Hot drops = Emo Rage & Tears in Local

Last night I got home from class, was doing some dishes when I noticed intel pick up. Incoming controlled Chaos Gang from Fountain.

I dried off my hands and hopped on comms. Fleet was already starting to form, and I took the reigns. We got carriers on standby and prepared to ambush them.

Initially we were going to hit them on the in gate (from ZXB into 5-C). This quickly turned impossible as the first CC scout entered 5-C local. I had the bait Geddon warp to KEE- @ 10km and sit there looking dumb.

Scout landed (Rapier) and decloaked. Our cloaky Phobos was late, however, and noticed (or should have) the Phobos cloak up under the gate. I waited, wondering if it would work. I was 900km off the gate at a bookmark, and gang had all warped to me and we were full speed aligned KEE-.

Their gang started landing on the Armageddon, and they all aggressed.

Bam, I had Phobos decloak bubble up and cyno up. Gang warped down to gate, but tackling was pretty fail. All we nailed was a Scimitar (I primaried him as he was close and I got scram/web on him) and a Caracal who, for whatever reason, sat 10km off the gate during the engagement while his friends ran.

They all dissapeared from local and we scrambled to get eyes on them... not into KEE-, not backwards into ZXB, I assumed I-E to M-2 which allows them into KEE- and down the pipe.

I was right, they were reported into JP4 a minute later. We got Hom3 in a bait Astarte into JP4, and held everyone on the jump bridge into JP4 (I didn't want to spike local while they were in there). As the last man was leaving JP4 Hom3 jumped to NOL via JB and we all followed him in. Carriers were already in NOL- aligned to the O-I gate (where the fleet would arrive from) and Hom3 set up shop on the gate.

I jumped ahead of gang into NOL- and warped to a nearby moon aligned down to the gate. Scram + Web + Long Point meant I could hold onto a couple targets. I kept gang in JP4 on the jb to keep local count moderate.

After a couple minutes we were starting to wonder if they had gone south to Querious... when the Rapier scout entered NOL-

Jackpot.

He cloaked off Hom3, who smacked him in local. Local spiked shortly after, Rapier decloaked, and they all started pounding on Hom3. I warped down and tackled an Arazu (short point + web) and Scimitar. Hom3 was going down fast and carriers were taking awhile to get on field.

I dropped the Arazu solo (my alt with fighters whored on the mail only) and moved onto the Scimitar. Hom3 become more and more frantic, "Guys I'm bleeding structure", "Ok I am going to die... wait a little love there! Need more come on guys!"

My carrier landed and was locking hom3 up with both reppers flashing. My reps hit about the same time as the other carriers, and hom3 went from 10% structure to full armor. The pucker factor was intense.

I was extremely busy dual boxing my carrier and my Cane, so Hom3 called primaries. Their gang was in fast moving ships (as described before) but we knocked down Arazu, Scimitar, Rifter and Vexor. The Rapier, Ishtar and Stabber bailed out.

No losses (barely) and some decent kills. In retrospect I shouldn't have allowed Hom3 to be bait for a couple reasons.

1. T2 Command ships, with a couple exceptions, are mainly active tanked with high resists. This tank becomes marginally diminished when confronted with large amounts of DPS all at once. This lack of buffer leaves him out in the open.

2. He only had one point and no bubble. My Cane would have been a better tackler (although it may have died).

But, we ended up doing alright despite the shortcomings.

Oh, and earlier in the day Staffe O of Godfathers was sneaking around 5-C local with a gang waiting in ZXB-. I knew this, doubt he knew I knew.

Found him sitting on ZXB- gate, after he said something about "too many people to fight" in local. We had like 20 over half were docked afk but whatever.

Me and a Harbinger were on gate, I had Harbinger point him. He, of course, jumped into ZXB-.

I did too. Knowing full well his gang was on the other side.

Sure enough, they were all waiting, drones out etc. I held cloak, with gang landing on the other side. As soon as we were in position I started my approach.

Tanked Cane = Win. They all agressed, and I called fleet in.  Only slow thing on field was... Staffe's Hurricane.

I jumped out, as my tank was almost out of armor hitpoints. But Staffe died.

Rest of his gang (ceptors, bombers and a Rupture) got out except for a Hound. Staffe emo'd in local, about blobs and such... but the bottom line is, he got greedy without eyes in 5-C sat on the gate without aligning out. Slowest ship on the field should always be ready to get out asap.

His salty tears fueled my happiness.

That is all.

That is all.

Providence

Couple nights ago I took a fast moving gain up into Catch and into Providence.

In retrospect it was stupid.

We got 24 kills... all frigate hulls (many were T2, but all frig size).

None were in Providence.

I'm not going to go into details... but needless to say there was only one group who formed up rather quickly and gave us a fight (which we couldn't have won or even broken even with, so we had to bail). Important Internet Spaceship League. Thanks guys... wish I had brought heavier ships, but ceptors dictors afs and bombers are horribad against 3 Drakes Cane Cynabal and Onyx.

The rest of the Providence dwellers (CVA included) ran. Even with 20+ in local. I was dissapointed.

CVA was the best. We took a side trip to R3- (near Yong, my happy old dear pirating home). I held gang 2j behind because I was so sick of neutral eyes scouting us and no one wanting to fight. Jumping into R3 I was confronted by a Onyx with bubble up, and a Malestrom/Cyclone combo 70km off the gate.

I held cloak, looked at local (which had several more CVA) and waited to see who would come to whore my "supposed" mail.

No one else. Just the same 3, drones out waiting for my cloak to drop.

"K guys jump in warp to R3 jump on contact. Go go go!"

Fleet started moving, and I prepared to burn back to gate and bubble the Onyx, while making contingency plans in my head. Onyx bubbled down, I figured he was hoping that I would think it was clear and break cloak, at which point he would cycle bubble up (thats what I would do).

Imagine my surprise when Malestrom and Cyclone warped off... at which point I broke cloak and started burning at Onyx (I was 23km off). Unfortunately he warped before I could drop bubble.

So 7 guys scared CVA, who obviously had neutral eyes next door. In small little ships that wouldn't have been able to break an Onyx tank. With two of their own ships in perfect sniping position. It could (if they were smart) been an easy victory for them. But they ran.

We went back to Catch, killed another couple bombers on the way and headed in for the night. None of the kills were epic or worth going into detail on. It was largely unsatisfying.

Funny story... I had 10k of nanite repair paste in my Sabre the entire roam. I meant to bring it to 49-u to sell and have available for me (I overheat lots) but forgot to empty my hold. Thats over 100 mill of repaire paste. In a dictor (aka flying coffin). Scouting. :-)

That is all.

Winter is coming...

Daredevil Down!

Got home from a night of riding to find an op ending, one in which we took a station. Dienekes had found a potential target, so I grabbed yet another Sabre (I lose those lots) and started towards 49-U.

When I hit NOL- I noticed a target in local, who shortly dissapeared. On a whim I jump bridged back to JP4 and started up towards NOL via gates. When I hit D-W I noticed a neut in local (not the same guy) So I reapproached and waited.

Daredevil on scan.

Hmmm.

Local bumps one more, same corp.

Hmmmmmmmmmmm.

Daredevil lands, Flycatcher on scan. Interesting. I could demolish the Flycatcher, but the Daredevil could demolish me.

As the Flycatcher landed, he aggressed. I jumped through and waited session, Daredevil followed. Reapproaching, he aggressed and I jumped back into the Flycatcher. Daredevil hit hard, had me at 50% shields... not allowing me to safely take on the Flycatcher.

I bounced back and forth for a good 5 minutes. Meanwhile Dienekes was burning up from 49-U in a Scimitar.

I ended up disengaging as things got a little sketch. I tried to sucker them towards NOL-, but they ended up continuing on their original course towards Fountain.

I had held them up just enough, however, and Dienekes and I jumped into I-E and then to 5-C ahead of the two former Atlas guys.

First whim was to sit on KEE- and wait. Upon jumping into 5-C and seeing empty local, however, I decided to be more sneaky. I warped to ZXB- at 30km, with Dienekes warping at 0km. Plan was to put me in a position to make tackle and keep DK safe while he repped me. I also jumped my alt into system and assigned fighters.

Sure enough, after about 2 minutes of waiting local bumped by two neuts. Immediately I bubbled up and waited.

First, Flycatcher appeared on scan. He landed barely touching the bubble (the smaller the ship, the less they fall into the bubble on warp in. Pods and shuttles usually land outside the bubble in fact). I started locking, and cursed as he warped off. My Sabre had a cloak on it and it cost me, and single bubble had yet to cycle.

Daredevil was on scan at this point, despite my worries that his buddy would notice the Scimitar on the gate. Daredevil landed 4km off of me, and luckily I had a bubble ready. He had yellow boxed me prior to bubbling him, perhaps he would have fought. Regardless, I bubbled the Daredevil, which allowed me to finish locking and drop a point and web on him. Unfortunately I was not scram fit... but it didn't matter as he kept a tight orbit and started hitting me hard (Neutron Blaster IIs, very very short range on frig size, but good damage). Dienekes saved me with reps, and the Daredevil started to take damage. Fighters weren't able to track him, so it was my guns that were doing the damage and it was taking forever.

