Malediction v Stabber

The hunt:

My fight with Valgore against the Drake had been a great deal of fun, but I had yet to really test the Malediction's solo engagement envelope. Clearly, with only three missile points the Malediction was not going to be soloing any decently fit battle cruisers, but what about their smaller brethren?

As luck would have it, I spotted a Stabber jumping around Atlar, and I decided to cautiously give chase. I say cautiously because local was fairly full, and many of them were from a local pirate gang; I did not want to end up jumping into another trap.

So when I managed to get a fix on the Stabber the first time I jumped in at 100km to get a fix on the pilot. Hitting "get info", I immediately jumped out again so as not to cause him alarm.

Taking a look at his vitals while in warp, he was not obviously affiliated with any of the local gangs, and he seemed legit, rather than some one's out of corp alt. Time to try and find the fight.

The Stabber kept on the move. I was not sure exactly what he was doing; sometimes he was at belts, sometimes at planets. Only as I continued to track him did I learn why; I was not the only hunter.

Wherever the Stabber went, there was an assault ship not too far away. Sometimes, when I tried to jump in on the Stabber, I would find myself landing shortly before the assault ship. At first I thought that I might need to defend myself, but the other pilot did not seem to interested in me. I imagine he (probably correctly) assumed that he could not keep me in a fight I did not want, and I (probably correctly) assumed that my half-baked missile skills were not up to taking down a well flown assault ship.

Eventually, though, my higher warp speed and align time began to work to my advantage, the assault ship fell further and further behind, while I kept getting closer and closer to the Stabber.

As I gave chase, I began to notice that there were certain places that the Stabber kept returning to, so when I next saw a scan result in that general direction I took a chance; rather than narrow down the scan, I simply jumped to the recurring destination.

Fortune, as they say, favours the bold; I landed right on top of him.

Immediately pointing and webbing him, I opened fire and waited for the drones. These, however, never materialised, and I soon found myself evading the Stabber's return fire completely.

Still, breaking his tank was going to be a slow process, and somewhere behind me was an assault ship. I opened up a ransom channel.

Now, I had given ransoms a great deal of thought since my last ransom attempt, and I had decided that I did not like the "traditional" ransom structure. Basically, it seemed like a whole lot of work.

On vent, I'd been able to listen to other Tuskers ask advice on ransoms, and hear the responses. People often have formulas based on age, hull cost, etc. Everyone tries to strike a stressful balance between getting a ransom at all (not too high) and getting ripped off (not too low).

This model of ransoming seems like fantastic way to kill all the fun in pvp, so I had decided to do things my own way. I would tell my victim that they could make me one, and only one, offer for their ship/pod, and that I would either accept or reject that offer. This would shift the stress of working out the ransom to them; all I had to do was decide whether I preferred the money or the killmail! It seemed pretty perfect.

So when this chap responds to my convo, I quickly lay down the rules; one offer and one offer only. He suggests 6 million for his ship, and I prefer the killmail. Easy.

He tells me to make a counter offer, but rules are rules. He had had his shot; now I wanted my killmail. It did not take as long as I thought it would.

2011.05.22 20:33:00

Victim: Damien Miles
Corp: Mercenarius Mercded
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Destroyed: Stabber
System: Atlar
Security: 0.4
Damage Taken: 21467

Involved parties:

Name: Taurean Eltanin (laid the final blow)
Security: -5.6
Corp: The Tuskers
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Malediction
Weapon: Caldari Navy Foxfire Rocket
Damage Done: 5426

Name: Gistii Impaler / Angel Cartel
Damage Done: 16041

Destroyed items:

Sabretooth Light Missile, Qty: 120
Titanium Sabot M, Qty: 160
Stasis Webifier I
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon I, Qty: 4
Assault Missile Launcher I, Qty: 2
Damage Control I
Sabretooth Light Missile, Qty: 630 (Cargo)

Dropped items:

Y-S8 Hydrocarbon I Afterburners
Medium Armor Repairer I
Medium Shield Booster II
Titanium Sabot M, Qty: 480
50mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
Titanium Sabot M, Qty: 4380 (Cargo)
Hornet I (Drone Bay)

Thanks to the fantastic lock speeds on interceptors, and FNG's sage advice, I was able to snag his pod. Again, I told him that he had one, and only one, opportunity to purchase his implants from me. This time he decided that he could find 90 million ISK, and I decided that I was willing to forgo the killmail.

