liberator wrote: If I lose a ship, it's a blow that I have a very hard time recovering from, insurance or not.

You have an apparently large corp who will happily frag people until you have enough stuff for a new ship.

Usually i would too... But these were weird circumstances... And the only reason i'm not upset or depressed about the loss right now (other than that its being replaced) is that i know i take peoples ships from them as it was taken from me. It wouldnt be fair of me to cancel my sub or something rash like that, because i essentially got a taste of my own medicine...

No one has commented on the general suckiness of my character.

Because you dont suck. You're still young is all.
Christ, if we were going by your logic, I suck too.
My CEO has 24mil SP. I have 6.

But hippo's been playing less time than i have and he's a combat god.

I take a Vigilant on a storyline mission and nearly lose it.

I lost my Apocalypse on the weekend. Storyline mission too.
2x T2 large reps, and 4 named hardeners, lasted about 15 seconds... didnt even have time to align.
And before you say it, no I cant afford to replace it, and no I cant make the money back in an hour. Even if I had another battleship I couldnt make it back in an hour unless I got something incredibly rare.

Far from it. According to your skill sheet, you're far more skilled than i am in both spaceship command and weapons. The only way i mught be better than you, is knowing combat tactics, and having friends who know good pvp setups. If you think i've just aquired this knowledge through superioity, you're giving me too much credit.

combat tactics? point, shoot, and keep the other guy from doing the same, anything else is superfluous garbage.

And I still haven't figured out how to keep my armor rep running indefinately.

capacitor relays and capacitor chargers

and there goes my guns, cause i don't have enough grid/cpu to run that kinda stuff.

Do you have to end every post with a negative comment? Setup threads exist for a reason. Go to the official EVE website, forums, Ships and Modules, walla.

everyone of those threads is made by people who don't use anything but t2 and the most expensive named stuff.

All I ever get is basic crap, even on lvl2 missions.

Something wrong with the T1 variants?

No, it's all I use, but none of the loadouts use what i use.

Ok, if you need extra grid and recharge, try a power diagnostic. They boost your grid, capacitor, and shields.
Also, after looking at your skills, I noticed you engineering skills are lacking. Train Engineering to 5, get Energy Systems Operation (recharge) and Energy Management (Cap volume). They help a lot.

Doesn't change the fact that my armor rep (Med Armor Rep 1) eats 1/5th of the cap in my Thorax every 10 sec, and repairs less than 1/10 of my unplated armor.