As he hit half shield he started to move away, perhaps realizing this was a bad situation to be in (derpa derpa). I was never going less than half shields and I had started overheating guns to finish this quick. With the web on him he wasn't able to move far. He started webbing me in an attempt to break free, but in doing so he started moving directly away from me.

Ooops.

0km/s transversal meant wrecking shots from my autocannons, and it certainly wrecked him. Down he went.

His pod was on the edge of the bubble... so I popped another one to keep him still until I finished locking. I held him until DK got on the mail, and then we sent him home the quick way.

In local he had one sentence, "Man bad luck"

Dienekes simply wrote back "Nah".

Good planning with good execution made that kill possible. It may have been overconfidence from our previous meeting that led that Daredevil to stick and fight when he should have immediately started burning off when he landed in the bubble.

We warped to the station (I needed to rep overheated mods) and noticed the Flycatcher sitting on it... weird.

33km off and he warped... damn. Warped to empty space... alt-x and moons popped up... bam! 5-1

Warped to 5-1 and he logged.

We sat and waited for almost an hour but he didn't log back in. Oh well, we got the Daredevil. Good stuff. Only 2 kills, but it was a well executed plan with a satisfying ending.

That is all.

Defense turned Offense.

Last night I went on a defensive roam that was forming. I had just gotten home from a long ride, and Hom3 was forming a gang to go hit a Wildly Innapropriate gang that was sitting outside PNQ station.

We rolled out with 3x Canes, Onyx, Curse, 2x Drake, Arazu, Sleipnir and Vagabond. We moved into position on the jump bridge to PNQ and got intel that they were still on station with bubble up. I suggested sending the Arazu in first, but we all went in at the same time.

Unfortunately their entire gang warped off or was warping when we landed on station, except their Broadsword. So we killed the Broadsword; as he was being podded their Onyx and a Ferox warped into the station, landing where his bubble had been (bubbles effect at the time of warp, so if you initiate warp while its up it may be down when you land but you still land off gate/station etc.). I burned at the Onyx with MWD (he was further off) and he warped off about 4 seconds from getting pointed. The Ferox, however, was caught and he died in a ball of flames.

Not sure what they hoped to accomplish.

We pursed towards Cloud Ring and I was closing on a Drake when someone in our gang yelled about neuts behind us. So Hom3 stopped the gang.

Too bad the guy had an overview glitch.

So we prepared to head home when I jumped ahead one more on a whim.

WI was in local still.

I explained this to Hom3grown, who brought the gang up quickly. I was in local in my Cane, but being nano/buffer fit (shit for tank) I hel alignment to the gate from a nearby planet, and had them all on directional.

Hom3 sent in the Onyx who warped to the outbound (where they were sitting). I initiated warp while he was in warp, assuming the would all jump through.

They did.

Unfortunately they had had the Onyx bubble up and cycle... so we landed 15km off gate and they had all jumped through. So we burned through and continued the chase. All the way into Cloud Ring. Then in 0-B I noticed a shift. The WI gang was not exiting local while I was in warp. I figured they were going to fight.

They were.

Bubble up and they were all waiting with drones out. Unfortunately for them, the bubble had gone up after I was in warp, allowing me to land on the gate at 0km. Same for a drunken Viandamanor Red (MVN member) in his Curse. I sat on the gate long enough to get them aggressed and then jumped through.

Then our Onyx pilot landed on gate and instead of bubbling up he jumped through. I'm not sure why... he was in an Onyx and their gang didn't have much for DPS. But this allowed them to all escape, and I was not happy.

They booked off their route of travel (towards Pure Blind) into 9-4RP2. I jumped first (pro scout) and saw them all sitting their, drones out. Gang was right behind me.

Our Onyx came through, bubbled up. I broke cloak and was insta primaried. I held tackle on the Onyx as long as possible, and then started buring straight down. I finally figured out the 2 stealth bombers they had were pounding me, and 20/20 hindsight I would have instapopped both of them. But survival was on my mind (as points were all around) and we destroyed their Onyx and Crusader. I made it out of the fight at about 10% shields.

A Drake jumped in right as we started looting the field, but he reapproached and aggression kept us from getting him. We started the chase once more, and I actually passed him in 7D-0SQ. He safed up, but on I went as new targets were dissapearing in local (and had to be in front of us on the pipe to P-2, as the gang reported no new contacts behind).

Sure enough, I spotted 2x Dramiels in H1-... and they left local. Then they came back. So I warped to KU5R (outbound gate). Dramiel x 2 and  Cynabal from a corp I didn't recognize. They jumped through, and I follwed.

Right into a Fidelas Constas gang.

I held cloak and watched. Not sure if the 3 ships I jumped with were friendly or not, and I had called gang into H1- (the system I had just left, whose in gate the Fidelas gang was camping). I told them to hold warp, as local bumped by a couple. Hom3 responded that it was too late.

I revaluated the situation and realized that we could take this with good target calling and smart flying. As the 2x Dramiels and Cynabal broke cloak, they were fired on by the Fidelas gang.

Question answered.

"Guys the are aggressed on neuts, jump jump jump. Primary the Tengu!!!"

I broke cloak and reapproached asap, as they were busy shooting the reapproaching Dramiels. This allowed me to make it back to the gate, and I jumped back into H1, as the gang cross jumped me into KU5R. Hom3 thought I needed saving in their, but I told him I was out and coming back in.

Tengu died fast. With a Curse neuting him along with 3 Canes with medium neuts, whatever repping power he had was gone. His fit was also horribad... a Fengu (Falcon/Tengu).

Next primary Hom3 called was the Harbinger. Perfect choice... not much tank but decent DPS. I shot the pesky Rifter down before switching to the Harbinger, as he was 7km off of me (perfect range for Phased Plasma 425IIs). He instapopped. Switched over the Harbinger as he was going down. After the Harb popped we moved on to the Drake. Points were spread from the get go so none of these guys could escape. I had the Raven pointed from the start and held that point. Drake went down quickly, next target called was the Raven, but Hom3 switched after it was apparent people had already started shooting the Dominix (I agreed with Raven being called next). So Dominix went down... an odd fit. Remote reps, with no neuts, and CCC rigs instead of trimarks. I am a firm believer in trimarks on any armor tanking ship; its a given on an RR setup. Last was the Raven, who had de aggressed at this point and was sitting on the gate. So Casebolt and myself gave him some nice bumps off gate (nano cane close to 2km/s), and down the Raven went. Interesting fit, active tanked with 2 fitting mods in the lows (CPU) along with a shield transporter... not entirely pro. Battle report here.

We lost our Curse... as he was primaried at the onset of the engagement. I would have primaried him too... and had I been piloting I might have broke cloak and reapproached assuming I would be primaried (he was drunk though, can't expect too much). But he died, the only loss of the evening. The kills we made more than made up for it.

We looted the field, I scoped out P-2 (and found nothing), and we headed home. Job well done to Hom3grown.

That is all.

Wormhole What?

So on Friday night, I hopped on EVE for a little bit of pew pew. Little bit because I had a test on Saturday morning (ew).

Apparently some neuts were hopping in and out of S-6, which is a dead end constellation. Funny thing was, they weren't coming into 5-CQDA, the adjacent system. Immediately I figured wormhole, and we got Saber6 in (hes an excellent prober).

He found the wormhole in about 2 minutes, and we stacked up on the entrance. Cloaky went in, reported Hurricane on either side. I sent in a ship to either tackle or force him into our system, but he warped off.

Sent in Sandwich in a Cov Ops and we found their POS. 2x Canes, one was in the POS the other was... 150km off. Oh, and the POS was unarmed.

Wow.

Sandwhich slowboated into position, and I jumped into the wormhole in my gank Cane. Scram + web + 24km point fit.

Warped to Sandwhich @ 10km and landed right next to the Cane, who wasn't aligned. Bam.

I started on him, hoping his buddy would come out. His shield dropped fast, I figured he was armor tanked. When his armor melted fast, I held DPS and called the gang in, as it seemed his buddy was going to stay inside the pos.

When people started landing I instructed everyone to hold DPS... and yet he still was going down. I figured out (finally) that my Warrior IIs were killing him... lol

Finally everyone was on the mail and we finished the Hurricane off. Looking at his fit... I was sad.

The pos, interestingly enough, was at half shields. Either A. it was reinforced and hadn't been repped or B. Just was onlined.

SO we switched out to bombers (bs wouldn't fit through the womrhole entrance) and reinforced the POS. We didn't know if it would go reinforced (if it was stronted) and when it did we were a little sad. But it didn't take long, so no sweat.

This was my break from studying... and I went back to the books afterwards.

That is all.

Shooting Sov Units = Bleeding Eyes

Last night I got back from class and logged into EVE. Apparently there was an op to put the CZK- station (in Catch) into second reinforce, and there was no USTZ FC for it. I wasn't doing anything so I was like, sure, I got it.

