Rage Mode Engage

In keeping with the theme of yesterday's post, all I can say is Rage Mode engage. I logged in to the docking bay of Gunpoint's base of operations in Egbinger and checked in on our top-sekret unofficially official corp chat channel. I quickly was brought up to speed - the corp was out around Odde having some haphazard fun in frigates.

Thankfully, my Rifter was already sitting on the tarmac, cargo filled with ammo and ready to roll out of the station at a moments notice. I initiated the undocking procedures and slid my Rifter into the appropriate traffic lane and announced my departure to my corpmates already on the hunt. I set the navcomp to destination Oddelulf and made best speed for that system.

Odde is just a handful of jumps away from Egbinger so the trip across the different star systems took mere minutes (thank the Gods for warp drives and stargates). It is easy to take for granted how quickly we can traverse light years now, especially having never known space travel without warp drives and stargates. I digress however.

I arrived in Bosena (a lovely pirate system home to the blood-thirstiest of the blood thirsty yarrbears in Molden Heath) and sat in a pounce several 100km from the Odde gate. Sard and Wensley were already working scanners trying to pinpoint a couple potential targets for our lovely frigate swarm to devour. I sat idle, listening in on comms, when Aria came through announcing (with much glee) that there were a pair of Hulks in neighboring Teon that needed violenced.

Aria asked all pilots in fleet to dock up in a station in Odde where she would distribute ganky Thrashers to purge the Hulks from that asteroid belt in Teon. Destroyers were quickly issued to the fleet, primed already for the ganky love-fest that was about to befall those helpless mining barges. The fleet was split into two wings, the plan simple. 1st Wing would launch its attack while the 2nd wing would hold back to take out the other Hulk, or hunt down a new Hulk in Teon. It only takes a certain number of Thrashers to suicide a hulk before Concord arrives to wipe the system of the gankers, so there was no need to have the entire fleet warp in and destroy the Hulk - it'd be overkill and a waste of a few destroyers.

I was assigned to the 2nd Wing with Wensley leading while Aria and Sard led the 1st Wing into Teon to issue [RANSM]'s brand of great justice to the miners. The 1st Wing made short work of the first Hulk. Naturally, Concord arrived just as the Hulk's structure was giving way and our pilots of 1st Wing flew home in their pods.

By now, 2nd Wing had amassed on the Bosena Gate in Odde, ready to start making our way to Teon via the Odde - Bosena - Teon route. We sat on the Bosena gate and watched our fleet members from 1st Wing jump back into Odde in their pods. It's pretty much the only time seeing so many friendly pods flying around is a righteous occurrence. As the last of 1st Wing's pods came back into Odde, Wensley gave the order to 2nd Wing to jump into Bosena and make for the Teon Gate.

I initiated the jump sequence of my Thrasher and soon was enveloped by the cyno field of the jump gate. Odde vanished and Bosena faded in to existence. Wensley initiated a joint squad warp and all Thrashers of 2nd Wing sped off the gate towards the Teon gate in unison. As our Thrasher wing landed Wensley gave the "jump jump" command, the pilots of 2nd Wing pounced into Teon. We had a scout in a belt already with another Hulk and Wensley gave the order to warp to Masty. Our primary target announced, Cronox Xon was about to become a very disappointed miner.

Our wing of pain landed 10k off our target. Sensor boosted, I engaged my targeting computer, the lock resolved quickly and I engaged my artillery cannons. My shells flew through the belt towards their mark, impacting the shields of Hulk. With the combined force of the wing's artillery cannons, the Hulk's shields quickly gave way. Damage bled through into armor which also quickly gave way to the Hulk's structure.

The Hulk succumbed to the barrage of our artillery in short order. The local comms channel had already lit up with the first volley about our criminal transgressions and Concord was already on the field working through our wing of Thrashers. The plan had been launched, and had succeeded. As my Thrasher gave way to the fury of Concord I launched my Pod back towards lowsec and made best speed back to Odde.

While neither Hulk yielded much in the way of loot, they did provide plenty of lols for us. Much to my delight, the lols (for me atleast) did not end with the destruction of the Hulks. No no my friends, the victim of my Wing's violence found it necessary to hail me through private comms. As my communications interface announced the incoming hail from Cronox Xon I launched my fingers for the accept button.

