May 2012 Character Review

Is it just me, or did the last month fly by seemingly very quickly? Straight down to business then with the statistics for the last month:

50 Ship kills (31 Solo)

16 Pod kill (13 Solo)

2,559,261,053 Isk cost to victims (140,637,816 Isk received in loot)

8 Ships Lost

0 Pods Lost

211,192,519 Isk lost in value of ships destroyed

(70,554,703) Isk lost for the month

As you can see from the kills & losses above I've been far more active in game this month than I was the previous month, something I'm very pleased with. I have also flown far more recklessly which shows in the losses. Despite losing isk in the month when comparing kills & losses I've had a lot of fun in the process and that's what matter ultimately to me.

The ships I lost were:

1 x 400mm plated Rifter, a great 1v1 against a Merlin. In an effort to streamline my hangar I've been flying some ships with old fits that have been gathering dust. Despite this I've found some great fights, like this one.

1 x Suicide thrasher, a took a little part in the early stages of Hulkageddon. Actually I lost three Thrashers but 2 don't count in Corp as they were killed by Concord. I can't say I "enjoy" ganking but it was an interesting change for a day or two.

1 x Hawk, I engaged a Prophecy in a belt and whilst the brain said he's likely bait I wen't for it anyway. My Hawk died swiftly to him.

1 x Hurricane, Going back for revenge on the Prophecy I land with him, unfortunately for me he calls in a couple of Tornados to help leaving me buggered. Can't blame him and a fun twist.

1 x Vengeance, my first outing in the Vengeance was with a potential new Tusker, we roamed down to Heimatar where we ended up in a 7 vs 2 engagement. This tough little nut amazed me and we didn't go down without one of the best fights I've had in recent memory.

1 x Rupture, lost in when I managed to land right on top of a Talos. Quick and messy loss.

1 x Vigil, pretty lolfit. One evening a few of us went out in frigates for fun and I decided to try and lose this contraption which I did by getting one-shotted by a Thrasher.

1 x Stabber, on a long roam I ran into an EVE University gang in Heimatar. Jammed scrammed then deaded but this Cruiser amazed me by taking out an Enyo!

Here's what Kirith's skill chart looks like this month:

These are the skills that Kirith has completed training of this month:

Gallente Drone Specialization IV
Minmatar Battleship IV

Minmatar Battleship is still cooking and gets finished on Friday, right on cue for the roam I hope to take out. Might even buy something silly to lose on it, it's only isk right? Anyone have any thoughts on Fleet Tempest & Machariel fits out there.....?

After Minmatar BS V completes it's on to Heavy Drones all the way to V which will take me just about into July all being well.

I haven't prioritised trading this month, netting just 66m in profits. The market scene is still all over the place I find when not looking at it daily. My future capital pilot diversified into PI some more and has trained for an Iteron V to make the process easier. Now done with that she's back to training for the Thanatos. Speaking of which I've taken the first steps towards acquisition of the ship so more on that one day in the future. PI though is my carebear activity of choice and I'm pleased with the returns I'm getting which is the main cause of my lessened focus on station trading.

Total Ransoms Received: 555,360,662.30 Isk (5m Isk received in the month)
Battleclinic Rank:  447 (+25) 

For Laughs

This Sunday I had some time in game and that time turned out to be great fun.

There were some fun a frollicks with a Dominix & Drake combination who seemed to come to Hevrice looking for a fight. Three BC's from The Tuskers formed up and took up the offer of a fight, Kirith in a Drake. Turns out the Dominix was active shield tanked and it happily shrugged off the kinetic damage from our three Drakes. The Drake working with the Dominix landed some 50km off and I went for point on it, which unfortunately took my dps off the Dominix. My Drake vs the hostile Drake, both HML fit we spewed misiles at each other with gleeful abandon as I was a long way away from the Dominix and out of range. Unfortunately whilst we were have our own little head to head one of the Tusker Drakes went down against the Dominix. My fight with the Drake was pretty even but as we both were close to being broken I (over)overheated my launchers and managed to melt them. Warping out to repair my heat damage and regen shields our opponents fled the field and left system, it was a fun fight but I have to learn to better manage my overheat. gf's exchanged in local.

Later on I switched to Grumblecub 2 and jumped in to the neighbouring system, Jov. I spotted a Mantcore in a faction war mission and warped in. The Manticore was about 170km away but I burned for it anyways, I got within 26km before they warped away but not before they had fired a couple of very ineffective Torpedo volleys at me. I warped out and then warped back to the mission where I waited patiently. After a short while the Manticore lands with me and is destroyed in very swift order, the best part of this was having no GCC as he'd agressed me earlier. Over the course of the afternoon I kept checking to see whether I could catch them again as they came back to try and finish the mission, sadly to no avail.

Back in Hevrice, I spot a Rupture in space. It didn't belong to anyone in The Tuskers so I dock and reship to one of my own Ruptures. By this time he's left system so I set off in pursuit towards Aeschee. In Aeschee he's flitting about and I'm not sure what he's doing. I know who the pilot is but can't fathom his random warping. Eventually I pin him down to a belt, warp in and destroy if swift order. I had hoped for a more challenging fight but was satisfied to have gotten a kill in a Cruiser as I don't fly them very often.

Back to Hevrice and I decide that I'm a little bit bored. I get into one of my Scythes, this is one of the hulls which I mentioned the other week that I wanted to have a laugh with. Undocking I'm fearful that I'll be laughed out of space but set off in search of targets.

A few systems from home I park in a belt trying to act like a good little miner and it isn't long before a Rifter pilot tries his hand like a moth to the flame that is a miner in low-sec. He lands and I'm upon him determined not to let him get away. I engage and literally within the blink of a eye he's toast and warping his Pod out. I literally laughed out loud and couldn't stop giggling. I had destroyed him before a corp mate could even land in the belt, it was so so fast! Again no GCC.

Within minutes of securing my loot I'm back in my belt "mining" and another Rifter lands with me, another dance and another dead Rifter. This one did better though taking me into 80% armour and trying to make a run for it. Through careful overheat of propulsion, point & guns he doesn't make it out. No GCC again.

