Syndication
"Syndication" is the Gallente Epic Arc. To begin requires 6.8 standing with either Impetus Corporation or the Gallente faction, but once begun, standing is not checked again for the duration of the arc. It is somewhat more difficult than L4 missions, but not impossible to do in a tech 1 battleship such as a Maelstrom. Strongly recommend at least the equivalent of a Gist-C shield booster for tanking purposes, almost all stages involve what would be considered heavy DPS in a level 4 mission.
Note that each step *does* count toward your next L4 storyline mission for the Gallente faction, although the storyline may not actually trigger until you complete a normal L4 mission.
Also note that once any epic arc is completed, you can repeat it 3 months later. If you 'Quit Mission' at any step before completing the arc, however - which heavily damages your standing with whichever corporation you're currently working for in the arc, but only trivially impacts your Gallente main faction - you can restart the arc from Step 2 immediately.
This walkthrough is a work in progress, initially authored by Phineas Qwinn. (Just call me Qwinn :)
Step 1: Impetus
Agent: Roineron Aviviere, beacon in Dodixie
Standing: +6.5102% Impetus Corporation at Social III
The agent is at a beacon in space in Dodixie. He will send you to Gian Parele in Tolle, who is at a beacon named "Impetus Tolle Studio", 4 jumps away.
Step 2: The Tolle Scar
Agent: Gian Parele, found at "Impetus Tolle Studio" beacon in Tolle
Standing: +6.5102% Impetus Corporation at Social III
Mission Location: Tolle
Enemy: Rogue Drones.
Recommendations: EMP damage.
Pocket 1: Rogue drones spawn and auto-aggro as you approach within 20km of acceleration gate. No unusual drone aggro. Single group: 6x frigates/destroyers, 6x cruisers/battlecruisers, 2x battleships
Pocket 2: All rogue drones present and auto-aggro upon arrival after activating pocket 1 gate. No unusual drone aggro. Single group: 5x frigates/destroyers, 6x cruisers/battlecruisers, 7x battleships
Loot: About 1000m3 of refinables, and typically lousy (for drones) salvage. Two drone structures drop no loot.
Step 3: Priority One
Agent: Gian Parele, found at "Impetus Tolle Studio" beacon in Tolle
Standing: +6.5102% Impetus Corporation at Social III
Mission Location: Carirgnottin (one jump from Tolle)
Enemy: Minmatar (no standing loss).
Recommendations: Thermal damage. Fit afterburner and salvager if possible, there's a fair amount of ground to cover and the salvager is required for mission completion in pocket 3.
Pocket 1: No enemies. Proceed through acceleration gate 46km away.
Pocket 2: Arrive 42km from next gate. Single spawn appears during approach, all at a range of 12-20km. 6x frigates/cruisers, 4x cruisers/battlecruisers, 3x battleships. Multiple frigates target paint your ship, take them out quickly as they significantly increase incoming DPS.
Pocket 3: 2x frigates/destroyers, 5x cruiser/battlecruisers, 3 battleships at a distance of 23km-37km from arrival point. No aggro. Shuttle wreck 49km away needs to be salvaged for mission completion after all enemies are dead. Not sure if frigates have any special attacks, I killed them first. DPS in this pocket is fairly heavy, I had to warp out once in an omni-tanked Machariel with a Gist-X large shield booster. The cruisers were surprisingly tough to damage, tanked about as well as the battleships, so should probably kill the BS first.
Loot: Not much, about 350m3, but lots of Republic Fleet insignias: Commander II, High Captain I, Private III and Midshipman II and III.
Step 4: The Averon Exchange
Agent: Gian Parele, found at "Impetus Tolle Studio" beacon in Tolle
Standing: +6.5102% Impetus Corporation at Social III
Mission Location: Averon (two jumps from Tolle)
Enemy: Mercenaries
Single pocket. 6x Pator 6 cruisers send you a message and warp out, followed by 3 waves of spawns.
Spawn 1, all within 5km: 3x Merc Commanders (cruisers), 5x wingmen (four of them webbed me instantly), 5x elite fighter frigates. They orbit very very close, and due to the extreme webbing, drones are vital here.
Spawn 2, at approx 10km: Appears when all of Spawn 1 is dead. 4x mercenary lieutenants, 5x mercenary corporals (all medium size). Spawn 3 does generous DPS, so probably a good idea to not kill the last rat in this spawn until you've regained some cap and tank.
