The Republic Fleet Firetail

Is a fun but expensive ship for what it is. This is my conclusion after having owned one for the last month. I don't know if I will replace it once I lose it, I suspect however that I probably will as I can be a sucker fun having something different to fly.

I have been running with a fit that differs from any other that I have seen, every loss mail for a Firetail that I have seen runs some variation that has a Medium Shield Extender in the mids. I don't really like shield buffer/passive recharge setups on small ships. That's not to say that there is anything wrong with them but I like to feel like there is at least something I can do when watching my tank being depleted, be that through cycling an armour rep, shield booster etc. At least then I feel like I have thrown everything to the wall to try and save the ship should it go down.

This is the fit that I have been using on "Private Pile", my Republic Fleet Firetail:

2x 150mm Light AutoCannon II (Republic Fleet Phased Plasma S)
Rocket Launcher II (Foxfire Rage Rocket)

1MN Afterburner II
Stasis Webifier II
Warp Scrambler II
Small Capacitor Booster II (Cap Booster 150)

Small Armor Repairer II
200mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
Damage Control II

2x Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Small Trimark Armor Pump I

===========================

Effective HP: 5,237
Tank Ability: 40.28 DPS
Damage Profile - (EM: 25.00%, Ex: 25.00%, Ki: 25.00%, Th: 25.00%)
Shield Resists - EM: 12.50%, Ex: 56.25%, Ki: 47.50%, Th: 30.00%
Armor Resists - EM: 66.00%, Ex: 23.50%, Ki: 36.25%, Th: 44.75%

Capacitor: Stable at 46.18%

Volley Damage: 301.07
DPS: 119.45

The main downside is that it has pretty low DPS for my liking, however it looks really cool in my opinion and I have fun flying it. It also has the added bonus that people always expect you to be shield tanked and usually shoot you with the least optimal damage type!

What's in your Hangar?

This is the question asked at EVOGANDA

The question has two parts to all intents and purposes:

Q1. Do you follow a naming convention, if so what is it?

A1. Yes, I like to try and follow themes. Occasionally I'll throw in a wildcard but I tend to follow a theme. I started naming my ships after Dangermouse characters but soon found that I ran out, I'm currently naming ships after well known cartoon characters and thinking of naming them after Pokemon next for a laugh. I need to keep themes with plenty of names as I do tend to get through rather a lot of ships due to the nature of the piracy beast.

Q2. What's in your hangar right now?

A2. Lots of ships

Betty Boop - Rifter (Artillery fit), plus two un-named spares.
Calvin - Rifter (Gank fit)
George of the Jungle - Thrasher (Armour tank), plus un-named spare.
Grape Ape - Jaguar (Gang fit), plus un-named spare.
Green Giant - Rifter (Artillery fit).
Grimm - Rifter (Gank fit), plus fourteen un-named spares.
Hagar the Horrible - Jaguar (Solo fit), plus un-named spare.
Heckle & Jeckle - Rifter (Cookie Cutter), plus two un-named spares.
Hello Kitty - Thrasher (Shield Tank).
Hobbes - Rifter (Gank fit).
Homer Simpson - Wolf.
Huckleberry Hound - Thrasher (Shield tank), plus two un-named spares.
Imperial Navy Slicer - Un-named as I can't actually fly it.
Private Pile - Republic Fleet Firetail.
The Grinch - Thrasher (Artillery fit), plus un-named spare.
Zephyr

These are spread amongst three hangars with the majority being at home base. All my ships including spares are fully fitted and rigged.

I hate to fly a ship when I don't have a spare of the same fitting. Hopefully another Wolf will be in my hangar soon.

So, what's in your hangar?

Tusker Interview #4

Another of Romeo Blakstorms' superb interviews has been posted today. This time CEO of The Tuskers Ka Jolo goes under the spotlight.

Read all about it here

EVE Uni Q & A on Piracy

Mynxee posts a link in her recent blog post to a recent EVE university Q&A on Piracy. EVE Uni interviewed:

Ka Jolo - The Tuskers
Mynxee - NOIR
Sard Caid - Gunpoint Diplomacy
Verone - VETO

Link to download here

I have just spent a very worthwhile few hours listening to the Q&A, greatly enjoying it. If you can spare the time I recommend you give it a listen.

Decimating a Wormhole Mining Gang

Last night something happened which went so well we couldn't have asked for more.

