Lost my Proteus

It started out as a good day... ended up pretty bad. I drop into the C3 I was camping and found the old neighbor sitting near his guns, and no force field on the PoS. Warping to a pounce, I drop back in and pop his indy. We exchange pleasantries, and I go and kill his Ibis and two cans of Stront. Loot, and pop the wrecks, the neighbor logs out.

I should have log out too... instead Sa convinces me to hang around while he hauls a PoS and drops in the hole. Soon as he does, I hear hole fire and watch a t2 scout jump in and out. Wierd behaviour aside, we have this guy tagged as red. Corp is red. Sa cloaks up and slow boats away from the anchoring PoS.

Three more jump and jump back, a Moa finally jumps in and warps to a planet. I warp right behind him at 100km... and right on top of him decloaking. I go for the tackle, and see a dictor on dscan a momment later. Followed by a Cane, and a couple more BCs.

Yup, I fell for the bait and paid for it with my T3. I built this T3 with love, specifically to kill miners and indys in the Old Hole. They had a habit of getting away, until I rebuilt the Proteus with a faction 3-point.

Sa's alt is trapped in the neighbor's hole, with a tower and only a days fuel. Sa is putting it on the grape-vine to find the hole and rescue his lost alt and tower. I'll let you know when we find him again, might be a while.

Ice Changes

ZOMGWTFBBQ? Ice belts being removed? Grav sites going away, and being replaced with no-probes required anoms? Ice becoming a four hour wait for the next site? Choas? Dogs and Cats sleeping with each other? MADNESS?!?!!

So... the second hole is on hold ( same number of letter, just change the 'e' for a 'd' ). The alts are going back to farming ice... lots of ice. While we were in boringville, carving ice, we had an ibis show up right next to us. Sa warps all of us to the station! WTF? Suddenly three red-flashy ships drop right where we were. Good job!!!

One gets nailed by Concord, the other two warp out and back to the second set of targets. By this time Sa's alt is back in a BC and 'tags' the two flashies for a nice Concord assisted KM. He was laughing so hard he blew coffee out his nose!

So we log for an hour or so, end up checking the home hole and dicking with the neighbors. We cleared out all of thier LADAR sites, for about four hours. The reactors are offline while Ge micro-manages some BPOs and component production.

Sunday morning, we log in and check the neighbor again. He has visitors!!! I have all the sites book-marked, and I start making perches. Three tengus should be a good match-up for our little five-person fleet. We load up a Loki, Proteus, Falcon and two HAM Drakes, and an alt sits in a Hictor... just in case.

My first attempt at a close tackle go poor, I set up a perch in the fifth site and go for the gold. Warping in the Falcon and Loki we decloak only to see them warp off... somehow warned we were coming.

We all load up scouts, and put out probes to find thier entrance. A minute later, I have the K162... we put up pickets and wait. Five minutes later a Condor and Kestral jump through the K162 and warp to seperate sites. Ge goes for a tackle and misses the Kestral, Sa reports the Condor cloaks on site.

After a few cloak and bounce sessions, as well as watching them create pounces. I tell Ge to try again, he misses and in frustration loots some sleeper loot and shoots the wrecks. They get the hint and warp to the K162, I follow them inside and quickly find thier home PoS(s). Ze takes up picket at the K162, and watches a Pilgrim enter the K162 behind me. I take up position over thier PoS and watch ship changes.

Two of thier number log out, Sa calls for the Falcon and overwatch as he grabs the stabbed Noctis and collects all of the loot remaining. Shortly after finishing, Ge reports a cloaky t2 leaving. We load up the Bloots, escort it home and crit the connection. I stay in the neighbors hole, and we all log out for Ice mining.

Did I mention Ice Mining is boooorrrinngs? We did it anyway. We haven't been on our alts for more than ten minutes when a yellow flashy drops into the belt. We dutifully warp off, Sa grabs the BC and heads back. I go make lunch while he tackles and kills a Minmatar FW pilot who had a suspect flag. Since our home hole and alts are 'hot', we take the rest of day to play WoT.

Three CHEERS for PoS changes!

The upcoming changes to PoSs will have a major impact on our little corp. Roles will be revised, divisions will be re-purposed, and security will be increased! I can't wait!!!

Being able to section off people's loot and specialty Mods will allow us to expand our recruitment drive. Now about those hangers?

