Asset Protection

Part of hauling with Push Industries is knowing how to protect your assets (namely your ships). As a Pusher you will have to fly a freighter (usually worth around 1.7 billion ISK) as well as provide 1 billion ISK or more as collateral for the contract you accept. However, the reward for the courier may be as little as just a few million ISK. As a jump freighter pilot (JF Pilot) you will be flying a jump freighter worth much more than a normal freighter and in more dangerous space. The safety of the assets you use to deliver contracts (your ships) is very important and it is necessary that you try to protect your ships.

Dangers

It is important to understand the different dangers for hauling.

High Sec

In high sec there is a danger of a "freighter gank" where a group of players aim to immobilize and destroy your freighter before CONCORD destroys all of their ships (usually seconds on both counts.) Immediately afterwards they will use other characters in Tech 2 industrials to try and loot your freighter wreck. Long standing examples of this have happened in Niarja and Uedama and any 0.5/0.6 system on the major trade routes can be problematic at times.

A freighter should never have more than 2bil ISK in cargo at any time. Once a frieghter has more than that, it becomes a gank target.

Gankers are attracted to certain conditions and they are usually (but not exclusively), if a cargo is worth more than 2 bil or if it is double wrapped (Thus potentially being over 2B). If a contract is double wrapped then they will likely assume that you have something valuable and usually try to gank you. It is recommended to not double wrap a contract in a freighter. Gankers will almost always gank the ship to see what is inside.

Webbing

The use of a webbing alt is highly recommended at all times and is necessary when passing through hotzones such as Niarja or Uedama. A webbing alt (or webber) can be any ship with 3 or more stasis webifiers on it. After a stargate jump if you activate the webs on your freighter, the freighter's max speed will be reduced allowing it to get into warp nearly instantly. Here is a video demonstrating the tactic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjrbDMh3BHY&list=PLIOM-qilFsoQZyhpxd7bsx5DQCEM0EiiQ&index=3 . To web your freighter without getting CONCORDed your webber must be in the same corp as your hauler or your hauler must accept a duel from your webber.

Some ships have bonuses to webbing range such as the Huginn, Rapier, Hyena, Vigil Fleet Issue, or Cruor making them ideal for use as a freighter webbing ship. While training for a proper web ship, a fast frigate with a MWD can do but they should only be used while you train for a better webber. A squishy frigate can easily be popped.

Log off trick

If you do get bumped a webber will no longer work. Never take a duel from somebody that is offering to help you (with webs or anything else) that you do not know and trust. Another option to try is the log off trick. If certain conditions are met your ship will disappear from space after 1 minute even if your ship can not warp or is locked by another ship.. There are a few steps to the log off trick.

1. You can not have any timers. If you have webbed yourself you will have a 15 minute log out timer. Since webbing after a bump does not help anyways, it's best to not web after getting bumped because that will prevent you from doing the log off trick without having to wait 15 minutes.
2. Stop the warp on your ship by hitting Control+Space.
3. Open Esc menu and click "Log Off", NOT Safe Log Off.

If these steps are followed your ship will disappear from space after 1 minute even if your ship is locked.

This trick will work if the other players are bumping you just for fun or ransom but the log trick can be negated by the aggressors shooting your freighter with a rookie ship, thus giving you a timer and preventing your ship from disappearing.

Here is an example of the log off trick working: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1hS1hpHt_c

Docking/Undocking

Docking and undocking from stations poses their own threats for haulers. PushX has corp books marks for insta-docks and insta-undocks. There are appropriate times to use each.

Docking

When a ship warps to a station it may not land within docking range of the station thus having to burn in and making the ship a target. You will be able to dock when your distance from the station is at 0km. This can be a problem when there is someone on the undock waiting to kill a hauler. Outside of Jita 4-4 gankers wait for vulnerable blockade runners to land for an easy and possibly juicy kill. An instadock will warp you directly into docking range every time so you can dock immediately upon exiting warp.

Undocking

Undocking can pose an issue when someone is outside of the station waiting to target you while your ships aligns to the outgate. An insta-undock is a bookmark directly in front of the undock of a station and is far out from the station undock usually 150km or farther. When you undock and warp to the insta-undock bookmark your ship will warp instantly and out of range. Freighters SHOULD NOT use insta-undocks. Freighters can be easily scanned down and a bumping ship can be warped to you and you'll have no where to dock.

