I have not been feeling like writing, and not playing as much EVE as I have in times past. So that's what's up with the lack of posting. I am in the process of winding down my occupancy of the C4 I am in. The logistics have become unfun.
But enough of that. The thing that broke through my writing torpor today was a nice little kill. My system had many connecting wormholes, and I wanted to get my Jita alt in with a few last PI goods to pump into my pipeline. My system had an unusually high number of connections: its normal static C4 and C5, but also three other C5s connecting via K162s. Thus I had been scouring nearby systems for exits in my trusty Manticore. I found only a single lowsec exit, not near to Jita. Oh well. I tried. After that I had returned home, and was just sitting around in my system, watching a wormhole just in case someone came in. I was in the room, playing other games. But occasionally I'd come back to sit at EVE, tweak prices on my Jita alt, and with Von check a dscan, and look at the probe scanner to see if there were any new wormholes.
At one point I returned and dscanned and what's that? Probes! The guy came in a different wormhole, but I figured maybe I could still ambush him at my tower's decloak trap. So I warped back there. I landed on grid and barely had time to rotate my camera to face the bubble, when -- bingo! -- an Astero appeared in my trap. Astero vs bomber in most places is a win for the Astero. But any ship on grid with me at my tower, and I will win that fight. Go time!
I uncloaked, and got all systems on, locking the unlucky Astero up. I even hit her with a round of torps before she was evaporated by my tower's guns. Unluckily for her, her pod was cleanly in the bubble. So I terminated her -- the tower won't do that -- and returned her to highsec the fast way.
It turns out she was pretty new in EVE, so I opened a chat, told her about tower traps and how to avoid them, and we had a nice little chat. She had some questions about stealth bombers. I hope I helped. Anyway, one question was what can one hunt in a bomber in wspace? I listed some ships, but as a part of that I refreshed my corp's killboard at zkillboard, to remind myself of what I had killed recently.
That's when I noticed that not only had my tower killed once today, it had killed three times! (Others are this and this.) Yow! My tower is a better EVE player than I am this month.
Showing posts with label Podkill. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Podkill. Show all posts
Sunday, April 5, 2015
Sunday, January 18, 2015
Stupid or Fearless
A C6 system connected to my system last night, and I scanned it down then. I found some good gas, a Vital Core Reservoir, and I sucked gas for 20 minutes until the sleepers came. Today, I am eager to go get some more of that tasty C540. But with the passage of 10 hours, it's wise to look around first.
I reenter the game in my Manticore, and first update my own system. There's a new site, which turns out to be gas. OK, first I'll check out C4a. Last night it had nothing going on, and I hope to verify that again today.
I warp to the wormhole, and sure enough I land not on it but at its signature location. This means that nobody has been on this grid since downtime. That's what I want to see. I jump in, look around, and find nothing different. OK.
Back home, then onward into C6a. I warp to the wormhole, noting that this one has been activated since downtime. Hmm. I jump.
A dscan from the wormhole shows nothing, but then it is way over at the edge of a rather large system. Last night I bookmarked the one local tower, so that's the place to look. I warp to it at 70 km. As I get close, I dscan. There are four ships on scan: a Megathron, an Anathema, and two Covetors. All thought of gas is gone. Are the Covetors out in space?
I land on grid, and sure enough the Megathron and Anathema are safe within the POS forcefield. Both are manned. The Covetors are not here. Could they really be mining in an open system? In wspace? I get dscan going and quickly find them in an ore site. Yes is the answer.
I warp to the ore site at 10km. There they are, very close to each other and also close to a can they are mining into. Looks like an easy kill. A trap? No, not those ships. I think these guys are just stupid. Or fearless.
I am 149km from the can, so just a tiny bit of movement and I can warp to it. I turn opposite the Covetors and move a bit. Now I can warp to the can at zero. I can and I do. No fancy moves today.
I exit warp close enough to one of the Covetors that it decloaks me. That's fine; I was going to uncloak by hand anyway. I get my systems on, locking both Covetors. I put my warp scrambler on as I am locking, but not my painter and torpedoes. Once both locks complete, the scrambler gets one of the Covetors. I open fire (and paint) the one I don't have scrambled. I hope it won't warp in time, and it does not. Boom, gone. I attempt to lock the pod, but it does warp in time.
Now for the second Covetor. Torps and painter on. Dscan shows no change; I doubt they'll try anything with a Megathron, and if they do I can leave faster than he can lock me. After a few rounds of torps, boom again. This time the pilot is not so fast, and I get the pod locked in time. I send him back to highsec. Ha ha! I scoop the corpse and a few bits of loot that fit (there are huge chunks of plagioclase that don't). Then I get away from the wrecks and rocks and cloak. Aaah, safe again.
Now I watch on dscan as the three remaining locals sit at the their tower, trying on various ships. I am hoping they send over a Miasmos or something to try to fetch their ore. But they don't. These guys are stupid, or fearless, mining in an open system. But not that stupid or fearless.
After a while, I get bored. I warp to the outer planet and launch probes, then back to their tower to watch them as I scan. Fortunately I have Tripwire, so I can ignore most of the sigs that were here last night. Even so there are four new ones. I set to scanning.
It appears that they have noticed the probes. They get into different ships. Then one by one, they log out.
As I scan I warp around to wormholes as I find them. I find three. The first is a K162, highly disrupted. Hmm. The second is a small wormhole, outgoing.
The third wormhole is another K162, also highly disrupted.
Wait a second... these guys may not be as stupid as I thought. They disrupted all the wormholes except a small one, and that one small wormhole is outgoing. They may have seen it appear, and intentionally not opened it. Why didn't they disrupt the wormhole to my system? ... Or did they? Did I enter the system through a highly disrupted wormhole and not even notice?
I warp over to my wormhole. Yup. Highly disrupted. Who's stupid now?
(I explore through EOL wormholes all the time, but rarely through highly disrupted ones.)
I reenter the game in my Manticore, and first update my own system. There's a new site, which turns out to be gas. OK, first I'll check out C4a. Last night it had nothing going on, and I hope to verify that again today.
I warp to the wormhole, and sure enough I land not on it but at its signature location. This means that nobody has been on this grid since downtime. That's what I want to see. I jump in, look around, and find nothing different. OK.
Back home, then onward into C6a. I warp to the wormhole, noting that this one has been activated since downtime. Hmm. I jump.
A dscan from the wormhole shows nothing, but then it is way over at the edge of a rather large system. Last night I bookmarked the one local tower, so that's the place to look. I warp to it at 70 km. As I get close, I dscan. There are four ships on scan: a Megathron, an Anathema, and two Covetors. All thought of gas is gone. Are the Covetors out in space?
I land on grid, and sure enough the Megathron and Anathema are safe within the POS forcefield. Both are manned. The Covetors are not here. Could they really be mining in an open system? In wspace? I get dscan going and quickly find them in an ore site. Yes is the answer.
 |
| Easy. |
I am 149km from the can, so just a tiny bit of movement and I can warp to it. I turn opposite the Covetors and move a bit. Now I can warp to the can at zero. I can and I do. No fancy moves today.
I exit warp close enough to one of the Covetors that it decloaks me. That's fine; I was going to uncloak by hand anyway. I get my systems on, locking both Covetors. I put my warp scrambler on as I am locking, but not my painter and torpedoes. Once both locks complete, the scrambler gets one of the Covetors. I open fire (and paint) the one I don't have scrambled. I hope it won't warp in time, and it does not. Boom, gone. I attempt to lock the pod, but it does warp in time.
 |
| One down. One to go. |
Now I watch on dscan as the three remaining locals sit at the their tower, trying on various ships. I am hoping they send over a Miasmos or something to try to fetch their ore. But they don't. These guys are stupid, or fearless, mining in an open system. But not that stupid or fearless.
After a while, I get bored. I warp to the outer planet and launch probes, then back to their tower to watch them as I scan. Fortunately I have Tripwire, so I can ignore most of the sigs that were here last night. Even so there are four new ones. I set to scanning.
It appears that they have noticed the probes. They get into different ships. Then one by one, they log out.
As I scan I warp around to wormholes as I find them. I find three. The first is a K162, highly disrupted. Hmm. The second is a small wormhole, outgoing. The third wormhole is another K162, also highly disrupted.
Wait a second... these guys may not be as stupid as I thought. They disrupted all the wormholes except a small one, and that one small wormhole is outgoing. They may have seen it appear, and intentionally not opened it. Why didn't they disrupt the wormhole to my system? ... Or did they? Did I enter the system through a highly disrupted wormhole and not even notice?
I warp over to my wormhole. Yup. Highly disrupted. Who's stupid now?
(I explore through EOL wormholes all the time, but rarely through highly disrupted ones.)
Monday, January 12, 2015
An AFK Helios
Sunday, and I am hunting again. What it is about hunting? It's addictive like a lottery. Usually you pay a small price and get nothing. Sometimes you get a win, and sometimes a jackpot. I have one more wormhole to explore right now: the C4 through my system's static C4.
I dscan from the wormhole as normal, and lo and behold. Several ships including an Astero, a Helios, and three Ventures. Ventures! You might sometimes see a Venture here and there in a POS, but generally three at once means a gas mining op. Targets!
Unfortunately, I am in my torpedo fit, which lacks sufficient warp scrambling to stop a Venture. So, I'll need to find a place to refit. But I can do that.
What else does my dscan show? There is a POS, probably where the cloaky non-Ventures are. (There's very little reason a ship with a covert-ops cloak should ever be seen in wspace.) Should I bother finding their POS? Nah. Of more concern to me is a set of sisters combat scanner probes. Either I arrived just as these guys are being hunted by someone else, or else they have the probes out. If my wormhole is new, and they saw it via the discovery scanner, that might explain the probes. But I don't think so; it's too fast. In any case, there is nothing to be done about it.
I check the system map. There are two planets out of dscan range of the inner system, where I am. I fly to planet VI, the second-outermost first, to check for any additional enemies. None. Good. Now on to planet VII, the outermost. It has no sigs or anoms, so I am hoping there is nothing out there. My hopes are fulfilled: no towers or ships. A good place to refit. I make a safespot as I start to decelerate. Then I warp to it, and after a last check of dscan, uncloak and launch my mobile depot.
It makes me nervous doing a refit when I have already seen combat probes. But I cannot see them now, and I figure I can get away if they do discover me. So I do my minute, with lots of nervous dscans, then refit as fast as I can, pull the depot, and cloak. Whew. Safe again. (I hate being uncloaked.) Now I warp back to the inner system, to start looking for those Ventures.
Except when I get there, there is only one Venture left on scan. There are two shuttles that weren't there before. Drat. I think they noticed me somehow. My dscan quickly finds the ships all at a POS, and strangely, the probes are there too. I warp over to the planet. I quickly get the right moon identified, then warp in for a look.
The Venture, shuttles, Helios and Astero are all there on grid with me. But strangely, so are the sister's probes. That's weird. Then I notice the Helios is not the same distance from me as the other ships. They are all about 80km; it is 250km. I look around, and I see it. It is outside of the POS shield, with the probes all around it.
So the guy warps out to fire probes, fires them, then... what? Disconnection? Just forgot? Who knows. It's a target, though.
I check the space in the Helios's direction, and quite fortunately there is a planet more or less in it. It's planet VII, the outermost. It will take me two warps back and forth, but I should be able to get pretty close to the Helios. So I bookmark the POS then warp to my safespot. Then I warp back to the POS at 100km. A check shows the alignment is still good.
At this point I get concerned about the nuts and bolts. I know I get a few seconds of time before the POS modules can lock/shoot at me, and I know it is only small POS guns that can lock me in any reasonably short time. (This info I computed a year ago; that's the gist. The details are here; don't miss the comments.) I get a full dscan to check the POS: it has the normal ECMs and such, and some medium guns. (These don't worry me; too slow to lock.) It has 6 small blaster batteries, and 6 small laser batteries. I check the stats on both: only the lasers appear to be able to target at 170 km or so. Can six small lasers kill me? I don't know. Should I attack or slink off?
It is moments like this that a mini-Penny sits on my shoulder (on the sinister side), and whispers, Kill! I listen to this whisper. So I save my location 100km from the POS, and then it is back out to my safespot at planet VII. I jettison everything in my hold to reduce the loss if I do get killed. Then I warp to my recent bookmark at 70km. I end up nice and close to my still-unmoving target, about 20km from him.
