Starwalker had been in two very close fights recently, fights that had ended with both combatants in deep structure. Most interesting had been the fight with a Thrasher, which as a Minmatar destroyer was designed to kill frigates.
The Thrasher had first been spotted near the Sun in Covryn and Starwalker had arrived there in an especially fit Breacher (tracking disruptor) to take it on. However, it was around 100km away and as the Breacher moved closer it simply warped away. So, disappointed, Starwalker returned to base and undocked in a Tristan instead to head out for a roam.
Jumping through to Iges and scanning from the gate nothing interesting appeared on scan but the same Thrasher pilot from earlier arrived in system. Starwalker warped to the sun at 100km and started to scan from the sun. He did not expect the Thrasher to arrive at the sun but was prepared just in case, then it suddenly appeared at close range.
Starwalker immediately went into action with lock, scram and web. The default orbit range was set to around 4km and from the incoming damage it was clear that the Thrasher was auto-cannon fitted. Starwalker increased the range as both ships tried to get the kill.
The damage dropped as Starwalker increased range to around 7.5km but it was still hurting badly and soon the Tristan was on fire. But the good news was that the Thrasher shields had gone and the race was on to see who would die first. Starwalker knew that he could have escaped as he had complete range control but he also wanted the kill.
It was very close as the ships slugged it out with the Tristan now reliant on its small ancillary armour repairer to work at 70% efficiency. It was going down to the wire as the Thrasher was trailing flames too. Starwalker's Tristan had just 3% structure left when the Thrasher exploded into a glorious fireball of destruction.
The fight had been incredibly close and there was no way to be sure when it was in progress who would win. Starwalker knew that it could have gone either way but he was very pleased to have got the kill. Killing a destroyer in a T1 frigate was always an unexpected pleasure.
Starwalker had a penchant for brawling frigates and liked to roam in low security space. The engagement envelope was somewhat limited - generally other brawling frigates. It was possible to catch bigger prey in a frigate such as a battleship but that was a rarity. Similarly, generally avoiding point range kiters (Slicer, Condor...) was advisable unless they could be caught such as at a warp-in point.
Usually Starwalker avoided the Griffin on the basis that being jammed permanently throughout a fight was no fun. However, drones changed the equation significantly because they would continue to fight irrespective of whether their mother ship was jammed. This became important when Starwalker's Tristan entered a complex and chased the Incursus that was there.
Within seconds of the fight starting a Griffin entered and Starwalker quickly locked it up and sent the drones after it - just before he was jammed. Luckily he had been fast enough, the drones were doing their work on the Griffin and Starwalker concentrated on trying to get out of range of the Incursus.
The drones were destroying the Griffin and for some reason it decided to stay and die rather than run, probably to help the Incursus get the kill but it did not work. The Griffin went down and with targeting restored the Tristan's blasters and drones went back to work on the Incursus. The Incursus exploded and the 2v1 was over.
Starwalker had been helped by the fact that the duo were newer players but what was satisfying was that tactically he had reacted quickly and with the right response. He had seen that the greatest danger was from the Griffin and that it needed to be neutralised immediately, he had then tried to keep as much range as possible from the Incursus to reduce the blaster damage.
Whilst drones could be easily destroyed the benefit of drones was that they:
- Would be able to continue to fight even if the mother ship was jammed
- Would operate over a significant range from the mother ship, in particular against point range kiters
- Some point range kiters would fit their ship to achieve a speed of well over 4km/s to outrun the Hobgoblin IIs
- Warrior IIs had lower damage but were significantly faster and could catch most point range kiters. Consequently, Starwalker carried 5 x Hobgoblin IIs and 3 x Warrior IIs
Starwalker fitted his Tristan for scram range fighting as when he ran into a kiting (MWD) Tristan fighting at point range he simply destroyed the drones. A few times now he had effectively chased off a Tristan because its offensive capability had been destroyed. Whilst those fights had not resulted in destroying the kiting Tristan the more important point was that Starwalker's brawler frigate had not been destroyed.
Starwalker spotted a Tristan at a medium complex and warped in with this Merlin. He had void ammunition loaded even with the tracking penalty, as he expected the Tristan to be webbed and easily hit. Normally he used Caldari Navy antimatter but he wanted to try this heavier hitting ammunition this time.
The Tristan applied its neutralisers and Starwalker realised immediately that void consumed more capacitor resource and so the capacitor would stop sooner. He hoped that he could kill the Tristan before his capacitor ran dry. The Merlin blasted away and the Tristan was soon in structure but then the power of the neutralisers made themselves felt.
The Merlin's capacitor was finished and everything else stopped when it stopped, the web and point dropped, the ship came to a halt and the blasters stopped blasting. One or two more hits and it would have been all over but without any capacitor all the Merlin could do was wait for its destruction and eventually it exploded.
Starwalker was a little surprised to have lost to the Tristan at point blank range but he suspected that using orbit with the void ammunition might have played a part. So he checked the logs and could see that most of his shots were either grazes or glances, despite having the web applied to the Tristan. The hit quality was so poor that very little damage was being applied.
The problem was with the tracking of his neutron blasters and he had inadvertently exacerbated the issue by using orbit rather than keep at range. Orbit had the effect of increasing the angular velocity and reducing the incoming damage but it also had the effect of reducing the outgoing damage. He should have used keep at range, which minimised the angular velocity and so would increase both the incoming and outgoing damage.