I can't see this tactic working for long before people get wise to it, but at the moment its hilarious!

Hi....

It's been a while.

So, I have reactivated on the try Incarna for 5 days basis.

Getting reacquainted I undock in whatever I was sat in when I last logged in as I now can't see it due to seeing my avatar instead. It appears that I'm in Severina, a Rupture. Having done a complete reinstall of the EVE client I have only the default overview and setting, no shortcuts, nothing.

I hit the D-scan, hello little Incursus. I'm rusty but narrow him down to a belt, pleased with how quickly it all comes back to me.

Warp in, lock, point, boom. His pod escapes my slow lock time.

Adrenaline level.... I've got the shakes and the adrenaline of the first kill. Awesome!

Hello EVE, I think I'll be back.

June 2010 Character Review

It's a couple of days late, for which I apologise.

June has been a weird month for me, it kicked off with the Alliance Tournament which seems like oh so long ago. Then I was swept up with the Dramiel whirlwind and destroyed a host of ships with it. Since the loss of the Dramiel though I have struggled to find the inclination to fly. Tonight for example I was determined to get out there and fly. And I did just that, but only for 25 minutes. In that 25 minutes I managed to lose Blog Moar!, the Wolf which I have talked about a couple of times. It was lost valiantly tackling a Myrmidon whilst a corp mate attacked it with his Ishtar. Now I am logged off again feeling a bit "Meh, can't be arsed". The biggest factor in this for me is that June also saw my trusty laptops graphics card overheat and completely wreck my laptop. I have been attempting to fly on my desktop PC but I just can't get my mojo using a desktop. Fortunately though my new laptop is scheduled to arrive on Monday so I should be back to my pillage & plundering ways soon enough.

After some catch up on the Rifter plan for having diverted to the Dramiel I had three level V skills to catch this month before getting myself into the interleaving of plans. Motion Prediction, Rapid Fire & Sharpshooter are now all resplendent at level V, Hull Upgrades V has only two days remaining now. 229 days remaining on the Rifter plan. I don't expect much progress on that plan through July as I will be getting Medium Projectile Turret to V along with Medium Autocannon Specialisation to IV. Maybe just squeezing out one or two Rifter skills.

I have purchased my first Cruiser hulls already in anticipation. Five Ruptures & Stabbers, Two Bellicose & Cyclones and a single Hurricane. A drop in the ocean in numbers as I will have another five Ruptures, eight more Cyclones & nine more Hurricanes joining them soon. Moving them is a logistical "challenge" but I do like to keep a very well stocked hangar.

PS. I also plan to buy a Scythe for my comedy collection.

Kirith sits at 16.3m SP right now, major gain in the month is clearly to Gunnery. I did have to train Target Painting up for the Tournament, but other than that blip things went to plan.


My trading alts profits dropped again this month to 104m from 138m the previous month which is disheartening. Following the "free" 100,000 SP's from CCP (Thank you)I chucked a load into trading skills for my Hulk pilot to make him a much more effective trader. It early days of course as this was only a few days ago, but early signs are good. My probing alt as has been mentioned previously has now finished getting his skills to a good standard so i have moved onto my Freighter alt which again is an isk sink to train up even without the actual purchase of the Freighter!

Some stats:
Tuskers: Rank 20 on Battleclinic
Kirith: Kills 678(188 in June), Losses 108 (4 in June)
Kirith: ISK Destroyed 18.9Bn, Lost 1.1Bn

May 2010 Character Review

263 days remaining on the Rifter plan. Perhaps not as much progress this month as I perhaps had hoped at the start of the month, but I guess that the way the cookie crumbles when you start eating into those longer skills and interleaving two skill plans at a time.

June is upon us and that means a few things to me. First and as I stated last month in the not too distant future this month I will be behind the wheel of the Dramiel, which I have been looking forward to for some time now. I really hope that it lives up to my expectations. I have two fitted and ready to go in the hangar but am doing a stirling job of resisting the temptation to fly them until I am properly skilled. The two that I have are both fitted differently, one with something of a controversial fit. There are two fits that I also want to try, the classic fit and I want to try an utterly bizarre fit that will need me to get Shield Upgrades V to fit. The latter will have to wait a while I think.


June also means that the Alliance Tournament starts this coming weekend. The Tuskers and The Bastards formed an Alliance for the purpose of entering. I have been doing bits here and there to help out with practice and will be cheering our team on from the bar & big screen TV in Hev V. Hopefully Mr Snypes ladies will be coming along to provide entertainment between matches. Good luck fellas.

Finally June will see the first true steps into bigger hulls and bigger guns as I start training for a Rupture. Minmatar Cruiser will be taken to V before I get into one of course and that will be the last skill on the plan that I train to avoid temptation to take one out for a spin.

Up to 14.7m SP now, and this months big gains are made in Drones, with some padding in Spaceship Command, Gunnery & Navigation. Drone skills should be fine where they are for a while, Navigation is nearly maxed out for me too. Next months gains will predominantly be in Gunnery & Missiles.



The main hangar is still well stocked, due to a further supply run bringing in a couple of new Rifter flavours to try and limited play time reducing my losses. I think I have around 55 ships in Hev right now with plenty more scattered about the universe.

Funding this are my hard working alt team. I don't know whether it's just me but this month station trading has been poor, bringing in 138m isk to the coffers which is well down on last month. I have "lost" an alt from station trading to being my prober which has an impact, especially as I have invested quite a bit of isk into his Covops, skill purchases & implants. Given time I should be able to get him to earn his keep. My afk miner is resplendent in a Hulk too which has eaten up a chunk of isk. Overall it's been an expensive month given the reduced level of income.

I should probably save the months stats update for following the MEME started by Romeo but I'll give a brief summary here as normal:
- Tuskers Battleclinic rank is all over the show lately, so we'll see next month when hopefully it settles down.
- Battleclinic is also broken at the moment, but Kirith is upto around 590 kills for 104 losses. I have been having a bit of a laugh with Slasher & Burst frigates recently so expect to see them die in a fire on Battleclinic soon!