With the ransom paid, I let his pod go, thankful that we had not been interrupted by the assault ship.


Afterthoughts:

Looking at the killmail, I began to have some regrets - I'm a bit of a softy that way. As ecstatic as I was over the size of the ransom, which would effectively pay for all the ships I had lost so far on the T2 Tour, I remembered, not too long ago, when I had sunk the majority of my assets into my +4's, and I wondered if I shouldn't have accepted less from such a young player.

I decided that I wanted to help him out - he had been polite throughout - so I convo'd him again. I wanted to give him some advice about surviving low sec and give him some of the ransom back. Unfortunately for him, he left the ransom channel before I completed my first block of text.

I convo'd him again, and he said "what do I have to do to get rid of you?" and left the channel. My patience was wearing thin - I had been polite throughout too - so I thought I would send him an in-game mail. That way he could see that I had good intentions.

That's when I found out he had blocked me.

I suspect there is a serious lesson in here for me somewhere. I have been helped hugely by the Eve community, and by my reader's in particular. I have been given advice, support, ships, modules and even ISK. This generosity has made me very keen to give something back to the community, and hence my attempt to return some part of the ransom to a new player.

However, just as my attempted generosity towards the miner I fought during the Punisher Plan did not go as intended, neither did my effort to return some of the ransom. Instead, I just ended up feeling stupid for even trying. I'm not sure what to take away from all this, but perhaps I need to change my approach.

All that aside, I was very happy with how the Malediction performed against an above class vessel. While I was disappointed by the lack of drones - I really wanted to test my rockets out against them - I certainly can't complain about the outcome.

Interestingly, the Tusker reputation apparently reaches even new players. At one point he had second thoughts, fearing that I would take the money and kill him any way. When I pointed out that I was a Tusker, he paid up.

Rifter & Malediction v Drake

The hunt:

I was eating dinner when I heard the call.

Was anyone near Atlar? Well, yes, but I was in the middle of my dinner. Better let someone else get this one.

But there was nobody else, and Valgore Muerte had managed to land point on a Drake in his Rifter. He couldn't break it's tank, and he was running low on ammo.

I hate to see a call for help go unanswered, and I also have a soft spot for people that try to kill Drakes in T1 frigates. So I put my dinner to one side,  told Valgore my Malediction was six jumps out, and that I was on my way.

About three jumps before I reached him, Valgore had to drop point and run. He likes shield buffer fits and the Drake had switched to an alternate ammo (we assumed javlin missiles), which increased his dps against Valgore significantly. With his buffer gone, he had been unable to hold the Drake in place.

However, having seen off the pesky Rifter, the Drake seemed in no mood to leave the system, and it warped to a different belt, presumably to go on ratting.

Arriving at the final gate, I let Valgore know that I was ready, and he jumped back in on the Drake. Jumping through the gate, I immediately warped to Valgore and landed my own point. I settled into as wide an orbit as the range on my rockets and nos would allow, opening fire with gremlin rage rockets. I also put up my web, to maximise my dps.


The fight:

The Drake, quite reasonably, seemed to feel that what had worked once would probably work again, so he targeted Valgore first, aiming to strip away his buffer and drive him off. We all traded blows for awhile, each trying to break our target's tank. As the Drake reached about half shields Valgore's EMP finally gave out and he had to switch to phased plasma. Moments after that, his buffer failed and he was forced to retire from the field again.

Alone with the Drake, I began taking significant damage from his missiles, so I started up my repair system. I was gratified to find that I could permatank his damage, albeit with difficulty. To do so, I was forced to drop my web in order to keep my cap up, which gave the Drake far more freedom to maneuver.

He took advantage of this by making abrupt course changes. I think he might have been hoping I would move beyond scram range (In a Malediction? Good luck with that.), but what it actually did was throw me out of nos range. I could not afford to miss any cycles if I was going to keep pulsing the repair system, so I tightened my orbit to compensate. Of course, this in turn brought my speed down and increased the Drake's dps. I needed to strike the right balance between speed, cap and incoming dps, and that meant constantly adjusting my orbit and range.

