Roaming fleets - I love them and WTF is a COCKROACH?

We undocked into our local space and the Sansha incursion was still there - hanging around gates became a very bad idea as these chaps could hit HARD. Local was at an usual high of 60+ and a check scan revealed a fleet from the Volition Cult in their huginns and scimitars. SniggWaffe came in and chased them off while we were still getting ready. Snigg then got bored and also left the scene; meanwhile a sizeable Sicarius fleet went into Hagilur no doubt to do battle with a smaller fleet made up with pilots from the 'Something Posing as meat' alliance. Then there was the presence of Eve-University in Hagilur too. Yes, quite a typical night in this neck of Metropolis.

All in all, I knew something would kick off somewhere. We lept in to impose ourselves onto the local scene but we couldn't get anything useful. Man, I do miss Max and his stiletto in these times. We were too slow to cross the distance and the fight had petered out by the time we arrived. It wasn't all bad luck, z0de managed to kill a caracal in his paper thing brutix and we also snagged a Celestis; both with Eve-Uni. This then kicked off a some sort of hunt where Eve-Uni, The Fendalian Collective and Sicarius (shame on them, all flashy and criminal) joined up to camp the gates blocking our exit route back to Evati. Sicarius should be fighting Eve-Uni and The Fendalian collective since I thought they are pirates! There was chatter that leaked out into local from the Fenders:

"HOLD FIRE!"

Then followed by:

"Sorry, your flashiness scared us."

Yes, that is what happens when you have criminals in your midst. The overview can be distracting, just invite them into fleet. Anyway, we moved deeper into the Hagilur pocket looking for more targets. If people wanted us, they will have to find us. Camping gates is one of the most boring activities around and I was sure that people would just get bored - thereby offering us an opening. Eve-Uni for most of this time stayed docked up, poking their heads out only occasionally before ducking back in. We rolled around Ansen, Arwa etc before we decided it was time to leave. I checked with my scouts and sure enough, the exit gate was now cleared, the carebear camp lasted no more than 15 minutes. We moved through. Just as we emerged into the familiar Evati star filled sky, another one of my scouts informed me that a pirate fleet had come in through Thelan and had jumped into another camp!

So we raced back and only managed to get a few scraps. However, a man has to eat so we were grateful for the meagre morsels. We the moved around again into the outskirts of The Forge when we spied a megathron and friends, we jumped in and killed them only for a third fleet come piling in. We killed their stealth bomber and made a hasty withdrawal. All the while enduring some silly smack from the newcomers. They were awfully confused mistaking us as members of yet another fleet of pirates next door and calling us out for running away.

Anyway, no worries from us as we were quite chill with kills and loot aplenty. We docked up and rested, some pirates leaving their ship hangars to deal with other business while new pirates, fresh from resting came on board. The Bastards' are more active now (though with the occasional quiet day) and this can only be good for us as an organisation.

The remaining week had us messing about with bubbles in null-sec, some gate camping and more roaming fleets. As pirates, we tend to fly with whatever and whoever so plenty of solo and duo-fleets head out from Evati. Not for us where no-one undocks unless there's a fleet of 50+ with logistical support! Hell no, we're pirates and we have to eat so we go with what we have!

It just so happened that BracerKirk and Tibbs on one of these roams spotted and killed something....amazing. I don't even know what it is or why it was sitting where it was at but am going to give them each a medal.

Please look at the kill of a CCP 'Cockroach' and the 'enigma' loot.

Some Italian Vomit, A huge gate camp, and lots of alcohol

Introductions please
The latest drunk roam for me kicked off with some of my fellow fleet mates already well drunk by the time I linked in. Mirtillo was slurring into the communications while Dam1987 was being drunk and Scottish: a fearsome combination. There were some new faces there but within minutes we were all fast (and drunken) friends. Shizraak, one of my old drun roam attendees was absent due to some illness. The best cure is alcohol my dear Shiz!

So we compared notes on what we were drinking and insulted each other as nicely as we could about our choices. I was actually mixing my drinks but had settled on that old stand-by: Disaronno and coca-cola. 

Drink of choice

The Incursion
What happens when an incursion appears, there's alcohol sloshing around and the pirates are bored? Well carnage. As our first outing, we decided that we would rush straight into the Sansha incursion and see just how hard these Sansha chaps were. They were appearing in space like the poverbial bogeyman and sucking up hapless citizens into their ships. That simply wouldn't do!

So we undocked in our ships (I forget which one) and warped to the beacons; so many Sansha about and aggressive too. My ship arrived amidst a see of red - an incursion fleet was in full flow. I ordered targets to be locked and fired and before I even finished, a spikey Sansha battle ship volleyed my craft into pieces. All around me, my drunken fleet mates were sliced to pieces. The alcohol played its part: dulling our senses and responses but still, the power of the incursion fleet was most impressive. After losing one too many ships we thought that we should now go on a roll.

I decided on a bait maller and called it (cunningly) as 'bait'. 

We set destination to be Ardar and left via Arnher.

The Camp

Well, one jump out and there was a camp on the Evati gate in Arnher. It looked like members of Dark-Rising (now out of the Executives alliance) in a fleet of perhaps a dozen battle cruisers and support. Even drunk, I still retained enough wits about me. I ordered the fleet to burn back towards the gate and sure enough, the [-Dark] fleet went red on all of us. However, their alpha damage was quite poor, or did they not concentrate on primary and ended up spreading their damage? Either way, we all managed to get out. Result! One for the drunken bastards!

The vomit then the tackle
At this point, Mirtillo announced that he was going to vomit and off he chundered.

The Second Camp
After our brush with Dark Rising, the fleet wandered up towards the Hagilur pocket - always fun as EVE-Uni has made it one of their low-sec PvP 'summer camps'. We warped around here and there and didn't manage to entice the Unistas so I offered to move around a bit more.

After several attempts at reading the map, I figured out where I needed to go - into Miroitem and straight into another camp. This time is was held by the infamous 'Negative Ten' alliance who promptly destroyed my ship and smart bombed my drunken arse back to Evati. Take a note Dark Rising: that's how to camp a gate.