Low Sec

Standard

Some dangers in low sec are gate camps and station camps. Scouting is always recommended and knowing the proper procedures for flying industrials is important. For small deliveries to Low sec you should always use a proper ship with a proper fit.

Blockade Runners should always have a Covert Ops Cloak.

Deep Space Transport should be equipped with a Cloak and a Microwarp Drive to perform the MWD+Cloak trick. See this video for a tutorial on how to do the MWD+Cloak trick. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDZ0r4tavJE

Jump Freight

In low sec there are the dangers of having your cyno ship destroyed before, during or after your jump, having your freighter bumped off station, or being station camped.

Here are some guides that help with cyno placement and knowing the dangerous stations for cynos and undocking.

http://go-dl.eve-files.com/media/1312/Station_Cyno_Placement_Guide.pdf

http://go-dl.eve-files.com/media/1105/Stations_undock_range.pdf

Null sec

Null sec has all the dangers of low sec but with the extra danger of interdiction warp disruption bubbles which can draw an incoming ship of course during warp to arrive tens or hundreds of kilometers away from the intended destination and if inside the interdiction bubble unable to warp to a safe spot or station. These bubbles are colloquially known as "Sucker Bubbles" and "Punch Bubbles."

Wormholes

Our only wormhole serviced is Thera which has a mix of lowsec and nullsec risks. Entrances can be heavily camped at times, especially when they are near trade hubs. There are also interdiction spheres as in nullsec which usually occur around stations. DST pilots should also be advised that highsec wormholes will not accept your ship through if its stability has been compromised.

See http://wiki.pushx.net/index.php?title=Wormhole_Service for more information.

Acceptable Risks

Risk is a part of EVE Online. No matter what you are doing or where you are there is always some risk, even if it is very minimal. Hauling involves risk too. Protecting your ships means understanding and managing the amount of risk involved when you accept and try to complete contracts. Where the risk is not considered to be "significant" for the type of ship you are piloting you are expected to complete courier contracts appropriate for the ship(s) that you fly unless an exception for you has been explicitly granted by a member of the Push Executive.

In the eyes of Push Industries "significant risk" applies only to situations where you are 80% sure that you WILL lose your ship trying to complete a contract. Risk is assessed on a contract-by-contract basis, not on a general level. Your assessment of risk MUST be based on recent kill mails from EVE Kill, Dotlan statistics, in-game map statistics or in-game scouts. In other words you must have hard evidence to justify not accepting contracts.

The following table provides a general overview of what amount of risk specific hauling ships can take on (by security status):

T1 Industrials	These should not be used in Push Industries as their tank is paper thin
Freighters	Slow and expensive, these ships should stay in high security space.
T2 Industrials (BR/DST)	Designed to tackle the dangers of low security and lawless space, these ships are built to move through hostile space (low sec, Thera).
Jump Freighters	These ships can go anywhere there is a station to freely dock at.

Any other ship not listed in the table above should not be utilized for moving Push Industries contracts. Other ships such as covert ops ship or a tanked orca with a webber are not endorsed by Push and are not acceptable. There may also be a risk of removal from the corp if the risk was inappropriate for the route and collateral and a loss occurs.

Prevention

The best way to prevent the loss of your ship is not to take unnecessary risks. As a Pusher you have the right NOT to take any contracts where you believe there is a significant risk of losing your ship (see Acceptable Risks for a corporate definition of "significant risk") or that you feel are too difficult to complete. As a member of Push Industries you will never be punished for trying to protect your ships.

Other ways to prevent the loss of your ship include not to carrying extra freight or cargo that could make the value of your total cargo really high, double-wrapping so that random ships cannot scan your cargo, not using low sec short cuts and not using the autopilot feature are all very good ways to minimize risk.

High sec systems to be careful of:

• Niarja
• Uedama
• Aufay

Low sec systems that are very dangerous:

• Amamake
• Egghelende
• Hagilur
• Kemala
• Kinakka
• Old Man Star
• Rahadalon
• Rancer
• Tama

Thera is a system where the general threat is usually low but can catch Pushers out. Utilising a scout is highly recommended to prevent landing in a bubble or undocking into a station camp that has just materialised. Having your own bookmarks in addition to the corp ones is recommended.