Ironfleet Towing And Salvage

After that last post I thought I’d better post about the extreme fun I had in an alliance op yesterday. We took a bunch of cruiser hulls (number varied, but 7-8 gives you the idea) and me in a blockade runner to carry the ammo and loot) into a wormhole down in Grincanne. While we were looking around, we encountered and destroyed (popped and podded) a couple of players in battlecruisers. Then we went two jumps deeper into deep wormhole space (this took a lot of time and probing).

From there, we found a wormhole that led to “unknown space” (that is to say, less deep and closer to high sec). Our FC in the Covert Ops jumped in there and scanned down a trio of ratting battleships. By that point we were down to five cruisers (including one Blackbird) and the gang was not enthusiastic. But the FC, rightly, pointed out that they were (a) not fit to kill cruisers and (b) not expecting “Ninjas! Thousands of Them!” or the Spanish Inquisition either one. Then he waited until one battleship warped off somewhere, before warping the gang (not including my toothless Blockade Runner) down on their hapless heads.

It was a slaughter, and not by our side — the battleships couldn’t track well enough to hit us and were heavily jammed by our Blackbird. The third battleship came back, took one look, and fled again, while we chewed the first two down to rubble.

Their pods got away, but we saw where they went, which made probing their exit wormhole fast. We popped out in Annaro just before the server crash, with about 1,000 cubic meters of loot worth about 17 million ISK. (Most of the ships killed were cheap t1 fits, but there were two high-meta lasers that were worth in excess of five mill each.)

I don’t think we lost anybody and it seemed like a good time was had by all. Some of the combat pilots aren’t happy with the time spent probing for wormholes, but the longest we spent was about half an hour. Many hands (and core probe launchers) make light work, as they say.

I realize that if I posted this story on the forums I’d get a “so you went roaming in a cruiser gang and got a few kills, what’s the big deal” troll. Tough. You gotta remember, we mostly operate alone or in small groups, in high sec space. A successful roaming gang is pretty good work for us. Add in the wormhole factor and the “killing ships bigger than us” factor, and it made for a very nice day.

I’ve been spending some time on the Singularity test server, checking out the new probing system coming with the March 10 Apocrypha expansion. It’s still horribly buggy, but looks promising; more player skill to use, less randomness, less endless waiting. It looks like it will be easier to find specific ships (especially in deadspaces) than at present, to the dismay of low sec mission runners; but on the converse, the “salvager buffet” in busy mission running systems is going away. Instead of getting many warpable hits in single scan, all nicely identified by ship type, possible mission runners will need to be checked out one-by-one, with probe repositioning between efforts. All in all, I’m quite happy about the proposed changes, but mission salvage will be very different in a few weeks.

So, I decided to have one more taste of it, and dropped some probes. Found, fairly quickly, a bunch of small and medium Blood wrecks at an acceleration gate. The directional scanner indicated large wrecks through the gate, so through the gate I went.

It was a small wreck field, with only about five large wrecks and perhaps twenty mediums and smalls; so I decided to cherry pick the larges in my covert ops ship, rather than going back for a dedicated salvager. Good thing I did, too; because about the time I finished salvaging the large wrecks, three mission runner types showed up and began hoovering their wrecks at a great rate of speed. I had ten armor plates and thirty burned logic circuits, so I was happy; I salvaged another half-dozen mediums while they worked, and we were done.

Note I said I was happy. Them? Not so much.

Shortly after they arrived, I got a convo invite. Jarmada, apparently as much a stranger to punctuation as he is to courtesy and spelling, got right to the point:

Jarmada > fuck off
Jarmada > is this you mission
Marlenus > Would you like a petition for bad language?
Jarmada > do iyt
Jarmada > this is not your missiopn
Marlenus > Never said it was
Jarmada > so get out
Marlenus > Why?

Apparently he was stymied by the rhetorical force of my inquiry, because he ended the conversation.

Perhaps unhappy with the outcome, he sent me a somewhat incoherent EVEmail:

to piss poor to do your own missions : so u steal from other pple : your a scum bag of the lowest form

At this point, I looked up his info. He’s the CEO and founder of a two-member corp confusingly called The Australian Alliance. Don’t they speak English in Australia? Or have some form of literacy education in primary school?

I replied with a cheerful version of the Ironfleet form letter:

Just a salvager, actually; salvaging wrecks is what I do for a living. It’s not theft — salvage is not owned.

Have a look at the Ironfleet Towing And Salvage blog (ironfleet.com) if you’re curious about the profession. While you are there, check out the “GMs On Salvage” article, to learn why it’s not theft as you seem to think.

