Ninja Salvaging Series 2 - Paying for your mistakes

Each action has a consequence. This rule applies everywhere. Have you run your mouth when you shouldn't and got killed? Have you done something and made a target for yourself? At every step we make decisions and deal with the outcome based on those decisions. My decision to write a blog about my activities also has consequences. It puts me on a radar which is not necessarily a good thing. I believe that you get most advantages operating under the radar, in the shadows. Bonus points if you do not have any api associated to any of the killboards. That might be too extreme, but it will always give you an advantage if your enemies underestimate your capabilities. But who want's to live that kind of life? What good are the stories if they never see the light? What's the point of the kill if you can't brag about it? I embrace my enemies and always act under assumption that every target I go for is a potential bait. Anyway, let's get back on the subject.

Haunted by the past

If you are a casual reader of my blog, you might remember how I started ninja salvaging series, season 2. I died trying to get Machariel, but was lucky enough to have him concorded. Great thing about getting shot at without engagement rights is that you get killrights. Since then, I have been keeping tabs on Vladimir Samborskiy, an ex Machariel pilot. Everyday I see him log and every time I checked on him, he was mining several jumps out. Even though he was mining in a Mackinaw, a mining ship that is worth around 200mil, I did not feel like wasting my killrights just yet. It was a big downgrade from Machariel to Mackinaw. I was hoping he would lick his wounds and buy a new mission ship after some time. Besides, you can very easily gank a Mackinaw in a 0.6 security system. So it really felt as a waste.

Days were passing and I was in my 3rd week of killright. I got a month to exact his revenge and time was running out. I decided that 2 weeks of mining is enough time to rebuild his ship and decided to go for a kill. Except it wasn't as straightforward as I thought it would be. Last few days he has been very slippery. Traveling around systems, making it hard for me to find him. Finally I chase him to Simela, that is a lvl 1-3 Sisters of EVE mission hub. It is usually a starting point for people to grind their SOE standings. I get a visual and his ship id and probe him out. He appears to be flying a frigate, doing a mission, which has a lot of small wrecks on scan. How underwhelming. From a faction battleship to a frigate. I start feeling that I have missed out my opportunity and should have just killed his Mackinaw when had a chance. Since there was still time left on my killright. I went back to Dodixie to observe some possible gank targets, me and my ninja buddy - Beliar Gray had been thinking about.

It was getting late and our targets logged out. Getting ready to do the same, with a bitter taste that no explosions materialized today, when accidentally I spot Vladimir in Dodixie dock. Oh boy, I hope he is here for a good reason. Buying a new Machariel would be a very nice reason. After watching for a few minutes I see him undock in a Gila and warp out. I miss the destination and we lose sight of him for a moment. He doesn't appear to be in any surrounding systems so it's probably not a lvl4 mission. We run a locate on him, but I have a gut feeling he is on the way to Simela. I set my destination and burn at full speed while Beliar follows. My gut was right, he was going to Simela direction as I meet him half way.

We end up in Bherdasopt, a next door system to Simela. He appears to have warped to his mission I had scanned him and his frigate earlier. I guess it was too tough for a frigate or took too long and he opted for an upgrade. Gila is by no means a Machariel, but I will take it over a Mackinaw any day. While he was slaughtering frigates in his mission, me and Beliar went to Simela and waited for him on the gate with my fast tackle Proteus and his Neutgeddon

I was a little worried if I will have enough time to activate the killright and put a tackle before Gila warps out. After several minutes of waiting, Vladimir finally appears in local. This is it. He pops on the overview, I quickly activate the killright and tackle him. A bump from Proteus and Armageddon made sure he is not coming back to the gate alive. In just a minute he was toast.

The criminal had what was coming to him and justice prevailed again. 

Last episode of season 2

With such happy ending I would like to finally close season 2 of Ninja Salvaging Series. It sure was a fun ride. Before it becomes too much of a routine, it is time to change up my play. I will be going to back to w-space. I am going on a pilgrimage again, where I will lock myself out in some random wormholes and stalk people. It might sound boring to some, but it actually gets me very excited. Taking my time to hunt is a very rewarding experience that I can't wait to write about. At some point, I will be back to ninja salvaging in high-sec for a season 3, but until then, I have some ideas I want to try.