So I started playing some HALO Reach when IRC spat out some interesting info. -A- had dropped an SBU in HED-.

No backup fleet, and eyes in staging systems showed no form up for -A- either. So... I guess it was dropped for shits n giggles?

Due to the timer for onlining, I formed up fleet early and got as many in as I could. We had about two hours to kill it before it onlined. 10 million shield, 10 million armor and 1 million structure hitpoints with 50% resists across the board.

We moved out about 1.5 hrs before online time from 49-, and stopped couple times on the way to HED- to let stragglers catch up, as I needed the numbers. On the way there a rear scout reported a WN Scorpion coming in from GE- to the pipe in the same direction of travel as us.

So in U-Q I had fleet reapproach, with a couple tacklers in the prior system. They missed tackle on the in gate, and the tacklers on the out gate pushed him through.

Right into the fleet.

He blew up really fast. Scorpion.

PL had a few cloaky camps on the way but wouldn't be suckered into engaging, so we moved on to WD- and held on the SV5 gate while I scouted out HED-.

I cross jumped somebody leaving HED- into SV5, but kept on to get a warp in on the SBU. As I was doing so, Dienekes reported a Dramiel jumping into WD-, same guy I had cross jumped. He jumped into WD- and waited session timer. I made sure NOBODY aggressed (I'm sure a few did) because he did what? Oh, of course! He reapproached and jumped back into SV5. So did most of the fleet :)

Problem for this guy was.... as he reapproached in SV5, he bounced off the gate. Hard. As a result, he died.

Dramiels fit was shit. There is absolutely no reason to not dual prop fit. It will save you. Salvager in the high? Please. Missile launcher or nos. No questions. Salvager.... Ugh.

We moved into HED-, started shooting. Init formed up and dropped caps on it as well, helping the process. We took one break to try and smash a PL gang that moved into SV5... but only caught a Maller. PL usually flies cloaky/speedy ships to maximize engagement dictation. Smart, and hard to catch.

We finished off the SBU and moved home. Re shipped to gank BS and went back to CZK- to shoot the station. Init dropped more caps, and we sent it to second reinforce. We had other targets available, but 2am was enough for me and I called it a night.

I really hate shooting POS's. I hate shooting sov units and stations even more. That being said, its necessary stuff.

But it will be offset by fun roams later this week :)

That is all.

Busy Weekend

Between tests and homework and real life... I actually managed to get on EVE quite a bit this weekend.

But I didn't really spend much time writing about it.

To remember specifics at this point is a bit difficult, sadly enough. Quite a bit has happened over the weekend EVE wise, both on a personal level and on a political level.

Saturday was particularly busy. GE- had fallen to INIT. HED- also fell,  but for some reason we didn't maintain a force in system. So -A- tried to kill the TCU onlining. INIT came to sandwhich them in, and due to great MVN pos gunning and hero bubbles (suicide Sabre for me) INIT landed right on top of them, and our fleet poked its head out of the shield.

INIT left shortly after, although -A- still had good numbers in system. I wasn't getting along too well with the FC at the time (inability to communicate in an effective manner) so I went afk for homework. Turns out -A- left local without a fight. Corp chat had some pretty angry people in it at that point, as we had worked hard to whittle down -A- and they managed to bail out easily.

Two things would have made that easy... eyes on the fleet to report when and where they are aligning and a cloaked dictor in line with their POS on Keberz gate (as Keberz is high sec) and a cloaked dictor in SV5 on the HED- gate. Keberz dictor would bubble up when their fleet aligns. Didn't happen though, and their fleet slipped out, missed opportunity.

Did quite a bit of small gang and soling. Quite a few cloaky kills (Sabre ftw) as well as cyno ships and random stuff coming through.

Politics in the area are completely effed, as PL and Init are blue, the drone region guys are who knows what, IT and INIT are blue, fun times to be honest.

Oh, and I lost my second Sabre yesterday due to being convo'd as I was landing on a drag bubble with a PL Sabre. I was spamming lock button when convo request opened...  Doh! Sabre vs Sabre is a quick fight, and I didn't even finish locking him when I died. He probably laughed. Needless to say, I turned on autoreject after that.

Some roams in the plans for this week, we'll see how it turns out. Oh and props to Evoke for a massive killfest of NC. http://killboard.ev0ke.de/?a=kill_related&kll_id=110323 Although we were fighting recently, I still respect the alliances of DT, CH, and Evoke and have many friends that fly with them.

That is all.

Roams and Hot Drops

Took a gang out last night. Same place... HED- and Providence. This one was much later and not posted, so we got like 14 in fleet.

More fun in my opinion. Precision rather than a stampeding herd of idiots who spoil good kills by lemming over and over again.

Yes, I was still bitter of the previous night's failures.

We moved out and hit up GE-.

Despite the cloaky camp that was in V-3 on the GE- gate... they wouldn't bite. Our gang hadn't even been scouted. I gave up once a neutral alt got eyes on us and we moved towards HED-.

We caught a Drake coming from HED-, he died instantly. We bubbled for his pod, he laughed at us in local (not sure why).

We camped in and around SV5 for a good 15 minutes grabbing several shuttles, noob ships, ceptors and other random small stuff.

After that we moved into Providence, which was dead. On our way out, however, I was scouting into ERVK- and saw 7ish Dead Terrorists in local. Far from home, and no station. Directional popped several ships appropriate for roaming... gang was on the other side of the in gate I was holding cloak on.

Sure enough, DT started landing. Dictors, Canes, a T3, Curse, and some others. As the lead elements landed I broke cloak (I wanted the scout to see me... If he jumped into the next system and saw my gang the gig was up).

Bam.

Instant aggression... and their pro dictor pilot bubbled their entire (aggressed) gang on gate. With no eyes next door.

Did I mention the bubble? I didn't even have to jump in a lone dictor now... they did the job for me.

I waited another 10 seconds to snag point on T3... and called fleet in.

Instantly the DT started running. Primary switched to Curse... as the T3 warped off... My cap was completely empty thanks to the Curse and my point had dropped allowing him to escape.

Curse popped, secondary was the Cane we had tackled. He popped. As he was going down, a second Cane warped in... landing 20km off gate in the bubble.

Now, if I was him, my plan would have been MWD at gate and jump. Good chance of making it before I died, and good chance of all hostiles in due to the fight that had just happened. Logical choice, right?

Not to him.

He burned straight off gate... quick as hell too. But we had good light tackle and held onto him. Pop went the second Cane.

Battle report here. I lived thanks to Dezzy in his Scimitar. Killerkeano, an old Atlas mate whos now with IT held the point on the burning Hurricane... and lived thanks to Dezzy in his Scimitar. Logistics for the win.

We burned home, and disbanded gang. Shooting the shit on comms, a MM gang moved in from Fountain. I quickly re posted fleet and spanked for numbers to take them.

I allowed their scout burn out for me in NOL... he came right at me. I lit him up with barrage... and he immediately got his transversal up. I switched to phased plasma, which hit him every few shots... I wondered if his gang would pop in local soon when he made a bad decision.

He closed from 20km to 10km for what? I don't know.

Needless to say I activated point (up until then I had played oh shit I want to leave oh noes oh noes) and turned on 2x Medium Neuts.

Sha bam! He capped out instantly. Point dropped, MWD turned off. Two volleys later, POOF!-1 Stilletto

I offered a GF in local (as I had been in similar situations... tackler on Cane, I sympathized). No response.

I ended up playing pro bait on Pr- on NOL gate. Killerkeano in cyno Falcon sat nearby, watching.

MM gang, spread around PR- and in NOL, took the bait.

Falcon popped cyno.

Carriers dropped.

Reps kept Killerkeano in his cyno Falcon alive. I couldn't save my bait cane (I was insta primaried and had my shield xfer on the Falcon instead of myself), and we lost a second buffer shield cane to them after I went down. Later evaluation revealed that one of the STK- carrier pilots had overview set up wrong and wasn't giving out reps... he felt bad, I was a little annoyed but what can ya do?

Battle report is sketch. Some of the mails haven't been posted yet, probably STK- pilots. We got a few battlecruisers and at least one HAC. Would have liked to not have lost anything with 3x Carriers and a Nyx on field... but we focused on the Falcon and that one carrier wasn't repping anything.

We tussled with Drunk Gang as well. Tried to cut them off on their way down from Fountain, but they wouldn't shoot my Onyx.

Kinda wimpy, given their gang type and composition, but we jump bridged in front of them and got a fight on the 319-/GY6 gate. First error of the night was a Muninn, who took aggro while we were baiting them to drop caps. He jumped out of 319- to avoid dying to the longer range ships... but didn't wait out his timer in GY6. He broke cloak and the Drunk gang hanging out at off gate spots (in Vagas, Ceptors and 2x Cynabals) saw the opportunity and swooped down on gate. His Muninn melted. I wasn't happy.

We ended up getting our fight in 319- on the GY6A gate. We killed a Rook (actually earlier in C3N as they were burning home) , Vagabond and Hurricane of theirs... but then my Onyx moved out of rep range (dual boxing fail)... and due to bumps and scam/webs, I was unable to get back in time and I died.

