Engagement Report 21 – Dual Hull Brutix

As I was running around in my Dual Hull Brutix, I went to a mining anomaly only to see a couple ships warp off. I can’t really catch anything other than a completely AFK miner or ratter in my Cloaky Brutix, so not a big deal.

While moving around in the same system I noticed an Ishtar and for a brief period a Pilgrim… Odds were these guys were forming to engage me. Also new on scan… a carrier at a station. Carriers had been rebalanced recently and not only they were stupidly overpowered against subcapitals, everyone was just eager to use it, so extra caution was mandatory.

I noticed the Ishtar to be on the same mining anomaly where I’d scared those mining ships… Very well, I warped in again, but this time at 100km range. Last thing I need is to be scrammed by a HAC, neuted by a pilgrim and then jumped on by a Carrier. Not that they’d need to use the Carrier to kill me if an Ishtar and a Pilgrim caught me at the mining anomaly, several AU away from my backup Brutix.

As I arrive at the anomaly, the Ishtar races to me… ye… he’s too eager to catch me, so let’s see if we can change terms a bit. I warp off, move around a bit hitting d-scan and get my eyes on station. The Carrier pilot reships into a Confessor and another pilot joins them in a Malediction. Good! They were getting frustrated about not catching me and reshiped into some tackle. I can manage tackle, just not a Carrier.

It was time to make use of their bloodlust. I still needed to split them a bit and get some range from their home system/station where they could bring out the Carrier at any time.

The Plan: Jump out to where I have my backup Brutix, drag them 1 or 2 jumps away from their home station and engage them. I would need to primary the Pilgrim, and then re-assess the situation. Either try kill the Confessor/Malediction if they came into Scram range as they would melt, or if they stayed at range focus on the Ishtar. I was confident I would be able to jam the Ishtar (I was assuming the Ishtar to have a Scram) and use the MJD to bail out. 

And so I jump out and wait for them to follow. As I jump out, the Malediction chases. Good… Now I only have to align out and warp off in order to draw them!

…but my ship is not moving! In fact, my overview is not loading! I can see the ship cloaked, but is not responding my commands. W…..T…..F…..!!! I spam every freaking command and nothing! Maybe I’ll just disappear in space?... One minute passes and I start taking damage but I’m not seeing anything on my overview!!!!! I cannot even move! I could try warp in my backup Brutix, but then what? Give them 2 kills?

I die without even loading grid… this was annoying as hell as I could have taken the Ishtar, Pilgrim and Malediction easily with both toons (Confessor never showed up). I petition my loss and ask for CCP to also move my backup Brutix to Curse, as he’s 40 jump away alone, due to a bug on CCP’s behalf. This roam was over for today.

The following day, I get my ship back but CCP replies they cannot move my alt as it’s not a service they provide… pffffff. I look for a Thera connection and is also 30+ jumps away… bah… Seems I’ll have to make 40 jumps alone. I also need to settle my score with those guys. CCP provided them an easy kill, let’s see if they would manage to kill me as easily next time.

The road from Curse to meet Rtb deep down south was boring and dull until I met some Coven guys… I had certainly been reported on their intel channels as they had a HIC waiting for me in an outgate along the path. Funnily enough, I had seen that gang form up with Rtb, but was not expecting them to go intercept Pleniers! I guess they don’t have many visitors down there…

So, knowing that gang had about 10 guys, including a Falcon, I tried to warp off, but the HIC scrammed me… No other choice other than jump. As I jump they only had 3 or 4 tackle on the gate, with the rest coming into local, so I opt to reaproach gate and cloak. No way I’d be able to MJD away in time before getting scrammed, and Falcon would make futile any attempt to get some kills. Eventually they decloak me, and most aggress me, but I’m already close to the gate and I jump out and warp off. The cloak saved my ship once again.

