The Wandering Druid of Tranquility

I am out and about, flying around, doing my thing. It’s been quiet, so I figure, how about some low-sec npc ratting. I head to a new favorite place of mine, Otou. It’s a nice system, some nice npc rats, but it’s also a dangerous place. I’ve run into some fun pirates in that system and they do mean business. They are a good lot, very professional pirates. I have had a tangle or two with them, always managed to escape their grasp in the past. So, as you would guess, I would have made their hit list.

As fate would have it, I did tangle with them again. I was ratting around and in jumps a fellow in a stabber. He locks me down and we begin to fight. His support shows up and I am not able to get away as he’s got a 24km warp scram on me and I stopped fitting warp core stabs a long time ago. I am brought down to structure and I figure, well, there goes my Deimos. Might as well surrender. I shout in local that I surrender and to my pleasant surprise a convo begins. Wow, these are not gank pirates? I am intrigued. I stop firing and drop my weapons lock. Very professional, straight and to the point. They state their ransom sum. I go ahead and pay them and they let me go.

I’ve not seen that in a while as most pirates I have been running into are on the gank first, collect loot path.

What happens next surprises me even more and again, it’s a pleasant surprise. Their CEO convos me and is very polite. We chat about a few things and he comes out and asks if I would be interested in joining his corp. Again, I am intrigued. I’ve been in two corps already and things have always petered out. TRAPS and YA-RR do spend most of their time in empire and I think I am finally ready for the low-sec life. I’ve done some npc ratting in low-sec but I’ve spent most of my time doing empire wars.

I tell him that I am still working a contract, as I was at the time, but I would be interested in learning more. He invites me to safely spend time with them in their home system and do some PvP. Shortly after, I am with them on a gate camp, having some fun with my Domi. A few kills later, I realize, I’ve been missing a lot of fun and these guys seem to be a good bunch. After some removing myself as ceo of my 1 man corp, I take the plunge and join up. Yup, I’ve gone down the dark path of being an Outlaw, I joined the Neo Spartans.

It’s been a few days and already it’s been a blast. We’ve had a bunch of kills, including something I had always wanted to do, but had not had the chance. While we were working a gate, the word comes in that a freighter is incoming. So, we head off to engage. I click the wrong gate and warp off in the wrong direction. Yup, even vets make noob mistakes. So, I arrive late to the fight, just in time to put some damage in and they watch the ransom. He’s given a choice, pay the 700 mil or eject and save his pod. He says that he’s empty and he won’t pay. A quick cargo hold scan confirms that’s he’s empty. 700 mil or eject and save your pod.

What does he do? He refuses to pay and self destructs. How lame. He could have kept his pod and simply lost his ship but no, he had to be stubborn about it. Oh well. We are ordered to destroy the ship before the self destruct timer goes off. Fortunately, we are successful.

Yup, that’s a freighter wreck, my first that I helped to create. It’s been over two years playing and I feel like I have started to play EVE for the first time. More people should make the move to low-sec and zero-zero. There is a whole section of game play that people are missing spending all their time in Empire.

So, here’s to my new corp mates, let’s have some fun!!!

I have been having fun with my new corp. a war or two, some PvP here and there. All and all, I am enjoying my time.

So, what am I going to write here? Yet another tale of how I hunted down, locked and popped another player. Of course, but I think it needs something else. Something more entertaining. Here we go.

Captain Ga’len and his trusted crew are in deep space, traveling to the northern regions of EVE when an incoming message sounds on the com.

“Captain, I have an incoming emergency message from GuardianXM. He is engaging with a Raven class battleship and needs help.”

“Helm, come about and engage full warp drive!!!” I shout, “contact the base, tell them to have the ‘Pulse’ ready for immediate departure!!”

The ‘Genolin’ is moving at top speed and makes it back to the base. The ‘Pulse’ was ready when our crew arrived on the bridge.

“Undock and set course for Hiliban.” We fly as fast as we can. Additional coms from GuardianXM show that he is holding on as long as he can.

We jump into Hiliban and warp to our fellow captain. “Red alert!! All crew to battle staions!!! Prep the drones for immediate launch!!!”

We drop out of warp and there is the raven. He’s pounding away on GuardianXM’s Thorax class cruiser. There is debris all over the area, pieces of his ship floating about. He’s been in a tough fight.

“Lock target, engage NOS and Neuts!!! Engage scrammers and launch drones!!!”

“Open a channel to GuardianXM. We are here and engaging, if you need to retreat to repair damage, please do so. We will continue the fight!!”

GuardianXM stays a while longer and has to warp out, the damage to his vessel is too great to continue the fight. We dig in and hold our ground. Slowly, the drones work their way through the Raven’s shields, then armor and finally structure.

We have lost our shields and armor repair nanites are holding the ground as a large blue light fills the view screen. The raven is destroyed.

