Monday 16 February 2015

The Freighter Escapes

I previously wrote how my freighter pilot got caught by a ganker in Niarja and I logged off in order to evade any attempt at ransom or ship loss.

I'm happy to report that extraction of my freighter was successful a couple of days ago and in a reasonably humourous manner.

It was suggested in the comments (by Catalin C) that I could use the Duel mechanics to allow a neutral party to web my freighter for quick escape. 

A Cunning Plan



In preparation for the extraction I watch listed various gankers and people whom I'd determined might be related to Machariel pilot. They all appeared to be active primarily outside of my time zone and would randomly login/logout in neighbouring systems.

So I devised a plan to login a few alts ready to extract at a time just after downtime. I also needed a catchy codename for the operation. The best I could come up with, after spending far longer than I did coming up with the plan, was Operation Runaway.

Avengers They Are Not


Assembled in neighbouring systems and moved in prior to the operation:
  • Boosting Alt in a Damnation with Republic Fleet Mindlink
  • Combat (PvP) Alt in Rapier with Faction Webs
  • Second Combat (PvP) Alt in Falcon with Rainbow ECM setup
  • Industry Alt in a Covert Ops ship, cloaked and at a deep safe in system

Multi-boxing WAS a bitch to setup but I managed to do it thanks to ALT-TAB, a heavily caffeinated drinks and a couple of bacon rolls.

Go Go Go


EVE is starting up...
EVE is STILL starting up...

Characters ready to go at the launcher screen.

EVE is CONTINUING TO start up...

Triple check that the launchers are in the right order

SERVER STATUS IS OK

I ALT-TAB through each launcher clicking the Login button, carefully avoiding the Freighter pilots launcher
Select the character as each Selection screen appears
There is a delay of about 2 minutes as each client fully loads and I see my ship in space.
Fleet is created, invites sent, accepted

LOCAL IS EMPTY

Everyone is out of warp and ready, make sure I cloak the covert ops and move him in a random direction
Login the Freighter pilot, invite to fleet

CRAP! LOCAL HAS JUMPED TO FIVE PEOPLE, WHERE DID THEY COME FROM?

Takes me a few seconds to realise they are all my characters.

PANIC ATTACK AVERTED

It takes a long time to warp the 1,000,000km.
Out of warp, boosts are active and the EHP of the Providence is a nice ~382,000
Start warping to my covert ops pilots. 

DAMMIT, ACCELERATE FASTER

Wait until ~30% warp speed before initiating a duel and activating my webs
Freighter warps off into the sun (quite literally)

Success and an Oversight


Operation Runaway was a total success. I (internally) let off a cheer and finish off my energy drink and a bacon roll. 

Take that fake internet game pixels and person in their parents basement*
It is only as I write this that I realised my big mistake, I forgot to bring a neutral logi to rep my freighter should it have gone badly. Fortunately it didn't...

My wife asks me what I'm so happy about, I tell her what I expertly did, and she rolls her eyes and calls me an idiot.

* - it may be true, I can't prove it is nor can I disprove it.

1 comment:

  1. Glad to hear you are safe.

    Be careful on the regional gates as you might be outside of Web range.

    Also, when you use the duel mechanics the timer on the Web alt doesn't expire and your freighter jumps ahead. Just don't break gate cloak until the Web alt it's in the system.

    Have fun

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