Ari and myself were now on opposite sides of the gate with a hostile CVA gang between us and decided that the best course of action was to relay the intel to our alliance and see if someone wanted to form up a gang to take them out. While the gang was forming Zealots and Guardians continued to trickle into R3-K7K from Misaba. A Prorator followed them in leading us to wonder if they were planning to plant SBUs somewhere. A Machariel had taken up a snipe spot on the R3-K7K gate but the Misaba side was mostly clear. Arimathea reported that local in R3-K7K had suddenly dropped. With Misaba still clear he jumped back in and we made our way to Yong to join the gang that was forming. The Machariel decided to take a pot shot at me with his 1400mm artillery but I thought better of trying to get a tackle on him, even though he had taken GCC.

Back in Yong I hopped out of my Vagabond and into my Stabber Fleet Issue. Flying a damage ship would make a pleasant change and with its dual propulsion and full tackle the Stabber makes a good addition to an armour HAC gang. Once the gang had formed we made our way to Misaba where we engaged a Brutix on the R3-K7K gate. The Brutix jumped into null sec and we followed only to nuke him on the other side. While we sat on the Misaba gate the CVA gang warped to a pounce spot about 200km from us. We dropped bubbles and aligned while cursing that no-one had seen local spike. CVA warped away just as we got a warp in on them and we followed them to the N8XA-L gate. Once again they were in a safe spot but this time we got a warp in on them and the fight began. Using my Stabber’s speed I was able to chase them as they burnt away and get tackles on a couple of Guardians. We lost an interceptor and badly fit Guardian in the small skirmish that followed and managed to snag a whole bunch of kills including three Guardians. The final battle report shows us having much greater numbers but not all of their gang is shown due to them only getting a couple of kills. The real balance was about 40 on our side and 35 on theirs.

It was good to be out and in the thick of it again. Our roam didn’t come to much but we spotted a hostile gang, reported it, and were able to take part in a fight against it. Not bad for an evening’s work, I think. Hopefully there is more of the same to come in the future.

Related posts:

1. Not In My Back Yard

Rionnag Alba has been part of all of three iterations of Triumvirate, the alliance that terrorises the Northern Coalition. This time we had no intention of reforming the alliance but many of the corporations we have flown with and fought alongside in the past are in Pure Blind and having great fun. Joining them was a logical conclusion. Standings were set and the order was given to evacuate from Catch. Once all my ships were safely in high security space I had a good look at them and decided that it was time to slim down and focus only on the ships that I fly. Except for my faction frigates I sold off most of my possessions and moved the half dozen ships I had settled on to our staging system. Because I don’t fly capital ships I had to rely on a corp mate to jump them out for me but I now have a full hangar in X-7OMU and I am ready to join in the hell raising.

Life up here is pretty full. Back in Catch there were maybe two of three gangs a day at weekends but here, even in the week time, there seems to always be a gang forming up and going out to look for trouble. This is good because living deep in hostile territory does not make for good carebearing during quiet times. Thankfully I’ve built up a decent stock of ISK and have Grr’k making more for me to keep me in ships. One thing that I did overlook was the need for a battleship. Because I am used to flying in logistics ships I brought a Guardian along for remote rep gangs. However, because we fly with lots of carrier support there is little use for logistics ships so my Guardian is pretty useless. Time to ship up that Tempest I was trying to sell, then.

The only allied ops that I have participated in so far have been POS shoots with no kills to speak of so aren’t worth writing about. We did go out on a fast HAC roam last night which resulted in a good fight despite me losing my Vagabond fairly early in proceedings. At least I learnt a couple of things and have adjusted my Vagabond fit for more tank as opposed to the maneuverability that I had opted for previously. Unfortunately I had to head to bed reasonably early so I missed out on this fantastic piece of hotdropping when an NC fleet tried to attack one of our towers.

In between fleets there is still plenty to do. I am completely new to this area so I am spending my free time in my Dramiel exploring the area and making bookmarks. While this can be fairly boring and repetetive work it does often stir up the locals and I had an adrenaline filled scuffle with a Muninn that resulting in me running away with my tail between my legs. It turns out that 180 mm autocannons on a ship with tracking bonuses are very, very evil when you’re in a frigate, even one as fast as this.

At the time of writing we are still officially in -A- but that should change within the next 24 hours. I am definitely glad that I tried out alliance life but I am sure it is not something I will rush back to. Thanks to all of the leadership and FCs and everyone I flew with in my time there. Here’s to an exciting future, though. Let’s hope its full of explosions and that not too many of them are mine!