I could make a run straight at him, but then getting away will take precious seconds. He's not moving, so I feel it is a better idea to move around to that I can align to a celestial and drive by him. Then I can warp instantly. I look around for a celestial that is positioned so that when I align to it I am perpendicular to the POS, so as to have as much transversal as possible. Planet II seems good. OK. Now I need to move across the Helios so as to position myself so that the Helios is between me and planet II. This takes a few seconds. Then I stop, about 12km from the Helios.
It's time. I don't know whether I will be killed, but I'll find out. I take a breath, and align to Planet II.
As I close to 8000m, I uncloak and start locking the Helios. Then it's the normal routine, turning on my systems and watching the Helios' shields/armor/structure drop. It take eight rounds of rockets, the last one as I am almost out of range. And beeep! I am hit! The last rockets fire, and the Helios dies. Yay! I warp immediately.
My shields were blown off and I took some armor damage. But I am happy: I got my kill under the nose of five guys at their POS.
Now my mind turns to loot -- and the pod. If the guy is AFK, maybe I can get it. I forgot to bookmark the location, so I warp out to planet VII again, then back to my former bookmark at 70km. And indeed, the pod's still there.
Mwahaha. I do the same thing as before: approach over the top to get into position. (This time I save the location.) Then I align to planet II, and do the same drive-by. The pod pops just as I get hit again, taking only shield damage. Then I am safely into warp again!
Now I could warp straight back if I want. I check the killmail, and there is a sister's probe launcher that survived in the wreck. Also there is the corpse. So I do want! But I first warp out to my safespot anyway. It will take some time for my shield to regenerate. When I do warp back, I warp at 10km to my spot just to be safe.
When I get there, I am saddened to see the enemy finally did something: one of them got an Armageddon and warped over to grab the loot. I look, but he also grabbed the corpse. Drat. I watch as he turns then warps back into the forcefield. Well, it's still a good day for me.
I warp back out to my safespot and grab my jettisoned stuff. Then I warp back home to my system and my POS. I'll need to buff out that armor damage. I grab an armor repairer and get it done.
Lessons here are obvious enough. Always cloak in wspace if you can. If that guy had cloaked after firing his probes, I never would have even thought to try to kill him.
Another lesson: POSes are safe inside, and kind of safe outside. But not super safe outside. An aggressor has a few seconds to do stuff, and more than that if he has a tanky ship. If your defenses are not numerous, even a stealth bomber can operate uncloaked for a little while.
I dscan from the wormhole as normal, and lo and behold. Several ships including an Astero, a Helios, and three Ventures. Ventures! You might sometimes see a Venture here and there in a POS, but generally three at once means a gas mining op. Targets!
Unfortunately, I am in my torpedo fit, which lacks sufficient warp scrambling to stop a Venture. So, I'll need to find a place to refit. But I can do that.
What else does my dscan show? There is a POS, probably where the cloaky non-Ventures are. (There's very little reason a ship with a covert-ops cloak should ever be seen in wspace.) Should I bother finding their POS? Nah. Of more concern to me is a set of sisters combat scanner probes. Either I arrived just as these guys are being hunted by someone else, or else they have the probes out. If my wormhole is new, and they saw it via the discovery scanner, that might explain the probes. But I don't think so; it's too fast. In any case, there is nothing to be done about it.
I check the system map. There are two planets out of dscan range of the inner system, where I am. I fly to planet VI, the second-outermost first, to check for any additional enemies. None. Good. Now on to planet VII, the outermost. It has no sigs or anoms, so I am hoping there is nothing out there. My hopes are fulfilled: no towers or ships. A good place to refit. I make a safespot as I start to decelerate. Then I warp to it, and after a last check of dscan, uncloak and launch my mobile depot.
It makes me nervous doing a refit when I have already seen combat probes. But I cannot see them now, and I figure I can get away if they do discover me. So I do my minute, with lots of nervous dscans, then refit as fast as I can, pull the depot, and cloak. Whew. Safe again. (I hate being uncloaked.) Now I warp back to the inner system, to start looking for those Ventures.
Except when I get there, there is only one Venture left on scan. There are two shuttles that weren't there before. Drat. I think they noticed me somehow. My dscan quickly finds the ships all at a POS, and strangely, the probes are there too. I warp over to the planet. I quickly get the right moon identified, then warp in for a look.
The Venture, shuttles, Helios and Astero are all there on grid with me. But strangely, so are the sister's probes. That's weird. Then I notice the Helios is not the same distance from me as the other ships. They are all about 80km; it is 250km. I look around, and I see it. It is outside of the POS shield, with the probes all around it.
So the guy warps out to fire probes, fires them, then... what? Disconnection? Just forgot? Who knows. It's a target, though.
I check the space in the Helios's direction, and quite fortunately there is a planet more or less in it. It's planet VII, the outermost. It will take me two warps back and forth, but I should be able to get pretty close to the Helios. So I bookmark the POS then warp to my safespot. Then I warp back to the POS at 100km. A check shows the alignment is still good.
At this point I get concerned about the nuts and bolts. I know I get a few seconds of time before the POS modules can lock/shoot at me, and I know it is only small POS guns that can lock me in any reasonably short time. (This info I computed a year ago; that's the gist. The details are here; don't miss the comments.) I get a full dscan to check the POS: it has the normal ECMs and such, and some medium guns. (These don't worry me; too slow to lock.) It has 6 small blaster batteries, and 6 small laser batteries. I check the stats on both: only the lasers appear to be able to target at 170 km or so. Can six small lasers kill me? I don't know. Should I attack or slink off?
It is moments like this that a mini-Penny sits on my shoulder (on the sinister side), and whispers, Kill! I listen to this whisper. So I save my location 100km from the POS, and then it is back out to my safespot at planet VII. I jettison everything in my hold to reduce the loss if I do get killed. Then I warp to my recent bookmark at 70km. I end up nice and close to my still-unmoving target, about 20km from him.
I could make a run straight at him, but then getting away will take precious seconds. He's not moving, so I feel it is a better idea to move around to that I can align to a celestial and drive by him. Then I can warp instantly. I look around for a celestial that is positioned so that when I align to it I am perpendicular to the POS, so as to have as much transversal as possible. Planet II seems good. OK. Now I need to move across the Helios so as to position myself so that the Helios is between me and planet II. This takes a few seconds. Then I stop, about 12km from the Helios.
It's time. I don't know whether I will be killed, but I'll find out. I take a breath, and align to Planet II.
 |
| Aligned and about to uncloak. |
As I close to 8000m, I uncloak and start locking the Helios. Then it's the normal routine, turning on my systems and watching the Helios' shields/armor/structure drop. It take eight rounds of rockets, the last one as I am almost out of range. And beeep! I am hit! The last rockets fire, and the Helios dies. Yay! I warp immediately.My shields were blown off and I took some armor damage. But I am happy: I got my kill under the nose of five guys at their POS.
Now my mind turns to loot -- and the pod. If the guy is AFK, maybe I can get it. I forgot to bookmark the location, so I warp out to planet VII again, then back to my former bookmark at 70km. And indeed, the pod's still there.
 |
| AFK and uncloaked: a bad mix. |
Mwahaha. I do the same thing as before: approach over the top to get into position. (This time I save the location.) Then I align to planet II, and do the same drive-by. The pod pops just as I get hit again, taking only shield damage. Then I am safely into warp again!
 |
| A second run for the pod. |
Now I could warp straight back if I want. I check the killmail, and there is a sister's probe launcher that survived in the wreck. Also there is the corpse. So I do want! But I first warp out to my safespot anyway. It will take some time for my shield to regenerate. When I do warp back, I warp at 10km to my spot just to be safe.
When I get there, I am saddened to see the enemy finally did something: one of them got an Armageddon and warped over to grab the loot. I look, but he also grabbed the corpse. Drat. I watch as he turns then warps back into the forcefield. Well, it's still a good day for me.
 |
| I can't kill this in 15 seconds or less. |
I warp back out to my safespot and grab my jettisoned stuff. Then I warp back home to my system and my POS. I'll need to buff out that armor damage. I grab an armor repairer and get it done.Lessons here are obvious enough. Always cloak in wspace if you can. If that guy had cloaked after firing his probes, I never would have even thought to try to kill him.
Another lesson: POSes are safe inside, and kind of safe outside. But not super safe outside. An aggressor has a few seconds to do stuff, and more than that if he has a tanky ship. If your defenses are not numerous, even a stealth bomber can operate uncloaked for a little while.
Saturday, January 10, 2015
A Gank on Scan
It's the weekend. I am out in my Manticore looking for prey. C5 I want to leave closed until later today. So I head out through our static C4, into C4b. It has occupants who aren't home. It also has three wormholes I find: its C1 and C3 statics, and a connection from a C4 other than mine.
I check out C1 and C3 first. With the new null sites, C1-C3 are my highest chances of getting a kill. In both case, nothing going on. There are no side wormholes in C1a at all. C3 has an EOL C4 in addition to its highsec access. I do open both systems up to highsec, hoping for a later gank. Then I return to C4b. That's my one remaining unexplored direction, so that's where I am going. As I come back up from C3a, I notice its wormhole has gone EOL since I went in.
I mark the EOL wormhole, then warp across to C4c. Ah. The wormhole to C4c is EOL too. I figure that whoever scanned the C3 also instantiated this one. So, it's got almost four hours to go. Plenty of time to look around. I go into C4c.
In C4c, I dscan as I always do from the wormhole. Aha! There's five Tengus on scan, and wrecks. Also two tractor units. Site runners! I move off the wormhole and cloak. There are combat probes on scan; Tengus can certainly have combat probe launchers, and they are running sites in an open system. So I figure they are looking for people like me. Hopefully they did not notice me.
Now I start trying to figure out where they are, looking at anoms. I don't succeed in this -- perhaps they are in a signature site. But there are a few anoms out of dscan range, and also a lot of anoms total. So I bookmark all of them, just in case. Even if the site-runners are not at an anom now, they may well move to one.
Now I start trying to find the enemy again. I still can't. But as I am doing this, I notice some new ships on scan. And then more. Then all the Tengus are gone. Except one.
Um... those are not PVE ships. I think I am witnessing a gank, albeit remotely. I grab a screenshot, then look again in a few seconds. In the first there's one Tengu still visible.
Shortly it is gone, replaced by a wreck and a corpse. (A later killboard search reveals the kill and the podkill.) Not long after that, the tractor unit is gone, also replaced with a wreck.
I try to figure out what anom they are in, but they're not so far as I can tell. Drat. It sort of makes sense though -- who rats in an anom in an open system? Crazy people. It's fairly crazy to rat in an open system at all, even in a sig, but at least then you have a chance of seeing probes on scan before the gank hits.
Anyway, if the site-runners were in a relic/data site, then it may still be scannable. (Hopefully no cans were cracked.) I guess I will have to scan. I warp to an outer planet, unfortunately not that far out. The site is still on scan, so I'll just have to be quick. I decloak, fire my probes, and recloak as fast as possible. Then I start scanning.
There are 17 sigs on scan. Sigh. I set to work. I scan down sig after sig. Nine are gas, which I ignore as soon as I determine it. Those wrecks can't be from a gas site; there are battleship wrecks and also too many. There are four relic sites and one data site. I dscan each site as I find it, expecting it to be the one where the battle happened. No luck; none of them have wrecks or anything else.
The remaining sigs are wormholes. One of them I came in. There is also a connection to a C3, and another to a C4, both of which are EOL. I sit at the C3 when I find it, and as I scan there is a steady procession of ships exiting. First there is a scout, one Gin Andtonic, with Adhocracy. (I like a good G&T myself.) Then a procession of Tengus, all with Kreigsmarinewerft: Haja Hakaari, Ted Stinger, Molasse, Avallarion Selara, and Silly Sin. It appears both the Germans and Adhocracy came from this direction, although maybe Adhocracy came from the other direction and that scout I saw is just moving forward.
Once my scanning is done, I go back into the inner system. I can't find the battle site. I start to wonder if I can track it down by constructing its position. It seems crazy, and is. Still, I start scanning for the site as something to do. I know I can't really find it, but it's good practice anyway.
After a lot of work narrowing it down on dscan, I finally notice I am honing in on a bookmark. That is a bookmark of a Sleeper Sanctum I made when I first entered. I should dscan that just to be sure... oh. Yeah, that's where the wrecks are. I don't know how I missed it earlier. (This is why you make bookmarks.) The site is apparently unoccupied now, save for wrecks. I warp in for a look.
There are juicy sleeper wrecks in a nice ball. There are also two unlooted sleeper wrecks that evidently did not get pulled in before the tractor was killed. They are about 40km and 20km from the wreck ball.
Sleeper wrecks! Precious! We wants their salvage!