I go AFK as they have too much. When I return they are gone, but as a bonus, a couple of them complained on local how bad is a Brutix with a cloak. If a module allows me to survive a gate gamp that outnumbers me 10v1 and still pissed them off, then it’s a mod worth having…

While continuing to the system where I died previously due to the bug, I get reported in intel again, and some Coven guys from that last gang meet me at my destination. Coven and the system locals are blue and filled with bloodlust, having more than 10 guys active. Ok,  too much for me to take right now, so time to cloak up again. People come in and come out in different ships (from interceptors to carriers), link my latest loss in local over and over again, make funny jokes about my ship fit while asking for me to decloak, etc etc etc… Patience is virtue.

I go AFK, but eventually I have to log off. The next day I log in and notice about 5 or so active people. It’s time to warp around a bit and see what can be done this day, but soon enough they bring out a carrier and chase me to the gates with an Hyperion, a Rattlesnake and some extra ships… Once again, I cannot engage, but no worries.  Having more stuff to do at home I cloak up and wait. This time they posted my latest loss in local, but also complained how cloaky camping is “unfair” and “not fun”. Eventually I had to go to bed. Patience is a virtue.

Ok… 4^th day! I log in! People don’t seem surprised to see me around and most dock up. Warping around I notice 4 or 5 active guys, but this time I have an extra surprise. The Pilgrim pilot that killed me while I was stuck with that bug was online and active… He was gloating very loudly in local how he managed to kill me once and would kill me again “EZPZ”, commented on my Brutix fit and how in the world a “snuggly” person like him managed to kill me so easily… 

Let’s face it… I will not hold myself back on killing someone that is suffering a bug. Not long ago I killed a 2 billion faction fitted Tengu that disconnected mid fight. Though for him… shit happens, welcome to EVE. While talking to that Tengu pilot afterwards I acknowledged to have noticed him disconnect, so no need to gloat on being a “superior pilot”, but I won’t stop shooting either! 

I actually told the Pilgrim fella “Man… I actually was suffering from a bug not loading grid… Did you not thought strange that I didn’t do anything? Nor shoot, nor move, nor even target you?” He was really acting like a 12 year old kid in local “PAWND YA COS WE BETTER N U NUTED/SCRAMD NO BULL EXCUS FAILFAILFAIL”. Sigh… ok… Number one rule in EVE is to keep a cool head and control bloodlust or personal vendettas. As long as I keep a cool head and focus, there will be always tomorrow. Also, patience is a virtue.

I move around in system and this time no one brings out Carriers. Good… Unfortunately I see nothing more interesting, so I go to the gate where my Backup Brutix is holding cloaked. Less than 30 seconds after another Pilgrim pilot decloaks and jumps out. Auch… if this guy is also stalking me, then 2 Pilgrims would be a hard to kill as they can easily incapacitate both my ships! Still… In this particular case, the social aspect and personal experience matters a lot. Somehow, I doubt they would have the proper coordination to spread neuts along both my ships, so I just go for it. I had been here for 4 days already, enough is enough.

I jump out chasing the Pilgrim with the unknown pilot. On the other side I had no idea on this guy intention, so I just go for it! He did not cloaked and aggressed me back! Good! I spit out ECM drones as I want to jam him and conserve the most of my capacitor as possible and bring out my backup DPS Brutix from the shadows.

Pleniers gets neuted pretty fast, but Rtb is delivering good damage and Pilgrim goes down at a steady rate. As expected, my previous killer in a 2^nd Pilgrim jumps and joins the fight. At this point I was really worried. Would he neut Rtb rendering both my ships dead in the water? If so I would need to deaggress in order to jump out, as we were close to the gate, but his bad judgement prevailed. My previous killer in the 2^nd Pilgrim also applied neuts to Pleniers, who was already capped out.

As the 1^st Pilgrim was entering structure a Vexor jumps in and joins the fight, but more importantly, my previous killer in the 2^nd Pilgrim started to kite away in a big hurry. I could try to catch him with Rtb, but would have been a bad call:

1 – 1^st Pilgrim was not dead yet and Rtb was the only toon with enough capacitor running the Scram on him;

2 – Even if I caught him, he could neut Rtb easily and bail. Pleniers would not regenerate capacitor fast enough to join any time soon in this chase.