More Alcohol
With myself being podded, it should have cleared my alcoholic fugue, right? No. I was still drunk when I emerged from the cloning vat. I cannot remember anything else from the roam; apart from applauding someone for throwing up (live) on the vent server and some other madness.  I think I probably insulted everyone I could think of too and no doubt, most of this was recorded onto vent.

Which reminds me, there's a four hour drunken roam recording that TheHermit has stashed somewhere. I shudder to think what is on it...

Drunk Roam Update, yet another FC guide and When Can I Bring My Tornado Out?

Drunk Roam Update

I have had much interest from people so thank you so much! My liver will try it's best to withstand the punishment. I have some comical fits in mind and if anyone else has one; please send it to me or pop it under the comments. Remember, you will be drunk on the night so who cares?

The main fleet pilots

I think I will be bringing a Bellicose to begin with then moving through my list of ships. I do have a maelstrom that is a bit of a shocker in terms of rig set-up so this looks like a great candidate too.

Date of the drunk roam: 3rd February 2012, Friday Evening, starting from 20:30 in the Metropolis Region Low-Sec, exact details to those who are coming will be passed on when in fleet. Be in the 'INDEPENDENCE' in-game chat channel from 19:30 onwards please.  We will rolling around until we pass out (which for me will be very soon!) or we run out of ships.

Yet Another FC Guide

A typical FC?

The Bastards are fortunate to have a number of excellent FCs and after Penelope's recent article in Eve-Tribune I have had many evemails from people wanting more information. For now, I would like to go through Penelope as it was her article that opened up this conversation. However, I have been in the process of putting together a simple FC guide for The Bastards since early 2011 because we have a lot of new pilots and I encourage my pilots to step up, lead a fleet, go out and 'just do it'. This usually is the only rule I have for budding FCs; you learn by doing. No amount of theory crafting will suffice. I will post up snippets in this here blog for all to enjoy (or critisise) and for general comment.

When Can I Fly My Tornado?
Lately, we've been busy having a fight all over Metropolis and our KillBoard hasn't been able to keep up: the new updates with the latest patches (new ammo) has broken the KB. However, I love the new Neocom and other UI changes. The much anticipated AF changes too. All wonderful stuff and makes a space ship flying pirate like me, very happy in the pants. Of course, this still means that I am distracted enough not to bring out my Tornado, apart from a few POCO bashes this month. I am also looking for a close range face melter and it appears that the Talos fits the bill? Comments please as I want to benefit from other pilots' expertise and experience.

Antics

A massed brawl is always good for the soul

The Bastards have been active from the very first day of 2012 - our neck of the woods has been extremely busy with corporations and alliances either setting up shop or passing through Evati. All great for our line of business. Nearby we have Eve-university in Hagilur / Dudreda (they apparently have a 'war' on with the infamous RvB alliance), we have Eve-Union come rolling around setting up POCOs and responding to their attacks with their usual numbers and tactics, close by there are chaps from TEST alliance, clustering around the entrance points to Geminate and Vale and we've even seen some White Noise(dot) fleets wander through. All wonderful stuff for us. Nothing keeps a pirate happy than activity and loot and this month has been super fun. Long may it continue.

I did miss a sanctioned fleet this thursday - I was all for attending but a last minute issue prevented me from leaving work, but the chaps appeared to have a successful night as per the kill board summary which makes my absence sting even more. I could have brought out my tornado after all!

Happy New Year, boy we love them POCOs and Drunk Roam!

The Bastards: Rested, Reloaded and Ready

Chill with a drink and fag

2012 seems The Bastards back with all guns blazing. December of last year, after much negotiation - we entered into an agreement with our erstwhile rivals, Los Chupababras. Despite the hispanic name, the majority of the chaps are Italians. A link-up with joint fleets and comms was organised and tentatively, we went out as a combined fleet. The results, I have to say, have been very pleasing and lucrative for both groups. Now, instead of hunting each other we would go after other targets usually in a combined fleet of between 12-20 ships. A nice number, large enough to take on most things in low-sec but small enough to avoid the much bigger (usually null-sec aligned) groupings. It has been six weeks now and things are just getting better. Certainly, the response from all the pilots have been positive.

Now why did The Bastards agree to such a link up in the first place? Our patch of low-sec has seen an upswing of larger, more well organised groups roaming through. This is all well and good for low-sec space, long regarded by many as a barren desert of woe. However, for residents such as ourselves we frequently found ourselves out-numbered 3-1 or more. Now, when cornered we can and do fight as hard as anyone but our primary goal is to survive and hold the field so we can pick the loot and/or engage in one or two cheeky ransoms. If we can disengage and fight another day (preferably in the same ship!) then so much the better. So our choice was to adapt or be brushed aside and become irrelevant. We adapted and it has proven to be a good decision. Certainly, the board of directors at The Bastards have supported this. What? You didn't think that there were corporate structures at The Bastards? 

POCO? 

Let's blow it up....

 We love POCOs? What on earth is that? Sounds like some medical term for a pimple on one's arse or a Californian pop group.  In fact, it stands for 'Player Owned Custom Offices'. With the latest (wonderful) release of the Eve client, this was one of many new features added and thereby enriching us all.

OK, so why the love for them? Well, we've managed to get plenty of fights after knocking one or two of these chappies down. They are similar to a small player owned stations (POS) without the guns. With no guns (or neutralisers, webbers etc) they are relatively 'safe' to engage. We have attacked a POCO with just two stealth bombers. It took ages but it is possible. Having the POCOs in our home system also means that we can ship up or down (or sideways) very easily as the situation dictates.

You knock down the POCO's shields (usually 10,000,000 HP) and it drops into reinforced mode for a period of approximately 24 hours. When in this mode, it is invulnerable to all further attack. This gives the owner time to gather personnel to repair the shields once it leaves reinforced. The timer is visible to anyone in local and of course, the attackers also know when the POCO leaves reinforced.

So 24 hours later, and cue fights. Or not.


Either way, The Bastards regard the presence of POCOs as an opportunity to harass and annoy as well as setting up an environment for a fight. Since we live in Evati, we can easily jump into battle cruisers (or stealth bombers) or the yummy new tier-3 battle cruisers and batter a POCO. A small fleet (about 10 ships) can get a POCO down in about 15 minutes. Since we're not a big alliance, this works out beautifully when we're waiting for a fleet to get established, pilots to come back from being afk or if it is a particularly quiet night.

