Which meant I spent a few days this week totally ignoring any fleets that went up, and went out roaming on my own. And I'd forgotten after only a few weeks of gang fights in FW how much time you spend looking for a fight when solo. Seriously it's worse than I remembered. Of course this might be because I'm now with the Gallente Militia, and the squids are paranoid as hell if you willingly engage when you're outgunned, since they expect a gang to come running to save your ass any second. And I'm not even kidding, I was accused of being bait three times in one night while flying through squid staging systems in my Slasher. I was weirdly offended.
But on my first night out in my humble shield Jaguar, I stumbled into a squid cruiser on my way home after an un-eventful solo roam. Well to tell the truth, I was tabbed out on my internet browser after jumping through a gate, where I was sat for a good few minutes after uncloaking from the session change, having completely forgot I was still in space. So when I started getting damage sounds from my client, I almost peed myself.
Tabbing back in I saw a fish-boy Thorax attempting to hit me from 20km away with blasters (lol). Relieved my ship wasn't melting, I dived towards the gate and orbited at 500m, hoping to get a feel for his damage and check if he had help incoming. Local stayed the same and his guns were tracking me terribly at almost point blank range. I decided to engage for the lols.
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| No shield damage, proper casual like |
Loading fusion rounds, I got into a tight orbit around him and started hitting him in the face with my awesome. He was dropping fast before he suddenly began to recover armour. "How odd" I thought. "You don't see alot of active Thoraxes". Using awesome tactics, I turned on my energy neut, which soon began to take its toll on the Thorax, as he repeatedly dipped into structure before clawing back some buffer. I kept my neut running and turned off my afterburner, since his tracking was in no danger of hitting me anytime soon. After dipping into hull several times, he eventually burst into a lovely blue flash, and being the asshole that I am, I pointed and popped his pod too (Not that he had any implants mind). I then attempted to troll him in Local for attacking an AFK frigate and losing, before realising that he would be in another system by now.
TROLL FIRST THEN POD YOU AMATEUR.
That was a little embarrassing on my part. And while his fit wasn't the best in the world, it was still a solo kill. Totally counts and stuff.
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| He didn't even launch his drones. I'm guessing he's new |
Then later that week, I finally finished training Gallente Frigate V, which meant I now had three brand new ships to play with, the Taranis, Enyo and Ishkur ! (I have an Ares also, but it's more of a fleet ship, so I'm ignoring it for the moment). Fitting up one of each, I decided tonight would be the night of the Taranis, and undocked with dual-prop/hull tank fit (similar to my throw-away tackle Atrons I fly in militia fleets). I went out looking for trouble, and managed to find a couple of fights to get my solo back :D
Sadly the first killmail I appeared on with my sexual new 'Ranis was infact the Gallente Militia shamelessly blobbing a poor little Punisher who had wandered into our staging system by accident. He died with honour, pewing away at a Rupture while we all poked him to death.
I couldn't resist D;
The second victim of my terrifying Taranis was a squid Condor, who I followed through a gate into Enaluri from Nennamaila. I held my cloak until his ran out, at which point he was 12km from me. I spammed approach and turned on my MWD as I decloaked, but Condors accelerate stupidly fast, and he managed to extend the range to 15km before our speeds topped out at around 3.5km/s each. Of course, during this maneuvering he had also pointed me and started smacking me in the face with light missiles, which was slowly killing me. While I had no doubt I could escape if I wished, I've harbored a secret hatred for kiting Condors ever since several of them ground down a militia buddy before we could reach him. Refusing to let this one take another innocent Gallente soldier into the abyss, I switched on my overheat (which the Condor pilot didn't seem to do, or remember to do) and hit over 5km/s, swiftly catching the smug Condor by surprise, before scramming him and letting rip with my neutron blasters. His shield held for a few seconds before it collapsed, and then I volleyed him right through his armour and his hull.
Boom.
And right as he popped I remembered I could have launched drones. Derp derp derp. I always forget I have drones when flying frigates with drone bays, I'm just not used to it. Oh well, it wasn't like I needed more DPS at that point. I scooped the loot before jumping back into Nennamaila to repair my guns and armour damage. Before I left station again, I wrote myself a sticky note (IRL) that said "LAUNCH DRONES" and stuck it to my monitor. Problem solved!
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| I'm tempted to train Interceptors V purely for this ship... |
Heading back out in a loop, I missed a few targets jumping through gates, before heading back towards Nennamaila to see if any squid gangs were poking our home system with a stick. Passing back through Enaluri again, I noticed a squid Firetail on scan near a medium plex. Dropping into warp I hoped he would stay on grid long enough for me to tackle him, but no joy, he had warped by the time I landed. I began to align out to the Nenna gate, when another squid frigate landed next to me, a Caldari Navy Hookbill. Both of us panicked and began burning away from each other, because the range quickly extended to over 50km before I turned at 90 degrees from him and watched to see what he would do. Expecting him to be rocket fit, I was slightly surprised when Scourge missiles began impacting on my ship. Light missiles suggested a kiting fit, so I guessed he would have minimal tank. A perfect target for my ganky 'Ranis !
I decided to try and bait him closer, where my scrambler would really ruin his day. Aligning back out to Nenna at max speed, I waited for him to start burning right after me. When he did, I turned off the MWD to speed up my turn, before spinning around and burning with an overheated MWD right at him. 60km quickly became point blank, as we roared towards each other at speeds of almost 4.5km/s each. Scram on, MWD off, AB on (reduce missile damage), guns loaded with Null ammo overheated and turned on. And I caught sight of my note too, which meant I actually launched my drones when I tackled him. Joy!
He quickly realised his mistake, and tried to get away from me, but it was far too late. With no propulsion he was dead in the water, and I soon melted through his hull.
Die fishy!
I made a valiant attempt to catch his pod too, but he was too fast with his warp out :(
I scooped the loot as he offered a "gf" in Local, which I returned before heading back to Nennamaila. It wasn't until I docked that I noticed what was casually sitting in my cargo.
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| Ohai Shadow Serpentis Disruptor |
Fly safe!
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