Close range blaster fits would thrive in that type of brawl and Starwalker needed to maximise his blaster damage, especially when his ship was being neuted. He compared the tracking of neutron blasters with the two key close range ammunition types:
- With Caldari Navy Antimatter ammunition the neutron blasters tracked at 0.47475 radians per second
- With Void ammunition the neutron blasters tracked at 0.35606 radians per second
It was with some dismay that he realised that he should have checked those figures earlier as when he had practiced some manual piloting with Brink Albosa he had recorded some average angular velocity figures. His afterburner fit Merlin had sparred with Brink's afterburner fit Rifter:
- Both ships orbiting between 0.5km and 1km had averaged an angular velocity of around 0.5 to 0.55 radians per second with a range from 0.44 to 0.66
- Merlin using keep at range and Rifter orbiting had averaged around 0.4 radians per second with a range from 0.35 to 0.46
- Merlin using keep at range with the afterburner turned off reduced the angular velocity to around 0.35 radians per second with a range from 0.3 to 0.4
In short, assuming that range control was not an issue, he should turn off his afterburner and use keep at range to maximise his damage output. As luck would have it Starwalker ran into the same pilot, archillae, again in a Tristan and he had the chance to try out the new tactic. It worked like a charm and the Tristan was a burning hunk of metal very quickly.
Starwalker had been enjoying the success of his Caldari Navy Hookbill in his recent engagements. It was bound to end at some point and it was with a little bit of over-confidence that he engaged an Algos at the sun. He had expected to simply burn through the Algos tank before the drones could break his shield. That was not the case and his fine Hookbill became a heap of space junk. For the next Algos fight Starwalker rectified that mistake and went for the drones first but in killing the drones he lost the scramble. So Nathan Irythia escaped with his ship but not his drones.
Starwalker undocked at the helm of a nice Hawk, which was a bit slow in comparison to the Hookbill but it was still a good ship. He spied a Federation Navy Comet at a complex and warped in. The fight started as expected, the Comet was being murdered by the Hawk but then an Incursus arrived and the Comet started to pull range. The Incursus fired on the Hawk. Starwalker suspected that they were cooperating and then noticed that they were both part of the B O R G. The Comet left the fight in deep armour and the Hawk started firing at the Incursus instead but it was easily tanking the damage.
The Comet came back along with a Dramiel and the fight had just turned decisively against Starwalker. He realised too late that tactically he should have moved from the warp-in point as he had made their job much easier. With three frigates in close proximity pounding on the Hawk it was not long before it too became an inert lump of metal and joined its maker.
Back at base Starwalker undocked in another Hookbill and took to the space lanes again. An Atron in a small complex was looking for a fight and surprisingly had the idea of taking on the Hookbill. He started 40km away but edged his way closer feeling out the range. At first Starwalker suspected a kiting fit because he deliberately stayed out of scramble range but then he seemed to change his mind and moved into an orbit of around 8km
This was an opportunity too good to miss and the Atron soon regretted coming in so close as the rockets tore through its structure. Starwalker moved on and spied a Rifter and Tristan together in a medium complex. He decided to engage and as he warped to the gate the two T1 frigates were waiting together for the fight.
Starwalker obliged and went for the Rifter as the closest ship and before long the Rifter was in armour and trying to disengage - it was soon out of scramble range and carried on to go about 30km away. The incoming damage was low and so Starwalker turned his attention to fight the Tristan and before long it too was in deep armour. For some unknown reason the Rifter decided to come back and help his fleet mate but as he got to within 10km the Tristan exploded. The Rifter turned around to run away but Starwalker overheated his web and afterburner and the Rifter died in an explosion shortly after the Tristan.
Starwalker had engaged in a 1 v 2 fight and won, he was very happy with the result even though it was not really a tough fight.
New Eden gives and takes away. On any single day Starwalker has no idea whether it will be filled with good fights, easy kills, losses or long fruitless hunts. He had set out in Caldari Navy Hookbill confident that this ship had good range control capability by virtue of its speed and web.
[Caldari Navy Hookbill, Double MSE]
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Micro Auxiliary Power Core II
Medium Shield Extender II
Medium Shield Extender II
1MN Afterburner II
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
X5 Prototype Engine Enervator
Rocket Launcher II,Scourge Rage Rocket
Rocket Launcher II,Scourge Rage Rocket
Rocket Launcher II,Scourge Rage Rocket
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Bay Loading Accelerator I
Small Core Defense Field Extender I
Starwalker had also elected to fit this ship with a double medium shield extender. Normally he opted for gank over tank but he was feeling in an experimental mood and wanted to try it out. This cyno-ship was hardly a test but it did show that the tank was very capable against the sentry fire. The Vengeance spotted in a complex would be more of a test and Starwalker decided to engage.
The Hookbill established range of around 7km and hammered away with its rockets but quite frankly the Vengeance seemed to be tanking the damage fine. Starwalker was considering whether to leave when a Talwar jumped in and immediately targeted his Hookbill. It was time to leave.
