All In A Morning's Work

I logged on this morning to update a could skill queues, one for Kirith and one for Selia. Local was pretty empty for Heydieles, and a couple war targets and a Tusker in the mix. I looked with Selia and saw two plexes open, a minor and a medium. Hmmmm....

I jump into a Plex-Diving Dramiel with its 31 km overheated point and headed out with boat violence on my mind.

Boat Violence

I hit the minor plex first. As I landed in the site I see two Condors, one circling the button and one running around out farther with NPCs in tow. Stupid NPCs. I make a run at them in turn but both of warp out before I can get in lock range.

I turn my ship around and warp to the medium plex. Its a long warp, 53 AU, so I'm thinking I'll just bounce back to the minor to catch the enemy coming back to finish it when I land and to my eternal surprise see a Condor there, sitting at zero on the acceleration gate. Point, lock, orbit, weapons and drones free.

The new and improved Mk II Condor is a lot tougher than the old days, but my Dramiel can kite it far beyond the range of its rockets. He kills one of my drones so I send out the spare. Then an Incursus lands, the Tusker pilot. Part of my wonders if I should run but the Condor is in armour and I decide to get range on  the Incursus and let my drones do the work on the former. The Condor explodes (and later I realize its a second Tusker pilot) but the Incursus gets range and rips off my shields and 25% of my armour.

I'm scrammed but dual prop'ed, so I hit the afterburner and pull out of range. From about 20 km out I can ping him with Barrage and my drones, but as I get him dipped into armour any significant amount he reps it back up to full (confirmed dual rep tank through local after the fight).

I debate my options. I could keep him pointed at 20 klicks and keep pinging him and hope to wear out his cap, but if he turns on my drones I'll lose most of my DPS at this range and there is no guarantee he'll ever run out of cap. Or worse, someone else like a war target or another Tusker might drop in. I could let my shields rep up and then try and time an approach for when his shields dip, but I'm nervous about his blaster damage up close and the fact he's a Tusker pilot. I respect those guys.

In the end I decided the risk of trying to kill this Tech I frigate is not worth the reward. Maybe in my own Tech I ship, but not the Dramiel. I recalled my drones and warped off.

Good fight, sorry it didn't have an earth shattering kaboom to end it.