Another reason to be extremely professional then when using such an expensive ship, no? And without multiboxing at all, you can hardly move a JF around, since you need a Cyno for it to jump on anyway. These guys aren’t newbies or without social contats in the game. They could easily access all the knowledge they need to avoid being killed, it’s really not a big deal. The increase in numbers does not show that there is “something wrong” with the current mechanics. The pilots need to adapt, that will take time, more or less depending on how lazy or stubborn they are. But in the end, you can move your JF as save as ever if you follow some simple rules.
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Change is in the wind…
We have more data from a wider window of time, and zkillboard’s about at the limit of what it’ll be able to provide unfortunately.
Still using July 4th as the delination date for lancers, JF gankings between July 4th and now is well over 310. For comparison, the previous 4 months before July 4th is ~220. So the gap has widened from a delta of 56 to 90 as we look at bigger windows of time showing JFs are at higher risk than ever before.
As usual, I’m sure we’ll get plenty of nay-sayers with lots of explanations for the increase replying to this additional information. But just like before:
Quibble all you want, but the numbers continue to speak for themselves.
Destruction is good for the game
Totally okay when keeping in mind that they were at almost zero risk before (unless the pilot was exceptional stupid).
In the recent days I was in Ishomilken, mostly almost alone in local. The last JF kill there was (when checking zKill), in Nov. 22, so almost a year ago.
https://zkillboard.com/system/30002756/reset/group/902/losses/
Thats 10 jumps from Jita. Looks like a good and qiet system for exiting LowSec to Highsec. If you chose one of those where the Lancers wait all day long, it’s your own fault.
One more update, but this time not alot’s going to be said about JF gankings. Perhaps I’m saying we’re “post-Viridian” at this point and now dealing with the new challenges of Havoc. And from a JF pilot’s point of view Havoc’s changes are far more reasonable…just incursion on steroids really (plus temporary null sec effects in low sec, sheesh).
GHSOL has resumed operations earlier this month, and our customer base made this possible. Our biggest and best customers made citadels available to us via their generosity and commitment to keep funding them. I can only guess that our competitor’s increases in rates motivated them.
I can’t express my appreciation enough for all the effort/ISK these customers put into the project given the diplomatic obstacles, substantial up front investment and of course, supporting GHSOL through on going contributions to the citadel owners. All of this has redefined GHSOL and made our JF courier service sustainable again. And let’s not forget GHSOL’s JF pilots who are facing higher risks, but still willing to use this new infrastructure to move cargo as safely as possible!
As I wrap this up, I’m going to come back to a topic that started this original thread. GHSOL has come through this unscathed. In the 3 weeks since we resumed operations, our JF pilots have returned moving 300+ load of cargo. So if this continues (as I expect it will), we’ll end 2023 the same way that we started this year…the market leaders when it comes to moving high value JF sized loads of cargo in high/low sec. BUT…and you knew a “but” was coming…I don’t know how any new/independent JF pilot would viably and sustainably haul cargo with all the obstacles in place. They really have no choice to but do so in the context of a larger organization (null sec alliance, courier service, etc) given how citadels are now necessary to counter the T2 lancer dreadnaught threat that can be projected all around Jita.
In the past, just having 2 Omega accounts, a 10b ISK ship and ISK for collateral was already enough for an individual player to start JF hauling (and reading this, that still seems like a pretty high barrier to entry). Over many years, the increasing risks of ganking (super alpha, bouncing in low sec, skirting Concord consequences in high sec, etc) meant fewer and fewer players were ready to do try this undertaking. And of course CCP has done nothing to guide new players toward hauling as a career beyond the agent distribution mission that have been around for decades. So the barrier to entry was already substantial…but now, with requiring multiple citadels in key locations, that barrier to entry is insurmountable by the individual (obviously multiboxing due to lighting cynos) player.
Some have claimed JF hauling is really a cartel…just a dozen or so multiboxing players (or a small active group in a courier corp), and lately I’ve been kinda wondering about that. So many years ago, GHSOL was created as the low cost alternative…just a bunch of independent JF haulers joining together as Black Frog continued to raise rates making our business model of flat rate hauling viable. But I don’t know if that whole scenario could repeat again with another small bunch of players who like hauling…all I can say is GHSOL will continue to give customers a reasonable alternative. And we’ll continue to take in new JF pilots and not complicate their hauling effort with lots of silly rules so they can haul however they want to.
As always feel free to come to channel GHSOL in game to talk about any of these topics…I do love to talk about JF hauling and why it can make you 10b’s of ISK every month if you’re ready to commit the time and effort to this activity!
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Well now…
I may have spoke too soon. I thought the above post about GHSOL reopening would be my last update, but there’s been a few more odd turns of events.
