Spirit of the Season

I can't remember a lucky streak like the one I've been enjoying in the recent weeks. It sure didn't end with that mining Navy Megathron from my previous blog post.

Killing my first tier 3 battlecruiser on my own (in a fierce 2 on 1 battle, no less) is worth a mere sidenote next to other crazy and much more profitable engagements.

Two days ago I caught some talk about some Vargur running a mission in Jovainnon, while Taurean and I were busy a few jumps further out. Between scanning and pondering tactics, I bothered to ask what a Vargur was anyway. Once I was told it was a marauder class battleship, I suddenly became much less busy busy and made haste heading back.

By the time Taurean and I were in position, our tackler Konig was lamenting his cruel fate - apparently he got popped messing up his orbit someway. The next bits of intel informed our little fleet that the Vargur had docked and logged off.

However, the marauder had returned after our guys' first attempt to pin it down. I also learned that it had managed to escape after destroying a Lachesis of ours. Yikes.

To make sure it came back a third time and actually stay put, I suggested to bring my Stiletto and position it near the mission gate. I would then log off and wait for our scout's mark to log back in as soon as the Vargur was back on its way to the site.

Luckily, the Vargur pilot did indeed return and warp where we wanted him. Seconds later the marauder was pointed. With that out of the way, our next step was bringing in some boats that packed some punch. Why yes, we had quite the thorough organization going. Seriously though, the whole episode started off bad and just refused to get any better; I was starting to worry how we'd mess it up next.

I could persuade my fellow Tuskers to ransom the guy ("I'm spacepoor, remember?") and invited him to our ransom channel. He complied easily enough to stop shooting, so we could negotiate the terms in a civilised fashion. Another Tusker chimed in that he could bring a ship scanner, so we told our customer to please stand by for a moment.

As it turned out, the marauder had some pretty expensive gear fitted. We agreed to offer safe passage for 1.5 billion Internet Spaceship Kurrency. His counter offer consisted of one fully fitted Heavy Interdictor. We respectfully declined and proposed that he should eject from his ship, saving his pod and his assumed head full of implants.

His final rejection forced us to unleash a storm of DPS upon him. Yet somehow our Hurricane, Malediction, Wolf and Stiletto failed to make any sort of dent into his active shield tank. Worse, the Vargur forced our Hurricane off the field - despite two tracking disruptors on him. Why yes, we began to feel faintly foolish by all this.

With our pathetic little pool of less than effective ships, we pleaded for assistance in our intel channel (in retrospect, I should've just gone and get my Cruor, leaving Taurean to the tackling).

As soon as Tsubutai was done mocking us, he had the grace to jump clones and bring his Machariel into the fray. Shortly thereafter the Vargur exploded, which gave me the chance to lock the pod and see it warp off... I did have my point cycled, do you think I'm stupid? You're stupid!

At least things didn't end as badly as they started and we got roughly a billion ISK out of the wreck.

But wait, there is more!

Earlier today I was hauling some assets from Hulmate to Hevrice. I made the four jumps in my Stabber Fleet Issue, packed my stuff and was on my way home again soon enough. Back in Jovainnon, there was a neutral Harpy sitting on my in-gate. No point risking my cargo under sentry guns, so I engaged warp to Hevrice gate.

Interestingly, the Harpy had a lock on me right as I was done aligning and in warp. If it was ready to engage, I would happily oblige. The Harpy followed me eagerly and buzzed around me for a bit. Micro warp drive and rail guns, also interesting.

It was orbiting me at about 12km when it opened fire and put a warp scrambler on me. I casually flicked on my own overheated scrambler, webifier and afterburner and started to approach the assault ship. This expert maneuver I spontaneously dubbed "Osnap, son" was super effective.

The Loot Fairy, obviously struck by a festive mood, granted me all but one of the Harpy's faction modules. Merry Christmas.

WHAT.

I brought my Stabber Fleet Issue to Adirain, where two rookies in cruisers were merrily ratting together. They eventually ended up in a belt with an unaffiliated Thrasher. When I arrived at the belt, no one was shooting anyone. A peaceful scene, disrupted by me laying into the Omen. Both his Maller friend and the Thrasher had the sense to flee.

