O Titan, My Titan

I've previously covered the killing of a Titan in Mai, located in low sec Domain, and how there is a group of pilots here who ply their trade in this system with the sole purpose of killing any and all capital ships that attempt to use it.

George Takei approves again (possibly)

Acting Suspicious

With eyes watching the system and anyone who entered, it was the arrival of a character called Zynen approximately 90 minutes beforehand that piqued their interest. The pilot, instead of flying directly to station, docking up and remaining there started warping around the system, obviously checking for pilots in each station and then warped back to the only gate in system and left.

This behaviour raised a red flag in the minds of the pilots watching, something was going to happen.

Target Finder

Zynen returned to Mai shortly after leaving but a 5 degree d-scan of the Zaimeth gate did not show the pilot there, a 15 degree did but not the smaller angle, an angle that would show they were on the gate. A couple of further d-scans at different locations (to triangulate) showed Zynen at a point between station 4 and the Zaimeth gate.

Research was performed on the pilot to see previous losses and who they might be associated with but this wasn't overly useful as kills were found back two years but not much recently. As a result they believed they may be seeing a super capital cyno rather than the titan which arrived.

Smash and Grab

At 0721 EVE time a cyno went up in Mai, a cloaky bump ship immediately warped in at range and as soon as the Avatar class titan of Suki Antollare appeared on grid the microwarp drive was lit and the Avatar was bumped, so as to prevent any immediate warp away that the titan pilot was expected to be doing.

Avatar Class Titan

The bump ship was not alone, whilst he was in warp the firepower that appears on the killmail was bought online and immediately entered warp to the cyno. Bumps continued on the titan as the dps and tackle arrived on grid and then the titan was caught.

Open Fire, All Weapons

The dreadnoughts sieged as soon as they exited warp and, with eyes still on the Zynen who had moved into neighbouring Zaimeth, a cyno inhibitor was deployed in order to try to make it harder for rescue to come. It must have worked as after the titans mobile depot was destroyed Zynen exited Zaimeth and was not seen again and no rescue force was seen to assemble or come towards Mai.

Update: Jean Learner started this thread on Reddit regarding this kill and mentioned that when the titan was at 51% armour they had a rescue ready but the deployment of the cyno inhibitor and the lack of cyno fitted to the titan meant nothing happened.

Big Badda Boom

11 minutes, or just under two dreadnaught seige cycles, was all it took from first shot to the gigantic explosion that swallowed the Avatar of Suki Antollare. The grid was now clear and salvagers could be bought in.

Good fights were posted in local but the titan pilot remained silent and very quickly logged out after losing the titan.

Back Slapping

Loot was taken, the wreck salvaged (eventually, a titan has a lot of salvage) and what was taken was split between the pilots involved.

The banter on teamspeak was laid back but I did detect some smugness and rightly so. Mai has seen another titan die to the same killers as last time.

Thanks to Bil Tuesday, FreeSoul5150 and Emmgel for their assistance in writing this report. I haven't attempted to contact Suki Antollare because I'm almost certain they will not speak to me.

Bonus Comment: The killmail shows that the Nyx used fighters and not fighter bombers, those of us that know Bix Bro are not at all surprised at this and so was Bix Bro who didn't know they had fighters on grid and honestly probably also had no idea what ship they were flying. It's a New Zealand thing.