Cheerio —

Marlenus, CEO
Ironfleet Towing and Salvage

This earned me a more coherent, if still unusually punctuated as well as unreceptive, response, urging me to play the game his way instead of mine:

salvage is theft : this is my mission : i did the kills : i dont use probes to find other pples salvage : go to a belt and salvage the wrecks there if ya want the salvage that bad

Pish, tush, my good man! If I did that, I wouldn’t have gotten all these lovely Armor Plates!

Somewhere in all this, he decided to do some Ironfleet advertising in local, which is always appreciated:

Jarmada > watch your missions guys : thers a prick in here mission jumping and salvaging your loot : name is “Marlenus” :
Ianmizu > just salvaging, or looting too?
Jarmada > just salvaging : so u cant shoot the asswipe
Ianmizu > ah :(
Jarmada > i not going to help the prick : not doin missions in this system
Jarmada > cya’s
Ianmizu > o/
Marlenus > Just another one of the many spaceways cleaning services Ironfleet Towing And Salvage is happy to provide!

I’m moving slowly through 0.0, because I can’t resist checking every POS for valuable stuff that’s not nailed down.

Found some, too.

Found, in fact, a large standard (!) container, drifting outside the force field, labeled “fuel for jump bridge.”

Only, there’s one small problem.

Which would be the battery of faction warp scramblers and warp disruptors and guns of every kind, all online and ready to make sawdust out of Core Complexion’s finest hull.

Sigh, moving on.

Ha! Not a dozen jumps into my adventure, and what do I see in local chat?

None other than the immortal Chribba (he of high-sec Veldnaught fame). And get this, he was saying:

Chribba: I hope they respond with “We didn’t want that alliance anyway” and post their new rebuild info.

Remember how dear sweet Chebri used to complain about Ironfleet “lies” at the drop of the hat, whenever she disagreed with the Ironfleet version of events? ( example example example example )

Given the close association between Duckeye and Chebri, I was therefore amused by the following exchange. I wrote awhile back:

A long time ago, in the time of The Great INDY War, I had a random war dec from a guy named Duckeye who never showed up. It was right after the INDY alliance called off AC-ME’s dog Chebri, and there were anonymous commenters in this post who suggested a Duckeye / Chebri connection, but it was never confirmed.

I did later confirm that Duckeye is a shared account, because I station camped him for awhile during factional warfare (he was flying for the Gallente scum) and we had a cordial chat during which he utterly failed to remember ever having declared war on Ironfleet, blaming his “little brother” who “played the account for a couple of weeks”. Yeah, that’s pretty obvious nonsense, but it’s the sort of nonsense you’ll get from account sharers who don’t want to be too open about it.

I got three things wrong in that; it was actually Jim Bridger who had the conversation with Duckeye, Duckeye did remember making the war declaration, and it turns out to have been “a friend” who was sharing Duckeye’s account. So, my account wasn’t perfect. But, in a comment, Duckeye showed up and called the story “bull”, on other grounds that make no sense at all:

I like the bull he talks about near the beginning though, because the only time I ever played with faction warfare was when the devs were testing it on singularity half a year ago, thats when I shot CCP Greyscale when he was in his ragnarok… hell my gallente standing is under -2.00, and thats all crap from a year and a half ago when I did missions for Caldari Navy as a mainstay like your everyday Joe, couldn’t participate in Gallente FW even if I wanted to.

I don’t even have a little brother, and I definately don’t talk in local when I decide not to undock because I just minimize eve and boot up another game, it’s fun to waste the campers time instead because they sit outside like retards.

But like I said, nothin but love. He sure tries hard, I’ll give him that.

I guess Duckeye knows something about bull all right, because Jim Bridger still has the chat log:

Channel ID: ((‘solarsystemid2′, 30001376),)
Channel Name: Local
Listener: Jim Bridger

