Zappity's Adventures: Entosis Rapier of Magnificence

Things were quiet and I was bored, sitting in a plex while writing up the story of the epic Slicer fight. Suddenly, I noticed I was no longer alone in my plex. A wild Comet had appeared and very rudely scrammed me. Didn’t he know I was busy? I hastily locked him up and set my drones on him. Alas, it was a mirrored fight and I had simply begun too late. So here you go, a Comet loss just for you:

Comet: https://zkillboard.com/kill/57060691/

A couple of hours later I was sitting in a borrowed Rapier on an entosis node somewhere in Tribute. The theory behind using Rapiers for entosis is great: they have long webs and can use an Entosis Link II well beyond 200 km. You are meant to sit there, orbiting the node at this sort of range and entose away. If a flight of angry interceptors appears to defend their space, you are meant to use your cunning and webs to evade them until the entosis link cycles down and you are able to warp away. Such is the theory.

I was halfway through the entosis cycle when they appeared, at least a dozen interceptors landing on the node at zero. They did not look very pleased to see me to be honest. They began burning toward me at a most alarming pace. I gently aligned away to a random corp bookmark that was somewhat close to the direction I was already heading in order to avoid losing too much speed. I then swapped my sensor booster script to scan resolution, wanting the ability to lock them quickly.

The ships covered the distance quickly, and before long the leader was within 50 km. I slapped an overheated web on him and he rapidly fell away! Well that worked really well. If only he was the only one. Because the second interceptor was now also under 50 km away, requiring a web of his own. At this point, I recognised the limitations of a fit with only two webs. A third interceptor was in range, so I quickly switched targets and webbed him back, too. One of them landed an overheated point on me! I webbed him, too, just as my entosis link cycled down. I warped!

I didn’t accomplish anything but it was a hell of a rush.

Zappity's Adventures: Just a sigh about ECM

Oh look, a Griffin Navy Issue on d-scan along with half a dozen flashy yellow and red types in local. Now, I hate ECM as much as the next person but what can I say? I was curious! I hadn’t fought one of these things before. And anyway, I was in my magnificent Comet, slayer of all.

I waited for him with my drones set to aggressive, ready for the offensive even if I was jammed. He landed in the plex and immediately - IMMEDIATELY - jammed me. I was pretty much helpless for the twenty seconds. I waited patiently for the cycle to end, only to be immediately jammed again. Of course, by this time a bunch of Tristans and Slicers and all sorts had appeared on short-scan.

My Comet was not taking any damage from the Griffin so the situation was obvious: he was tackle and they were about to land and kill me to death. I had no range control because I could not lock him to apply a web. My drones, I assumed, were chipping away at him but I realised that any tackle worthy of the name would have a decent buffer fit.

Finally, the second cycle ended and the next jams failed! A couple of seconds later he was counter-tackled and I was able to rapidly pull range. I warped to the safe I was aligned to before I could be caught again.

I would just like to leave an important message here. I hate jams. I don’t care if they are balanced. I don’t care if they are OP. I just hate the way ECM feels as a mechanic and CCP should feel bad.

I hunted on until I found a Slicer who was willing to do battle. I fumbled the fight badly. Things started out fine because I remembered to set my drones on him. I was so proud of this that I forgot to activate my guns. I was then concentrating so hard on slingshotting him that, when I did finally activate them, I didn’t notice that they weren’t hitting him properly at range. When I did see this, I deactivated the guns and tried to reload Spike during the cooldown cycle. Which obviously didn’t work.

By this time I was in structure and he still had a good chunk of armour left. He was too good to catch with a slingshot (although I must confess to not getting my afterburner cycle management quite right) and I resigned myself to a well-deserved explosion. When the explosion finally came I cursed the client for lagging because my modules were still on screen. And then I realised that it was he who had exploded! My worthy opponent had neglected his reps and was popped by a wrecking shot! Ha!

Slicer: https://zkillboard.com/kill/57060441/

Zappity's Adventures: Lowsec, good old lowsec

After four months away I was finally home and de-jet-lagged. Time to PvP. I decided that an Incursus was the right ship for me. I needed to reconnect and get rid of the shakes.

I safely exited Jita and made my way toward the Cal/Gal warzone near my old stomping ground of Ishomilken. A couple of jumps out saw me in a system with two players with suspiciously similar names. They were piloting a Vexor and a Kestrel according to d-scan. I taunted them but they declined to fight. Actually, they just ignored me! Rude.

In the next system I found a Worm flitting between plexes, evidently looking for people to kill. I don’t like Worms. I remember that they were hideously overpowered the last time I did this sort of thing. But I wanted a fight.

I warped to his plex and sat on the acceleration gate until I thought he would have spotted me on d-scan. I then warped to the adjacent plex at 10 km. I wanted to catch him before he had the chance to kite-scrub me. Sure enough, he was soon on short scan. I overheated all the things and tackled him before he had a chance to run away.

I activated my repper a little too early and wasted the first cycle. Then all my armour disappeared and I was glad I didn’t have to wait long for the next cycle! The Worm hit REALLY hard. But his shield was disappearing pretty quickly, too. I guessed he was buffer fit and, sure enough, his armour disappeared in huge chunks. I was still repping hard when he entered structure and exploded. Ha!

Worm: https://zkillboard.com/kill/56936008/

I said ‘gf’ in local but he did not respond. Rude.

I went next door to Ishomilken and repaired my modules in the station. I undocked just in time to see an Epithal warp to a planet! Oh joy unbounded! I chased him and we landed at about the same time. Now, I am wary about Epithals, always suspicious that they are fitted with nasty warp core stabs. So I bumped him good with my afterburner while killing him slowly. He popped! Unfortunately, he had not yet gathered his planetary whatsits so the killmail was cheap. But he did indeed have stabs fit, so it was a moral victory.

Epithal: https://zkillboard.com/kill/56936202/