“Recall the drones and move in to the wreck, prepare recovery teams and salvage what we can from the wreck. Good job everyone!!”

We are able to recover some useful modules from the debris. We rendezvous with Captain GuardianXM and split the booty. It’s yet another good day for company.

So, I was killing some time this morning, just wandering about, no real plans for a whole lot. It’s a holiday here in the states and I didn’t want to start up in anything really involved, only going to be on for a short time.

I am warping around, npc ratting when I come across a guy in a Cyclone, mining. He’s just mining away and mining away. I am really just on my through the system and the only person in local was this guy, I was curious why someone would be in a Minmatar battle cruiser, in a belt, in Amarr, a 1.0 sec system. Larger cargo hold perhaps?

Well, as I ponder these things, he locks me. Mind you I just warped into the belt and I was aligning for a warp out. Of course, I ask why he’s locking me. He answers “I can kick you butt.”

Well……I’m game…..let’s go.

I alter course, kick in the mwd and close the distance to his jet can. I swap the can and he warps out.

Hmm…..either he’s got something with bigger guns, he didn’t see me take the can or he’s just a noob in a BC. A few seconds later, he warps in flying a Bestower. Okay….so….it’s a hauler versus an assault ship? Hmm……he’s not going to take the can, is he…..better lock him so I can warp scram him before he gets away……no…..he won’t take the can now……YUP, HE DID!!!

So, I obviously warp scram his hauler and promptly convo him. Ransom time!! He refuses the convo. I attempt to ransom him in local, “I WILL KICK YOUR BUTT!!!” Okay, on go the guns and release the drones!!!

As predicted, he didn’t last very long, blew him up before his auto-destruct kicked in. He kicked in his auto-destruct? Why? Does he want to go get his Cyclone that much faster? He could have ejected. Oh, wait, I would have taken the ship if he had and if I did blow up the ship, I would get a chance for some loot. Self-destruct to ensure that no modules survive and the attacker gets nothing. Yeah, use a game mechanic to stick it to the attacker. It’s supposed to anger pirates who’ve spent the “Yarring” very hard.

So, I figure that he’s not gonna come back, right? Hell no, he said he’d kick my butt. I figure he’s gonna come back with his Cyclone.

So, I orbit his wreck, waiting for his Cyclone to return. He comes in, locks me and warps out. I follow him around the system for a bit and we finally end up back at his Bestower wreck. Then we go at it. He’s hitting me with artillery shells and missiles, I am nosing him, hitting him with my rails and letting my little drones do their thing. We are going at it for several minutes. As he passes into structure, I see the system message that he has activated his auto-destruct. Hmm, two engagements in a row he has done this. Did I fall for the old “taunt the pirate and sefl destruct to frustrate him trap?” Well, if I have, he’ll get his insurance payout. He will loose all those expensive modules too, he should have paid the 50,000 isk ransom I kept offering him in local.

The counter goes down and there is litterally 1 slice of structue left, his ship pops.

As his pod warps away, he’s laughing in local. “Hahaha, no killmail for you, I auto-destructed first!!! Hahahahaha. No loot for you either!!! Hahahaha.”

He’s right, I didn’t get the kill mail.

So, I get nothing for my trouble, or do I? There is loot in the wreck of his Cyclone, a Cargo Expander II, some ammo, an artillery gun and a missile launcher.

Strange. Did a self-destruct happen or did I pop him.

No kill mail would suggest the self-destruct worked, but the loot left behind, more than ammo and/or drones and that would suggest that I popped him first.

I kindly inform him that it was nice of him to leave his extra cargo expander II in his cargo hold as well as a rail gun, missile launcher and some ammo behind when his Cyclone popped.

Needless to say, he starts a massive smack talk session. I let him go off and I eventually leave the system, after relocating all the ore that was in the jet can. So, I walk away with 6 mil in loot and refined ore sales.

Self-destruct, hmm, he seemed to think that he won that fight with that. Why is that? Hmm…., I do what any self-respecting pirate in training would do, check the forums concerning this particular tactic, self-destructing to avoid a kill mail/loss mail. I do some digging, even check the game logs. I see that his ship did self destruct before I could blow it up, even though he had literally 1 slice of structure when he popped. Were my shots in the air as he blew up? There’s no way to know. It’s so close, I decide to petition it, stating I don’t think the self destruct did not work correctly and I in fact did blow up the ship, why else would their be loot in the wreck. Shortly after I file the petition, I received the kill mail, hence the above referenced killboard posting.

So, I guess I did in fact pop his ship. To be nice, I head back to that system and post a copy of the kill mail, in several copy and paste moves, into local for him to see. I even forwarded a copy to the guy, just to let him know again what he lost. He starts smack talking, saying he’s going to petition a hack since he received the loss mail too and that activating a self destruct ensures that I should have gotten nothing from his Bestower or Cyclone.

