Breacher, Tormentor and Incursus. The Dual-Web Kestrel and Caldari Navy Hookbill noted earlier can also be equally effective as a scram-kiter as rockets can deal effective damage up to 9km, while the dual webs maintain your speed advantage.

Kiter

The other key factor in the meta are long range kiting ships. These will equip a warp disrupter to tackle at 20km+ ranges, and use long range weapons to fight well beyond the range of other ships. They are generally glass cannons, maximized for speed and damage. As they will not be able to apply a stasis web to their opponent at such long ranges, they usually rely on Micro-Warp Drives to maintain a speed advantage. However as a MWD can be switched off by a warp scrambler, if they can be closed down and tackled they will usually die quickly.

A good Kiting ship who is already inside a plex is very difficult to kill, as they will orbit the beacon well outside of scram range, and closing them down is very challenging. A ship such as a Tormentor with beam lasers can switch to long range ammo to damage the kiting ship at range, but without the ability to close range and get tackle, the Kiter is likely to simply warp away if they take too much damage. The primary disadvantage of a kiting ship is that they are very poor at attacking a plex, as any defending ship is likely to immediately scram and web them on the beacon and prevent them pulling range.

Common kiting ships are the Condor, Imperial Navy Slicer or Tristan

Practical Scenarios

In each case, two volunteers should be requested. Their fits should be posted in fleet chat, and the Teacher will decide which will defend, and which will attack.

10 minutes will be allowed at this point for the entire group to discuss potential tactics for this fight.

Things to Cover:

• What are their relative ranges?
• What type of weapons?
• What about their speeds?
• What propulsion mods do they have?
• What kind of tackle modules?

The Set-Up

There are 2 bookmarks set up. One is labelled “The Beacon”, and one “The Gate”. They are 1AU apart. A third bookmark marks the observation spot.

The defending ship in each scenario will move to the “Beacon” and position themselves however they wish.

The attacking ship will warp to the “Gate”. The Teacher will call out “start”, at which point the attacking ship should warp to 0 at the “Beacon”, and engage the defending ship.

Example Scenarios

• Fast Brawler attacking a Scam-Kiter

• Slow Brawler attacking a Scram Kiter

• Scram Kiter attacking a Brawler

• Kiting Ship attacking a Brawler

First ship to reach hull loses. No ship is to be destroyed. Both ships will now warp off to the EC or Station in system for repairs.

Debrief

10 minutes should be allowed for a debrief of the fight and how it played out, and how tactics succeeded or failed. Each scenario should take 15 minutes in total.

Total lesson time is 2 hours, although depending on numbers etc, if people are willing it can be extended.

Closing

Please leave any feedback in teh fourms, or send me a private message. Hope you all enjouyed the session and hope to see you again!