So... hostiles know about this site, obviously. Two groups, actually: the Germans/Condi and the gankers/Adhoc. That's a big do-not-risk sign. On the other hand, it's been quiet here for a while, and I have ceased scanning for a few minutes at least. Also, any new explorers or locals that enter the system will not be able to get on grid with the wrecks. The anom is gone, and there's nothing left here that is scannable.
My wormhole is EOL, and there is some chance that I missed noticing that when I first bookmarked it. But I don't think so, nor would I have missed EOL status on both it and the C3 wormhole back in C4b. And if I do get trapped in here, it's not a big deal -- I'll just scan out -- but it would mean a half-hour or so wasted doing extra scanning and burning across highsec.
All in all, I think I will wait. I know from examining local chat when I entered the system: 16:41. Now it is 17:30. I've spent all that time hunting then watching the gank then scanning. Those wrecks were either fresh or created after I entered. So they'll last until 18:30 at least, probably a longer. In fact, longer. I notice the tags on the wrecks: some of them are Adhocracy tags. Evidently Adhocracy finished off the last wave. (Why they did not salvage themselves, I don't know. Maybe they will try?) I know -- or I think I know -- the timing on my entry wormhole. Hopefully the gankers and gankees do not know the timing, and will want to stay out of the system to be safe.
If either group does come back, it might be with a gankable salvager. I slowboat away from the tractor unit, making a perch 263 km from it. Now I am poised if they do come back. My plan is to sit here and watch my overview and dscan for an hour or so. Then I'll try for the salvage and loot myself.
At about 18:15, I get my alt Otto online, and warp over to check out C4b. It is still empty. OK. I go back home and get in a salvaging Coercer.
In C4c, Von sees a Buzzard on scan. It fires Sisters Core Probes and cloaks. Well, it can't find me here. Ha. It scans for a while. And a while longer. Yeah, there are 17 sigs. It is still scanning at 18:30, so I hold up Otto. Hey Buzzy, I'd like some privacy here!
Finally, the probes disappear. I start dscanning intensely, hoping to see the Buzzard again. After two minutes, I do. I expect that is him leaving. OK, go time. Good luck, Otto. Otto sees a Sister's core probe in C4b. I deduce the Buzzard is there, and will probably see him, but I doubt he will do anything.
In Otto goes. He warps direct to the site and starts salvaging. No point in being coy.
All the wrecks but two are already in a ball, thanks to the efforts of the now-dead German tractor unit. (Too bad about Noctises. Grr tractor units.) Otto salvages furiously in his cheap little destroyer, thanks to six salvagers and cheap rigs.
Nobody ganks Otto. He has to microwarp over to get the two wrecks not in the ball. And then, that's that. Salvaging done, Otto flees. Von flees just after. I don't want to get stuck here!
Nice loot. Thanks, Adhocracy!
I check out C1 and C3 first. With the new null sites, C1-C3 are my highest chances of getting a kill. In both case, nothing going on. There are no side wormholes in C1a at all. C3 has an EOL C4 in addition to its highsec access. I do open both systems up to highsec, hoping for a later gank. Then I return to C4b. That's my one remaining unexplored direction, so that's where I am going. As I come back up from C3a, I notice its wormhole has gone EOL since I went in.
I mark the EOL wormhole, then warp across to C4c. Ah. The wormhole to C4c is EOL too. I figure that whoever scanned the C3 also instantiated this one. So, it's got almost four hours to go. Plenty of time to look around. I go into C4c.
In C4c, I dscan as I always do from the wormhole. Aha! There's five Tengus on scan, and wrecks. Also two tractor units. Site runners! I move off the wormhole and cloak. There are combat probes on scan; Tengus can certainly have combat probe launchers, and they are running sites in an open system. So I figure they are looking for people like me. Hopefully they did not notice me.
Now I start trying to figure out where they are, looking at anoms. I don't succeed in this -- perhaps they are in a signature site. But there are a few anoms out of dscan range, and also a lot of anoms total. So I bookmark all of them, just in case. Even if the site-runners are not at an anom now, they may well move to one.
Now I start trying to find the enemy again. I still can't. But as I am doing this, I notice some new ships on scan. And then more. Then all the Tengus are gone. Except one.
Um... those are not PVE ships. I think I am witnessing a gank, albeit remotely. I grab a screenshot, then look again in a few seconds. In the first there's one Tengu still visible.
Shortly it is gone, replaced by a wreck and a corpse. (A later killboard search reveals the kill and the podkill.) Not long after that, the tractor unit is gone, also replaced with a wreck.
I try to figure out what anom they are in, but they're not so far as I can tell. Drat. It sort of makes sense though -- who rats in an anom in an open system? Crazy people. It's fairly crazy to rat in an open system at all, even in a sig, but at least then you have a chance of seeing probes on scan before the gank hits.
Anyway, if the site-runners were in a relic/data site, then it may still be scannable. (Hopefully no cans were cracked.) I guess I will have to scan. I warp to an outer planet, unfortunately not that far out. The site is still on scan, so I'll just have to be quick. I decloak, fire my probes, and recloak as fast as possible. Then I start scanning.
 |
| No battle here, only my probes |
The remaining sigs are wormholes. One of them I came in. There is also a connection to a C3, and another to a C4, both of which are EOL. I sit at the C3 when I find it, and as I scan there is a steady procession of ships exiting. First there is a scout, one Gin Andtonic, with Adhocracy. (I like a good G&T myself.) Then a procession of Tengus, all with Kreigsmarinewerft: Haja Hakaari, Ted Stinger, Molasse, Avallarion Selara, and Silly Sin. It appears both the Germans and Adhocracy came from this direction, although maybe Adhocracy came from the other direction and that scout I saw is just moving forward.
Once my scanning is done, I go back into the inner system. I can't find the battle site. I start to wonder if I can track it down by constructing its position. It seems crazy, and is. Still, I start scanning for the site as something to do. I know I can't really find it, but it's good practice anyway.
After a lot of work narrowing it down on dscan, I finally notice I am honing in on a bookmark. That is a bookmark of a Sleeper Sanctum I made when I first entered. I should dscan that just to be sure... oh. Yeah, that's where the wrecks are. I don't know how I missed it earlier. (This is why you make bookmarks.) The site is apparently unoccupied now, save for wrecks. I warp in for a look.
 |
| Abandoned? |
There are juicy sleeper wrecks in a nice ball. There are also two unlooted sleeper wrecks that evidently did not get pulled in before the tractor was killed. They are about 40km and 20km from the wreck ball.
Sleeper wrecks! Precious! We wants their salvage!
So... hostiles know about this site, obviously. Two groups, actually: the Germans/Condi and the gankers/Adhoc. That's a big do-not-risk sign. On the other hand, it's been quiet here for a while, and I have ceased scanning for a few minutes at least. Also, any new explorers or locals that enter the system will not be able to get on grid with the wrecks. The anom is gone, and there's nothing left here that is scannable.
My wormhole is EOL, and there is some chance that I missed noticing that when I first bookmarked it. But I don't think so, nor would I have missed EOL status on both it and the C3 wormhole back in C4b. And if I do get trapped in here, it's not a big deal -- I'll just scan out -- but it would mean a half-hour or so wasted doing extra scanning and burning across highsec.
All in all, I think I will wait. I know from examining local chat when I entered the system: 16:41. Now it is 17:30. I've spent all that time hunting then watching the gank then scanning. Those wrecks were either fresh or created after I entered. So they'll last until 18:30 at least, probably a longer. In fact, longer. I notice the tags on the wrecks: some of them are Adhocracy tags. Evidently Adhocracy finished off the last wave. (Why they did not salvage themselves, I don't know. Maybe they will try?) I know -- or I think I know -- the timing on my entry wormhole. Hopefully the gankers and gankees do not know the timing, and will want to stay out of the system to be safe.
If either group does come back, it might be with a gankable salvager. I slowboat away from the tractor unit, making a perch 263 km from it. Now I am poised if they do come back. My plan is to sit here and watch my overview and dscan for an hour or so. Then I'll try for the salvage and loot myself.
At about 18:15, I get my alt Otto online, and warp over to check out C4b. It is still empty. OK. I go back home and get in a salvaging Coercer.
In C4c, Von sees a Buzzard on scan. It fires Sisters Core Probes and cloaks. Well, it can't find me here. Ha. It scans for a while. And a while longer. Yeah, there are 17 sigs. It is still scanning at 18:30, so I hold up Otto. Hey Buzzy, I'd like some privacy here!
Finally, the probes disappear. I start dscanning intensely, hoping to see the Buzzard again. After two minutes, I do. I expect that is him leaving. OK, go time. Good luck, Otto. Otto sees a Sister's core probe in C4b. I deduce the Buzzard is there, and will probably see him, but I doubt he will do anything.
In Otto goes. He warps direct to the site and starts salvaging. No point in being coy.
 |
| Grinding wrecks. |
All the wrecks but two are already in a ball, thanks to the efforts of the now-dead German tractor unit. (Too bad about Noctises. Grr tractor units.) Otto salvages furiously in his cheap little destroyer, thanks to six salvagers and cheap rigs.
 |
| Getting to the last wreck. |
Nobody ganks Otto. He has to microwarp over to get the two wrecks not in the ball. And then, that's that. Salvaging done, Otto flees. Von flees just after. I don't want to get stuck here!
 |
| Loot. |
Thursday, December 11, 2014
Culling a Flock
It's midday Sunday. The Boy is out at a guitar lesson, so I am in EVE. I've checked out two systems, a C4 and a C5, adjacent to my home system. No targets. Now, into a second C5 via a K162. I'm not particularly hopeful of finding anyone doing anything dumb, because after all they connected to us. They presumably know they are not zipped up. That's why I left this one for last. Still, you never know in EVE.
I am right to not know. I cross the wormhole and dscan, and what should appear but a flock of Ventures. Also an Orca and a tower, almost certainly boosting a gas mining operation. Eight targets! Visions of mass slaughter arise in my mind, but let's not get ahead of ourselves here. I can only kill multiple Ventures if they are being extraordinarily stupid. First things first: get on grid.
Is there an outer planet? There is an outer planet. I warp to it at 100km, as always cloaking immediately as soon as my gate cloak drops. This is my first chance to blow my cover, and there is nothing I can do about it. With eight of them, probably at least three actual players, there is a decent chance someone is dscanning. Will the see me? I hope not.
I make a safespot out in space near the outer planet, which is pleasingly abandoned. Also there are no sigs out here, so there is little reason why any of the natives would come out here. I warp to the safespot, uncloak, deploy my mobile depot, and fire probes.
The probes I throw out of the system. I'll get back to them. The depot is for refitting. I need to refit my Manticore from its normal configuration into its Venture-killing config. The Venture killer removes the normal target painter for a second warp scrambler, which is needed to tackle a Venture with its built-in +2 warp core stabilization. My anti-Venture fit also forgoes torpedoes. I've been using light missiles for Venture killing, because I have had them at level V for a while. But recently I trained Rockets V, so I get to try rockets for the first time. Yay, me.
My minute is impatient. Then I refit, get the rockets loaded, scoop the depot, and it's hunting time.
I warp to the inner system, then get a rough bearing on where the Ventures are. 2.4 AU from me, and generally up and left of the sun. I set my probes to 2 AU distance, then move them into a rough position as my marker. Now I start trying to hone down to 5 degrees. Usually getting down to 15 degrees is fast, while the last step to 5 is hard. (CCP: very please to put in a 10 degree setting?!)
This time, I am trying for five degrees for a while with no success. Then I back out to 15 degrees and the Ventures are not there. What? Try at 360: there. Again at 15, then 30, and 60: not there. I guess they moved. Strangely, they are the same distance from me, 2.4 AU. But somewhere else. Back to the start of my search.
I narrow and narrow, and get to 5 degrees. OK, that's it. I check my distance, and have to work it a little bit to get it to look like 2.4 AU. (This is done purely by eyeball, and is a bit of an art.) But now I am ready to scan. I set the probes to 0.5 AU, and scan. Scanning... and a red dot, 49%. OK, quickly, drop the range to 0.25, adjust, and scan again. 100%! A Vital Core Reservoir! I retract the probes to hide them. I am "below" the site, which means it is safe to warp in at 100km. So I do.
Warping... and on grid. And sure enough, there is the big gas cloud, the C540 one, with all eight Ventures orbiting it, sucking gas. The little cloud is already sucked up.
The good news is that an orbiting Venture can be sneaked up on. Or so I think. I have never done it successfully before, but that's because my average kill is not orbiting. Stupidly, they sit still.
