Negative Ten

"Today Is A Good Day For Someone Else To Die!"

-- (Terry Pratchett, Feet of Clay)

Some milestones in Eve are greater than others and the journey to them is what defines many of us as pilots, pirates, capsuleers. I have achieved a fair few in my time and I now celebrate re-achieving another.

Many moons ago I had busted a mission in progress in a nearby system, a Raven battleship was downed by my Pilgrim, using drones and energy neutralisers. However once the Caldari Battleship went down my drones, in their infinite wisdom, decided it wise to destroy one of the rats, thus ruining my pristine, perfect negative ten security status.

It has been a long time coming but I once again proud to be true Negative Ten:
Kane Rizzel -10.00000000000000

The Hawk and the Worm... Or how Kane feels dirty

As is the always the case, intel of a ship trying to run the static plexes reaches me, a Hawk assault frigate is in the 1/10 DED rated complex. Sitting on my new couch, I peruse the ships in my hangar and choose something a touch... Unconventional:

Worm

Korako 'The Rabbit' Kosakami, Gurista leader, has a particular love for stealing the Caldari's ship designs, souping them up, and turning them on their creators. With the Worm, he has taken the Merlin design so familiar to Caldari pilots and turned it into a defensive powerhouse with increased electronic warfare capabilities.

Special Ability: 50% bonus to Rocket and Light Missile velocity

Caldari Frigate Skill Bonus: 5% shield resistance per level
Gallente Frigate Skill Bonus: 5m3 Drone Bay Capacity per level

It is... Very different from what I normally fly and is not exactly fit to the most common specifications but all in all I thought it would be ideal for what I intended and as is my habit, I intended to introduce it to someone in a violent fashion. The most peculiar thing about this particular Worm is the tank, the fact it doesn't fit a conventional tank means I would be relying on things out of my control to win this fight, but you never know your luck until you try it :)

I warp to the 1/10, he's just about to activate the gate into the second room, I follow with all haste as there's only a small window for me to activate the gate on his key. We both exit warp about two clicks away from each other and I engage, point blank range, rockets fizzing all around, I deploy my tank... A flight of EC-300 ecm drones...






He's hitting me hard, I have no shield buffer, or armour for that fact, I'm relying on the ecm drones to get a jam and some fancy flying on my part.

He's hitting me very hard up close, at 10% shields I hit my afterburner, to gain range and possibly decrease the damage from his rockets, at ten clicks I set orbit, dual webs and scram holding him in place as my speed mitigates some of the damage from his launchers.

My thermal rockets aren't doing much but the EC-300s are starting to do their job, allowing me to regenerate some of my shields. I change to EM rockets and the damage increases, along with the jams, I'm starting to turn the fight, so I move in close again, but he relocks and starts to pulverises my shields, Once again I move out to ten clicks to mitigate the damage.

His tank is failing and I'm at about 50% shields, I decide it's time to finish, the EC-300 drones have another jam cycle and I recall the little beauties... Only to deploy a flight of Warrior IIs to help finish off the last of his shields.

He explodes violently, bits of Hawk littering the plex.

A good fight shared in local and an apology from me for using ECM drones.

Sure I felt dirty, but it was a good fight, a fight in which luck, more so than any other fight, played a very big role and for once I was on the other end of EC-300s :D

Unlucky...

"Luck is my middle name," said Rincewind, indistinctly. "Mind you, my first name is Bad."
-- (Terry Pratchett, Interesting Times)

Luck is a fickle mistress, still reeling from a serious case of not having any, I decided to run around in The Cunning Man, yet to get used to this new clone, a little stiff and in need of some smiling from the Lady herself.

A Vagabond from Electus Matari had entered Eifer and I would need something a touch more... Potent.

Enter Flubber, born from the ashes of her predecessor, a Fleet Issue Stabber and a ship perfectly suited to duel the Minmatar Heavy Assault Cruiser.

I head on over to Eifer and start moving around system... Waiting... Patiently.

My patience is rewarded, belt 1-1 was to be the place as he warps in on me at 50km. There would be no Lame Kane, no Crazy Ivan's as the Vagabond comes right at me, pauses and moves off at range, overloaded webs reach out and slow him down enough for a overloaded scram, shutting off his MWD, which allow my webs to be more effective.

Flubber moseys on over, right up the Vagabonds nose, drones and ammunition already flying between us, my shields stripped, a race for survival, guns overloaded and his shields start to wane, once stripped his armour and structure become a casualty of Flubber's guns and drones.

Unlucky for the Vagabond pilot but a good fight none the less, as much shared in local

How noob can you go

"Yes," said the skull. "Quit while you're a head, that's what I say."
-- (Terry Pratchett, Soul Music)

Bombing around Eifer in my Rifter, I had tackled a Drake earlier for the M34N crew and ransomed the pod for a few hundred milllion, so things were looking rosy.