Ugh.

I called it at this point, as Drunk gang was getting more gangmembers on field and we weren't. Got caps out and got pod home (for the second time).

Looking at killboard, looks like we lost a Deimos to them too. Didn't see him in gang or hear him on comms, but he was in the system at the same time. Should have gone to sleep 2 hrs before this... and in retrospect, I should have called the Drunk Gang engagement off long before we lost the Curse and Onyx. The fight itself lasted a good 20-30 minutes, much of it ranged, stand offish engaging.

Fail.

Oh well, you live and learn. It was way past my bedtime anyways (4am-5am).

That is all.

Roams and HED-

Wish I had time to write yesterday... while roams were still fresh on my mind. Unfortunately my work had their annual audit and there was all hustle bustle and no down time.

Basically, two nights ago, we roamed around Catch. Roaming on the way to HED-GP to cover for Bonecaya. Earlier that day we had taken one of the very few moons in HED- and dropped a tower, but it was unarmed at the time.

I had an op planned that evening (USTZ) but the emergency op to take the moon in HED- bled into my departure time, so I postponed leaving by about an hour. But when the time came, we had a very nice shield gang set to go.

First stop was GE-. PL and -A- were at it again, but this time PL seemed to be in control. I played on the GE- gate in V-3 and waited. Sure enough PL started peeking around, and a Dramiel + Rapier + Ceptor came into V-3.

Dramiel kited.... Ares pointed... then Dramiel got in close on my Cane and started hitting me. He was slowly breaking tank, emphasis on slowly. I called Hom3grown in with his Ceptor, as the Dramiel was taking decent damage from my 425s. He started burning away best he could, which was tough given I neuted his cap to shit with 2x Medium neuts. Warrior IIs were hitting him as well. Hom3 landed as the Dramiel was burning away out of overheated point range.

Problem for him was... he was burning straight out. Barrage + 0 transversal = pwnage. As he hit 40km out, Hom3 still holding him, the Dramiel popped.

GF

Nothing spectacular about his fit, but he didn't call his buddies in. I was assuming my gang was scouted waiting next door. Catch right now is a madhouse of people evacing and people shooting the evacing residents and neutral alts everywhere.

After realizing the futility of baiting PL or -A- we moved towards head. In 36N we caught this Blackbird, who cloaked after Hom3 jumped in with him. We called gang in to help decloak, just as they started hopping in Hom3 found him and BOOM went the Blackbird.

At this point we covered for the pos guy of MVN, Bonecaya. I had thought this would be a short cover op... until he told me it would be 12-14 trips and Agil was 4j.

Eff that.

"Everyone in fleet who can fly an Iteron X up"

Lots of X's.

"Everyone who X'd and isn't an outlaw, jump Keberz and move to Agil. Once there you buy an iteron and open trade with &^%*&^%"

So we covered while 14x Iterons moved all of our POS equipment in one trip.

While this was going on a Drake who had DC'd from gang (and not spoken up, nor asked if it was clear before logging in) started yelling about being tackled. I was not happy; one, he ended up dying. Secondly, if I had known we could have used him as bait. The other thing was I had mentioned, several times, that there were skirmish forces moving all around Catch, and lone travelers or people trying to catch gang in a non cloaky were in trouble. So basically, it was "I told you so". Although he was in my fleet, I took no responsiblity for his lost Drake.

As it was he had jumped into SV5 (next door to HED-) and a skirmish force of En Garde (10 guys, give or take) tackled and started hitting him. They had Legion, Apoc, Hyperion, among other ships. I ordered everyone to the SV5 gate and only light tackle through. My gang size was approaching 70 at this point.

I should have been more specific on fast tackle. I mean, to me, this means ceptors recons and dictors.

I am very OCD about fleet, both in terms of composition and ship locations. I knew how much light tackle I had. My plan was to send them through, only bumping local about equal numberwise to a much heavier (compared to light tackle) equipped En Garde gang. En Garde would certainly stay on field, hoping to kill a weaker force, at which point committed and tackled/bubbled I would bring in the hammer.

What actually happened was a good 1/3 of my fleet including Drakes and other big shit jumping into SV5 and spiking local way more than I wanted.

Guess what the En Garde gang did? Yup. They burned out of the bubbles my dictors dropped and we caught one Brutix.

One.

Brutix.

Out of battleships and a potential T3 and some reconds and other BCs.

One.

Brutix.

What transpired afterwards for the next 2-3 minutes was PK emo raging the shit out of comms. Verbal lashing in fleet chat by many other angry/disappointed fleet members also went on.

The selfish needs of a few cost the gang many good kills. Stupid noobs. I calmly ended my rant with this:

"Next time I see that shit you will be kicked from fleet and comms. You will find your way home yourself."

We finished the POS part of the roam and moved out towards my original destination: Providence. I knew I needed to wrap the roam soon, as it had been 2 hrs already and gang was gettign tired I was sure. Hom3 was forwards scout, I was scout. This combo works great, as the forward scout can skirmish and bring in the secondary to either box it in or bring a bigger fight.

First kill was a Vengeance he started tussling with in T-RPFU. Vengeance aggressed his Stiletto (no brainer) and I jumped in my Cane. Neuts from my Cane allowed Hom3 to GTFO when he started to crack, and gang followed in shortly and repped him up. Vengeance died.

We poked around the closer Providence systems, trying to find targets. Nothing. Some systems had plenty of neuts but no one wanted to fight. Then we hit the Important Internet Spaceship League constellation. I was +1 of gang, Hom3 in an offshoot. Local spiked... with some neutrals I was not familiar with. I held on our in gate, and directional popped with lots of T1 stuff. No other gates in scan range...

"Fleet be ready, fleet be ready"

They all landed. Yellow boxes popped, turning quickly to red. I orbited gate at close range, tank slowly dropping but not alarmingly fast. All agressed...

"Fleet jump jump, grab whatever you can and kill it. Reps on PK"

No need for primaries, more important was to grab as many of the fast movers as possible. As I hit 1/4 shield reps topped me off, and we killed lots. We lost one dictor... not sure how, but he died. Other than that we killed 15.

Fleet moved home without incident. This roam also had plenty of other, smaller kills. Shuttles, noob ships, things the gang knocked off especially while camping HED-.

Long freaking roam, but the little tussle at the end made up for it.

That is all.

Don't Question the FC

The title of this post is subjective,  I will admit.

There are times when I am in gang in my pricey Zealot or Curse or whatever... and I am thinking "This dude is gonna get me and my compadres vaporized". The FC may be new, or insecure, or unexperienced, or all of the above. In those situations I follow the FC's orders... loosely. This is just smart piloting. If I feel (based on comms, my own eyes, scouts reports, intel, whatever) that we are about to enter a bad situation that has no postive ending, I may warp @ 10 instead of 0. Or not jump quite yet. Etc. Some may argue this is dumb... but I don't mean the even fights you are just scared of losing a ship in. I mean the 50 vs 100 their composition is better you are going to lose all pilots and get no kills. It happens.

But in almost every other situation, listen to the FC. Especially if he is experienced and exudes confidence. There are reasons he is doing what he is doing. It doesn't have to make sense to you. If he has (in the past) gotten you kills, has kept (most of) you alive, hes doing something right.

I say this because people in my gangs often scratch their heads and say "FC, confirm we're holding here?" or "FC, are we for sure holding in here".

Yes. I am sure.

I stutter step my gangs quite often. By this I mean we burn many jumps at super high speed, and then stop. Or crawl. Sometimes I will even move gang off the autopilot route and hide them in a dead end system, or take an alternative route. There are solid reasons I do this. More often than not its to keep the enemy from getting eyes on my gang. For instance, the Scimitar kill last night would most certainly not have happened if he had known A. their was a large gang nearby and B. that gang was in CNC- on the FAT- gate. Or the Drake pilot... he would not have jumped into V-3 from GE- had he known that 20 guys were already waiting to kill him.

Often these decisions are made based on intelligence that the general fleet does not know about. Channel command between me and my scout as well as secondary FC's is full of chatter. As a general fleet member you can not hear these things. During alliance ops I often have conversations open with scouts, to minimize already cluttered comms and with the (accurate) assumption that spies are listening. Nothing worse than a scout reporting a new contact or valuable intel and having the enemy spy immediately relay "we've been spotted". Or ordering scouts to systems to investigate eggress routes, etc. Thats basically broadcasting your intentions to leave and telling the enemy which way you intend to go, setting up potential drops or counters.

It is, in fact, common for thinker FC's to do seemingly strange or random things. If you, as a gangmember, are mystified... imagine what the enemy FC is thinking? It is as much a venture into psychology as it is a technical battle of range and weapons and warp ins. You can always tell the difference between a huge alliance pvp FC and one that deals in small to medium sized gangs. A large alliance op is simple. If you have more guys, you engage. If you have the same amount of guys... you engage. If you are inferior in numbers, you sit in a POS or run. Warp ins, warp outs. Call primary, shoot. Secondary, lock up, tertiary lock up. It takes brainpower, don't get me wrong. You need to manage warp ins and decide when to fight and when to run. But there is no hiding and sneaking with that kind of game... at least not usually. Its hard to A. hide B. control 200 players stampeding through systems to a target. More like a cowboy driving a herd than a spec ops team. Hammer more than a knife.

