The Assult pocket 3 changed, but it may still be worth it to blitz

PvE Gameplay Center Missions
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[EDIT: The first few posts in this thread work to confirm there have indeed been changes to this mission. I will add a reply at the end with a few thoughts and my math.]

While a bug was filed a couple of months ago (and fixed) on The Assault, I can’t find any info about patch notes on the following.

Today, to mark The Assault (L4 Serpentis) as completed, I needed to destroy ALL groups of ships in pocket 3, not just the group on the left. (Left, right, and re-spawn.)

Wanted to confirm you all have also noticed this. (Maybe this was changed back in December and I simply haven’t accepted this mission in forever.)

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Yep, happened to me as well

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Was doing some caldari missions and the guristas version didn’t complete till I killed the respawn group, Killed all three initial spawns before triggering it, maybe you can leave one or two of them, but doesn’t seem worth it.

So I guess the assault is an automatic turn down now, and doesn’t matter which version it is.

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Thanks - forgot there was a respawn. I have edited my post accordingly. I’m going to reach out to Anize and see if she wants to update her guide.

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I myself have killed the tower to prevent the new spawn.

and i have done the mission without killing the tower…

Assault seems to no longer be blitzable.

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So…

I am not going to make a statement one way or the other if The Assault LVL4 is still blitzable, but I would like to offer some sample numbers I just encountered. Each of you will need to make a ‘Yay / Nay’ decision on your own.

I pulled out a stopwatch and timed myself running this from clicking ‘Accept’ to clicking ‘Complete.’

A few things to note

  • All relevant Nav, Social and Combat skills are maxed (Large turret spec at IV)
  • This was the Serpentis version
  • This was a same-system mission
  • First two gates were unlocked, took 'em right away. There was no extra 3rd spawned pocket in the third room. (I’m not sure why.)
  • In the second pocket, I was aligned and activated the gate, but three webs held my speed at 10m / s for like 45 seconds before I actually kicked into warp. If that can be avoided, this can easily be an 8-minute mission if same-system.

The Numbers

Running it took 9 minutes 23 seconds, and I had 15-20 seconds of distraction, so let’s call it 9 minutes even.

Mission payout: 2.17 million ISK
Time bonus: 1.71 million ISK
Bounties: 3.74 million ISK
SoE LP award: 9,467

Let’s be conservative and value the LP at 1,000 : 1 , and call the value 9.47 million ISK.

Total value: 17.09 million ISK
Total time: 9 minutes
Equivalent hourly rate: 113.9 million ISK.

Yep, that’s lower than the long-term hourly rate blitzers have come to achieve, certainly. But it’s not terrible, and certainly helps with a sizable agent standings boost if you’re been unlucky and your standing is now hovering in the danger zone.

The news gets better, though.

If we use a more realistic SoE LP ratio of, say 1,200 : 1, the math works out to 126.5 million / hour. If you assume 1,400 : 1, you get all the way up to an hourly equivalent of 139.1 million, and that is certainly in the ballpark.

Am I personally going to continue to blitz this mission? Probably no - I see myself declining it 9 times in 10.

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Take a quick look at a self-reply I did to this thread. It might not be quite as automatic as either of us thought at first. I crunched the numbers.
But still, yeah, I’m personally choosing to remove it from my list.

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yea the serp version seems a bit more friendly as there are only 2 groups and they are both pretty small. eve-survival doesn’t mention a respawn for the serpentis version. https://eve-survival.org/wikka.php?wakka=Assault4se Yea not a bad mission if you have to take it for standings. I typically declined it anyways and could maintain standings on burners.

The gurista version has 3 sizeable spawns with a few jamming hacs and then a respawn. Far less friendly, I might test it at some point to see if you can kill group 1+2 and the respawn to blitz, but no idea when I’d get around to it.

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Wow - the guristas version sounds awful.

FWIW, yesterday I ran this mission and did actually get a spawn in the 3rd pocket - a couple of frigs, BCs, and BS’es. Not a serious threat, but enough that it would probably add 2-4 minutes of time, and thus push this mission well into the ‘auto decline’ category.

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