13 Jun 2007

Solo'ed a tempest...but where's the kill mail?

Now, I was out hunting in Eifer 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 Gusandall was full of Blackfleet versus MeanCorp / ADF / FFAT et al. Too hot for a solo pirate like me.

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 Auren.' Flipping the map around, I got a feel for the route.
'Try Eifer to Gusandall to Auren. A couple of jumps, you should be fine. '
'Gate campers everywhere today,' observed Akaya as he made his journey to our rendezvous. I could not agree more.

flashfresh > omw to auren
Akaya Kalari > one at the eiffer side of the gate, another on the gusandall side lol
flashfresh > You're in a rifter - you're fast enough
flashfresh > get into auren and safe spot
flashfresh > I am 4 jumps out
Akaya Kalari > ya, they didn't even see me ^^
Akaya Kalari > the only other person in Auren is non-hostile
flashfresh > Then hunt him!!!
flashfresh > 1 jump out.
Akaya Kalari > ?

I arrived in Auren 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 Eifer. Maybe I would be lucky. A quick scan and indeed, there was a tempest.

flashfresh > Eppix - lets get him. He's in a tempest. lets take him!!!!
Akaya Kalari > Who?
flashfresh > Eppix
Akaya Kalari > k, warping to you
flashfresh > knock out his drones first
flashfresh > and then the ship
flashfresh > should be fun
Akaya Kalari > :)
flashfresh > OK going to planet X as he is in that cluster
flashfresh > Then we scan him down and engage
flashfresh > Unless he has safe spotted

Planet X loomed ahead of me and I willed the scanner to pick out the battleship's signature. Nothing.

flashfresh > He's moved
flashfresh > Going to another spot.

At my second scan spot I hit the scanner once more. Akaya was following me, ready to pounce.

flashfresh > He's moving. IX cluster now
flashfresh > IX-belt 4

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.

Akaya Kalari > He's here!

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.

flashfresh > Go go! We've landed too far!
flashfresh > 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.

flashfresh > Attack!
Akaya Kalari > just now got in range
flashfresh > This is funny
flashfresh > I doubt we'll get him though.
flashfresh > But feel the rush............

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.

flashfresh > ach - stabbed
Akaya Kalari > =/
flashfresh > Do not follow.
flashfresh > You had no scrambler and I did not have enough points.
Akaya Kalari > I'll have one soon
flashfresh > Indeed
flashfresh > 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.
flashfresh > you also have about 11 minutes left on your criminal counter yes?
Akaya Kalari > ya
flashfresh > OK.
flashfresh > Well we have ten minutes of twiddling our thumbs before I go back to fit more points.
flashfresh > I am going to fit x2 +2 scramblers
flashfresh > Should give us four points that should lock him down tight
flashfresh > Akaya - you have a webber ?
Akaya Kalari > No, I have electronics 2, I have none of that
Akaya Kalari > 10 hours on electronics 3
flashfresh > hmmm
flashfresh > This will be tricky taking on a tempest with two rifters then but it was fun wasn't it?
Akaya Kalari > ya
flashfresh > OK in 7 minutes I will leave the system and refit with x2 +2 scramblers
flashfresh > I hope Eppix is noob enough to stay put in the system but he is hanging around the sentry guns too now.
flashfresh > Hmmmm

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.

flashfresh > He's near the vii cluster lets get closer.

I jumped to the VII cluster.

flashfresh > OK the scanner tells me he is either at vi-1, vi-2 or viii-1

flashfresh > This is agony. 4 minutes left
flashfresh > ok he's at vi-2 but we can't engage him yet. We can't lock him down!
flashfresh > 3 minutes are crawling by
flashfresh > You know, I think the tempest pilot has gone back to ratting again!
flashfresh > He's cycling through the belts.
flashfresh > OK - he's moved to cluster VIII; do not venture into the belts Akaya

The red counter winked off. My Concord Global flag had finally expired. I did not wait any longer.

flashfresh > ok stay here. Am going to refit
Akaya Kalari > k
flashfresh > keep him on scan

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.

flashfresh > Is Eppix still there?
Akaya Kalari > he's moved, I'm looking for him
Akaya Kalari > found him

Damn it. Akaya was too eager and didn't have the points to lock the battleship down.

flashfresh > Warping to you. You have him on visual or on scan?
Akaya Kalari > visual, but he just ran
flashfresh > 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.

flashfresh > He's at XI-7
flashfresh > Go go!!