The bad news is that they are all over the place. The gas cloud has a radius of some 70km. There is no way I am going to get two of them. Orbiting while you mine is not the absolute best way to do it (here's how to do it right), but it is solid play.
Currently I am more than 100km from edge of the cloud. This is too far to approach in reasonable time, but too near to warp. Well, I can bounce. I bookmark the C540 gas cloud (that is, its center), then warp off site to a nearby planet. Then I warp back to the cloud at 70m. I end up nearer to the edge than I thought, just 9000m. But it's actually pretty much perfect. I am near the edge, ready to go. Now all I need is for a Venture to come to me.
A quick look around shows one Venture in particular that appears to be headed nearly at me. He's 70km from me, but approaching fast. OK, that's the one. The Venture's orbit is mostly towards me, but a bit to the "down" direction from my perspective. So, I maneuver down to intercept, and also include a slight angle in towards the cloud. The approach is working. The target is getting closer: 50km, then 30km. I am getting close to the cloud: 7km, 5km. I stop for a bit. That's close enough.
Now the target is 20km, and closing. I start moving a bit more down, and as he closes to 10km, towards him. Time for pew!
I uncloak, and start locking. All systems on: 2x scrambler, sebo, rockets. The lock completes: got him. My rockets start up, and the range stays short. Good.
He is past me, and starting to pull away. I may have to pulse the microwarpdrive to keep up. But it seems like not. Distance is maintained at about 4000m. Then boom, he's dead. I am ready, and start locking the pod. He's not ready, it seems, because he does not get the pod out in time. Locked! And podded.
I attend to the overview: no ships left on grid but me. I didn't have any awareness of them leaving. Tactical tunnel syndrome.
I approach the wreck and grab the corpse for my collection. Then I open the wreck and loot. The loot won't fit: there is a lot of gas, which is large stuff. (The loot fairy smiled on this gank.) I grab all the fittings, and fill my hold with a small portion of the gas. In fact, there is significant value in gas. But I can't take it, so I perforce will leave it. Perhaps they will try to get it back. I'll hang around. I bookmark the wreck just in case I need to get back fast.
This would be a good time to find their tower. I burn away from the gas and the wreck, and get cloaked. Safe, I turn my attention to dscan. OK, they are at that planet. I warp to a random moon (wrong one), then dscan up the right one and warp in to have a look. I have to approach the tower to get close enough to see.
The flock is there, but some have already refit into various other ships. An Archon? I don't think they intend anything here except logging out. Sure enough, poof it is gone. I watch them all as one by one, they get into a big ship of some kind, then poof.
Finally one is left, still in a Venture, and the Orca. I sit and watch another few minutes. Nothing. I doubt they will do anything.
Now I resume being my greedy resource-harvesting self. There's 12m worth of gas in that wreck, and I want it! I log in my alt Otto, who warps to my tower to get a gas-carrying Miasmos. Then I have a better idea: a Venture! Otto gets one of our gas-mining Ventures, then removes the expensive gas miners, just in case he gets whacked. Then he renames it, to the same tag and name as the natives were using on their Ventures. I figure this might confuse them if they see it on dscan, at least long enough. I doubt they are paying attention, but you never know.
Otto enters the system and warps to the wreck. The guys at the tower don't move. Otto lands on grid, grabs, and goes. Gas mining the hard way.
 |
| Ships on scan! |
Is there an outer planet? There is an outer planet. I warp to it at 100km, as always cloaking immediately as soon as my gate cloak drops. This is my first chance to blow my cover, and there is nothing I can do about it. With eight of them, probably at least three actual players, there is a decent chance someone is dscanning. Will the see me? I hope not.
I make a safespot out in space near the outer planet, which is pleasingly abandoned. Also there are no sigs out here, so there is little reason why any of the natives would come out here. I warp to the safespot, uncloak, deploy my mobile depot, and fire probes.
The probes I throw out of the system. I'll get back to them. The depot is for refitting. I need to refit my Manticore from its normal configuration into its Venture-killing config. The Venture killer removes the normal target painter for a second warp scrambler, which is needed to tackle a Venture with its built-in +2 warp core stabilization. My anti-Venture fit also forgoes torpedoes. I've been using light missiles for Venture killing, because I have had them at level V for a while. But recently I trained Rockets V, so I get to try rockets for the first time. Yay, me.
My minute is impatient. Then I refit, get the rockets loaded, scoop the depot, and it's hunting time.
I warp to the inner system, then get a rough bearing on where the Ventures are. 2.4 AU from me, and generally up and left of the sun. I set my probes to 2 AU distance, then move them into a rough position as my marker. Now I start trying to hone down to 5 degrees. Usually getting down to 15 degrees is fast, while the last step to 5 is hard. (CCP: very please to put in a 10 degree setting?!)
This time, I am trying for five degrees for a while with no success. Then I back out to 15 degrees and the Ventures are not there. What? Try at 360: there. Again at 15, then 30, and 60: not there. I guess they moved. Strangely, they are the same distance from me, 2.4 AU. But somewhere else. Back to the start of my search.
I narrow and narrow, and get to 5 degrees. OK, that's it. I check my distance, and have to work it a little bit to get it to look like 2.4 AU. (This is done purely by eyeball, and is a bit of an art.) But now I am ready to scan. I set the probes to 0.5 AU, and scan. Scanning... and a red dot, 49%. OK, quickly, drop the range to 0.25, adjust, and scan again. 100%! A Vital Core Reservoir! I retract the probes to hide them. I am "below" the site, which means it is safe to warp in at 100km. So I do.
Warping... and on grid. And sure enough, there is the big gas cloud, the C540 one, with all eight Ventures orbiting it, sucking gas. The little cloud is already sucked up.
The good news is that an orbiting Venture can be sneaked up on. Or so I think. I have never done it successfully before, but that's because my average kill is not orbiting. Stupidly, they sit still.
The bad news is that they are all over the place. The gas cloud has a radius of some 70km. There is no way I am going to get two of them. Orbiting while you mine is not the absolute best way to do it (here's how to do it right), but it is solid play.
Currently I am more than 100km from edge of the cloud. This is too far to approach in reasonable time, but too near to warp. Well, I can bounce. I bookmark the C540 gas cloud (that is, its center), then warp off site to a nearby planet. Then I warp back to the cloud at 70m. I end up nearer to the edge than I thought, just 9000m. But it's actually pretty much perfect. I am near the edge, ready to go. Now all I need is for a Venture to come to me.
A quick look around shows one Venture in particular that appears to be headed nearly at me. He's 70km from me, but approaching fast. OK, that's the one. The Venture's orbit is mostly towards me, but a bit to the "down" direction from my perspective. So, I maneuver down to intercept, and also include a slight angle in towards the cloud. The approach is working. The target is getting closer: 50km, then 30km. I am getting close to the cloud: 7km, 5km. I stop for a bit. That's close enough.
Now the target is 20km, and closing. I start moving a bit more down, and as he closes to 10km, towards him. Time for pew!
I uncloak, and start locking. All systems on: 2x scrambler, sebo, rockets. The lock completes: got him. My rockets start up, and the range stays short. Good.
 |
| I pounce. |
I attend to the overview: no ships left on grid but me. I didn't have any awareness of them leaving. Tactical tunnel syndrome.
I approach the wreck and grab the corpse for my collection. Then I open the wreck and loot. The loot won't fit: there is a lot of gas, which is large stuff. (The loot fairy smiled on this gank.) I grab all the fittings, and fill my hold with a small portion of the gas. In fact, there is significant value in gas. But I can't take it, so I perforce will leave it. Perhaps they will try to get it back. I'll hang around. I bookmark the wreck just in case I need to get back fast.
This would be a good time to find their tower. I burn away from the gas and the wreck, and get cloaked. Safe, I turn my attention to dscan. OK, they are at that planet. I warp to a random moon (wrong one), then dscan up the right one and warp in to have a look. I have to approach the tower to get close enough to see.
The flock is there, but some have already refit into various other ships. An Archon? I don't think they intend anything here except logging out. Sure enough, poof it is gone. I watch them all as one by one, they get into a big ship of some kind, then poof.
 |
| Gas loot. |
Now I resume being my greedy resource-harvesting self. There's 12m worth of gas in that wreck, and I want it! I log in my alt Otto, who warps to my tower to get a gas-carrying Miasmos. Then I have a better idea: a Venture! Otto gets one of our gas-mining Ventures, then removes the expensive gas miners, just in case he gets whacked. Then he renames it, to the same tag and name as the natives were using on their Ventures. I figure this might confuse them if they see it on dscan, at least long enough. I doubt they are paying attention, but you never know.
Otto enters the system and warps to the wreck. The guys at the tower don't move. Otto lands on grid, grabs, and goes. Gas mining the hard way.
Tuesday, October 28, 2014
A Brace of Ventures
Sunday. I've been crawling wspace all weekend, to no avail. I've seen a lot of probes and a few scouts, and I have seen people doing nothing at POSes. What I have not seen is sleeper wrecks, or miners, or gassers. But I keep hoping.
I am now two jumps down the chain from my home system. My home system connects to our static C4, which connects to a second C4, where I am. There are many wormholes here. I've explored a further C4, a C5 (EOL: I stayed only long enough to see nothing happening), and another C5. Nothing, nothing, nothing. There's another C5 through a small wormhole. This is no problem for me, in my Manticore. I jump.
Dscan from the wormhole shows nothing beyond a POCO. I am near an outer planet in this system, which has a fair number of signatures. Only three anoms, though. System may be inhabited. Won't find out the truth here. I bookmark the wormhole, then warp to the inner system to look around.
As I warp across the system, I dscan. Ventures on scan. Six of them! I am in a C5. C5 plus Ventures almost always means one thing: a core gas site. There is an ore anom among the three here, but it's in the outer system. And nobody mines rocks in wspace anyway. These guys are mining gas.
I work a bit to find a general location for them. While doing this I see a Flycatcher on scan. Overwatch? Unknown.
Then I warp back out to the outer system to refit and launch probes. My Manticore is currently fit with its general purpose gank fit. I want the anti-Venture fit: it uses light missiles for better damage against such tiny targets. It also has two warp scramblers, since one cannot hold a Venture. Where to refit? I make a safespot between two moons; that should do. I check dscan -- clear -- then uncloak and launch my mobile depot. I hate being exposed! I also launch probes, then throw them out of the system.
I sit for my tortured minute, nervously watching my dscan for combat probes. No probes, but I do see a Venture on dscan. Ooops. Evidently they are not locals, and are coming from the other signature out here. Will they bug out?
My minute is up. I swap in the new fit as fast as I can, then grab the depot and cloak. Safe again!
I warp to the inner system, to the planet nearest where I think the gas site is. The Ventures are still there. Good. Now I get setup to probe for the gas site. The range is 2.7 AU. I set the probes in the correct spot for my 60 degree scan, then start the narrowing. I get to 5 degrees with surprising ease.
I decide to risk missing the site or having to scan multiple times for a shot at getting it in a single try. I set my probes to 0.25 AU. And... I scan. Ping, ping... a hit! 100% on an Instrumental Core Reservoir! I recall the probes, and warp to the site... no, wait. Cancel that warp.
I am looking "down" at the gas site. (Space has absolute directions.) Gas sites are aligned up/down, more or less: they are safe to warp into from the sides. From above in particular, you don't want to warp in at any range for fear of landing in the large cloud. (Its radius is 50km.) The gas clouds decloak anything in them.
The only thing really decently far away is the outer system. So I warp out there to bounce back to the site, at 50km. I figure to check out what the Ventures are doing and then form a plan of attack.
As I warp back toward the inner system, but still out of range of the site, I dscan and see three Ventures. Uh oh. Did they see my probes? I land in the site (nicely far from the gas), and no Ventures. Bummer. I bookmark the gas clouds anyway.
I warp back to the outer system, and get confusing hits on dscan. Ventures, then no ventures. I warp back in. Same thing. Eventually I make a safespot right out in the middle of the system, so that I can dscan both out to the outer planet and to the gas site. I can see the Ventures briefly a few times, but narrow-band dscan shows them not in the gas site. Spooked, I'd say, but not enough. They are either warping to and fro among safespots, or possibly cloaking. Either way, they are still in system.
I'll wait.
I get out my phone and get a game or two of chess in. Occasionally I dscan and see nothing. But after a particularly intricate endgame, I dscan again and there they are again. Narrow band dscan at the cloud: there. Ha!
I warp back to the gas site, this time at 20km from the site's center. (I am already far enough away that my angle of approach should be fine.)