I've got respect and appreciation for both types... but I do get annoyed when I am in fleet and potential targets flee before the stampeding elephant long before we arrive. Doubly so when small amounts of tact and cunning could have netted at least one or two of them... sometimes even the whole gang.

So... before you question your FC over comms, stop and think. There is more than likely a reason he's having you hold where you're holding, burn to a system, switch gates randomly, etc. Its either to keep you alive or help you cut someone else's life short.

That is all.

Last Nights Roam

Last night a major alliance roam went down while I was sitting in class. Humourously, the only loss was the FC jumping into Keberz and forgetting he was in high sec. He aggressed a neutral on gate and got Concorded.

To be honest, many 0.0 dwellers have this withdrawal syndrome of sorts. Even on an alt, at first glance while in high sec I either panic due to the number of neutral combat ships around, or salivate at the sight of an Obelisk or Fenrir on gate with me. This lasts all of a half second until I realize that no, I am in high sec and I am not in danger or that target is not killable.

As that alliance gang returned I formed up a much smaller gang to take out, as I needed my dose of pew pew and wasn't able to join the other gang. Not expecting the 50-60 man turnout due to their roam lasting almost 3 hrs, but a few die hard PVPers (and some who had just logged on like myself) showed up and we got a 20 ish man gang to take out.

Shiptypes were nano-bcs and fast crap. Only one Scimitar (grrr) but we moved out.

It was pretty much dead, all the way to Curse. Then through Curse, a ghost town. Only one Stabber which I had my Crow scout tackle (i was on other side of gate in Hurricane, figured he would last long enough for me to get in and tackle. He didn't). Curse... competely dead. Not even a drag bubble in VOL- What is this world coming to?

We jumped back into Catch and headed to GE-. I knew we would get pew pew there... the question is how much? Reports earlier had 70+ in local, a mix of PL and -A-. I brought gang into next door V-3... and jumped my Cane into GE-

Nothing on gate, but was stuck in a large anchored bubble.

Scan was clear except for a Crow and Slicer.

I held cloak and watched local scroll up with mad smack from PL and -A-.... and scanned local list. Sure enough, a mixture of PL and -A-. As my cloak broke I slowboated it back to gate.

Halfway there a Drake landed on the edge of the bubble. Immediate yellow box... then red. No damage... he had just turned on a painter.

huh?

Aggression stayed and he burned through the bubble to me. Definately weird. Directional out to 14.4AU was still clear. I refused to aggress and waited.

He convoed me.

"Hi" he said.

I contemplated my options, reporting the situation to fleet members for entertainment.

"Meow" I responded.

"Can you talk so Russian translate can" he said.

huh

"What?"

"I need leader speak Russian plz"

I didn't respond. He stopped painting me about the same time. It was unfortunate as I had just brought the gang down to the gate and was going to gank him. But instead of burning off out of the bubbles, he approached and sat at 0. I got ready... if he jumped, he was dead. If he started burning off, right as he hit the edge of the bubble I would point and bring in gang with orders to engage while MWDing out of bubble (in case some of the now 80 people in local came to the show). Directional still showed clear.

He jumped.

"He jumped, jumped. No bubble!" I didn't want my gang bubbled if the En Garde Drake had friends coming. I jumped into V-3 and he had already de-cloaked. Wait to soon if he hoped to reapproach, which didn't seem to be on his mind. He started going down fast, and my Cane along with a few others gave him massive bumps off gate. Sure enough, Drake exploded.

I had bubble up for pod, and after that got everyone out of bubble and down to a spot 200km below gate. I hopped back into GE-... maybe get another couple kills. As I jumped in, a Sabre landed on gate. He burned through the bubbles and jumped. I also picked up more incoming ships and jumped back into V-3. I was pissed when I found gang members on gate, in bcs and stuff. I had ordered a bubble for the Sabre, who burned off and cloaked. So now I had gang members in large ship caught in a bubble, with an anchored bubble on the other side with hostiles incoming.

I yelled. And cussed them out. They quickly got off gate.

I sent in the bomber to check out GE-... he reported several hostiles now on gate trying to decloak him, with more ships (in heavier types such as BS) incoming.

Time to leave... we had pissed em off and they had us scouted.

So off we went, heading back to 49-U. As we got close to home, I noticed several neuts in local of FAT-... and my forwards scout noticed the same in 25S. I smelled something cooking.

So I held gang in CNC- and kept scout in 25S. Scout and I had noticed some +1 and -1s from our two systems, same names. So they were active. I held on 25s gate in FAT- and waited.

As I was about to give up and call it... plus one. Scout reported -1 and sure enough, gate fire.

To my surprise a Scimitar decloaked and started burning. I gave chase in my Cane and called a tackler from CNC in, and called scout in as well. Scimitar was fast... and I burned out my MWD chasing him and overheating point. As my tacklers landed he warped. Either to planet V or to CNC- gate. We gave chase, and I picked up a POS on scan, figuring he was there.

Until local dropped and gang yelled "hes here!"

I warped to the gate along with the tacklers and held... waiting for the reapproach. It was unnecessary, due to pro bumps and webs (Rapier FTW!) and the Scimitar died. Scouts were sad they didn't get on mail, but its part of the job. I was chill, as being FC/scout usually means you A. miss out on kills and B. die in a flaming ball of fire. Gang had fun and got a kills and my Hurricane lived... win!

We moved to 49-U and disbanded fleet... two kills for an hour roam was meh... so so. But we had fun!

That is all.

My Bachelor's Throne

I have seen plenty of pictures of people talking about their EVE Setups.... So I figured it was about time I posted my current set up. I have all my electronics in my living room, as its more roomy and ventilated than the bedroom.





Cockpit view.

Turtle beach headset (Xbox and PC) HP Pavilion something with lots of ram and nice video card. I run comms on the laptop as well, allows for quick reference, ts drags etc. Xbox for those boring times, N64 for party time (Mario Kart & Super Smash Bro = Win). Water is good for the soul, and yes that is a snowboard. This year isn't looking too good, I refuse to by a pass because my schoolwork will go to hell if I do.

Large flat panel LCD. Xbox, N64, Antec tower with fiber optic and HDMI outs on the vid card. 5.1 Surround sound blasts music while I pew pew (hence the reason to run comms on the laptop).

This is all in a decent sized living room with vaulted ceiling. Two windows on the right and the kitchen nearby to the left. Love sac right next to the couch for movie times (game on).

Easley's Post - Made of Win

The Following Can Be found on Easley Thame's Blog at "I Could Have Taken It Solo" I figured I would post it as I hate clicking links when in capsuleer myself :-)



Homeland Defense :: Worth Taking Seriously


Corporations often allow hostiles to roam their space freely. The common refrain is “if our ratters get caught, they deserve to die.” While this is actually true in my opinion, there is no reason not to take advantage of these opportunities for some easy kills in your own back yard.

The other day, a ratter called out that he was tackled in a Sanctum. Instead of berating him (that comes later) we formed a small gang in a flash (-MVN- are usually on voice comms when in-game) and warped in on the Stain Empire roaming gang with a nice mix of recons and close-range brawlers. They were far off and managed to warp as we came on-grid, but we caught their Curse and Sabre in a bubble on one of the out-gates. The SE gang then made best speed out of Delve.

If you are diligent about forming up counter-gangs and taking out hostiles, you create systems that roamers learn to pass by when they travel in lieu of easier pickings. We will occasionally go so far as to setup sling bubbles or cloak in the belt with a ratter when we know a hostile is inbound, making our busiest systems the most dangerous by far. While it’s impossible to succeed every time, I have noticed some areas of IT space are clearly safer than others.

The one caveat is that, if you are not highly experienced as a corp with small gang pvp, and if you don’t have FCs on who know what to do, trying to save ratters can just make the situation worse. In -MVN- this is rarely an issue, but I wouldn’t encourage any corp to warp ships wildly into a belt to save a single member’s ratting boat. The key is forming a gang (albeit in a hurried manner) and responding properly so that you turn a bad situation into a good one.

It’s also worth chasing down a roamer sometimes, if for no other reason than to prevent them from thinking your space is a soft target. A short while ago, we heard a report about a Sleipnir traveling through Anzac’s constellation. Earlier in the day, the Aussies had some difficulty catching him, so we wanted to be sure he didn’t make it out alive. We got ahead of him and when he jumped into NOL- a nasty surprise awaited him on the gate.

In my opinion, it’s best to make your home systems a nightmare for cloakers, roamers and other hostiles who may wish to visit. You can take the time to yell at your member later and, if they are not very useful to the corp, go ahead and kick them. However, it’s never good to let your disappointment cost you potential kills.

Hai. I'm still alive...

This last week kicked my face in so far as real life goes. Math test and crap tons of homework. Not so much EVE time.

