Abyssal Deadspace

Abyssal Deadspace is a mysterious area of isolated space which players can enter to try to complete time-limited PvE combat challenges in order to obtain lucrative rewards.

Pilots can only enter abyssal deadspace by using special filaments, and even then only limited pockets are accessible for a limited time. The pockets are filled with dangerous localized space effects and any ship that ventures away from the stable pocket or stays in for too long will be destroyed by these effects.

Abyssal mechanics

Running Abyssals can be fun and profitable, but it is very important that pilots grasp the core mechanics involved, as--unlike most PvE combat in Eve--failure means the certain loss of both ship and pod.

Entry

Tier 1 filament: The info of the filament shows what the properties of the site it opens are. That it is a Tier 1 filament can be seen by the 1 glowing stripe on the icon.

The Triglavian Bioadaptive Cache contains the loot for each pocket.

Triglavian Extraction Nodes also contain the loot.

Pilots can enter Abyssal deadspace using filaments obtained from data sites, from abyssal deadspace itself, or purchased from the in-game market. Seven tiers of increasing difficulty exist, numbered from 0 to 6. Entry into the Abyss is limited to either:

• A single Tech 1, Tech 2, Navy Faction or Pirate Faction cruiser; T3 Strategic Cruisers cannot enter
• Up to two destroyers, at the cost of 2 filaments
• Up to three frigates, at the cost of 3 filaments

To enter the Abyss, activate the filament(s) while in space. When activated, a beacon (named Abyssal trace) is created at your entry location. The Abyssal trace can be scanned down using combat probes, which means that sufficiently motivated players might be able to find it and await your return from the pocket.

Activation can be carried out anywhere in space, as long as the following conditions are satisfied:

• No Gates, Stations or mobile depots at less than 1000 km.
• No other Abyssal trace at less than 1000 km.

To keep their abyssal trace more secure, most players activate their filaments at safespot bookmarks.

Abyssal layout

An Abyssal Deadspace instance is composed of three pockets, sometimes called "rooms" by players. Each pocket contains enemies and a gate to the next pocket. The gate only unlocks once all enemies in the pocket are cleared.

The enemies in the pocket are randomly selected from a range of spawns appropriate to the tier of the filament used. Higher tier filaments take you to pockets with (much) more dangerous enemies. Some pockets may contain enemies who are in combat against each other. However, none of these factions will be allied with you. You must fight your own way out.

Abyssal NPCs leave no wrecks to loot or salvage.

Loot

Each pocket also contains a structure called the "Triglavian Bioadaptive Cache" which has a scant 300 hit points and which, once destroyed, drops some of the loot for that pocket.

In all but the easiest (Tier 0) Abyssals, there are also "Triglavian Extraction Nodes" and "Triglavian Extraction Subnodes" which also contain additional loot.

Cache wrecks can be salvaged for Triglavian materials, though the time- and ISK-efficiency of doing this is dubious.

Time and space limits

The deadspace instance is stable for only 20 minutes. If you are still in the pocket after 20 minutes your ship and your pod will be immediately destroyed.

You must clear the three pockets and exit with the allocated time, or you will lose both your ship and your pod. The third pocket gate returns you to the location in space where you activated the filament. To finish the Abyssal run within the 20-minute limit, you must achieve a faster average pocket clear time than 6.66 minutes.

Each pocket is surrounded by dangerous space which will destroy your ship and pod if you enter it. This space appears as a red graphical effect which becomes more obvious the closer you fly towards it.

Restrictions

Other restrictions on Abyssals are:

• Fleet-mates cannot warp to you while you are within the Abyss, nor can you warp out of it.
• You cannot cloak
• You cannot deploy a mobile depot.
• There is no Local chat channel.
• Core Probes and Combat probes launched will be removed from space shortly after launching and cannot be recovered.
• The Directional Scanner will not work.
• The map will not work.