Come on lads, don't you know there's a war on?

Well, err no actually.

I don't know actual the reasons why, but at some point in the last few days the Nostradamus Effect Alliance retracted its war against The Tusker Bastards Alliance. Of course there are some obvious hints on our killboard as to the reason why, but I wouldn't like to state that as the reason.

The war, was well, very strange. Trying to camp a pirate corp into their home station with about 4-6 pilots probably isn't the greatest idea. Who knows how many Tusker vessels are holed up the bowels of that station but if I'm anything to go by, it's a helluva lot. This gave our pilots the ability to pretty much choose whatever they pleased to undock in. Of course, much docking games were had but props to them that they did fight occassionally. Unfortunately I think I missed out on all the fights.

Lately I've not been getting so much time online, or on the blog as I imagine that you have noticed. No, I'm not quitting EVE or taking a break! Dratted real life presents a massive work load. Work's busy as we hurtle towards the annual audit and at home the sale of my house was agreed a few days back so I'm going to be sorting all that and somewhere new to live out in the coming weeks.

A couple of parting shots for this short blog entry:

I'm very pleased to see that it looks like Battleclinic is up and running properly again after a weeks brainfart on rankings. Thanks BC team for fixing it.

My probing skills on my alt are continually improving, today we took out a mission running Drake & also a mission running Rupture. I'm loving the probing alt and can't wait to get him in a proper Covops ship!

Spring has Sprung

Casiella Truza of Ecpiltic Rift posted a few days back about their in game plans in the near future taking them through Spring 2010. He asked the community if they had any interesting projects coming up.

Jumping on the bandwagon, this is what Kirith and my second account characters have lined up:

Kirith
As I worked out this morning has another 118 days to go before setting foot into a Rupture. The Rupture will be nicely fitted out and have all the necesary skills to fly it well and I am very much looking forward to the day I fly cruisers, and especially battlecruisers.


Why so long? a lot of corp mates have asked. Well, of course I could fly it quicker than that but I have some rules that I am following you see. I am determined that I do not lose sight of my long term goal of flying a max skill Rifter. When I say max skill I mean literally every skill that is publically available and affects a Rifter I will have at 5 at the plans conclusion. This includes all of the support skills. Not only then will I fly a fairly overpowered Rifter, but loads of those skills will naturally benefit a host of other ships. But I digressed a bit, so back to the subject of why so long. Every skill towards the Rupture I am taking to least level 4, once I have that skill to 4 I do another Rifter skill to level 5 and interleave them. Eg.

- Combat Drone Operation, train levels 1-4.
- Fuel Conservation, train level 5.
- Drone Interfacing, train levels 1-4.

You get the idea. Now the shortest of my Rifter plan skills as they are all train to level 5's from 4 is currently 7 days 22 hours and they get longer from there.

There are two distinct sections of skills for the Rupture, Drones & Cruiser specifics like medium guns. Once Kirith completes training the Drone skills, a quick stint of Gallente Frigate 1-5 will be trained to give my a bit of fun as I plan to buy a Dramiel to mess around with.


The alts
My alts are still doing a comfortable job of station trading generating a nice income stream on their basic bog standard 5 orders. Bringing in an average of 8-10m isk per day for 30 minutes of time spent updating orders.

In 12 days my "afk miner" will be in a Hulk.
Plus 33 days an alt will be behind the wheel of a Charon Freighter
Plus 55 days the other alt will be a properly skilled Covops pilots

TL:DR
Kirith, Dramiel & Rupture
Alts, Hulk, Charon, Covops

How about you, anything interesting planned?

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.

Kill of the Month: February

Yes I know, it isn't February anymore and no it isn't a typo.

Recently a monthly challenge was started on The Tuskers forums where throughout the month the killboards are scoured and kills are put forward for consideration as kill of the month. Last month my Drake kill in a Rifter was a contender.

There were five engagements voted on:
Tressin takes his toll on a destroyer gang in his Rupture
Bart takes out two Ishkurs in his Vexor
My Drake kill in a Rifter
Sonbalins Thorax snags a Vagabond
Latro takes out a Hurricane & Celestis in a Wormhole

As the votes rolled in it ended up as a a close run thing between my Drake kill with corp-mate SonBalin's Vagabond kill in his Thorax. The votes fell in a my favor and my prize, a shiny Imperial Navy Slicer. Granted I can't fly it but will do one day!

What's with all these entertaining fights lately?

It seems that this last week has been one of the best in my EVE experience as a pirate. I've had some very fun and interesting fights. A small showcase below:

Rifter & Thorax
I had warped to the gate after spotting a lone neutral Rifter sat 10km away, I was trying to get him to aggress me but he was having none of it, as I was merrily orbiting him a second flashy Rifter piloted by Eviwyn, of Hellcats notoriety landed and locked me up and engaged, just after she engaged a non-flashy Thorax landed and also locked me up and engaged. Yikes! Unlocking the neutral Rifter to avoid getting accidentally gate-gunned I set about the Rifter and made good progress in destroying it. By the time the Rifter was down I was into around half-armour, I switched focus to the Thorax and his drones. Without the added pressure on my tank of the Rifter I was able to effectively speed tank the Thorax and his drones taking him out efficiently.

Busting a small low-sec ratting gang
Entering system, this gang were at the only belt immediately on scan, by the time I had warped there they had left, so using the gold old pirate initiative I selected the next belt I thought that they would go to and warped to zero. Landing amongst a Kestrel, Tristan & Caracal I decided to take out the fastest first. So the kestrel went down, followed soon after by the Tristan. The Caracal had not warped out to my joy and was trying to avenge his corp-mates by spamming Heavy Thunderbolt missiles at me. He didn't last long with my fire switching to him. I bet they must have been scratching their heads wondering wtf just happened afterwards. PS. Ignore the Osprey on related kills, I found that later.

