Sunset on my Dramiel

Last night I had 20 minutes so I decided to bomb around in ole faithful, my Dramiel. In Kedama I detected a hostile on a plex gate and warped in. A Thrasher, could be tough so I click on him and ....

WHAT THE HELL!?!?!

So lately every once in a while my computer while playing Eve freezes solid except sound for 4-6 seconds. It's happened three times now, including last night when I started to engage the Thrasher. And when I say freezes I mean no mouse, no keyboard, no movement. It happened when I fought Connall Tara in a duel and a night last week when I was flying around in Korneilia before going to the wormhole and I engaged a Condor.

I don't know what causes it, but it seems to happen periodically at the beginning of some PvP engagements.

When it happened last night, I became very rattled. Now I was lucky that the freezing wore off before the Thrasher had engaged me but I was rattled and made some missteps. I managed to pull range as my shields and armour took damage, but I knew from the damage that I was facing an Artillery Thrasher and I noted with panic that my afterburner speed was less than his MWD speed. I switched to MWD and tried to pull range again as he closed but sadly failed to manually pilot out while keeping transversal up. As I flew in a straight line from him he lined up my bloomed signature perfectly and my damaged ship could not take the hit.

BOOM!

I was not pleased with myself as I limped back to Heydieles in my pod. Lots of "I shoulda"s. Like, I should have not engaged a Thrasher, I know the margin of error against them in my Dramiel is small. Or I should have tried to dive in close to 500 meters and get under his guns with my afterburner. Or I should have flown manually and kept the transversal up. Sigh.

Regardless, I will not be getting another Dramiel for a while. Against trickier and better opponents the ship requires a better pilot than me. I have two Daredevils to run with for a while and a slew of ideas for the improved T1 frigs, destroyers and cruisers I want to try.

* * * * *

Anyways, I got back to Heydieles and decided to jump in my new Incursus to check out the local plexes. I warped into one and saw a militia member in a Fed Navy Comet engaging two neutrals in Maulus ships. I leaped to help out, but my mind was racing.

"Maulus... what's a Maulus?"

The Comet exploded and the two ships turned on me.

"Gallente, right? What do they do now? Hell, what did they used to do?"

Suddenly I was sensor damped all to hell and my locks broke.

"RIGHT! Its the T1 electronic warfare frigate! .... Oh crap..."

Sure enough, the tactic these two were using was obvious and I was trapped in it. Combined their remote damps brought my lock range down to the 4 km range. They were faster than I was and were kiting me from 10-15 km away. I was pointed... and stuck.

I did the only thing I could do. I fought on. Zigged and zagged to try and pull one of the hostiles into locking range. I targeted and shot drones to reduce their DPS. My tank was holding up nicely, so I settled in for a long fight.

Then, fortune shined on the prepared. One of the Maulus must have his approach instead of orbit and flew straight at me. I nearly tripped over my fingers in my hurry to lock him and get a scram on him. Once pointed, the fragile ship was gone in three shots.

With that done his partner warped off and we exchanged pleasantries and fits in a convo. Good fight.

* * * * *

So one fight in which I spazzed out and one in which I fought well and got the kill. I'll take that any night of the week.

Putting November Behind Us

November was horrible for me (3 kills, one of which was an arranged duel and another that was a cyno Velator, and 3 losses including a low grade snake pod) and was especially disappointing after the awesome October I had. I was logging in and looking for fights, they just did not come as expected. I was beginning to worry that the faction warfare and plexing changes had changed the warzone to be less friendly to my playstyle.

Well, last night changed that opinion in a hurry.

I logged in and noticed in teamspeak a whack of people in a channel. "A fleet!" I cried, "let's see if I can join."

I get in and discover that they are roaming around in Tech 1 frigates and destroyers. Not my favourite ship types for gang warfare but beggars can't be choosers. I hope into an arty Thrasher and head out to join the fleet in Black Rise region. The fleet is heading back towards Heydieles but is not standing down. Excellent.

Right after I join the fleet, we come across a Diemos and quickly dispatch it, and I accidently killed the pod (so used to flying solo!). Sorry FC.

Already December is better than October!

We continued on and ran into some Shadow Cartel pirates in Old Man Star (aka OMS). A Hurricane, Stabber Fleet Issue, Federation Navy Comet and Slepnir command ship. Our advance wing engaged and forced them through. The SFI was too fast to catch and the Comet warped off too, but the battlecruisers were caught and we piled in to the command ship. He boosted like a champ but in the end our large fleet (aka blob) proved too much. A few minutes later our scouting wing caught the Comet and killed it too.

We started plexing in several systems as things had died down and I decided to switch to my Dramiel.
Skipping over an uninteresting Thorax kill, we got reports of a Caldari militia gang composed of Crucifer, two Thrashers, and a Cormorant. We gave chase and fought them in a plex in Vifrevaert. I got an inital tackle and allowed us to kill teh tech 1 frigate and one Thrasher as I warped out in deep armour. I came back and found ourselves in a stand off with the two remaining destroyers 150 km off and our group of 9 frigates at the button. One of our cagey Incursus pilots loitered around a wreck 60 km off and lured them into approaching. The FC gave the order for fast tackle and despite still having armour damage I charged in close and hit the afterburner for transversal. I lost my shields and rest of my around, but the gamble paid off as the arty fit Thrasher and rail fit Cormorant could not track me and we dispatched him.

