Wanted Dead or Alive; But Mostly Dead

Another milestone has been reached in my Eve career. Today my friends, Vultirnus had the first bounty placed on his head. That’s right, old Vult is now a wanted criminal. All because he blew up a Heron, can you believe it!? The bounty is probably more than the cost of the ship. Seems like I picked on someone who’s a little touchy about getting their frigates blown up.

It was an interesting day to say the least. I logged in and scanned down our home system. Nothing too much new to worry about. We had a null-sec connection that was still critical from my collapsing efforts yesterday. Our static, and a new connection to a class 1 wormhole. That deserves some attention. I warp into the C1 and start poking around. There are a few derelict towers and one active tower, but no ships or pilots to be seen. That’s fine with me as I also find a ladar and grav site as well as four anomalies. I decide to scan the system down since I’m alone and would like as much free intel as I can get.

The C1 has its hi-sec static connection and a connection to a C2. I scope out the C2 just to make sure that no hostile pilots are buzzing around before I start pillaging the C1 for it’s isk. As everything is quiet I grab my new sleeper slapping Zealot and head into the C1 to “relieve” the C1 inhabitants of their anomalies. I pull in about 120 million isk in about 45 minutes. Not a bad operation for a lone pilot in a hostile system.

That’s when things start getting weird. Industrial ships start popping up on my directional scanner. Only for a second or so at a time. I have all the signatures in the system bookmarked. I have no idea where these ships are coming from or where they’re going. Just then Azx logs in. We get into some cloaky ships and head into the C2 to see if we can shed some light on what is going on. The industrial ghosts continue to haunt us for a while, long enough for me to log off to attend to some real life obligations. Azx continues to monitor the situation and determines the ships are now dismantling a tower in the C2.

I get back online as soon as I can. Ok I could have gotten on earlier, but Wolverine was on tv and well, I like Wolverine. Anyway I get on in time to join up with Snow and Azx and try to ambush these industrial ships moving cargo from the POS to a hi-sec wormhole. After much observing we get a good handle on their operation and get ready to take down the next ship we see. Sadly at this point a Bestower, Vexor, and Orca have made it through the wormhole and the hole has gone critical for mass. But a pilot continues to come back in just a pod to move more ships out of the system. Eventually I attempt to grab a Buzzard as it runs to the wormhole but was not able to lock it down fast enough to manage a kill.

So as it stands our ambush was unsuccessful. We didn’t manage to catch any enemy ships and we’ve now given away our intentions. Then some other ships start popping up on the scanner and then disappearing. We have no idea what is going on. Pilots are all over this system, but apparently just alts of the other pilot we saw. Finally I have an idea. All of the ships still in system appear to be frigates which are a pain in the ass to catch. Unless you have two sensor boosters with scan resolution scripts. Something my sniper Oracle just happens to have fitted. As I fly back to our home system to grab the Oracle the Buzzard shows up on the hi-sec wormhole along with a Heron.

I’m flying as fast as I can to get back to the C2. The Buzzard jumps through but the Heron remains on the hole. Snow is parked cloaked by the hole watching and Azx is in a Tengu out of scan range aligned to the hole ready to jump in if I need the help. Finally I arrive at the C2 and warp to 70km off the hole. The Heron is locked in less than a second and vaporizes as eight large tachyon lasers melt through the ship’s structure. The pilot probably didn’t even realize I was on grid before he died. The pod ejects and I’m able to lock that and destroy it as well.

We didn’t manage to make a big isk kill, but at least we got a corpse out of it. Then to my amazement, a notification pops up on my screen. Wouldn’t you know it, the Heron pilot put a 20 million isk bounty on my head! A badge of honor as I see it. The corp enjoys a good laugh over it, and I decide to initiate a new practice in my Eve playing. I open up my mailbox, and type out the following to my latest victim:

Hey every blog needs it’s visits. Seems like a good way to keep things light hearted; and maybe rub it in a little.

Hat Trick and a Chance Encounter In The Sandbox

Jimmeny freakin’ crickets!

This has been an absolutely epic day in Eve. I don’t even know where I should start to be perfectly honest. I had been dying to get into the game all day long. It’s summer, which means summer Fridays here in New York (we get out at 2:00 pm). I watched alliance tournament coverage for most of the day (don’t tell anyone), and basically just didn’t get any work done while I day dreamed about Eve. Needless to say I was excited when I finally got past the log in screens and was welcomed by a full turnout from the corporation.

We got a lot done. Things were shuttled to and from hi-sec space. PI got switched around, again, and we tested out a few fits for durability and damage output. I even got an Arbitrator fit to resemble the Pilgrim speed tank fit I developed recently. It will be interesting to see how it performs, but I think the cap is too unstable to make it a viable fit.

