Day 6: A comedy of errors

“War is months of boredom punctuated by moments of extreme terror”
Anonymous (First World War)

As anticipated, the Nagrind’s first mission didn't exactly go to plan. Although, ironically, not in any of the ways I had actually anticipated. Despite playing EVE for a long time what transpired shows just what a novice I still am.

Day four was New Year's Eve, and I had no time online. Day five I wasted hours scanning down signatures near Dodixie, waiting near Wormholes and coming up with nothing...

Day six, I relocated the Heron to Jita and spent more time in scanning. In my initial scouting run I found three Triglavian Wormholes. The first two were not an issue despite the many wrecks strewn around. On the third, I swear I didn't warp to zero, but before I could align out I found myself tackled and podded. Being in a squishy explorer with zero tank it happened extremely quickly. Ouch. Not the beginning I was hoping for.

I have lost a handfull of ships to NPC's:

• A Magnate to a ghost site before I knew what ghost sites were
• A Punisher to a response fleet someone else must have spawned
• A Rifter in an Abyssal because I had only loaded one damage type and the Devoted Hunter's resistances were too high for me to break its tank before the timer ran out
• Losing internet connection just after engaging a Clone Soldier transporter in low sec. Logging back on again to find my pod.

This one stung, however. I had expected to lose the Heron. Just not like that. Not to an NPC.

Making a mental note to never warp to unexplored wormholes at less than 50km, I spent some of my meagre funds on a replacement and headed out again a bit more cautiously. I named my second Heron Nagrindr. From my reading this is the plural of the first. Corpse gates.

This time it didn't take long found a suitable Unknown Space wormhole, but as I arrived another Heron was entering it. Having just lost one ship I decided not to risk it being a hunter like me and moved on.

A couple of systems later I found another candidate and settled in to wait. Within minutes of arriving my d-scan showed probes. I was quite excited. The wormhole was scanned down twice (the second time with Sister's probes) but nobody warped in. Then nothing happened for forty minutes. I docked up and took a break before heading out again.

Not long after returning I had my first customer. As the wormhole was 3.3AU off a busy station I had set my dscan to 3.2AU to cut the clutter. I saw a few probes. Then seven. Then all eight. When they disappeared, I started spamming d-scan until I saw a T1 explorer incoming. I hit the hole to warp. It was then I realised my mistake. I'd set my bookmark on first arriving. When I warped back after my break I'd warped to the bookmark. Because of my earlier experience with the Triglavian I was a full 50km from the hole! The explorer came out of warp between me and my wormhole, took one look at me and warped straight off again. I'd made a rookie mistake and completely blown my first potential engagement. Not my finest hour.

I approached the hole to zero and settled down to wait again. This time I didn't have to wait long. Same procedure as last time, and I hit the hole as soon as a Heron appeared on d-scan. Only to have the dialog appear warning me about the dangers of entering wormholes. I had neglected to click the box to say don't show it to me again.

By the time I'd dealt with this the Heron had arrived. So much for not being seen. However, he didn't warp off immediately, so I went through the hole to see if he would follow. He didn't. Clever guy. Second engagement muffed. Dang!

Two strikes and two wipeouts! I exited the hole and waited for the polarisation timer to run down. By now it was getting late and I was pretty annoyed. My performance had been woeful. I was in two minds as to whether to cut my losses, log off, and put all of my learning to use another day. I was still deliberating, when my third and final customer appeared. But to hear how that one went, you'll have to wait until my next post...

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