The private communications window from Cronox Xon's hail popped up on my communications interface, and the tears began to flow. The butthurt was immense with this one. I'll need to edit this entry, as I'm currently not in a position to access my communications logs, but I will post Cronox Xon's brief tear-capades later this evening. Be warned however, his English is broken, or he was really just that upset he couldn't type coherently. I like to think it was the latter rather than the former.

OOC: My action was short and brief last night as I was at home with Kiddos as my wife was working into the evening. Between the Kids' dinners, and the eldest proclaiming his unyielding need to make "pee-pee water", and his proclamation of "poopy's commin' Daddy!" (we started the whole potty training business), I did not really have the freedom to continue on with the fleet and logged for the evening. Nevertheless, it was a most excellent way to come back into the fold & start abusing my sec-status. The fleet continued on however and had a successful evening of spanking more locals as evidenced by the front page of corp Killboard. It is good to be back in the saddle.

New Year. New Rage.

Yes, It's basically been a year since last post. Sorry :( I just haven't felt inspired to write much. Lots went on over the last year. Sard continues to boggle my mind with everything he knows about pvp. Raxip still wants me to hold him. We have some new pilots with us in RANSM now, exceptionally good pilots (great...moar people to make me feel like a lemming).

Aria (sorry deary I don't have your blog link handy) and the Wens-inator (New Eden's favorite Drifter in his Rifter - actually, he doesn't fly these much anymore). Aria is fucking fantastic at everything from 'splosions to sammiches. Wens, well, I haven't had much time flying with him because he came right around my burn-out. He's the fucking Dread Pirate though, so his name speaks for itself.

I've spent the last few weeks contemplating my EVE journey (/me rolls eyes *drama*). I have to admit, I think I got a little burnt out. I've been trying a few different things in game to take a break from what was the norm (mission alt *gasp*), and of course, some other games. I've spent alot of time in the last few weeks playing Armed Assault 2 (fucking awesome milsim for people who are into that stuff), a little bit of FFXIV (since it's currently free to play in it's currently borked form), and I finally picked up Starcraft 2 cause I was just in the mood for an RTS - which is totally out of character for me I usually despise RTS games...cause I suck at them. Starcraft 2 is made of Win though.

I've been getting the itch to go out and roam around Molden Again though, with much less focus on maintaining that sec-status. Months ago, while I was out methodically ratting around Great Wildlands trying to keep my sec status around -2.0, Sard told me he thought I'd just have to accept the flashy status. Literally, "Dude, Vas, I think you're just gonna have to accept your ass going flashy".

I've thought about that ALOT over the last few months and I think he's right. I've become to focused on maintaining my sec-status because it made the most tactical sense. I had become more focused on game mechanics and making sure I was putting myself in the "right" situation at all times, then actually, you know, going out there to blow shit up for fun. My pews had become all business and no fun (queue sad clown face).

So. In short. New Year. New Rage. To hell with the bullshit.


(P.S. Next Year, I predict the theme will be: "Holy Fuck. What the hell have I done to my Sec-status?!?!)

Exequror of Doom

Made my morning.

Sithly Goodness *slurp*

Fuck. Yes.

Video Games | The Force Unleashed II | E3 2010: Exclusive Betrayal Cinematic Trailer HD

XBox 360 | Playstation 3 | Nintendo Wii

Yarr-Pews & Lulz: The Second Coming

Greetings! It's been an incredibly long time since I've really had anything to write about. I've been busy in New Eden, but have not really had much of anything worth taking the time to write about. Until now. Below you will read a little bit about where I am currently with my character's life.

To keep a long story short (as what follows is long enough in it's own right), I decided to take a break from piracy and moved out to experience life in null-sec. It wasn't really what I was expecting. It wasn't really what I enjoyed doing with my time in EVE period. It wasn't for me, atleast not in the environment I found myself in.

What follows is my first real attempt at an in-character post. Forgive me of any quality short comings. Forgive me for piss-poor gramar. Forgive me for the length - it was actually longer, but I managed to cut it down. I hope you enjoy it though. I'm not sure how much in-character writing I'll do moving forward. I'll probably still post battle-reports as just, well, battle-reports. If I'm inspired enough, as I was with this event, I'll certainly be more apt to write about it in person.

So, please, go take a bio. Go have a smoke. Go grab a coke. Then come sit down and read. Again, I do hope you enjoy.