Snow suggested we go for a lo-sec roam. She apparently has quite an itchy trigger finger, but a little more bloodlust in the corp is always welcomed in my books. I grab my Pilgrim, Oz rolls out an interceptor, and Snow brings a covert ops boat for scouting. Ok maybe not the most intimidating gang ever, but we should be able to find some fun. We start out in our static system and its adjoining lo-sec chain of about four systems. Not much going on here, but I notice we’re only a few jumps away from a very familiar spot.

Oz and I used to operate out of the Fensi lo-sec chain. It was our first experience living in lo-sec and we felt pretty badass at the time. We know the systems pretty well and have fond memories of some very good hunting spots. It started out pretty much on par with my hunting style so far. An afk frigate was sitting outside a station with a cyno up. I popped him pretty quickly and evaded taking too much damage from the station guns. Sweet only a few minutes on the roam and we’ve got a kill, not bad.

We continue moving through the chain until we enter a system with an unusually chatty local channel. There are only a few pilots in system so I’m surprised to see so much dialogue. It sounds like one of the players has an Eve blog they publish and was recognized by the other pilot in local. The blogger was sitting in a Jaguar outside a station about 15km from docking range. He noticed Snow’s combat probes but didn’t dock up or warp away, instead broadcasting over local where he was. While all of this was going on I was slowing crawling my way towards his ship while cloaked. I was still about 30km away from him and needed to buy myself some time.

I decided to ask the pilot in local about his blog, trying to distract him while I closed the distance. As he was describing his blog to me I mentioned I had an Eve blog as well and we exchanged links (his blog can be found here: After time adrift under open stars). Much to both of our surprise, he recognized my writing! Apparently he had visited the blog a few times in the past. What a small world! A random player in the same lo-sec system as me that I found through a wormhole connection reads my blog. Blows my mind, but doesn’t prevent me from engaging the Jaguar while he is alt-tabbed out reading my blog. Shameless? Absolutely.

Luckily for him the Jaguar’s tank is robust enough to buy him enough time to get into docking range. We all have a laugh in local and I warp to a celestial to wait out my new global tag. We hang around a little longer talking until my tag expires and our roam continues on to the next system. A number of ships appear on d-scan, but there aren’t enough pilots in local to account for all of them. Snow throws out some combat probes to start getting a handle on them while I d-scan the system to help narrow the field. It turns out a Velator has decided to going afk while in a safespot. Never a good idea, especially with my expertise in popping afk Velators. Snow locks down the signal from her probes and I warp in to make quick work of the defenseless ship. Two ships down! What a good roam!

A few more ships are hanging out in the system, but we know there aren’t any pilots in them. Snow finds them with the probes and we see two Herons unpiloted floating in what remains of a POS. The tower and many of the buildings are still there, but nothing is online and the Herons are free for the taking. I wanted to blow them up, but apparently Snow could make some use of them for some of that industrial, profitable stuff she does. Oz ejects and “commandeers” the vessels. This has been a surprisingly profitable excursion so far. I mean considering we were expecting to lose our ships, things are turning out well. We move on, and find a rather elusive Myrmidon. We play cat and mouse through a few systems but can’t seem to lock him down. He knows we’re after him, and we know his ratting ship won’t withstand our force. A Myrmidon would be a very nice addition to the killboard.

Eventually we let Oz into the system alone with our prey. Hoping with only one pilot in local he will be less likely to run. Oz is having a tough time finding him even in his interceptor, but it’s only a matter of time before he eventually lands in the same belt as him. I kick the slow as hell Pilgrim over into the warp and heat up the modules. Oz has the Myrmidon locked down well, and isn’t taking too much damage. The Hobgoblin I drones can’t keep up with him and he hasn’t taken much if any damage so far. I lock onto his drones and launch a wave of acolyte II’s. They begin chewing through the outclassed enemy drones while I get into a suitable orbit of the target and engage my tracking disruptors.

The pilot of the doomed vessel begins a chat session with Oz asking for us to spare his ship. Negotiations begin but he is less than reasonable. We offer a ransom of 80 million isk, which is a steal in his ship to be honest, but he refuses. Alright, no sweat off my back. The energy nuets make his attempts at actively repairing his armor impossible and he shortly vaporizes in a brilliant blue explosion. We loot the wreck and even salvage what’s left of the ship with Snow’s salvager module. Who fits salvagers on a roam? We do apparently. We decide to call it a night after such a great kill and fly our ships back to the HQ system.

What a great day playing in the sandbox! This is really what keeps bringing me back to Eve over and over. You just can’t get these kinds of conflicts and interactions in any other game. Not to mention flying spaceships is super fun!