Speaking of a quiet night - I don't think we've had one in since the new year. My first blog entry in January comes on the 16th day and this is because everything has been just so damn busy and fun. The first year started off with kills galore and while I don't want to go through kills (and losses) in any detail, though some memorable events do come to mind including a crazy evening when we engaged an EVE-UNION fleet (after we had reinforced one of their POCOs) which then pulled in both Shadow Cartel and Black Soul Industries. Unfortunately for The Bastards, we were caught in the middle. EVE-UNION has a video available here of the night's fight from their viewpoint.Another night, Marco and I were chucking torps at another POCO and it was late for both of us. We were so tired we practically fell asleep made worse by 1) still having a GCC and 2) warping to a gate and not jumping instantly. Needless to say, we both lost our hounds, much to my horror (but only after I woke up) - very surprised that no-one actually took the opportunity to pod me!

In between these POCO bashes we've been roaming around. The population in this section of low-sec has increased significantly and it is most likely due to the presence of 100s of TEST alliance pilots, now relocated to Otosela so they can base their strikes into Vale of Silent and Geminate Regions. What fun.

So, I do make an offer to my fellow pirates in the Metropolis / Molden Heath / Heimatar region: we are more than happy to set-up a fight on numerous POCOs and we would greatly welcome the extra muscle that some of our bigger friends can bring. Please contact either me, TFS Tibbs, Marco Drack or TheHermit for more details please.

The Bastards will remain a medium sized corporation so we can't bring in dreads and carriers without bankrupting ourselves as we're poor pirates. Unless there's someone with deep pockets who can give us all the capital ships we need?

No?

Thought so.


DRUNK ROAM

Pirate love a pint or two

Date:
3rd February 2012
Friday Night; 21:00
Location: Somewhere close to Akkio

Yes, the first drunk roam of 2012 is being organised. I have the above dates as two possible options and will see which one has the most yes votes/comments. My liver has had sufficient time to recover from the last drunk roam and I went easy over christmas too. So I feel a bit more robust but we shall see.

THE BASTARDS' DRUNK ROAM REQUIREMENTS:

A FUN roam, no sad faces!! Come out of the Captain's quarters and fly spaceships and get drunk!!

1. Join the in-game channel 'INDEPENDENCE' for details and fleet pick up and vent info on the day.

2. Any T1 frigate/cruiser fitted out with whatever you want.

3. Yes, fit a rupture with lasers if you want.

4. Or a thorax with arties and missiles.

5. Or a rifter with a cruiser sized weapon.

6. Or bring a Celestis.

7. Mix your weapon systems. Why? because we can and that's how we roll.

8. Points required of course, we can't have people running away.

Pirate forcing someone to drink to excess

9. We each drink a shot of spirits (or beer) every half hour during the roam and after each ship kill and after each ship loss and for every ransom.

10. Aim is to see who can stay up for the longest.

11.Needs to be frapsed with some vent recordings as well.

12. If you decide to fit a stab (why not?) then you have to say 'STABBED!' in local, take a shot of alcohol and then RUN like the wuss you are when you get tackled. If you do this and get smack - everyone else will need to take a shot on your behalf.

13. Any other rules that the FC wants to make up...

Interested? Then contact us using the one of the following methods:

1. Post a comment here; with a yes or no. A drunken ship type would be good too. 

2. Contact Flashfresh on flashfresh@the-bastards.com

3. Contact TheHermit on thehermit@the-bastards.com

4. Contact Flashfresh or TheHermit or Shizraak ingame via conversation or evemail

5. Twitter: #tweetfleet

Go on, it will be fun.

OTHER STUFFAdministrative
I have had the usual stack of administrative tasks assigned to me and this included the unpleasant (but necessary) task of booting inactive members from the corporation. We've had some chaps who have not been online for well over 12 months and not a word to anyone if they're coming back. So the corporation is slimming down drastically in Q1, 2012. We're also going to be restocking our ship hangars with shiny kit and I just have to set up a roam with mainly tier-3 battle cruisers. I know many corporations have already done this with excellent results.

EVE-Tribue and Penelope Starr
We were honoured to have Penelope Starr, a writer for Eve-Tribune with us for a bit leading up to the new year. She wanted to find out more about low-sec piracy and fleet work for an article and I was happy to contribute. Her excellent article: 'The First Rules of Target Calling' is a great read. Highly recommended.

Marco is the new CEO
A little birdy just told me that Marco is now the new CEO...excellent news, make him primary!

The Bastards 2012, refreshed and reloaded. We are of course, still recruiting so click on this link for details if you are interested in joining up.

For Mike! Rolling around low-sec; the BCs still rule & Christmas is only days away!

Tornado, love it.

Crucible
With the introduction of the new tier-3 beasties; the battle cruiser class ships has definitely been given a boost. There are rumours that the tier-3 are all over-powered but we've killed a fair few already so I don't think they are over-powered - yet. I have undocked in my tornado a few times and loved it but never had a chance to fly it out in a fleet. I am also busy thinking up of a counter-fleet for these beasties and armour hac gangs comes to mind. Of course, I am happy for my idea to be challenged but would be interested in hearing from other pilots what their thoughts are on countering these beauties (apart from an even bigger fleet - am interested in the rock, paper, scissors approach).

However, it doesn't mean that all the tier-1 and tier-2 battle cruiser ships are now relegated to a secondary role. Oh heavens no. Due to the much higher cost of the tier-3, one can still get 2-3 tier-2 battle cruisers, rigged and fitted for the same price of the tier-3. A fair trade in my opinion.

As a pirate, being isk-efficient is paramount to long-term survival and The Bastards still fly with the tier-2 battle cruisers as our main ship-of-the-line.

Still, I cannot ignore that Crucible has been a magnificient expansion with little tweaks and fixes here and there as well as some wholesale changes. Hell, CCP even decided to give us some christmas presents! I decided on the CA-2 implant but then realised that I never did pick up the CA-1 implant! (doh)

The Last Four Weeks - FOR MIKE!