If a player is in Abyssal Deadspace when server downtime occurs, the player will return to the solar system from which they entered. Any drones must be recovered before the server goes down, or they will be lost.

Three types of gates you will encounter are: Triglavian Origin Conduit, Triglavian Transfer Conduit, and Triglavian Proving Conduit. These gates will be folded closed until all enemies have been destroyed, after which they will (quite spectacularly) open and energize. A gate with a triangle in the center means you still have more pockets to go! (Note that at the time of writing, fall 2021, the Proving Conduit does not appear; its mechanic has been replaced by the Triglavian Proving Grounds.)

WARNING: Any ship and capsule should be considered potentially lost the moment a player enters Abyssal Deadspace. Abyssals are unforgiving to inexperienced, ill-equipped or foolhardy pilots. If your ship is lost inside the site, you will lose your capsule, clone, and any implants equipped as well. Running Abyssals can be a fun and profitable challenge, but do not enter Abyssal Deadspace with a ship or with implants that you cannot afford to lose.

Enviromental Effects

Abyssal deadspace has several enviromental effects that will all apply to both the player ship and to the NPC ships. These effects will disadvantage unprepared ships, but they can be predicted from the type of filament used, and players can use them to their advantage.

All effects applied to your ship will be shown in same location as EWAR effects; by default this is above the capacitor and health displays, at the centre of the base of your screen. Hover your mouse over the icon to see what effect is applied to your ship.

Weather Effects

Each Abyssal Deadspace site will have one of five pairs of weather effects comprised of one bonus, and one penalty. These effects are intrinsic to success, as they are highly impactful. It is important to note that since both the "bonus" and "penalty" component of any weather apply to all entities, the "bonus" can end up being a bonus to the player, and/or a penalty to the player by virtue of being a bonus to the enemies, and similarly vice versa with the "penalty" component. Not every bonus is impactful in every situation, and the same goes for penalties, so it is critical to consider these effects when planning a ship/fleet build, strategies, and tactics.

The bonus and penalty effects found in each of the five weathers are as follows:

Weather	Penalty	Bonus
Electrical	-30/50/70% EM Resist	-50% Capacitor Recharge Time
Exotic	-30/50/70% Kinetic Resist	+50% Scan Resolution
Firestorm	-30/50/70% Thermal Resist	+50% Armor HP
Gamma	-30/50/70% Explosive Resist	+50% Shield HP
Dark	-30/50/70% Turret Optimal and Falloff Range	+50% Maximum Velocity

Penalty strength selection:

The strength of the penalty found in a given site is determined by a roll between either 30% or 50% through tier 3, and a roll between either 50% or 70% in tier 4 and above, as described in the table below:

Tier	Name	Appearance	Penalty Strength
0	Tranquil		-30% or -50%, random per site
1	Calm
2	Agitated
3	Fierce
4	Raging		-50% or -70%, random per site
5	Chaotic
6	Cataclysmic

These bonuses and penalties may be addressed in the following ways:

Resistance penalties (all weathers but Dark): These will increase the amount of damage taken in the damage type of the resistance penalty. These penalties are addressed by covering this hole on your ship(s), and ensuring that you are putting out damage that matches this resist hole as closely as possible. By forgoing the resist hole, one is choosing to fight against the natural resistances of the NPCs, just as one would in Dark weather, which lacks a resistance penalty.

Turret optimal and falloff penalty (Dark): As this applies to not only NPC and player turrets but player drone turrets, it is inadvisable to bring turret or drone boats to these sites, and to use launchers instead. Additionally, missiles lack of navigation requirements for the purposes of damage application, enable the player to more easily and better take advantage of the maximum velocity bonus found in this weather. This penalty will dramatically reduce the amount of tank requirement/damage taken by players due to the NPC AI not correcting for the reduced range; they will fire on you from outside optimal, and often even outside 1x falloff or more, and consistently miss. Finally, this penalty means that there is no resist penalty, and therefore no resist hole to attack. This weather will require more damage output than most others, save potentially Firestorm.

