15th Movember

So I spent a few days out and about in lowsec FW space without much luck getting into a decent fight.  I'm managing to resist the urge to charge in at any ship that presents itself, unlike during my previous attempt to get some solo PvP in the summer.

The downside is that I spend a lot of time going 'nope, nope, nope,' and moving on.  I'm guessing as my skills and capabilities improve I'll be able to take on more prospective fights.

I'm still flying Liar (from previous post), and finally found a fight I thought I might stand a chance in - normally I wouldn't dream of taking on a Catalyst in an Incursus, as they are likely to be blaster fit, the same as my Incursus, but have massively more firepower and are designed to take out frigates.

However, in this instance the pilot was fairly new so I was hoping he'd be T1 fit and not have great skills, with fingers crossed I piled in.

He quickly shredded my shields once I'd closed in and unleashed my drone.  My armour repper was able to recover most of the damage to begin with, but couldn't really keep up with the incoming damage.  Then I remembered to Overheat my guns(!) as I was in structure, my repper pulled me back into armour briefly before there was a flash and a Boom!

I was pretty sure I'd died, but my repper must have completed it's cycle just in time! I scooped the loot, dropped a "gf" in local and warped out just as a harpy landed almost on top of me.  I thought the Harpy had caught me, pretty sure I saw the scram icon over my ship but my warp drive had already started.

In retrospect I should probably have kept towards the edge of my scram range to let my drone do it's job, though I couldn't have known that the Catalyst didn't have and repair modules nor scram fitted!

Anyway I lived to fight another day and I made another donation to Movember.  I've now matched my previous number of kills, but in half the time.  Hopefully I'll get a bunch more over the next few days.

9th Movember

I didn't get into space as much as I'd have liked last week, but I have this week off work as we've got builders in at home. Turns out Monday daytime (EU timezone is a little bit quiet), but I decided to do a bit of ratting on the side whilst looking for a fight. I was in an Incursus renamed to Liar and set off wandering through low sec. I found a Serpentis Clone Soldier Trainer at a belt with a 1 million isk bounty and a tag. Nice start, but not what I was after.

I few systems later I landed at an outgate to see a Nemesis jump in and cloak. The pilot was fairly new so I decided to hang around in system. There was only the two of us. I toured the belts in case he was ratting. nope, and no more clone soldier trainers. Nemesis pilot was still in system, but sensibly enough not showing on dscan.

I decided to fly to the sun and then align to my original outgate. Then I checked my evemail. I really should turn my sound on when I'm not playing in front of the TV next to the missus, however if I read my mail in space, I always make sure I can see my overview and ship status, so I quickly spotted the Nemesis when he decloaked and engaged me with his target painter.

I set a tight orbit and burned the 20-odd Km to his ship, releasing and engaging my drone as I did so. His first salvo took about 1/4 of my shields, but I figured I was too small & fast for his Torpedoes to do much damage. As soon as I got into web & scram range I activated the modules and then turned on my Blasters once I got closer.

It didn't take long. Boom!

I scooped the loot dropped a gf in local. The guy knew my ship was too small, but he'd done 30 jumps without a fight and couldn't resist...I know how that feels! I let him know it was for a good cause (I have details about Movember in my Bio). He's supporting Movember too and wished me well.

I dumped loot in station and carried on. Donation to Movember made.

Movember - Day 1

For the month of Movember I'll be having another go at focusing on solo PvP, as well as sporting a handsome 'tache to do my bit for raising awareness of Men's Health issues.

During the month, I shall be blogging about my exploits here and for every successful kill I'll be donating £3 to Movember (I had 3 kills on my killboard at the start of this month).

All of my ships will be named after Queen / Freddie Mercury songs

Yesterday was the 40th anniversary of the release of Bohemian Rhapsody, so it only seemed fitting that my first foray was so named.

Suffice to say, it blew my cobwebs off and got my blood pounding...I landed on top of a fairly new character flying a Catalyst in my Merlin.  He promptly warped off whilst I  exiting warp, to be replaced by a Kiting Atron.

I never landed a shot, but I was quite pleased with managing my ASB, even surviving through the reload cycle.  I managed to get out of scram range briefly, but I was too slow on the warp button so I eventually died.

Second ship was fitted up and I took my incursus, newly re-christened as "It's a Hard Life" and headed off up towards Arnon.  A few jumps in there's a lone guy in system, I scan him down to a FW mission, so prepperd my modules and headed in.  He must not have been paying attention as I landed about 50K away and lit my burners to get to him, expecting him to warp out any second.

He eventually woke up and engaged me when he was about half armour, but it was too little, too late.

I dropped a "gf" in local, but didn't get a reply.