First kill!

I'll be the first to admit it, I'm fairly useless in PVP. That's probably a bit of an understatement infact, a monkey smashing the keyboard would probably fare better than me in a fight. So imagine my shock when I managed to kill an Incursus today. Although it was a duel to be fair, no epic LowSec chases for me.

I'd been meaning to get into PVP for sometime now. I'd trained some basic skills and some useful things like Overheating and wandered around lowsec promising myself to attack the first thing I saw. Of course when that thing turns out to be a smart-bombing battleship, I think I was well within my rights to run for the safety of high-sec. So instead of being the PvP god I wanted to become, I was sulking around Amarr in my PvP Punisher. (I had used my rudimentary knowledge of fitting to make an attempt at a PvP fit before I ran it past one of my corpmates. He got me to change most of the fit).

My trusty, battle-proven Punisher

So there I was sitting on my ass outside the main tradehub in Amarr feeling sorry for myself and a little bored when I saw the can on my overview. TI FRIGATE I V I!! An Incursus was floating next to it. I've always been suspicious of these fights but I wanted to get a taste of PvP before mission running sucked out the last of my soul. Checking the pilot's history showed him to be a 2007 player. That meant he definitely had the skillpoint advantage, aswell as experience. I then checked out his corp to make sure they weren't all camping in the area to gank me halfway through. Just him in the system. I was sorely tempted, but also worried by his three year advantage. Not only that, but I was well aware of the recent blaster buff, and three years meant he must have T2 blasters on that thing. I hesitated.

Then I almost slapped myself around the face. How could I ever become a PvP god if all I worried about was how I was going to lose to older players? Suddenly determined, I flew straight at his can. He saw me about 10km out and started to orbit me. I continued to orbit his can for a while, trying to decide on tactics. I went for the "turn on everything and pray" approach. I locked him up, turned on my Damage Control and took his ammo in the can.

Pretty much instantly my shields melted and I panicked. My Caldari side was screaming "OH MY GOD THE SHIELDS, THE SHIELDS!!!". Then I remembered that I was flying an Amarr ship based around armour tanking. Derp. I fired up my autocannons, my nos and my scrambler and settled into orbit next to him. I hoped he was shield tanking because I was having some serious trouble breaking through it. But glancing at my armour showed me I was still at around 80%. We traded blows as a Providence floated by only a few kilometres away. It was oddly peaceful. Then his shields broke. His armour started falling faster and faster and my heart started to flutter. My overheated armour rep was keeping me around 50% armour and I was chewing into his hull. His damage control was slowing me down, but my tank hadn't yet been broken and I was sure I would win. I was right.

I sat back in my chair, heart hammering from the adrenaline rush. I hadn't even realised I had leant forward so far. "Gf" appeared in local. A huge smile spread across my face. "Gf dude" I replied. My first true PvP fight, and I had won. I looted his wreck, sold what I couldn't use and kept the rest. I sat in the station and excitedly told my corpmates of my victory, small as it was.

I can easily see why people love PvP. Already I want to go back out and kick some ass, the adrenaline rush and surge of joy when I won was amazing. Though part of me knows it's a little sad to get this excited over exploding pixels, the rest of me can't wait for the corp roam planned for next week. Thank you snowman1 for giving me the PvP bug!

Tl;dr PvP is way more fun than Incursions. And I love Incursions.