However I decided it was a suitable target against which to test my newly acquired tech 2 beam lasers. The ammo I planned to use was Gleam, a special ammo only usable by tech 2 guns. It is hugely damaging but has a downside. When it is loaded it halves the amount of my shields. This is not as bad as it sounds however as my main form of defence is armour. Shields are a damage soak not a survival tool. After loading gleam into my guns I opened a conversation with the Arbitrator pilot to bide for time and let my shields recharge.
[ 2010.08.17 13:59:52 ] Shota Cypher > o/
[ 2010.08.17 13:59:57 ] Brielle 15 > o/
[ 2010.08.17 14:00:03 ] Shota Cypher > something up?
[ 2010.08.17 14:00:16 ] Brielle 15 > allow me to jettison something?
[ 2010.08.17 14:00:37 ] Shota Cypher > why wouldn't I lol
[ 2010.08.17 14:00:45 ] Brielle 15 > why not
[ 2010.08.17 14:00:51 ] Brielle 15 > scared of a girl?
A girl! A surprise but not an unwelcome one. Many of my duels against other male pilots has resulted in them killing me despite the agreement to stop at hull. It seems testosterone takes over. I answered,
[ 2010.08.17 14:00:59 ] Shota Cypher > not at all :)
[ 2010.08.17 14:01:03 ] Shota Cypher > you want to fight?
[ 2010.08.17 14:01:07 ] Brielle 15 > hummm
[ 2010.08.17 14:01:19 ] Brielle 15 > yea
[ 2010.08.17 14:01:46 ] Shota Cypher > to hull?
[ 2010.08.17 14:02:07 ] Brielle 15 > sure
[ 2010.08.17 14:02:12 ] Shota Cypher > kk 2 secs, I'll get your can
I approached her jettisoned can and took the 280mm artillery cannon inside. Instantly I was webbed, scrambled and totally capped out. The neutralisers on her cruiser were going to make this near impossible. Luckily I had a tech 2 nosferatu equipped. I activated and began to drain her cap. This thin sliver of energy allowed me to open fire. Gleam was everything I had hoped, blasting at her shields and quickly whittling them down. As of yet no damage had been applied to me and I was growing in confidence.
The sound of targeting came through my sound system, alerting me that something was locking onto me. Panning my camera drones I found an unwelcome sight. 5 Acolyte drones were swarming towards me. The choice of Acolyte confused me for a moment, yes they would rip through my shields but they would find it hard to deal with my armour. My punisher has a 8.5% resistance to Em on my shields and a 70% resistance to Em damage on its armour
As the drones approached I knew I would have to kill them if I wished to win this fight. Suddenly my guns stopped firing. She had moved out of my Nos range but was still able to neut me with her much longer ranged neutralisers. This was a disaster, as long as I was webbed I could not catch her and she was already over 15km away. Although no longer webbed (she had moved out of range) if I attempted to chase her down she would simply web me again and push out of range. The drones arrived. Now in real trouble I had a sudden flash of brilliance. Run Away.
There was no reason I had to stay in her neut range. Turning my Punisher away I hit my afterburners and had another flash of brilliance. I knew I could not tank the drones forever so I would simply try and put as much damage on Brielle as I could. I also had a trick which would hopefully throw her a bit. I switched to Aurora, a much longer ranged ammo and instantly my shields boosted back up to half full as the negative effects of the gleam were removed.
I opened fire, red beams of light arching out to her cruiser, glowing as they impacted on its now nearly empty shields. And then they stopped. We had moved so far away from each other I could no longer maintain a lock. This was turning into an epic battle of frigate verses cruiser. The cruiser doing far better in terms of health with about 1/4 shields remaining. My frigate however was flagging a bit and beginning to show the stresses of the drones lasers. Now out of targeting range of the cruiser I switched to her drones and after waiting for the lock began to shoot. Not a single shot hit as the drones orbited too fast for the lasers to follow.
I turned my lasers and afterburners off and began to conserve every joule of cap for my armour repper while nossing one of the drones. A minute later my armour gave in and the drones began to hit my structure.
[ 2010.08.17 14:04:14 ] Shota Cypher > ok stop
[ 2010.08.17 14:04:18 ] Shota Cypher > good fight and nicely done
This has taken far longer to write up than it did to actually take place. The whole fight took a little over 2 minutes (2 mins, 2 secs for those who care) and gave me a good overview of my ships capabilities against a far superior foe. It was great fun and I hope to have an Arbitrator of my own soon.
Amazingly as I continued to warp around the belts looking for either rats or a miner to grief I warped right on top of a Myrmidon. He instantly dropped 5 t2 hammerheads and locked me. I was astounded as that was the second time in under 10 minutes that I had been locked upon arrival at a belt. The residents of Hek sure love their pvp. Anyway I opened a chat and this happened,
[ 2010.08.17 14:20:26 ] Shota Cypher > what is it with people locking onto me while i'm ratting :P
[ 2010.08.17 14:20:32 ] Shota Cypher > your the second in 10 mins lol
[ 2010.08.17 14:21:00 ] Enararia > so if you try to can flip i can insta pop you
[ 2010.08.17 14:21:07 ] Enararia > thats bout it
[ 2010.08.17 14:21:26 ] Shota Cypher > I have no intrest in can flipping
Ok the last bit was not entirely true but I am not dumb enough to can flip a myrm.
Thats all for now so Fly Safe.
Ha, so you are one of from the Dark Side which my fellow industrialists warn me about.... But well done! Seems that there can be more to the Punisher than convential wisdom allows.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I found the short-range T2 ammo of any kind to be rather useless: Faction ammo delivers the same punch, but with much fewer drawbacks.
That was the first time I had ever used t2 weapons of any kind so I was very interested to see how they work. It was more eagerness than actual planning.
ReplyDelete