Edit: Jeebus! This is ridiculously long. Sorry. And no I'm not cutting it down anymore then it already is :)

____________________________________________________

Vasavia awoke in her room, dimly lit as the sun broke past the curved crest of Planet 6 in 5C. The air in the room was dry. Stale. She rolled over in bed, fighting with her mind to wake. Fighting to force herself out of bed. As sleep finally subsided, and her mind gained more control of her spirit she arose, flinging the sheets that had provided the barest of warmth through her restless night.

It had been little more then 20 days since arriving to the lawless space of Insmother. Null Sec - cold, heartless, forsaken by CONCORD. It was early in the day. Earlier then when Vasavia normally awoke, but this trend was quickly becoming the norm. In the days since arriving to the "Casablanca" (as it was affectionately called by its residents) Vasavia had slowly started to have second thoughts about her move to Null Sec. No, it was more then just second thoughts. It was outright doubt, doubt that was leading to regret.

The first couple days had been interesting, indeed. A new environment, a new home, a new way of life all together. She had known before making the move to 0.0 that things would be drastically different out in the lawless space of Null Sec. However, after a few days of exploring her new environment and making observations of this new world Vasavia started having trouble sleeping. She began to wake up with more unease about her new home. She began to miss her former life.

Rolling out of bed, Vasavia worked her way to her desk sitting across the room. Bringing the terminal to life, she browsed the updated media reports about the current capsuleer conflict in 49-. As she read the latest combat reports coming out of that system, her mind began to unfocus from the words her eyes were scanning over. She was completely lost in her memories of low-sec, memories of the Molden Heath & Metropolis regions. These areas were the grounds from which she truly grew into who she was. These areas, and the actions that she had been apart of, were what defined her.

Memories of her Frigates screaming into a belt, asteroids roaring past her ship just mere meters as she would come blasting out of the warp tunnel into the belt. An unsuspecting target sitting in that belt, ratting, salvaging or sometimes mining. Vasavia was missing that hunt. Missing the exhilaration of frigate combat. Missing the satisfaction that came from piracy.

She missed the comradere that she had enjoyed with other pirates she had met throughout her career as a pirate. She missed the Yarr. She missed the "lulz". She missed the moments of laughing at each other when an engagement went wrong, when she missed a tackle that should have been hers. She missed that those moments...were okay thanks to their comic value. A stark contrast to the current reality in this new environment that she had found herself in.

The annoying ring of an incoming eve-mail broke her mind away from those fond memories and back to the reality of where she was. Vasavia sighed. Refocused on the "now", she opened the alliance mail that had just arrived, taking note of the other neglected mails she had been avoiding reading. Beginning from the oldest unread mail and working her way up the list to the newest arrival, she began taking mental notes on the items she needed to catch up on, and those tasks she would need to try to get ahead-of.

Vasavia had noticed that the tension coming across in the eve-mails from the Alliance-mates, as well as those coming from her own corp-mates, had started to increase. With this increase, her patience for her new existence began to dwindle. Half-way through the remaining unread messages Vasavia jumped up from her seat at the desk, flicking the terminal off.

"I can't do this anymore, this isn't who I am", she whispered to herself.

She glanced around her room, sizing up the things she needed to get organized. Clothes, personal weapons, datapad, comm-link. Vasavia hadn't spent enough time in her new home in 5C long enough to really accumulate much in the way of personal possessions.

Twenty minutes and I can be gone, with little evidence that I was ever even here, she thought to herself.

Her corporate-assigned Maintenance Chief would have already been up and on duty for the last 2 hours. Vasavia quickly walked back over to her bed-side, her eyes fixed on the comm-link resting quietly on her nightstand. She grabed the comm-link and reached out to her Chief. The Chief answered, uncaring, almost as if he was bothered by this interruption in his workday,

"Yes...?", he answered.

"I want all my ships repackaged and ready for transport, save for the 3 Rifters. Leave them in the hanger as they are," Vasavia commanded.

"...," the silence from the Chief could only mean one thing - suspicion.

"Relax Chief, in my enthusiasm for my new assignment out here I over extended on my funds when purchasing new ships to build up my hanger. I simply do not have the funds to support what I have in station. I'll better serve the alliance for the time being by liquidating the more, extravagant ships in the line, and reinvesting in some cheap tackles. I've taking a disturbing note of the lack of tackle-pilots we have had during defensive engagements anyway. We need a dedicated tackler, and that's my specialty," was the justification put forward by Vasavia.

"Makes good sense, Vas. I'll make the arrangements and have everything, excluding the Rifters, repackaged and placed on the regional market," was the Chief's reply.