Session started: 2008.06.25 07:07:39
…
[ 2008.06.25 07:17:02 ] EVE System > Channel changed to Nourvukaiken Local Channel
[ 2008.06.25 07:37:37 ] scout505 > caution, gate campers in tama
[ 2008.06.25 07:37:51 ] scout505 > lots of em
[ 2008.06.25 07:44:23 ] Duckeye > YAY CALDARI, GO CALDARI!!
[ 2008.06.25 07:46:02 ] Jim Bridger > Duckeye! Finally a war you show up for!
[ 2008.06.25 07:46:10 ] Duckeye > do I know you
[ 2008.06.25 07:46:20 ] Jim Bridger > LOL, you declared war on my corp once, but never showed up
[ 2008.06.25 07:46:36 ] Jim Bridger > For your friend Chebri I believe, but that was never clear
[ 2008.06.25 07:47:22 ] Duckeye > ah, yeah, I was going to help but my computer broke basically the same friggen and was out for a couple of weeks, I let a friend play on my account for awhile
[ 2008.06.25 07:47:32 ] Jim Bridger > Ah, happens
[ 2008.06.25 07:48:00 ] Duckeye > seems like it happens too often
[ 2008.06.25 07:51:12 ] Duckeye > I’ve found that the caldarians are pretty damn bored, was taking a complex by myself and was responded with 14 ships
[ 2008.06.25 07:51:35 ] Jim Bridger > LOL, we like to travel in groups. ;-)
[ 2008.06.25 07:51:52 ] Duckeye > noticed, you guys are built pretty much to be in gangs
[ 2008.06.25 07:51:53 ] Jim Bridger > I swear some of the boys outside in Tama can’t even beat off unless they are in a circle
[ 2008.06.25 07:52:48 ] Jim Bridger > I was running around in Gallente high sec in a rocket kestrel, but I did not find any unescorted pods. :(
[ 2008.06.25 07:53:02 ] Duckeye > you guys should probably head down to minmatar-land, they seem to be stomping on the amarr
[ 2008.06.25 07:53:35 ] Jim Bridger > Let ’em stop, I say! I went on a fleet expedition to help our Amarrian “brothers”, they were rude and condescending and got us all killed
[ 2008.06.25 07:53:44 ] Jim Bridger > Er, make that “let ’em stomp”
[ 2008.06.25 07:54:05 ] Duckeye > wouldn’t doubt it, they lost a paladin on the first day
[ 2008.06.25 07:54:25 ] Jim Bridger > They can’t decide what coms to use, so they never have an entire fleet on the same voice coms
[ 2008.06.25 07:56:45 ] Duckeye > you’d be surprised how off guard a lot of people are, all you need to do is hop into a stealth bomber and cruise around enemy safesec and catch ships autopiloting around
[ 2008.06.25 07:57:31 ] Jim Bridger > I am not an SB pilot yet, but I think we’ll be seeing a lot more of that
[ 2008.06.25 07:59:42 ] Duckeye > granted, sitting in a system with 50 war targets is interesting
[ 2008.06.25 07:59:55 ] Jim Bridger > We make it as interesting as we can! ;-)

PWNED by the logs!

Admittedly I’ve made my own mistakes of memory on this blog, but how do you forget participating in faction warfare?

Sorry I haven’t had a lot of updates recently; it’s been busy in real life and in-game, I’ve been flying a covert ops ship, scouting for the TEARS alliance in their recent war. That started off as a big deal, against a fairly large industrial alliance called the Coalition of The Extraordinary:

They brought some fight, Suddenly Ninjas was having a lot of fun and (with some other TEARS people) even killed an unescorted Orca (!). I spent a lot of time looking for more targets like that one, but I never really had much success, and thus, didn’t have anything to report here.

Then a couple more corps saw how much fun we were having, so they declared against COE also; COE, sensibly enough, hired mercenaries. That didn’t have the desired effect (the new TEARS allies had fun shooting at REPO, but TEARS kept hunting CEO) and now CEO appears to be in a failure cascade, with most of its members leaving in the last 24 hours. I suppose they may plan to re-marry after the war, but for now, CEO seems to be an empty shell of its former self:

All of which sounds exciting enough, but for me, it was a war that consisted of flying endless jumps, finding a system with war targets, confirming that they are all solidly docked up, waiting around for awhile to see if that changed (it never did, for me) and moving on.

Saw something in the belts I’d never seen today: a Retriever mining barge flying Tech II combat drones. With a jet can, out, of course.

I was out of position, so he had plenty of time to see me coming in on his can. He targeted me early. He wants to fight, eh?

I flipped the can, putting what I could in my hold. He scoops his drones.

What?

Yes, he scooped his drones. But, he’s also flashing red. I dunno, maybe he took from the Ironfleet can.

Doesn’t matter, I pound him.

Just before he pops, he decides to launch his drones again. Nice, that way they aren’t at risk in the explosion.

Also just before he pops, he gets a Merlin warping in for reinforcement. I don’t want to get scrambled and held for further reinforcements, but I’m not all that worried; so I looted up, scooped the Hobgoblin IIs, and made my departure.

2008.12.31 19:11:00

Victim: Angellis Ketatsu
Corp: The Careos Syndicate
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Destroyed: Retriever
System: [redacted]
Security: 0.7
Damage Taken: 2807

Involved parties:

Name: Marlenus (laid the final blow)
Security: 1.2
Corp: Ironfleet Towing And Salvage
Alliance: Tear Extraction And Reclamation Service
Faction: NONE
Ship: Crane
Weapon: Havoc Fury Heavy Missile
Damage Done: 2807

Destroyed items:

Strip Miner I
Pyroxeres, Qty: 10837 (Cargo)
Expanded Cargohold II

Dropped items:

Strip Miner I
Expanded Cargohold II
Small Shield Booster I

So Jim was out on a long patrol in his new Rifter when he passed through a system a couple of jumps from me and noted a four-month-old character (Gmachaine) from an NPC corp, mining in a Cormorant destroyer.