Maximum Velocity bonus (Dark): Enemies and player drones will only use the bonused attribute of "Maximum Velocity" when chasing. When in their desired range, they will use their normal, un-bonused "Orbit Velocity". Players, however, are able to control how much of their max velocity they are using, and thus can fully benefit from this bonus.

Capacitor recharge time bonus (Electrical): This bonus effectively grants not a 50% bonus, but rather 100%, as it halves capacitor recharge time, thereby doubling the capacitor recharge rate. NPCs receive essentially no benefit from this bonus, but players are able to leverage the additional capacitor regen to great effect.

Armor hit point bonus (Firestorm): This bonus is the opposite of what is found in Electrical sites, in a way - it is usually not relevant to player ships, only in certain cases, and is highly impactful to the enemies. As many enemies you will encounter in these sites are armor-heavy, this will dramatically increase the time-to-kill for each individual enemy, thereby keeping threats on the field longer, and increasing overall site time. The hit point bonus on the player ship can be relevant to players running destroyers and frigates, to some degree, though is largely unimpactful for players using cruisers. Firestorm is generally known as the most difficult weather.

Shield hit point bonus (Gamma): While most enemies are armor-heavy and some (Lucid Sleepers of the Vigilant Tyrannos) lack shield entirely, there is more than enough shield HP present for this to present a time challenge compared to sites without a hit point bonus, though less of a challenge than Firestorm. In terms of players leveraging this bonus, players are able to utilize the increased shield regeneration that comes along with the increased hit points, building passive shield regeneration tanks that can handle massive amounts of damage. NPC shields found here generally are designed to effectively not regenerate whatsoever, and thus do not gain a notable amount of regeneration from this bonus.

Scan resolution bonus (Exotic): Largely irrelevant, be aware that NPCs will lock you faster, enjoy locking NPCs faster.

Localized Effects

Filament Cloud (orange) and Bioluminescence Clouds (blue)

Deviant Automata Suppressor

The pockets will also contain clouds and Triglavian towers that apply effects to player and NPC ships in their immediate vicinity.

Localized Clouds:

• Filament Cloud (orange): Penalty to Shield Booster boosting (-40%) and reduction to shield booster duration (-40%). If using a conventional (not Ancillary) shield booster, in effect this does not weaken your shield booster, but rather increases its capacitor cost per second by 66%. If you rely on a shield booster to survive, you should avoid entering these clouds.
• Bioluminescence Cloud (light blue): +300% Signature Radius (4.0x signature radius multiplier). Entering this cloud will make your ship an easier target to hit but it will also make all rats easier to hit. If fighting small but accurate enemies like Damaviks, this cloud can actually be helpful, and you can lure the rats into it.
• Tachyon Cloud (white): +300% Velocity (x4.0 velocity), -50% Inertia Modifier. Be very careful entering this cloud with an active MWD, as the inertia reduction will cause you to accelerate very quickly (x4 velocity, x0.5 inertia, x8 acceleration), potentially slingshotting you outside the pocket boundary for a very quick death. These clouds will also increase enemy velocities, causing them to either close range very quickly, or suddenly pull away.

A long, long time ago...
In September, 2020, the Tachyon Cloud was introduced, replacing the older Caustic Cloud. The Caustic Cloud applied a -80% penalty to local and remote Armor Repair modules, making it a death sentence for armor tanked ships. However, the cloud was very rarely seen.

Triglavian Towers:

• Deviant Automata Suppressor: Damages all missiles, drones, and rogue drone frigates within its area of effect. The larger tower does about the same damage to drones as a single medium smartbomb; the smaller does more than double that. Flying into the range of this Suppressor can help you take out pirate drones. Watch out for your own drones.
  • Short-Range Deviant Suppressor will attack all drones, missiles and rogue drone frigates within 15 KM
  • Medium-Range Deviant Suppressor will attack all drones, missiles, and rogue drone frigates within 40 KM
• Multibody Tracking Pylon: +60% or +80% tracking to all ships in its area of effect. This can be helpful for fighting small, fast enemies. It helps your drones as well as your ship.