Starwalker aligned to the sun and overheated his afterburner but instead of gaining range he ended up moving closer to the Vengeance. He had not actually checked their relative positions first and this mistake allowed the Talwar time to establish a secondary point. The Hookbill's rockets were redirected to the Talwar but it was a futile attempt to take one down with him and the Hookbill exploded.
A short while later Starwalker was out in his Tristan and killed yet another cyno-ship.
[Tristan, 200mm SAAR]
Damage Control II
200mm Reinforced Steel Plates II
1MN Afterburner II
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
X5 Prototype Engine Enervator
Light Neutron Blaster II,Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
Light Neutron Blaster II,Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
Small Ancillary Current Router I
Small Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Small Trimark Armor Pump I
Hobgoblin II x5
Warrior II x3
He had elected to redefine this build with more tank on the basis that it was too slow to establish range control. Therefore the intent was to tank the incoming damage whilst the drones did their work. The Merlin on scan at the complex would be a tough customer but Starwalker warped in anyway. The Merlin simply tore through his shields and overwhelmed the small ancillary armour repairer. The Tristan tried to gain some range but failed and it was wrecked by sheer firepower overcoming the tank, even with a T2 200mm plate providing some buffer.
Undeterred, Starwalker undocked in his Hawk, which also sported a heavier tank than usual with an MSE and medium ancillary shield booster. He found this Algos - ratting, which was the first ship he had found and caught ratting in a long time. Finally, he decided to return to base and just as he was about to dock he noticed a Navitas on scan at the medium complex, it was perhaps the same Navitas that he had chased earlier and had taunted him in local.
Whilst Starwalker had ignored the taunts then he had remembered the pilot's name and when he warped in it was indeed the same pilot. The Hawk landed on top of the Navitas and it was destroyed very quickly - it wasn't even fitted with any modules. The pilot, Laila Vemane, cried "noooo" in local and Starwalker smiled to himself.
Starwalker was cruising around in his Tristan and whilst he had aspirations to change the fit for something faster he had not done so yet. He spied a Tormentor in a complex and decided that it was fair game. It was not long before he was on grid and engaged.
The sequence of engagement was still a little haphazard, after all this time, because Starwalker was still trying to optimise the first few seconds when warping into the complex. In short, Starwalker often seemed to give commands too early or too fast and some of them got lost. He had also varied his approach from mainly clicking to using shortcut keys and clicking to then back to clicking.
The engagement started immediately as the Tormentor was simply waiting and his trap had been sprung. A Griffin arrived on grid and before long the Tristan was jammed and then destroyed. Afterwards Starwalker realised that he had wasted a few precious seconds, he should have targeted the Griffin immediately and set his drones on it. The DPS was coming from the Tormentor but the Griffin simply stopped the fight. The advantage with drones was that they would continue to attack the Griffin even if the lock was lost.
The Tristan loss was soon followed by the loss of a Merlin during a fleet fight after a long roam. It was an EVE battle where the Rebels had brought knives (T1 frigates) but the opposing fleet brought guns (T2 frigates, cruisers and battle cruisers). Given that the Rebels didn't even have an advantage in numbers it was inevitable that their little T1 frigates would become the focus of a turkey shoot. The only compensation was that this Rupture, which was first on the scene, was destroyed.
Starwalker headed back to base in his pod. He didn't mind the loss of his ship that was the nature of the beast - fortune favoured the brave, sometimes. More importantly, he now had to consider what ship to fly next as he had no other ships in station.
So he decided to bring in to Gultratren a couple of Caldari Navy Hookbills. He had flown them before and liked them but he was also wondering if a ~1.2km/s frigate had a better chance of catching a kiter than a ~1km/s frigate. A Kestrel on scan seemed the perfect opportunity to see what would happen, except it was brawling fit.
Whilst that was a surprise, Starwalker did not hesistate to send the Kestrel to the afterlife and he would have done the same for the pilot except he got away. Maybe next time he would see if the Hookbill could slingshot a kiter into range.
Starwalker contemplated his flight time and was disappointed that he had spent so much time in dock. But from time to time he had to be docked to replenish his ISK, Starwalker enjoyed his lifestyle but it did not pay for itself. Recently, he had spent very little time in space and he was missing the opportunities to get into trouble in New Eden.
However, he now had the opportunity and without hesitation he undocked in his Tristan. He had considered changing his fit or flying a different ship but when he was docked all such plans were on hold. The Tristan was still a good ship and the fit was fine, so he scanned local looking for targets and noticed a Rifter, just as his communication channel signaled a Rebel fleet had been formed and were out and about only 13 jumps away.
That was an opportunity too good to miss. He would rendezvous with them but first things first, where was that Rifter - there was some killing to be done. It was at a complex and as Starwalker warped in the Rifter was ready for combat and immediately engaged. Starwalker was a little slow getting his drones out and before long he had his small armour repairer overheated as the Rifter pounded on the Tristan's hull with its autocannons.
The DPS race was truly on as the Rifter orbited at around 1km and the Tristan was dipping into structure. But the drones and the blasters were also wrecking havoc on the Rifter's shields and once they were gone the Rifter rapidly became a wreck. Starwalker exchanged a GF, scooped the loot, repaired the structural damage and joined up with the Rebels.
