Ratting Leads to a Kill

I had this idea that I should grab all the junk I have strewn around space and haul it to Jita so that I can easily contract it to be delivered in low sec (now that my sec status is making it uncomfortable to visit some ritzy high sec neighborhoods).  So I decided to do some ratting last night to see if I could raise my security status from -2.1 up to -1.99 to allow me to cruise around high sec unmolested in my Bestower.

It didn't go especially well.  I killed rats on asteroid belts in a few systems, and saw my security status change from -2.1 to hmmmm...  errr... -2.1.  No change.  This might be a long process at this rate!

But enough of that drudgery.

This morning Jack is sitting in Ishomilken (in station!) and I'm also doing some exploration in another screen with an alt.  I noticed a challenge from Brick0Joe in Ishomilken local:

Brick0Joe > jack
Brick0Joe > I know you fight rifters
Brick0Joe > fight my rifter

What else could I answer, but

Jack Dancer > OK
Jack Dancer > Planet 9

Brick0Joe showed up in his rifter and we began the Dance of Death...

At first I was a bit worried.  No, make that a lot worried.  I had all systems overheating and we orbited close.  My shields evaporated while his weren't moving much at all.  Oh oh.  He's a very experienced player - his history goes back to 2005 and his security status is a cool -9.9.  I didn't have much hope going into this contest, and even less as I hit armor while his shields were slowly dropping.

But you just never know.

Once I got through his shields (and he was close to being through my armor even with my repper doing yeoman service) things started to change. I wrecked havoc on his armor as I was keeping mine generally in one piece.  Eventually, as I started losing burning pieces of my hull while trying to restore armor to hold off his attack, he passed me in the destruction race!  He was suddenly in structure - even lower than me!  And then he blowed up!  \o/

I was at 37% structure - so it was a close one.

GFs were exchanged in local along with an interesting recap of the fight.  Brick wasn't flying with rigs and was flying a shield fit rifter (something I'm going to try to do more often now that I bought a pile of regolith medium shield extenders for about 3.3 million isk each in a backwater market).

How did ratting lead to this kill?  Well, I forgot to change my ammo from last night's failed attempt at security status repair.  I was still shooting basic non-faction cheapo EMP ammo instead of fancy faction fusion or phased plasma that I usually have in the autocannons.  Since Brick0Joe was flying without rigs and didn't have his em hole plugged on his shields - my EMP was hitting his shields with 0% protection.  Nice!

Of course, my loyal readers will know that I didn't figure this out on my own - in the post-fight chat Brick pointed this out...

But, regardless, for a change I got lucky!

Brick0Joe has been away from Eve for a year and just returned.  I advised him to consider joining R1FTA and would certainly recommend him.

Death to Flying Things Score: 8-20-1