GHSOL is again ceasing operations. After the failed trial with one citadel back in July, this fall GHSOL worked with a citadel owner of a long time network of citadels near Jita and access was granted to just our JF alts. The owner of this citadels been a long time customer, so the trust was there and as you might expect this customer very much appreciated GHSOL rates. In fact, with all their work another 600 contracts where completed since the above update last month for a grand total of 900 in just 7 weeks. GHSOL was humming along just like the good ol’ days and had retaken the “market leader” title in the low sec JF market of moving cargo!
Once again I throw out…BUT
Today, the whole citadel network (going far beyond the 3 recently used by GHSOL to get access to Jita) was destroyed. And by a capital fleet far beyond anything any courier corp could be expected to field (or hire for that matter) for defense. The “why” this came about can be debated…to be frank, plenty of people are willing to guess but I doubt many know for sure. Time will make that apparent to all.
The take away is clear. Citadels aren’t the answer to making JF hauling viable again…not when it comes to the economics of moving cargo to/from low sec. At least if your organizations is anything smaller than the big null sec blocks who can consistently protect their citadel from half a dozen titans plus a support fleet. So CCP will eventually have to decouple this dependency allowing JFs to actually use its abilities to take the gate into high sec in scenarios that are greater than 18 seconds in warp.
Otherwise JFs in the coming years will get relegated to just the logistics branch of null sec blocks and in all other cases JF hauling rates just become absurdly high, JF ganking continue to dissuade players from trying this style of play and low/null sec courier services intermittent whenever diplomacy shifts impeding this type of business.
Let’s see what 2024 brings…
Yes, today i got Lanced and the Lancer didn’t appear on killmail. He must’ve redocked and reshipped. They waited 10min before killing me trying to get me to eject. I’d be really curious to see how people evade this kind of tactic as i arrived on gate and i was at 1000m from the gate and i just couldn’t jump and then i was bumped 30km off the gate in 10sec and held for ransom which i didn’t pay.
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Now that all unfolded a bit quicker than expected. Many thanks to key GHSOL members for taking the lead in getting around the latest obstacle to continued operations!
GHSOL found yet another set of citadels to use with equivalent citadel operating costs. So GHSOL is ready to move your cargo as of today, and the best news is the rates/terms are the same! Come to channel GHSOL in game if you have any questions.
As always if you know of citadels in low sec near high sec gates in Forge/Citadel regions, your efforts in getting GHSOL access can help us avoid these service disruptions. Thankfully this last one was just two weeks, but with your help the next one could be completely avoided! Please work with Itarino Rotsuda in game if you can help.
The citadel network used by GHSOL has both held when tested and grown in early 2024. With 300+ contracts completed in the last month, our operations have been humming along! Come to channel GHSOL to find out how we can cheaply and quickly move your cargo to/from low sec…often at half the price of the competitors for those far away asset safety system.
Even with what ended up being just a 2 week interruption in our service at the end of 2023, we’ve moved 1200 contracts since we resumed operations 3 months ago. 2024 definitely looks as promising as ever as more JF pilots come haul for GHSOL now that citadels are required to safely haul large numbers of loads of cargo consistently. Many thanks to our key corp members who’ve gone through great efforts to set this citadel network up and the JF pilots who keep the cargo flowing!
I was Experiencing the exact same thing, jumping to a gate to highsec as usual and got within range, but somehow the new Lancer Dread Stopped me from jumping the gate, with it’s weapon, and i got bounced off the gate.
Having a mechanic that prevents you from jumping into highsec if you want to, with no agressive timer or anything it not okay im my opnion
Hey, i got a similiar situation happeing to me, where i was lanced by a T3 dread, when i was triing to jump into highsec. This is a new kind of stupid mechanic at all, which makes hauling stuff more worthless, cause u have no chance to do anything against. Local was down, when the npc-cop-player was watching me cloaky it seems. as soon as i warped to the gate, they opened a cyno next to the gate and dropt a lancers dread and some blackops in. the lancer was stopping me to jump, while a BO was pumping me off the gate and tackeld me. this is a new way of stupid ganking stuff. as we all know hauling trough high sec is not a fun at all cause of ganking (but okay, u can do things against beeing ganked) but these lancer traps are a broken mechanic at all.
you have to safe a lot of money, got some contracts or stuff of ur mates in (u have to pay at the end) and such a broken gameplay stops the hauling things on a honorless way.
Lets summarize:
doing your run in the most active EVE timezone known for gatecamps and piracy (it is)
chosing Pakkonen (5 Jumps from Jita…) as entry point (stupid)
not checking zKill if there have been other JFs lanced before (they did)
not realizing that unknown NPC-corp players in lowsec could be PvP-scouts (they were)
not used a bouncebookmark but instead directly warped at the higsec gate into the waiting trap (you have)
But the game is “broken”? 