Related posts:

1. A Postcard From The North

• Rifter: I have about 15 of these kicking around with a couple of fits that I am trying out. They are usually just called Rifter but at the moment I have one called Freki after the alliance tournament prize and one called Agincourt after its victory over the French in Curse.
• Cheetah: Called Peek-a-boo and used mostly for probing exploration sites. My probing skills are terrible and I use the exploration sites to get some practice. Honest.
• Claw: I have two of these both confusingly called Claw and it takes me a couple of attempts to tell them apart. One is fit with an active tank and the other with a buffer tank. Not a ship I regularly solo in so the active tank ship gets more use in interceptor packs.
• Stiletto: My staple fleet ship. I currently only have one of these because they die pretty often. She’s called Point! and my fit is pretty standard for a tackle interceptor. Sometimes I like to put on explosive shield resist rigs when I’m tackling for a small gang.
• Hound: When I run frigate gangs I tend to FC from the safety of my stealth bomber. Hound is fit to be able to use torpedoes and bombs and the cloak makes it a good ship to lead from.
• Republic Fleet Firetail: Currently unassembled my Firetail is waiting for me to come up with a fit that I like before I take her out hunting.
• Dramiel: I have two of these sleek and popular Angel frigates. The hefty price tag and status as flavour of the month has put me off flying them. I should really sell them while their price is at a peak but I like having them around.
• Thrasher: This is probably my favourite ship to fly at the moment and I have seven in my hangar. Three of them are fit; one with artillery, one with autocannons, and one with an experimental setup I have yet to try. All of them are called either Sabre or Thrasher except the test one which is called Brick.
• Sabre: This is the most recent addition to my hangar and one that I am just getting the hang of flying. She’s called Sabre and has been out on a couple of gangs now.
• Rupture: Another staple and a ship I have been flying in solo a lot recently. I currently have two fit in my hangar. Freki is fit as a nano ship for pretending to be a Vagabond in and Rupture is a pretty standard armour tank fit.
• Muninn: A pretty standard sniper HAC that hasn’t been used in far too long. Named Muninn in case you didn’t spot the general theme here.
• Vagabond: Another staple of any Minmatar hangar. Eponymously named Vagabond she comes out in small gangs.
• Rapier: I haven’t actually used her in anger but she’s there for when I need her. Until then Rapier still has the manufacturer’s shrink rap on some of her controls.
• Scimitar: Because I only have Logistics IV I haven’t played with Scimitar much. She’s fit for roaming PvP gangs but I’m still adjusting the fit until I’m happy with it. I do sometimes fly logistics for alliance fleets but in those cases I use official alliance-fit logistics ships.
• Hurricane: I have just one of these called, imaginatively, Hurricane. She’s fit for damage and hasn’t seen the light of day for quite a while.
• Tempest: Machariel is my fleet fit Tempest for when DPS is the only thing we need. I prefer to fly in support roles but lately there hasn’t been any point so the fleet battleship has been brought out. Despite being a small ship pilot in general I have had fun flying Tempests in small gangs with some of my old pirate friends. I tried a nano fit but it died due to over confidence or lack of ability. Hopefully I’ll try another before too long.
• Typhoon: This is my ratting ship. I lost her predecessor due to accidentally turning off all my hardeners so this one is called Pay Attention. I don’t use her much these days because my alts provide most of my income.

As you can see, Wensley’s hangar is fully focussed on PvP. The Wolf, Jaguar, and Cyclone are noticeable by their absence at the moment but I’ll probably buy some soon. I like to be stocked for any eventuality. In general I tend to solo in the T1 ships and use the T2 variants in gangs and fleets.

The An’Har family, by contrast, have a selection of shuttles, a Prowler, and a Mastodon to their name. They’re saving up for a Fenrir but that is probably a little while away because Wensley loses ships at a phenomenal rate.

No related posts.

2JJ-0E is a small system with just four belts but between it and the neighbouring system, CT7-5V, there was plenty to keep me busy. I saw a few of the locals around it soon became apparent from talking to a friend that my presence was annoying them. Fantastic.

Harvesting the belts and the odd cosmic anomaly finally finished off the process that began last week. My security status is now -1.8 and I am once again welcome everywhere in New Eden. Well, when I say welcome…

Anyway, after an extended period in deep space my supplies were running low and my medical clone needed updating. I set a course for the station system of 4C-B7X that sits in the centre of Outer Ring. It is a major hub and I was able to purchase all my supplies and upgrade my clone. Upon undocking I found a Cormorant, Megathron, and Tempest waiting for me. A quick pulse of my microwarp drive slung me out past them but not before the Megathron’s fearsome blasters could tear a good chunk out of my shields. Shocked by this I locked up the Cormorant who had briefly scrambled me and started to shoot while powering away. At 50 km I slowed down thinking I was safe only for a huge volley from the Tempest to vaporise my remaining shields and rip into my armour. Shaken, I was too slow to react and a second blow from the Tempest and a lucky shot from the Megathron tore through my Vagabond’s structure and Wheeeeeeeeeeeeee was no more. My pod warped to safety and Wensley is now sitting safely in station weighing up his options.