Combined with the usual frolicking with ladies, I didn't really get on EVE until yesterday. I took the time to take a roam out. I chose Catch as the destination, and set out with a gang of ceptors/Dramiels/AFs and Bombers with a couple dictors and Falcons as support.

We ran up the pipe from 49- without incident, and hit up the hot system of GE-. With 70 in local I was sure we would get a fight (which is why I chose the shiptypes I did, given our fleet size). Sure enough, on station, Scimitar and Tengu. I had gang off grid 500km away, fully aligned.

"Guys, I'm going to get this Tengu aggressed or bring his buddies in. I bet  I die"

So I warped in, orbited, dropped bubble and waited.

Nothing.

"Alright hes not biting. I'm gonna turn my belly up and give him an easy kill"

Closed orbit and dropped web and scram on him. He had to go for this...

He didn't.

But his buddy in a Vagabond that undocked did. Called in the gang, attempted to burn off but I was done for. Didn't get podded though, and that Vagabond died.

Sabre for a Vaga? I'll take it. If only I had gotten on the mail...

Unfortunately for the gang stats, the -A- fleet that was in system (I had known this) dropped on station and we lost a Vagabond. Not sure if he was in a bubble or what, but he ended up dying. I was a bit unhappy, as the point of this gang was to be escapable and dictate engagements.

We moved into Catch. I was in my hero pod... In Hemin I re shipped to a Falcon, and after a short break we moved out towards home. I had a Raptor scout us, and went without incident until we hit U-Q gate in 0SHT. Scout reported dictor on the other side in U-Q... who bubbled. We were jumping 0SHT as this was going on 1j ahead of us. Tengu reported on the gate as well now...

I had our Raptor hold cloak and wanted an X in fleet for the first person that hit that out gate. I had an X in fleet and was about to have that X jump through if the Tengu aggressed. Scout yelled out he was reapproaching and they were shooting. I had tacklers jump through asap and get secondary points.

We tackled the Tengu and started pro bumps to keep him off gate. Despite our crappy DPS we managed to take him down, in large part due to Nemulus and his Vagabond. Our Raptor died... not sure what was going on. He told me later he was sticking around to make sure the Tengu didn't leave. Given the secondary tackle and the bubble he was sitting in... meh.

Republic Fleet Disruptor and Republic Fleet 10MN MWD dropped... which bought the Raptor pilot and myself new ships.

After that juicy kill we moved back home, where I, sadly, continued carebearing. I'm on the way to a Nyx, and getting closer day by day.

We had a carrier move train last night as well. Many corpmates ships were still in 6-C waiting to be moved, so we took several carriers up and back. Without incident, and we managed not to lose any cyno's.

Amazing.

We'll see what this week brings...

That is all.

Capitals.... lots of them.

Pictures

I Really Should Sleep More

As the title states, I should probably sleep more. I haven't been cutting down much on EVE, social life is still active and homework is chewing up time.

But hey, when you're having fun, you're having fun.

We took out another Cry Havoc tower last night, on a neo moon. Not the most exciting of scenarios, but we did bring in dreads again. I'm very thankful for Dreads and their pilots, as they make my pos shooting time very short. We were able to drop it in 1 siege cycle, set up the new tower and go home. While setting up the new tower Kaidan of Finfleet found a small camp 2j away. I took gang to our exit gate, set my self and tacklers into the next system (which I was pretty sure had eyes) and sent first the 2x Ceptors and, while they were in warp, 2x hictors to tackle the Harbinger and Hurricane. Hurricane got tackled by Hom3grown, and the Harbinger was tackled by the HICs but started burning off. As tacklers landed I brought gang into adjacent system and had them jump on contact into TXW-....

Cane ended up dying, but the Harbinger burned out of range of the HICtors and Kaidan... providing reps in his scimi... forgot to keep point on Harbinger and he warped. Sad day. But one Hurricane kill for no gang losses was fine with me. We rolled back into Barleguet as tower finished anchoring, and moved next door to get onto a titan for bridge home.

Intel reported a cloaky camp that had been camping the Reb gate in 6-C for a few hrs. 2x Ishtar, Sabre, Falcon, Arazu....

I smelled a drop. I moved my super low SP cyno alt in a Kestrel with cloak to the Reb gate, warping her right into the bubbles and cloaking. I started slowboating (cloaked Kestrel = 40 m/s) towards the gate. Too many blues... started yelling with my main in intel to GTFO the gate. Finally got some response, and blues dissapeared into off grid safes and moons and such.

Waited... patiently. Everyone on the titan, the tower anchored and primary mission accomplished. One bait Drake on the gate... still no biting. I knew they were there.

Then gate fire from Reblier... and... Charon?

wtf?

In fleet to boot. I laughed. Some ballsy fool had jumped pro bait in.  No way they could resist a freighter kill. Sure enough... decloaked Arazu... then 2x Ishtar and Sabre, lastly Falcon. They were like 50 off of me... but no time to waste. I decloaked Kestrel and started burning at them. Charon was now getting hit, and despite its massive hitpoints I didn't want the situation to turn south, so I popped cyno and brought everyone in.

Immediately I had PK in system, and burned right at the Falcon with my Manticore and hero point. Another 40 ships came in with me :)

Due to the range of the cyno, the only thing that got killed was the Falcon. The gang was obviously in a position to bail if things went south for them (they were operating in the main staging system of IT, usually 70+ in local). So one Falcon down... I was happy.

Took a small roam out after that, attempted to drop Mukk and his CH gang. On the way back, I sent in a bait Drake, once again to the exit gate and let him get pulled into the bubbles. As he was landing I was in warp in my Sabre to the gate. Sure enough, same gang tackled our bait Drake... and they had replaced their Falcon! I landed and immediately burned out the Falcon (as he was the closest) I bubbled him and put scram web and guns on him... but he jammed me up. So I kept a close orbit (1k) to keep him from cloaking and prayed my shields would hold as gang was in warp to the gate (70AU warp from 6-E gate). Ishtars dron'es were eating me alive, but Ishtars disappeared as gang showed up on scan. Falcon was screwed... even though I couldn't point him or shoot him, he couldn't get away due to bubbles and close orbit. Gang landed and his Falcon went pop.

Gang disbanded, as I was getting loopy tired. I sat in station and sorted corp crap and political bull for a bit, grabbed a snack. Not long after the same guys in 6-C were at it again. They had another Falcon too...

So I warped to the gate in Sabre and cloaked.

And waited....

Not for long. 2x Ishtar warped in at 80km off of me and cloaked. I started slowboating...

Arazu and Falcon was surely on field (cov ops cloak = warp while cloaked, unlike Ishtar). Sabre may or may not have been. After about 10 minutes Argentina (RKK CEO) warped to the gate and started shooting the bubbles. In FCIT he was pissed about people leaving bubbles up, as enemy was using them. So he started shooting. As we had cycled several bait ships into Reblier with no biting, I figured this would work as Manticore + Arazu = Manticore insta-dead.

Sure enough, Arazu decloaks with the long point. Easily a solo kill, the Ishtars decloaked to whore on the mail too.

And I was 24km off of them. Done, done and done. I decloaked and kicked MWD on. Sabre at 2.5 km/s and I burned right between the Ishtars, crapping a bubble. Gang in Reblier at holding point aligned warped down to gate and jumped. Easley in his Arazu got double points, one Ishtar scrammed other pointed. Scrammed Ishtar was primary, pointed was secondary and burning like crazy. Gang started melting first Ishtar, second was being held only by Easley's overheated point. I tried to burn back in to grab scram and web on the Ishtar (I had to burn off in armor, the Warrior IIs ripping me apart) at 27kms he warped... fail. Argentina did lose his Manticore... but such is life :)

But, all in all, 2x Falcon and an Ishtar kill from that camp. I knew I hit a nerve when the Ishtar pilot started posting killmail stats in local. I don't doubt they killed quite a few IT and allies. They were camping a gate picking off easy targets. Huge alliances are cake to cherry pick from. But... the point of that kind of gang is to kill easy targets and take no losses. If you are losing about the same as you are killing, your camp sucks. You shouldn't be losing ANY ships. Every one of those losses they took... EVERY one, could have been avoided if they had been aligned out. Ishtars had a precious 3-5 seconds before I bubbled them. Falcon's had way more time, yet stayed on field while tacklers burned right at them. Whenever you are operating in a hostile environment, you have to assume there are more people in the play then the one target (bait?) that you see. Almost a half bill isk pissed away in 2 hrs. Not pro.

That is all.

Dropping Caps

This weekend was filled with EVE. Fail and win. This should be a long post.... as long as work (on Labor Day dammit) stays dead.

Friday night was a POS shoot. I was going to co-FC the op with Ciryath, but ended up having a girly come over. We ended up at the POS shooting it, with me in a Manticore keeping eyes and my alt cloaked in system for a safe. We didn't  bring in caps, and the CH fleet stayed inside the pos, an Archon venturing outside and barely making it back into the shields in structure.

At this point I went AFK due to uhmmm.... reasons :) and didn't see what happened next. Talking with alliance command later on it appears the CH fleet warped to a safe, got caught, almost lost an Archon but right before it popped they lit a cyno and bridged in DOOM's supercap fleet. We only lost a few ships (which was pretty good considering) and were forced to retreat.