Enemies

Abyssal Deadspace contains a wide variety of different hostile NPCs. Each NPC will behave differently, and taking the right combat approach in different situations is important. The following discussion covers all the different types of NPCs and their abilities; for an overview of the possible sets of NPCs you can face in an Abyssal room, see Possible rooms in Abyssal Deadspace.

Unlike in most other regions in Eve, Abyssal Deadspace NPCs have very clear naming patterns, and will have either a prefix or suffix which states what special abilities they have.

This makes target prioritization easier, which is extremely important in the Abyss: the general best strategy in most rooms is to start out by killing any EWAR that poses a threat to your ship. Depending on your fit, this can mean Neutralizers, Webs, Tracking/Guidance disruptors or, if the pocket has battleships, Target Painters.

You should also pay attention on whether dedicated remote repair ships are on grid; if you can't kill other frigates before repairs land, prioritize killing remote repairs first. After the dangerous EWAR and remote repair ships are dead, you can focus on the damage dealers in your preferred order.

Factions

Rogue Drones	Drifters	Sleepers	Triglavians	Sansha's Nation	CONCORD	Angel Cartel

Rogue Drones

Rogue Drones are perhaps the most common type of enemies encountered in Abyssal Deadspace, and come in three sizes: Frigate, Battlecruiser, and Battleship. Rogue Drone Frigates can often be found in rooms containing extremely large groups of them, alongside other larger Rogue Drones, or even alongside ships from other factions. Rogue Drone Battlecruisers are somewhat slow and have very short range (only 2+4km), but have pinpoint tracking within that range and extremely high damage. The Rogue Drone Battleship ("Abyssal Overmind") has extremely long range and damage, comes in a different variant at each Abyssal Filament level, and is discussed further, later in this page.

Rogue Drone Frigates deal either a single type of damage based on their name, or a small amount of omni damage alongside EWAR. Rogue Drone Frigates are also susceptible to Deviant Automata Suppressor pylons, but if those are not available, they can be much more easily fought using Multibody Tracking Pylons or Bioluminescent Clouds.

Rogue Drone Battlecruisers also deal only a single type of damage, based on their name.

The Rogue Drone Battleship deals Kinetic and Thermal damage, and the Battleship found in Tier 5 and 6 sites also has a Stasis Webifier, which helps counteract its poor tracking.

Rogue Drone Frigate names have the suffix Tessella. Rogue Drone Battlecruiser names have the suffix Tessera.

Rogue Drone Ship
Name	Weapon
Spark	EM Damage
Ember	Thermal Damage
Strike	Kinetic Damage
Blast	Explosive Damage
(name) needle	Low damage
(name) lance	Higher damage
(name) grip	Battlecruiser, short range but extreme damage
Snarecaster	Webbing
Fogcaster	Turret and Launcher Disruption
Gazedimmer	Sensor Dampening
Spotlighter	Target Painting
Fieldweaver	Remote Shield Logi. No damage.
Plateforger	Remote Armor Logi. No damage.

Drifters and Seekers

Drifters and seekers are sometimes encountered together but can also appear on their own. They all fire omni-damage turrets and have flat omni-resist profiles.

The key ship in a Drifter room is Karybdis Tyrannos, who flies a Drifter Battleship. This battleship has extremely long range, and will attempt to fly away from your ship(s) at around 300m/s, to drag you to the edge of the abyssal pocket.

This can be very irritating, as it forces you to fly all the way back to the exit gate after the battleship finally dies. During the time spent chasing the battleship, you are vulnerable to its poorly-tracking but hard-hitting turrets. The strength of the battleship varies with the level of the Abyssal filament; higher-level filaments feature more damage and HP. Thankfully, the Drifter Battleship here does not come with either a Doomsday Weapon or any EWAR abilities.