The fleet headed off with Peri Simone as the fleet commander and with Kane the Black and Groggolog acting as scouts. The fleet had the usual fun and games looking for targets, chasing ships around and waiting at the sun as an open invitation. Finally in Amamake the fleet engaged another small fleet and after killing a Daredevil and Osprey they bugged out.
It had been a good night, a solo kill and a couple of fleet kills. Starwalker headed back to dock happy with the roam. Back in station he sighed as he took off his Black Jacket, he had returned to dock and didn't know when he would be able to undock again. There was still so much he wanted to do and he had so little time in space - it was truly disappointing.
Starwalker was roaming around in his Tristan and saw four T1 frigates in a medium complex and immediately recognised Semirande as he had only recently destroyed his Atron. The default assumption was that all four frigates were together and a quick check of local revealed a number of people in the same corporation as Semirande.
Starwalker thought it was very unlikely that he could take on four frigates at once but he also wondered if the four were perhaps actually doing the complex and if so there was a chance to engage just one or two. It would be a risky choice to go in as it was equally possible that they wanted to catch something entering the complex. Indeed retrospectively he saw that they had killed a Thorax only 15 minutes before.
Whether it was courage or stupidity Starwalker decided to give it a try - no guts no glory. He warped into the complex and was met by all four frigates as he entered, they were waiting for the chance to pounce. Starwalker went for the nearest ship, the Rifter, and launched his drones. However, momentum changed the relative positions and it ended up 7km away with the Merlin and Republic Fleet Firetail being closer.
The majority of damage was from the drones but this early targeting had the effect of splitting the Tristan firepower because the blasters were out of range. Worse, the drones did not all go after the Rifter and the log showed that they seemed to split their attention between the Rifter and Firetail. Normally Starwalker set the drones to focus fire to concentrate their fire but perhaps Starwalker had switched to the closer Merlin and Firetail.
In any case, the Tristan was taking a lot of damage and was not doing enough damage in return. Given that, it was inevitable that the Tristan would succumb quickly and it did so. There was an Incursus there as well but that must have been out of range when Starwalker arrived as only the other three frigates were on the killmail.
When Starwalker reconsidered the fight he realised that he should have thought about the fight before entering the complex. To decide what he would do if they were waiting for him. Given this was a trap, his only real chance was to overheat his afternurner and speed off away from the frigates rather than engage directly. That manoeuvre was not intended to run away but to split the enemy targets. If he was able to inflict heavy damage whilst avoiding as much incoming damage as possible then he had a chance. Brawling against the odds was not a winning tactic.
Starwalker had been finding some fights and kills in faction warfare sites such as this Atron and Slasher. This cyno-ship was just unlucky in that Starwalker had attempted to kill it but he had been chased off by sentry fire. When he returned there was a Machariel standing guard so he quickly left again but the cyno-ship was killed by a Loki shortly afterwards.
However, more generally, Starwalker had recently either been chasing ships that were far too fast to be caught or had to escape when he was unable to get into scramble range. There was a third alternative and that was the kiter was driven off by factors such as incoming damage, stalemate or new entrants to the fight.
The key problem for Starwalker was that he was unable to get into scramble range when he was in an afterburner fit, brawling frigate and coming up against fast or MWD fit frigates like the Condor or Kestrel. They maintained point and range control of around 16km - 24km away. He had now tried many times to slingshot ships into scramble range (10km with overheat) and whether it was poor manual piloting or not the end result was the same he either had to escape or be destroyed.
The upperhand and therefore choice was always with the faster ship as they could either stay to the bitter end or leave if things started to look bad. Starwalker had recently fought against a Kestrel and whilst the drones from his Tristan had inflicted damage the Kestrel could simply decide to leave when it was in any danger, which is what it did. This escape option would always be open if Starwalker was unable to establish a long point (warp disruption) or scramble.
The fight with the Maulus had a similar outcome to the Kestrel in that the Hawk's Javelin missiles could chase it away but without a long point the faster Maulus would dictate how long the fight lasted. So damage projection was useful both offensively and defensively but to get the kill required warp disruption. Starwalker was enjoying the Tristan but he needed more speed.
To go faster, Starwalker needed to either fly faster afterburner ships or use a MWD fit, which would mean giving up range control against any afterburner fit frigate that got into scram range. Speed was not the only factor and key factors such as damage projection and tank needed to be combined into the choice of ship(s) and fit to fly.
It was a dilemma and no matter what ship (frigate) or fit was chosen there was always a counter that would destroy it or something that would be faster or have better damage projection and so on. The key for Starwalker was to select a ship and fit based on what he expected to encounter or fight against and also was prepared to fly and lose. It was about establishing relative superiority to the potential target, which was possible. What was not possible was one frigate and fit that could beat every other frigate in combat.
Starwalker's recent experience was that he was encountering a lot of fast ships and he did not know whether a ship going around 1.2km/s was any better at doing a slingshot than a ship going at around 1km/s. In short, he would either need to spend some time looking at fast afterburner ships like the Condor and Breacher or fitting a MWD to a combat frigate like the Merlin and Tristan. Those choices did not even include some of the other excellent frigates such as the Caldari Navy Hookbill or Hawk - so many choices...
Starwalker was cruising in his Hawk and looking for trouble. He had refit his Hawk away from the previous MWD fit to an afterburner, two webs and to have slightly more tank. The basic rationale was that he needed range control when brawling and the Javelins could keep kiters away.