The interesting part was, I had specifically brought up this concern before we started the op. All of DOOM's FC's were on, and they had an op schedule right before ours. Their fleet dissapeared from X-7 to parts unknown. I told alliance that CH would be easy to handle, but if they called in DOOM we would be in trouble. This was prime USTZ on a Friday night... huge particpation time.

The sad part was that when I got back from my computer, I was sitting 5-C station. Apparently some jackass had warped to me at 0, and since I was only 200 off the POS I got killed. I know better than to stay in fleet, but my leaving the computer was sort of abrupt (girls don't like staring at EVE and do things to distract you), so I was asking for it.

I laughed at the situation and got a clone back up to 6-C staging system. Sorted my alt and played the market for a bit. The girly fell asleep on the couch at this point, so I moved her into the bedroom and started talking on comms again. Decided to take out a small gang and managed a couple small kills, then fell asleep myself.

Saturday was made of win. I took out an Alliance roam early on. Destination was to break up the perma camp in F67E. Plan was to bridge in on them, as their early warning scouts make any kind of hide-n-go-seek action impossible.

That was until reports of carriers undocking and aggressing 7 jumps away was reported in intel...

Jackpot.

A small (10 man) gang of alliance was in DP34- and had skirmished with a gang of neutrals. They ended up bailing, but over FC channels I heard the news and took my 20 man gang down that way. I scouted out the target system along with my cyno Falcon, Max Paralax. I had the other alliance gang gtfo of system (they were scaring the locals) and put my gang in an adjacent system that was empty (no eyes, no worries to the enemy).

Intel had the carriers on station engaging other neutrals... perfect.

I warped my Sabre in at 0, and burned right at the little engagement. I counted about 20 neutrals, but without spending time looking each of them up I wasn't sure who was engaging who. No need though, as our gang (along with the other alliance gang) could take all of them. I burned right throug the heart of the orgy on the undock and dropped first bubble. Immediately I called in both alliance gangs, Max dropped cloak and lit cyno and the party started.

Most of the subcaps were immediately zooming off. Those that didn't docked. The first Thanatos docked immediately when local bumped. The second managed to dock as blues filled my overview, landing on station. In came our Nyx's (2) and an Avatar. The Chimera was the only carrier left on field, and I'm sure he was madly spamming the dock button. The Nyx's do amazing DPS; the Chimera was dropping shield rapidly and had hit about 1/3 shield when the Avatar's Judgement lit my screen up....

BOOM.

Chimera wreck lay at the undock, a husk of its former self. Props went all around, gf's exchanged in local. Nyx's moved in to scoop capital mods and fighters, support fleet stood guard until the titan capped up and jumped back out.

I almost hoped for a counter drop... we had several more supercarriers on standby at this point, ready to go. But the drop went off without incident and off we went.

We formed up on the titan again, and had Cardking in his uber tanked Megathron jump into the wonderful F67E almost perma camp. By almost I mean that if you're running solo in a tackleable ship, you are going to die. If you are an even fight or superior in numbers/composition they will have long since safed up when you arrive. So that solo mega looked pretty juicy.

He jumped into their camp and they immediately aggressed. Card laughed as he tanked their DPS with shields. We waited until he got more aggression from their gang and then he popped cyno. In we piled... but most of their gang was able to burn off. We did grab a Drake and a Hurricane.

We continued onwards, I was scouting in a Dramiel. I jumped into X-M and found a Retribution 20 klicks off of the in gate. I locked him and and tackled, holding gang on the other side. He slowly moved towards the gate, and I assumed afterburner fit. I figured he would jump, so I tightened my orbit, making my Dramiel a juicy target.

He bit.

Drones popped and he lit me up. First couple hits were hard, I called in gang and thankfully the Scimitar's got reps on me as I hit low armor. Retribution popped, bubble was late and he warped pod off.

Took gang back to set up for another bridge... Some of the gang managed a Falcon kill on the way.I switched out for a dictor in 6-C and met gang as it was coming back. Found a Harbinger chilling in MHC- on the F67E gate. I dropped a bubble and forced him into F67E, where the gang popped him.

After the Harbinger kill, I brought the gang back to 6-C and set them up on the the titan. The plan was to move one of my covert cyno alts into max bridge range towards Cloud Ring, to cut down on transit time. However, as she hit the F67E gate in MHC-, she found a bubble up and a fight on the gate. Neutrals engaging neutrals, nothing too crazy. But the Sleipnir trapped in the middle of a bubble was worth it.

"Guys wake up wake up if you're on the titan get ready if not get there fast!" I yelled.

I talked to titan pilot, who was ready, and decloaked my alt and lit the cyno. In we piled, the enemy ships yellow boxing but for some reason not shooting my alt (they weren't on the gate, so aggression timers meant nothing). Sleipnir started to burn off, but multiple webs and scrams ensnared it quickly. His tank was good, but not good enough for the gang that bridged in right on top of him. Within 30 seconds the Sleipnir went kaboom. He didn't take that much damage... his active tank without much buffer a horrible match for the slew of DPS that came at him.

We rest on the titan, but my alt got popped on the way to destination system. She decloaked to light cyno and the two battlecruisers on gate were too fast and one volleyed her poor ship. So we humped it towards Cloud Ring. Easley and the fast movers killed some small random crap (frigs and such) as they were burning ahead of the main gang.

Scouting, I hit FD- and found some Evoke camping the PF- gate. They scattered as we neared, but I had a prober enter FD- and take a peek. He found a Harbinger safed off grid above the PF- gate and got me a warp in. I landed 22km and burned at him... as soon as I hit 17km I dropped bubble. My Sabre was scram/web fit and he was burning straight away from me. Before I could get scram on him he was out of bubble and warped off.

Laughing in local followed, along the lines of "fail bubble hahahaha". I had a Rapier de cloak nearby and immediately his points and webs were on me.

His mistake.

His artillery fit Rapier hit me with one volley for damage before I realized he was arty fit, and started an orbit. Combined with the Falcon who had been probing that jammed him shortly after, his drones were the only damage and I started shooting those immediately while dropping a second bubble right on him. Gang was jumping into system and the Rapier was now stuck doing no damage and unable to leave. Gang landed, Rapier died.

I laughed in local this time. Rapier Kill > Harbinger Kill.

Into Cloud Ring we went, killing a bomber and T1 frig on the way. We stopped by G8- to visit CH... they had about equal numbers in local but I'm sure many were AFK and no fights ensued.

Up to Pure Blind we went, and managed a a Rokh kill on the way there. I had bubbled the in gate in an attempt to nab a bomber, and after I was warping away and bringing the gang in (and after the bubble had actually dropped) he landed... but way off gate as he had initiated warp while my bubble was still up. Needless to say the Rokh died. His active tank didn't last long--not long at all.

I sent BigVix into P-2 solo, and he found a Vagabond on station. I'm guessing Fidelas Constas didn't report our gang moving in intel... or the Vagabond pilot didn't look at intel. Regardless, Bigvix in the Dramiel tackled, Vagabond aggressed we came in and Vagabond died.

Not much else happening in P-2, so we hit the out gate and started home. In KU5R I found the rest of the Fidelas Constas gang, of which we had only snagged a Rokh before. Bigvix and jumped right into them, as gang was in warp in the previous system. I waited until we were landing and then bubbled up. The smart ones burned off and got out, but a Hurricane and Dominix jumped through right into the waiting arms of the gang. Hurricane and Dominix went poof, along with one of their dictors.

Not much of a fight to be honest, but a case in point of how important eyes are when you are traveling. Had the enemy gang been aware of the situation I doubt they would have jumped... in fact I bet they wouldn't have even been sitting on the gate.

We hopped back into Cloud Ring and got convo'd by Cry Havoc. Pax Sex and General Longkill let Vix and I know that a Wildly Innapropriate gang was in and around G8-. See, thats just chill. I recognize we are hitting CH/Evoke/DT... mainly in retaliation for hitting one of our moons. But we used to fly with them quite often, and I know a lot of the guys. There are some pricks, but every alliance has those. So I took the intel and ran with it.

Ran right into the enemy gang. I had jumped into G8- along with Bigvix. Our CH friends informed us they were fighting on the station. Gang was landing on the opposite side, sitting on the G8- gate. I decloaked and dropped a bubble. The WI gang was landing, bam bam bam more and more ships. They all started jumping on contact. I couldn't jump due to aggression, and I wanted to keep eyes as it was. Easley took over on the other side and started barking primaries.

WI got owned. Onyx, Drake, Cane, Cane, Rifter and Incursus for no losses. Doubt they knew what hit them.

Meanwhile, Vix and I had tackled a Harbinger who chose (wisely) not to jump through. I managed to get a bubble on him, but his Heavy Pulse IIs were ripping me to shreds. I had to break orbit, and had Vix come in for the short tackle. He managed to hold onto the Harbinger until the gang started jumping in after letting aggro timers expire. Chalk up one more WI Harbinger.