I land in the site, and sure enough. Ventures. Three are doing something... don't know what... clustered near the edge of the cloud but not moving. They are about 60km from me. Perhaps transferring cargo? Several others seem to be in the middle of the cloud. And two are orbiting at speed. I decide to try for an orbiter. I look at them and find one that seems to be coming around the gas cloud to me. I wait... he's off to my right a bit. I start moving that way. But the cloud is very close... 10km... 6km... I have to slow down, and vector to my right.
Here he comes! I am close. But not quite close enough. I am not going to risk blowing it.
OK, I have determined that intercepting a Venture at the edge of a 50km cloud is pretty difficult. Let's look again at the others.
Those guys in the middle of the cloud... they appear to be right at the center. This is a huge no-no. Don't do it Venture people. Anyway, I check their location using the tactical overlay, and I am right. They are in the middle. So, it's an easy approach: bounce off the nearest celestial, then warp straight to the cloud as already bookmarked. It's a plan!
I warp, then warp again. The gas will uncloak me; I don't need to do that myself. So I get ready to hit my sebo and start locking. The Ventures will all flee, of course. But I might get two if I am fast.
I land on grid. I leave warp and the gas uncloaks me. I start the sebo and then lock the two nearest Ventures. I turn on both of my warp scramblers, but not the light missiles. I'll pin one while I shoot another. The one I am shooting will be able to leave if the pilot is alert. But I hope he won't be alert.
The plan works. The one is pinned, and my missiles make short work of the second. Wow, fast. I start on the one I have pinned. Strangely, they are not fleeing. There's a third Venture still in range, so I lock it. The first pod flees. Now the second one dies, and, oops. I am warp scrambled.
Hmm, I guess it was a trap. Oh well, no bubble here, not yet. I'll kill everyone close and then see about escaping. I open up on the third Venture. Strangely, none of them are shooting me and I see no drones out. No damage. As I check for how I might escape, the one scrambling me warps. The third one dies. They are all gone, except one pod. I kill that. (It was the one I killed second, I find out in retrospect.)
I check dscan. Nothing. OK, safe. Or safeish -- I am still in a warpable spot they have bookmarked. But I gather what loot I can carry, which is trivial, and the precious corpse. Then I warp back home ASAP. I have a dinner engagement IRL and I must leave in a few minutes. Back up the chain to home, then I warp to safespot and leave EVE.
I feel good.
A look at the killmails shows another mistake: the Ventures have almost no tank. No shield extender; no damage control. Extra hitpoints get you a few extra seconds to react.
I am now two jumps down the chain from my home system. My home system connects to our static C4, which connects to a second C4, where I am. There are many wormholes here. I've explored a further C4, a C5 (EOL: I stayed only long enough to see nothing happening), and another C5. Nothing, nothing, nothing. There's another C5 through a small wormhole. This is no problem for me, in my Manticore. I jump.
Dscan from the wormhole shows nothing beyond a POCO. I am near an outer planet in this system, which has a fair number of signatures. Only three anoms, though. System may be inhabited. Won't find out the truth here. I bookmark the wormhole, then warp to the inner system to look around.
 |
| The system. My entry on the right. |
As I warp across the system, I dscan. Ventures on scan. Six of them! I am in a C5. C5 plus Ventures almost always means one thing: a core gas site. There is an ore anom among the three here, but it's in the outer system. And nobody mines rocks in wspace anyway. These guys are mining gas.
I work a bit to find a general location for them. While doing this I see a Flycatcher on scan. Overwatch? Unknown.
Then I warp back out to the outer system to refit and launch probes. My Manticore is currently fit with its general purpose gank fit. I want the anti-Venture fit: it uses light missiles for better damage against such tiny targets. It also has two warp scramblers, since one cannot hold a Venture. Where to refit? I make a safespot between two moons; that should do. I check dscan -- clear -- then uncloak and launch my mobile depot. I hate being exposed! I also launch probes, then throw them out of the system.
I sit for my tortured minute, nervously watching my dscan for combat probes. No probes, but I do see a Venture on dscan. Ooops. Evidently they are not locals, and are coming from the other signature out here. Will they bug out?
My minute is up. I swap in the new fit as fast as I can, then grab the depot and cloak. Safe again!
 |
| Range and bearing. Ready to scan. |
I decide to risk missing the site or having to scan multiple times for a shot at getting it in a single try. I set my probes to 0.25 AU. And... I scan. Ping, ping... a hit! 100% on an Instrumental Core Reservoir! I recall the probes, and warp to the site... no, wait. Cancel that warp.
I am looking "down" at the gas site. (Space has absolute directions.) Gas sites are aligned up/down, more or less: they are safe to warp into from the sides. From above in particular, you don't want to warp in at any range for fear of landing in the large cloud. (Its radius is 50km.) The gas clouds decloak anything in them.
The only thing really decently far away is the outer system. So I warp out there to bounce back to the site, at 50km. I figure to check out what the Ventures are doing and then form a plan of attack.
As I warp back toward the inner system, but still out of range of the site, I dscan and see three Ventures. Uh oh. Did they see my probes? I land in the site (nicely far from the gas), and no Ventures. Bummer. I bookmark the gas clouds anyway.
I warp back to the outer system, and get confusing hits on dscan. Ventures, then no ventures. I warp back in. Same thing. Eventually I make a safespot right out in the middle of the system, so that I can dscan both out to the outer planet and to the gas site. I can see the Ventures briefly a few times, but narrow-band dscan shows them not in the gas site. Spooked, I'd say, but not enough. They are either warping to and fro among safespots, or possibly cloaking. Either way, they are still in system.
I'll wait.
I get out my phone and get a game or two of chess in. Occasionally I dscan and see nothing. But after a particularly intricate endgame, I dscan again and there they are again. Narrow band dscan at the cloud: there. Ha!
I warp back to the gas site, this time at 20km from the site's center. (I am already far enough away that my angle of approach should be fine.)
I land in the site, and sure enough. Ventures. Three are doing something... don't know what... clustered near the edge of the cloud but not moving. They are about 60km from me. Perhaps transferring cargo? Several others seem to be in the middle of the cloud. And two are orbiting at speed. I decide to try for an orbiter. I look at them and find one that seems to be coming around the gas cloud to me. I wait... he's off to my right a bit. I start moving that way. But the cloud is very close... 10km... 6km... I have to slow down, and vector to my right.
Here he comes! I am close. But not quite close enough. I am not going to risk blowing it.
 |
| This guy lived. |
Those guys in the middle of the cloud... they appear to be right at the center. This is a huge no-no. Don't do it Venture people. Anyway, I check their location using the tactical overlay, and I am right. They are in the middle. So, it's an easy approach: bounce off the nearest celestial, then warp straight to the cloud as already bookmarked. It's a plan!
I warp, then warp again. The gas will uncloak me; I don't need to do that myself. So I get ready to hit my sebo and start locking. The Ventures will all flee, of course. But I might get two if I am fast.
I land on grid. I leave warp and the gas uncloaks me. I start the sebo and then lock the two nearest Ventures. I turn on both of my warp scramblers, but not the light missiles. I'll pin one while I shoot another. The one I am shooting will be able to leave if the pilot is alert. But I hope he won't be alert.
The plan works. The one is pinned, and my missiles make short work of the second. Wow, fast. I start on the one I have pinned. Strangely, they are not fleeing. There's a third Venture still in range, so I lock it. The first pod flees. Now the second one dies, and, oops. I am warp scrambled.
Hmm, I guess it was a trap. Oh well, no bubble here, not yet. I'll kill everyone close and then see about escaping. I open up on the third Venture. Strangely, none of them are shooting me and I see no drones out. No damage. As I check for how I might escape, the one scrambling me warps. The third one dies. They are all gone, except one pod. I kill that. (It was the one I killed second, I find out in retrospect.)
I check dscan. Nothing. OK, safe. Or safeish -- I am still in a warpable spot they have bookmarked. But I gather what loot I can carry, which is trivial, and the precious corpse. Then I warp back home ASAP. I have a dinner engagement IRL and I must leave in a few minutes. Back up the chain to home, then I warp to safespot and leave EVE.
I feel good.
A look at the killmails shows another mistake: the Ventures have almost no tank. No shield extender; no damage control. Extra hitpoints get you a few extra seconds to react.
Monday, October 20, 2014
An Ishtar in C1
It's Sunday evening. I've been on EVE half the day, with little to show for it. I did get in some POS fuel earlier, taking advantage of a nice connection three jumps from Jita. And my Jita alt got his PI goods moved up and down to and from planets. He had almost run out on all of his planets. So that was nice.
The main highlight of the day was watching a frigate party swarm a Venture at a wormhole deep down my chain. (Presumably they came through a small wormhole in the system, from C6.) I blundered into this, having seen the ships on scan and gotten curious. I looked, then warped to 70km to the wormhole they were clearly at. As I aligned for warp, I hit a dscan and there was a freshly -fired warp disruption probe. Augh! Abort! I tried to abort, but it was too late. I warped and of course ended up about 10km from the wormhole. But I don't think the gankers knew I was there; they were looking for other prey. Still, when I hit grid it was only them there. I had an alarming moment thinking they saw me on scan (which they may well have) and were gunning for me. But they were not. I slid back from their bubble and did not even have to warp. So when the Vexor jumped in a few moments later, I got a good view. Sorry, no pix. I wasn't thinking clearly.
Anyway, now it's after dinner time. By now the main traffic of the day will have died down. But I still have a nice chain scanned, so it's time to head out and see what I can get.
I head down into C4b. Nothing. It's got several wormholes off it; by now they may or may not be there. But if they are, I am heading in. If they are EOL, that probably means I instantiated them earlier in the day. So I'll look.
I look in C1a. Nothing. Back up, then to C2a. The wormhole is EOL. I head in. Nothing.
Jayne comes on, and we get on coms and chat a bit. I'll call him if I can find something to attack. He logs off.
I head into C1b. C1b is a terminal system for my chain -- since its static did not lead to more wspace, and it had a lot of sigs, I did not search it down. I just looked for towers, which there were none of. And targets, which there also were none of.
But that was earlier today. Right now, my dscan from the wormhole is promising. There's sleeper wrecks, and an Ishtar. Anything else? A mobile tractor unit, as one would expect. And Republic Fleet bouncers. I move off the wormhole and cloak.
C1b is an anom graveyard, with perhaps 50 anoms of various kinds. So I am not bookmarking them all. Instead, I swing around dscan as if looking for a POS at a moon. Quickly I narrow it to the right site, then warp in at 100km. This is lucky, since it appears the Ishtar has finished the site and is now setting to salvaging, using salvage drones.
Do salvage drones really work? Maybe with top skills? I guess they do work because he slowly cleans out the wrecks. (He also has a normal salvager.) He scoops his tractor and warps off. I catch the direction and easily find the new site. A sleeper wreck appears on scan.
Now I text Jayne. I want to drop on this guy, but I also want a gang. While I wait, I warp into the sleeper anom and bookmark the target's tractor unit. I watch him kill a few sleepers. I start wondering if I can gank this guy without help. But this rumination is cut short.
Having been there just a few minutes before, Jayne is back on in just a minute. I tell him the situation, including that the target is in a C1. This means our "normal" PVP fleet, battleships and Onyx, can't be used. Our selection of gankfleet material that aren't battleships is meager. (We try to limit the total value of ships at our POS.) Anyway, we have Falcons, so Jayne grabs one for his alt. (Not great in retrospect.) And he uses his PVP Stratios, which is already perfect for this sort of thing, other than its costliness.
While he is making these choices, I swap my two characters. Otto can't fly my Onyx, so he heads downchain to becomes my eyes on the target. I head back upchain to reship. When I get there, Jayne is ready. I swap into Onyx. We're already fleeted, so I fleetwarp us off.
Back down the chain. C4a to C4b to C2a to C1b.
Meanwhile, Otto watches as the target clears the site he is in. He is now salvaging, with wrecks still being pulled in. This is a choice point. He's probably far more alert on dscan now, so there is some risk he'll warp. The gank would probably be more likely to go off if we wait for his next site. But that assumes there will be a next site; there is always the chance he'll leave after this one. Also, I don't fancy waiting out in wspace, even in a decently strong fleet. There's always someone bigger. And it could be a while -- he's salvaging with drones. So I order us in. We'll take our chances.
We jump the wormhole, then warp to the tractor unit. The die is cast. Will he see dscan and warp in time?
No. We land on grid, and I raise my warp bubble. He can't warp, but maybe he can run. We lock him up and get warp scramblers and a web on him. Now he cannot outrun us either.