Vasavia grinned. She had learned through her time as a pirate one had to be quick with the lock, quick with the trigger, and even faster with their mouth to survive in the world of New Eden. Within a matter of just a few seconds she had moved the Chief from high suspicion, to utter and complete acceptance of her Will. None-capsuleers could be such fun putty to play with.

"Oh, and Chief, I need to make a quick run to pick up some skill books. I don't want to risk any of the Frigates for such a task. Please ready my Pod. I'll go out in that," Vasavia requested.

"Roger that, Vas", the Chief confirmed.

And with that their communication ended. Vasavia quickly threw on her clothes and grabbed what little personal gear she had tucked away in her storage locker at the foot of her bed. She quickly walked back to her desk, and slid into the chair. The terminal sprang back to life. There were only two things left to do.

Vasavia brought up her contacts list, skimming down the list until she found who she was looking for. Her eve-mail to the recipient was simple:

"Sardie-Poo,

I'm returning. Application is in the mail.

PS - You are showing stubble on your scalp. Get your shit shaved up."

Next, Vasavia made contact with a Clone Specialist in a sparsely populated Station located in Teon. The station, while not ideal for Clone activation, did have limited Clone storage and animation capabilities. Vasavia had previously made arrangements to have clone placed there in the event she needed to make a quick return to Molden Heath. Even though this station lacked the more sophisticated Cloning technologies, it was perfect for her. She could quietly reanimate, and make her way into Molden Heath low-sec with ease from this location. The downside, of course, cloning here would put her pirate-flashy ass in high security space.

Flicking her terminal off one last time, Vasavia jumped up from her desk chair. The force from her sudden movement slammed the metallic chair hard into the wall. It bounced off and rolled towards the center of her room. By the time it's roll came to stop Vasavia was already out of the room, down the corridor and around the corner.

The ride down to the hanger of the station was more exhilarating then when she first arrived to her new home in 5C. It was the same exhilaration she had felt when she first truly realized her calling in the world of New Eden was a calling to Piracy. It was the same exhilaration she found in combat, the same exhilaration she got from the unpredictability of a ransom, the same exhilaration she got being chased by hostiles and CONCORD. Again, the memories she had of these acts of piracy came flooding back as the lift she was in descended deeper into the outpost on its path to the hanger. Chills of excitement raced up her spine.

The lift stopped with its usual sudden halt. It's doors slid effortlessly open. Vasavia, snapped back to reality, stepped out of the lift with more energy and vitality then she'd had the last couple weeks. Powerful, confident strides that had been absent from her recently had now returned - fueled by the anticipation of her return to her true identity in this world. Vasavia moved down the long corridors to the hanger entrance. As she drew closer the sounds of the hanger grew more audible. It was obvious, today was a busy day in the outpost.

Entering the hanger, Vasavia made her way quickly towards her line of ships. Her maintenance crew was already well into the repackaging process, prepping her ships for resale on the local market as she had instructed the Chief to have done. Vasavia looked towards the undocking lanes and admired the chorus of Battlecruisers and Battleships coming and going in the station. Interceptors and Frigates weaved their way through the slower traffic. Her Pod, her coffin, her vessel back to her life idled just down the catwalk. The Crew Chief came up behind her.

"Pod's ready, Vas. I noticed a couple issues with the propulsion modules on one of the Rifters. I have my best guy working a diagnostic on the propulsion systems now.", the Chief reported as if business was usual.

Vasavia looked at him over her shoulder as she turned to face him, "Very good, Chief." She extended her hand.

He gave the slightest of winks, as if knowing what was truly going on, "We'll make sure everything is in order, Capsuleer. I'll over look the sale of assets personally and see to it that funds are transferred to you immediately".

Caught of guard slightly by the exchange Vasavia could only give a small, friendly smile, "Very good, Chief. Very good indeed."

She turned back towards her Pod and made her way down the catwalk. When she reached the Pod she opened the small personal storage compartment and slid her flight bag in containing those few personal items she had packed from her room. She climb into the Pod and sealed herself inside. Running through the checklist all the Pod's essential systems were in order. The propulsion systems came to life, the navigation computer was brought up, but no destination set. Vasavia contacted the outpost's traffic control and requested permission to undock and join the exit lane traffic pattern.