Some time shortly before Valgore was able to jump back in, I ran out of gremlin rage. Being completely new to the whole concept of carrying ammunition, I had taken some forum advice and stocked up on two reloads of everything, which gave me a total of 300 gremlin rage rockets. This was very clearly not enough, but it's all I had on board. I switched over to foxfire rage, and continued firing.

With neither of us able to target the Drake's resistance hole, we knew there was no longer any chance that we could handle the Drake on our own. With all the other Tuskers in Hevrice, it was time to reach out to the locals. Gunpoint Diplomacy was the obvious choice.

In addition to being home to several former Tuskers, Gunpoint are generally very good pilots. You don't need to roam Molden Heath very long to realise that the RANSM ticker means a great deal; good fights and good players.

So Valgore contacted the Gunpoint pilots he knew, and I sent a message to Dian Lung; although she had recently left Gunpoint, she was back in the area to roam with her old corpmates for the day.

The responses we got were generally positive, and we were told that help was on the way. Then things got very, very quiet; someone up the chain had taken charge, and plans were being made that did not directly involve us.

As we continued trading blows with the Drake, Valgore got a bit of a break. The Drake was focusing everything he had on me, and his maneuvers became more erratic; if I suspect he knew that at this stage we would have called for backup, and that his days were numbered. Unfortunately for him, I was able to continue tanking his damage. Active tanks for the win.


The flight:

Finally, local spiked. I couldn't tell how many players had entered the system; my chat window only holds about 15 entries. Anything more than that to a low sec player is "way too many".

Everyone knew something was about to happen, but Valgore and I were not quite sure what. And then, all of a sudden, my overview was filled with flashy red; Gunpoint had arrived!

Which of course meant that we were potentially in deep, deep trouble.

Other pirates, I suspect, will instinctively understand what Valgore and I were thinking, but not all of my readers are pirates, so I'll try and explain.

High sec pilots often view low sec pirates as a co-operative block, but this is simply not the case; we fight each other all the time. I've tried (unsuccessfully) to take on Gunpoint pilots in the past, and they have tried (unsuccessfully) to kill me on a number of occasions too.

Admittedly, there is a certain level of mutual respect among some of the (better) pirate corps, but it's more professional courtesy than any kind of alliance. Equally, co-operation is not unheard of when targets too large to be dealt with alone present themselves. However, this co-operation is not to be taken for granted, and whether intentionally or not, we had not been given any reassurance that we were not also targets.

With a massive Gunpoint fleet landing on us, Valgore's orders were simple. "Get out. Get out." Any thought of an orderly handover of point on the Drake went out the window; I simply warped to the sun, and then bounced to a safe spot.

As I warped out, I saw hell being unleashed on he hapless Drake. I've never seen a carrier hotdrop, but I imagine it feels a lot like what I saw. There was no escape for him.

2011.05.22 19:35:00

Victim: Celestis 234
Corp: Empyrean Warriors
Alliance: The Obsidian Front
Faction: Unknown
Destroyed: Drake
System: Wiskeber
Security: 0.4
Damage Taken: 63753

Involved parties:

Name: Valgore Meurte
Security: -9.7
Corp: The Tuskers
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Rifter
Weapon: J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
Damage Done: 18546

Name: Willem Revolati
Security: -10.0
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Deimos
Weapon: Hammerhead II
Damage Done: 9095

Name: Taurean Eltanin
Security: -5.5
Corp: The Tuskers
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Malediction
Weapon: J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
Damage Done: 8078

Name: FeistyOne
Security: -9.9
Corp: Twisted Inc.
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Proteus
Weapon: Proteus
Damage Done: 7304

Name: CraftyCroc
Security: -9.8
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Stabber Fleet Issue
Weapon: Stabber Fleet Issue
Damage Done: 5435

Name: Chewlookinat
Security: 3.6
Corp: On The Cloth
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Hurricane
Weapon: Hurricane
Damage Done: 3295