We start in on him, and it is clear pretty quickly that we can break his tank and that he won't escape. That established, we stop shooting the Ishtar and lock up the tractor unit to kill it first. We don't want to lose any juicy loot to it. It dies.
Now we turn back to the Ishtar and grind it down. Boom. The pod, squish. I turn off my bubble. We run around collecting drones, Jayne loots the wreck, and I grab the corpse for my personal trophy case. Then we GTFO and head back upchain. As Penny says, job's a good one.
The main highlight of the day was watching a frigate party swarm a Venture at a wormhole deep down my chain. (Presumably they came through a small wormhole in the system, from C6.) I blundered into this, having seen the ships on scan and gotten curious. I looked, then warped to 70km to the wormhole they were clearly at. As I aligned for warp, I hit a dscan and there was a freshly -fired warp disruption probe. Augh! Abort! I tried to abort, but it was too late. I warped and of course ended up about 10km from the wormhole. But I don't think the gankers knew I was there; they were looking for other prey. Still, when I hit grid it was only them there. I had an alarming moment thinking they saw me on scan (which they may well have) and were gunning for me. But they were not. I slid back from their bubble and did not even have to warp. So when the Vexor jumped in a few moments later, I got a good view. Sorry, no pix. I wasn't thinking clearly.
Anyway, now it's after dinner time. By now the main traffic of the day will have died down. But I still have a nice chain scanned, so it's time to head out and see what I can get.
I head down into C4b. Nothing. It's got several wormholes off it; by now they may or may not be there. But if they are, I am heading in. If they are EOL, that probably means I instantiated them earlier in the day. So I'll look.
I look in C1a. Nothing. Back up, then to C2a. The wormhole is EOL. I head in. Nothing.
Jayne comes on, and we get on coms and chat a bit. I'll call him if I can find something to attack. He logs off.
I head into C1b. C1b is a terminal system for my chain -- since its static did not lead to more wspace, and it had a lot of sigs, I did not search it down. I just looked for towers, which there were none of. And targets, which there also were none of.
But that was earlier today. Right now, my dscan from the wormhole is promising. There's sleeper wrecks, and an Ishtar. Anything else? A mobile tractor unit, as one would expect. And Republic Fleet bouncers. I move off the wormhole and cloak.
C1b is an anom graveyard, with perhaps 50 anoms of various kinds. So I am not bookmarking them all. Instead, I swing around dscan as if looking for a POS at a moon. Quickly I narrow it to the right site, then warp in at 100km. This is lucky, since it appears the Ishtar has finished the site and is now setting to salvaging, using salvage drones.
 |
| Salvage drones? |
Do salvage drones really work? Maybe with top skills? I guess they do work because he slowly cleans out the wrecks. (He also has a normal salvager.) He scoops his tractor and warps off. I catch the direction and easily find the new site. A sleeper wreck appears on scan.
Now I text Jayne. I want to drop on this guy, but I also want a gang. While I wait, I warp into the sleeper anom and bookmark the target's tractor unit. I watch him kill a few sleepers. I start wondering if I can gank this guy without help. But this rumination is cut short.
Having been there just a few minutes before, Jayne is back on in just a minute. I tell him the situation, including that the target is in a C1. This means our "normal" PVP fleet, battleships and Onyx, can't be used. Our selection of gankfleet material that aren't battleships is meager. (We try to limit the total value of ships at our POS.) Anyway, we have Falcons, so Jayne grabs one for his alt. (Not great in retrospect.) And he uses his PVP Stratios, which is already perfect for this sort of thing, other than its costliness.
While he is making these choices, I swap my two characters. Otto can't fly my Onyx, so he heads downchain to becomes my eyes on the target. I head back upchain to reship. When I get there, Jayne is ready. I swap into Onyx. We're already fleeted, so I fleetwarp us off.
 |
| EVE is pretty. |
Meanwhile, Otto watches as the target clears the site he is in. He is now salvaging, with wrecks still being pulled in. This is a choice point. He's probably far more alert on dscan now, so there is some risk he'll warp. The gank would probably be more likely to go off if we wait for his next site. But that assumes there will be a next site; there is always the chance he'll leave after this one. Also, I don't fancy waiting out in wspace, even in a decently strong fleet. There's always someone bigger. And it could be a while -- he's salvaging with drones. So I order us in. We'll take our chances.
We jump the wormhole, then warp to the tractor unit. The die is cast. Will he see dscan and warp in time?
No. We land on grid, and I raise my warp bubble. He can't warp, but maybe he can run. We lock him up and get warp scramblers and a web on him. Now he cannot outrun us either.
 |
| Die, MTU loot thief. |
We start in on him, and it is clear pretty quickly that we can break his tank and that he won't escape. That established, we stop shooting the Ishtar and lock up the tractor unit to kill it first. We don't want to lose any juicy loot to it. It dies.
 |
| Almost dead. No, you can't tell. |
Now we turn back to the Ishtar and grind it down. Boom. The pod, squish. I turn off my bubble. We run around collecting drones, Jayne loots the wreck, and I grab the corpse for my personal trophy case. Then we GTFO and head back upchain. As Penny says, job's a good one.
Thursday, October 9, 2014
Another Massacre
It's corp night. That's the night we get together as a corp to run PVE sites in C4 -- usually -- to earn ISK. Since we got a C5 static in Hyperion, C5 is now also a possibility. We got our latest incarnation of our PVE fleet ready to go last night. So, tonight we are hoping for a good system.
I log on. I expect the guys to appear in an hour or so. But I am on by myself right now. This is wspace, so there is no gain without scanning. Let's see what we've got in the home system. A bunch of new sigs since last night. Only two gas sites have persisted, but there are five sigs. This is likely to mean we have a K162, but it might mean a new sig site. Only one way to find out. I launch probes and scan.
Sure enough, the extra sig is a K162. I warp to it; it's from C2. That probably means a highsec connection, which would be nice if we needed anything. But we don't really, and we will probably be popping this wormhole. I also scan down our statics, and fly there to bookmark them. The statics may or may not be linked from the far side; that depends on whether whoever opened up the connection from C2 came in and instantiated them. But the K162 is linked for certain. I'll look at it first. I warp to it, and jump into C2a.
As always when I jump in wspace, I dscan upon entering C2a. And what to my wondering eyes should appear, but two mobile depots and one tiny reindeer. No, I mean a Ferox. A Ferox? Caldari battlecruiser, T1, guns. Shield based tank means big sig radius likely. Guns means I might be able to kill it in my Manticore.
I am near the outer planet in this system, which is rather far out from the rest. So I can only see it on scan. I bookmark the wormhole, then move away and cloak. Now I look to see if I can find the Ferox. If it is out in space, I cannot. But it might be at some moon or something. A quick narrow-beam dscan of the nearby planet disproves that theory. It's out in space. I dscan towards the inner system. It appears to be on grid with a mobile depot, or maybe both depots.
I dscan again, expecting that by now it has disappeared. But it is still there. That's... odd. Why would someone be sitting out in nowheresville? I can't fathom. What I can do is get combat probes. Not in my Manticore, of course. The CPU is far too limited. I'll log in my alt, Otto, for the purpose.
I log Otto in, then fly him to our tower to change ships. He's got a Cheetah that has combat probes, so I get that, then warp to the wormhole. As I warp, though, a dscan from Von shows the Ferox is gone. Rats. Kind of expected that, really.
I bring Otto in anyway, and orbit the wormhole at 30km cloaked. It is possible the Ferox is running sites or something, and so I may still want the combat probes.
Meanwhile, Von examines the system map. There is just a single anom in the whole system. It's an ore site in the inner system. Recently I have taken to entering un-dscanned space by warping to ore anoms if they exist. The reason for that is that if miners are there, you find out via overview. You do lose the possibility of luckily finding of a tower at a moon. But you also eliminate the possibility of warping into a tower with a decloak trap. So, all in all a slight win. I warp Von to the ore site.
As I enter the inner system, I dscan, and my excitement rises. Covetor! Miasmos! Retriever! Mack! There's a mining op on! And I am headed to the only place it can be.
Sure enough. I land on grid and there they are. They are about 80km from me, so I can use Look At. Three of them are clustered together near an arkanor asteroid. The fourth, the Mack, is elsewhere in the field. You might ask WWPD? But I know, and I think you know. This is a miner massacre waiting to happen! I bookmark the asteroid, then hightail it back to the wormhole. I am going home to get my Onyx.
Otto will keep cloaky eyes on. I warp him into the ore anom, where he sits and watches.
Von crosses into C4a, then flies to my tower. He gets into my Onyx, then warps right back to the wormhole. This is no time to be worrying about polarization. This is a once in a year opportunity which should not be missed. The operation might break up at any moment.
I cross back into C2a, and sit cloaked a second. Where to warp to? A little eyeballing with Otto shows that the arkanor asteroid is a bit further away from the outer system than the miners. So I warp the Onyx to the ark at 10km. The die is cast. I notice as I am doing this that the Mack has now joined the other miners. Mwahahaha!
Will the Ferox interfere? I don't know. I don't know if my Onyx can kill it in a straight-up slugfest or not. I do know, though, that I'll get a bit of warning. I'll dscan. And if the Ferox does warp in to attempt to help, my bubble will stop it before it lands right on me. If it has a scrambler, it can't pin me before I can (maybe) drop my bubble and attempt to flee. But I think I'll take my chances and just slug it out.
All this rumination is cut short as I land on grid. Hands shaking! Cool. The miners don't flee in time. I pop up the bubble, and start locking up ships. It's killin' time.
I kill the Mack first since it's most expensive. The barges have some drones, which attack. But they can barely more than scratch my paint, and they will soon be turned off. When the Mack dies, I shift to the Retriever, Covetor, and finally Miasmos. I get a conversation request from someone as I am killing the ships, but I have no time for that now. While I am still killing the barges, I move over to loot the Mack's wreck. I get a bunch of low-value loot, but it fills up my Onyx. The barges all killed, I dispatch the pods. (Strangely I miss one of them. Not sure what happened there. Did not notice it get away.)
I feel like a god. Fear me! I dscan from time to time through the massacre, but I never see the Ferox. Now that it's done, I feel it's time to GTFO. I don't know who lives here. The Ferox may be swapping ships into something appropriate to kill me. So, I turn off the bubble (this takes a while), and when it finally deflates, I warp to the wormhole back home.
I check Local for the time to see if I am still polarized. (I am not.) I am amused to find the following conversation there:
Meanwhile, I have this lovely chat with CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK:
This chat goes on as I continue doing stuff. Back home, I get into an Iteron V to collect loot and corpses. It is fit for medium sized cargo, about 17k m^3m and two warp core stabs. Seems about right for the task. But back at the ore anom, Otto sees the Ferox land on grid. What is it doing? I dunno. In any case, I can't go there now in a transport. I want to kill the Ferox. What ship should I use? Hmm. Probably one of our PVP Ravens.
As I consider this, Hiljah logs in. Corp night! Well, having a gang changes things. I mention in corp chat I have a target. Then Jayne logs in. We get on coms. I get back in the Onyx. Hiljah gets something, an Arazu I think, and Jayne gets a Raven. We warp to the wormhole. We'll warp straight to the ark asteroid bookmark, pin the Ferox, and kill him. Before we can jump, though, he warps out. Dammit! He's salvaged the wrecks (?) and perhaps looted some. But there is some loot still there. And the bodies. I notice now that there are more corpses than I made: there are five. Eh? Is this the second gank these guys have suffered here? (EVE is strange.) In any case, I warp back home to get back into the Iteron V.
The Ferox appears on dscan at the wormhole. It seems it is back at a mobile depot. We call for combat probes. Jayne logs in an alt who can probe. This takes time.
Meanwhile, I have taken the Iteron in to C2a and warped to the site of the massacre. I figure I want the Ferox to try to stop me. I'll stay on grid as long as I can while my buddies land. But the Ferox is still in the outer system. I run around collecting loot and all five (again: ?) corpses. Then I warp back.
The guys have probes out, but did not get a 100% hit in time. The Ferox disappears. If I were him, I'd warp out of the system. But he seems to have cloaked. We lurk about a while longer. We search down the mobile depots and the Ferox reappears. We get a 100% hit and get Hiljah on grid. Hiljah almost gets the Ferox, but it decloaks and warps just in time. Oh well. It still remains in system, but we can't find it and decide to forget about it. If he has any skill, he can evade us easily.
We pull out and pop the hole. Onward with PVE. These hits don't pay for themselves.
I log on. I expect the guys to appear in an hour or so. But I am on by myself right now. This is wspace, so there is no gain without scanning. Let's see what we've got in the home system. A bunch of new sigs since last night. Only two gas sites have persisted, but there are five sigs. This is likely to mean we have a K162, but it might mean a new sig site. Only one way to find out. I launch probes and scan.
