A Jump Too Far

So the marching orders came down and the plan for moving the capital fleet was announced. Everything looks good except the timing... I'm a father of 1 year old twins and on the weekends I'm on duty for late night and early morning wake ups, I can't set an alarm clock for a middle of the night operation when I most need my sleep. Perhaps I could squeeze in a mid week late night operation, but the weekends are family responsibilities.

So figuring that moving after everyone else would be problematic, I decided to be preemptive and do what I have done many, many times before (come to think of it, I don't think I've ever moved my current carrier to a cyno that was not generated by Derranna).

This morning before work, my favourite time for carrier jumps as the populations tend to be more sedate around downtime, I loaded up the Jump Range Planner and put in the information, picked some good waypoints, and sent Derranna in her little cyno ship to the first jump. Once she got there she picked a good spot, got Kirith in gang, lit the cyno, and I undocked the carrier.

"JUMP" I ordered in my best captain voice.

"Beacon is too far," the ship's AI informed me matter-of-factually. "The beacon is 14 light years away and your ship can only jump 13.6 light years."

I put in Jump Drive Calibration V instead of IV into the planner. I really should log in when doing plans as it has my stored info.

I scrambled to redock, and when safe I went back to Derranna to wait out the timer and then pick a new, correct jump waypoint and send her there. A nice empty system this time, I once again picked a good spot, lit the cyno, and this time the Ninveah jumped without complaint (although I swear the AI was using a mocking tone when informing me the jump was complete).

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Follow up on the new header:

When soliciting comment from Andrew he mentioned that it would look better without the Blogger Bar at the time and the borders around the image. Alas, I said, there is no option to remove the Blogger Bar anymore. but one google search later he sent this address to me and a few seconds later it was removed. I was able to remove the division borders myself. He thinks it looks better but it looks so naked to me. However, I trust his colour judgement more than my own.

Skills Update

I haven't blathered about my skills in a while and since I'm feeling a tad under the weather and work is too busy to go to Jiu Jitsu class, I figured a post was in order.

Historic landmark in skill training today! Kirith is finishing his basic Carrier training with the completion Capital Energy Emission Systems IV. This is the third and final milestone on the carrier training path, with Feb 7, 2007 being the point I announced my intention to train for a carrier and July 18, 2008 marking the point I could actually sit in the ship. Here we are almost two years later and I'm just about done. Phew! To be fair, I had a few side trips in there for tech II rails and blasters, shield mods, overheating, etc, but you get the gist of it: capital ship training is long haul only.

Next step is the Winter Training Plan coupled with a couple weeks of Gallente cross training to get access to the Gallente battleships: Dominix, Megathron, and Hyperion. Especially the Dominix for a cheap PvP battleship platform since the Scorpion is very role specific and Raven too expensive for my goals.

Meanwhile, a friend asked if I could build an Amarr Redeemer Black Ops battlehship and I agreed to it depsite the lack of Amarr Starship Engineering skill. I bought it and I'm working it up to IV this week as a break from the leadership skills I've been beavering on for a while now.

More Carrier Picture Goodness

When I jumped to Sukanan constellation to a friendly POS, I haad a chance for some good pics. Enjoy! (As usual, click to see full size)

Making the jump.


Profile. She's a sexy beast, no?


Head on.


Isometric.


I'm probably going to make a new blog banner and signature out of one of these. I'm leaning towards the profile for a sig and one of the other two for a banner.

Carrier & Skill Update

I'm in the final throes of training for the carrier for sure as the last prerequisite skill I need for my modules is completing. On Dec 10 I'll be able to use the Capital Energy Emissions module and the Ninveah will be ready for business. The rest of the ~49 days of training is simply fine tuning and improving existing skills.