As I was looting the wreck, I noticed new locals and checked my scanner. It showed a Megathron Navy Issue. A second later, the thing fell right into my proverbial lap.

Okay, I thought, You can do this! This is why you got this boat! Get right under his guns, pray he doesn't have two neuts and focus down the drones first!


I hit orbit and pulled range. Wait, why was I pulling range? I checked and the button said 1500. I realized the new orbit storing must be bugged as I was drifting out of scram range. In the ten seconds it took me to re-establish point, I noticed hardly any incoming damage. [Looking at the footage, I never hit the orbit button and just over-shot in my excitement.]

Turned out he was completely helpless; i.e. not going anywhere, not doing any harm to me, losing armor damn fast. It was time to invite him for a chat. Doing so, I noticed the Thrasher nearby again, no new pilots in system. The Thrasher landed and attacked me.

I lazily assigned my drones to beat up the young destroyer pilot, ordering the Navy Mega pilot to cease fire if he wanted to save his ship.

No answer. New people entered the system, the Maller was on scan again. As good a time as any to finish this flying pinata. The Thrasher wasn't looking so good either, but kept firing heroically.

Pop went the Thrasher, pop went the pile of half a billion ISK.

I looked at the killmail.

Then I almost pulled a muscle bursting into laughter.

High Profile

Even as a director of The Tuskers, I'm sometimes baffled at how widely we are known. And I'm delighted that many people who have encountered or temporarily joined us speak so highly of our corporation and what we do.

Take this recent Crime & Punishment thread. I'm simply stumped at just how positively many people there speak of The Tuskers, considering that this particular discussion board isn't always the most civilized of places (to put it lightly).

Here's a direct quote from this very thread:

"That's probably because they spend most of their time active in-game rather than trying to convince everyone how pro they are (or crying about game mechanics) on the forums."

Well, I would consider this is pretty spot-on. We're not about blatantly shoving our killboard statistics in people's faces whereever we go. We're not about slandering our competition in regions we frequent. We're about doing what we do and we enjoy doing it well; preferrably to the point of excellence. People pick up on that eventually.

In the meantime, The Tusker Code is making sure that we're not putting them off. Chest beating, smack talking, scamming, lying - none of that has a place in our corp of - get this - pirates and warriors. Not saying none of that ever occurs, but the accused better has a very good explanation if it does.

The fact that The Tuskers are housing about half a dozen active bloggers generates further publicity. There are many tales of great victories; hardly boastful, often analytic and not rarely self-critical. Some terrible failures of ours regularly warrant an update as well. It's perfectionists writing about their craft and trade - admittedly for self-exposure and recognition, but done in style (at least I'm trying).

Recently it even seems like our level of exposure is gaining more momentum. Besides the thread staying on top of C&P for quite a while, I assume Taurean's and Suleiman's blogs are getting more and more readers. Rixx Javix over at the highly popular EVEOGANDA has given this snowball even more of a push, starting off his new series Know Your Lowsec Corps with The Tuskers. That's a lot of people who got to know us in one fell swoop.

So we do what we do, maintain a positive image and therefore have word of mouth working for us. But what makes sure The Tuskers aren't consistently, even occassionally picking up bad apples, who might set us back? The answer lies in our recruitment process.

First and foremost, the hoops applicants have to jump through are clearly laid out. Even if they miss one, they're encouraged to try again. Granted, I in particular can be a bit of a hard-ass if an application is significantly lacking in parts. But not even I slam the door shut immediately. Either way, our requirements rarely fail to filter out pilots who are a better fit for corps of different flavors.

All of the above makes me proud to be a Tusker and I'm happy to be a director as well, sometimes getting to be the first to welcome new great members into our ranks.

The one and only downside is that targets are becoming more and more wary as soon as they see our emblem in local. I for one can live with that, though. I'm even working on spreading our name, soon beyond blogging, too. You might want to stay tuned for that.