So, what has been going on in the world of The Bastards? A busy period for us for sure; the month of November and December have been especially active and this has coincided with our decision to work more closely with our erstwhile rivals, 'Los Chupacabras' who live in the station opposite us. Now, like all good pirates we've been tussling for space and loot since their appearance about two years ago and would occasionally work together when the circumstances required it, I mean when a carrier is tackled you just have to put aside your differences and pile in don't you?  In fact, there was an embryonic relationship between The Bastards, Los Chupacabras and Mean Coalition already forming as a response to a concentrated (albeit brief and unsuccesful) effort by a bunch of anti-pirates in cleaning up Heimatar and Metropolis earlier this year. Since then, Mean Coalition has wandered off into null-sec and hold some space somewhere in Vale.

Anyway, I have had the pleasure of leading our new composite fleets the last month or so and I must say, the results are immensely satisfying. One of our outings was into Helgatid after a scout of ours (love having them in the opposition camp!) reported back that Shades of Gray alliance were business demolishing a Customs Office and putting up one of their own. Even better, they had a few of the tier-3 battle cruisers out and smattering of cruisers and support ships.

We rumbled our ships across to the Helgatid gate and held as I waited a few more seconds for the fleet to assemble. Then I gave the order to jump and warp straight to the Custom Office in question. The sudden jump in local now doubt was noted; I didn't have any heavy tackle with me - but I did have MaxUrsa in his Stiletto! We arrived and the Shades of Gray pilots were already aligning but we wanted to grab the bigger ships: the tornado, the talos and some battle ships. I called my targets and proceeded to fire on them. With tracking disruptors fitted, the large calibre weapons on the talos and tornado could not hit much of anything. All the Shades of Gray smaller ships fled the field, leaving the larger ships to fend for themselves. I think this was a mistake; their cruisers should have stayed and kept some of us pointed. Anyway, now we had to be quick as this was the home system of Shades of Gray and no doubt, we expected them to ship up and to come straight back out. Local was also in their favour as I counted about 30 other pilots. Ordering the fleet to overload our weapons we popped the enemy ships sequentially with no loss of ships on our side. We didn't even have logistical support but we held to our motto of 'Overwhelming DPS, then GTFO!' Grabbing all the tasty loot we expected a counter attack and I started to align the fleet out.We didn't want to get caught with a cargohold full of loot now did we? We had families to feed.

The fleet battle summary is here.

Oddly, no counter-attack came. It looks like most of the pilots in local were away or decided that discretion was the better part of valor and stayed put. No problem, a wise decision especially if one isn't organised. We saluted the Shades of Gray pilots and left local, eager to divvy up the loot. Oh, this unfortunate Stiletto was caught by Max and Marco. I don't think it was part of the Shades of Gray but it was caught anyways. Actually, Shades did come back out this time with BCs and BS class ships to continue the destruction of the Custom Office. We thought it was a trap but maybe I should have ordered our ships back in?

Another fleet, a week later was just as much fun but involving the Eve University. Our fleet was actually split up across multiple systems but Marco, King, Nicho and Beauty found themselves in the Hagilur pocket. Eve University were around and they couldn't resist taking a bite out of Marco and co. They jumped him while I listened in on communications. It seemed quite even but a scout (spy) told us that Eve University had dozens of active pilots in the system next door and were already undocking battle ships and blackbirds to assist in Marco's take down.

So we moved in, my timing was a bit off however as we arrived on top of Marco and his assailants before their Eve Uni help could assist. Nonetheless we took them all down, failing to catch their frigates that had warped in as well as losing point on their blackbird and (to my disappointment) one of their battle ships that wisely came in at range, turned tail and fled.


Well done to the Unistas for disengaging smoothly.

A day or so later, another combined fleet engaged some of the most fun-loving pirates in New Eden - 'The Defenders of Pen Island' in Arnher. I wasn't there but I was told it was a fun, and rather one-sided affair. However, we're all pirates and not knights of old, no hard feelings. We want loot and isk and the ability to hold the field so that we can also salvage. Nothing more. It's all about the isk. Am sure the Pen Island chaps understand this fully. There are two battle summaries from our side: The Bastards and Los Chupabras. Ernie, from Los Chupas also made a video but he has been roundly lambasted for having a terrible overview and having no music!

Once again, salutations to our fellow pirates of Flashy Red for a good tussle.

With christmas festivities on the horizon, it was time for the annual pre-christmas roam for The Bastards. What do you mean you don't celebrate christmas in New Eden? Bah - humbug. Yet more Eve university fun as I led another fleet out; this time with Penelope Star of Eve-tribune fame in tow. We also invited Mike Azaria (check his blog out here) to the fleet who was going to bring a sacrificial tornado to add to the fun but he had to drop out. We promised to lose the tornado and fight 'For Mike!'. Alas, we fought but the tornado stubbornly stayed alive. Next time Mike, next time.

Anyway, we found some Unistas and promptly overwhelmed them on the Dudreda gate. Nothing gallant about it, we just battered them. No idea why they were camping the gate - I never realised that they had pirate tendencies? Ironically, we weren't even after the Unistas - they were in our way as we were en route to ambush another fleet thanks to a tip-off by a friend in the nearby system of Arifsdald. These chaps, Obsidian Front were busy bashing a Customs Office and while they are over 130 AUs from our ingate, we were assured by a friend that they were not aligned.

So we piled in and groaned as we entered into warp towards our targets 133 AUs away. It seemed to take forever and already, our friend had told us that our target ships were aligning to get out. We landed and threw points onto the tier-3 battle cruisers (our 'kill-as-many-tier-3-battle-cruiser' competition is still running!) and grabbed four of their ships. A carrier also landed but without enough neutralisers or a heavy interdictor we couldn't pin it down long enough to kill it. Bumping by us just plain failed. A pity. Still, loot was gathered and no losses so success in my books.

Right after this engagement we rested just off a gate when we spotted a Vigil sitting about 230km from us. Now, I am not paranoid or anything but this chap shouted 'SCOUT!' and I did not want to get dropped by anyone. We had a cloaked ship sneak up to the vigil pilot and then I sent that crazy Dutchman, Dil'e Mahn to do the deed. He locked, pointed and killed the hapless frigate.

Of course, locking the pod and killing him with everyone on the killmail was a requirement but the chat in local was a bonus.

