Feast or Famine

++Feast++

Piracy in New Eden is feast or Famine for many: some weeks there is a bonanza of loot and ransom and then there are weeks and weeks of nothingness. The last few days has been just that. I was idling in the 'Podded Pilot' supping a drink when Jubes paged me, he was outside and hunting and killing and generally making isk from other people's misfortunes. He managed to track and kill a myrmidon outside Gusandall when his mate, 'Gonzattack' appeared in a dominix and engaged. Jubes had to disengage but I undocked and engaged his dominix with my hurricane. I also asked a friends from Omen and Hellequin to assist in his megathron and once Jubes came back, we finally killed it. The kill mail revealed that Gonzattack had strapped four 1600mm plates onto his dominix. Giving it a massive HP buffer. He tried to de-agress and dock up but we killed it. Also, Gonzattack had actually killed me before - when his corp was still with Kraftwerx, they appear to have left this alliance but they are still red to us in Black Flag. Also, the megathron that Arzal piloted reminded me a lot of Rhericlya's megathron, the ship that kicked the crap out of three canes. Read it here.

However, it looked liked we managed to ambush him and kill him. So it took a few of us and we out-ganked him. We're pirates right?

Anyway, back to the Dominix kill and the CONCORD killmail.

2008.01.11 13:52

Victim: GonzAttack
Alliance: None
Corp: Bad Passion
Destroyed: Dominix
System: Gusandall
Security: 0.4
Damage Taken: 58672

Involved parties:

Name: Arzal (laid the final blow)
Security: -1.2
Alliance: Triumvirate.
Corp: omen.
Ship: Megathron
Weapon: Neutron Blaster Cannon II
Damage Done: 21382

Name: Jubes
Security: -9.9
Alliance: None
Corp: BLACK-FLAG
Ship: Hurricane
Weapon: Hurricane
Damage Done: 19252

Name: flashfresh
Security: -10.0
Alliance: None
Corp: BLACK-FLAG
Ship: Hurricane
Weapon: Hurricane
Damage Done: 10060

Name: RealZonk
Security: -9.8
Alliance: None
Corp: Hellequin Inc.
Ship: Tempest
Weapon: Valkyrie I
Damage Done: 7978


Destroyed items:

Void M, Qty: 126
Heavy Neutron Blaster II
Heavy Neutron Blaster II
Heavy Neutron Blaster II
Phased Weapon Navigation Array Generation Extron
Heavy Capacitor Booster II
X5 Prototype I Engine Enervator
1600mm Reinforced Steel Plates II
1600mm Reinforced Steel Plates II
Armor Thermic Hardener II
Armor Explosive Hardener II
Armor Kinetic Hardener II
Void M, Qty: 1551 (Cargo)
Trimark Armor Pump I, Qty: 3
Berserker I, Qty: 3 (Drone Bay)
Warrior II, Qty: 5 (Drone Bay)
Praetor I, Qty: 4 (Drone Bay)

Dropped items:

Heavy Neutron Blaster II
Heavy Neutron Blaster II
Heavy Neutron Blaster II
Void M, Qty: 252
Quad LiF Fueled I Booster Rockets
Warp Disruptor II
Cap Booster 800
1600mm Reinforced Steel Plates II
1600mm Reinforced Steel Plates II
Null M, Qty: 1200 (Cargo)
Cap Booster 800, Qty: 8 (Cargo)
Praetor I (Drone Bay)
Valkyrie II, Qty: 10 (Drone Bay)
Berserker I, Qty: 2 (Drone Bay)

++Famine++

The next few hours were then boring, a loose, mixed gang went out hunting in Eifer. We dropped probes and baited and waited but nothing. Nada.

Not even a shuttle or a rookie ship.

Zip.

We traveled along well known lines of communication and nothing. After five hours of searching, we called it quits. A bit disappointed as after the Dominix kill, we were hoping for more. A famine indeed so I docked up and did something else.
++Feast++

Kraftwerx Alliance has been around Eifer and Gusandall for a while and Bad Passion corp (the last Dom kill, now an ex-Kraftwerx corp) are around. Anyway, I found myself drinking in the 'Podded Pilot' and swapping stories with other pirates at the bar. Once again, I was paged by the corp. Our intelligence sources had spotted a Kraftwerx duo coming into Eifer. We intended to welcome them. My hurricane was still in space dock after my last fight. Holes and leaks now had to be looked at. I had to be battle worthy so I picked my trusty rupture, now fitted with T2 weapons and able to pack a punch.