Drifter ships start the fight with heavily-damaged shields, armor, and hull. Drifter cruisers all use some form of EWAR in addition to dealing damage, but they also have large signature radii and are thus easy to finish off.

Seeker ships are far more generic than Drifter ships, and while they feature many forms of EWAR, they also have only thin armor.

Drifter Cruisers will all be named Scylla Tyrannos, and so their type must be checked to see their abilities.

Drifter Cruiser
Cruiser Type	Weapon
Entanglement	Webbing
Nullwarp	Warp Scramblers
Nullcharge	Energy Neutralizers

Seeker types
Seeker Name	Weapon
Lancer	Generic Damage Dealer
Entangler	Webbing
Spearfisher	Warp Scramblers
Illuminator	Target Painting
Dissipator	Energy Neutralizers
Obfuscator	Sensor Dampening
Confuser	Turret and Missile Disruption

Sleeper Drones

Every Sleeper drone is equipped with remote repairers, so it is best to kill smaller ships first, as they die before repairs land. In addition to damage, they will also use webs and energy neutralizers. The Sleeper drone battleship (Lucid Deepwatcher) always spawns in pairs or trios, and deals rather high damage, but has very poor tracking. Its fire can easily be evaded with a sub-10km orbit.

Sleeper drones fire EM/Thermal turrets (and the cruisers have irritatingly high tracking and range), and Kinetic/explosive missiles (with poor flight speed and application).

Sleeper Drones all have the Lucid prefix.

Sleeper Drone Frigates
Name	Weapon
Escort	Generic Damage Dealer
Aegis	Higher Damage Dealer
Warden	Webbing
Firewatcher	Energy Neutralizers
Preserver	Strong remote repairs

Sleeper Drone Cruisers
Name	Weapon
Watchman	Generic Damage Dealer
Upholder	Webbing
Sentinel	Energy Neutralizers

Sleeper Drone Battleship
Name	Weapon
Deepwatcher	Target painting

Triglavian Collective

Triglavian ships can appear in any pocket. They use Entropic Disintegrators to deal high Thermal and Explosive damage. As each ship's damage will slowly increase the longer it stays focused on one target, Triglavian rooms can quickly become DPS or range-control races, to either kill their high-damage ships before they can kill you, or to kill their tackle ships and fly beyond their damage range.

Triglavian ships almost all feature Remote Armor Repair abilities, and mount the widest range of EWAR of any Abyssal faction.

Triglavian Ships
Name or Prefix	Ability
Damavik	Very fast frigate. Large signature radius.
Kikimora	Fast, extended range destroyer
Vedmak	Hard-hitting cruiser
Rodiva	Low-damage remote-repair cruiser
Drekavac	Harder-hitting battlecruiser. Spawns with 28% shield, 68% armor and 11% hull.
Leshak	Long-range, slow, high-damage battleship. Spawns with low hull and no shields or armor.
Prefixes
Striking	Generic Damage Dealer
Starving	Energy Neutralizers. No Remote Repairs.
Harrowing / Shining	Target Painting
Anchoring	Warp Scramblers
Renewing	Strong remote repairs
Blinding	Sensor Dampening
Tangling	Webbing
Ghosting	Turret and Missile Disruption
Vila Swarmer	3 or 4 Vila Swarmers will be spawned by NPCs which have "Vila" as the middle name (example: Striking Vila Damavik). Deals very low omni DPS. (10-20 DMG per shot) Destroy the controlling ship first as the drones will deactivate once it gets destroyed, and destroying the drones will take alot off time.

Sansha's Nation

Sansha's Nation ships use very long-ranged lasers, and thus must be fought up close. However, fighting them up close is a challenge in itself, as they also bring a wide range of EWAR abilities, including significant energy neutralizers.

