Deep Space Transports Vs Blockade Runners

Or 

Occator vs Viator

Well I am training one of my characters to be a transport pilot in high sec. To me this has several utilities.

1. Transport of PI from WH to market.

2. Transport of ganking ships and fits to where its needed.

3. Moving stuff to staging area's for various null gateways.

Now as this character already has Gallente industrial IV it was the natural choice to take to V and then Transport ships.

Choice of ship was the next one. Natural inclination is to go for the one with the cloak. but the bigger hold has a draw as well.

I asked corp mates and slightly more were in favour of the Occator than the Viator.

Objectively

Viator lowest HS price 100 million but that seems to be a one off and trade hubs look to be 127-130 million

Occator Lowest HS price is 200 Million, and trade hub price 203-205 million.

Looking at kill board

Viator has lost 43,790 and Occator 14,807

Exploring 1 page of the Occator, of the 50 loss mails, only 8 were in High Sec and of these 6 were war targets.

In Viators 1 page of 50 loss mails gave me 16 dead in High Sec, about half due to Wars.

I did notice that the Viators were mainly cargo or inertial stabs in the lows with one or two shield modules in the mids. Most had a covert ops cloak.

The Occators, despite getting 4% armour resistance per level of transport ships and 35% bonus to armour repair and 100% overheat bonus on local repair and resistance mods, seemed to be largely shield tanked. The many lows were, and I say that this was from 8 ships at random, mainly istabs or other speed enhancing modules. Only 2 of the 8 were armour tanked.

This does seem bizarre in the extreme.

Anyway, for mainly HS use then the Occator is the clear winner for me.

I will update this thread as and when I lose the ship.....

Failed Gank

Now I have an alt that used to within SLYCE, but was removed in one of the recent purges.

I had complied with the requirements and done everything right, and the alt was on  the list through an honest mistake.

I had a word and was invited back.

I however had a bit of a moment. Fueled by several pints of  Hobgoblin  and Spitfire , I decided to stay in the NPC corp.
In SLYCE, all he was was a salvage monkey anyway. Skilled in the use of cyno's, salvagers and a thrasher with a very limited PI suite.

So I thought lets stay neutal and upset someone.

Plugged in the skills for Catalyst and small hybrids, along with all the combat skills like surgical strike.

Went to Amarr and bought a catalyst, had to fit it tech 1 guns. I thought, I would see if I could kill something.

Trolled around  a number of 0.5 systems and only found skiffs, Orca's and some Mackinaws. none of those I could probably do solo with the right skills.

Anyway, 5th system I check, I have a MTU, Orca and 2 coveters on Dscan from the gate. limited quickly to 1 planet but 10 belts.

Just to be contrary I warped to belt 10, and tried Dscan from there, Limited it down to two, all targets in the same place.

Found them on the second try. 2 coveters mining, an Orca with a MTU tractoring 10k off.
I had warped to 0, and nearest coverter was 11 k away, so hit approach and fired up sensor booster, scram and guns. Completely failed to overheat, as Thermodynamics was not on the list of needed skills I had injected...

So bumped the coveter a good bump and came to rest 170 m off target. Sitting there it took 20 seconds to turn safety off. Not a good start. But no reaction from any of them except a boost washing out from the Orca.

It did cross my mind at this point to shoot the MTU and hope one of the ships tied attacking me, however I only had ganking ammo, not enough for an MTU.

So shot the coveter in front of me.

Some good hits but damage was not enough, looked like about 25% structure left before concord jammed,scrammed and shot me.

I warped he pod out to the top station, and saw he coveter land just behind me. luckily I had bounced off a customs office and my timer allowed docking.

No communication from the 1 or 3 pilots on grid. Another in system asked what was happening. I replied honestly that I was learning a lesson, and that lesson was mainly that I needed more skills.

Anyway, 30 seconds later I was given a 500k bounty. The first any of my characters have had.

So waited out the timer, and warped back to the belt in my rookie ship. My wreck was gone, I assume looted by the MTU and salvaged. The Orca and 1 coveter still there. The chap I shot was in a Gnosis.

So I bumped the Gnossis and the Coveter several times, and ineffectually the Orca once.  They all kindly locked me up, and part of me was waiting for the kill right or the stupidity of one of them getting Concorded.

Anyway they must have been worried that more were on the way as they all warped off.

I did pick up 5 hammerhead 1's and 5 hobgoblin 1s though that they left behind.

They also kindly added another 250k to my bounty.

Loss mail
Catalyst 1

And yes I know I had ammo in the hold. That the ammo I was looking for a little later in the station...

And to top it off the kill right was made public for the cost of 10k

Now all I need is an alt in HS that can accept and clear it for me.


Lesson learned and an hour of fun. The other party may well now watch local a bit better as well.

To Orca or not

Well my industrial character finally finished building a Freighter. I am the owner of a shiny new Obelisk. Well will be in 1 day.

I will have to hunt down a hi sec WH  as no way would I pilot it back through 4 low sec gates.

I will of course triple bulkhead fit it, as I have no intention of making it easy for those nasty gankers.

I have been reliably informed that in a 0.5 system a triple Bulkhead fit will pop with

30 Catalysts or
23 Bombers or
14 Talos

Now I suspect there is a bit of leeway to do with overheating and ammo and what type of hits you get.
I also suspect that if CODE are involved and Polarised Weapons it will be less.

However, with those numbers, unless its done for tears, carry less than a billion, maybe a billion and a half and your economically not worth it.

I would welcome input from anyone who does this regularly.

I suspect it would also be safest to drop corp and join an NPC one to actually fly it. War decs make flying freighters in a corp effective suicide.



Anyway gone a bit off topic. I had an Orca BPC pack laying around so I thought why not.

I have started to build the components and have about a third built. But what to do with it?

Mining wise I suspect it pulls in less than a Mackinaw, the Orca relying on the drones only. OK,  the drones are heavily boosted, but its still less.
The Orca has a 100% hull bonus and up o 50% bonus for industrial command skill for drone mining, so in reality 130-140 max.

Not sure how they stack, but current T2 drones mine 68m3 each per 60 seconds

If they stack how I hope, that will up the output to about 180m3. That's better than 2 tech 2 strip miners but not the same as a Mackinaw and drones.

Again, if anyone has the numbers for Orca mining with tech 2 drones and ship skills at 3 or 4 please let me know.

I assume I would at least try it.
I could also provide boosts to other miners, if I feel in the mood.

Options are:-
1. Keep as a mining ship
2. Keep as a hanger ornament that sees a sun occasionally.
3. Sell it - about 750million ish at current prices.
4. ?


Fly safe