A fleet was scrambled that included Dogz (typhoon), Viper Sam (hurricane), Krypt (hurricane) and myself.

The duo were a drake and a thorax, easy meat but they were hugging a gate into high-sec and well, who knows what was on the otherside? It was Krypt who arrived first and was locked by the drake. Then he was locked by the thorax, I arrived along with Viper and Dogz and we locked and engaged. The fight was over quickly with the Kraftwerx Drake and Thorax being reduced to atomic dust. I even did the most damage on the drake.

Once my flag was gone, I went back to Gusandall to drop off the loot. I undocked and spotted a wolf and rifter and decided to check it out. Using the scanner, it was clear that the wolf and rifter were both in safe spots but no harm in the checking the nearest belt. So I went there and a minute later, a rifter came screaming in. I locked, scrambled, webbed and popped the rifter in a volley and a half. Checking the kill mail and then the local chat, I realised that the rifter pilot was screaming that we were blue. I checked my standings with his Corp (The Metafarmers) and no we were not blue and never have been. The Metafarmers are pirates too and have touted themselves as macro and farmer hunters. Fair enough, I have respect for Stakhanov (metafarmer CEO) and he is blue to me on a personal basis. I always leave them alone if I know they are station camping and blasting farmers to scrap. Hell, I might even join them.
However, anything in a belt gets popped. There were no farmers in the Gusandall belts, only me in the rupture so the Metafarmer rifter was a little bit out of the way and bad luck to him.
Despite this, regrettably I may have created a bit of a diplomatic issue for Viper Sam to sort out. Still, our policy is to keep our blue list as lean as possible.

Pirates! Bah.

My hurricane was finally ready and it came at a good time, as Viper called a fleet together to tackle a rokh and rupture and others he had spotted. The fleet assembled on a gate and we waited for the signal with Dogz powering in to make the tackle in belt 1-1; he reported that he engaged the rokh but that it had left for Emolgranlan. We followed in, now eager for the kill and we all jumped to the gate. The Rokh made the mistake of firing its guns at Dogz and made it impossible for him to activate the jump gate to escape due to the build up of electrical energies on his weapons interfering with the jump gate's systems.

Physics lesson over, we pummeled the rokh and then the rupture into fragments. Adam and Krypt had joined us by now but both were under sentry gun fire though that did not stop them from getting onto the kill.

++Famine++

Then came the famine. With Viper now unavailable, I reformed the fleet and answered WayCharles' call for assistance. Some VETO corp ships were around and he tracked them in his Cerberus but by the time we were ready; the ships were long gone. According to WC, these Veto ships were fast. Probably nano'ed.

The fleet by this time was quite large and we roamed for a couple of hours with little or no action. The closest action was when the fleet was on the other side of a bubbled gate camp; Prediction Pain going in first and picking targets but she was unfortunately taken out. The rest of the fleet, now blind, jumped in but we were rumbled. The camping ships had high-tailed to a POS and sat there. We destroyed the warp bubble anchored near the entry point.

We also entered E0A-ZC but found nothing there just three wrecks of rookie ships. Pickings appearing to be quite slim even for the gate campers?

So we turned the entire fleet around and decided to head to Aedald.

++Feast++

Three jumps to Aedald we caught up with the two VETO corp ships but we could not catch them, after they engaged Dogz we all jumped in but with no rapier in the group; there was no way we could catch them. The VETO guys were nano'ed and ran circles round us and we left them behind us. We can't kill what we can't catch. Where's a rapier when you need one?

The clock was ticking for me and I decided on returning to Gusandall. I made this announcement and Kane Rizzel decided he wanted to join me. So we zipped back - just as the rest of the fleet decided that they too, were going to call it a night and head home.