Theseus kingslayer > where did you all go?
Theseus kingslayer > i brought back a noob ship for you to shoot at this time
Dil'e Mahn > excellent
Theseus kingslayer > you bunch of bored idiots
Dil'e Mahn > we'll see if we can fit you into our busy schedules
Theseus kingslayer > a vigil for all that effort..
Theseus kingslayer > i don't know...
Dil'e Mahn > a man's gotta eat, a wise man once said
Nichonostra > I lack of anything else
Nichonostra > ur vigil was AWESOME
stockin > a spine?
Dil'e Mahn > check, I have one
Theseus kingslayer > there wasn't much in there you know
Dil'e Mahn > it was there
Dil'e Mahn > it was cluttering up my overview
Dil'e Mahn > it just had to go
Dil'e Mahn > nothing personal, sir
Dil'e Mahn > just keeping space a safe and clean environment for everyone.
Theseus kingslayer > but you are the danger to space.. i was a neutral
Dil'e Mahn > all a matter of perspective, I'd say
Dil'e Mahn > what if a new player was flying around and accidentally ran into your vigil?
Shizraak > we aren't a danger to space
Shizraak > just the ships in it....
Dil'e Mahn > consider the material damages, trauma...
Theseus kingslayer > space is very big.. the possibility is almost 0
Theseus kingslayer > more like .00000000000000000000000000000000000000000001
Dil'e Mahn > still
Dil'e Mahn > that's more than "not at all"
Dil'e Mahn > I can understand your annoyance, but you have to understand that you cannot just go and park ships all over the place
ogf > all of the lag :/
Theseus kingslayer > so you all feeding your kids with scrap metal tonight from the vigil kill eh?
Dil'e Mahn > no, we were thinking of using the corpse for that
Shizraak > omnomnom
Theseus kingslayer > yeah, thanks for lagging out my computer by all getting in on a pod kill
ReBeLSKuLL > yummy tummy corspy in my tummy
ReBeLSKuLL > np, here, a souvenir for you! http://the-bastards.com/kb/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=22817
Dyrius Okel > YARR!!!!
Theseus kingslayer > only 17??
Theseus kingslayer > there were 20 of you
Dil'e Mahn > we tried to get more people on
Nichonostra > CARRRRRRRR
Theseus kingslayer > someone pulled the trigger too fast
Dil'e Mahn > yes
Dil'e Mahn > there's always one, isn't there
Nichonostra > It wasnt me
ReBeLSKuLL > sorry guys, i blew it
Dil'e Mahn > *sigh*
Dil'e Mahn > we discussed this, rebel
Dil'e Mahn > well, good day, sir
Dil'e Mahn > fly safe now
ReBeLSKuLL > good day, merry xmas :P
Theseus kingslayer > never
Dil'e Mahn > and remember: parking at a station is <b>free</b>.
Theseus kingslayer > alwasy fly dangerously

A day or so later; yet another fleet and we battered through Eve University; again our battle cruisers simply smashing through the out-matched students in their mixed cruiser / battle cruiser / interceptor fleet with no losses on our side. The report is here. It was only even in numbers as they were caught on a gate and couldn't use their better mobility and speed to exit the fight. Bad luck chaps. We're not singling out the Unistas, honest! However, it does look like low-sec roaming is part of their current school curriculum and long may this continue but please fit better mods so that we can loot it!

A student being dragged off...somewhere

KING and NICHO - the deadly duo.
After a 12 month absence, where they came close to being released from The Bastards, these two deadly pirates came back into our orbit and the first thing they both said was, 'what can I kill?' In any organisation and in all fleets, you need some pilots who are willing to engage almost crazy odds. Where fear isn't a word they recognise (or common sense!) and they go literally, balls to the wall. Pilots like these galvanise the rest of the organisation and inspire people to get active and to join in. I love these guys and they are HUNGRY and aggressive. Do not take your eyes off them for a second and like salvering, starving wolves, they can be forced (by their very nature) to go after prey in the most difficult (silly) circumstances as illustrated below.


King, in his Dramiel spotted an Ibis sitting on a station, minding his own business. Now in low-sec, of course you have to take care and one cannot rely on the station and gate guns to protect you. However, when you're being buzzed by a dramiel, it is unlikely that an any aggressive action will occur right? Especially for an expensive Dramiel for a lowly Ibis?


No. King, decided to fire on the Ibis and pop it.

In a dramiel, right under the noses of the automated sentry guns? Surely not? King is a good pilot and was already aligned and full speed but well, something didn't work out. 

http://the-bastards.com/kb/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=22759

Still, these two guys are invaluable members of the team and if you see either of these two in local, beware and looking at the killboards I can see that they continue to be busy even in the christmas break!

Future plans

We are continuing to recruit pirates and will welcome more in 2012. Our recruitment thread is here. If you want to experience the pirate life, play Eve in 'super hard mode', then look no further.

There will be a drunk roam organised, I thought it would be very unwise for me to organise one this side of the festitivies as I doubt very much my liver can handle it. However, there should be one organised in January 2012 and I will have one of our drinking captains (Shizraak) be the secondary fleet commander, God help you all.

However, to all my friends, enemies and customers - I wish you all a merry christmas and a peaceful and restful new year. The Bastards will be back in 2012, reloaded and rebooted and rested. I cannot wait.

Of course, a christmas greeting from The Bastards needs a jolly white fat man with a beard dressed in red and trimmed with white fur, so here it is:

Kill the new battle cruisers!!

What do points make? PRIZES!

Red Vegas should be proud. With the new tier-3 battle cruisers hitting the markets, Vegas wanted to inject some fun and excitement into the month and he came up with an idea. Here's his post from our forums (shameless content padding I know!!):

CONTEST
Fellow Pirates and Bastards!
I have a contest for you this December to break in the Crucible Winter Expansion. After talking with Flash I have kept the contest sweet and simple.

Kill as many Tier 3 Battlecruisers as you can get your turrets on. You must be involved in the most solo/fleet killmails of the new Tier 3 Battlecruisers. That's it, your prize will be a Tier 3 Battlecruiser of your choice

PRIZES
Oracle [http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Oracle]
Naga [http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Naga]
Talos [http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Talos]
Tornado [http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Tornado]

One hull of any race!