OPM Holdings
I'm sat safed in Adirain and see a Kestrel ratting in a belt. I warp in pop it, and pod the pilot. Return to safe spot to wait out GCC and the pilot returns in a Stabber, goes to the same belt again so I warp in pop the ship and pod him again. Return to safe to wait out GCC. Pilot re-enters local in a Stabber with a friend in a Rupture, I warp in pop the Stabber and his pod but am gallantly gunned down by the Rupture. Fortunately I jettisoned my loot at my safe before engaging. I return to base to reship. I return to Adirain again to find him back again! Ratting, again! This time he's in a Rifter so of course I go in, pop his ship and pod him again. Way too funny.

The Typhoon 50 jumps away
Bourreau, a corp-mate says on vent that he got a Typhoon tackled piloted by a three month old. Problem is that he's 50 jumps away! In for the long haul Bourreau sets to work. I decide to jump clone to Aralgrund, jump in a Rifter and speed for his location some 11 jumps away. Bourreau notes that another pirate has entered local. I eventually arrive after probably ten minutes and rendezvous with my friend in his Jaguar. We soon have the Typhoon in low armour as a Rapier decloaks 175km away and starts to MWD towards us. Bourreau bugs out to save his Jaguar but I want this guys ship killed so I hang in as the Rapier closes. As the Rapier gets within 17km from me the Phoon explodes and I align out only to be webbed, pointed and have Warrior II's sicked on me. I shoot down a number of the Drones and the Rapier bugs out \o/.

Another Corps low-sec op ruined by Kirith
So last night I'm minding my own, cruising around look for something to pewpew. I sight a gang of four ships ratting together. A game of cat and mouse ensues and I eventually land amongst them and catch their Thrasher while the rest of them bug out, I pod him too as there's another Thrasher looming. Once my GCC is up I set off in search of the other three, two systems out I find them but see a Brutix on scan too. Hmm, I drop off my loot at a station then undock to go for no guts no glory kamikaze style madness. I warp in on the Rupture, Rifter & Caracal. Boom, Rifter goes down first then the Rupture and his Pod, finally the Caracal. Battle report here. As I finish off the Caracal the Brutix appears and a Dramiel is on scan. I align out and burn away from the Brutix escaping before returning to loot the field.

The Rifter truly is a ship to fear in the hands of a madman who does not care so much about losing it! Who said solo piracy is dead!

Rifter Solo's Drake!

Well, the title of the post indicates what the highlight of my week has been. Detail of the fight is further down the post, needless to say I was extremely pleased with the result and my corpmates would attest that I wouldn't shut up about it for a while!

I had spent a fair amount of time in the Bleak Lands on our current campaign recently and was getting a bit disheartened by the difficulty in soloing effectively in a Faction Warfare zone in a Rifter, so many blobs around. The one time this week I found a Minmatar Militia Rifter doing a complex I got jumped by a five man Amarr Militia gang before I could kill the Rifter who sadly got away.

Noticing that I have lost a number of ships of late and not sold on my hard fought loot drops means that my isk balance has hardly moved. This made me start to think about other ways I could earn isk fairly easily. I moved my hauler alt to Rens to have a go at some small scale trading, as she's on the same account as Kirith I invested a few minutes only on training Trade I to increase my orders from 5 to 9 so as not to take away much precious training time from Kirith. Starting with a cash balance of only 300k isk 4 days ago i now have increased her value in buy & sell orders to over 10m isk, not bad for a few days work. I do some order management before and after I log off Kiriths sessions and usually in a morning too for ten minutes before work. I'm still finding my feet with what to buy & sell but things look good! I've also been looking at the feasibility of using a 21 day free trial to make a mission runner and see how much isk I can bring in during those 21 days, the down side of course being using the mission runner means I can't pewpew with Kirith. Jury is still out on that one.

The weeks combat review, Battlecruiser-tastic! As I mentioned getting a bit disillusioned with Bleak Lands I jump-cloned "home" to my old stomping grounds, I've had some good fortune since doing so...

Parting shots in Bleak Lands
Noir and I were hanging around in Huola and noticed a Harbinger zipping around, we both set out to find him and eventually Noir caught up with him at a planet. Calling in any corp mates in system to assist, Jolo undocking a Dominix heading on over as I too headed in, I was in an Arty Rifter which really was designed as something of a fast fleet tackler not suited to a DPS role. Noir's Thrasher went down and I soon started taking more damage than I could handle from drones as another Harbinger along with a Myrmidon & Kestrel had joined the fray. I had to bail, so warped out then back again after I had repped up. Jolo was doing an awesome job, having taken down a Harbinger and being well at work on a Myrmidon as I re-entered, again drones were sent after me but I went down as the Myrm did. The second Harbinger warped out just before the Myrm popped. I'd managed to get a point long enough on the Kestrel before I went down for Jolo to get one too so he didn't escape either.

Rifter Once, Rifter Twice
This chap was unfortunate enough to be caught by me twice on consecutive days. The fights were straight forward enough and he ran away as I warped in both times, only to return to ratting afterwards. On the second time of me jumping back in however he would turn and engage me, not that I'm complaining at all but....why?! He did it both times aswell so perhaps some folk don't learn.

Rifter kills Drake, Solo!
This kill has to be my most satisfying yet. Entering the system there is only me in my Rifter and this fellow in his Drake, he's ratting. Now normally any sane person would think, it's a Drake so why bother trying to crack it's tank. But I thought, might aswell have a go, I'll be able to gtfo if I need to. He's enagaged with the last rat as I land and makes no attempt to leave as I close, could it be a trap I wonder? Still deciding that I can bug out if I need to I engage. During the ten minute fight a number of pilots came and went through the system but none came to investigate our engagement, thankfully. My first priority was taking out his 5 Drones as they were doing a bit too much damage and had I left them alone I would have succumbed. Now to the formidable tank, I slotted in a magazine of EMP S and let loose, slowly but surely his shield was depleting until around 1/3 shield left, peak recharge. His damage to me was inconsequential and easily tankable with speed, I barely had to even pulse the SAR II. I overloaded my highs and pushed through his peak recharge into his armour. At this point I asked him for 70m isk for me to stop and save his ship and Pod, say that he didn't have it I proceeded to remove what remained of his ship. His damage had stopped on me by the time I killed him, looking at the KM it appears that he ran out of ammo, how embarrassing! Such a tremendous feeling when it went pop and put me on a high for the whole evening. I renamed my Rifter "Drake Bane" in honour! The fit on the Drake was not a bad one either, sure not T2 fit but still I am very pleased to have taken down this mighty tough ship piloted by a character older than I with a lowly Rifter.