Into a giant secure container … that wasn’t anchored. It couldn’t be anchored, not in a .8 system.

So, he called me.

I headed over in my trusty Crane and scooped the container. Gmachaine immediately began targetting me.

Remember, now, that scooping a container never generates agro.

Then I heard the sound of weapons firing. Concord incoming?

Nope — he’s shooting at his asteroid, because he hasn’t switched target focus. Don’t laugh, I did it myself when I was a noob. It’s embarrassing.

Just then my mail icon flashes. EveMail from Gmachaine: “Did you just steal my cargo?”

He shoots at the asteroid for almost thirty seconds, then stops. Then, a pause … presumably he tried to shoot at me but got deterred by the Concord warning.

Now he’s asking for a conversation; I minimize the window, since I usually prefer not to talk to my salvagees until our transactions are complete.

I wait. Will he shoot me, out of blind faith that his cause is just and he can explain to the cops when they show up?

Apparently, no. I give him about thirty seconds, but he just sits there.

He’s got a rat wreck right there … maybe he’d shoot me if I went flashy?

I looted the wreck.

He begins shooting. Mistake. I warp scramble him and begin shooting heavy missiles. Destroyers and heavy missiles do not mix. He goes kaboom.

Now I feel a tiny bit bad. Four months and he’s still using a Basic Miner and shooting at me with Civilian Gatling Railguns?

2008.12.05 19:32:00

Victim: gmachaine
Corp: State War Academy
Alliance: NONE
Faction: NONE
Destroyed: Cormorant
System: [redacted]
Security: 0.8
Damage Taken: 2141

Involved parties:

Name: Marlenus (laid the final blow)
Security: 1.2
Corp: Ironfleet Towing And Salvage
Alliance: Tear Extraction And Reclamation Service
Faction: NONE
Ship: Crane
Weapon: Caldari Navy Thunderbolt Heavy Missile
Damage Done: 2141

Destroyed items:

EP-S Gaussian I Excavation Pulse
Civilian Gatling Railgun

Dropped items:

Basic Miner
Dual Diode Mining Laser I
EP-S Gaussian I Excavation Pulse
Civilian Gatling Railgun, Qty: 2

Today in my daily belt sweep I found a Covetor (been awhile since I saw one of those) mining into a jet can. Pilot was Achaja1980, member of a corp called K-Gene Armed Mining. Hmm, maybe these guys will fight for their ore?

When I returned in my trusty Crane, also present were two combat ships, baby ones, a Merlin and something else. Merlin was flying a K-Gene corp tag, and sure enough, he locked me up and started shooting when I flipped the (almost full) jet can. Trouble is, my Crane doesn’t have its inherent +2 warp stabilization any more, and even a Merlin can kill me eventually if I can’t escape. Especially with some friendly drones flying off the mining barge, which remains a possibility. So, I boogied.

And came back in a stealth bomber.

Sadly, nobody was there but the Covetor pilot. I cloaked, she left. I lingered to defend my new can full of ore.

Achaja180 came back in a Ferox. Cool, I thought, she’s going to flip the can back, then defend it until she goes non-blinky, I’ve got fifteen minutes to figure out what I’ve got that can crack a Ferox.

Only, she didn’t flip. She just looked around and left, apparently for good.

Once all aggression was gone, I went home, got a Bustard, and hauled home my new jet can full of ore. But I’m still confused. What’s the point of being armed miners if you don’t try to fight? They had more pilots than me, giving them a huge tactical advantage that should have ensured I didn’t go home with any ore. Puzzling.

After a month of being too busy for EVE and another month of moving house plus annoying travel stuff, I got back into the game to find out it was time for new projects. Faction warfare from the Caldari perspective had (has) degenerated into a game of “find some targets”, with no regular fleet combat happening due to the general pointlessness of it all. Worse yet, my favorite people to fly with have all left the Caldari Militia to pursue other projects in other places.

On the upside, the batch of high-quality scoundrels at Suddenly Ninjas has finally gotten their act together (sorta) and formed an alliance of like-minded corps. Since their methods and mine share certain commonalities, I’ve long thought it would be fun to be allied with them, and they attract just enough war declarations to keep life interesting. One quick Evemail to Tchell Dahhn (we’ve discussed the possibility before) and the deed was done!

TEARS (stands for Tear Extraction And Reclamation Service) looks to be in an organize-and-expand sort of phase, one the less charitable might term “getting our shit together”. That’s fine with me, considering that Ironfleet has always been a very loose collection of loners anyway. There aren’t many alliances that could tolerate the enemies a salvage corporation tends to accumulate, but TEARS is up to the job!

Updates as events warrant.