1. Energy Emission Systems IV (21 hours, 16 seconds)

2. Energy Emission Systems V (7 days, 19 hours, 49 minutes, 47 seconds)

3. Capital Energy Emission Systems I (1 hour, 6 minutes, 50 seconds)

4. Capital Energy Emission Systems II (5 hours, 11 minutes, 18 seconds)

5. Capital Energy Emission Systems III (1 day, 5 hours, 20 minutes, 52 seconds)

6. Capital Energy Emission Systems IV (6 days, 22 hours, 1 minute, 12 seconds)

7. Fighters III (1 day, 14 minutes, 10 seconds)

8. Advanced Drone Interfacing III (23 hours, 28 minutes, 42 seconds)

9. Jump Fuel Conservation IV (5 days, 21 hours, 7 minutes, 1 second)

10. Capital Shield Operation IV (5 days, 12 hours, 48 minutes, 57 seconds)

11. Capital Shield Emission Systems III (1 day, 5 hours, 20 minutes, 52 seconds)

12. Capital Shield Emission Systems IV (6 days, 22 hours, 1 minute, 12 seconds)

13. Energy Pulse Weapons IV (1 day, 9 hours, 12 minutes, 14 seconds)

14. Fighters IV (8 days, 7 hours, 13 minutes, 26 seconds)

15. Energy Pulse Weapons V (7 days, 19 hours, 49 minutes, 47 seconds)

Ninveah Reporting For Duty!

I had about 30 minutes to log in last night. Not much but enough.

I finished the last batch of invention jobs and found that from 20 Invul Fields and 20 Large Extenders I had 10 tech II versions of each. Exactly 50% which is the expected rate. I'll pull those up to the factory and buy the parts to build them after dropping off the cloaks and Cerbs tonight.

Sukanan constellation was quiet with only one war target docked up and a couple more up in Amarr playing docking games with a couple of our guys. Seeing an opportunity to make that last jump with the carrier, I got Derranna into position outside a POS and I jump cloned to my ship.

I double-checked the intel channels and got on teamspeak. Satisfied that there was lots of blue and no other hostiles except docked-up-boy, I popped the cyno and moved to jump the ship.

WHOOOSH! Man I love that graphic.

The Ninveah materialized a couple kilometers from the safety of the force field and feeling very exposed I boogied in that direction at a solid 80 meters per second. A bit of excitement erupted on voice comms as allies noticed the beacon on their overview but I quickly assured them it was just me.

Damn carriers are slow. I was starting to get paranoid. What if the hostiles showed up in force and zeroed in on my ship before I got to the field? What if the few neutrals in system are hostiles in disguise? What if FINEG perpared a login trap for me and I'M ABOUT TO DIE!?!?!!

Oh, I'm in the force field? And nothing happened? Just my overactive imagination again then. Whew!

So I slowly brought about the prow and aligned to station, nudging the beast into warp with a satisfied sigh. Once docked I gave a "good night" to my co-pilots and logged.

"Skill Training Complete"

I finally finished Tactical Shield Manipulation V this morning and will be able to fit my Capital Shield Booster tonight.

Overall this means I'm in the short strokes of my Carrier training, another two months for full capabilities, and less than 3 weeks to operational capability.

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In other carrier news, last night I made the second jump of my journey but my time online got called short due to a visit to the blood donor clinic that lasted over 2 hours (110 minutes of waiting, 10 minutes to give my pint of blood... AB+ second rarest type and also known as the universal receiver... all your blood are belong to us).

However, when I logged in quickly to get Derranna back on track to Task Murkon, who should I see in local in this far off jump point but Lemage, CEO of FINEG! Either it was coincidence or he was checking up on me for an easy POS takedown again or even a carrier kill.

Definitely going to keep my eyes peeled for those guys online next time.

WHOOOOOOSH!

So last night I got Derranna's second cyno ship ready (a Vigil) and tore off for the jump point once again. Uneventful trip through high sec and then a few jumps through low sec. As I was looking at the map I saw a system called Rancer on my route. "That sounds familiar" I thought and I ran a search. Oh yeah. Still, its a Wednesday evening and I'm in a fast frigate, what's the worst that could happen?

I jumped into Rancer and saw local was only a few pilots. I warped to the outgoing gate and saw a red flashing Hyperion battleship. "Heh, I thought, I'll be jumped and gone before he can ever lock me.... why am I taking damage? OH CRAP! SMARTBOMBS!"

*BOOM* *SQUISH* ... "Welcome to the cloning facility on Gulfonodi XIII."

Well crap. The smartbombs did in my ship and pod in short order before I could even activate the gate. The ship loss was minimal, the cyno generator a minor expense, the +3 implant set very annoying to lose, and the cost of a new clone stung. Not a serious loss but definitely high on the annoyance list. Especially since I was now stuck deep in Minmatar space far from any assets and no money.

