Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Of roams and RR Battleships

The brain feels a bit better now so here goes with the update. As I mentionned earlier, a lot has happened in Curse since the last big post. The first and most major event was that the alliance moved yet again, with all the repackaging, contracting and cynoing that this implies. The main reason is that the european Bozo players were basically perma-camped because their play time was in the middle of TCF primetime, and because they lived right next door and weren't afraid to show they vastly superior numbers at a time when 80% of the alliance is not even logged in the Euro-Bozos were stuck in station. There are more reasons to the move but I'm not in a position to discuss them here at the moment. Being very active during the move gave me the opportunity to see an impressive lightshow, as the capital ships were jumping back and forth between cyno fields, which I now have the skills to create. When I was on cyno watch duty I got to take a few nice screenshots:


Queb's Nidhoggur


The Anshar


TS's Phoenix


Queb jumping out

But moving isn't all that happened. With a new locale comes new neighbors, and ours have a love for gate camps. That is a good thing because we have a love for BUSTING gate camps! We are usually successful at breaking those camps with minimal losses, though sometimes we do have to call the retreat; we may be crazy but not stupid. On one of those camp-busting ops I was just logging on as the fleet was making it's initial attack on the Onyx that was on the gate, so I hop into my interceptor and fly top speed to the fleet's location. Just as I get out of warp the FC calls for bumps on the Onyx to get him off the gate. So because I had time to set up because I wasn't yet targeting I was able to line myself up perfectly, so not only did I bump him, I PUSHED him 15km away from the gate. The Onyx then proceeded to die a horrible death. R.I.P.

Sometimes the opposition brings heavier firepower though, in the form of remote-repairing Battleships (hereby called RRBSes). Well, that's ok because we have RRBSes of our own! I can't fly one yet because in order to be successful the ships have to be fit right and for that I'd need about 2-3 months of skill training, not to mention a good amount of ISK. I will get there though. So in these gangs my job is to tackle whatever the FC wants me to tackle, whore some killmails, and do my best not to die. Here's a screenie showing how dinky a Stabber is compared to an Apocalypse:


Now you can imagine a Stiletto, which I sometimes do fly on those ops! Speaking of small ships, I'm happy to announce that I've achieved yet another benchmark in my EVE piloting career, and here's the story from the start. A now-ex Bozo buddy (Xanthame left to form a pirate corp... gl hf!) was flying around in his brand new Cheetah which he had just gotten the skills for, and was happily warping around cloaked and saying how cool it was. At the time I was in my Hurricane, ratting away to make ISK and pick up loot and salvage. But then all of a sudden Xanth calls out on Ventrilo "There's a cyno open in Utopia". An open cyno from an enemy corp could mean a single jump freighter or 10+ carriers so I ask him "Is anyone watching it?". His answer: "I don't think so, there's 2 more in local but neutral and not the same corp and this Breacher is just sitting there". My answer: "I'll be right there !!!". So I dock up the Hurricane and get into my cheapest Rifter and head to a gate leading into Utopia. Xanth and I start a fleet together and he then proceeds to get close to the cyno ship so I can warp in on it. And of course during all this time we're expecting anything from freighters to Titans so time is of the essence. As soon as Xanth is in position I jump in Utopia, warp to him, and start pounding on the helpless Breacher, which dies very quickly but the pod docks up in no time. I barely have time to celebrate my FIRST SOLO KILL that one of the neutral pilots undocks, of all things, an Ibis on me... yes, the Caldari noob ship! I'm not sure exactly what was on his mind but he actually attacked my Rifter !!! Of course I blew him up and podded him as he deserved >:)

Before I sign off with a screenie of my killer Rifter, I'd like to wish fellow EVE player, blogger, Godfather of my eldest boy and great buddy Letrange a happy birthday. May your flights be safe and dangerous at the same time :))

Cheapniz, the Rifter of Doom

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