As I zipped a head, I landed in Aralgrund and did a quick scan. The rest of the fleet was strung out behind me over a four system train. My scan revealed something of interest: two ravens, a rokh and an onyx. The latter was a new ship type; something that I had not seen before and I really wanted a closer look. Maybe our roam tonight could end up with some nice scalps. My scanning told me that the ships were either at the IV cluster, the top three stations or the Roniko belt. I toggled on the fleet chat.
"Gentlemen, I am in Aralgrund. I see two ravens, a rokh and an onyx on scan. Stand by please." There was a chorus of approvals from the fleet and a sincere wish that I could spot them. I needed help though and some bait without tipping off the pilots. I already knew that they were all pilots from SMASH alliance.
"Send Dogz in."
"Roger that. Dogz is en-route. All ships, form up on me on gate." Said Viper, bringing together the fleet and organising them. Dogz jumped into the same system as me in his Typhoon and continued to scan and agreed that the ships were somewhere over in the IV cluster. We both jumped over and continued to scan. I checked the stations while Dogz went over towards the Roniko belt. Due to our positioning, a lot of celestial bodies were in line with each other and we had to work quickly.
I landed on the stations but it was Dogz who was fortunate.
"Contact. Contact. Hostile ravens and friends on Roniko gate. Preparing to engage."
"Roger. Black Flag fleet, this is Flash. Are you all in position?"
"Affirmative. Dogz; give us the word."
"Engaged. Warp to me. Primary is the Rokh." Replied Dogz, his reply stuttering, probably due to the tremendous energies of the weapons' exchanges now being played out around the Roniko gate.
"All ships warp to Dogz. Primary is the Rokh." Said Viper, calm and under control. "All ships load up on EMP based ammo. Those are Caldari based ships and will be shield heavy."
"Roger that Viper. Emp ammo loaded." Hissed Muelac.
"Bring 'em on!" Yelled Krypt.
I warped into Dogz, delayed because I got caught up in the station undock but arriving I saw the four hostile ships being engaged by a fleet of hurricanes.
"Xmay is Primary." I said, identifying the Rokh. It shuddered as the hurricanes and others threw EMP based ammunition at it. Meanwhile, Viper was carefully allocating targets to the other pilots, we all had primaries - ships where we would focus our fire but we also needed to split our warp scramble and disrupt points onto the other ships; ensuring that none escape.
"Muelac and Krypt: points on the 'Nye2K'. Flash and Adam, points on 'The Equinox', Kane and the rest, points on 'Percival79'. Primary is Xmay - I have points on him. Secondary is Nye2K."

Xmay's rokh was atomised with no loss of ships on our side. It went down as the fleet focused it's fire on it. Muelac took some slight damage while Dogz was into 45% armour. We started to repair Dogz as the fire power switched over to Nye2K's raven. The Raven did not last too long either as the EMP ammunition proved to be too much and it too, disappeared in a bright blossom of fire and debris. The killmail revealed that this raven had a cloaking device fitted, but it did not survive the fiery demise of the ship. The second raven, piloted by 'The Equinox' was next.
"Good kill. Primary is The Equinox and secondary is Percival79. Flash, Mue and Kane - points on the raven. Rest get points on the Onyx. Fire at will." Said Viper as we switched our attention the the remaining two ships. Dogz was the enemy's primary target but he had cap booster aplenty and we also managed to remote rep his battleship keeping it in the fight long enough for both the remaining raven and then the onyx to succumb to our fire.

We cheered as the onyx was cut into three pieces by our weapon's fire, the three pieces all spinning off into space. Kane and I even managed to pod the pilot.

The loot was excellent though the killmails revealed that a lot of decent tech 2 gear had been destroyed but that's the way the cookie crumbles, I guess.

At last, the fleet decided to head home and it was only a three jump trip. As Kane and I entered into Gusandall, both ourselves and our crews physically exhausted with the extended foray - our sensors picked up the presence of a known pilot and victim. It was At1as and possibly a friend. I killed his ishkur while he was in the Angel Plex and it appeared he might be there again. I opened up fleet chat to Kane, the only other pilot in Gusandall - the rest of the Black Flag Fleet was strung out one to three jumps behind us.

"Kane. Are you seeing what I am seeing? I think At1as is back and in an enyo. With a friend."
"Confirmed Flash. What do you think?" I knew exactly what that wiley Sebiestor pilot was thinking and my avatar grinned back at Kane.
"Shall we?"
"Hell yes. Am going out in my wolf. Race you to the entrance." Challenged Kane as he and his crew transferred quickly to his waiting assault frigate. I was a touch slow as I needed to load up on ammunition and upon undocking from Gusandall, I realised that I still had some armour damage from some previous engagement. No matter, it would be two enyo-class assault frigates versus a wolf-class and jaguar-class assault frigate. Should be an interesting mix as the Enyo's could be set up for range with tech 2 rail guns. Or indeed, they could be blaster-based Enyo's and the fight will be up close and very nasty.