Name: Dian Lung
Security: -3.7
Corp: Ikaruga.
Alliance: NONE
Faction: Caldari State
Ship: Hurricane
Weapon: Hurricane
Damage Done: 2217

Name: Alex Medvedov
Security: -10.0
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Jaguar
Weapon: Jaguar
Damage Done: 2130

Name: Shtang Lord
Security: -10.0
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Zealot
Weapon: Zealot
Damage Done: 1893

Name: Vanderie
Security: -9.7
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Guardian
Weapon: Warrior II
Damage Done: 1519

Name: Slamby
Security: -0.2
Corp: On The Cloth
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Harbinger
Weapon: Harbinger
Damage Done: 1390

Name: Thorasine (laid the final blow)
Security: -10.0
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Hurricane
Weapon: 220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II
Damage Done: 858

Name: masty
Security: -8.3
Corp: The Executioners
Alliance: Capital.Punishment
Faction: NONE
Ship: Lachesis
Weapon: Warrior II
Damage Done: 596

Name: Xulgar
Security: -9.4
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Hurricane
Weapon: Hurricane
Damage Done: 562

Name: Laktos
Security: -9.4
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Harbinger
Weapon: Harbinger
Damage Done: 488

Name: Dirty Protagonist
Security: -10.0
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Guardian
Weapon: Warrior I
Damage Done: 347

Name: Angel Impaler / Archangels
Damage Done: 0

Name: Ariartus
Security: -10.0
Corp: Gunpoint Diplomacy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Sacrilege
Weapon: Heavy Assault Missile Launcher II
Damage Done: 0

Destroyed items:

Invulnerability Field II, Qty: 2
Damage Control II
Scourge Heavy Missile, Qty: 192
'Malkuth' Heavy Missile Launcher I, Qty: 5
Ballistic Control System II, Qty: 2
Large Shield Extender II

Dropped items:

Scourge Heavy Missile, Qty: 1049 (Cargo)
Y-S8 Hydrocarbon I Afterburners
Warp Disruptor II
Scourge Heavy Missile, Qty: 32
Caldari Navy Thunderbolt Heavy Missile, Qty: 192 (Cargo)
'Malkuth' Heavy Missile Launcher I, Qty: 2
Ballistic Control System II
Large Shield Extender II
Caldari Navy Scourge Heavy Missile, Qty: 129 (Cargo)


Afterthoughts:

Giddy with excitement after our narrow escape, (well, I was giddy, Valgore may be made of sterner stuff) Valgore and I waited in my safe until Gunpoint had left the system before heading back to Atlar for fresh ammunition. It had been an awesome fight, with highly technical flying and an exciting finish. Valgore was especially pleased that he had managed to put the most damage on the Drake while flying a Rifter, and I was quite happy with the number three spot.

Ammunition is clearly something I need to carry more of, though. While two reloads might work against frigates, taking on larger targets requires deeper reseverves, so I will probably move up to four reloads of rage rockets.

I am very happy with the Malediction's ablitiy to tank the dps put out by the Drake, although I have to weigh that against the Crusader's ability to go on shooting without reloading for about an hour. In this case the ability to keep a point on the Drake was key, though; my ability to dps was secondary.

I'm also impressed with Gunpoint's ability to muster such a large response at short notice. While obviously overkill (one battle cruiser would have done it, frankly), as displays of power go, it was pretty effective.

Malediction v Griffin et alia

The hunt:

Actually, I wasn't hunting; I was playing musical ships.

My hauler alt had just brought some Maledictions and fittings to Gelfiven for the next stage of the T2 Tour. Rather than risk them all to the perils of lowsec in a defenceless hauler, I had decided to fly them each from Gelfiven to Atlar individually with my main.

Because this was just meant to be a short journey, I had thrown together a buffer fit rather than an active tank - I was more concerned about the npc police than I was about other players.

As I was docking one of my Maledictions, I noticed a cyno going up right next to the station. There is nothing unusual about that; because the Hatchery "owns" Oddelulf, Atlar is used by a number of jump freighters on a regular basis.

However, this cyno was set up by a flashy, which meant I could actually attack him without fear of the gate guns! It was too much to resist and I immediately altered course and engaged.