3 – If I did not made the proper choices I’d end up with both Pilgrims escaping. THAT would truly annoy me more than a bit of local smack talk…

I had already decided to NOT make this a personal deal, so I focused on what I had at hands and secured the 1^st Pilgrim kill. As the Vexor was nice enough to show up, I proceeded by killing him too, with his 2^nd Pilgrim mate watching from 70km away. 

After this engagement my previous killer went into complete radio silence… I’m pretty sure he was calling the shots in this whole engagement, and even though he survived, his mates that put trust on him died due to bad coordination on his part. That’s probably even better in the long run, as this sort of episodes tends to shake the trust you put in the “FC”, especially in groups with low experience and somewhat high expectations. I totally believe he was fully convinced he’d kill me as easily as he did the previous time, but with me being able to actually command both my ships, things got a tad harder.

It was finally time to move. 4 days for a couple kills is hardly “efficient”, but EVE is more than just raw numbers and it felt good to just do some cloaky camping for a change. Also, local chat is a wonderful way to get some extra laughs. Some taunting or blowing out some steam in local is pretty acceptable for me, as long as people don’t become rude…

Engagement Report 20 –Dual Hull Brutix

Sometimes there’s the occasional roam that you classify as “weird”…. A series of events that really don’t happen often, and that make it worth to undock every day.

Ok, so I came out from Thera and found myself in an entry point for a carebear pocket. I stated many times before that hostile intel is my n.º 1 enemy, so I left my backup Brutix just outside the 1^st carebear system and went in with my Tank Brutix.

The ingate of the 1^st carebear system was heavily bubbled! I mean, they had bubbles up to 80km away from the gate! Heavily bubbled systems mean usually 2 things:

1 - The locals like to have time to dock up from their ratting/mining activities;

2 – The locals might like to catch outsiders on the edge of these mega-bubble-clusters, probably from the direction of other gates or station. To avoid being caught by the locals in this scenario, it’s important to look for celestials in the opposite direction of existing gates or station. Warping to a nearby moon on the “back” of the gate, or to an anomaly situated “up” or “down” might allow you to escape some gatecamp formed up on the edge of these bubble-Clusters. If no celestials are available, taking a time to make your own ping might be a good idea.

So ok, there I was inside these mega-bubble-cluster, but having a MJD, I did not care all that much. Just activate the MJD and then warp to some random anomaly or station to make myself known. I just need to be careful to not get tackled in the next 3 minutes MJD cooldown window.

1^st carebear system was empty of any activity, even if it had around 10 in local. I proceed to the 2^nd carebear system.

As I enter the 2^nd carebear system, I see a Phantasm on the gate at 0km. More important than the ship type it’s usually who’s the pilot. This happened to be a Verge of Collapse fella that probably came out from Thera as well. Now, these guys roam mostly in gangs, but sometimes they do roam “alone” with their links. First of all, I needed to find out if this fella was alone or not. I did not want to be jumped by 10 Orthrus or something like that.

This is where EVE standings come into play and how they can help you. I decided to set his alliance orange standings, so that I could assess easily how many “orange standing guys” there are in local. He seemed to be alone as only 1 orange guy was in local.

So this Verge of Collapse fella seems alone… Oh, the hell with it, let’s engage! As I shoot, he jumps out. I wait for 1 minute and nothing happens, no backup rising into local, nor anything. I jump into the 1^st carebear system and the Phantasm was there waiting for me, kitting around the gate. I decide to try making best of my local geography knowledge. Remember that mega-bubble-cluster I talked earlier? Time to make use of it!

The Plan: Warp to the gate with the Bubbles, apply my web and neut on the Phantasm as he lands on top of me at the edge of the bubbles, bring in Rtb, MJD on top of Phantasm, apply 2^nd web and 2^nd Neut and kill it! Couldn’t get simpler!