Sa has said he will allow us three hangers in the PoS; one for Corp Ships, one for senior members and one for the newbies. Ge thinks we should forgo the Corp Ship hanger and divide the corp into three divisions ( or four )? I think the three/four with Corp ships in the senior hanger a more efficient plan. Ammo and common mods should still be shared too.

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In other news VC and his family haven't logged in for some time, I think he has left the game completely. My infiltration alt is in his second corp... also, very low activity levels. Another month he will be able to AWOX his target, got an antsy employer who wants results and a corpse. This alt won't be a burnable asset once he is done, going to move him to statis for a month or so, then find another personal contract.

Back from the Concert

Well, the group is back from a Concert in Spokane, Don Williams fine voice crooning old country. Just like I remember.

Hit the local Gold Wing group, picked up some snazzy wall hangings and the booby-prize to boot. Good food, and nice people, we will be headed back next year to give the giant underwear back. We signed it of course, the history goes back five years.

The WH sleepers are really slowing down, and discussions have turned to farming a second hole. Our current home, we made very uncomfortable for the previous residents, until they got the hint and moved back to NS. Finding an unoccupied hole on the lower end is unlikely.

Moving up to a C3 is totally workable as far as skill. We are discussing a possible C3-NS hole, logistics would be an absolutely nightmare. Some of us have lived in a C2-LS hole, which was profitable and exciting. The biggest turn-off is we lost a couple of people due to the 'hostile' environment in low sec.

I am pretty sure we could handle a C3-NS. We would need to prep two orcas, full pos and modules with mostly compressed ( un-manufactured ) fuel. Then anchor large secure safes for emergencies, and bring in our security fleet. It would take a full commitment to get it set up, once in place it would only need four pilots to generate a good income.

On other notes, the corporation is stabilizing. Alts are moving into place, and we should have the most recent pilots trained to handle the C2. Production is slowing down due to a lack of sleeper salvage, and ladar sites. Ge is considering moving his production side back into K-space and leave the reactions in the hole.

Laying low

Five dead in our home system. It appears one gorup was harvesting sleepers in the hole, only to be jumped by an equal sized group. The losses show a Tengu loss vs 2 Drakes, 1 Hurricane and 1 Corax loss. The Corax was PvP fit!

Three K162s keep everyone laying low for the rest of the day. Morning form up, we find the statics are EoL. One Ladar site later, we start logging out. Ge spams a text to everyone, a Harby is in the hole killing out sleepers.

While we were gassing, a combat site popped up and the Harby slipped through the EoL static to take a crack at it. We miss three times to tackle him as he warps celestials.

After we are sure he is gone, we roll the statics and head to work. Makes me wish we had more people to watch our collective backs.

Fixing whats broken

Repairing the corp, restoring alts, bringing in new fuel and trying to find replacement pilots. Exhasting...

Over the weekend, I managed to pop t1 frig and pod. I heard back from Ze that the piloted had 'just learned about wormholes.' The lie couldn't get much deeper from a 1 year old pilot, with nascent skills. Either way, new corpse in my collection and some loose trash for the market.

Clearing the hole and prepping a second PoS has taken it's toll. I have all the mods on hand for a second PoS, and most likely will be finding another hole to park our up and coming combat pilots in. A solid C2 with a LS static would be great, maybe with some pink fluffy clouds. I would even entertain a C1 with a LS static for teaching new pilots.

I don't think I can shake Ge out of the current hole, he is an industrialist at heart. His PI is getting more efficient too.

Breaking up

I log in last night to find half the corp leaving! Without warning, VC and his Son-in-law are leaving for greener pasture. He logs off just as we log in.

He logs onto an alt, and leaves the shared channel. I PM him, finally get him to speak. He took all his toys and left us with control over the corp and alt corp. Not very forthcoming... I know him at work, he hasn't acted this erratic before.

So, here we are split into multipul corps. Sa is discussing with Ge about re-merging the old corp and moving yet again... I can't blame Ge for not wanting to move again. We are deeply invested in our WH. Moving the towers again, is just a pain.

Personally, I don't think I have the time or energy to move all of our crap again.

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On other notes, we could go back to war-deccing bears in hs. The tears are beautiful out in k-space.

On the hunt

Having a night off, I decided to really look around our neighbors house. I found two small PoS and a medium PoS in the C3. Figuring they would make great kills... zero defense, one hanger and two maintenance arrays available for plundering.

A full scan later, I find two k162s. One leads to NS and the other to LS, the static is also a LS! I text and assemble the troops for a hole rolling party at the neighbors. Adding in every character in the three target corps for good justice.

