In the context of faction warfare, "plexing" means taking over sites that spawn all over the low-sec under militia control. You can capture a plex by entering it, shooting any defenders (players or NPCs if you are taking over a hostile site), and waiting for the timer to tick down. Plexes are divided by size:
Scout (frigates only)
Small (up to destroyers)
Medium (up to cruisers)
Large (up to battleships)
Open (any ship)
Additionally, they come in two types: Navy (allowing only T1 and Empire faction ships) and Advanced (any type). Plexing can be divided into defensive plexing (d-plex), where we try to make a plex despawn in a friendly territory, or offensive plexing (o-plex) where we attack a plex in a hostile space. You can d-plex in basically any ship as all you have to do is just sit there and wait out the timer but for o-plexing, you need a ship fitted with some DPS to take down the NPC defender sporting a decent active tank. You can usually punch one class above the ship you are using so a well-fit frigate should be able to handle both scout and small plexes. Completing a plex results in:
LP gained
standings with the militia increased
Victory Points are earned for your faction, which means that the system becomes more contested for the faction that completed the plex
The LP payout depends on:
system type, frontline giving the most and rearguards giving the least amount
who holds the control of the system - for o-plexes you always get 100% payout, for d-plexes that is divided by how hard the system is contested so if Gallente has 90% control of the system, you only get 10% of the max payout
As such, if your aim is to maximize the rewards, the best places to be are frontline systems that either belong to enemy faction or highly contested friendly systems but this usually means that you have to deal with more players in space. If you are just testing the waters, try finding a friendly Command Operations system. For a more detailed breakdown of rewards, see this infographic.
Basic strategy:
Warp to the plex you want to run, preferably at range - warping to zero may place you inside the acceleration gate, causing you to get stuck or pinged off in a random direction
Use the acceleration gate. FW plex gates have a 100 km activation range so aside from some corner cases when warping at max range, you should be able to use it from anywhere you land
Assess the situation - if the grid is friendly, move to the optimal range of your guns measuring from the landing spot. If there are hostiles (players or NPC), move in to engage them
When you take control of the plex by removing any enemies, stay within 30 km of the beacon to start the capture process. You should see a timer in space ticking down.
Watch your local chat window for the number of enemy players and keep your directional scanner open. Set it to close range (between 0.2 and 1 au) and 360 degrees, then press V to refresh it. Refresh it as often as possible, with time it will become your second nature to monitor your d-scan constantly.
When the timer goes down to zero, the plex will be captured. You will be rewarded with LP, Victory Points for your faction, and faction standings.
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