And so I set the plan in motion, landing at the edge of the mega-bubble-cluster. The Phantasm follows and lands on top of me!... But this is where the plan stops working. The Phantasm kites away from me at around 4000m/s, so when I actually managed to get a lock on him, he was more than 20km away… it seems this fella was one of those dual 10mn and 100mn AB Phantasms.        

Anyway he was still interested in me and comes closer. He shoots me a couple times at range, never making much damage and I try to catch him by overloading my MWD and cutting his passes on me. I actually managed to web and scram him once, but besides the long point, he had a scram himself! This was odd… I’m used to fighting Phantasms that have 18km webs, but a Scram is way more disabling and dangerous for me! Eventually he achieves a steady 22km orbit on me, and I’m not seeing how my Backup Brutix can help me in this particular case, so it’s time to bail.

I activate my MJD to teleport myself away, hoping for him to not realise it and not come to dive in for a Scram passage. Even if he did, I would not be in terrible danger as I still had a lots of structure, I could bring Rtb to shove him away, or even use ECM drones to jamm him. Fortunately he did not scrammed me and I got safe.

He posted in local something along the lines of “…and ofc you had MJD… well, gf I guess…”. It was indeed a good engagement, with both sides having problems pinning their respective opponents. On my behalf, I told him how his scram made the whole job way harder than I expected and went my way jumping out of system as an “Orange Standing” Navy Brutix lands on the Bubbles! AAHHA! It seems I bailed at the proper time, just before his mate arrived!

Now this roam get a bit weirder… As I jump out the Phantasm pilot convos me and asks “Hey, is this Navy Brutix with you?!”. I’m puzzled… I reply “No, I thought it was with you instead…”. Phantasm pilot tells me “No, I’m alone man! Help me out killing him, I’m engaging!”

Hummm… I did saw the Navy Brutix was orange standings to me, but I did had several local entities sorted orange. Could I have done a judgement error earlier? I truly did NOT look at his alliance ticker. My instinct also told me the Phantasm pilot would not be lying or making some lame trap, so I went back to take a better look.

As I return, the Phantasm is indeed scramming the Navy Brutix and it does belong to some other alliance that lives nearby, so I rush forwards to help him. Then suddenly…

CYNO!!!!!!

Oh crap! I burn back to gate and try telling it to my temporary ally. He manages to kite away from the Navy Brutix just before a gang of 10 Black Ops Battleships jumps, and I managed to burn back the gate. Ufff… this was a close one. This roam just got weirder… a Navy Brutix cynoing a Black Ops Battleship gang, and failing miserably at killing anything.

Considering I’m pretty safe on the gate, I stick around and wait… I’m sure those battleships are going to stay around for the whole 10 minutes duration of the cyno in order to protect their mate from any possible dang… and then the Black Ops Battleships start to MJD off the bubbles and warping off to random celestials!

Oh really?!...

So… you’re just going to leave that Navy Brutix of yours strapped to a lit cyno alone? My head starts to fill with calculations:

1 – Navy Brutix is probably 50km from the edge of bubbles. If Black Ops Battleships warp in, they’ll be far away, and unable to provide full support.

2 – I doubt they’ll have more ships to cyno in…

3 – Even if the Black Op Battleships jump out of system, they won’t be able to go via the cyno again due to 10-15 minutes of jump fatigue right?!

4 – ENOUGH CALCULATIONS. THERE’S AN IMMOBILE NAVY BRUTIX THAT HAS JUST BEEN ABANDONED BY “ALLIANCE MATES”!!!! What more could I possibly want?! Who cares if it has a cyno lit?...

I finally get myself to go full speed ahead towards the Navy Brutix with both my ships, and the Phantasm that was swooping around also joins in. The Navy Brutix dies abandoned by his peers who were still cloaked up around the system.

OK… so what the hell happened there? I think all those Black Ops Battleships got nervous about just “sitting there” after failing the gank. I even go further and say they might have been afraid of a Verge of Collapse gang to be called in and kill them while they were sitting inside the bubbles. Anyway, they decided that protecting their bait was not worth the risk, allowing me and the Verge of Collapse guy to score a nice kill, thus ending one of the weirdest situations I had with my Dual Hull Brutix.