Because its the festive season I might leave him out there until things calm down here and he can make his way back to Empire space. Until then I bid you all a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year. While I might make the odd update here and there I’ll be pretty much signing off until January. For all those travelling to see family and friends, I wish you safe journeys! For all the rest, eat, drink, and be merry!

Related posts:

1. The Vagabond (Part 1)
2. The Vagabond (Part 2)

Now that I was familiar with the region I made plans to set up a mobile operations base. My hauler alt, Grr’k An’Har (you’ll learn more about him soon), can fly transport ships and I decided that it was time to set him up in a Prowler. Oh boy was I impressed by this ship. Even with Grr’k's basic skills it handled like a Vagabond only with the bonus of being able to warp cloaked. It made a heady change from the wallowing Mastodon that he had been flying before now. I quickly set him some navigation homework with a side dose of thermodynamics and sent him off towards Wield with a cargohold full of ammunition and nanite paste as well as a giant secure can that he could use to set up a supply dump for Wensley.

With his supply lines sorted Wensley no longer has to worry about making return trips until his task in Wield is completed. Once again I undocked the Vagabond and headed out into the wilds of the Outer Ring. Yet again the journey was pretty uneventful with only a small Ev0ke gang worth noting. Once I arrived in Wield I began to get on with the task in hand. So far this time I have had no faction spawns to comment on but I have been getting involved with the locals more often.

Now that I’m more familiar with the Vagabond my confidence is growing. I think its also helped by the fact that Outer Ring is a reasonably undesirable backwater and not home to any noted PvP organisations that I know of. The odd largish gang passes through but I haven’t seen the locals active in groups of anything more than three or four. Happy that I’m not going to get blobbed I have been engaging them more often. On my terms at least.

When I first arrived back in 33- I saw an Armageddon and Condor in the system. I eventually narrowed them down to a belt where they had somehow dragged a Shadow Serpentis spawn about 3,000 km away from the belt centre. There was no way I was going to be able to burn there and after a couple of half-hearted attempts to make a midwarp bookmark on top of them I gave up the chase. No sooner had I given up than I landed in a belt with the Condor. I hit him hard but he warped before I could get my point on him. Not to worry, I just followed him to the next belt where I was able to alpha-strike him before he could escape. I never got another shot at the ‘Geddon and later saw the same pilot in a Raven with wrecks in the belts but he always safed up whenever I entered system.

The residents of MT- were beginning to object to my presence a bit more severely than they had so far. I jumped into 33- from JV- only to discover a Phobos landing on the gate with me. I held cloak hoping he was passing through but he dropped a bubble and support began to land including a Raptor class interceptor and Maulus frigate. Following the usual drill I aligned to a convenient celestial and began to burn out of the bubble. Predictably, the Raptor gave chase and I was able to lock him and destroy him with ease. The gang didn’t give chase and I warped away and cloaked up until they got bored. It didn’t take long and they soon dispersed.

On another occasion I saw a Crow on scan. It was obvious that he was there to tackle for a larger gang and I decided to spring his trap. I warped to a belt at 100 km and began to burn away from the centre. Sure enough the Crow landed about 150 km from me and began to close for the tackle. He flirted with the edge of my lock range before making his mind up and began closing on me. My own lock resolved and a few rounds later the Crow was dust. I went back to loot the wreck and got the fight of my life when a Hurricane, Zealot, and Pilgrim landed right on top of me. Without looting I burnt out of range as the Hurricane and Zealot pointed me and my cap was nuked. With one desperate last burst of my overheated MWD I made it out of range of their warp disruptors with just 20% of my shields remaining. I warped to safety and lived to fight another day with my heart racing.

Since then I have had a fun fight with an Ishtar and Thorax where I let the Ishtar get away in structure because I was being too cautious about getting webbed and scrammed by the Thorax. They had a Blackbird too but I couldn’t get him before he and Thorax warped away. Another time I had a Hurricane in hull but let him get out of disruptor range just long enough for him to warp away. Finally I had a fight with an Ishtar where I wimped out because local spiked with a battlecruiser and HAC gang. I have managed to kill a Taranis and Rifter that tried to tackle me, the Rifter even got me scrammed.

