This is a story about escaping from a gatecamp. My heart is still pumping as I type this so bear with me.
I was on the way back from hauling my last load of precious loot to empire on a seldom used back road. This road had been quiet all morning, dotted with friendlies along the 20+ system route, as I strolled jump to jump to and from my destination. Along the route at the empire/0.0 junction, I notice a frigate with a State War Academy two week old pilot sitting 100km from the gate on the empire side of the junction. Interesting, but not an uncommon sight in this game where noobs stay in empire and never cross over to 0.0.
I jump through to the 0.0 side, and continue along the quiet highway until I get into the next system. As I jump, I see 2 ravens sitting 70km out, and an ishkur and crow waiting to tackle me. Damn those neutral SWA scouts!
Now I had just trained up Cloaking the day before and happen to have had a cloaking device installed on my industrial minutes before the first run. As my jump cloak wears off, I quickly hit the cloaking device, praying that it works. They only caught a glimpse of me, but it was enough to start trolling with their drones out. Making almost perfect grid line passes trying to ferret me out, these guys were not giving up easily. Closer and closer they come, minutes ticking away, with their first passes coming as close as 10km. Not happy with the results, the ishkur starts to troll in orbit around gate moving in a spiral outward, hoping to get lucky. Meanwhile his buddy continues the gridline trolling, coming closer and closer to me, each pass hoping they are about to hit the jackpot.
The downside to device cloaking is that any object that comes within 2km of you will break the cloak, and these guys were moving as close as 4-5km with each pass. The adrenaline is pumping and as I begin to accept my fate of the inevitable, a glimpse of hope named Vlasic shows up in the system to assist. While at first he tries to distract them, they aren't biting at all. At this point the crow is now in between me and the entrance gate, and the ishkur is between me and the exit gate.
"Align to this planet, I have a safe spot for you" displays on the comms link. That is great, but how am I gonna get out of scrambling range of these fast ships and make it to warp speed in time? Waiting for the right moment, time slowly ticking by, I held my breath, reciting the next moves in my head. Tens of minutes later, with the ishkur and the crow now 22km and 26km away respectively, I hit the decloak, afterburner, and warp to member with perfect precision. Catching both tacklers off guard, I enter warp seconds later while they desperately try to scramble me, but alas, they are out of range. Warping to my saviour, the following comes across the local comms link:
[17:54:32] Arthegon > mandrake grrrrr
[17:54:49] Mandrake Knight >
[17:54:50] Zimi Vlasic > =)
[18:07:04] Mandrake Knight > cya lamers, nice try
With a little bit of finesse, Vlasic pulls an inline safespot out, and I warp to the exit gate, much to the dismay of the big fishes who were hoping they caught a meal.
The duration of this story was about 30-35 minutes, and is by far the most white knuckled adrenaline pumping story I have to date.
cliffs:
lamer pirates trap me at a gate while i am cloaked
about 30-35 minutes transpire while they try to find me
Vlasic saves the day with a safespot and I escape unharmed
I was on the way back from hauling my last load of precious loot to empire on a seldom used back road. This road had been quiet all morning, dotted with friendlies along the 20+ system route, as I strolled jump to jump to and from my destination. Along the route at the empire/0.0 junction, I notice a frigate with a State War Academy two week old pilot sitting 100km from the gate on the empire side of the junction. Interesting, but not an uncommon sight in this game where noobs stay in empire and never cross over to 0.0.
I jump through to the 0.0 side, and continue along the quiet highway until I get into the next system. As I jump, I see 2 ravens sitting 70km out, and an ishkur and crow waiting to tackle me. Damn those neutral SWA scouts!
Now I had just trained up Cloaking the day before and happen to have had a cloaking device installed on my industrial minutes before the first run. As my jump cloak wears off, I quickly hit the cloaking device, praying that it works. They only caught a glimpse of me, but it was enough to start trolling with their drones out. Making almost perfect grid line passes trying to ferret me out, these guys were not giving up easily. Closer and closer they come, minutes ticking away, with their first passes coming as close as 10km. Not happy with the results, the ishkur starts to troll in orbit around gate moving in a spiral outward, hoping to get lucky. Meanwhile his buddy continues the gridline trolling, coming closer and closer to me, each pass hoping they are about to hit the jackpot.
The downside to device cloaking is that any object that comes within 2km of you will break the cloak, and these guys were moving as close as 4-5km with each pass. The adrenaline is pumping and as I begin to accept my fate of the inevitable, a glimpse of hope named Vlasic shows up in the system to assist. While at first he tries to distract them, they aren't biting at all. At this point the crow is now in between me and the entrance gate, and the ishkur is between me and the exit gate.
"Align to this planet, I have a safe spot for you" displays on the comms link. That is great, but how am I gonna get out of scrambling range of these fast ships and make it to warp speed in time? Waiting for the right moment, time slowly ticking by, I held my breath, reciting the next moves in my head. Tens of minutes later, with the ishkur and the crow now 22km and 26km away respectively, I hit the decloak, afterburner, and warp to member with perfect precision. Catching both tacklers off guard, I enter warp seconds later while they desperately try to scramble me, but alas, they are out of range. Warping to my saviour, the following comes across the local comms link:
[17:54:32] Arthegon > mandrake grrrrr
[17:54:49] Mandrake Knight >
[17:54:50] Zimi Vlasic > =)
[18:07:04] Mandrake Knight > cya lamers, nice try
With a little bit of finesse, Vlasic pulls an inline safespot out, and I warp to the exit gate, much to the dismay of the big fishes who were hoping they caught a meal.
The duration of this story was about 30-35 minutes, and is by far the most white knuckled adrenaline pumping story I have to date.
cliffs:
lamer pirates trap me at a gate while i am cloaked
about 30-35 minutes transpire while they try to find me
Vlasic saves the day with a safespot and I escape unharmed