"Kane: are the marks still in the 'plex?" I asked, anxious that they had not been alerted to our presence.
"Affirmative Flash. Two Enyo's waiting for us. I think they like the 'plex there!"
"Primary will be At1as. Let's kill his ass." I replied, chuckling.
"Roger that. At1as is primary." Once I was at the acceleration gate, I did a final check and activated the gate, a fraction of a second behind Kane. How come he is so much faster? Anyway, no time to ponder as our ships were whipped through into a deep Angel-held complex. The first thing that my scanners picked up were wrecks - so many that it obscured everything on my overview.
Shit I thought, I had not adjusted the overview to show ONLY enemy ships. Vital seconds were lost as I hastily flipped up a new screen. Kane was a lot more professional than me. Lucky for us. "At1as pointed." He said, I locked both Enyo's and decided to add a second point on At1as. He could be stabbed and we did not want our prize to escape. My instincts then took over: locking the second enyo and firing on the primary, adjusting orbit, pulsing the afterburner, maintaining the orbit and keeping the target in my kill zone. Kane's wolf was taking the bulk of the fire and his shields winked off and then he was into armour. The Enyo's were close to us and scoring hits so this meant they were blaster fitted and no doubt tech 2 versions with tech 2 ammo. This would hurt then, though I wasn't too sure if the enyo's had a webber. Doubtful, with only two slots - one would be some afterburner and possibly a scrambler. No, there was no webber here.
"Damnit, those enyo's hurt!" Yelled Kane, I checked the damage readout and he was being pummeled into hull by the enyos.
"Adjust your orbit Kane. They're using blasters with no webber. Move out to 5km orbit. I will move in closer and take the fire."
"Roger - primary is almost down anyway." Indeed, At1as was reading 50% armour damage and it was falling quick - a testament to Kane's immense gunnery skills. I moved close and switched orbits with Kane and since we were both using auto canons, which had far superior fall off, we continued to hit the Enyo. At1as tried to maintain his fire on Kane but now he was presented with a choice: should be continue to hit Kane, now into hull but further away or switch to me, much closer but shield tanked with 85% shield left?
The choice was a horrible one and it was even worse when the second enyo turned and warped out; leaving At1as alone with two blood-thirsty Minnie assault frigates. The enyo tried to stay in the fight but it was blasted to scrap soon enough. We missed the pod though.

The kill mail revealed some goodies on the ship and like before, this chap loves his T2 gear.

2008.01.12 02:41

Victim: At1as
Alliance: None
Corp: Children of Thermonuclear Synthesis
Destroyed: Enyo
System: Gusandall
Security: 0.4
Damage Taken: 9047

Involved parties:

Name: Gistii Thug / Angel Cartel
Damage Done: 5751

Name: Kane Rizzel (laid the final blow)
Security: -10.0
Alliance: Derek Knows Us
Corp: NovaKane Incorporated
Ship: Wolf
Weapon: 150mm Light AutoCannon II
Damage Done: 2133

Name: flashfresh
Security: -10.0
Alliance: None
Corp: BLACK-FLAG
Ship: Jaguar
Weapon: Jaguar
Damage Done: 1163


Destroyed items:

Void S, Qty: 197
Light Neutron Blaster II
Warp Scrambler II
1MN Afterburner II
Power Diagnostic System II
Capacitor Power Relay II
Small Armor Repairer II
1st Tier Overseer's Personal Effects (Cargo)
Null S, Qty: 1500 (Cargo)
Void S, Qty: 3806 (Cargo)
Anti-Explosive Pump I
Hybrid Collision Accelerator I
Hobgoblin II (Drone Bay)

Dropped items:

Light Neutron Blaster II
Light Neutron Blaster II
Light Neutron Blaster II
Void S, Qty: 67
Small 'Knave' I Energy Drain
Damage Control II
5th Tier Overseer's Personal Effects, Qty: 2 (Cargo)
2nd Tier Overseer's Personal Effects (Cargo)
3rd Tier Overseer's Personal Effects, Qty: 2 (Cargo)
4th Tier Overseer's Personal Effects, Qty: 2 (Cargo)
Angel Ship Log 141490454 (Cargo)

Exhausted, we collected the loot and docked up. A magnificent end to the day.