This loss was a 100% avoidable if you just had cared to prepare your run properly and has little to nothing to do with a “broken” lance mechanic.
There are at least three 99.99% safe™ methods to bring your JF into HS (well, three that I know, there could be more). Figure them out and execute them well and it’s the pirates that could complain that they literally have almost zero chance to ever catch you.
Another month, and another update. Our citadel network has been tested several times and defended, so we’re gaining confidence and actual delivery times are quite fast beating all the competitors easily. Adding NPC null sec service to our offering has increased our flow of cargo through the citadels. And we’ve caught the eye of a couple null sec organizations who see the value in outsourcing logistics to GHSOL.
Overall, with the recent growth in the citadel network, the JF pilots in GHSOL are enjoying the new options as we move cargo in all directions, anywhere (except citadels), any distance for flat rates. The real proof of this is how there’s been an increase in candidates, but I do have to say that GHSOL’s citadels do require us to lay out clear performance critieria (not just skill/experience levels) for them.
I’ve said it above, and I’ll say it again. Casually hauling with your jump freighter regularly is over unless you’re part of an alliance who can put up citadels and defend them. If you take the same route more than six times in a month, you can expect to be noticed by gankers who’ll have a T2 dread waiting to cyno in and take advantage of this while you’re in warp…even if you think you’re being fancy and picking quiet low sec systems off hours. After almost 15 years of nerfing, CCP has brought the era of independent anonymous JF haulers to an end.
Quite possibly this may be my last update. In most respects, everything has returned to normal, though GHSOL has made significant changes in our culture. Some not for the best IMO. But then adaption/compromise is never easy, eh?
Over 10 years ago, GHSOL was created to be an inclusive place for independent JF haulers with few rules or constraints. That was our culture…and it definitely differentiated us from our competitors on may levels. Keep it simple with just enough rules so everyone “plays nice” with each other. I’ve always favored the “union” analogy, and yes, I’d be the guy who has to lead and interact with management. I’ll let you guess who’s “management” in this anlogy, but it’s fair to say it’s changed with time.
Over the years, customer demands did push us towards offering higher efficiencies, but not in a way that required much from the JF haulers themselves. About the only changes made were max skill (for lowest expenses so we could offer the best prices) and no Nomads since eventually we had to offer the highest m3 to distinguish ourselves. But we always kept the philosophy of you keep all the reward, you haul your way when you want to do it however much you want to.
With the introduction of lancers and the requirement of a citadel network, now a large shared expense had to be accounted for. The first undesirable change has been no more casual hauling…you now have to pitch in both in effort and covering this high shared cost. Good for a sense of building a sense of “teamwork” but also introducing alot of complexity as a flow of ISK has to be setup and managed.
The next change was stepping out our usual niche of service. No longer do we have the luxury of keeping things simple, but we’ve got to increase the flow of cargo by expanding service. So while we’ve maintained the “flat rate”, “any distance” part of our culture, finally after many years we’ve expanded into null sec and introduced a real rush service.
All this was done with alot of thought and effort on my part and key people within my organization. But invariably the “independent” part of our culture has somewhat slipped away. And of course, as I’ve said above many times, new JF haulers have a far more difficult time getting into this game style. But given how much prices increased for us AND our competitor, maybe it’s best that there’s less JF haulers ensuring the balance between overall capacity, the flow of cargo and of course higher rates charge (of which GHSOL still remains the cheapest and quickest among all the competitors).
As a final thought, I’m proud of the fact that the whole GHSOL crew anticipated future changes in circumstances. Plans and programs that were rolled out nearly six months ago required few tweaks if any. But we had the luxury of months of watching the effects of lancers last year before jumping back in the ring so not surprisingly we came up with a solid and resilient plan!
Now for the next curve ball that CCP throws everyone…like with the high sec route between Jita and Amarr gets broken by pirate insurgency regularly for more than a week at a time. The flow of cargo will have to find an alternate way. And yes, JFs will be the solution, and we’ve got a plan! Sheesh that was a cheesy reference…
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My goal here is to start a discussion. Ask 10 different people what “rush” is when it comes to a hauling service, and you’ll get 10 different answers.
- For CCP, “rush” is 24 hours (and they won’t allow for any less than that)
- For shippers, “rush” is their cargo at the destination yesterday.
- For industrialists, “rush” is cargo delivered 5 minutes before my next job slot opens.
- For wormholers, “rush” is before this damn thing collapses or someone rolls it.
- For gankers, “rush” is delivery in the next hour since camping a gate gets boring.
- For scammers, “rush” is however fast so that you don’t read all the terms of the contract.
- For haulers, “rush” is putting this load of cargo at the top of the list (but who knows when it’ll actually get moved)
- and for GHSOL, “rush” is within 6 hours of when you created your contract. So you get to use/sell the same day or even same gaming session.
