Right Place, Right Time

Action Summary

Task: Solo roaming, but things quickly turn crazy.

Problem: Sudden local spike to 30, enemy AHAC gang with logistics support, followed by a spike to 72, friendly tier-3 sniper gang.

Enemies: 8-9 Zealots, Deimos, Damnation, Devoter, Loki, Proteus, 4 Guardians, misc light tackle.

Friendlies: About 20 tier-3 snipers (mostly Tornadoes), some Recons, 2 Falcons, 2 Scimitars, misc light tackle.

My ship of choice: Cynabal.

Reasoning for choice: I was in it for the solo roaming when shit got real hot, real fast.

Killmails

Lots of kills: http://redc.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_related&kll_id=13317379

After Action Report

I was solo roaming in my (new :D) Cynabal when local spiked to 30. An enemy logi-supported AHAC gang entered system and warped off. Shortly afterwards, another spike to 72, and a friendly tier-3 sniper fleet jumped in and warped after them.

I wasn't there at the beginning of the fight, but apparently a friendly Loki was tackled and the enemy gang all bum-rushed him. This allowed our snipers to set up perfectly as the Loki was desperately burning away, and the shooting gallery started. By the time I got there, the hostile fleet was well over 80-100km from the gate, and our sniper fleet was another 80-100km farther out doing business.

I warped in at 100 and nearly shit my pants, as I landed almost in the middle of the AHAC blob, but fortunately was able to burn out and away before they could react. I then started joining in on the festivities. Our FC was doing a fantastic job of target calling, and we were quickly popping Zealots as our Falcons got jam cycles in on their Guardians. After losing several Zealots and most of their fast tackle, the enemy gang started burning back to the gate in an attempt to escape.

At this point, our fast tackle swooped in and started webbing, and we popped a few more Zealots as they desperately burned back to the gate. In addition, we were finally able to break the tanks of their Loki and Proteus as their logistics were jammed or panicking, and snagged some nice juicy kills.

They ended up getting out with pretty much a single Damnation and their logistics. Apparently it's customary to let logistics live if they make it out now, as we could have chased them down easily but the FC figured he'd cut them a break.

Best part of the night? Our two hero Scimitars somehow kept our initial tackled bait Loki alive through the entire engagement.

Lessons Learned

Sniper fleet > AHAC fleet, any day. They were doing next to no DPS to us simply due to range, and were also slower by far due to their massive armor plates. Also, pay attention to blue fleets. If I had not realized a fight was going on, I would not have thought to join the fleet, and would probably have just gone to a different system to poke at solo targets.

Although the Cynabal is absolutely not a ship suited for sniper fleets, it can still maintain excellent range against AHAC gangs. I was perfectly safe from incoming DPS even with no logistics repairing me, as long as I stayed around 30km from the AHAC ball.

The hostile FC probably should have called a disengage sooner; that way, he would have lost 3-4 Zealots at most and the rest could have gotten away. His decision to stay on field and burn back to the gate cost him another few Zealots, and most importantly, cost him his two juicy T3s.

Overall a fantastic night and a fantastic fight that I completely stumbled into on accident. Killmail whoring ftw! My efficiency is looking quite nice this month now. :)

Take care, and fly safe!

o/

-Sarah "Numi" Ichinumi