Recently he seemed to have run into more kiters and generally fast ships in lowsec, although perhaps that was also because he had been chasing faction warfare pilots. It seemed to Starwalker that he was far more likely to find a fight at a complex than anywhere else currently. He did scan the belts from time to time but he had found zero ratters or anything else for that matter.
He spied a Slasher at a small complex and warped in to find a... Tristan. Starwalker wasted no time wondering about the Slasher and immediately locked up the Tristan, it was soon scrambled, double webbed and taking heavy damage from the rockets. But it wasn't alone and a Rifter, Condor and a Griffin landed close by. Before they could really help the Tristan went down.
Starwalker was firing close range Rage rockets and so attacked the Rifter next, which had come in to 2km, whist the Griffin and Condor were around 15km away. This proved fruitless as the Griffin jammed the Hawk and Starwalker tried to align out to make a desperate run for it. In hindsight, he should have moved in towards the Griffin as he had one more brief window of attack but wasted those shots on the Rifter rather than the real problem - the Griffin. The Hawk was jammed again and then was finally destroyed.
Starwalker jump cloned to Gultratren and undocked his Tristan, using the fit with the web and small armour repairer. Before long he saw a Condor, piloted by Malfyrion, in a complex and warped in. The target was 20km away and so he launched his drones and tried to get closer but the Condor was going at 4.6km/s. That was so fast that the Hobgoblin IIs could not catch up and hit it. Starwalker tried to slingshot in but unsuccessfully and then after some manual flying managed to breakout of range. He succeeded but suspected that Malfyrion had burnt out his long point with all of the manoeuvers. It was a lucky escape as the Tristan was about to run out of capacitor and the ship was already in structure.
A short while later, after getting fully repaired, Starwalker's Tristan warped in to a Kestrel at a complex. The Kestrel again maintained range and Starwalker was again unable to close the distance but this time the Hobgoblin's were inflicting their thermal damage. The Kestrel called for support and an Atron arrived on the scene and started to target the Tristan and so Starwalker decided it was time to head away rather than try to slingshot the Kestrel again.
The Kestrel was deep in armour and decided to beat retreat but the Atron continued to hold point. The drones attacked the Atron and after receiving some damage it decided to leave. Starwalker had now had a second escape from a kiter but luckily got this killmail later when that Atron must have run into a Heron whilst still damaged and was then killed.
Starwalker decided it was time to return to base before one of these kiters destroyed his Tristan when he saw another Tristan when scanning from the sun. He waited at the sun and before long the Tristan, piloted by Destru Kaneda, arrived only 40 km away. Starwalker moved in with his Hobgoblins first and then tried to close into point blank range. Destru had other ideas and the distance was held around 7 to 8km and Destru had also released his Warrior IIs.
Starwalker was slightly surprised to see Warrior IIs as he had assumed that Hobgoblins were the best general choice but on later examining the Tristan's resistance profile - explosive damage was better for armour tanked Tristans. Given that Starwalker's electron blasters were out of range of the target Tristan he set to work on the drones and killed five drones. Initially, he used his web on the enemy drones but in retrospect he should have left it on the Tristan.
In the meantime, both ships were going into structure and it was going to be very, very close. Destru moved in to 5km and Starwalker switched from the remaining three drones to Destru's Tristan and also applied the web. Both ships marched towards zero structure and it looked like Starwalker's Tristan would explode first but a final lucky hit saw Destru's Tristan explode into a fiery ball of flames and his remaining warriors hung limply in space. Good fights were exchanged and Destru noted that it was the closest fight he had been in for a long time. It was the closest fight ever for Starwalker - he had just 4% of structure left.
Starwalker had been considering a micro-warp-drive (MWD), scram and web combination since the TESF roam to address the pesky kiters. He had a Merlin that was fit with those modules along with a medium shield extender and he had also fitted a Hawk with those modules along with two ancillary shield boosters.
[Hawk, RLMWD2ASBW]
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Limited 1MN Microwarpdrive I
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
Stasis Webifier II
Medium Ancillary Shield Booster, Cap Booster 50
Medium Ancillary Shield Booster, Cap Booster 50
Rocket Launcher II, Scourge Rage Rocket
Rocket Launcher II, Scourge Rage Rocket
Rocket Launcher II, Scourge Rage Rocket
Rocket Launcher II, Scourge Rage Rocket
[empty high slot]
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
The rocket damage was not spectacular (~178) but the active shield tank (~369) was pretty good for ~20 seconds with both boosters going or ~40 seconds if staggered. Starwalker wasn't really sure if the fit was very good against afterburner T2 frigates but he would give it a try. The general intent was to be able to tank the damage from brawlers or kiters within scram range. Kiters within point range would likely be caught by the speed of 2.6km/s or it would be much easier to slingshot something fast.