"Pod Vasavia, initiate undock procedures and join traffic pattern in Taxi 01-B, continue taxi to Lane 01, contact Casablanca Tower for final launch approval.", came the request from the Traffic Control Officer.

"Casablanca Traffic, Pod Vasavia. Good copy taxi 01-B to Lane 01.", Vasavia returned.

Vasavia disconnected the lines feeding the fuel cells of the Pod, and disconnected the power lines supplying power to the Pod while in dock. Next, the docking clamps that kept her tiny Pod attached to the catwalk she had just walked down unlocked their claw like grip on her Pod. The Pod hovered on the same plane, and drifted just a few meters out on its own. The catwalk retracted and Vasavia initiated a slow turn, pointing her Pod towards her assigned taxi lane.

The Pod joined the taxi traffic puttering along towards the main launch lane in use. Vasavia, looking through the Pod's camera monitors, watched the busy Capsuleers and crews of the station going about their daily routines. She watched the larger traffic cruising into the station via the Docking Lanes. Before long, she heard the buzz from her navigational computer telling her the entry into Launch Lane 01 was coming up. Vasavia got on Comms with the launch control tower:

"Casablanca Launch Tower. Pod Vasavia. Permission to take Lane 01 for departure straight out.", she requested.

The tower's controller came back over comms, "Pod Vasavia. Lane is clear. Cleared to take Departure Lane 01. Fly safe."

"Casablanca Tower, Pod Vasavia. Copy, taking Lane 01. Depart straight out Lane 01.", was her call back to the Tower.

Pfft. Fly-safe., Vasavia thought to herself as she maneuvered her Pod into the departure lane.

I can't wait to get back to flying reckless., she thought.

Her Pod now aligned straight down Lane 01, and any traffic ahead well distanced from her heading & course, Vasavia punched the throttle forward and her Pod instantly accelerated to it's max propulsion. The stations walls surrounding Departure Lane 01 sped by in a solid stream of lights and metallic surfaces. Their finer detailed blurred by speed. In a matter of seconds her Pod burst out the departure lane opening on the face of the station. The station quickly fell behind her. Vasavia quickly brought up her list of "bookmarks" in her navigational computer.

Browsing down the list for System 5C-, Vasavia selected the "Tactical Undock" bookmark for the station she had just launched from. The warp-drive of her Pod almost instantaneously spooled up to full force, throwing her egg-shaped vessel into warp. Her Pod burst away from the station even further. Within a matter of just a couple seconds, the Pod's warp-drive cut out and her Pod slowed to a complete stop. There she idled over 250k out from the station. Vasavia turned the cameras towards the station and watched the monitor. From this distance the "Casablanca" and the Capsuleer traffic buzzing around it looked beautiful.

Vasavia pressed herself back into her seat more, reclining into a restful position for the next phase of her journey back to her former life. She thought about her current body, this shell that had been brought to life months before now, months before even entertaining the thought of moving to Null Sec. She had been through a lot in this body. She felt a little remorse for how the journey would end for this clone.

Turning her attention down towards the various control panels of her Pod, she turned her eyes towards the Pod's life support systems. With a few quick movements of her fingers the Self-Destruct sequence for the Pod was initiated. The soothing, calming sound of Aura's voice - that wonderful A.I. Diva all Capsuleers become acquainted with - reported the count-down:

"This Pod will self-destruct in 2 minutes...", Aura reported.

Vasavia closed her eyes.

"...1 minute 30 seconds until...", Aura returned.

Vasavia opened her eyes and fixed her gaze towards the station again.

"...1 minute remaining until...", Aura updated.

Vasavia started to drift back to those fond memories of her former life as a pirate. She grinned.

"...45 seconds remaining until...", Aura persisted.

Eagerness and Anticipation began to build up inside of Vasavia, so much anticipation she felt like she could literally burst this Pod apart herself.

"...15 seconds remaining until...", Aura called.

Vasavia closed her eyes, held her breath, and pressed her head back against her seat.

Within an instant Vasavia's Pod burst apart into hundreds of shards of metal and thousands of pieces of components. The explosion would not even be visible to the traffic below flying around the "Casablanca". However, one thing would be noticed by all those pilots. Vasavia's frozen corpse, idly suspended in the coldness of space, would now be listed on the other ships' overviews. Perhaps someone would come and clean up the mess, perhaps someone would try to reprocess her corpse in hopes of finding salvagable implants. It didn't really matter either way.