Caracal
There's a Caracal sat on a gate to highsec, hmm looking for a fight I imagine. I warped to 200 from the gate and he jumps to high-sec. I decide to go sit in a safe to see if anyone else enters the system when the Caracal comes back. I went to sit at a planet to make myself easy to scan down, sure enough in he comes. I could be asking for trouble if he's assault launcher fit but I'm game anyway. Turns out he's Heavy Missile fit and can't really pose a threat to me so it's a simple matter of reducing him to a wreck. Later in the evening the pilot came back looking for me for revenge (his words), sadly he didn't get chance as he jumped into a belt and was ganked by a small four man gang. Pity

Rupture
Considering the very young age of the pilot, this thing took some killing. He was ratting and I engaged him, he took the rats out then started on me, I was taking a fair bit of damage as he kept spitting Warrior I's at me, each time I killed them he sent more. Well eventually he ran out of Drones so I could actually fire on him and he went down along with his Pod. Looking at the fit he had small weapons fitted which explains why I was taking more damage than expected.

One unhappy Cyclone pilot
While waiting out GCC after killing the Rupture, this Cyclone entered system and started, yep you guessed it...ratting. Still high on my earlier Drake kill I went in and was rewarded with the kill in quite short order, though perhaps it seemed short order as I was glued to my D-scan due to the high local population. After the fight the pilot convo'd me telling me to give him the 23m to replace the ship, when I explained to him that wasn't how piracy worked he was less than impressed and now vows to hunt me down for all of eternity, super I look forward to our next clash!

Stabber at a Gate
This fellow was keeping a low profile in system, hugging gates between warping to safe spots. Eventually his willpower failed when I had been sat at a gate for the best part of 5 minutes. I was 200km from the gate when he landed so was able to warp back and land close to him. I had 17km to cover to be able to catch him, approaching at overloaded max speed with overloads mid's I caught him with my scram and killed his MWD taking a ton of damage on the way in but once within 1200m of his and orbiting it was game over for him and I barely took a scratch from that point. Once he was down I then made a mistake and shot his Pod out under the gaze of the Sentries, figuring I could escape. Alas it was not be and my Rifter got toasted. I came back later in another Rifter and recovered all the loot so not too bad on the whole.

Harbinger
I really don't know what this was about. I had spotted this ship at a safe early in the evening. Returning some hours later it was still there, I asked my nearby friend in his Helios if he would mind finding it for me, which he did in a minute or so. The Harbinger appeared to be dead in space not moving. I warped in and took it out without even being shot at, so I assumed the pilot to be afk. Waiting with glee to see the contents I was very disappointed to find it an empty ship. Venting my frustrations on the pilot's Pod. The only thing I can think of is that it must be an insurance job wanting someone to nuke the ship, but they could have self distructed it to do that. Who knows...

The Artillery PVP Rifter - Initiation

Yes, a strange post title and indeed combining the artillery and pvp in the same sentence. More on that later.

Quite a few kills in the last few days so a quick summary of them:

Vexor
I decided to jump clone back to Heimatar a for a 24 hour stint back in my "old stomping grounds" and looking in my hangar I remembered that before I headed off to pastures new with The Tuskers I had bought fit some PVP Artillery Rifters but had yet to test them. So I set off in one and eventually came across a Vexor in a cosmic anomaly. My heart sank a bit when he was 130km away and I was Afterburner fit. Worth a try anyway I deemed as there were plenty of rats closer than I so I might be able to close before I appeared on his overview. Keeping a close eye on him he was aligned to warp out but he either can't have seen me or assumed I had a short point fitted as I pointed him from 20km and settled into a wide orbit. My modest damage plus that of the rats was more then he could handle and he died quickly. I took out his Pod too when he wasn't paying the ransom.

Raven
I was missing my Corp mates so jumped back to Verge Vendor at the earliest opportunity. A Raven was spotted in a mission nearby, If I recall a 2006 character. A prober came a soon dug him out upon which we went in and took him out very quickly. His Pod went too when he was quite rude in our ransom discussions. I assume looking at the fit that he either must have been inactive some of his lifetime or that perhaps the character had been sold to another player. Triple tank type hull repairing Raven ftw amirite?

Rifter
Hevrice and its neighbouring systems are in Faction Warfare zone and there are quite a number of plexes and missions spawning. I decided to wait on one while doing some scanning and this little Rifter warped right onto the acceleration gate with me. I had advised the corp that he was inbound and two other fleet members landed to whore the killmail, unfortunately pirate willpower didn't hold long enough for the fourth member of the fleet to get on the mail and he got toasted no matter how much I kept asking for people to hold fire. He got away with his Pod though.

Myrmidon
Keeping my eyes on the scanner I saw this Myrm on scan before it docked up. I advised corp so they decided to undock a few ships on him as he undocked. Unfortunately as Rifters are not so good at tanking Sentry Guns I merely warped in to get on the Killmail and then warped out again. I look forward to the day I have something big enough to participate in.

Drake
Last night I logged in to find a T1 Frigate gate in action in Old Man Star. I headed out to join them as quick as I could. They had taken quite a toll on the locals by the time I arrived, listening to three ships being killed just while I was on my way! Unfortunately the killmails for two Incursus we got before this Drake that we killed are missing somewhere in the ether. This Drake and a Thorax were at a Faction Warfare mission that had spawned so we engaged, unfortunately it was a trap and we got obliterated, but not before taking the Drake down for the loss of three T1 frigs. Not a bad swap.