All Sansha's Nation ships have the Devoted prefix.

Sansha's Nation Cruisers
Name	Weapon
Knight	Heavy damage dealer; high range & tracking

Sansha's Nation Frigates
Name	Weapon
Hunter	Above Generic (50% More) Damage Dealer
Fisher	Webbing
Priest	Remote repairs
Trapper	Warp Scramblers
Smith	Energy Neutralizers
Lookout	Sensor Dampening
Herald	Turret and Missile Disruption
Torchbearer	Target Painting

CONCORD

CONCORD rooms contain a mix of CONCORD and EDENCOM ship hulls. CONCORD hulls use Thermal or Explosive missiles, while EDENCOM ships use EM-Kinetic Vorton Projectors.

CONCORD rooms are generally feared by many Abyssal runners due to their high damage and heavy damage-application support. The sheer incoming DPS, combined with the multiple Webs and Target Painters, makes passive or active tanking in these rooms extremely difficult. Because of this, Marshal rats (especially Drainers) are often targeted first to reduce incoming DPS.

While the EDENCOM ships offer no EWAR, they bring very high alpha damage on very slow fire rates, meaning that the combination of Marshal DPS and EDENCOM alpha can easily and unexpectedly break an Abyssal runner's buffer.

The three saving graces when fighting CONCORD/EDENCOM ships are:

1. they cannot land Wrecking Shots
2. Vorton Projectors will chain their damage to any objects within 10km of your ship, and can thus be exploited into dealing friendly fire damage to other enemy CONCORD/EDENCOM ships
3. CONCORD ships are not especially durable, which turns the CONCORD room into a pure DPS race to determine whether you die first or the Marshals die first.

All CONCORD and EDENCOM ships have the Disparu Troop suffix.

CONCORD ships
Name	Weapon
(prefix) Pacifier	or 39 DPS Rockets
(prefix) Enforcer	or 130 DPS Heavy Assault Missiles
(prefix) Marshal	or 427 DPS Rapid Heavy Missiles
Prefixes
Attacker/Assault	Generic damage dealer
Arrester	Webbing
Marker	Target Painting
Drainer	Heavy Energy Neutralizers
EDENCOM ships
(no prefix) Skybreaker	87% 14% , 444 damage / 6 seconds
(no prefix) Stormbringer	87% 14% , 666 damage / 9 seconds
(no prefix) Thunderchild	77% 23% , 2470 damage / 15 seconds

Angel Cartel

Angel Cartel rooms are the bane of fast and evasive ships. Angel Cartel ships have extremely high flight speeds, rather small signature radii, good range, varied damage types, and varied EWAR. The Cynabal is especially problematic, as it features all of these abilities combined in one ship.

All Angel Cartel rats have the Lucifer prefix. Certain ships can also have the Elite prefix, and have even higher stats than their normal forms.

Angel Cartel Ships
Name	Weapon
(Elite) Cynabal	Heavy damage dealer; high range & tracking
Ixion	Target Painting
(Elite) Dramiel	Generic damage dealer
Fury	Energy Neutralizers
Echo	Webbing and Scramble
Medusa	Sensor Dampening
Burst	Remote repairs
Swordspine	Target Painting

Damage to deal

The Abyssal Deadspace resist penalties apply to both the player ship and to the NPCs present. Thanks to the mechanics of resist penalties, this means that damage-matching to the penalized resist will effectively earn a damage bonus equal to the resist penalty (smaller damage increase if the target has too low a base resist). So, in general, you should select your damage to match the weather.

However, in some cases, the natural resist hole of the NPC is equal to or greater than the resist hole caused by the weather. This is the case in Dark filaments, which have no resist penalty.