In a system near to Hevrice a prober found four wormholes. Then across vent you hear something which surely cannot be true...

Prober> Err, guys. I have three Hulks mining in a wormhole
Other> No wai!
Prober> Way!
Other> No wai!
Other> You're joking right?
Prober> No wai!

(Above transcript fictional for poor attempt at humor, but you get the idea)

Immediately everyone starts burning back to base to get in the most useful ships, and once the gang composition is complete there are ten of us waiting at the wormhole entrance. The key component of the master plan being two Arazus each with three points. They take up positions after some sneaky manouvering, and just as they are about to decloak and engage points a Mastodon (T2 Hauler) arrives at the scene. The Arazus decloak and spread their points around while the rest of us make best speed across 50AU. A Drake appears on scene too as we land, which is primaried and destroyed in fairly short order. Once he's down we leisurely work our way through the rest to make sure everyone whores onto the killmails. All bar one of the enemy pilots manages to get their Pods out, the one we snag declines the ransom opportunity and is swiftly despatched. Cleaning up the scene of devastation we loot the wrecks, salvage all the wrecks (mmm T2 salvage) and steal the ore too. Nobody will ever know we were there right? A superbly orchestrated operation.

A Tale of Two Pods

Both mine.

It was one of those times when you wonder if the world is conspiring to take you down a peg or three. I am fortunate in so much as I don't fly with expensive implants or perhaps the urge to "ragelog" would have been greater, but a couple of days ago I had an evening where everything I touched or did seemed to go horribly wrong.

The culmination of the fail-cascade was me being podded twice within an hour of each other. First I engaged a Claw in my Rifter and lost, I got the message that my Pod was warping and then watched it get destroyed. Landing in a fresh clone some 50 low-sec jumps away I renewed my clone, plugged in some cheap +1's jumped into a Thrasher and set off back to Hevrice. I had gotten to the Heimatar Faction Warfare area. I was warping out to the next gate as a Punisher snagged me just as a Faction Warfare gang landed on the same gate and made very short work of my ship and pod. Waking again in Aralgrund I decided I was going to take the "safer" short route across high-sec in my Reaper after renewing another clone and plugging in some more +1's. This trip was fortunately uneventful, though the Faction police managed to relinquish my Reaper of shields, armour & a chunk of hull before I got back to Hevrice.

Thinking back to why this happened, I conclude that I have become guilty of complacency. I seem to have become overconfident in my abilities and have paid the price. I hope now that I fully appreciate the lesson I have received. Confidence is a good thing, Over-Confidence only sets you up for a fall.

March 2010 Character Review

This month has seemed to run along quite slowly, I'm not entirely sure why as it's been an interesting one.

I've now been able to upgrade my secondary jump clones implants to +2's so I don't feel frustrated jumping into it and losing training time and I've started taking a peek at some hardwiring, dang they can be pricy! As we stand, there are 308 days remaining in my Rifter plan. As per last month I have continued to diversify from the Rifter plan. The Thrasher plan has been completed and I can now fly Thrasher nicely with all relevant skills at least to IV. I also picked up and trained Assault Ships which also is now at IV.

The next goal is the Dramiel once I have my Drone skills done in a couple of months, followed by Rupture and then on to the Hurricane. As I am relucant to let go of the Rifter plan I will be interleaving skills from these other plans by doing for example one Rifter skill, one Drone skill, one Rifter skill etc. Yes I am fully aware that I am delaying flying the bigger ships, but I feel that if I put down the Rifter plan it will never get finished.

Increasing Kirith's SP's this month by 1.5 million the most significant gains have been to Mechanic, Gunnery, Spaceship Command and making a start on Drones. Drones V completes tomorrow.


After spending practically the Darkblade family's net worth this month on restocking the hangar with Thrashers, Rifters and a smattering of T2 frigs cash resources have bounced back nicely, especially after my recent good fortune on the market recently, even to the extend that I bought a Jaguar for Kirith hangar in Aralgrund.

I am making use of all my alt slots, the four non-training alts are station trading on their basic 5 buy/sell orders and my Miner alt is chugged away towards a Hulk in just over a month. Trade alts total income generated so far 253m ISK.

Updated Battleclinic stats:
- The Tuskers are ranked 39th, up one place on last month.
- Kirith has 411 kills for 72 losses, My busiest month ever for both kills and losses.
- Assets destroyed soars to a total of just under 8bn this month.