So I sent some ISK to her, sent her off through high sec to the other cyno ship I accidently left in Caldari space, and then back towards the jump system this time avoiding systems known for pirate activity. Yay for high sec autopilot. I got through low sec without issue this time and found my target system not only quiet but abandoned. I was going to wait until near downtime but I figured this was opportunity knocking so I logged Kirith in and packed up the carrier.

I got Derranna in position, checked local was still empty and lit the cyno. Kirith undocked, waited out the timer, and jumped. The Ninveah's first jump under my command. *sniff* Brings a tear to the eye.

As local was still empty, I took some pictures. As usual, click to see full size (high res!):











And as a bonus, here are a couple other pictures from earlier operations.

Here's me in my Falcon with fleetmates in a Rokh and Megathron battleships waiting at a gate for an enemy:


And here is my PvP Rokh at the alliance station camp looking for that hostile carrier:

Out Of Practice

Back in the day when I had the alt Barak Vorn and his Thanatos carrier at my disposal I got pretty good at using two clients to move the ship from one end of empire space to the other, with Derranna and Optivus Slysonn providing the cyno beacons. Heck, I could get from Gallente to Minmatar space with four jumps over a cup of coffee with the numerous jump clones I had set up.

Its been a while and last night it showed. I was setting up for the trip from the carrier's current location to somewhere closer to home. I needed some nitrogen isotopes as fuel so Derranna loaded up the 99K she had from previous aborted POS venture *shakes fist in FINEG's general direction* and a cyno frigate into a Mammoth hauler and set course for Caldari space. Once there I scouted her into low sec and gave the fuel to Kirith before scooting back into high sec.

At this point I realized my first miscalculation. I forgot how small the cargo capacity of a carrier is nowadays. The ~3,400 m3 of the cargo hold and 10,000 m3 of the onboard Corporate Hangers were insufficient to carry all that fuel, much less the two capital mods (Capital Shield Transfer Array and Capital Remote Armour Repairer) which take 4000m3 themselves.

So I brought Derranna back, transfered the excess fuel and modules to her. But wait! I sent the Capital Shield Booster as well! Damn, send that back. Ok, all set; Derranna got back into high sec and set course for the first jump point. Once she got there I opened up the cargo hold to get the cyno frigate ready... except mistake #2: I forgot the damn thing back at the high sec system beside the carrier! I had taken it out to not risk it during the low sec jump and forgot to load it back up.

Sigh. I better get back in shape or this move is going to take forever!

Chimera Progress

As Jump Drive Calibration IV ticks down, I get closer to the point where I can move my Chimera, the Ninveah, to my base. I want to have the Capital Shield Booster on and that will be ready by the end of November.

Here is the current setup. Only Tech II at the moment sadly.

(yadda yadda yadda, you know the drill)

And here is the current contents of the drone bay:


Make note that I don't have the Ogre II skills yet. :/ And the collection of drones is not complete, I still need a couple more fighters, logistic drones, etc.

And here are the skills I still need to train along with the mods I need to fit.


Soon my sweet, soon.

Activate Jump Bridge!

Last night I wanted to get the rest of my ships to the 0.0 outpost using my alt's Barak Vorn's carrier. Normally it would be one jump except the alliance has several POSes with cyno-jammers which means my cyno-pilot Optivus can't make the cyno field for the carrier to jump to.

What to do?

Fortunately Sylph is actually, you know, organized. The have a POS with a Cyno beacon setup at a nearby system that Barak, being part of the alliance, can lock on and jump to without the need of another pilot. Then from there, in theory, he can jump to the outpost system using a POS structure called a jump bridge which can link POSes in different systems and allow ships to jump there and back.

So I cyno jump to the beacon and right click on the jump bridge. No option to jump.

"Hmmm, maybe my capacitor has to be at 90% or better like normal jumps", I think. So I settle down and wait for the recharge to occur.

A few minutes later, I'm recharged. Right click, nothing. What the heck? Am I not doing it right? Do I need fuel in my cargo hold? Nope, that didn't work. What is going on here?

Just as I was about to ask for help in corp chat I realize I'm just over 5000 meters away. Probably too far away to use it and I approach. Sure enough, the option to access fuel and jump to another jump bridge structure appears as I close the distance to the right amount. Sigh.

I jump to the outpost system, warp to station, and dock safely. Now Kirith has his selection of vessels and is ready for wild and woolly adventures in 0.0 again.