Engagement Report 19 –Hull Myrmidon/Hull Brutix

One of these days I had an intense roam with 4 different engagements. I don’t usually have so many fights in a row, nor so strong feelings towards EVE (yes I got pissed!)

This day I actually took out a variation from my usual setup and brought a Hull Myrmidon as Scout/Tank and the usual DPS Brutix. I wanted to see how I’d be able to control a  Drone Boat and a Gun Boat at same time, and evaluate the advantage of having a Cap Booster in the Myrmidon. Like I said several times, I hate the lack of Cap Injection in my Brutix Setup.

In the pipe that goes to HED-GP I jumped into a Stiletto and Hyena. Holding my cloak I looked at local and these guys had around 10 in local, but I bet some of them would not be active. At the same time I’d spam D-Scan to take notice of ships moving around me. A Svipul lands on a ping, then a cormorant, then another Svipul, then a couple more small ships. I have their attention. Also, the system I came from was completely empty, so these guys had no eyes either, hence being careful on pings. 

I decloak and burn back to gate. I see a new Cynabal on D-Scan, but it never really arrives on gate, so my conclusion is that the Cynabal went to a POS nearby. They probably want to use it as a “surprise element” against bigger targets, probably as myself. I wait a bit more.

Eventually a Cormorant gets bold, warps down to 20km away from me and shoots me. I just needed a proper reason to engage some of these little ships, hoping for the Cynabal to come provide backup. I burn at the Cormorant and kill it. In the meantime all those small ships warp down on me and shoot me too. As I enter structure the Cynabal lands close by, within my scram range, and does not tries to get away from me. I Scram/Web the Cynabal and bring in my Brutix. Cynabal melts and I proceed to also kill an Hyena that got too close. Rest of the gang warps off and they talk that my bait structure tank did managed to trick them.

I continue my pilgrimage to HED-GP, repair in the “Freeport” station (you have to pay, but its better than making 3 jumps out to repair) and notice my mate Madmatt is in local. We try to kill some random travellers with no luck and managed to avoid an Initiative gang.

Eventually we got the attention of the local Russian crowd and begin being stalked by a Tengu, a Talos and a Link Tengu. I don’t like to engage T3 Cruisers, let alone with links on their side, but Madmad was in a Hull Navy Brutix, so we sorted a plan: Drag them into next system, where they had no links, catch the Talos, swarm the Tengu with ECM drones and then try bring him down. At this point they knew I had 2 BCs so there was no surprise element on my part.

We were actually somewhat surprised they followed us into the next system where they had no links for now, so now we just needed to catch the Talos! This is when all started to go downhill… Both me and Madmatt failed to catch the Talos, as he was still faster than us and kept always his distance. If it was hard to catch him without links, once they brought them in, it was completely impossible. We stopped the chase, but this had already also led to having the 3 ships in my fleet quite separated from each other.

Ok, not too worried about it, but It’s time to bail out. Tengu was Scramming and Webbing my Myrmidon within 10km from the gate, but shooting him would be pretty much pointless. I have no doubts it would be more than ready to tank 3 Brutix for long enough to deaggress and jump out, considering we were pretty close to the gate. I spit out my ECM drones from both my ships and put them onto the Tengu. Once I got a Jamm I tried to warp off the Myrmidon, but he’s being somewhat bumped by the Tengu and unable to properly align out… When I least expect it the Tengu regains lock on my Myrmidon and scrams it again! How did I mess that one?! Not only that, both Tengu and Talos are focusing DPS onto my ECM drones and killing them fast! Before I notice it all my ECM drones are pretty much dead, and I’m left without any options so save my Myrmidon. It dies.

This loss annoyed me for sure due to another factor. During that jamm cycle on the Tengu I could have MJD away, and then focus on warping off. The Tengu bumping the Myrmidon would not interfere with the MJD as it did interfere with warping out. I ask Madmatt on his Navy Brutix to get safe and I prepare to jump out my Brutix once its deaggressed.