Later on a small gang were camping the Emolgranlan gate and I tried to draw the Wolf off the gate, eventually he started to close the distance so I warp to 100km off the gate, so as his friends couldn't get a warpin to him and spoil the fun...


Can you guess the Facepalm?



... I agress the Wolf, in full sight and range of sentries :FACEPALM:

I warp my pod out and offer a 1v1 to the Wolf with a new Rifter which would take me a minute to fit but nothing in local is uttered, so I warp to Gusandall gate to get another Rifter, land, there's a Hurricane just landed as I jump through the gate...

... And I'm in the station, sans implants and a hefty cloning bill :FACEPALM:

Bugger

Rifter heart and soul

Death was Nature's way of telling you to slow down. -- (Terry Pratchett, Strata)

I had been patrolling Eifer for most of the day, won some (Using a Rifter to kill Malediction before his Hurricane friend could catch up and a Dramiel most notably), lost some (Lost my Navy Vexor to Harbinger bait) and had a bit of fun on the hunt.

One particular hunt stands out, a young Hurricane pilot was running a mission out of high security space, employing the services of an associate, the Hurricane was probed in his mission site in short order.

Warping to my associate I could feel butterflies, even a half decent Hurricane would be dangerous to The Cunning Man. Feeling the need for some action I went on in, landing not too far away from where the Hurricane pilot was finishing up, I moved in for tackle, in range and active.

A mixed flight of tech one drones is launched and set about trying to dismantle my Rifter, of course I couldn't stand for that, locked them all up and popped them one by one until none stood against me.

The Hurricane Pilot was trying very hard but his guns just couldn't track my Rifter in its tight orbit. Volley after volley of RF Phased Plasma rounds slam into the shields and armour of the Minmatar Battlecruiser, my speed enough to mitigate all damage.

The Hurricane pilot is smarter than I give him credit for as he moves closer to one of the structures in the mission complex, disrupting my orbit and allowing him to get a few good hits on the Cunning Man with his 425s. Manual flying from here on in Kane as I start to throw the Rifter around.

After a good few minutes I chew my way through the Hurricane's shield, armour and structure and it explodes in spectacular fashion, bits of debris raining against the Cunning Man's beautiful hull. The pilot had all but completed the mission by the time I had commenced violence and his mission objective was left only a few hundred metres away. As he was very young and he tried very hard to fight back, I made arrangements to get the mission objective back to him, free of charge.

I've had quite a bit of fun flying the Rifter again and I hope it shall long continue as I shall try very hard to stay away from the bigger ships and concentrate on Rifter Violence™

Return of the Kane

The hippo of recollection stirred in the muddy waters of the mind.
-- (Terry Pratchett, Soul Music)

It has been a long time, the station has been refurbed and my hangar now has an office, not just a few crates for a desk and a makeshift bed in the corner. Someone has spent a lot of money on this and it all looks very pretty but somehow it's just... Wrong.

The Cunning Man floats above the docking platform, I ease myself into my custom built 'pod' and set about making my way into the black, Gusandall, it has been too long.

There's a few pilots showing up on the local comms net, but mostly in bigger ships and quite obviously together and possibly a little too much for a rusty old pirate.

There were a few frigates with them but soon they all jumped out, destination unknown, but I loitered at the usual haunts. A Malediction from the large group re-enters Gusandall, a scout no doubt, I wait for him in the first room of the 2/10 complex. A tech 2 Interceptor vs my Rifter... Well... I know how this was going to end but you got to let people think they're in it to win it.

As predicted, the Malediction appears on scan in the direction of the 2/10 beacon, soon he would be arriving, all systems primed and set to overheat from the get go.

Malediction comes out of warp only a few hundred meters away from The Cunning Man, targeting systems acquire the target, yellow box, then red as the Malediction pilot gets serious.

My guns spin up and ordinance starts flying, the interceptor at point blank range melting with every volley, it explodes, with my shields barely troubled by the missiles it had launched.

This was not about the hunt, as I was hunted, or the fight itself, as it was wholly unremarkable, but how knowledge of my surroundings and the predictability of others led to victory.

And just like that, Kane is back :)

[OOC] The future is exciting

YOU HAVE PERHAPS HEARD THE PHRASE THAT HELL IS OTHER PEOPLE?
"Yes. Yes, of course."
Death nodded. IN TIME, he said, YOU WILL LEARN THAT IT IS WRONG.
-- (Terry Pratchett, Small Gods)

Due to massive changes in my Real Life I will be very scarce for the foreseeable future.
I'm moving to London in three weeks to start a new job, same thing I'm doing now but on a larger scale.

I'll see you guys when I see you o7

Four