So, despite what people have told me, ratting has been pretty good fun. I’ve made plenty of ISK (including four faction spawns that have dropped two low-grade Snake implants) and my security status is very nearly fixed. I’m nearly there now and beginning to run out of ammunition so it might be time to send Grr’k on a supply run. Once I’ve got to -1.9 I think I’ll change my routine and begin farming a system properly to see how much ISK I can make. I’ll need a whole hangar of new ships next month anyway…

Related posts:

1. The Vagabond (Part 1)
2. The Vagabond (Part 3)
3. Last Week: Part Two

Why am I doing this, I hear you ask. Well, in the new year I shall be leaving The Tuskers after 16 months of great fun. The decision to leave was a hard one to make. After all, I’ve been part of The Tuskers almost since their inception. The time has come, though, where I need a new challenge so in a couple of weeks I will be moving out of Hevrice and embarking upon a new adventure. But enough of that for now.

Ask anyone who has done it and they will tell you that ratting your security status up is a boring and thankless task. Believe me, it can be mindlessly dull. You find yourself a nice quiet corner off null security space and loop through a handful of systems killing an NPC battleship in each one. In a mammoth session last night I estimate that I killed in the region of 60 rats for a net security gain of about 1.5.

Thankfully, though, I wasn’t doing this in just any ship. I chose to take the Vagabond with me because it is perfect for operating behind enemy lines. It is fast enough to be able to escape from bubble camps, has the damage to make short work of battleships, and allows me to operate a full PvP fitting. In fact, the only compromise that I made was to fit a cloak rather than my preferred small neutraliser. While the neutraliser would allow me to deal with pesky tacklers the cloak lets me safe up and hide should there be too much interest in my activities. The penalty I pay is a vastly increased lock time but when you’re operating out of an area with very few stations and even fewer friendly ones, the ability to hide is pretty important.

After doing a bit of research I picked a constellation in the Outer Ring region called Wield as my new home from home. Access from Hevrice is easy with a variety of nullsec entry systems available and low likelihood of a camp. The constellation forms a convenient loop and most of the systems don’t have stations. Outer Ring is a quiet area anyway and I am unlikely to be massively disturbed as I go about my business. To the south IT Alliance and Pandemic Legions/Sons of Tangra are fighting over Fountain and to the north Ev0ke are mounting a successful invasion of Cloud Ring. Traffic between these hotspots is pretty limited. Perfect. I filled my hold with phased plasma charges (as well as the obligatory selection of PvP munitions) and set off towards my new base of operations.

As soon as I left Hevrice I began the process of placating CONCORD by making sure I killed a rat in every system that I flew through. Because I was familiar with the terrain I opted to enter nullsec by going into Syndicate from Harroule. As I expected there was no camp and I was able to proceed at a leisurely pace. For many jumps the only ship I encountered was a Retribution camping a sling bubble. As soon as I began to burn towards him the Retribution took the sensible approach and warped away. Despite the quietness I made a point of practising nullsec manoeuvres such as avoiding sling bubbles and cloak/warping. Before heading to my final destination I explored Syndicate a bit more. After several roams out here I’m reasonably familiar with the area.

In 97X-CH I encountered my first opposition. A Crow and two battlecruisers were camping the Y9G-KS gate. As I landed and jumped I saw them jump through with me and I was surprised to find myself caught in a bubble on the far side of the gate. I quickly aligned to a celestial and powered up my microwarp drive as the Crow decloaked and began to give chase. After what seemed like an age my lock resolved and a few volleys of Barrage later the Crow was toast. With his battlecruiser friends unable to mount an effective chase I took the opportunity to warp off to a safe and allow them to lose interest. Because this ship is new and expensive I am being very cautious with her. Not to mention that her purpose is to kill NPCs. Still, I’m not going to pass up on any combat that offers itself. I just have to be more careful than I would normally be.

I carried on to Wield constellation without further incident and settled down into a routine, ratting my way around the loop of four systems and dipping occasionally into the station system of NM-OEA where there seemed to be a regular population of about a dozen or so locals. Aware of the fact that I was new to the area I excercised caution and opted to cloak up and hide rather than fight an Ishtar and a couple of basic camps set up to try and trap me. After an hour or so I had had enough and powered down my ship in a safe place.

The next day it was business as usual and I happily pottered around killing the various Serpentis fleets in the constellation. I was even lucky enough to find a Shadow Serpentis spawn not once, not twice, but three times. Things were going well.

After a little while I noticed a Thorax sniffing around and after he’d followed me around a little bit I was happy that he was alone and decided to engage. A small pursuit followed before I found him in a belt (I think he was looking for me too) and, despite the cloak, I was able to get a lock and easily kept him at range. There was no way he was going to be able to get his warp scrambler on me and the night sky in 33FN-P soon lit up by a bright explosion.

With my ammo running low and my precious supply of faction loot safely tucked away in my cargo hold I set my navigation computer for Hevrice and began the journey home. Once again nothing untoward happened and I safely arrived in Hevrice, complete with a new security status of -6.

Related posts:

1. The Vagabond (Part 2)
2. The Vagabond (Part 3)
3. Last Week: Part Two