Completely unexpectedly on my part, the Tengu is able to bump my Brutix out of the gate a whole 15km! W……T……..F……. Seriously?!? I try to slowboat to the gate, but he manages a 2^nd bump on my Brutix and now I’m 20km away from the gate! ARE YA FREAKING KIDDING ME?! I was caught completely off guard, I have no options to bail or kill them and I lose my 2^nd ship for nothing! 

My corp mate, Quawr, that was hearing the engagement on coms actually tells me that I was becoming altered, something he’s never seen and he flies with me a lot… I’m usually very calm and relaxed, even in the face of certain death, but losing 2 ships like this... Ye… it looks like it pissed me off.

What could I done differently? I still consider the original plan to be decent. For the Myrmidon to survive, I could have activated my MJD and worry about warping off after. It’s something I’ll need to remember next time. As for the Brutix… Not much could have been done other than avoiding to be still… BCs are easy “bumpeable” ships and will happen from time to time.

After those 2 losses I thought about logging off for the day, but it was kinda early, so I reshiped into 2 Brutix, took a deep breath and undocked. Considering Madmatt was still active, I went towards him to HED-GP again. Maybe we’d get the chance for a rematch with these guys, who knows!

Along the way, about 3 jumps out from HED-GP, I encountered  a gang of 1 Stork, 1 Hecate and 4 Svipuls. I was in “travel mode” so they were able to notice the 2 Brutix, therefore no surprise effect on my end. We might have a fight here, so I cloak up my DPS Brutix nearby and try to split them on the gate. I jump out and in a couple times, everyone targeting everyone, but no shots being fired. 

Eventually the Stork managed to teleport me 100km away from the gate. Luckily for me, only the 2 of us were teleported, so his backup was also far away. He quickly realizes his precarious position and tries to burn away, but I managed to scram and web him just in time. I consume my Improved Drop Booster and  bring Rtb in the DPS Brutix as the rest of gang is burning 100km towards me.

My primary targets are the ships scrambling me, so Hecate is the next target once the Stork dies. Then it’s time for Svipul #1 and next is Svipul #2. Pleniers is getting in deep structure, because these T3 Destroyers do hurt a lot, but because no one else is scramming him, I activate his MJD and warp off as low as 4% Structure! Madmatt actually joins the engagement in the end and helps out killing Svipul #3. After last derp against the Tengu and Talos it felt really good to achieve a solid victory…

Madmatt actually tells me the Talos pilot logged off, but the Tengu pilot was somewhat active, lurking in HED-GP with his main and in the adjacent system with his alt toon. Madmatt stayed out 2 jumps on purpose to avoid being detected by the Tengu pilot’s alt, I went HED-GP to look around. Tyr Carter, another mate of ours that logged in went to a safe spot in a Curse recon.

Not long after, the Tengu pilot’s alt, also in a Tengu, comes into HED-GP from the adjacent null sec system, warps to station at 0km and sits there undocked. We wait a couple minutes… The Tengu is just sitting there still. Madmatt warns me this pilot likes to bait people in sturdy ships, in order to bring out a Nightmare and shoot them at range.

I take a better look on the Tengu sitting on station… He has no guns nor missiles, so could it could be a link Tengu... But this pilot is not dumb. He would not leave his alt just there on station. Still expecting this to be a trap, I decided to bring in both my Brutix at same time to bump him off station. He did not docked nor reacted otherwise. Either he was AFK or simply not afraid from my dual Brutix.

After I bumped the Tengu 15 km away from station I aggressed with both my Brutix. Tengu locks me up and Scrams both my Brutix while undocking his Nightmare! AHA! It was a trap as pretty much expected, but no worries. Madmatt warps in shooting the Tengu in his Navy Brutix, I put my ECM drones onto the Nightmare and Tyr Carter in his Curse went to neut the Nightmare dry while trying to get under his guns.