Imicus
I saw this on a gate and was certain it was bait for a trap so I jumped through the gate to have a looksee. Nothing on the other side so I jumped back through and killed it while the pilot must have been afk. I took out his Pod too so I guess he wasn't a happy bunny when he came back. I still have no idea what he was doing there though!

Rupture
This fellow was in Hevrice, I think the only unfriendly in the system at the time so I don't really know why he hung around. Heedless we proceeded to work on scanning him down and when we got very close to 100% he warped away. Not to worry though as within a minute or so a corp mate called point and warp to Romeo. A whole bunch of us blobbed him and saved Romeo's Exequeror from a sticky end (Cheer \o/) so the Rupture died fast. We snagged the Pod too when the pilot declined the ransom opportunity.

Merlin
I found this fellow in a Faction Warfare mission complex and discovered him 70ish km away. I reported it to corp anyway and a couple of corp mates were in the vicinity so tried to get there before I or he died. I was gratified to see him engage me, but it was a very close fight. I was capped out by the end and at 99% Structure but once I had broken his shield it was game over for him. Noir managed to get a single volley off at him but my other Corp mate didn't quite get a lock in time and I wasn't in a state to hold fire.

Catalyst
The final kill for this review is a 2 month old player in a Catalyst, frankly me getting this was pure chance as I picked up a Catalyst on scan as I left a gate. I knew he wasn't at the gate so took a guess at one of the belts on scan and warped straight there. I landed 3km from him and it was a quick death for his ship. I attempted a 5m ransom from him but he said had no money so I sent him via the Pod express.

To return to the title of this post relating to the Artillery Rifter, I can say that tracking is an issue. DPS is still reasonable as I think I get 93 from it. I will try versions with tracking rigs rather than falloff in future to see how much that helps. The trump to this ship will be Frigates with MWD's but they seem to be fairly rare. Of course the major weakness of this is the tank as it's paper thin but I'll lose a few and then decide whether to keep refining it or whether to ditch it for now like I did with the "Gank" Rifter.

In other news, yesterday was a sad day for The Tuskers. Wensley a long time and (in)famous? member left. The hole he leaves I am sure will be a large one but I wish him all the best in his 0.0 adventures. Although I didn't get to fly with Wensley, I'm sure those that have read his blog will feel like they have.

100 kills!

Without further adieu I announce that i have reached 100 kills, pretty much all of them solo apart from i think two.

My fights today were pretty nice against a couple of Rifters who were well fitted. One player was older, and one younger than I which was dictated in the quality of the fights. Against the older player we were pretty evenly matched until low shields when i took the lead. Although i ended the fight at 50% armour I wasn't permanently running my repper as I didn't feel i needed to so I was rather pleased. The second Rifter I found waiting out his GCC at a Moon, he wasn't paying attention as I landed but i soon got his attention. He went down easy and I don't think i even went into armour. I snagged his Pod too and was about to pick on a Thrasher in system when another pilot destroyed it (the pilot of the earlier Rifter I had killed), he was in a Rupture this time and i knew he had a good fit so I stayed away and unusually for me utilised caution!

Although my application to EACS (see previous post) has gone in to get my jump clones it hasn't been processed yet so perhaps it'll get done tomorrow.

A busy weekend

Well,this weekend has been kill filled. At least by my standards it has anyway and I'm rapidly approaching the 100 kill landmark.

It all kicked off with a Bellicose, I found him in a belt in a 0.1 system ratting. He was up against 3 cruisers and I landed some 30km away. He had plenty of time to flee before I caught him but didn't take the opportunity so I laid into him. His shield tank was pretty good until his cap ran out. When this happened he logged off, but I can only assume he didn't know that his ship would stay put. With the cap gone the rest of the ship fell apart quite fast but his pod disappeared very rapidly so I couldn't catch it. I waited for him to log in and when he did he had quick reactions and his Pod had hardly landed before it shot off to the confines of a station.

Shortly after this I caught an Atron engaged in some faction warfare installation capture. I had seen the pilot around alot before and was surprised to see them solo in a system, even more so when I landed 60km from them and was allowed to approach under fire from the 6 Matari NPC battleships. I caught them and only a few salvos was needed to reduce it to a wreck, a couple of faction warfare pilots had arrived in the system so I didn't hang around to claim the Pod or scoop the loot, not fancying my chances much against a Jaguar & Loki.

Now we come to tonight, and this has to be my busiest night of business to date.

Entering Ofage I spot a pilot who I have had some decent fights with, Kiormin74. I notice her criminally flagged so warp to a safe and find her attacking another of my "old friends" in their Rupture. I picked off Kiormin first, who safely warped her Pod out. Her Rifter had been down to 60% armour when I engaged so it was an easy kill. Switching quickly to the Rupture so that it couldn't escape it was also at around 60% armour. It went down nice a swiftly only just scraping into the lightest of armour damage to me. I knew the pilot never paid ransoms so just nuked his Pod. The system was pretty busy anyway so I didn't fancy hanging around. Scooping some loot to brim my cargo hold I warped out as four frigate hulls came screaming in. A timely escape.

Sitting at a safe, waiting out the GCC a one year old in a Rifter came up on scan. I did wonder if it was a trap as he wasn't moving around alot but when he warped to another belt I followed, caught him with 40% armour and shredded him and his Pod not wanting to see if I got hot dropped on by the four frigates again. My cargo hold still full I had to leave the corpse and loot.

After time was up I headed to dock and empty the hold in my home base. I decided to head back out to Ofage again. Arriving I continued to chase a pilot in an Incursus around who I had failed to catch all evening (kudos to you sir). While doing so I had kept eyes on the scanner for anything else opportune that I might take a look at. Earlier I had found a Hoarder at a POS with an unanchored Moon Harvesting Array but sadly it's shield was up so I could only watch. Scanning the site again, the shield was down! so I headed back to the moon, bookmarked the tower so I could warp straight back to it and the Hoarder. The Hoarder pilot must have been afk so I releived him of his ship and Pod in short order. But now what to do about this PoS tower and array? I hadn't the first clue about them. I asked in corp for some advice and it seemed that the tower was only offline and not unanchored so there was nothing short of a large fleet that could do much to it. A little depressed I decided to light up the Array as I couldn't carry it and after over a full hopper of ammo it blew in a very satisfying explosion.