You will also receive a medal for your hard work and dedication from The Bastards corporation.

MEDAL
VEGAS' Winter Challenge

DURATION
End of 2011

CURRENT LEADERBOARD
Marco drack = 4
TFS Tibbs = 3
z0de = 3
Harlon Mathuin = 2
Dil'e Mahn = 2
flashfresh = 2
Nichonostra = 1
Max Ursa = 1

Now, I actually took receipt of a new Tornado class battle cruiser a few days ago and fitted it with T2 800mm repeating artillery pieces but am a tad worried about losing it. I saw how these things can melt oh-so quickly under concentrated fire. In any fleet we come up, these things will be primary. Other fleets we meet up will probably do the same thing. I wonder if one can make a bait tier-3 battle cruiser?

Anyway, we had a tremendous amount of fun last night bagging another two more such battle cruisers along with a handful of battle ships. Give and take during the evening for sure but that is the fun of New Eden right now, the new upgrades certainly have given pilots a shot in the arm. Am in the process of writing it up last night's fun and will update the blog soon with new content.

Winter Expansion, the fury of a Tornado and the Oracle speaks....

So the winter expansion is here and I love it: ships, fonts, nebulae to name three. However, I will leave the analysis of this most wonderful of expansions to another time; let's talk about piracy!

Seeing Tibbs fly the Tornado within hours of the BPO being made available was a great. I was honoured to see this brute fly and destroy a poor unsuspecting Vexor. It didn't survive a concentrated double volley from this monster.

Of course, being pirates we had to come up with something relating to killing and it was Vegas who offered up a competition: the most kills of the new tier-3 battle cruisers would get their choice of any tier-3 battle cruiser (Naga, Tornado, Oracle or Talos) - what a prize!
The evening kicked off with a few kills by our mixed fleet: a raven, a drake etc but then we had reports of at least one, maybe two tier-3 battle cruisers! They were in Todifrauan and we just had to pay them a visit! z0de went off ahead with his megathron, determined to get a piece of the action; as he approached - he gave us an update:

"Two oracles!" Oh sweetness I said, surely a worthy target for us. The z0de added: "You do know it is bait and we're running straight into a trap?"

"Hell yes!" Chorused The Bastards, completely undaunted by death.

A pause and then z0de added:

"A Tornado, a hurricane, 'rax and some support." I glanced at our fleet: a typhoon, four hurricanes and a drake. That would do. We warped to the ingate though there was no call from z0de for us to jump in. The excitement started to build up.

"Ok, more are coming in. I think they want a fight!" shouted z0de as his weapons went active. We jumped and my overview filled up with targets. We were outnumbered at least 2 to 1. However, we had one target: any one of the three new battle cruisers. Scared? hell no.

z0de called the targets as we got range on the Oracle. Our guns barked and shells, rounds, missiles and drones streaked out. The enemy, mainly from the Shades of Grey Alliance answered back with equal fury. Without logistical support, we could only rely on local buffer tanks and speed, completely inadequate but no, we had our target and nothing, not even our fiery deaths would stop it. Raelyf, was the first to go down, the calm pirate merely muttering 'Raelyf, down,' as his hurricane was torn to shreds, the fate of being set to primary.

To my port side, and slightly below was the battle cruiser of TFS Tibbs, one of the best solo pirates that The Bastards have. He had at least five ships surrounding him and he was trading furious broadsides with them all. However, once his shield generators burnt out, it was only a matter of seconds before terminal hull breach.

"We're burning up!"

A screaming missile buried itself deep inside the drake's superstructure before detonating.

"Tibbs is down." Two pirates down.

"More incoming, shit a Loki and a Talos and Dramiel. Kill the Dram, kill it! I am scrammed." It sounded like z0de or Marco but it was difficult to hear due to the sub-space distortions from the many weapon system types all firing. From my position, I could see Red Vegas in his hurricane started to drift sideways as his engines were blown out from behind him. He and his crew continued to fire, even when they had time to punch out.

"Steady lads! We can kill them!"

A caracal swept past my hurricane, I ordered my gun crews to target it as well as a thorax that was within optimal range. I opened up with my howitzers just as Red Vegas' hurricane disappeared in a flash of light and debris. My hurricane rocked as the shockwave washed over me. I hit the micro warp drive to get some range as I was being yellow boxed.

"Vegas is down." The voice was garbled and I just caught sight of a battered capsule racing off. There was little sign of any crew escape launches however - most must have been caught up in the conflaguration and were atomised.

Three pirates down.

The Oracle battle cruiser wasn't  going down, whatever was installed for it's shield tank was not dying. Fair play to the engineers who had fitted this beast together. z0de switched primary to the Tornado and he started to give chase in his megathron! Marco in his typhoon followed, his engines glowing white hot as it pushed the venerable Minnie battle ship ahead and after both the Tornado and z0de's megathron.

Meanwhile, we had scored a kill on an enemy Hurricane, thorax and a caracal but no Oracle or Tornado! So a poor trade. The battle space was thick and crowded. Bits of flaming space junk spinning away.

Edney, also in a hurricane tried to get out of range of the fire from the Loki, Oracle and Talos but he was hopelessly outgunned and couldn't return adequate fire. Warp scrambled and blind, Edney tried to ram the nearest enemy ship, ploughing through the remains of Tibbs' drake wreckage and determined to go down while taking something with him. Alas, it was futile and he and his crew blasted out in their capsules and escape pods as the hurricane exploded.

"Edney down."

Four pirates down. It was looking grim for The Bastards.

"Shit, there's still more of the them." Muttered Marco as he surveyed the enemy ships around him and a couple warped in. Already, his capacitor was dangerously low and he had little left to fight back but he kept up the pursuit along with z0de.

Red klaxons flashed as I was warp scrambled by a dramiel (are they still viable?) and taking fire from one of the two Oracle, the Tornado, vagabond and few others. I tried to drop below the plane and ordered my drones onto the dramiel. Speed and some nifty flying might get me out of this. Meanwhile, z0de and Marco, still in pursuit of the Tornado had the enemy battle cruiser down to structure but it was too late: z0de's megathron was on fire in at least six places and half of his guns burnt out and useless. Ploughing ahead, z0de didn't give up.