Spawn 3, at approx 25km: Appears when all of Spawn 2 is dead. 3x mercenary commanders (medium), 5x mercenary overlords (battleships). The battleships hit hard but go down quickly to thermal damage, so target them first. Mission completes when the last battleship is dead.
Loot: About 1200m3, typical merc loot, nothing special.
Step 5: A Different Kind of Director
Agent: Gian Parele, found at "Impetus Tolle Studio" beacon in Tolle
Standing: +6.5102% Impetus Corporation at Social III
Report to Eron Viette at Stetille II - Impetus Publisher, 8 jumps away. Note that you'll really only be there for one mission, so you might just want to bring your tractors and salvagers in cargo rather than bring a dedicated salvaging ship.
Step 6: Assistance
NOTE: Don't let the low reward fool you - this mission can be insanely difficult. Or very very easy, depending on your tactics. See below.
Agent: Eron Viette, in station Stetille II - Impetus Publisher
Standing: +6.5102% Impetus Corporation at Social III
Mission Location: Stetille
Enemy: Mercenaries and Minmatar (no standing loss).
IMPORTANT: This mission requires you to kill 3 waves, but the last two waves are trivial, just one battleship in the second wave and two BS in the third wave. The first wave is where all the action is. When you warp to the location, you'll need to approach Audalle Roire who is approx 30km away. When you get within 20km or so, he will speak to you, and the first wave will spawn fairly close, within 15km, and close quickly. The wave is just a few ships at first, but more battleships arrive every few seconds, until there are 12 battleships total. The DPS you will receive initially seems tankable, but ramps up -very- fast to insane levels. Don't even think about it - as soon as the first few ships arrive, JUST INITIATE WARP OUT IMMEDIATELY, and good luck with your tank holding if you delay at all. There were no warp scramblers the two times I did it, but do expect webbing. Then warp back at 100km distance and start moving away as soon as they're in range, sniping from as far as you can - for your projectile users, use arty, even if you're in a Machariel. Their ships are fast and will catch up to even a 180m/s BS well before you can take them all out. At greater than 70km, they'll miss you altogether. At greater than 50km, the damage is tankable without too much trouble. Much closer, and the DPS will start climbing sharply again, don't be shy about warping out again and come back at 0km if you need to - the remainder of the wave should now be a good 100km from the starting point, and you can repeat the process. Do it this way, and it'll be easy - I handled it rather easily and painlessly in a Maelstrom. Try even briefly to tank the 12 BS's at close range, and, well, I hope your ship was insured. Oh, yes, a signal amplifier or sensor booster to extend your targeting range is probably a good choice for this mission as well, since you really want to stay as far away as possible. And, needless to say, an afterburner wouldn't be amiss either, if you can stay far enough away you shouldn't need to tank much at all. Even MWD should work, though I haven't tested it - but I'd just do regular AB anyway, the signature increase likely isn't worth it.
Spawn 1: Spawns when you approach Audalle Roire, see note above. Frigates: 3x Mercenary Wingmen (web), 4x Mercenary Elite Fighters. Cruisers: 6x Minmatar Pator 6. Battleships: 12x Mercenary Overlords.
Spawn 2: 1x Mercenary Overlord. Spawns when one of the battleships in Spawn 1 is killed, no way to know which is the trigger. Killing this ship completes the mission objective.
Spawn 3: 2x Mercenary Overlord. Spawns when Spawn 2 is killed.
Step 7: The High or Low Road
Agent: Eron Viette, in station Stetille II - Impetus Publisher
Standing:
Choosing Into The Black (hisec choice) yields +0.0666% Impetus Corporation at Social III
Choosing Outside the Scope (losec choice) yields ??????? Impetus Corporation at Social III
At this point you must choose to continue along one of two different branches, one that stays in hisec and the other in losec. For the initial writing of this walkthrough, I am choosing the hisec route. Perhaps in 3 months I'll fill in the losec route, if no one else gets to it first. In the meantime, it is reportedly possible to do all of the combat in the losec route in a PVP fit assault frigate, which I can't ride yet. In 3 months I should have covops and assault frigs and can try it then. For now, I can help the other carebears.
Hisec Path Step 8: Into the Black
Agent: Eron Viette, in station Stetille II - Impetus Publisher
Standing: +6.5102% Impetus Corporation at Social III
Report to Mourmarie Mone in her ship in space in Noghene, 8 jumps from Stetille, 7 jumps from Tolle and Dodixie.
