Now, I was out hunting in E## when I came across this chap: Akaya Kalari. He got out out fast, before I could lock him but he we struck up a conversation and chatted for the next hour or so. The prey was thin today as G### was full of other pirates and meanies.
The conversations meandered a bit but it got into a chat about the pirate profession and I told Akaya to get the warp drive disruption skill. Bread and butter for any pirate. Akaya lacked this skill and he has already experienced the problems this might have caused.
'Dude - if u want to practise; come and see me. I wont destroy you.' I said, fully intending to maintain my word.
'What system are you in?' asked Akaya. Checking the scanner, 'Go to a system called A###.' Flipping the map around, I got a feel for the route. 'Try E### to G### to A##. A couple of jumps, you should be fine.' I said.
'Gate campers everywhere today,' observed Akaya as he made his journey to our rendezvous. I could not agree more.
I arrived in A### and ganged Akaya. I also spied out a pilot I recognised: 'Eppix' - my notes indicated that he was a rookie tempest pilot and had been seen in and around E###. Maybe I would be lucky. A quick scan and indeed, there was a tempest.
'Eppix - lets get him. He's in a tempest. Lets take him!!!!' I howled.
The excitement was clear in my voice. Akaya was thrilled to be involved in a BS hunt and warped to me. Now tackling a big ship like this needed some plan and the death of frigates (in my view) has always been drones and webbers. Nos isn't too much of a problem for Minmatar ships due to our low cap weapons.
'Knock out his drones first and then the ship. Not the other way.' I said. 'This should be fun.' I added. Akaya agreed with a smiley and off we went to scan and to track down this big bugger.
'OK going to planet X as he is in that cluster. Then we scan him down and engage. Unless he has safe spotted
Planet X loomed ahead of me and I willed the scanner to pick out the battleship's signature. Nothing. I asked Akaya to continue to scan while I jumped to another scan spot. At my second scan spot I hit the scanner once more. Akaya was following me, ready to pounce.
'He's moving. IX cluster now. IX-belt 4 I think.'
I gang-warped me and my wing man to the target belt. Akaya's rifter was rigged for speed and burst out of warp seconds before my rifter.
'He's here!'Akaya shouted.
Indeed he was. Looming ahead of our two small rifters was a tempest-class battleship. Pride of the Minmatar navy. I checked my overview to see how far we had landed.
'Go go! We've landed too far! move move move!'
I hit the afterburners and got within range as quickly as the burners would allow me. Eppix was busy looting some wrecks: unfortunate Angels caught by the monstrous battleship. He apparently didn't notice two rifters enter into the belt, or did not care. It was his mistake and I ordered my wing-man in.
'Attack!'
Akaya powered his ship forward. 'Just now got in range!'
'I doubt we'll get him though. But feel the rush............' I said, the thrill of chasing a mark down and engaging it as intoxicating as it was all those years ago. So we blasted the tempest with all our weaponry. There was no return fire on me after we were locked. A couple of minutes passed before there was any hostile return fire. Heavy missiles it would seem but no drones. No web either. Could we be so lucky? There was flicker around the tempest, a slight bend in the light and the tempest warped out. Damn. I turned off the warp disruptor. Disappointed I spoke to Akaya.
'ach - stabbed.'
I checked the scanner and found that the tempest had zipped to a gate. Making sure that the young Akaya did not get himself killed. I spoke to him quickly.
'Do not follow.' And added. 'You had no scrambler and I did not have enough points.'
'I'll have one soon.' Replied Akaya.
Nodding, I said,'Indeed, but he'll sit here now as he knows we only have one point between us, so he will think we are no threat to him. You also have about 11 minutes left on your criminal counter yes?'
'Ya.' replied Akaya sadly.
'OK. Well we have ten minutes of twiddling our thumbs before I go back to fit more points. I am going to fit x2 +2 scramblers. Should give us four points that should lock him down tight. I paused and then asked. Akaya - you have a webber ?'
Akaya checked. 'No, I have electronics 2, I have none of that. 10 hours on electronics 3.'
Time trickled by. 'OK in 7 minutes I will leave the system and refit with x2 +2 scramblers. I hope Eppix is noob enough to stay put in the system but he is hanging around the sentry guns too now.'
With us unable to attack, I decided we could at least keep tabs on the tempest. It had already moved off from the gate it had warped to and appeared to be back in the belts.
'He's near the vii cluster lets get closer.' I said, as I jumped to the VII cluster.
'OK the scanner tells me he is either at vi-1, vi-2 or viii-1. This is agony. 4 minutes left. He's at vi-2 but we can't engage him yet. We can't lock him down!'.
It was absolute agony of just waiting. Just to rub it in, the tempest then went back to ratting.
'You know, I think the tempest pilot has gone back to ratting again! He's cycling through the belts.OK - he's moved to cluster VIII; do not venture into the belts Akaya.' Absolute agony.
The red counter winked off. My Concord Global flag had finally expired. I did not wait any longer.
'OK stay here. Am going to refit. keep him on scan!'
'K' Affirmed Akaya.
That was my last instruction as I activated the star gate and left the system. I was getting updates from Akaya as I docked and got the engineers to take out two mid-slot components and slap in two +2 scramblers.