As a side note I should in the next few days have a some hardware in place around Tuskers HQ, so I guess I better make plans to head over there. I am thinking I want to get some jump clones in place in Aralgrund, Hevrice & Bosena (I'll need to get some hardware around here too). First though, I shall need to work out the mystery of jump clones, and how I get them & how they work as this is yet another thing I haven't a clue about. Time for some research this week I think.

Deeming myself worthy of a rest I retired for the evening to write this up and head off for some well earned sleep.

An encounter with SUICIDAL Larsen

After a long roam yesterday I came across two newer players, both flying Thrashers. Both appeared to be docked up, sometimes launching only to redock again. I played the being patient game for around 20 minutes and decided to leave the system once both players appeared to have logged off. Entering the neighbouring system I discovered one of the pilots must have escaped without me noticing and had not logged off. The Thrasher was in a belt that could be scanned from the gate I had jumped through. Warping to him I landed and he was far enough away to warp out. Following his trajectory I landed at his destination and caught him. Both he and his Pod went down swiftly and without fuss.

Next, the other pilot who had logged off jumped into the system, again in a Thrasher. I was about to hurtle off after him when a Pirate who I had been wary of for a long time entered the system. I had pinpointed the Thrasher by this time but decided to hold position. SUICIDAL Larsen was his name and he was in a Claw Interceptor. I warped around a bit but maybe it's paranoia but I could swear he was after me. Locating the Thrasher again I decided to use him as bait, keeping him on scan until the Interceptor went for it which within a couple of minutes it did I warped in. Tackling the Claw I went through his shields quickly, however his armour tank was incredible and all my damage was repaired. Meanwhile I was taking plenty of damage and was soon cap dry. I escaped with my pod and exchanged gf, commending him on his ship & skills. That was one tough Interceptor and I consider myself lucky to have gotten my Pod out.

Tonight has been slow again as there are lots of big gangs out there. One gang I saw had 10 Drakes present and a whole lot of support too. I did manage to snag a Rupture and its pilot's Pod too a moment ago, which is always a nice thing to end an evening on. I took out his drones first, he had three with a mix of medium and light. He had a pvp fit, unfortunately most of the T2 fittings in it blew up with the ship. It's actually quite nice to take out a ship that's pvp fit rather than someone unprepared in a belt ratting ship.

Ambushed!

So I log in and depart the station in the accustomed fashion. In my home system there is a Rifter piloted by a Corp mate of the Rifter I destroyed last night, he's skipping about between belts, apparently not ratting thus I decide that I think its a trap. Lestaways, I find him and attack, once I attack local is increased as the pilot from last night enters the system. I finish off the Rifter as the Rupture arrives on scene. I lock and destroy the Rifter pilot's Pod for good measure before switching to the Rupture. I am heavily pinned down by the Rupture and taking heavy damage as I was already at 60% armour after the fight with the Rifter. Sure enough my Rifter explodes and I warp my pod back to home base for a ship swap. Exiting the station I attempt to find the Rupture, but its at a safe and soon warps out of the system.

During the course of the day I see the duo again on several ocassions, unfortunately for them their ambush trick won't work a second time.

On my roam I find myself in another system bordering high security space, a young pilot in a Thrasher enters the system just as I am about to leave. Deciding to stick around I scan him down to a belt and warp on in, he's under fire by a rat so I tackle him and have soon destroyed the Thrasher without a scratch due to his artillery fit. The pilots gets his Pod out very fast.

Still waiting out the Global Criminal Cooldown timer another pilot enters the same system in a Stabber, again they're quite young so after a spike in local clears I track them to a belt. I get them tackled quickly but then get rat agro. Switching from killing the Capsuleer I take down the rat in short order before coming back to them. It doesn't take long for the Stabber to be destroyed and I manage to snag the Pod and destroy it too bringing me ever closer to that -10.0 security status.

Stoopid mistake

Lets recap on yesterday first as it won't take long. Sunday must have been the day of rest for a lot of people that's about all I can say. When eventually I did come across a Cyclone in a belt and duly pinned him down, took out his drones and 60% of his shields. To find that a Pilgrim decloaked nearby, as soon as he appeared on scan I warped out rather than take the assumed raping he would land on me. The Pilgrim was joined by a Hurricane shortly after and they finished off the Cyclone. Turns out I had a nice conversation with the Pilgrim pilot in local afterwards and he lives in the same part of the UK as me, it's a small world we live in.

Anyhow, on to the stupid mistake of the day. I found myself a nice Rupture, knowing as you will how I am a bit partial to a bit of Rupture in my Rifters. He was ratting, and as I fathomed his ratting route I lay in ambush for him. Surely enough he warps in like a good Rupture pilot and I approached and locked. Note here the key problem, I approached and did not orbit. Thus it was that I melted in the face of his autocannons and came to a delightful halt in front of him where he could rape me some more. Realising far too late the mistake I had made, I went bang before I could get into orbit. Hopefully a mistake I won't repeat anytime soon!

What happened afterward however, went some distinct way to compensate for my earlier folly. I stumbled upon a capsuleer around 4 months old flying a Hurricane. Deciding that I fancied my chances I followed him around which resulted in a little back & forth between systems and then to a belt where I guessed he may be waiting for me or hiding from me. Either way I was committed to the fight. Engaging a good orbit (this time) I set about the task at hand. He set a wave of three medium drones on me which I primaried as the biggest threat as he seemed to be artillery fit with some launchers. The drones went down pretty easily which enabled me to resume on the Hurricane itself. The Hurricane pilot convo'd me and was talking a little about this blog and ships, though conversation seemed to stop when I went into his armour. The fight was taking ages though and I was primarily concerned that other pilots may join in as per my fight yesterday, to that end I kept a keen eye on the scanner. Late in the fight another drone was deployed (or one that had been recalled) and promptly shot down. I was graced eventually with a satisfying pretty explosion, I requested a ransom for the pod and was instructed to nuke it, so I duly did without needing to be told twice. If anyone wonders how the Rifter held up in this fight, well it was never in any danger, comfortably repping to full and never going cap dry even with a web on me most of the fight. Here is a screenie:

Millionaire Club!