Hisec Path Step 9: Poor Man's Shakedown
Agent: Mourmarie Mone in Noghene.
Standing: +5.2081% Federal Intelligence Office at Social III
Mission Location: Chamerout (two jumps from Noghene)
Enemy: "Independent" Minmatar (no standing loss)
IMPORTANT: It is quite easy to fail this mission and have to restart the arc from Step 2 - in fact, I did so. The issue is that the Shanty Town key you acquire in pocket 1 -is- consumed when you take the gate to pocket 2. If you have to warp out of pocket 2 for any reason, such as running out of ammo (happened to me) or you simply take too much damage, you cannot get back in the pocket, and you must quit the arc and redo everything. So be -very very- prepared for and careful in pocket 2, you only get one chance at it. For projectile users, I advise autocannons as a lot of enemies orbit close, but also an afterburner because some of the BS's in pocket 2 do a lot of damage (looks like EM to me, for the record, which I did have a hole in) and stay at far enough range that it's very difficult to break their tank - which is, by the way, what caused me to run out of ammo and then require warping out due to damage when my drones weren't enough to finish the job.
Pocket 1: No enemies on arrival. You need to blow up the various structures - "Asteroid Micro-Colony Minor", "Minmatar Bunker" and "Habitation Module - Residential" - one at a time. Some will drop cans with trade goods. Others will spawn 1-3 cruisers and 1-3 battleships. None of them are difficult to kill. Eventually one will drop the "Shanty Town Gate Clearance" key (watch local chat for the message indicating it has dropped). This will unlock the gate to the 2nd pocket. Pocket 1 as a whole is quite easy. WARNING: The key -is- consumed upon use, so again, you have only one chance to complete pocket 2. Don't bother blowing up the Asteroid Installation or the very tough Asteroid Prime Colony, they contain nothing.
Pocket 2: Same idea, blow up structures, but the ones that spawn rats contain less cruisers and more battleships, and some of them - the "Independent Veterans" in particular - are quite a bit tougher than the ones in pocket 1. Blow up structures one at a time until one spawns the Elder. Killing him completes the mission.
Loot: Approximately 800m3. Loot quality unimpressive, but by far the best salvage of any step of the arc so far, over 5 million. Plus all the trade goods from the structures.
Hisec Path Step 10: Underground Circus
Agent: Mourmarie Mone in Noghene.
Standing: +5.2081% Federal Intelligence Office at Social III
Mission Location: Castlemon (one jump from Noghene)
Enemy: Serpentis, Angels (so bring thermal and explosive ammo for this one)
Pocket 1: Two groups. First group is 6x Serpentis cruisers called "Lustadores" that do not aggro when you engage the second group. Second group is 3x Angel Cruisers, 3x Serpentis Cruisers, 4x Angel Battleships, 3x Serpentis Battleships. The closest is at approx. 30km range. No auto-aggro, either on first entry or even if you return after attacking and then warping out. DPS is quite heavy within 40km range, recommend moving a good distance out (over 55km) and sniping. Even at that range, they hurt considerably. Once group 2 is dead, close in for group 1 as they will frequently sensor damp, killing your targeting range. A couple of the habitation modules drop tourists and various trade goods. Pleasure hubs in this pocket only drop drugs. I did not check any of the walls, bunkers, lookouts or elevators.
Pocket 2: 7x Serpentis cruisers, 3x Angel cruisers, 3x Serpentis battleships and 3x Angel battleships. Immediate aggro from all enemies. I speed tanked the mission at 500m/s at around 50km range from the closest, which was a pain as the Angel Battleships repeately sensor damp, but I had a signal amplifier so it was bearable, might not have been if I hadn't had that. The DPS *seemed* considerably lower in general than it was in the first pocket, but I didn't experience what would happen attempting to sit still and tank at close range. Once they're all dead, take out the Ringmaster Pleasure Hub, it takes a while to beat it down. When you do, a can full of drugs drops, and the Ringmaster pops out in a cruiser, not hard to kill, and you get the item you need from the wreck. No other structures in this pocket dropped anything at all.
Loot: Meh. Bout what you'd expect from mixed Angels and Serpentis. Ditto for the salvage. Got 17 million in bounties though.
Hisec Path Step 11: Intaki Chase
Agent: Mourmarie Mone in Noghene.
Standing: +5.2081% Federal Intelligence Office at Social III
Mission Location: Pemene (three jumps from Noghene)
Enemy: Intaki Syndicate (Gallente)