I watched helplessly as battle ship calibre weapons zeroed in me and battered my hurricane to pieces. Without any logistic support or a local active tank, I was doomed. My micro warp drive was offline thanks to the dramiel and I was being battered. I whipped out my pod but could see z0de and Marco (both ships now on fire and shedding molten metal) still in hot pursuit of the Tornado.

"Flash is down. Good luck gentleman, die well!"

With a roar, both z0de and Marco overloaded their engines in a last ditch attempt to close the gap and make our first kill of the new class of battle cruiser. It was a brave but foolish attempt as the last two Bastards attracted the full attention of the enemy fleet and they were atomised.

The report ends with success: a fleet from Black Soul Industries (I think) piled into EM and Shades soon after our demise and managed to kill off the Tornado amongst other ships types. .

The butcher's bill:

The Bastards
Megathron (lost)
Typhoon (lost)
Hurricane (lost)
Hurricane (lost)
Hurricane (lost)
Hurricane (lost)
Drake (lost)

Shades of Grey/Electus Matari
Hurricane
Tornado
Oracle
Oracle
Vagabond
Loki
Thrasher
Caracal
Thorax
Dramiel
Thrasher
Talos
Hurricane

God, being a pirate - love it.

Playing like Elite

Flash's Gaming PC on Tue Night....

Why doesn't New Eden have a super low-fi and lite version for their interface? I say this because my main rig blew up on tuesday night. My only back up was my battered work laptop and man, was it struggling, even with everything else turned down to low.

I need something even simpler than the lowest setting on New Eden, yes - I need wireframes and DOS based graphics. I need.....Elite.

Check this out, some of you may even be old enough to remember the glory of this most influential game - the super graphics, the game-play and the vastness of the universe, replicated perfectly each time. All for under 64K of RAM too. If EVE had an 'elite' setting, with super low and simplified graphics, I would be playing this setting all the time. Hell, I would be trying to play this on my netbook, my smart book even! Check out a screen-shot from a bygone era:
 

GET POINT! GET A POINT ON IT!!!!!

Can I say, winter is coming!

2 v 1 - surrounded but what a fight!

It was a quiet night; most of the Bastards were out and about or had taken time off from the tricky world of piracy. I decided that, after chatting to a few acquaintances, to stretch the old sea legs for a bit.  Selecting the venerable rifter; I shot out into the blackness of space and started looking for trouble. Local was the usual welcoming sight of pirates, brigands and clueless newbs, so I didn't have to go far. I landed in Todifrauan and missed a cyclone that had left the gate. Holding my cloak, I tried to use the directional scanner to get a better view of him and determined that he had zipped towards planet III. I sent the rifter racing after him. As I arrived, I caught a ghost of his ship and the tell-tale sign of a ship immediately warping out.

I tried again and once again, he slipped away. Fair play to the cyclone pilot who was making me chase him. He then dissappeared from local and I calculated that he was most likely in Arnstur. Pushing the rifter towards the gate I suddenly spotted a pair of new pilots, both from the same corporation. I should have noted the cyclone's affiliation and compared it with the these two new chappies; maybe friends?

The star gate sent me through into Arnstur and the cyclone pilot was in local. I held cloak and tried to determine his location, there was a flash on the stargate as another ship came in after me. An examination of local informed me it was one of the pair of newcomers, one system back. I quickly accelerated off the gate and towards what I assumed to be the most likely location of the cyclone. Pinging the directional scanner ahead of me revealed that the cyclone had already moved. I landed inside the asteroid belt and got into an orbit as I tried to figure out who was around me.


The cyclone was still around in space but a malediction was spotted on my scanner and it was getting nearer. I primed my webber and disruptor and decided that this interceptor would be a good snack. Sure enough, the distinctive shape of the Amarrian interceptor burst into space and I quickly fired off my tackle modules. He landed just a touch outside my web range but I had him pointed. Likewise, so did he. With it's superior speed, the malediction got into a comfortable 23km range. My barrage rounds could reach out to him but did neglible damage. The interceptor pilot was one of the duo who came in and his partner, sure enough appeared - this time in a dramiel.

It now looked a bit worse for me. The dramiel also was outside of my web range. I overloaded my micro warp drive but the use of the disruptor had depleted my capacitor just when the dramiel volleyed me and sent his warrior drone after me. My armour repairer and x3 small armor tri-marks meant that I had significant amount of armour to chew through but I could last for too long.

My rifter died and I was podded too. First pod death this year and fair play to the two pilots; a great job by them they're welcome to the loot.

Of course, one cannot keep a pirate down long and a days later, I led a fleet to go roaming; the usual roll around the neighbourhood. We took down a tempest, stabber, rupture, maelstrom, mammoth a rifter and a hulk but comically, we lost Shizraak (in his rapier) to some pos guns.

Pod killing someone on a gate was the most fun: I was in my arty hurricane and somehow managed to lock the unfortunate pilot of the rifter and ended up popping him. No idea why he didn't jump, he certainly wasn't AFK.

Winter is coming!

It was with some considerable interest that I listened in on a conversation with one of my pirate captains, something about a new battle cruiser hull that could indeed hold battle ship class weapons? Say it ain't so! However it appears to be true, the new tier-3 BCs all can support battle ship class weapons. While The Bastards cannot take any credit for the idea of jamming a weapon system one class above the ship's hull; we certainly have been doing it enough times. It is our infamous 'Oversized clip and carbine' roams, some of which I noted down for prosperity. We've also flew frigates with oversized guns, cruisers with over sized guns but have yet to move onto battle ships with capital ship guns. The latter should be a challenge for sure.

Hulk Smash

I had to include this section, this is lifted from a forum post by one of our more active and most polite pirates: TFS Tibbs. With no further ado, here it is:

So after finding a wormhole to deepest nullsec and landing on a macro-mining operation this happened:


http://the-bastards.com/kb/?a=kill_related&kll_id=22386


and then this spewed out in local...