Not exactly, at least not in the sense that you are probably thinking.

I am pleased to announce that Kirith now had a bounty of over one million isk on his head, or should I say his pod. It had been sat at 5,000 isk for a long while and I'm dead chuffed it his hit the million.

Tonight's roam started well with me popping a Catalyst who went down extremely fast as he was engaged with rats too and already at low shields. What followed was then a 2 hour period with no sniff of another kill. I thought I was going to get popped myself a couple of times tonight as the first occasion I warped to a gate as a gang jumped through and I was rather concerned you might say that there would be the tail end of the gang on the other side of the gate (fortunately not). The second time was a Mean/Hellequin coalition of a few ships sat on the other side of a gate, they didn't seem bothered by me fortunately again.

Deciding to call it a night and head back to my home system I find a couple of capsuleers in a Rifter & Rupture, I guess that they are working in cahoots. I warp to what I think is the right belt and the Rifter was there, I land 4km from him so point him and engage straight away. The Rupture arrives as I do so so I lock him too but he warps away. The Rifter is going down comfortably and I can handle his damage on me along with the two rats that are also firing on me. The Rupture comes back, which I really didn't expect, perhaps his fleet mate was giving him grief for running! I target him again then the Rifter explodes and I target and pop the pilots Pod too. Switching my scram to the Rupture I set about it and I'm now only really taking damage from the rats as the Rupture doesn't scratch me. He doesn't last long being a big fat juicy Cruiser though I wasn't quick enough to catch his Pod. I enjoyed the fight no end, fighting two pilots and the firepower of some rats and coming out well on top a superb feeling to end the day on.

Repeat Customer

It has been a slow day today. After some early success in taking out a Thrasher, the pilot of which didn't seem one bit amused spamming local in what I assume to be Russian until I told him I didn't understand. Afterwards I had a dry spell for a while until I came across someone I had killed before in a Rupture (again) in the same system that I killed him in last time (last weekend I think).

I assumed he would have the same setup as last time, and it turned out that I was pretty much right. The evil Neut & drones. I however was not flying the Cap boosted fit that has been succesful vs Neuts so I was somewhat apprehensive. But if I don't try I will never know so I went for it. This time he must have forgotten about his drones as they did not put in an appearance. What surprised me the most however was how limited the effect of his Neut was due to my Nos keeping me going. Granted his damage in the entire fight didn't get through my shields as he didn't use his drones. Who knows if the outcome would have been the same if I needed to use my armor repper, but as it was I got rewarded with a pretty explosion. I offered a ransom for the pod but I didn't receive it so I have added another corpse in my collection.

A little time later I was convo'd by the pilot, assuming he was going to ask why I shot him (again) I accepted the convo. All he wanted to know was "were is my stuff". I told him that I had taken some and left the rest where it died. Usually I blow up the wrecks I create but on this occasion I didn't for some reason.

The Hunter Became the Hunted

Today I had a days holiday form work so I it was a fair no-brainer for me to have an EvE day.

It was a quiet morning before downtime with a few people evading me in a Rifter and two Hulks. Jumping into my home system I found local crowded with a couple of people at POS's, a couple of old pirates docked up and a single "target" player. Deciding that it wasn't worth the risk of being jumped by the older pirates I left the target alone and moved on to the next system over.

The next system over was empty, so I warped to a gate many AU's away. Just as I arrived at the gate the target I had seen jumped into this system. Pulling a U-turn in my Rifter I headed back to a scanning safe. To be disappointed by one of the aforementioned old pirates jumping in aswell. Holding at my safe he didn't stay long and must have only been passing through, I set about scanning for the Rupture.

On a related topic, I don't know what happened to the fear of Ruptures I previously held, I seem to be rather gung-ho about attacking them lately!

Anyway, I digress. Eventually the Rupture turned up at a belt, I assume he had been in a safe. Warping into the belt my heart sank a bit when I saw him 35km away. Putting the pedal to the metal (If Rifters have pedals?) I closed the distance as quick as possible. Using the camera zoom I noticed he was moving away from me, but not aligned with anything, at 12km he turned and I thought he was leaving.

I got my lock and scram in before he could and we both started taking shield damage, he dropped a bunch of hammerheads on me along with a Nos, Neut, Web & Scram. This didn't look good! Primarying the Hammerheads I took a couple out before they were recalled, my cap had gone and I was struggling to hold scram and I could forget about the AB. Where I could I grabbed a Rep cycle and everytime my cap-booster had reloaded I dropped a new charge into the Capacitor. I was quickly down to below half armour. Taking care of the last Hammerheads I started applying damage to the Rupture itself. Damage on me at this point had dropped massively thanks to there being no more drones. My opponent was still getting the occasional Neut cycle out but he was clearly capped out but I made pretty quick progress down to half structure when I needed to reload. Slapping in new clips of ammo I resumed the offensive and at around 10% structure the pilot requested me to stop guns for 10m isk. Before I had time to reply the Rupture was a pretty explosion and I locked down the Pod. Deciding to offer a Ransom of 10m isk (see what I did there?) we agreed and I received the ransom and let him away with a day pass.

After the fight and good fights exchanged the pilot wanted to chat so I warped away to a safe. We spoke awhile about the fight and it turned out that he was a friend of the Stabber & Scythe pilots who I came across last weekend. I blew up his friends Scythe and Pod and the Stabber got away. He had been trying to hunt me down for a couple of days. This suprised me as I had no idea that I was being hunted! Perhaps we will lock horns again some time.

The overriding factor of this fight for me was that the Cap-Booster had once again saved my ass big-time.