• Drifter ships, Seeker drones, and Sleeper drones have uniform resists.
• Sansha's Nation ships other than the Devoted Knight are weak to EM and Thermal and strong against Kinetic and Explosive. The Devoted Knight is weak to EM, then Explosive, and strong against Thermal and Kinetic.
• Angel Cartel ships are the opposite of Sansha's Nation: strong against EM and Thermal, weak to Explosive and Kinetic.
• CONCORD ships have uniform resists. EDENCOM ships are weak to Thermal and EM.
• Triglavian ships are weak to Explosive, then Thermal, and strong against Kinetic and EM. In a -30% Electrical filament, their EM resist is equal to Explosive resist.
• Rogue drone ships have wildly varying resists. Damage-dealing and EWAR frigates have the same natural resists as a Tech 1 hull from one of the races. Repair frigates have 0 resists. Battlecruisers are slightly weak to EM/EX, and slightly more resistant to TH/KIN.

The Rogue Drone Battleship's resistances change at different tiers. With one exception, the Weather-induced hole is greater than any natural resist hole, and should be targeted; however in a Dark Filament, these resistances become relevant.

If swapping damage types (i.e. through missile reloads) is possible, it should be done for these battleships. Their Shields are weak to EM damage, and the following chart lists their Armor weaknesses:

Rogue Drone Battleship
Abyssal Tier	Name	Damage to deal
1	Photic Abyssal Overmind
2	Twilit Abyssal Overmind
3	Bathyic Abyssal Overmind
4	Hadal Abyssal Overmind
5	Benthic Abyssal Overmind
6	Endobenthic Abyssal Overmind

Abyssal Deadspace Co-op for Frigates and Destroyers

When the Abyss was created, it the pockets were designed for a single cruiser. However, later updates allowed the Abyss to be entered with fleets of either three frigates, or two destroyers.

Entering the Abyss as a fleet of small ships requires 2 (for destroyers) or 3 (for frigates) of the appropriate filaments, of the same type, in a single ship's cargohold. All ships in the group must be in the same fleet.

The pilot of the ship carrying the filaments can then use them and select the Activate For Fleet option. Doing so will consume the filaments, and rather than pulling the ship into the abyss, it will open a limited-use acceleration gate that leads to the abyss. Fleet members can then activate that acceleration gate and launch themselves into the abyss.

The 20-minute timer is shared by all ships in the fleet, and starts counting down when the first of the ships finishes activating the acceleration gate and enters the abyssal pocket.

To compensate for the increased filament consumption and the loot being split across 2 or 3 ships and pilots, the Biocombinative Cache found in multi-ship pockets contains significantly more loot than the ordinary Bioadaptive Cache.

Players are not required to do 2-ship or 3-ship Abyssals in 2 or 3 ships. One tactic used by experienced Abyssal runners is to activate three filaments for three ships--significantly boosting the available loot--and then run the resulting pockets alone. Since the pockets will be balanced for three ships, not one, this requires careful planning and fitting, and is not for the faint-of-heart. It does, however, markedly increase the profits made by successful runners.

Abyssal Deadspace from the outside

Orange glow means it is a tier 1-3 Abyssal Deadspace. Yellow glow means it is a tier 4 or 5 Abyssal Deadspace.

When you enter an Abyssal, you will be removed from the Local chat channel in your system of origin and from the directional scanner. You cannot see who is in the system outside the deadspace, and they cannot see who is inside or in what ship they are using.

But that does not mean you are wholly safe. Once the filament has been used, a rift appears that can be combat scanned by anyone in the system and can be warped to. It also appears on the directional scanner of anyone who has not filtered it out. This makes it possible for people to camp the exit and shoot whoever comes out.

This means that you have to consider where you use the filament, especially in low security and null security space. Even in high-security space you should be cautious. It is best to activate the filament at a safespot bookmark, preferably more than directional-scanner range (14.3 AU) away from any celestial and any frequently-warped routes. Experienced Abyssal runners find large systems where they can set up such bookmarks, and replace their bookmarks frequently.