Sure enough, the extra sig is a K162. I warp to it; it's from C2. That probably means a highsec connection, which would be nice if we needed anything. But we don't really, and we will probably be popping this wormhole. I also scan down our statics, and fly there to bookmark them. The statics may or may not be linked from the far side; that depends on whether whoever opened up the connection from C2 came in and instantiated them. But the K162 is linked for certain. I'll look at it first. I warp to it, and jump into C2a.
As always when I jump in wspace, I dscan upon entering C2a. And what to my wondering eyes should appear, but two mobile depots and one tiny reindeer. No, I mean a Ferox. A Ferox? Caldari battlecruiser, T1, guns. Shield based tank means big sig radius likely. Guns means I might be able to kill it in my Manticore.
I am near the outer planet in this system, which is rather far out from the rest. So I can only see it on scan. I bookmark the wormhole, then move away and cloak. Now I look to see if I can find the Ferox. If it is out in space, I cannot. But it might be at some moon or something. A quick narrow-beam dscan of the nearby planet disproves that theory. It's out in space. I dscan towards the inner system. It appears to be on grid with a mobile depot, or maybe both depots.
 |
| A ship not in a POS |
I log Otto in, then fly him to our tower to change ships. He's got a Cheetah that has combat probes, so I get that, then warp to the wormhole. As I warp, though, a dscan from Von shows the Ferox is gone. Rats. Kind of expected that, really.
I bring Otto in anyway, and orbit the wormhole at 30km cloaked. It is possible the Ferox is running sites or something, and so I may still want the combat probes.
Meanwhile, Von examines the system map. There is just a single anom in the whole system. It's an ore site in the inner system. Recently I have taken to entering un-dscanned space by warping to ore anoms if they exist. The reason for that is that if miners are there, you find out via overview. You do lose the possibility of luckily finding of a tower at a moon. But you also eliminate the possibility of warping into a tower with a decloak trap. So, all in all a slight win. I warp Von to the ore site.
As I enter the inner system, I dscan, and my excitement rises. Covetor! Miasmos! Retriever! Mack! There's a mining op on! And I am headed to the only place it can be.
Sure enough. I land on grid and there they are. They are about 80km from me, so I can use Look At. Three of them are clustered together near an arkanor asteroid. The fourth, the Mack, is elsewhere in the field. You might ask WWPD? But I know, and I think you know. This is a miner massacre waiting to happen! I bookmark the asteroid, then hightail it back to the wormhole. I am going home to get my Onyx.
Otto will keep cloaky eyes on. I warp him into the ore anom, where he sits and watches.
Von crosses into C4a, then flies to my tower. He gets into my Onyx, then warps right back to the wormhole. This is no time to be worrying about polarization. This is a once in a year opportunity which should not be missed. The operation might break up at any moment.
I cross back into C2a, and sit cloaked a second. Where to warp to? A little eyeballing with Otto shows that the arkanor asteroid is a bit further away from the outer system than the miners. So I warp the Onyx to the ark at 10km. The die is cast. I notice as I am doing this that the Mack has now joined the other miners. Mwahahaha!
Will the Ferox interfere? I don't know. I don't know if my Onyx can kill it in a straight-up slugfest or not. I do know, though, that I'll get a bit of warning. I'll dscan. And if the Ferox does warp in to attempt to help, my bubble will stop it before it lands right on me. If it has a scrambler, it can't pin me before I can (maybe) drop my bubble and attempt to flee. But I think I'll take my chances and just slug it out.
All this rumination is cut short as I land on grid. Hands shaking! Cool. The miners don't flee in time. I pop up the bubble, and start locking up ships. It's killin' time.
 |
| Trapped in my bubble. |
 |
| Massacre. |
I check Local for the time to see if I am still polarized. (I am not.) I am amused to find the following conversation there:
[ 2014.10.08 23:48:58 ] NightFury128 > Hello :DIronic. I did not see this in time for it to matter.
[ 2014.10.08 23:49:09 ] Alpha Strike Toaster > SUP :D
[ 2014.10.08 23:49:31 ] NightFury128 > Hows hows WH life been?
[ 2014.10.08 23:50:08 ] Alpha Strike Toaster > good I enjoy it so far. trying to get into Astral inferno to try it out more.
[ 2014.10.08 23:50:17 ] NightFury128 > ah nice
[ 2014.10.08 23:50:47 ] NightFury128 > WH space can be fun :)
[ 2014.10.08 23:51:43 ] Alpha Strike Toaster > It has been so far. I'm curious what it's like living out of a POS
[ 2014.10.08 23:52:13 ] NightFury128 > in High sec space? meeeh not very exciting
[ 2014.10.08 23:52:20 ] dav Uitra > u do know talking in wh local shows all the other players that ur active lol
[ 2014.10.08 23:52:21 ] Forloth Rollard > ^^^^^
[ 2014.10.08 23:52:32 ] NightFury128 > lol
[ 2014.10.08 23:52:51 ] NightFury128 > I like being socialble :)
[ 2014.10.08 23:53:16 ] dav Uitra > makes u a target use a channel
[ 2014.10.08 23:53:32 ] NightFury128 > k
Meanwhile, I have this lovely chat with CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK:
[ 2014.10.09 00:03:57 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > what an ass hole"we are Hi sec, we wont be back." Yup. He claims he was transporting PLEX. In wspace. I'd have loved to gank that, assuming it was the truth.
[ 2014.10.09 00:04:12 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > we are a new miner corp you would have mad more if asked us to pay
[ 2014.10.09 00:04:45 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > never mind, your a pussy not an asshole
[ 2014.10.09 00:05:43 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > poor little pussy cant fight anyone with gus?
[ 2014.10.09 00:06:26 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > most the guys you killed are players less then a month
[ 2014.10.09 00:07:39 ] Von Keigai > Sorry, was busy.
[ 2014.10.09 00:07:48 ] Von Keigai > Hi.
[ 2014.10.09 00:07:49 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > being a pussy, yes
[ 2014.10.09 00:07:59 ] Von Keigai > Look. I don't pause to look at bios or whatever before I kill.
[ 2014.10.09 00:08:06 ] Von Keigai > I kill first, ask questions later.
[ 2014.10.09 00:08:21 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > because your a pussy, it was easy for any body but a noob to see
[ 2014.10.09 00:08:30 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > duh no fighting escort, no links
[ 2014.10.09 00:08:46 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > all bunched up
[ 2014.10.09 00:09:05 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > lol, what atool, your skill must really suck to pick on a new miner corp like that
[ 2014.10.09 00:09:33 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > you even pod killed, waht a totall pussy to pod kill after that
[ 2014.10.09 00:09:48 ] Von Keigai > Hmm. Pod killing is de rigeur for wspace.
[ 2014.10.09 00:09:53 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > pod killed people who cant fight wow what a man, lol
[ 2014.10.09 00:09:58 ] Von Keigai > I think this is a valuable lesson for your new guys.
[ 2014.10.09 00:10:02 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > no
[ 2014.10.09 00:10:13 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > taught me what a real pussy looks like
[ 2014.10.09 00:10:31 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > a man would have said wait these guys could need some help,
[ 2014.10.09 00:10:42 ] Von Keigai > I am sorry you are so hurt. That's EVE, friend. Permanent gain, permanent loss.
[ 2014.10.09 00:10:48 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > a child or boy acts like you did
[ 2014.10.09 00:11:06 ] Von Keigai > I am not a man. I am a monster. Don't forget that in wspace. Most people here are.
[ 2014.10.09 00:11:11 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > i am not hurt, just amazed at what a tool you are
[ 2014.10.09 00:11:22 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > monster, lol
[ 2014.10.09 00:11:25 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > your a child
[ 2014.10.09 00:11:32 ] Von Keigai > Aw, so hurt.
[ 2014.10.09 00:11:41 ] Von Keigai > Did you lead these guys up here?
[ 2014.10.09 00:11:47 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > not trying to hurt you, your too noob for that
[ 2014.10.09 00:11:57 ] Von Keigai laughs.
[ 2014.10.09 00:12:37 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > run away child, find more targets that cant fight back
[ 2014.10.09 00:12:53 ] Von Keigai > Um, I just did. A clump of them.
[ 2014.10.09 00:13:04 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > another miner group?
[ 2014.10.09 00:13:12 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > wow, what a pussy
[ 2014.10.09 00:13:58 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > whats really funny is in all you pussniess you missed the most valuable target, lol nood
[ 2014.10.09 00:14:25 ] Von Keigai > Please educate me then. What did I miss? Other than some kills?
[ 2014.10.09 00:14:53 ] Von Keigai > I am always looking to improve.
[ 2014.10.09 00:15:13 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > the ship, 100 km off, no pilot, thank god you did not pod ivanna
[ 2014.10.09 00:15:29 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > hopefully by now she has it and is gone
[ 2014.10.09 00:15:41 ] Von Keigai > I went for the clump. Assault missiles have a range of about 25km.
[ 2014.10.09 00:15:43 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > no kill mal
[ 2014.10.09 00:15:46 ] Von Keigai > Could not go after both.
[ 2014.10.09 00:15:53 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > so she must still be alive
[ 2014.10.09 00:16:42 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > well if you would have been smart you would have it the unpiloted trasport ship first, that would have been right up your pussy little ally
[ 2014.10.09 00:17:29 ] Von Keigai > Missed one? That was in range?
[ 2014.10.09 00:17:42 ] Von Keigai > See, now you are helping in spite of your anguish.
[ 2014.10.09 00:17:45 ] Von Keigai > Thanks.
[ 2014.10.09 00:18:11 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > no, we were invited in for a little minig because we are Hi sec, we wont be back
[ 2014.10.09 00:19:16 ] Von Keigai > Well. Live and learn, eh? Or die and learn?
[ 2014.10.09 00:19:21 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > 30 Day Pilot's License Extension (PLEX) 30 Day Pilot's License Extension (PLEX) Tobacco Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane I 1MN Afterburner I Acolyte TD-300 Blueprint
[ 2014.10.09 00:19:38 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > some of what you missed, we were on a trasport mission when they invited us in
[ 2014.10.09 00:19:54 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > Concentrated Veldspar Concentrated Veldspar
[ 2014.10.09 00:20:16 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > Expanded Cargohold II she said she is safe in .4 space, need to go later
[ 2014.10.09 00:20:38 ] CAPTAIN CRIMSON HAWK > i would have given you the ship to let my friedns live, lol dumb ass pussy
This chat goes on as I continue doing stuff. Back home, I get into an Iteron V to collect loot and corpses. It is fit for medium sized cargo, about 17k m^3m and two warp core stabs. Seems about right for the task. But back at the ore anom, Otto sees the Ferox land on grid. What is it doing? I dunno. In any case, I can't go there now in a transport. I want to kill the Ferox. What ship should I use? Hmm. Probably one of our PVP Ravens.
As I consider this, Hiljah logs in. Corp night! Well, having a gang changes things. I mention in corp chat I have a target. Then Jayne logs in. We get on coms. I get back in the Onyx. Hiljah gets something, an Arazu I think, and Jayne gets a Raven. We warp to the wormhole. We'll warp straight to the ark asteroid bookmark, pin the Ferox, and kill him. Before we can jump, though, he warps out. Dammit! He's salvaged the wrecks (?) and perhaps looted some. But there is some loot still there. And the bodies. I notice now that there are more corpses than I made: there are five. Eh? Is this the second gank these guys have suffered here? (EVE is strange.) In any case, I warp back home to get back into the Iteron V.
The Ferox appears on dscan at the wormhole. It seems it is back at a mobile depot. We call for combat probes. Jayne logs in an alt who can probe. This takes time.
Meanwhile, I have taken the Iteron in to C2a and warped to the site of the massacre. I figure I want the Ferox to try to stop me. I'll stay on grid as long as I can while my buddies land. But the Ferox is still in the outer system. I run around collecting loot and all five (again: ?) corpses. Then I warp back.
The guys have probes out, but did not get a 100% hit in time. The Ferox disappears. If I were him, I'd warp out of the system. But he seems to have cloaked. We lurk about a while longer. We search down the mobile depots and the Ferox reappears. We get a 100% hit and get Hiljah on grid. Hiljah almost gets the Ferox, but it decloaks and warps just in time. Oh well. It still remains in system, but we can't find it and decide to forget about it. If he has any skill, he can evade us easily.
We pull out and pop the hole. Onward with PVE. These hits don't pay for themselves.
