Agression flags
I can’t believe I’m having such continued success with the agression mechanics in getting pilots to CONCORDOKKEN themselves as I have been. The last story is a prime example and it is one you’ll see repeated through Kate’s stories.

I recently heard from a fellow “Mining permit enforcement officer” who has been having similar success with the tactic, so clearly the confusion about agression flags is fairly widespread.

So lets break it down for those new to agression and wondering why CONCORD takes their ship when they try to help a corp mate in trouble.

Example
For this example we’ll need two pilots: Can Flipper of GreifCorp and Mr Miner from Industrial Inc.

So Mr Miner is happily mining away into a jetcan when the dreaded sight of Can Flipper’s ship comes into view who them steals from Mr Miner’s can.

Can Flipper has performed a criminal act and is now flaged to Industrial Inc for 15 minutes. What this means is that Mr Miner’s entire corp are free to engage and fire upon Can Flipper within that 15 minutes.

Sounds good, so Mr Miner sends his drones on Can Flipper to drive him off while he summons corp mates to come defend him.

Once Mr Miner opens fire, he now has a personal (and this is the key) flag of 15 minutes to Can Flipper (who will also have a 15 minute flag to Mr Miner even though they didn’t open fire). This timer is entirely seperate from the one that Industrial Inc has on Can Flipper, it is also reset every time Mr Miner opens fire.

So if Can Flipper warps off, comes back in five minutes and Mr Miner or Can Flipper exchange shots again, then the flag each of them have to each other is reset to 15minutes, but the flag Industrial Inc has to Can Flipper, which now has around 10minutes remaining, continues to count down and is not reset.

Can Flipper once again warps off and now once the flag Industrial Inc has on them expires in 10 minutes, they will still have a 5 minute window where they can engage Mr Miner and only Mr Miner.

With the Industrial Inc flag expired the other pilots of Industrial Inc cannot assist Mr Miner by firing on Can Flipper, though they are free to offer help by remote shield transfer or armor repair.

If any pilot in Industrial Inc forgets this and opens fire on Can Flipper, then CONCORD will arrive and destroy their ship, regardless of the previous events.

Solution
So the question is how can I prevent this situation where the can flipper can shoot on me, but my corp mates can’t help?

The answer, as always is to never, ever fire on a can flipper. It is a trap, doing so is giving them exactly what they want and only encourages them.

Sometimes you may feel you have to open fire, but before you do so, know that your vessel is powerful enough to do the job. Don’t just assume that because your ship is bigger (Hulk, Battleship, etC) you’ll win the fight.

Once you have destroyed their ship or run them off dock at the nearest station immediately. If you are feeling brave and they don’t have any fellow corp mates in system, steal back your ore before you warp out. Corp mates should then be used to protect the ore and haul it to station.

Summary
Opening fire is a dumb move, even if you do destroy their ship, most likely it is a cheap and easily replaced and they have other, better ships docked in system or nearby.

Sitting in a belt flagged is worse though, so if you absolutely have to shoot, run for a station, dock then wait out your 15 minutes in safety.

This article is reproduced with permission from:

Kate Yeats

Copyright and Source Acknowledgement to Kate Yeats at Adventures in acquisition

With our sincere thanks

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