Fight or Goodnight?

Plas and I went on a roam last night, just two Wolfs (wolves?) looking for trouble. Well, we found it in Old Man Star.

It was towards the end of the roam and we’d had a few little encounters – e.g. I’d been on grid at a planet with a flashy Merlin and sorely tempted to engage, but we were almost certain he had friends among the other ten pilots in system so left it.  But as usually happens, you get more aggressive as the roam draws to a close.  I’d much rather go home in a pod than not get a fight at all.

So Plas baited a Dramiel.

I was the next system over, waiting on the gate, and jumped in the second Plas said he had the Dram scrammed. Turns out the Dram was AB/scram fit – once I landed with my web (no scram as I was working with Plas) he’d be toast.  Unfortunately by the time I landed, the Dram’s Warrior II’s had almost finished eating Plas and I just got time to web and orbit the Dram and target the last drone before Plas popped.

The Dram still had speed on me, even webbed.  I popped the last drone and, after what felt like an age but was probably about 5 seconds, remembered to fire at the Dramiel and overheated everything I had.  He was eating into my armour and I was barely scratching his shield – what was going on?

Figuring that he had 150mm’s on, and could thus track me no matter how fast I was orbiting, I decided to kite him and minimise my own transversal to bring the power of my 4x200mm’s to bear.  I hit approach on a gate and he settled in about 8km behind me.  Now it was down to DPS and tank, where the Wolf should have an edge.  The Dram, remember, could disengage at any time as I had no scram.

It still wasn’t happening.  My Republic Fleet EMP was working, but nowhere near as well as I’d expected, even at the limit of my first falloff; and his 150’s should have been even worse.  it took an age, but eventually…

http://eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=10299073

Yes, he got me just as I got him into armour.  All I can think is that I accidentally burned out my guns; but also if he was flying this fit (from his previous losses) he had about 12K EHP against EM to my 6K against thermal.

GFs in local, another good learning experience all round, and Plas got some good insights about fighting with his Birthday Dramiel.  HB mate :)

Lessons:

• If you’re going to bait, bait close to the gate your support is at to minimise time in warp.
• Watch overheat once it’s on – burnt out guns are worse than unheated ones.
• Warrior II’s eat Matar ships.
• Check killboards before engaging – we could have checked the Dram’s likely fit before the fight.
• Dramiels are dangerous.

o/ silents

this is what we do to poor defenceless miners

Splode them.

Wtf you’d be solo mining in lowsec baffles me.  Not a word in local from him, though he did warp his pod out and then, strangely, back to the wreck.  Macroer?  I had to laugh though when I checked the stats of his alliance.

Few milestones here: Bruce is, for the first time, negative sec (-0.01!).  It was Kim’s first kill, and Brep’s first in a long while.

Fun little roam up through Old Man Star and back through upper Placid.  OMS was disappointing as usual.  Maybe it’s just our timezone.

Choo Choo! All Aboard the Fail Train

My intersection system wasn’t turning up any interesting targets, so I moved to the nearest lowsec to see what was up.  Bruce went ahead in his cloaky to check out the scene, while Shaz brought up the rear in her shiny new PvP fit Cyclone.  Lowsec right?  A den of scum and villainy?

I have never seen this particular system empty, but tonight it was.  Not shaping up to be a productive evening – when all of a sudden, I got a new spike in local.  Good evening Lipena.  How lovely to see you.  Now, let’s see what you’re up to.

Bruce quickly pinpointed her at a belt using my new 7-probe technique which I’m liking a great deal.  Imagine 2 x 0.5AU probes offset from each other by about 0.4AU, with that dual blob surrounded by a 1AU probe, itself surrounded by 4 x 4AU probes in a cross.  It’s hard to describe, but it gets 100% locks on destroyers and small indies without resizing.  Quality.

So Ms Lipena was happily bashing rats in a Thrasher.  Bruce warped to 50 to check out the scene, but was decloaked by a rock on landing.  Fail.  Lipena seemed not to notice, which sparked my curiosity and an info check.  Ah bollocks – 8 days old.  Damn me and my principles.  Still – the guy has balls, ratting in lowsec solo in a Thrasher at 8 days of age, in an NPC corp.  Or maybe he just doesn’t know any better.  Should I… educate?

Shaz was still a couple of jumps away picking up ammo, so Bruce followed the prey from belt to belt.  By the time Shaz arrived, Local had spiked to Lipena plus two and the system was getting more interesting.  Shaz jumped in, immediately warped to the target belt and with my heart thumping I got my very first security penalty with a textbook tackle.  Thanks Uni, the training paid off.

I was within seconds settled into a tight orbit around my prey, scrammed and webbed, though weapons cold for now.  I wanted to chat.  Opening the window, I commenced a delightful conversation with a very polite gent which went roughly like this:

Me: Hi there
Him: Hi
Me: I guess you’ve realised you’re in a bit of trouble
Him: Really?
(oh, playing innocent are we?)
Me: Are you new?
Him: Check the info, employment history
(wtf)

Yes you guessed it, I convoed the wrong guy.   A CEO of an Ushra’Khan corp.  Who proceeded to piss himself laughing when I told him what was happening.

Choo choo.

Er, ok.  Convo the correct guy.  Who by now is firing on me unprovoked – the guy either has balls of solid steel or brains of solid steel.  One salvo from the Cyclone’s guns put him into armour, and I left it at that while sorting my chat fail – he was barely tickling my tank.

Me: Hi there
Lipena: Hi
Me: are you new?
Lipena: yeah
Me: OK, normally I would have killed you but I just wanted the tackle practice.

More firing, goddammit.  Another salvo from the Cyclone and he was in deep structure.  The big guns fell silent, the peashooters not.

Me: So, be careful ratting in lowsec, there are pirates about ;)
Lipena: OK
Me: enjoy your evening o/

Still under fire, I warped Shaz out.  Shortly afterwards, Bruce watched as Lipena streaked off for the highsec gate, trailing a plume of fire from the ship he probably put every cent into.  I been there my friend.  You may hate me now, but you will remember that lesson.

I later probed Mr U’K down in a Primae.  Goodness but I wanted that kill, but he proved slippery and warped off just before Shaz landed :(

On the positive side, I got my first sec hit and nailed a very nice tackle if I do say so myself, plus had a hilarious night and picked up some 0.4 salvage.  This pirate crap is awesome!

o/