I landed 6km from the battleship that was buys dispatching an Angel cruiser. I quickly hit the double-scramblers.

flashfresh > Got 4 points on him now.
flashfresh > Go go go!!! Attack!!

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.

Akaya Kalari > doesn't like me lol
Akaya Kalari > half shields

Checking the readouts - I realised that Akaya was in danger.

flashfresh > Get ready to warp out then

flashfresh > keep moving at max burn

Akaya Kalari > ...
Akaya Kalari > boom
Akaya Kalari > I'll pod ram him for you

flashfresh > ?
flashfresh > you warped to a gate??

Akaya Kalari > No, he popped me
flashfresh > You should have left earlier to recharge
Akaya Kalari > You said move off at full speed instead of warping out, so I didn't warp
Akaya Kalari > sry =/

OK, so I was guilty of bad communication and lost my wingman.

flashfresh > He's hitting me now but I need you back as I can't break him solo.
Akaya Kalari > Are you tanking that?
flashfresh > Yeah
Akaya Kalari > lol, I was getting hammered
flashfresh > However, his armour is too thick and I will probably run out of ammo
Akaya Kalari > will sentry guns pod me?
flashfresh > no
Akaya Kalari > I need to go replace my ship
Akaya Kalari > how are you tanking that?
flashfresh > Size and speed

I realised that Akaya was still next to his wreck and in his egg watching the fight.

flashfresh > Go get another ship and come straight back
Akaya Kalari > They weren't hitting me hard, but I don't have enough cap to run a rep
flashfresh > Get a nos - now move and get another ship please
flashfresh > I can't keep this up forever!

I was getting impatient and needed Akaya to move.

Akaya Kalari > I'm going

Akaya then left the system - burning for the nearest system with any shop selling rifter-class frigates.

Akaya Kalari > but I won't be able to come back through the gate for 6 minutes
flashfresh > i know
Akaya Kalari > wish he had podded me, I'd be back at the station immediately
Akaya Kalari > lol
Akaya Kalari > 2 more minutes
flashfresh > ok never move away - always orbit ok?
Akaya Kalari > k

Another five minutes trickled back - I had burned through almost 1000 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?

Akaya Kalari > omw back
flashfresh > Careful u don't get taken out
flashfresh > He's down to 50% armour now
Akaya Kalari > Ok, how much ammo do you have left?
flashfresh > Enough - make sure you have plenty.
Akaya Kalari > 2k proton s
flashfresh > 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. I wanted a 20million 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.

flashfresh > He's into hull!
Akaya Kalari > woot, gating into eiffer
Akaya Kalari > almost there
flashfresh > he's on fire
Akaya Kalari > 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.

flashfresh > Get the kill mail?
flashfresh > Help yourself to the loot
Akaya Kalari > got no mail
flashfresh > Me neither -rats must have it. Good kill though!
Akaya Kalari > you sure you don't want this stuff?
flashfresh > Your first pirate kill and a BS no less.
flashfresh > Naw, Keep it
Akaya Kalari > okay, my cargo's full
Akaya Kalari > there's a stack of 3.5k widowmakers in there if you want em and ty ty ^^
Akaya Kalari > going to get what's left of my other ship
flashfresh > LOL - so how was your first pirate experience?
Akaya Kalari > fun ^^ way more fun than mining or mission running
flashfresh > yaaarrr
flashfresh > Very happy that i could tank the damage though
Akaya Kalari > ya, that was impressive
flashfresh > Had to keep the speed up so i took less damage but great pity we don't have the kill mail.
Akaya Kalari > ya =/
Akaya Kalari > stupid rats
flashfresh > next time
flashfresh > 1 minute left on counter. I need to dock and get more ammo.
flashfresh > That was a lot of fun.
flashfresh > I wanted to ransom Eppix for 20million isk but he refused
Akaya Kalari > aww =/
flashfresh > he said he was all insured
flashfresh > so we'll take his mods instead. A man's gotta eat
flashfresh > UK time -> nearing midnight
Akaya Kalari > =/
Akaya Kalari > time zones suck
flashfresh > But i hope u enjoyed your first day pirating!
Akaya Kalari > well, I'll be on really late tonight, so get up early =P
flashfresh > well done, could not have done it without your help mate!
Akaya Kalari > I did!
Akaya Kalari > was a blast
flashfresh > hope the loot was good!
flashfresh > ok - logging - its been a good night. see you later.
Akaya Kalari > see ya :)

I picked up x3 Large Named Shield Extenders - so it was a passively tanked tempest?

Noooooo?

Time: 11/06/2007 21:17:18
Character: flashfresh
Location: Gusandall
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