Varus, Give Me Back My Legion(s) – Augustus Caesar

A flurry of activity this morning has more than made up for the last few weeks of inactivity. I started off the morning in my Pilgrim hunting in Gallente FW space. Things were going fine. I even managed to catch an Imicus speed tanking a major complex by himself, while afk. That adds up to a simple frigate killmail for me! As I’m congratulating myself on the clever kill, I had stalked up to the orbit path of the ship while cloaked, Oz asked to help him out in a lo-sec deadspace complex in our static. I think I have time for that and it sure beats spending hours hunting elusive T1 frigates.

I head back to the HQ system and swap ships for my Legion. My beautiful Legion of invincibility. I jump back through our static wormhole and join Oz in the destruction of many Gallente NPC pirates. As we finish up the last room Snow logs on and helps out by grabbing a Noctis and sweeping up our mess. We’re just getting started when Oz notices combat probes on the scanner. Snow aligns for the wormhole and I drop a can so I can start to orbit the acceleration gate’s drop off point to intercept anything that might cause trouble. Oz positions himself on the front end of the acceleration gate to give us a heads up if someone does show up.

Only a minute passes before Oz calls out that ships have landed on the acceleration gate. Snow warps out as Oz joins me in the first room of the complex. D-scan is showing a Tornado, Talos, and Drake on scan. A Drake on Drake brawl sounds slow but doable, and I’m positive I can easily handle the Talos and Tornado on my own. Oz asks if we’re going to engage or run. I make the call to fight it out. These ships shouldn’t be a problem and my bloodlust is up from my earlier kill.

I believe there is a quote from someone famous that I can’t recall with enough precision to find it on google, but it goes something like, No man goes to war believing they will lose.

I should have kept that in mind. Obviously a secondary fleet was in waiting. Why else would they have attacked with three outclassed ships? Regardless it was too late to think about it now, as the third and fourth Drake warped into our position along with a Blackbird. The Tornado was destroyed easily, and we managed to drive a few other ships off before finally succumbing to the punishment of all those missiles. The Legion fought bravely, I couldn’t have asked more from her. But in the end even her armor wasn’t enough. Oz lasted another minute or so before joining me in the HQ system in a pod.

I didn’t mind losing the Legion, that’s what combat ships are for. I didn’t mind losing the skill points for not ejecting before it detonated. Four days of training again to me isn’t worth the possibility that they could fly my Legion home. One thing that did bother me is the half a billion isk armor repairer module which was unscathed in the attack and I’m sure met with much enthusiasm by it’s new owners.

No I didn’t mind losing. It was a fun battle, and the Legion will be built again and again as need be. But it is important to remember that with every defeat comes a lesson, and it is important to make sure that your emotions after the fight do not prevent you from learning it. Mine was to assess the situation a little more carefully before engaging. In truth we should have pulled out of the system as soon as we saw the probes, but I think we were both having an itchy trigger finger. We should have realized the backup fleet was just outside system though. Even without a scout to think a corp with only three members in relatively weak ships would engage our forces was absurd. I should have seen through their deception as the acting fleet commander. It will not happen again.

R.I.P. ISS Hades’ Scorn. I will avenge you.

Slow Day at the Office

I signed in to find Nuru online and active. I check in at the corp bulletin for the latest news. It’s a quick read, not much has been going on. I upload the latest intelligence to my nav comm and give the system a quick blanket scan to see what it has to offer me this evening.

A Ladar site and two gravs. Nothing too exciting but I know we can at least make some money off of it. I hop into my gas suckling Maller and head to the Ladar site. I’m welcomed by a small fleet of Sleeper frigates and cruisers. Whoops! Looks like someone forgot to clear those out before posting the bookmark.

I short time later my Harbringer has dealt with the Sleepers. Nuru warps in with the Noctis to clean up the mess. I hang around to provide what cover I can. It all goes smoothly though and in less than time than you can shake a probe at I’m back in the cloud harvesting away.

It doesn’t take long for me to get bored, although thankfully this time I stay vigilant on the scanner. I happen to catch a Cheetah as it enters our system before it can activate its cloaking device. I pass the word on to Nuru who I thought was mining in a nearby grav site, only to find him afk at the pos when I warp back to the tower.

I don’t feel safe out there with a peeper watching me, so I grab the Pilgrim and hit the new lo-sec system we’re connected to in search of something to destroy. I spend a few hours jumping around with little to no action. I manage to find a Kestrel on the scanner in one system and narrow him down to a safe spot between two planets, but he decides to log before I am able to find his exactly position.

The only real excitement of the night comes when I warp to a gate on my way back to my home system. The warp bubble collapses just as a Prorator reaches the gate. We both jumped through at approximately the same time. I awaken on the other side of the gate just in time to see him move off and cloak. I burned towards him with drones out in an effort to find him but to no avail. Oh well. I pop a few rats in the lo sec chain and call it an early night.