So, either lag cause the kill / loss mail being sent or my petition worked. Regardless, I made some isk. He was so ticked and is threatening to have BoB war dec my 1 man corp. Funny how smack talkers like to name drop. He may actually be friendly with people in BoB or possibly a BoB alt. I don’t think they will war dec a 1 man corp and if they do, that would be a MAJOR milestone for me. BoB war decs my little 1 man corp, I must be doing something right.

All this because he locked me in a 1.0 sec system and lost two ships because he told me, “I can kick your butt,” as I was warping away, not even planning to swap his ore can. I was going to warp away, dock at a station and log for the day.

I swear, sometimes people only open their mouths to exchange which foot they have inserted in them.

I am grabbing a few minutes of my favorite addiction before heading into work, NPC ratting it is. I am flying around the belts and here comes someone in a Coercer, charging towards my wrecks. I try to talk to them in local, but they manage to loot the wreck and warp out of the system before I have a chance to do anything. Convo invites are rejected and no response from emails.

So, as I am trying to contact this person to get them to apologize for their acts of cowardly theft, I see another person come in and hit another one of my wrecks. Wow, people must love to steal from me.

I follow this fella around, trying to lock him down and the aggro timer expires. Nutz, I have to head to work soon. So, I head back to one of the belts that had his wrecks in it and loot from it. Yeah, I steal from wrecks too, but I at least stick around for the fight.

I scan him down and warp into te belt. He’s there, I hit the afterburner and charge at him. He locks me and fires. Sweet, a fight between two assault ships. This should be good.

For the next 10 minutes, we orbit each other, he in his Jaguar, me in my Ishkur. Around and around, firing on each other, nosing each other. My drones firing away. We both go into armor, we both go into structure. The only thing that is helping me is my damage control and my armor rep. We are both at 10 percent structure and they, BOOM, he’s in his pod.

I have to say, skydvejam put up one hell of a fight. I personally think is was the luck of the wrecking shot that won that battle. I have to tip my hat to him, it’s why I play EVE, for the great fights. We exchange good fights and some friendly chat in local and then we both log.

So, what to do about that guy in the Coercer?

…so, I am scoping out targets in the belts and I come upon a mining barge. I read the name and it looks familar, Firncirithion. Why do I know that name? Oh, Omicron Corporation. I remember them, back from my TRAPS days. He’e the CEO that I never was able to nail, he stayed docked most of the time. Nexa finally got him, but he was a loose end for me.

He has a jet can out as his is mining. Nah, he wouldn’t attack me, would he? Let’s find out. I swap the jet can and sure enough, out come the drones. We exchange blows and suddenly, pop goes his Retriever. Loot galore, well, lots of mined ore and a few items, mainly two strip miner I’s. It’s a start. I dock and sell the loot and head back to handle the ore. I should have checked the scanner first, he’s there in his Myrmidon. I think that this is going to hurt and out he warps. I must have warped in as he was warping out. I lock my jet can and pop it, then warp out to get bigger guns.

As I jump back into the system, he’s there are the gate. He locks me and fires. I guess he didn’t see that I am in my Pilgrim of Doom. I close to 30 km and hit my nos. I get into warp scrambling range and scramble him just has he recalls his drones. They never make it back to the drone bay, he goes boom. From the loot and the killmail, I can tell that this was a quick fight because of his fittings, it was just not right for a Myrmidon. Not strong enough. I exchange good fights with him anyway, at least he made a showing.

So, on to roaming the belts, this time, in another system.

A hulk. Wow, I’ve never had someone in a hulk fight back and with the ore cans, all three of them full, this was not something I was going to pass up. He’s been here a while, I could make some money.

So, I close distance and swap one of the cans. As I am waiting for the jetison timer to exprire and jet another can, some NPC rats spawn. Out come his drones and they attack the rats. Then, much to my surprise, they attack me. SWEET, I have a chance to pop this Hulk. I work him down to half armor and in warps a Raven. I do a double take and the Raven locks me. These two are not in the same corp, suicide gank with a Raven? No, can’t be that dumb.

As the cruise missiles crash into my armor, I think, wow, I took that hit and survived, will I survive the second volley? No need, Concord shows up and attacks the Raven. Before I can get a shot off on the Raven and hopefully get the killmail, the Raven pops. A few seconds later, the Hulk goes up too.

So, I miss out on the Raven killmail, but the loot makes up for it. I head to a station and I nervously grab my hauler as my Punisher’s hold is too small to get everything. As I approach the belts, both of these people leave local. Sweet, they are not coming back for their loot.

So, a simple desire to pop a Hulk lands me with some very nice T2 loot, some E50 nos modules and 120 million isk more in my wallet. This was a good day.