There were plenty of other blinkies as I undocked and made the seven-jump journey back to Akaya. As I arrived at the warp gate and zipped through, I requested an update from my wing man.
'Is Eppix still there?'
'He's moved, I'm looking for him.......and I have found him!'
Damn it. Akaya was too eager and didn't have the points to lock the battleship down. I didn't want our mark to be spooked again.
'I am warping to you Akaya. You have him on visual or on scan?'
'Visual, but he just ran!' I cursed.
'damnit!'
OK, I had to concentrate - Eppix surely knew we were tracking him. I hit the scanner again and tracked the battleship down to a single location. I checked, rechecked and knew where he was.
'He's at XI-7. Go go!!'
I landed 6km from the battleship that was busy dispatching an Angel cruiser. I quickly hit the double-scramblers.
'Got 4 points on him now. Go go go!!! Attack!!' I urged my wingman on.
Like two furious flies, Akaya and I buzzed around the tempest firing at it with everything we had. Missiles streaked away from the missile pods dotted around the tempest and blasted Akaya. With his ship rattling around him, Akaya spoke up.
'doesn't like me lol - am at half shields.'
Checking the readouts - I realised that Akaya was in danger. I quickly warned him.
'Get ready to warp out then keep moving at max burn.' There was a long pause.
'boom.....' Said Akaya. 'I'll pod ram him for you! He popped me.'
Alarmed I said, 'you warped to a gate??
'No, he popped me'
'You should have left earlier to recharge. '
'You said move off at full speed instead of warping out, so I didn't warp. sry =/'
OK, so I was guilty of bad communication and lost my wingman. Not too happy, I couldn't do anything.
'He's hitting me now but I need you back as I can't break him solo.'
'Are you tanking that?'
'Yeah'
'lol, I was getting hammered'
'However, his armour is too thick and I will probably run out of ammo'
'Will sentry guns pod me?'
'no'
'I need to go replace my ship and how are you tanking that?'
'Size and speed.'
I realised that Akaya was still next to his wreck and in his egg watching the fight. He had to move.
'Go get another ship and come straight back'
'They weren't hitting me hard, but I don't have enough cap to run a rep'
'Get a nos - now move and get another ship please. I can't keep this up forever!'
I was getting impatient and needed Akaya to move. Akaya then finally left the system - burning for the nearest system with any shop selling rifter-class frigates.
'but I won't be able to come back through the gate for 6 minutes'
'I know'
'Wish he had podded me, I'd be back at the station immediately lol'
'ok never move away in a straight line - always orbit ok?'
Another five minutes trickled back - I had burned through almost 1200 EMP rounds but had finally managed to crack the Tempest's shield. I continued to hammer away but amazingly, I was chewing through a lot quicker. Wonder if he was shield tanking?
'omw back!'
'Careful u don't get taken out. He's down to 50% armour now'
'Ok Flash, how much ammo do you have left?'
'Enough - make sure you have plenty.
'I have 2k proton s'
'OK Akaya, that's good but move!'
Three minutes later and Akaya was nowhere to be seen. Where was he? I was still hammering away and had opened up a conversation with Eppix, the tempest pilot. I told him that, under current conditions - I would have him dead in three minutes. I wanted a mere 20million isk ransom. The answer was a cryptic 'We'll see.'
Hmmm, reinforcements? I re-doubled my efforts and finally cracked the armour. I certainly did not see the tell tale glow of a functioning armour repairer. The only data was a slew of missiles that I could just tank with my armour sitting at 25%. My repairer was keeping up but if a lucky shot came through then I was in trouble. Luckily this was not happening. What was on that ship? My target indicators told me that he was now into hull.
'He's into hull!'
'woot, gating into e### so almost there'
'He's on fire - hurry Akaya.'
'OK Flash I'm warping to you'
I fired a few more salvos but then the Angels turned up and also joined in the killing of the tempest. I made a mistake. I should have stopped pumping shells into the tempest and turned our attentions to the Angels.
The tempest, on fire from front to back, leaking fuel and oxygen, escape pods streaming away - finally shuddered and exploded. The pilot's pod insta-warped as well.
'Get the kill mail? Help yourself to the loot Akaya. You got the KM?'
'got no mail'
'Me neither -rats must have it. Good kill though!'
'You sure you don't want this stuff?'
'Naw, Keep it Akaya. You earnt it. '
'Okay, my cargo's full and there's a stack of 3.5k widowmakers in there if you want em and ty ty ^^'
'Akaya - so how was your first pirate experience?'
'Fun!!! ^^ way more fun than mining or mission'
'Well done, could not have done it without your help mate! ok - logging - its been a good night. see you later.''see 'ya :)'
I picked up x3 Large Named Shield Extenders and some named guns - so it was a passively tanked tempest?
Noooooo?
Time: 11/06/2007 21:17:18
Character: flashfresh
Location: G###l
Duration: 00:25:40
My Weapons Used
200mm Light 'Scout' Autocannon I
150mm Light AutoCannon I
Enemies Attacked
Eppix [TYYC]
Damage Done: 51017.00
Damage Received: 10905.30
ps: Akaya caught up with Eppix in Empire space and asked for the KM (kindly) - he got a polite FUCK YOU. Eppix has since been deleted and recycled as biomass.........
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