The Nullsec Diaries Part 1: A Terrible Idea

The other night, I made the very sudden, and very out of left field decision that I wanted to go to nullsec. With no real plan of attack or even the slightest sketch of an actual agenda, my motives were simple: a.) to wantonly blow shit up, and 2.) the new stealth bombers look like sex, personified as spaceships, so I should probably take one of those.

I decided my targets were going to be solo null-sec ratters and plexers with full-room rat aggro. There they would be, a Raven or a terribad fit Maelstrom, slugging it out with the local rats and just about maintaining their noobish tank when *suddenly!*, there would be me: appearing out of nowhere like a phantom to hurl bombs, torpedoes, and death their way. With this hugely over-dramatized scenario dancing through my head, I set about scheming and fitting up a Hound for hunting and murdering my null-sec dwelling enemies.

Day 1:

I should preface this all with a disclaimer: I don’t go to null-sec very often, and by “very often”, I more mean “really, not often at all”. Actually, a better description might be “seriously, hardly ever”. Part, and most of this, is that I simply have no need; I do what I do in high-sec, and I know pretty much every single trick, mechanic, and rule in the book when it comes to that part of space. I am king of the castle, and top of the food chain in highsec and I can pick my battles accordingly. That all radically changes in null, where the ever-present thought of instant bubble-death gives me a strange sort of maniacal death-wish, and I end up bombing around like an idiot, so assured am I in my imminent demise. I decided to work on that a little this time.

The load-out I planned to use I stole shamelessly from the infamous null bomber Valadeya Uthanaras:

Terrible Idea:

3 Arbalest Siege Missile Launcher
1 Bomb launcher
1 Covert Ops Cloaking Device II

1 1MN Coreli C-Type Microwarpdrive
1 Small Capacitor Booster II – cap booster 75
1 Warp Disruptor II

1 Ballistic Control System II
2 Nanofiber Internal Structure II

1 Small Polycarbon Engine housing
1 Small Bay Loading Accelerator

Dubbed “Terrible Idea”, I set about loud-mouthing my plans in corp chat. Stunningly, in a show of both camaraderie and clearly bad decision making skills, my pals Solomar Espersei and Tuomas Arturi decided to jump on board. So now, where there was just one idiot and his paper-bag DPS mobile, we now had three idiots with paper-bag DPS mobiles, plus an Arazu and a scouting alt; things were looking awesome.

As the evening wore on however, and we tweaked our fits and our planned routes and destinations, RL-aggro started to rear its sneaky head: dinners to make, girlfriends and wives to appease, children to put to bed; none of this boded well for a successful terrorizing incursion of null-sec. We decided to recharge, and come back tomorrow for our inevitable conquest.

 

Day 2:

Our campaign got off to a rocky start with work crap on my end of things taking a lot longer than intended. When I finally logged on, I was just in time for Solo to have to make a grocery run and Tuomas to do something with his kids; responsibilities are a bitch. I headed out to grab a drink.

A few hours later, the three amigos + alts reconvened for our march on Rome, and I set out to meet the others in low-sec bordering Syndicate. We paused for a moment to consider our odds at taking on a red Legion and Phobos I found camping a gate before we remembered that we were in ships with tanks like used sandwich wrappers and continued on to 0.0.

Our RL shackles dogged us though, with Solo grabbing kid aggro here and there, and me grabbing all sorts of girlfriend aggro.

Aiden Mourn > yo, im back
Aiden Mourn > where was I you ask?
Aiden Mourn > if you guessed, “helping choose curtain colors for gf’s sisters new house”, then you win a prize
Aiden Mourn > WOMAN THERE IS EVE TO PLAY

 

We scouted a few more systems, finding nothing but a very skittish Vagabond, until eventually the real-life monster reared its head again, and I got called out for a pseudo work emergency. Logging in space, I returned a few hours later to find the fleet disbanded and offline, and me alone in NPC null-sec. After playing a few rounds of “shoot torpedoes at the jet cans cause its looks AWESOME”, I got bored and logged.

End of Day 2.

 

So to recap, after 2 days of my “dramatic plan”, I am now lost in nullsec with no allies, and no kills to speak of. However, I’m also without any losses to speak of either, so there’s a silver lining in their somewhere; 0 kills + 0 losses = win. Stay tuned for part 2, in which our hero and his brave companions attempt to actually shoot something (anything), and most likely die horribly in the process.

 

-Aiden

~ by Aiden Mourn on May 31, 2012.