Saturday, October 4, 2014
A Hit and a Miss
It's the weekend. The Boy is away, and so I play. EVE, that is. I log Von then I log my alt, Otto. Since I have the two accounts, I try to use the second even when I concentrate mostly on the first. Often this means ice-mining in highsec while I explore. But lately I have been logging on Otto in a Hound. I use him to monitor a wormhole in my home system, and to maybe help trap people at my tower's nasty decloak trap.
Our home system has its normal two connections. The C5 is getting old, but I have time. I check out our C4 static first. We instantiated it last night, and it only has about an hour left. I explore it down a few layers finding nothing interesting. In one final system I find a guy idling at his tower in an Occator. I watch for a few minutes. Then I realize I can't hang out here for long, and return back up the chain.
Coming back into my system, I see a new sig. That's interesting, because it is likely to indicate activity. I scan down the new sig, which is a wormhole as expected. It is a C2. I head in to explore. Meanwhile, I fly Otto over to watch it, in case anyone enters. They probably already did -- that's why the K162 is there -- but you never know.
In C2a there are four live players at a POS: two in Tengus, another in a tranport, and a scout. It's always nice to see live players. But they are not doing anything, so far as I can tell. After I sit and watch them for five minutes, I give up. I scan the system down to see what may lie beyond.
Beyond is a highsec exit, which I transit to highsec and bookmark just in case. Then I return polarized, not fearing that any more. Another sig is a second C4 connection. I head further down the chain.
In C4f, I find a guy all by himself, mining gas in a Prospect. Unfortunately, I assumed the system was empty after seeing all but an outer planet. I started scanning his sig before flying to the outer planet he is near. He sees my probes, and aborts to a POS that is also at the outer planet. I start to scan down the system including the sig he was in. He is sitting at his POS. After a while, he gets in an Anathema and goes out to scan. Presumably he has noticed my new wormhole.
I get a fancy new idea. Perhaps he will go to my new wormhole predictably. I am nearly done scanning. So I scan down the wormhole I entered. I have already bookmarked the wormhole itself, as a matter of course, when I came in. But I don't know where its signature is. Thus the scanning. I find the signature in one try since I know precisely where it is. Then I fly to it. I pull my probes.
Now I watch the enemy probes. I am waiting for them to vanish. Eventually they do. I wait 20 seconds, then I uncloak and turn on my sebo.
I am hoping that he has pulled his probes because he found my wormhole. (Presumably he should have already scanned down everything else.) He will want to bookmark the wormhole proper, so I am hoping he'll warp to the sig at zero. This is the lazy thing to do, but safe 99% of the time. I hope to be the 1%. I'll be there at zero. There is a good chance he'll be uncloaked. If so, I hope I can lock him before he can warp.
That's the plan. In fact, nothing happens. I watch dscan and after about 20 seconds I see him. We are not near his POS, so I guess he must have exited one of the other wormholes. Oh well. I'll have to keep trying this one.
There are two further systems that he might have exited to: a C1 and a C2. I randomly choose C2, and keep exploring. I don't see him there. There are three guys as a POS, doing laps just inside the force field. I watch this for some time, then give up. I re-enter C4f. I check the POS -- still gone. Then I check out C1.
I am warping around C1 to look for towers when I hear wormhole noise. Alert! It must be Otto. I focus on Otto's screen, and I see a Stratios enter. I like the look of that. Unlike cloaky T3s, Stratioses cannot be interdiction nullified. As such, they can blunder into my trap as easily as its normal victims which are covert ops frigates. I warp Otto back to my perch just off the decloak trap. I watch for a few minutes but nothing happens. Oh well.
I turn back to Von in C1. There is a guy in a Venture, but he's idle at a POS. There are some ore anoms, which he might be thinking about mining. There is no gas, there being just two sigs. So I wait, to see if he makes a move.
I hear guns. Eh? Otto! My POS guns are firing! Yes, there's the Stratios. I uncloak Otto and get his sebo on, then lock the Stratios with shaking hands. I don't want to miss this. Locked! It is dead unless it has warp core stabilization. I set Otto's orbit at 15km. I doubt the Stratios can kill me in the short time it has left, but I don't want to find out.
The Stratios attempts to get out of the trap. It clears the warp bubble, but evidently it does not have warp core stabilization. I expect the Stratios to lock me, but it does not come before the tower kills it.
I am ready, and immediately lock up the pod. Pods should be able to flee even a boosted frigate, but I guess he is so flustered from the attack that he dithers that extra second. Otto locks. He kills the pod with torpedoes.
Well, score one for little Otto. Otto the spider, sitting so patiently in his web... Otto grabs the corpse and loots as much as he can from the wreck. Nice stuff: Coreli A-Type Adaptive Nano Plating. Loot fairy loves me today. Then he gets a Coercer to salvage, even though it is T1. Leaving a wreck in your trap is a red flag.
Then Otto heads back out to sit at the C2 wormhole and watch. Maybe someone else will come in.
Back to Von. The Venture has logged out. So I head back up. Back in C4f, I fly to the POS to check and the guy who was there earlier is not there... but his Prospect is on scan! He'll be in the gas again. I dscan to verify: yes, in the gas.
I warp out to distant planet to refit to my anti-Venture fitting. I hate taking the time, but I think it will be necessary. A Prospect has no built-in warp core stabilization, but I expect it to have two points fitted because it has the low slots for it, and why not? What else helps it survive? So I waste two minutes refitting. Then I fly to the gas site (a vast frontier reservoir) at 20km.
I land on grid, and there he is, 50km away. There is only one gas cloud, the C28 cloud. Evidently he has already sucked the C32 cloud entirely. I watch for a moment to see which way he is moving. And... he is not moving. It's hard to believe: he is just sitting there sucking gas. (Listen, kids, this is a bad way to do it.) Well, he may not know how to mine safely, but I know how to take advantage of that. I move straight at him.
This will take a while, so I look around to see if there is any celestial that I might bounce off of. But there's not. So I just keep moving at him. I have to steer up a bit to avoid the cloud, but it's only a mild change of vector. Won't be long now... 21km...
I am almost to warp scrambler range: 15km. I start to rehearse in my mind what I'll do. 12km. Suddenly the gas cloud vanishes! Oh no! He'll warp for sure. In desperation, I uncloak and pulse my microwarp, and start locking. I initiate my scramblers. I hope that the lock completes and I am in range to scramble.
He vanishes. What? Ah, Prospects can cloak. He's probably warped by now, but I continue in the direction I was hoping for a lucky decloak. No such luck. He's gone.
Our home system has its normal two connections. The C5 is getting old, but I have time. I check out our C4 static first. We instantiated it last night, and it only has about an hour left. I explore it down a few layers finding nothing interesting. In one final system I find a guy idling at his tower in an Occator. I watch for a few minutes. Then I realize I can't hang out here for long, and return back up the chain.
Coming back into my system, I see a new sig. That's interesting, because it is likely to indicate activity. I scan down the new sig, which is a wormhole as expected. It is a C2. I head in to explore. Meanwhile, I fly Otto over to watch it, in case anyone enters. They probably already did -- that's why the K162 is there -- but you never know.
In C2a there are four live players at a POS: two in Tengus, another in a tranport, and a scout. It's always nice to see live players. But they are not doing anything, so far as I can tell. After I sit and watch them for five minutes, I give up. I scan the system down to see what may lie beyond.
Beyond is a highsec exit, which I transit to highsec and bookmark just in case. Then I return polarized, not fearing that any more. Another sig is a second C4 connection. I head further down the chain.
In C4f, I find a guy all by himself, mining gas in a Prospect. Unfortunately, I assumed the system was empty after seeing all but an outer planet. I started scanning his sig before flying to the outer planet he is near. He sees my probes, and aborts to a POS that is also at the outer planet. I start to scan down the system including the sig he was in. He is sitting at his POS. After a while, he gets in an Anathema and goes out to scan. Presumably he has noticed my new wormhole.
I get a fancy new idea. Perhaps he will go to my new wormhole predictably. I am nearly done scanning. So I scan down the wormhole I entered. I have already bookmarked the wormhole itself, as a matter of course, when I came in. But I don't know where its signature is. Thus the scanning. I find the signature in one try since I know precisely where it is. Then I fly to it. I pull my probes.
Now I watch the enemy probes. I am waiting for them to vanish. Eventually they do. I wait 20 seconds, then I uncloak and turn on my sebo.
I am hoping that he has pulled his probes because he found my wormhole. (Presumably he should have already scanned down everything else.) He will want to bookmark the wormhole proper, so I am hoping he'll warp to the sig at zero. This is the lazy thing to do, but safe 99% of the time. I hope to be the 1%. I'll be there at zero. There is a good chance he'll be uncloaked. If so, I hope I can lock him before he can warp.
That's the plan. In fact, nothing happens. I watch dscan and after about 20 seconds I see him. We are not near his POS, so I guess he must have exited one of the other wormholes. Oh well. I'll have to keep trying this one.
There are two further systems that he might have exited to: a C1 and a C2. I randomly choose C2, and keep exploring. I don't see him there. There are three guys as a POS, doing laps just inside the force field. I watch this for some time, then give up. I re-enter C4f. I check the POS -- still gone. Then I check out C1.
I am warping around C1 to look for towers when I hear wormhole noise. Alert! It must be Otto. I focus on Otto's screen, and I see a Stratios enter. I like the look of that. Unlike cloaky T3s, Stratioses cannot be interdiction nullified. As such, they can blunder into my trap as easily as its normal victims which are covert ops frigates. I warp Otto back to my perch just off the decloak trap. I watch for a few minutes but nothing happens. Oh well.
I turn back to Von in C1. There is a guy in a Venture, but he's idle at a POS. There are some ore anoms, which he might be thinking about mining. There is no gas, there being just two sigs. So I wait, to see if he makes a move.
I hear guns. Eh? Otto! My POS guns are firing! Yes, there's the Stratios. I uncloak Otto and get his sebo on, then lock the Stratios with shaking hands. I don't want to miss this. Locked! It is dead unless it has warp core stabilization. I set Otto's orbit at 15km. I doubt the Stratios can kill me in the short time it has left, but I don't want to find out.
The Stratios attempts to get out of the trap. It clears the warp bubble, but evidently it does not have warp core stabilization. I expect the Stratios to lock me, but it does not come before the tower kills it.
 |
| Finish him. |
I am ready, and immediately lock up the pod. Pods should be able to flee even a boosted frigate, but I guess he is so flustered from the attack that he dithers that extra second. Otto locks. He kills the pod with torpedoes.
Well, score one for little Otto. Otto the spider, sitting so patiently in his web... Otto grabs the corpse and loots as much as he can from the wreck. Nice stuff: Coreli A-Type Adaptive Nano Plating. Loot fairy loves me today. Then he gets a Coercer to salvage, even though it is T1. Leaving a wreck in your trap is a red flag.
Then Otto heads back out to sit at the C2 wormhole and watch. Maybe someone else will come in.
Back to Von. The Venture has logged out. So I head back up. Back in C4f, I fly to the POS to check and the guy who was there earlier is not there... but his Prospect is on scan! He'll be in the gas again. I dscan to verify: yes, in the gas.
I warp out to distant planet to refit to my anti-Venture fitting. I hate taking the time, but I think it will be necessary. A Prospect has no built-in warp core stabilization, but I expect it to have two points fitted because it has the low slots for it, and why not? What else helps it survive? So I waste two minutes refitting. Then I fly to the gas site (a vast frontier reservoir) at 20km.
I land on grid, and there he is, 50km away. There is only one gas cloud, the C28 cloud. Evidently he has already sucked the C32 cloud entirely. I watch for a moment to see which way he is moving. And... he is not moving. It's hard to believe: he is just sitting there sucking gas. (Listen, kids, this is a bad way to do it.) Well, he may not know how to mine safely, but I know how to take advantage of that. I move straight at him.
This will take a while, so I look around to see if there is any celestial that I might bounce off of. But there's not. So I just keep moving at him. I have to steer up a bit to avoid the cloud, but it's only a mild change of vector. Won't be long now... 21km...
 |
| Closer... closer... |
I am almost to warp scrambler range: 15km. I start to rehearse in my mind what I'll do. 12km. Suddenly the gas cloud vanishes! Oh no! He'll warp for sure. In desperation, I uncloak and pulse my microwarp, and start locking. I initiate my scramblers. I hope that the lock completes and I am in range to scramble.
He vanishes. What? Ah, Prospects can cloak. He's probably warped by now, but I continue in the direction I was hoping for a lucky decloak. No such luck. He's gone.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)