As pretty much everyone but me would have figured out by this point, it was a trap. Two of his corpmates undocked (uncloaked?) in T3 cruisers as soon I engaged.

Now, there was still a bit of a delay between my attack and them turning my ship into a cloud of vapour. Most Malediction pilots would have used that time to destroy the defenceless Griffin. I, however, had brand new rocket skills, so I did not even have the dubious comfort of taking someone with me.

2011.05.18 19:11:00

Victim: Taurean Eltanin
Corp: The Tuskers
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Destroyed: Malediction
System: Atlar
Security: 0.4
Damage Taken: 2284

Involved parties:

Name: Tul Kezad (laid the final blow)
Security: -10.0
Corp: Friends Of Harassment
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Legion
Weapon: Heavy Pulse Laser II
Damage Done: 864

Name: Dr Narud
Security: -9.9
Corp: Friends Of Harassment
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Loki
Weapon: Loki
Damage Done: 1420

Destroyed items:

Rocket Launcher II, Qty: 2
200mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
Small Bay Loading Accelerator I
Damage Control II
5W Infectious Power System Malfunction
Caldari Navy Foxfire Rocket, Qty: 44
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
Small Warhead Calefaction Catalyst I
Thorn Rage Rocket, Qty: 300 (Cargo)
Gremlin Rage Rocket, Qty: 300 (Cargo)

Dropped items:

Rocket Launcher II
Adaptive Nano Plating II
X5 Prototype I Engine Enervator
Caldari Navy Foxfire Rocket, Qty: 88
Cold-Gas I Arcjet Thrusters
Foxfire Javelin Rocket, Qty: 300 (Cargo)
Caldari Navy Foxfire Rocket, Qty: 300 (Cargo)


Afterthoughts:

Clearly, there is a lesson here about not attacking obvious bait and not using weapons you are not properly trained in. Both are valuable lessons, but I think I'll pass on the first one. I admit that this is the second trap I have fallen into in as many days (see my last Crusader fight), but better that than missing out on fights because I'm terrified of what might happen if I engage. Even I, however, will admit that a dash of added caution goes a long way. I should at least have realised it was a trap, even if I engaged anyway.

And I'm totally on board with the whole rocket skills thing. Need to do something about that ASAP.

In an interesting twist, the Griffon that I attacked seems to have annoyed one of his larger corp mates shortly after my attack run, because BC has given me the following killmail.

2011.05.18 19:14:00

Victim: TrustTheDwarf
Corp: Friends Of Harassment
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Destroyed: Griffin
System: Atlar
Security: 0.4
Damage Taken: 2091

Involved parties:

Name: smartshogu (laid the final blow)
Security: -9.9
Corp: Friends Of Harassment
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship: Absolution
Weapon: Heavy Pulse Laser II
Damage Done: 1278

Name: Taurean Eltanin
Security: -4.4
Corp: The Tuskers
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Ship:
Weapon: X5 Prototype I Engine Enervator
Damage Done: 813

Destroyed items:

Liquid Ozone, Qty: 50 (Cargo)

Dropped items:

Cynosural Field Generator I

How odd.

Crash and Burn

Most of the Tuskers have abandoned the Molden Heath campaign, and this has had serious repercussions for me this weekend.

To begin with, it mean's I'm in the wrong place to take part in corp operations. I've tried to make the effort, though, but the journey (to Hevrice) at peak times is dangerous. I ended up losing more ships/pods trying to reach the fleet than I did in the actual engagements.

It also means that I'm flying around Molden Heath with no backup and no intel. Weekends are a prime time for gate camps and roaming blobs, and I've managed to find some of each.

On top of that, though, I've been quite ambitious in my recent undertakings. While it has certainly given me some good fights to post about, in many cases I simply bit off more than I can chew and I have to accept responsibility for that.

All told, I've lost eight ships and four capsules in the last 48 hours. My savings are decimated, and frankly, I feel a bit low about the whole thing.

I've sold virtually everything I had sitting in my hangar and I've managed to get back on my feet. I've got a new set of learning implants (pretty much the most important investment for a new character) and two fitted hulls sitting in my hangar. That's about as much as any new pirate can ask for.