On the otherside of New Eden, Vasavia was waking in a new body. Reanimated. Reborn. She would soon find herself back in Molden Heath, claiming back her true identity. She, again, would be flying reckless.

The Skies of Fire

Well, maybe not fire. After all, we are in space. No oxygen = no fires.

'nough Science. Unless you have been under a rock, you'd be aware that the wonderful excitement of the EVE Alliance Tournament starts this weekend. This 3 weekend romp-fest of pew-pew and boom-booms begins this Saturday. First two weekends being qualifying weekends, the third and final (read finale) weekend culminating in some exciting battles between alliances.

I followed last years tournament through Eve Radio while I got my EVE playtime in. EVE radio, along with Splint Infinity Radio, and New Eden Radio will all have live commentary streaming over the Internet during the showdowns starting with this weekends qualifying matches all the way through to the last battle of the finals. This year's alliance tournament finals (9/19 & 9/20) will also be streaming live over the Internet in HD - a new feature for this year's tournament.

If you've followed my blog at all, you'll know that as a member of Gunpoint Diplomacy I'm also apart of Rote Kapelle Alliance. Rote Kapelle is going to get in on this year's tournament. While I wont be battling it out (not sure my Rifters would be of that much use :) ) I'll be cheering on our capsuleers as they hurl virtual booms and pews in our first match-up this Sunday (9/6) @ 16:00 GMT. Best of luck to our tournament pilots! Be sure to check out the Alliance Tournament VII schedule for a heads-up on the upcoming pew-fests. Also, here's a fun trailer for the tournament. Perhaps we'll have another assassination in this years festivities!

In Gunpoint Diplomacy news, things have been relatively quite lately actually. Sard is taking a break from New Eden as RL has gotten pretty busy for him recently. Raxip as well has been pretty busy himself lately and his online pew-pew time has been cut down alittle as well. I myself, have been spending a great amount of time making some iskies for Vasavia with my alts.

Vasavia is getting close to being proficient at flying Gallente cruisers, having spent a great deal of time working on her crappy Drone skills, and medium hybrid gunnery skills. Being that cruisers take more iskies to purchase, and more iskies to fit correctly then my beloved frigates I needed to spend some time earning some cash for her personal coffers.

Oh yeah, Vasavia finally pulled off a ransom a few weeks back. Quick little 10 million. She's not had any luck pulling one off since then, though there have been a few attempts. She's either been laughed at (which naturally brings about the obligatory podding of the victim), and in one instance the victim was AFK (while his ship was sitting at zero at a planet). Face-palm.

Oh yeah, and Nursultan, thanks for the follow man. Bet you thought I wouldn't notice you, you sneaky pirate.

Shore Leave Successful!

Hello readers! First, I apologize for such a long period of time between my last update and now. It's really quite ridiculous isn't it? At the end of June, about the time of my last update, I took my wife and out young son (turns 1 today!) on vacation to Hilton Head Island. If you've never been, and you have the opportunity and means to go, I highly recommend this location. Hilton Head has got to be the most beautiful place I've seen. It's humid and hotter then hell during the summer months though - so be prepared. It's well worth it.

Another thing is, well I just haven't had much to write about. I've begun to feel like all my tails of combat are beginning to sound all too much alike, and I've just not experienced any action that I'd say was unique enough to write about. I mean, really. How many accounts of Vasavia pew-pewed this or that is really going to keep readers interested? My updates will probably be farther between then they have been, although I'm hoping not as far apart as this one has been from the last update.

As I said, not much unique things have happened over the last month. I've acquired some nice solo kills against other frigs over the last month. I've been with Gunpoint now for a few weeks as well and I'm really starting to get comfortable with the little gang of villainy-pirates. Right before I joined with Sard and the gang, Gunpoint rejoined a former alliance. Rote Kapelle. I'm also getting more comfortable with the alliance. I've been on a couple alliance roams and everyone I've flown with seems to be light years ahead of me in regards to combat. That's to be expected though. Suffice it to say, I'm very happy with my change in employ in New Eden.

I've yet to pull off any ransoms. "What!?! A pirate without ransoms in no pirate at all!", you say? Well, you're probably right I suppose. It's not so much that I wouldn't like to ransom some poor capsuleer that I just separated from their ship. The right opportunity just hasn't presented itself. Most of the time, in the systems I've achieved my kills in, there just isn't enough time to deal with the negotiation of ransoming. It may only take 30-60 seconds to strike a ransom agreement, but as any experienced capsuleer will tell you sitting in a belt for that amount of time is a huge window of opportunity for another pirate or capsuleer to come in and ruin everything for you. So, I've popped a shipped, and I'll warp out because there's just too much activity in the system to loiter and make myself an easy, already damaged target.

