[Poetic] Flying With The King of Space
Flying With The King of Space
So, I clone jumped back down to Delve today to take part in a Tengu fleet that The Mittani had broadcasted earlier in the day. He was going to be online and flying with the coalition, something he does not do often. I figure, if one is in the CFC then one should make an effort to fly with the most famous person in EVE and the head of the CFC, at least once in their career. Flying with Mittens is the Mecca of CFC membership. I heard the Adhan called out by the muezzin and I answered. Now I can say "been there, done that."
As I discovered tonight, the major drawback of nullsec operations into enemy territory is a lack of breaks. In lowsec, if I needed a break, I could just dock up in system, most times, and even if I couldn't, it was pretty safe to just jump a system or two away until I did find a place to dock up. There are not giant fleets and bubbles and such to contend with in lowsec. If I needed a break, there was little to worry about breaking off from fleet to do so.
That's not the case in nullsec, especially if you're in an alliance that doesn't operate in the area. The Goonswarm people had a POS they could go park in. I'm GENTS, so I didn't know where the POS was located, and I'm pretty sure I needed a password to get inside the shields. Neither was going to be handed over to me. I was in a hell of a lot of distress, though. Let's just say that I love a good spicy Chicken Vindaloo, but that it doesn't always sit well with me. It just got to the point that I had to leave the computer, no ifs ands or buts. I just hoped that when I returned I was still going to be sitting in a 450M ISK Tengu. Fifteen percent TiDi gave me more breathing room than what would have been normal.
It worked out. I didn't lose the ship. But man, 2.5 hours without a break, that's something I am definitely not used too. That said, Lazarus Telraven runs an active fleet. It was 2.5 hours of non-stop activity. During my distress break, I'd scurried off just as we were warping from a fight, and when I returned we were in the middle of another fight, completely different location. (Thank you nullsec penchant for fleet warps.)
We spent most of the night teamed up with NCDot and Pandemic Legion, dunking on poor TEST Alliance. To be honest, I felt bad for TEST. Comms were generally laughing up their incompetence, but they had three alliances beating on them at once. If it were TEST, PL and NCDot dunking on us, I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have fared so well either.
Yeah yeah, I know I once called for a war between the CFC and the HBC, but that was when the HBC included Pandemic Legion. I'm really kind of neutral on TEST Alliance. Those calls were really about my desire to see Pandemic Legion get its shit shoved in. I've no particular love for the Legion.
But I'm not calling the shots. I'm not in charge of our allies on any particular night. PL and NCDot are still red to us, but on this night they were allies against TEST. So, I'll do as asked, and not grumble about it too much. I did add 31 more kills to the killboard. And it was a fun night. Some laughter. Some jokes. The Mittani telling a couple of stories.
I did, unfortunately, make a big fitting faux pas. Originally it was supposed to be a HAM (Heavy Assault Missile Launcher) Tengu fleet. But at some point they put out some instructions for fitting changes. I didn't read those instructions very carefully, because I only made the changes to the mid-slots. Once we got into the first fight, I quickly realized that I was also supposed to switch out the HAMs for HMLs (Heavy Missile Launchers). I could not hit 90% of the targets. Basically, I'd just fire off a volley or two to whore on the killmail. Firing off more than that was a waste of ammo. I did not mention my mistake in fleet. I didn't want to draw any more attention to myself than I was getting. I wasn't getting a lot of attention, mind you, but enough that I didn't want to escalate it by an order of magnitude. I don't want to be known as the Dumbass immediately, I'd rather just ease into that role over time.
A mistake I won't make again.
It was a good night for fighting. And another interesting nullsec experience. I can't say I understand all the bizarre politicking happening right now in the Delve region, but its intriguing to say the least.
Source: Flying With The King of Space