Upon seeing the Curse landing, the Nightmare tries to kite away and focuses his DPS on him, giving me some breathing room. Also, upon seeing the Navy Brutix landing on his Tengu, he tries to also kite away from danger, overloading his 100mn AB and scramming my 2 Brutix. Fortunately, because he was triple webbed, he could not really move more than 1000m/s, so Madmatt managed to stay on top of the Tengu at all times, until he had no more capacitor to activate the 100mn AB, because he also had 3 medium neuts putting a huge strain on his capacitor.

The 3 Brutix are killing the Tengu just fine, but Tyr in his Curse if going to die. It’s really hard to get bellow the guns of an afterburning Nightmare as it has lots of mobility. As Tyr is spamming the “Warp” button, my ECM drones manages a jamm on the Nightmare and he’s able to warp away in his Curse with 6% structure!  Shortly after the Tengu dies, proving to be a 700mil faction fit Tengu.

After losing 2 Battlecruisers to this guy, it was good to score a payback kill. Payback kills always taste better! He was baiting me with the Tengu, but by knowing his habits, we managed to somewhat counter bait his bait, deceiving him pretty well.

Needless to say he docked his Nightmare, cursing my ECM drones for denying him the Curse kill. I felt my mission in HED-GP was done for the day and started to head home because I still had half an hour free.

 1 jump away, 3 Svipuls land on the gate with me and target. Not knowing if these guys were alone or not I jump in and out the gate a couple times to see if they have some sort of backup incoming, but it seemed that no… I eventually aggressed one of them and they all shot back. This time I did not even bothered in bringing my backup Brutix, as I was more than confident that I could kill easily all 3 of them. I asked if Madmatt wanted to join me, just because I was still chatting with him, and he showed up in time to help me kill the 3^rdSvipul.

Anyway, this was a very complete roam, with some nice solo kills, some dumb losses, some frustration, some payback, some teaming up with friends and lots of mixed emotions. Welcome to EVE!

PS: Sorry you had to hear me upset Quawr XD

Engagement Report 18 – Dual Hull Brutix

I log in in Curse and notice a mail from my Corp mates informing about a WH to Stain in Corp Bookmarks. I usually hate Stain… It’s a giant pipe and lacks the typical carebear pockets I like to harass. On EVE Map, it usually barely shows more than 3 guys active in each system, so makes hard to know where to go, as I like to head off to systems with 10 or more guys active. Of course, this information provided by the EVE Map is very generic but makes a great starting point for any roam.

Anyway, not wanting to roam around Curse, nor wanting to Jump Clone into Thera, I decided to give Stain a shot. I hold my DPS Brutix inside the WH cloaked and with my Tank Brutix I jump into an NPC station system, with around 10 in local. Pretty much everyone belongs to the same Alliance. Analysing a bit more the geography I noticed that my WH was close to 2 gates and about 70 AU from the station cluster. Ok… This means that I’ll need to drag any potential target to these gates around the WH, in order to have my backup Brutix coming in and provide fast help. 

Very well, time to warp around… In one of the stations a Wolf is undocked and targets me. A Drake from same Alliance undocks and also targets me. Wolf starts to burn at me! I don’t want to dock because there’s a good chance I’d be stuck with some station games until they got bored and just went AFK. Considering they are being so aggressive, this is the chance to bring them to the gates near the WH, so I warp there.

Wolf chases me and is already at my gate when I land. He targets me but does not aggress… Ok, I jump out and he follows. I burn back to the gate and target him. He emulates me but does not aggresses. These kind of games, with a tackler keeping me in a close leash, but not aggressing, usually means he’s waiting for backup. I jump back into their station system.

Oh boy! I was expecting the Drake for sure, but they turned out to have also a Dragoon, Confessor, Myrmidon, Maller and Jackdaw. This is too much to engage head on, so I overload my MWD and burn back to gate. I got Scrammed by EVERYONE, except for the Drake! Damn… These many Scrams will render my MDJ useless, even if I kill some of them, but a fight is here so I bring in my Backup Brutix.