We moved on towards 6-C, stopping to sniff around and almost catching a small gang just inside Syndicate (lemmings screwed that one up). Unfortunately we didn't get any more kills. Alliance was forming to hit a pos, but I was tired and hit the sack. Good Saturday I would have to say.

Sunday (yesterday) was a lazy day as well, so I logged some more EVE time. Started a roam, took a similar path into Cloud Ring and through P-2 and X-7. Managed only a few T1 kills, until we nailed this Fidelas Constans Vagabond. Just wrong place wrong time for a warp and he got insta-dead. In P-2 I found a Thorax off gate... and burned him out. I zoomed by the Brutix at high speed, dropping a bubble as I did so. He was scram/web fit, however, and I was locked down rather quickly. I immediately called in the gang and had Titus Loken in his Dramiel grab tackle, as Thorax burned out of the bubble. Titus held tackle until Thorax switched to him... and then had to burn off in low armor. By this time the gang was in system and burning out the Thorax, so I got close on him again for a scram/web and dropped a second bubble. Scimitars had me locked and repped and down the Thorax went.

At that point we headed back to 6-C, which was a very uneventful 20 minutes. I noticed that a fleet op that was scheduled (and cancelled due to no POS manager for NEXE being on) was being talked about. Apparently NEXE was able to supply pos for a moon we had reinforced that had come out... two hours before.

Eyes in system showed no CH. None. Pos was not repped. All mods offline.

Ugh.

Original plans for a hot drop were scrapped and I formed up RRBS > All Else. Talking with some alliance directors, I switched advert to Supercaps > Dreads > RRBS > All Else.

Giggidy.

In we went... no opposition. POS dropped with one siege cycle. I even whored onto it with my little stealth bomber. I hate flying worthless crap... but if we get fights I'm more valuable alive on field safely calling targets and managing the fight. Sitting in a new clone at some station is useless.

Another tower came out of reinforce while we were hitting the Cumemare pos... I sent my eyes to take a peak along with an alliance Arazu that had been watching system. Capitals were all out, conventional fleet was on standby as we waited for the POS in Cumemare. Funny story was... the NEXE guy was offline at this point. So the whole reason we had postponed op before (no NEXE pos guy) was now an issue again. So Bonecaya jumped in a POS kit and we took the neo moon.

At this point I contemplated handing off the fleet to Argentina due to homework constraints... but I was reminded that tomorrow meant no school (Labor Day!). So, we called for dreads again, and had 5 titans and some supercaps on standby.

We moved the RRBS fleet the 5jumps to Ruerrotta and lit cyno. In came dreads... and after a quick discussion in came titans and supercarriers. I wanted to bait CH into dropping on us (so we could counter drop), but the fact they had not bitten in Cumemare meant it was unlikely to happen. So in they came, and let me tell you, titans do massive damage with their guns.

Once again, after tower went boom, we scrambled to find a tower. DARK was supposed to take this tech moon, but they didn't have any guys on (understandable, it was insanely early morning euro time) so MVN dropped a small pos on the moon as a placeholder.

Caps out, conventional ships home and a succesful night. For those carebear/market types... it should be interesting to see the price of T2 ships as the technetium market fluctuates due to our activities. Keep an eye out for that.

Its only recent that I have started taking and using caps/supercaps for operations. Those that know me are well aware of my detest for POS shooting ops. Unless theres a fight, I couldn't be more bored. But it is a necessary evil, and to be honest having titans and supercapitals in your gang is.... pretty damn cool.

Look forward to more operations this week, as I have gotten school in a rhythm and such I should be able to manage time more.

When I get home from work, I will post some screenies from the weekend!

That is all.

For LOLs

Nitor1013Z > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMvOJPk37BI LOL

Losses... but worth it.

Last night I was only on for about 2 hrs... I ended up getting homework done (yay!) and taking this new girl out for a ride (I also found out she has an Xbox360 and plays MW2 on live, how chill is that?!?).

In the time that I was playing, I joined up a gang FC'd by Smoke AU. You may remember him as one of the pro scouts I used in the Pure Blind campaign. Small stuff, we ended up trapping a small Cry Havoc gang in MHC-.

Waiting on the F67E gate, which I assumed was their direction of travel, a random Pilgrim jumped into MHC-. He was in a hictor bubble from one of the blues, and I burned him out dropping another bubble so he was stuck. Decloaked and popped, -1 Pilgrim. Not 30 seconds later a Helios came in. Same trick, -1 Helios.

After 10 minutes of yelling at blues to GTFO of the system (as the CH guys had safed up) we sent in a prober and myself in a cloaky Sabre. After a few failed 100% warp ins... the Falcon called out a Drake on comms. Immediately I warped to him at 0... less than a 1AU warp!

As I landed, I hammered the bubble button with my mouse... finally a warp disruption probe dropped and the Drake was stuck.

He immediately started burning off but scram/web = win (until your dictor dies). I called gang in the moment my bubble dropped and they were in warp to me when the Drake's first volley of missiles hammered my Sabre to 1/2 shields.

"Where the hell is my Falcon dammit!" I yelled on comms.

"He's jammed, he's jammed" said the Falcon. Unfortunately for me, he launched a flight of drones before being jammed, which made me nervous. My nervousness changed to fear when no damage showed up, but my lock on the Drake dropped...

EC-300s...

and he was burning out of bubble fast.

"Call points on land, I'm jammed and hes almost out of the bubble!"

"point point point, you can get out!" said someone in fleet.

"I'm good, hes permajammed, almost got away is all"

Down the Drake went. Lesson... if you're bouncing safes, keep bouncing. Especially when probes are still out. Sitting in one spot isn't smart, sitting in one spot not aligned is retarded.

The rest of their gang ended up jumping into F67E... and reports were that more Cry Havoc were joining the fight. I ended up on the F67E gate with a Maelstrom who was more than likely bait (and their FC). For some reason a gang member in a Harbinger landed with me (without orders from Smoke) so I told him to aggress the Maelstrom.

So he did. But didn't move. Or align. Or do anything.

For those who have not encountered (or fly) Minmitar... Artillery wrecks. Especially with no transversal. I screamed at the guy to start moving his ship at least, and to align off.

Too late... local spike like crazy and he was already going down. About 10 Cry Havoc started breaking jump cloak on the gate. So I bubbled and burned off... easily escaping.

Until my attempts to pop a Crow chasing me bit me in the ass. How you ask? I'm sure everyone has done this at some point in time, but hammering my lock button also caused me to approach the CH fleet. Normally not too bad, but they had an Arazu. The moment my MWD turned off, I was toast.

I managed to get the pod out... sad but not too sad I reshipped in 6-C. I officially took gang from Smoke (he was okay with this) and told them to get into BC and logistics. Had we been in heavier ships than ceptors and afs we would have taken them then and there... but there gang would have cooked ours the way compositions stood.

After 15 minutes with fail IT members warping right into the CH camp (who had, by this time, moved onto 6-C gate in 6-E) and giving free kills, we started undocking. Decent logistics and good composition warped to Psyco's Erebus... and I set out in my awesome cyno Drake. The CH gang had moved down the pipe towards Orvolle... nowhere to be found. After 20 minutes we started losing gang members to boredom, so I told Cardking to take the gang out (as I had homework and that girl coming over).

I was heading back and hit FD-MLJ when I saw CH in local, familiar names, then all dissapear. I first went PF-... empty. Burned back to gate, headed up the pipe towards home. Intel started reporting them again in MHC- and then 6-E on 6-C. With the kills they were getting... I can't blame them.

I smacked MVN Command and got PG back online with his titan. Fleet warped back to titan and moved in bridge range as I entered 6-E. Sure enough, local was filled (about 12) with Cry Havoc.

I warped to the gate at 10km... and started burning towards it (like a noob) with no MWD. Vaga tackled... but the rest of their fleet hung off about 50km.

Damn.

Too far to spring trap. So I played the stupid noob card further as I approached jump range. I aggressed the Dramiel that had joined the tackling.

Jackpot.

CH gang started moving in and opened up... but not close enough to point. My shields started buckling, but I held on.

Then the Maelstrom piloted by MukkBarovian (who had been reported as their FC) was there with me. Not sure if he jumped in or warped in, but suddenly he was there.

I pointed him, popped cyno and brought in the gang. Reps were too late in coming... and my Drake went down. Sadly, nothing else in their gang was caught. Had I popped 10 seconds earlier I would have lived, but I needed to make sure that Maelstrom wouldn't get away. Hero tackler baby.

But the Maelstrom was worth it. Well worth it. Still waiting on someone to contract me that Shadow Serpentis Warp Scrambler.... we'll see if I get it.

I called it at this point... 2x losses in one day is bad enough, and I had things to do.

Card took out the gang on a roam and got 2 good fights; one with TEST and the other with Wildly Innapropriate. Both were decisive victories, with very few losses for many kills. Congrats.

MVN FCs are starting to shine again, with Easley, Cardking, Hom3 and myself doing lots of alliance ops. Agro, Cypress, Titus are doing the corp thing (for now). Its good to see.

That is all.