You will be invulnerable for a short time when you leave the Abyss. If you leave the rift and find yourself being camped, pause to assess your best options, and stay calm. One survival tactic is to quickly activate a new filament, but players who know you can do this will anchor a mobile depot nearby, preventing filament activation. Based on your assessment of the situation, you will have to decide

Rewards

Abyssal Deadspace is dangerous, but the rewards can be worthwhile. Abyssal Deadspace is the only source for many valuable items found in the Caches and Extraction Nodes/Subnodes. No wrecks are left behind by any NPCs, and all drops come from these two listed cans.

Rewards are as follows:

• Mutaplasmids that can be used to change the stats of certain modules. Which mutaplasmids are able to drop depends on the weather selected:
  • Gamma sites can drop shield related mutaplasmids - S/M/L Shield Extender, S/M/L/XL Shield Booster
  • Dark sites can drop propulsion module mutaplasmids - 1/10/100MN Afterburner, 5/50/500MN Microwarpdrive
  • Firestorm sites can drop armor related mutaplasmids - S/M/L Armor Plate, S/M/L Armor Repairer
  • Electrical sites can drop capacitor related mutaplasmids - S/M/L Cap Battery, S/M/L Energy Neutralizer, S/M/L Energy Nosferatu
  • Exotic sites can drop tackle related mutaplasmids - Stasis Webifier, Warp Disruptor, Warp Scrambler
  • All weathers can drop damage module mutaplasmids - Heat Sink, Gyrostabilizer, Magnetic Field Stabilizer, Ballistic Control System, Entropic Radiation Sink
  • T6 filaments can drop capital module mutaplasmids - All capital-sized versions of the modules above, plus Ancillary Shield Booster/Armor Repairer, Heavy Warp Disruptor/Scrambler, and Siege Module
• Precursor ship and weapon skill books, disintegrator specialization skill books
• Blueprint copies required for the production of Triglavian hulls, weapon systems, and ammunition:
  • Triglavian ship hulls
  • Entropic Disintegrators: Weapons with unique properties and only usable by the Triglavian ships
  • Exotic Plasma: Ammunition used by Entropic Disintegrators
  • Mutadaptive Remote Armor Repairer: A special remote armor repairer module used by the Triglavian Rodiva and Zarmazd logistics cruisers
• Production materials required for the production of Triglavian hulls, weapon systems, and ammunition:
  • Crystalline Isogen-10
  • Zero-Point Condensate
• Modules:
  • Compact Entropic Radiation Sink - a compact (low-fitting) version of the Entropic Radiation Sink
  • Perun Heavy Mutadaptive Remote Armor Repairer - a faction version of the Mutadaptive Remote Armor Repairer
• Triglavian Survey Database: often referred to as "red loot", this item is an ISK token item similar to Sleeper "blue loot" and Overseer's Personal Effects in that it can be sold to unlimited NPC buy orders for a fixed price, in this case, 100,000 ISK/ea
• Abyssal Filaments:
  • data hacking sites are the only source for Abyssal filaments outside of Abyssal Deadspace, and they only provide Calm (Tier 1) filaments
  • the Bioadaptive/Biocombinative Caches in Abyssal Deadspace can drop filaments of all tiers
  • it is therefore only by running Abyssals that the filaments for higher-tier Abyssal runs can be found, and there is a busy market in retrieved filaments

Gallery

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  Approaching the Gate in a Electrical Abyss

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  Slow boating through the impressive entry of the Abyss

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  Collecting the Loot in the Abyss

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  Investigating Comets in the Abyss

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  Valuable Ore in the Abyss

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  Triglavian Bioadaptive Cache

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  Abyssal Clouds

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  Abyssal Filament Traces

History

Abyssal deadspace was added to the game in the Into The Abyss expansion that went live on May 29th 2018. It was further expanded in the Onslaught expansion that was released on the 13th November 2018, and again in the Depths of the Abyss update on the 15th September 2020.