A Tale of Two Myrmidons

Friday night I logged in to a pre-arrange corp operation to roam low sec Essence region and look for kills. There was the usual back and forth about what ships we wanted to use. First it was HACs so jumped in my Eagle Sniperus Rex, but then we moved to battleships so I activated Memories of Mynxee (Armageddon class which survived the flight from Etherium Reach) but then was asked to be secondary on point in a tackle battlecruiser so I moved to Disposable, my blaster Ferox.

We roamed around trying to bait a pirate camping a gate but who fled when we entered system, and we looked for other targets, eventually running into a Myrmidon from Vanguard alliance.

The point main for our fleet was in a Myrmidon and as we landed at a gate, the enemy Myrmidon jumped in. We both attacked the enemy ship and the hostile decided to attack me, perhaps thinking the little-used Ferox was a juicy newb that he could overpower quickly with the help of the sentry guns. Guess again; this Ferox out of the box has more hitpoints and resists than any other Tier 1 battlecruiser in the hands of a well trained opponent. I was in no danger but the drones and blasters from our two ships easily overpowered our foe despite his cap draining efforts.

We didn't catch any others that night but the kill did ease the loss of the Manticore earlier in the week and I logged feeling satisfied for now.

* * * * *

Nashh Kadavrs convo'd me. He's that pilot going around and challenging Eve blogger "Celebrities" to duels and he wanted to add me to the list. I loved duels, I immediately agreed. We settled on battlecruisers sometime this weekend whenever we could match up our times online. I went to work.

A public deathmatch with my pride on the line had the brain working overtime. I didn't just want to show up, I really really wanted to win. So despite having a Drake and Ferox in the hanger, I went back to the drawing board.

First I checked his age and his profile of kills recorded on Battleclinic and from his previous three deathmatches. A 2008 character has had plenty of time to master battlecruisers so my age advantage was probably moot unless he trained foolishly, and judging by the setups of ships he had lost it looked like he had trained well. I figured he would fly a Drake with passive tank since he appears almost pure Caldari, and the tank would be solid but not impossible to overwhelm as I was willing to bet he would install a few ballistic control units for damage.

I opted for a Myrmidon, strategizing that I would approach under the cover of medium ECM drones and then once in range use blasters and drones to overpower his shields and take him out. I miscalculated and thought he would go for afterburner, but figured I would be faster anyways if we both took MWDs.

On Sunday afternoon we hooked up and did the old steal-from-my-can trick so the fight could be uninterupted in high sec space and no security penalities involved. The fight started 20km apart (should have negotiated for closer! ) and I sped towards him MWD blazing and he sped away with his MWD on. I checked speeds and saw I would catch up to him; good. We both launched ECM drones and I immediately targeted them and popped three. That should be sufficient, I thought.

Just as I got in web range and started my blasters going, I shut down the MWD so I could pulse it as needed to maintain range. Then disaster: his ECM drones got a hit. The webber shut off and he took off like a cannon shot opening the range between us as I was trying to orbit and was faced away from him and I had to repower the MWD and give chase. Then a second ECM jam hit from his piddly drones and He got out of web range before I got up to speed again. Dammit!

With a sinking feel I checked my cargo hold: cap boosters half gone and I was practically back where I started. Part of me considered running at this point as I knew I had made some serious miscalculations and was facing defeat, but I had made an agreement to fight to the death. I bucked up and waited out the second 20 second jam while giving chase to my quarry.

As soon as I could I targeted and blew the ever living shit out of those last two drones. Some small revenge. Then I worked the overheating of the MWD and webber once more to grab that elusive Drake and attempt to pull it into range of the blasters. My tank was holding, I caught him and webbed once more, I was pulling into range and ...

"The reload failed because there is no more charges in the cargohold."

The well had run dry. I wrote in the private convo window that I was out of cap boosters and he was going to win. All was left was to watch it happen.

My fatal mistake I believe was going for a little too much tank over speed in my setup. I spent far too much time closing to use my weapons and it cost me. I also will never assume two ECM drones are not dangerous. Damned little buggers.

A good fight Nashh Kadavrs, and you can bet I will be back for another in a few weeks time. Perhaps not Battlecruisers though... maybe cruisers? I've got a nice little Thorax I'd like to introduce you to.

His account of the duel: http://nashhkadavreveblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/celebrity-death-match-5-kirith-kodachi.html