While my Backup Brutix was in warp, I actually managed to have my Tank Brutix reach the gate at 0km, so I opted by jumping out instead of fighting. When my Backup Brutix lands a tense situation develops…

1 – In Station System, my DPS Brutix and the hostile main fleet are all at 0km on the gate, everyone targeting but no one shooting!

2 – On other side of gate, my Tank Brutix and the hostile Wolf are at 0km on the gate, everyone targeting but no one shooting!

This is pretty much a Mexican Standoff in Space! Mexican Standoffs are stupidly intense moments where nothing is happening! How awesome is that!?  Who will draw 1^st? Will they go for a headshot? Are you ready to be fired upon while seeing the sweat dripping out from your nemesis forehead?

On a more serious note, I needed to split those guys and the arrival on my 2^nd Brutix put them on “cautious” mode… I did not saw any way I could really take an advantage with the current Mexican Standoff in Space, so I warped off with both my Brutix, each in a different system.

This was a close one, but the longer I wait, they more backup they’re likely to bring. I need to man up fast or move along. I don’t really want to roam Stain all that much, and I got some targets here, so Its time to give another try. Too bad I lost my backup Brutix surprise advantage, but oh well…

The hostile fleet is still hugging the gate, so I jump my Tank Brutix into them and overload my MWD back to the gate. Only the Myrmidon and Wolf aggress… good. I jump out and burn back to gate once more. They follow and on the other side I’m aggressed by the Drake and Maller. EXCELENT! I had managed to split the 2 Battlecruisers (the main source of DPS and Tank on the hostile fleet) on each side of the gate. I jump out once, this time into the Myrmidon, Wolf, Dragoon, Jackdaw and Confessor, leaving the Maller and Drake separated in the previous system for 1 minute. 

I bring my DPS Brutix, take Improved Drop Drugs, and primary the Dragoon as it’s the easiest ship to kill and I don’t like being neuted. It melts. 

For my secondary target I went for the Myrmidon… It might seem a weird choice but I wanted to eliminate that source of high-DPS from the field while I had both my Brutix alive. 1100 DPS with a couple Medium Energy Neutralizers can kill an active tank ship pretty fast. Myrmidon was both buffer and active tank fitted, but went down at a nice rate.

For my tertiary target I went for the Wolf. Right now it was the softer target around.

At this point the Drake and Maller come back into the fight. Pleniers in the Tank Brutix was  scrammed by the Confessor, Jackdaw and Maller with structure reaching 50%. I decided to deaggress with him and see if I could jump out. I would keep shooting with Rtb in the DPS Brutix.

For my 4^th target I went for the Jackdaw.

The DPS coming from their fleet was too much and Pleniers dies with 20 seconds aggression left.

For my 5^th target I went for the Confessor.

Now, only the Drake and Maller survive, but my remaining Brutix is going down at a fast pace. Only the Maller is scrambling me, but shooting it is a futile exercise! I scram and Web the Maller, but my main objective is to achieve some range control, in order to slowboat away from him!

5km away, 35% structure… 6km away, 30% structure… 7km away 25% structure... 8km away, 20% structure… 9km AWAY, SCRAM DOWN! Still long pointed by Drake! ACTIVATE MJD AND MWD! GOGOGOGOGO!... 15% structure…

MJD activates and I’m able to warp off Rtb with around 15% structure. While I was warping off I remembered… Why did I not put my ECM drones onto the Maller?! I had forgotten completely about them, but I’m glad I managed to bail out without them. If I had died, I would be slapping me in the face for forgetting about them.

I did lost one Brutix and almost lost both of them… Is there anything I could have done differently to avoid my loss or kill more of them? I don’t really think so… I could have pressed on with Pleniers instead of deaggressing with him and probably killed the Jackdaw and Confessor faster, but I still have many reservations about killing the Maller fast enough, even with both Brutix shooting him for the limited period of time Pleniers was still alive.

Overall I was glad with the result and happy on finding some action in the system where the WH spawned because I don’t really like roaming Stain…