Placid seemed to have a number of targets in space and Starwalker found:
- An Executioner that was waiting for a target to enter the complex but Starwalker made short work of the Amarr frigate. He had thought initially that the Executioner would be MWD fit but the killmail revealed an afterburner fit. That was a surprise as the pilot, LokFonRey, in theory could have tried to dictate range but he did not even seem to try
- A Magnate with four warp core stabilisiers but the pilot, Welfare Queeen, must have been away as her ship was destroyed
- A Tristan who was also looking for a fight at the complex but Starwalker ignored the Hobgoblin II drones and simply destroyed the Tristan. But he had no time to scoop the loot as he found himself chased by three frigates and a destroyer
He decided to leave the system and as he did so the Thrasher, piloted by VileDK, jumped out with him. Starwalker was immediately locked and pointed and was fired on from 20km away. If Starwalker knew what was going to happen next he would have reacted differently. As it was he fancied his chances of destroying the Thrasher and so he approached and set his propulsion going, except he had taken two hits already and he had not started his active shield tank yet. The third shot popped Starwalker's Hawk.
Starwalker had forgotten that the MWD had a signature bloom effect and he had also approached reducing his traversal to zero. Worse, the destruction of his ship had been such a surprise that he hadn't even started his shield boosters. He would need to remember that expensive lesson - his active tank was really good but his buffer tank was minimal.
Undeterred by the loss Starwalker returned to base and undocked a second Hawk and found a Navitas at a complex, which he destroyed along with the pod and collected his corpse. A while later, Starwalker returned and found the same pilot in another Navitas - so he destroyed that too and claimed his second pod and corpse.However, he didn't have it all his own way as his dual propulsion Taranis was lost within a few minutes of undocking to this Dramiel that was waiting to pounce at a complex.
Peri Simone started the Target Everyone Somebody Fire (TESF) R1FTA roam a long time ago and when the R1DER alliance was started the invitation was extended to all alliance members. This had become a regular roam where usually Peri would FC but anyone could volunteer to FC and The Strabusiness stepped up to the plate last Tuesday.
Kane the Black and Zodiac Black performed sterling service as the scouts and The Strabusiness did a good job as the FC. The Rebels would take down any larger ships that they could find or engage other gangs but on this occasion despite the odd shenanigans there was no big fight. A couple of Coercers were the fleet victims:
- Coercer piloted by Yoyomommy was sitting in a complex and got tackled. He died extremely quickly, so much so that a number of the gang were not able to get in on the kill
- Coercer piloted by Dante Vicari was playing station games and had a battlecruiser with him but when the Rebels arrived they scarpered - to the sun. This was such a common escape point that it was not a good escape location and the Coercer was caught there and then left to its fate by the battlecruiser
Starwalker had docked up in Ishomilken after the TESF roam and the following day he was returning to base when he was caught by two Condors. He tried unsuccessfully to slingshot into range but the distance never closed to less than 16km and he was unable to escape the long point so his trusty Merlin was gone. Some small compensation was had by killing this Slasher with a Tristan but as Starwalker flew the Tristan he considered whether he needed to fly a frigate with a micro-warp-drive (MWD), scram and web combination to catch those pesky kiters.
The problem with using a MWD fit frigate in lowsec was that it sacrificed range control to a frigate with an afterburner, scram, web combination. Starwalker had nearly always flown with an afterburner brawler fit in lowsec and had only really used a MWD in nullsec on the rare occasions he flew in that space. He had learned the hard way that burning out of a bubble with an afterburner was painful and getting to a target fast was needed in nullsec. In short, almost everyone used a MWD in nullsec, except perhaps for surprise value or due to ignorance of nullsec bubbles.
Using a MWD frigate within a TESF roam would be no problem and indeed Starwalker had already used one to act as fast tackle if needed. Generally in a TESF roam Starwalker had always flown with a ship that he would use solo, which seemed to be generally accepted practice. The TESF roam had always been popular within R1DER and it was largely composed of solo (frigate) pilots who came together sometimes for small gangs, so these fleets tended to be simply a collection of solo pilots looking for action together. An FC and scout/tackle would be identified and then the gang, usually composed of various frigates would head out into space.
Employing fleet doctrines, roles, ships and fits based around combining logistics, scouting (beyond +1), fleet tackle and damage dealers was largely alien to R1DER. Similarly alien was using fleet tactics such as hot drops, bombing runs, black ops or capital ship engagement. Indeed Starwalker had not actually seen a RIDER or R1FTA fleet that actually had a battleship and Starwalker was fine with that. If he wanted that experience then he would join a nullsec alliance and respond to the Call to Arms (CTA) at whatever time needed.
Starwalker liked being solo with very few real rules and with like minded people. He enjoyed the small gang culture and sometimes combining with other Rebels if they happened to be in the same area or going on a TESF roam. The composition of R1FTA and R1DER had changed over time and in particular core R1FTA members like Miura Bull, Kaeda Maxwell and Lhorenzho have recently moved on. But Starwalker felt that the core principles had remained the same
- Fly what you want, where you want, when you want and how you want
- Honor 1v1 and ransoms
Starwalker wished all ex-Rebels well and hoped to see them back in R1DER in the future.
Starwalker had been grounded or at least that was what he felt like as he had spent almost no time in space in the last month. He still had his penchant for the Tristan as an alternative to his Merlin and he had now had a few more fights.
Most of those fights were with faction warfare pilots that were either really doing the complex or simply waiting for a hunter to become the hunted. Crimson StrongBlood had been looking for a fight in his Rifter but when it came down to it - he exploded quickly. The same could be said for groapadegunoi and his Slasher. Alexanderdit was in the complex but whether he wanted to fight was not really clear but whether he wanted to or not his Tristan was forfeit.