HCS:damn faggots
TFS:lol - so much for your macros
HCS:you stupid bitches are still here
HCS:get out of our system
TFS:Its now my system - damn macro cheaters
HCS:ahaha, you got lucky, thats all
TFS:macros suck dude - don't use em
HCS:you suck asswipe
HCS:think you know all?
TFS:yes
HCS:why you think you got me
HCS:didnt use macro
HCS:get the fuck out and dont return
HCS:fags
TFS:actually you may be right - a macro would have warped
TFS:so much fascination on being gay - very telling
TFS:anyways - thanks for the stuff - fly safer next time!

Basically, TFS Tibbs was out doing his own thing and had stumbled upon what he thought was a mining op. Quickly changing to his hurricane, he returned and proceeded to exact righteous fury on what he mistakeningly had thought to be a macro operation. It turned out it wasn't but the smack talk was funny.

Plex'ed up Madness or kids with too much moolah? 

Marco Drack is one of our more, outrageous Bastards and has garnered a reputation of 'Balls-to-the-wall' and Leeroy flying. Certainly, when he takes over as fleet commander; there's a collective groan from the pilots. However, many pilots, with grins splitting their faces, still sign up on his fleets. They know *something* fun will happen regardless. However, Marco lately has been attracting all sorts of attention, including a Gung-Ho Dramiel pilot (merely months out of pod school) who decided to tackle his Legion. Crazy kid died and dropped some lovely loot and has threatened to come back with an even bigger and more bling ship after he gets more plexes. Ach, if only people could combine brains with the money eh?

Tough week

Hasn't been a good week; I logged off near a gate in my purifier one hectic night. I logged back in and to my horror, there was a dramiel a mere 2km from me. Not able to cloak or run to the gate; the dramiel pilot (hats off to him) scrambled me and killed the ship. I got the pod out.


I then clone jumped to join Marco's frigate fleet - I was asked to fly Marco's sabre and as we progressed into null sec, I stupidly hit 'warp to' instead of 'align to' a star-gate...one I KNEW was already bubbled, as I came through it on the way in.

Being pulled into the bubble was annoying for sure, being scrambled by a hurricane and dramiel was even worse. Naturally, I blew up.

So my pod ran away, my crew dead and Marco demanding a replacement for his lost sabre.

One has to take the rough with the smooth eh? There's another op coming up this weekend, I hope I have better luck. Now where's that stabber fleet issue?

Two slippies, a drake, a rattler and friends and the welcoming committee when I got home...

This went boom....

I wandered into the usual Bastards hang-out; the 'Independence' bar and saw Fitz, Marco and a new chap called Jin. Fitz looked and sounded horrible: he had a serious case of man-flu and embarrassingly, excused himself from the bar, coughing and sneezing as he went.

Our fleet of three (two sleipnirs and a drake) undocked and went out hunting. The drake went on ahead, Marco and I in our sleipnirs sat on the gate and waited, our shield boosters primed to resist. as our scout and bait. However, it didn't take long before the star-gate we floated around pulsed once: signalling incoming traffic.

"Deploy drones." I said to Marco. The small winged mechanical killers slid out from their moorings and took up an orbit around us. Whoever had come in held their cloak. This boded well for Marco and I. Ordering battle stations as there was going to be some imminent violence, I waited patiently. I activated my shield hardeners and made sure that the capacitor booster was packed full with charges. The mystery ship still hadn't dropped its gate cloak but it was only a matter of time.

"There it is." Marco.

"Rattlesnake, rattlesnake!" I said with much excitement.

The distinctive Scorpion-class battle ship hull was there, hanging in space 25 km from me. Marco was closer and threw a point on it. I hit the mwd and raced over. The rattlesnake attempted to move back to the gate. We bumped it. We opened fire on it. His two friends in cruisers fired at us. Drones buzzed everywhere. The gate guns fired back on us. Our drake came back in to help. It was mad, fast and it was great.

The rattler went down and we got to work on the two cruisers: we somehow missed his fourth friend in a tempest and I think we also missed an Orca!

There's only so much a fleet of three can do on a low-sec gate. We quickly got off the gate and found a safe spot where we could collect the dropped loot and parcel it out amongst the Captains and crew.  Unfortunately, I had to leave the fleet and ran right into a small gate camp in our home system and rapidly blew up.

Not a good end to the evening.

The long reach of the lachesis - me loves it.

Lachesis - a right nasty bugger

With a fleet of about a dozen battle cruisers I decided to forgo our usual logistical support (as we didn't have enough qualified pilots anyway) and opted to go with recon support in the form of my lachesis and Marco's rapier.

A fleet with the ability to throw points out to 75KM and triple web someone to a range of 35km isn't too shabby at all.

So once the fleet was out, our scouts had detected some potential targets in Helgatid around what we assumed, was a just-anchored POS. It had its shield up but POS modules were anchored. There were a number of ships clustered by: an apocalypse class battle ship, a couple of cruisers and frigates. We can definitely have some of that.

As we moved into position; a second scout spotted an armageddon on a gate, killing off some of the local Angel rats. We were one jump away and arrived just as this second armageddon jumped into the Helgatid, no doubt to join his friends around the POS.

TheHermit entered first with his Onyx and snagged it.

"Point." He said and that was our signal to get in. Shizraak in his brittle hurricane was targetted by the armageddon and we went to work. Unfortunately for Shiz, this armageddon had a web and scrambler and kept Shiz pinned down long enough to completely boil off his shields and melt his armour. Shizraak's 'cane went pop but we took our revenge by killing the armageddon.

Meanwhile, our original target (the ships around the POS) was still there though most of the ships had scarpered by now leaving only the apocalypse. Our noobie-corp scout was 80KM away from the battle ship but it was enough. I asked for a warp in and overloaded my warp disruptor. When I landed there were three ships including the apocalyse. However, the battle ship was the prize and even from 80 KM my warp disruptor reached out and held the apocalypse.

"Point." I said and ordered the rest of the fleet to come in. Switching on their micro warp drives as they landed, The Bastards battle cruisers rushed over to the hapless battle ship and sliced it up.

The more I think about it; the more I love this ship. Need to fly it more often I think and I am so tempted to organise the fleet and update my set up for some obscene pointage.

Now, am asking all you EFT (or PYFA) warriors to recommend to me a set-up for either the Lach or 'Zu that you think would be suitable for our style of play (i.e. sneaky Bastards type of play..)

TTFN