In other developments, I finally finished training up for Assault Ships. It's nice to fly something that handles and looks just like my beloved Rifters, but packs more punch and tank then the fragile frig. The downside, of course, is cost. Jags and Wolfs are considerably more expensive then Rifters. Especially after buying and fitting the modules. Since getting into the Assault Ships I've lost a few wolfs, and have a single Jag in my hanger now. I don't take the Assault Ship out as much as I do the Rifters though - my attempt to minimize the chance of loosing an expensive ship.

Yesterday, I took the Jag out for a stroll though. I undocked from the station, and the first thing I see is silly Raxip's frozen corpse floating right outside our home station. How embarrassing (facepalm). I approached Raxips frozen corpse and scooped it up into my cargo bay, and immediately turned back towards our station to dock up and put his corpse in my Frozen Corpse Storage collection (the official Piratey Trophy Room). Seems his former clone had had a rough day.

After docking back up in the station and having the hanger crews unload Raxip's frozen corpse from the cargo hold of my Jaguar, I set out for a short quick roam around Molden Heath. I went through the typical hunting grounds: Aedald, Heild, Bosena, Odde, into Istodard, through Half and even as far as Sakulda. Nothing. Not a single thing worth pew-pewing. Disgruntled, I set destination for home. It was getting late and I needed to hit the ruck-sack.

I quickly traversed back through Half, Istodard, Odde and landed in Bosena. I hit the scan button on my directional scanner - this was Bosena after all, and the traffic is always changing in this system. Since I'd been in Bos last there could be new potential victi...err targets. The scanner swept the space in front my Jag. I sat idly in front a jump gate still under the jump cloak from when I entered the system. The scanner returned a hit on a Rifter, not far from my location. Much to my pleasure, the Rifter was in an asteroid belt. I commanded my Jag to leap to the asteroid belt. She sprang into action, quickly reaching optimum velocity for the warp drive to engage. I hurled through space towards the asteroid belt, watching the scanner to see if the Rifter dropped off - a que that he had moved out of the belt on to some other location.

My Jaguar burst out of its warp tunnel into the asteroid belt. The Rifter, my prey, appeared on my hud's overview readouts. I exited warp and landed under 2,000 meters away from the frigate. Perfect range. I activated my warp scrambler and webber, followed immediately by my Auto cannons and rocket launcher. I set my orbiting range and activated my afterburner to get my speed up. I sat back and watched as my auto cannons span and my rocket launcher hurled their projectiles of death towards the fragile frigate I had pounced on. The Rifter immediately took heavy shield damage, and I could tell from the readouts I was getting from the targeting computer that the Rifter pilot was desperately trying to heal his frigate's shields with a shield booster.

He must have realized quickly, that it was all in vane though. I was astonished to see the capsuleer eject his pod manually, rather then waiting for it to eject automatically as all ships do once the final bit of hull integrity succumbs to an onslaught. I hesitated for a brief moment. Amazed at this occurrence. I'd not encountered a capsuleer who would do this. All my foes had fought bravely to the end. This capsuleer didn't even fight back. He didn't even try and lock my Jaguar. I brought my mind back into focus and tried to lock the pod. However, the brief pause in my consciousness allowed the former Rifter pilot to get his pod into warp and out of the belt to the safety of...anywhere else.

I shrugged. I allowed my Assault Frigate to continue it's death-dealing on the now pilot-less Rifter. It quickly caved with no one to run it's defensive modules. The hull gave out and I immediately was greeted by a "free" killmail. Just as the Rifter exploded, my scanners screamed about the presence of a new ship in the belt. Another Jaguar. I didn't waste anytime investigating the wreckage of the former Rifter. Immediately, I set course for a safe spot. Then I realized, the other Jaguar that had entered the belt was sitting a far 230K away from my location in the belt.

My ship leaped into warp and I waited out my GCC in Bosena in a safe spot. After my criminal flag dropped I set destination for home. I arrived without any further incidents. Having docked up, I asked the maintenance crew to prep the vessel for the next day's action.

While shore leave is nice, it's always great to strap back into the pod and head out for the unknown pew-pew.