However, Starwalker hadn't had it all his own way. The first night back from his long spell away he lost this Tristan. The problem was simple enough:
- Warping in from the acceleration gate he was immediately targeted by JESSKABAL in his Caldari Navy Hookbill, who was waiting for his next target
- Rather than target the Hookbill Starwalker had managed to target the inoffensive beacon as he clicked on the target in the overview as it switched position with the ship
- Launching drones, getting up to speed, scrambling and firing his blasters took some precious seconds. Precioius seconds where he didn't notice that he had the wrong target selected
- Realising he had the wrong target selected Starwalker switched but he had now lost nearly a third of his shield
- He saw the tracking disruptor and web applied to his Tristan and also noticed that he was doing no damage - his guns could not hit the Hookbill at 7.5km with Null while disrupted. But where was the drone damage - that made up two thirds of the Tristan's firepower?
- His drones were out but simply idle. Having drones set to aggressive and on focus fire had not resulted in them attacking the Hookbill that had now taken half the shield from the Tristan
- Belatedly Starwalker engaged the Hookbill with his drones but he knew that it was too little too late
- He aligned out and tried to escape but with a web applied by the Hookbill he had no chance of getting the Tristan out - only his pod
The fight had not gone well, Starwalker felt rusty and that he had made a lot of silly mistakes. He had been in a later fight where he had engaged a Tormentor and somehow had made the same mistake with his drones. The damage came in but very little was going out, he felt sure he had pressed "F" to engage but his drones (again) were idle. It appeared that this command to engage had been lost at the start of the battle.
These faction warfare pilots seemed to run the full range of behaviours, from those that were in the complex for itself and did not want to engage, those that were there but would engage, those that were there as bait and those that were there to kill the hunters. That classification did not include those that were AFK, warp stabilised or those that lurked 100km - 200km away just watching but would disappear if you approached. Starwalker wondered if he should sit in a complex and see what came, perhaps an interesting new tactic to try.
Whilst Starwalker had gained a little more experience with the Tristan he also realised that he liked the holy trinity of propulsion, scram and web and the shield fit that he was using did not have the web. That web gave some degree of range control and would increase the damage from his drones, which was important now that he had Drone Interfacing V. The trouble was that the small armour repairer did not seem especially effective but perhaps that was Starwalker's imagination.
Starwalker was still out and about in the Tristan and strangely the ship was growing on him even more. He had fought a Daredevil in an outpost and actually it had run away to avoid destruction. That was the problem with no range control, targets could simply decide to disengage. Of course, sometimes range control did not even matter, this cyno ship was killed easily as there weren't even station guns.
Whilst hunting in Metropolis another Tristan came up on scan and Starwalker guessed that it was Denfior in local. The character was an outlaw and top ranked on Battleclinic he knew that it would be a difficult fight if he took it. The target Tristan arrived at the sun over 200km away and it was Denfior. Denfior then warped to an outpost and Starwalker decided not to follow as it would give Denfior a small advantage when Starwalker came out of warp.
Starwalker expected Denfior to return and that patience was rewarded, as expected, with the target Tristan some 150km away. Starwalker burnt towards it and noted that it was a MWD (micro-warp-drive) fit. As the distance closed, he launched his Hobgoblin II drones and then went through the engagement cycle - lock, scram, guns and neut.
The fight was really even and as Starwalker's shields slowly dropped the Denfior's armour repairer was working like a champion. Starwalker was fighting at 500m and had forgotten to change the ammunition to Caldari Navy antimatter but it was too late now. He checked the heat and the afterburner was fine he checked it again what seemed like a moment later and it was burnt out. That was not good.
The shield was gone and Starwalker was entering armour but Denfior was entering structure, although his armour repairer was still working over time despite the neut. Starwalker then noticed that he had lost a drone and relaunched a Warrior II to replace it. Both ships were in structure but Denfior was amazingly still repairing and then Starwalker ran out of ammunition. He had not refilled the magazine before the fight and now it took endless seconds to reload.
Both ships were marching down to zero structure but Starwalker's ship was going to explode first - it was in slightly worse condition and more importantly, was not repairing. It had burnt out its afterburner and so was suffering more damage too. The end seemed inevitable and Starwalker aligned out and then shortly afterwards his ship exploded. This had been a very close fight but it was Starwalker that warped away in his pod and close did not really count in New Eden.