As we headed back to OMS intel reported a small battlecruiser gang headed our way from Pynekostah (pirates or War Targets, I don't remember). As the fleet rushed towards the Abune gate in Heydieles, I chose to upgrade firepower to my Hurricane. We engaged in Abune and I helped kill an Arazu and Hurricane.

But wait! THERE'S MORE!

That Caldari militia destroyer gang we busted up in Vifvaraert? They were in the alliance Happy Endings and we got reports that they were coming back in Drakes and a Huginn. Now fully in our bloodlust, we moved to engage. As we were setting up a Happy Endings Falcon jumped into our fleet and we obliterated it. A few minutes later the 4 Drakes, Bellicose (!), and Huginn warped in at 100 km off the gate. The FC, the always enthusiastic Marcel Devereux, gave the order to attack the Huginn.

Now I admit some hesitation on my part. It seemed unlikely we could catch the Tech 2 Recon with its long ranged webs before the Drakes picked off our frigates and destroyers, leaving our two or three battlecruisers hanging in the wind, so I stayed close to the gate. But Marcel made the right call and caught the recon long enough for the pile on to do its work. With their tackle gone the Drakes made a fight of it but ultimately were overpowered.

With that, and my Hurricane having several perilously overheated modules, I decided to log off. A total of 12 killmails with my name on them, all from decent PvP encounters and not a single noobship amoung them. Best night of PvP for me ever. This calls for Octo-hat and goggles.

That's the Ticket!

I missed my weekly Eve night last week due to my escape to play board games, and coupled with not being able to talk about a game I'm in the Closed Beta for due to the NDA (hint: I bought this joystick to enjoy it more), I found a lot of wind taken out of my sails.

Throw on top of that a busy long weekend due to Canadian Thanksgiving, two family dinners requiring two car rides, and general little child rearing of three hyper-energetic (and loud) monsters, I was pretty wiped when I logged in last night.

Can I do it, I asked myself? Can I get the motivation to fly again? IS THIS THE END?

I joined a fleet that was next door in Old Man Star running a plex. Apparently this fleet's raison d'etre was plexing. I wondered if I should go off on my own (or just give up and log off). We finished the plex and moved into Ladister to run another Major outpost.

IS THIS THE END OF KIRITH KODACHI!!?!?!?!

"Tusker in local."

My ears perk up, the haze clears, the senses sharpen. My eyes focus on local and I listen more closely as chattering on teamspeak gives way to intel.

"IK Thel in Arbitrator one hundred klicks off OMS gate, in line with station."

"Roger, warping."

"Point point, warp to me!"

I activate my warp drive and its 14 AUs away. The Arbitrator cruiser goes down fast to our little gang and I arrive just in time to lock and engage my weapons. I do no damage on the kill mail but the blood has started to flow.

Moments later, more intel. "Another Tusker, Naoru Kazon in local, looks like Hurricane." The heartbeat picks up. That name I recognize, he's one of the more proficient pilots in The Tuskers and most likely come to fight.

At the sun one of our gang made a tackle and we went in full force. I was right; the Hurricane was ready to fight and fight dirty. He was setup to fight and kill frigates (which was our fleet comp) and he tried to spread us out but we got multiple webs on him and started to go to work. Sensing he was doomed, he decided to go after me for some reason, probably because I went in early and hard. It was a close thing, but I exploded a second before the Hurricane did.

Ah yes, that's more like it.

I went back to base and got a Vagabond. The fleet caught and killed a couple more ships while I was in the Vaga but I didn't see any action as I covered a gate. Its all good, the blood was flowing now. I was

Later on I went back to Heydieles and saw a pirate Condor 100 klicks off station. I docked and grabbed my Dramiel, perfect for tuning up these upstarts who think the new Attack frigs are "all that". AS I undocked I saw him warp off to the static dungeon called an Abandoned Battlefield. I warped after and after I landed I gave chase. I was fast, but he was a good 700 meters per second faster. I was patiently giving chase, hoping he would try to come into range to fight me when two more Condors landed behind me. Two Condors I would consider engaging in my Dram, three was too much risk. I went back to station and got my Hurricane and rushed back, but they were gone.

I floated around for a little while longer. Then, as I was docking and preparing to log off I saw a war target who I knew was in a Cormorant from intel earlier in local chat. Engaging destroyers can be tricky as a properly fitted one can, well, destroy frigates. So I selected an Arty Thrasher and narrowed down on deep scan the Cormorant to the minor plex in system.

As I dropped out of warp on the plex gate I saw my three 'friends' in their Condors again. Before I could react two warped into the plex and one warped to the sun. After a moment pondering options and chances, I decided to warp to the sun and see if I could take out one Condor before his friends could arrive. At the sun I saw not only the Condor, but the other two Condors and the Cormorant.

Ah what the hell. CHARGE!

I decided to go down swinging at the Caldari foe (because, for the Federation and all that so I accelerated towards the Cormorant with guns blazing. I don't know if the Condors were winning the fight or not but my salvo finished the enemy off. I then blazed in a straight line hoping to drop the transversal of any pursuing Condors. That worked on one of the damaged Condors as one salvo popped him at 19 km away from me.

The other two, sensing perhaps a tougher prey than they could handle, warped off. I beamed. Not only did I get a couple killmails, I survived AND held the field.

God I love this game.