Ok, so looking back at the last post, I alluded to the fact that I got into a fight by flipping someone's 1v1 PVP can. I looked at this can in two lights. One, the guy was probably fitted specifically for killing newbies as I was in a newbie solar system running tutorial missions. Two, he probably had a buddy in corp behind the scenes ready to stomp me. I decided to go for it as, even if I get thoroughly smeared across the proverbial wall, it's hard to pass up the chance at some good ol' 1v1 PVP. This is not going to be part of my plan for reasons I will explain after Part 2.
Noting that this guy was flying a Rifter and I was in a Merlin, I ran through some common Rifter fits and noted that he would probably be Buffer or Active armor tanked. Now, I'm still fairly new to PVP, so I wasn't sure how well a Buffer/Shield tanked Merlin would handle against a Rifter with either of the above setups, but I was about to find out.
Flipping the can, I began to orbit the lonely Rifter, glancing at my overview and D-Scan from time to time to make sure no corpmates of this guy weren't flying in. Waiting on the element of surprise, I'm sure, this guy made me orbit for over a minute before finally locking and turning red on me, at the same time chipping away a small chunk of my buffer.
Doing some fancy manual piloting, I tried to keep transversal vs. him extremely high to no avail, his tracking bonus was just too good. I lit into him with my two Rocket Launchers and 150mm Autocannons slicing large chunks out of his shields with each blast.
Feeling my blood pumping in my veins and a small bead of sweat forming on my brow, I watched excitedly as my fancy piloting appeared to be working out. His shields decimated, he was starting to lose armor at an alacritous rate. Watching his armor dwindling and my buffer at less than 1/4, I fully expected to get him into structure before I lost my shields.
Just when it looked like a sure bet, all of a sudden, his armor started increasing...."DAMMIT" I said to myself, "He's active tanked! ><" As he began biting deeply into my armor, I put out in comms "looks like you're going to win this one dude, good job :)" No response, he apparently didn't realize that my ships loss was a sure bet at this point. Capacitor empty, guns still firing but not taking much armor due to X's armor repairer, I tried one last ditch attempt at throwing off his guns by flying directly over him, maximizing transversal in the process....No luck. http://eve.battleclinic.com/killboard/killmail.php?id=13410570 my ship started venting atmosphere and my capsule ejecting just before my hull went in a ball of tears and angst, my poor little Merlin hadn't even survived half an hour in my possession before it was offered up to the demanding Ship Gods of New Eden .
Realizing that not only was I inexperienced in my Merlin, but also knowing that he was setup perfectly and probably had a decent amount of experience in his ship of choice, I didn't feel too bad knowing that I lost and I asked him if he wanted a rematch as I had a Rifter hull in the hangar of a station in the same solar system. He accepted which leads to Part 2.... :)
Lessons
So, there were a lot of lessons here. First and foremost is that it seems that a buffer shield tanked Merlin just doesn't seem to be on par with an active tank. I have seen this before in my previous PVP exploits on my other character and it still holds true in my mind. From now on, I will probably be flying my Merlin with a Shield Booster as it just seems like a better option that allows me to dictate the terms of my tank as opposed to crossing my fingers and hoping it holds up.
Second lesson here is, I really don't know how to anticipate what people are using. I can get decent ideas from loadouts on Battleclinic, but my uncertainty actually caused me to hesitate and, since I don't have a practiced PVP reaction yet, was also part of the reason I failed this.
Third lesson, in most cases, I believe a NOS is a better option than another weapon in your high slot, especially if active tanked as it will allow you to run your repper longer, if you get neuted, you can keep your point up and as long as they don't have a NOS, you can keep them relatively perma capped out, thereby destroying their active tank if they're using one.
Finally, while there are many lessons to be had from this fight, I am only listing the most important in my eyes, I need to not get discouraged as I am relatively new to PVP and I was at least able to hold up and duke it out without trying to run. Who knows, maybe he was almost capped out and would have lost his tank soon. Anyway, on to my rematch!
No comments:
Post a Comment