Whilst Starwalker did not know if he could have won the fight he had decided that there were some areas where he could have done better:
- Stop overheating the afterburner after achieving the close orbit. It was not needed at that point and resulted in his 500m orbit actually achieving around a 2km orbit, which was close to the optimal range for null ammunition
- Given that he had null loaded, anticipating a railgun fit, that range was not too bad but overall lower DPS than possible. What was a problem was not reloading the guns before the fight. He had used ammunition against the Daredevil and had not reloaded. Whilst this turned out to be a longer fight than usual or expected that was no excuse to not have a full ammunition load
- Starwalker had not really watched when he had lost a drone and so he had only replaced it after he had noticed. Drone management was definitely an area for significant improvement
Starwalker had started out with a Tristan fit that was based on using blasters with the drones and fitting the ship with a medium shield extender, to give it enough tank to take on the brawlers like the Merlin and Incursus. He had found that he had no range control without a web and he was unclear at how effective the neutraliser was in shutting down the targets propulsion and electronic warfare modules. The fit had looked like this:
[Tristan, MSE]
Pseudoelectron Containment Field I
Micro Auxiliary Power Core I
Drone Damage Amplifier II
1MN Afterburner II
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
Medium Shield Extender II
Light Electron Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
Light Electron Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
Small Energy Neutralizer II
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer I
Small Core Defense Field Extender I
Hobgoblin II x5
Warrior II x3
This fit had consequently been changed - to fit a stasis webifier and consequently the tank was shifted to a small armour repairer. Starwalker's experience was:
- Small armour repairer could not keep up with incoming damage on its own and at best simply slowed the incoming damage's progress towards the Tristan's structure. This had been the case with both the Breacher firing rockets and the Atron firing null
- Ships fighting at the edge of scram range were likely to have lower DPS and lower tanks than close combat brawlers like the Merlin. The Tristan tank had outlasted the Breacher and its drones would have done the deed if Starwalker had stayed in the fight longer
Starwalker had not fought many close range brawlers that orbited at 500m and simply wanted to melt ships, the only Merlin he had fought had not been fit to really test the Tristan. If the Atron had been afterburner fit and used Caldari Navy antimatter that might have ended differently but using an MWD and null scuppered any prospects it might have had for range control.
Given that experience, Starwalker now thought he needed a larger tank that could handle a close range brawler and anything kiting at the edge of scram range should be no problem and get killed by the drones. Ships kiting in point range may prove difficult to shake off through manual piloting but 5 drones should drive them off easily enough.
Strange, the preferred Tristan fit had now come full circle with what he had started out with. Starwalker had still not selected railguns as the weapons of choice because whilst railguns made more sense for targets beyond 4km they were useless up close, and Starwalker was concerned about a brawler trying to kill him at 500m.
Since Starwalker had a MWD Merlin fit from the TESF roam he decided to go into Syndicate with it and to see what fights he could find. He went to TXW-EI as it seemed it was not camped or at least had very few pilots in it from the map. He got to Vestouve and found a Malediction and Tornado on scan, they appeared to be together so Starwalker ignored them and jumped in to TXW-EI.
The system was camped and he had landed in a bubble with multiple ships but in particular a Sabre and two Vagabonds were close by. Close enough to get the scramble and kill. Starwalker did not panic and looked at his position and theirs relative to the gate and decided to run back to the gate.
He set his MWD to overheat, waited a little longer and then hit align and the MWD to get to the gate before he lost his propulsion module. The Sabre and Vagabond reacted quickly and he was locked and fired on but he was not scrambled and it was clear that he would make it to the gate as he had only lost 25% of his shield. He jumped.
The Malediction and Tornado were around 20km off the gate and Starwalker decided he needed to make a run for it so he aligned to a planet to the right and hit warp. There was no point in waiting as he could not go back into TXW-EI. The longer he waited the worse it might become as other gang members in TXW-EI jumped through.
The Malediction was too far away to get the scramble and Starwalker felt that he had a good chance of either escaping or getting some distance and possibly killing the Malediction. The warp engaged and he was gone before either ship even targeted him. As he landed at the planet he warped immediately again to the sun - just as the Malediction came in. Local started to increase and Starwalker decided to get out of Dodge before he left in his pod.
Starwalker was pleased with himself for escaping and reshipped in Covryn to a Tristan, he was going to roam low-sec and wanted to be in an afterburner fit frigate. There were a number of gate camps around, especially in Heydieles and Old Man Star but they simply let his frigate go through. Presumably they were looking for bigger prey.
Starwalker scanned down an Atron who seemed to be ratting but when Starwalker jumped in it was nearly 300km away. The same thing with the same Atron happened at another asteroid belt and this time he burnt towards it hoping he was looking for a fight. He was. The Tristan released its drones and engaged. The Atron was held at 5km as the Tristan started to take damage. The repairer could not keep up as the armour melted and the first slivers of structure were exposed. But the Atron was suffering much worse under the relentless drone fire and it exploded first.
Starwalker was feeling very happy with himself and felt that he was really starting to improve. It was at moments like these that fate then plays it tricks - Starwalker was about to make a stupid mistake on a low-sec gate. The Incursus at gate was not red and he knew that he had to wait to be fired on before engaging it, however, Starwalker managed to convince himself that he had been fired on and engaged with his drones. The gate guns opened up and Starwalker knew that he had made a mistake and he aligned out and hit warp. He might just make it in time - if he was lucky.
The Incursus pilot could not believe his good luck and simply applied a scram and started firing but really just to hold the Tristan there. Starwalker could not warp away and the ship exploded within seconds from the gate gunfire. Baali Tekitsu asked why he had been aggressed, Starwalker had no good answer he had simply made a mistake.
If that mistake was using drones too early the next fight was using drones too late. He had arrived at the acceleration gate and warped through into the waiting Coercer. It was going to be a difficult fight anyway but Starwalker made it harder by launching his drones too soon i.e. not out of warp yet and of course the command was then simply ignored. Starwalker only realised that his drones were not fighting when his shield were gone - that was far too late for this Tristan.