Still, I'm feeling a bit drained by the experience, so I'm going to take a bit of an Eve break - probably about a week. And when I get back, I suspect that I'll be flying quite conservatively for a while.

I have plenty to post about, so I won't be leaving the blog unattended and updates should continue as usual, but it may mean that I don't respond to my in-game mail for a while.

Crusader: a review

After having flown the Crusader in a variety of situations and in a handful of fights, I'm ready to move on. For any other new pirates, however, here are my thoughts on the Crusader.

In many ways, the Crusader is an unremarkable ship, with middle of the road dps and tank for it's class. What is exceptional, though, is it's high base speed and four low slots.

This pretty much tells you all there is to know about the Crusader, because everything else flows from that point. It has standard interceptor bonuses to mwd and the tracking to actually hit things while moving at speed. And because it packs energy turrets, Scorch allows it to engage targets beyond web and scram range (although range enhancing mods or rigs certainly help). The Crusader was, literally, designed to fill a mwd/kiting role, and by all accounts it fills that role admirably.

Of course, I was flying it all wrong. While I enjoyed the speed, trying to fight at close range meant that I was throwing that advantage away; with only two midslots the Crusader cannot counterweb, and so loses it's relative speed advantage. It's just not a brawler - it should avoid damage, not absorb try to endure it.

When I first finished with the Crusader I was certain that I did not want to end up flying that kind of ship. Further exposure to that way of flying (via the Malediction) has softened my views, though. It's simply not what I am used to, and I suspect I have developed a bit of a comfort zone.

That aside, and while I am reserving judgement until I have some other T2 ships to compare it to, I'm not actually a huge fan of the Crusader. If I want to fly a laser vessel in that fashion, why would I not just fly a Slicer? Sure, the Crusader is faster, but for most thing the Slicer is fast enough, and has much higher dps and range.

Still, the Crusader is an excellent ship, provided you are willing to fly it the way it was designed to be flown.

Crusader v Rifter et alia

The hunt:

It had been a slow day in Molden Heath, and I had wandered beyond my usual stomping grounds in search of a fight.

A few jumps out of Molden Heath I spotted a Rifter sitting in a belt. Outside of my patch, I did not recognize the pilot or his corp, but I did want to try my Crusader against another Rifter.

Now, although the Crusader is a T2 frigate, a well fit and well flown Rifter is more than capable of taking it on and winning. Obviously an experienced pilot, I also had no idea how quickly he might be able to call for assistance. I would have to hit hard and fast.

Warping to the belt, I landed within point range of the Rifter, and immediately settled into a tight orbit. Although I would suffer higher damage, the Rifter would have a relative speed advantage if he was packing a web, and I did not want it to be easy for him to disengage.

Activating my mids and overheating my guns, I tore into the Rifter, but my opponent immediately returned the favour.  No hesitation or delay; he was as fast on the draw as his sec status suggested. I started up my repper, and it was clear that this was going to be a close race.

He seemed to be active armor tanked, and my heart sank as I saw how little progress I was making against his armor. I was not able to dwell on the matter for long, however, as two more Rifters landed in the belt.

The first newcomer landed right on top of me and immediately started to attack. The other pilot was about 40km off; he was out of the fight for the moment.

At this point I overheated my afterburner and tried to burn away, but with two webs on me, it just was not going to happen.

2011.05.17 18:31:00

Victim: Taurean Eltanin
Corp: The Tuskers
Alliance: Unknown
Faction: Unknown
Destroyed: Crusader
System: Aralgrund
Security: 0.3
Damage Taken: 2516

Involved parties:

Name: WayCharles
Security: -9.9
Corp: Mountain Militia
Alliance: Mountain Sprouts
Faction: NONE
Ship: Rifter
Weapon: Rifter
Damage Done: 2144

Name: xxxAlloxxx (laid the final blow)
Security: -9.8
Corp: Mountain Militia
Alliance: Mountain Sprouts
Faction: NONE
Ship: Rifter
Weapon: 150mm Light AutoCannon II
Damage Done: 372

Destroyed items:

Small Energy Burst Aerator I
Gatling Pulse Laser II, Qty: 2
Small Energy Collision Accelerator I
Small Energy Transfer Array I (Cargo)
1MN Afterburner I (Cargo)
Scorch S (Cargo)
Medium Shield Booster I (Cargo)
Small Armor Repairer II
Adaptive Nano Plating II
Proton S, Qty: 100 (Cargo)
Small Shield Transporter I (Cargo)
Imperial Navy Multifrequency S, Qty: 2

Dropped items:

Gatling Pulse Laser II, Qty: 2
Damage Control II
ECM Burst I (Cargo)
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
Foxfire Rocket, Qty: 100 (Cargo)
Scorch S, Qty: 3 (Cargo)
Heavy Missile Launcher I (Cargo)
Heat Sink II
Imperial Navy Multifrequency S, Qty: 2
1MN Afterburner II

Warping my pod out, I left a "gf" in local. They had sprung their trap well, and flown their ships perfectly.


Afterthoughts:

My reaction to the two additional Rifters dropping in was all wrong. I was never, ever going to get away with two webs on me, and trying to do so distracted me from doing what I should have been focusing on: taking someone with me.

What I did not notice (until too late) was that I had broken the cap of the first Rifter. Thanks to my Amarrian cap skills, my repper was going strong, but he was deep into armor. I had a real opportunity to kill him, but my attempted flight had taken me out of Multifrequency range, and I did not notice this for several seconds.

I switched to Scorch, but I exploded just before he reached hull. If I had stayed focused, I probably would have killed him, especially as maintaining my transversal would have meant taking slightly less damage from my target.

So, with the same skills, ship and situation, a veteran pilot would probably have come away from this encounter with a killmail. I reacted poorly, and came away with nothing as a result.

Part of the problem is that I have focused so much on what is happening to me that I have not ever really considered what is happening to my opponent. I saw that my opponents tank was holding and assumed that there was nothing I could do. I did not consider his cap situation - largely because my own cap tends not to be an issue.

Some real food for thought here, and if I can properly absorb the lessons of this fight I will be a far better pilot.

Time for some changes

 I have spent some time thinking about a recent comment Benedict made, and my response. To save anyone tracking them down, here they are:

Benedict said...

While targeting non-combat ships makes for safer kills, I have to say it's also making for less interesting stories. The problem is that there's no suspense - as soon as we see the ship type, we know how it's going to end. Your combat writeups are much more exciting, because we don't know who's going to win until we see the killmail!

Taurean Eltanin said...

I totally agree. Of course, I have only a certain amount of control over the opportunities that come my way. Other bloggers deal with that by posting every week or so, picking out the most interesting fights to post about. Because this blog is as much a learning journal for me as it is entertainment for the rest of the community, I have decided to exclude only a narrow range of fights (suicide ganks and lol fights), and so I post pretty much everything, dull periods and all. The upshot (I hope) is frequent posts and a fairly honest view of a beginner pirate's life in New Eden.

On further reflection, however, I do think a change is in order.

When I started the Punisher Plan, every fight was important. I had so much to learn, and even ganking a hauler gave me much needed practice in hunting and fighting. But now? Not so much. A Crusader ganking a T1 hauler is not really worth writing about, and almost certainly not worth reading about.

So from here on out, I'm only going to post battles that actually involved a meaningful fight, or had some interesting feature. This means that my posting rate is almost certainly going to slow, but I shall try to post at least three times a week; Monday, Wednesday & Friday. Hopefully, though, my posts will be more consistently interesting and useful.

Of course, that means my blog will be even less representative of what I'm actually doing, but I suppose that anyone who is really interested can just look at my BC record. Battle Clinic has my API, so all wins and losses are automatically uploaded.

It also means that the numbering convention I started in the Punisher Plan will be redundant; the number is meaningless if there are kills that are excluded, so I will adopt a simple "Myship v Theirship" naming convention for my posts. This prevents my brain from exploding trying to come up with interesting names, and should also make finding particular battle records easier. I will retitle the pre-existing Crusader posts for consistency.

Finally, I will merge my "Post battle review" and "Lessons for the future" sections. During the Punisher Plan these sections deserved their own space as I had so many basic pvp lessons to learn. Now, however, I think they can safely be dealt with together.