Come on…you knew there’d be a plug for GHSOL somewhere in this post. But I like to think that at GHSOL, we have “real rush”, and not excuses, manipulated statistics or slight of hand on why YOUR cargo wasn’t where you needed it when the terms for delivery were clear.
One things for sure…few people actually are gathering/presenting data. Hauling service occasionally provide reports, but rarely with enough detail (like when the delivery time starts…at contract creation or contract acceptance by the actual hauler?). GHSOL shows all our raw data along with our average delivery time for the last week.
I’d be ecstatic if someone who regularly creates batches of similar contracts would split them between two (or three) services and give all of us a summary on which ones perform better. I invite any shipper to do this, and me and my JF pilots welcome the challenge. Heck, don’t even let us or our competitors know that you’re doing this…I’m comfortable saying we’ll be faster and cheaper than the rest even if we don’t know we’re being tested!
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Merged 2 Postings.
One Advert per Service should be enough.
Below is an analysis by one of our customer who uses MANY different courier services. I understand that this perspective is a bit broader than just low sec hauling. But it does show the trend toward higher rates over the last year.
If you want to read between the lines of this announcement, High Sec Buy Back was offering better prices in the one area where their territory crossed over with Low Sec Buy Back. But because of rising rates (in this case due to Lancers since HSBB used GHSOL primarily in this situation), HSBB now pays its customers less than before and is referring those customers to LSBB as an alternative in some cases. LSBB of course doesn’t pay as well since they’re offering to buy back in any random place in low sec…a much more general case for this buy back business model.
It’s taken almost a year to reach this point…both HSBB and GHSOL have tried many other alternatives to provide the lowest shipping costs, keep the most customers using the service and ensure the flow of cargo as high as possible. But we’re all being inevitably pushed towards higher rates, lower flows of cargo and a slower economy.
I will take this opportunity to say that anyone with 10Ms m3 of low value cargo stuck in low sec, GHSOL stands by ready to liberate your cargo at the lowest possible cost and work with you to get it to market! We have flexible ways including trips to/from low sec to move 360k m3 for as little as 160M to make this happen…don’t let your cargo stay trapped in low sec for another couple years! Let us show you how to put billions more in your wallet by cleaning up your hangars in low sec!
With the one year anniversary of lancers, our current citadel network has finally suffered its first loss. But by this time we’ve built it out (and made agreements) so that the loss was easily accommodated for. I’d like to claim there’s been no JF losses, but the reality is JF pilots make mistakes…often rushing or trying to break through a gate camp or HS gank fleet’s hunting grounds. That’s why everything has to be fully collateralized so the customer experiences remains positive in these worst case scenarios.
In a sense I still stand by my statement that JF hauling has become far more standardized. Looking at the killboards for jump freighters shows on a daily basis how any choices made while hauling other than the standard JF hauling practices eventually will cost that person their JF with enough trips. And citadels are now central to this.
Now if you want be on the bleeding edge of JF hauling, you’re instead exploring techniques to use low sec systems without any NPC stations, spreading jump fatigue for faster deliveries and how to increase the flow of cargo to support a larger citadel network. We’ve got a few ideas on how to achieve this last item by disrupting the traditional market players (beyond our usual low sec, large load, high value cargo focus) given how much they’ve recently raised overall hauling rates making our usual courier service a viable competitor to non-JF hauling! More to come in a future post here…
Finally, I’m a bit surprised the lancer hasn’t been used more broadly, but as the market price of a fitted lancer exceeding 25b, I can see how the lancer pilots choose only to focus on easier targets like jump freighters (and by reshipping to minimize who knows they’re fielding such an expensive ship). Maybe the lancer will just remain a niche ship like the Bowhead (and possibly the Avalanche?) with few use cases to justify its existence. But hey, BLOPS BS use to be in this category, and now with some recent buffs, you can’t go anywhere without seeing these ships used in all sorts of ganks.
As an update, it’s worth saying that after an enormous amount of effort and 10b’s of ISK over the last year, the citadel network has reached the level of stability and resiliency that we all envisioned at the start.
The folks operating/managing the citadel network had certain expectations, and as you can imagine the folks using the citadel network might have other expectations. And along the way, even more expectations/needs have come up.
Suffice to say the real measure of any citadel network is how much cargo flows across it, whether the numbers in terms of ISK (or time) work out and finally everyone’s confidence in whether it’ll be here next week, next month or in 2025. The last item is best measured by how many new recruits are attracted to GHSOL (including ensuring they do their part in moving that flow of cargo), and this has been by and far the most satisfying part of the whole effort.
As always many thanks to the key people in our organization who make this possible, the customers who’ve had to absorb some of the higher costs of maintaining a citadel network and as always those many tireless JF pilots who keep the flow of spic…uh, cargo moving to market!