Soon as we being the roll, Sa spots a familiar named Anathema. He drops a probe and finds we have a new sig in the neighbors house, a quick scan finds a new K162.

I drop my alt into the hole and find it is previously scouted. The book marks show massive warnings... it is occupied by [HAHA], also known as 'Surely youre Joking'.

Some days you are the boot, some days you are the spider. We roll our hole, and leave the scout alone. We kill sleepers, set up manufacturing and reactions. Everyone logs out for a round or three or WoT.

Weekend kill

After waking up late, I start scanning down the home hole. Nothing special, we will have this cleaned out in less than an hour... or so I think. Breakfast at Chapter B interrupted, and three hours later we are back online and ready to roll.

Two quick passes and presto, mags and anoms down, cleaned up and manufactuing set. Things are smuggled out through lowsec and isk is made. People log out for WoT.

I stick around and keep exploring. Our neighboring c3 has holes to NS and LS, I am deeply saddened that NS was actually occupied this weekend. I hop out to LS and start scanning, three addition k162s appear. One is EOL, two others look like c2 and a c3. I drop into the c2 and find nothing.

The c3 has lots of ships, dscan shows where the PoSs are located. One PoS is full of ships, and no pilots. I hunt down the second PoS and find two pilots, and incapped guns. One is in an frigate, the other in a t1 logi cruiser.

Something odd about the logi, it wasn't parked near the PoS... it was parked outside of the shields! I look closer, it isnt repairing the guns nor the shields. I set my sights on the cruiser, and start my slow maneuvering to it's position.

It is 1k outside of the shields, I decloak and MWD bump him to 6k. Scram and web, and start shooting. He melts... his pod pops out and starts moving towards the shield. Scram-web that, and pop it. Scoop the corpse, and try and loot the cruiser. Not enough room, and the modules are cheap. Pop the wreck and warp to a pounce.

The frigate shows up and huddles near the PoS.

I go make lunch.

Waiting on the pounce.

This mornings statics and k162s are all great! I have two semi-active holes and a hole full of germans! Just love that luck, and I am working today. My friend Ge is hiding out, sick he says, allergies says I.

So Ge is setting up standard pounces in the home hole, that is about 250k to 400k from the center of each site. Also means everything in the hole is active, and we have two to four days to harvest before it is all gone. Ge text me, to say that the germans moved an Azaru near the k162, and cloaked up. Got to love a trap.

In other news, my Granddaughter spent the night and shared breakfast before we left for work. I really enjoy the time with her.

PI and loot

My endevours of PI has netted me about 600mil in three weeks, which is enough to refit my tired Proteus. Paying the monthly bill with PLEX was also nice. Production has been slow again, we might be buying more gas from k-space. Loot was sub-par, barely bringing in 50mil.

On another note, someone died in the home-hole. And like usual, the killboards are silent.

Saying good-bye

The local germans have finally struck back at the invading NS'ers. With the constant possing of my potential targets, I have called it a day. Moving my looted modules out was fairly easy, and I left a flight of combat probes out as I left.

Returning to the home hole, I finally picked up three weeks of PI. Contracted my loot to be sold, and finally took a night off of hunting.

Good-bye Old Hole! Next time I bring in friends!!!

Bounty and talking smack.

Back to the Old Hole, and presto, miners. Those pesky ventures are back, I have refit my proteus just for them! And it pays off in spades, I nab one and pop him.

The next two days I watch as two of the pilots pod themselves to where-ever, instead of scanning down the static to highsec. It appears they didn't have the skills to do just that. So I find thier pub and crash it.

After a few minutes of watching the PoS, I see PsychoBitch (yes, that is the characters name) slow-boat out of the shield in a spade-head proteus. Teasing them in thier own pub only solidifies the idea they are new to WH space, I am eventually kicked out of the pub.

Sitting afk, I come back to an open conversation box with one of my victims. So much for staying afk ;) The corp kills a few sleepers and harvests gas while I am out of game, and another possible suicide happens. Since there is no killmail, I am assuming it was another suicide. Making two ships and three pods imploding.

Easter starts out with three bounties of 100k each, and ends with a dead cruicifier in system. Still no killmail, waiting, waiting... nope, no killmail. Make that four suicides?

The local germans do nothing about the Gallente PoS in 'thier' system. Looks like it is time to move out and find some other targets. These seem to be onto my little game.