Someone swore on coms. I silently agreed. The fleet had just made what is colloquially known as a 'whoopsie' - our five pilot frigate roam fleet had just (blind) jumped into a gatecamp of a dozen or more Space Monkies. "Hold cloak, hold cloak," the FC called out, in case anyone was about to panic. "Crap. OK. Burn back to the gate."
I was only 5k from the stargate; as other people began decloaking and moving, I set my ship to jump back through and pulsed my MWD, activating the gate just before a Crow could finish locking my Worm. "Well..." someone asked. "Now what?" "We'll forget the last desto. Let's head back home."
Since moving in to the C2 with Sky Fighters I've gone a lot of roams in null sec; our home has C5 and null static connections, and we've found a lot of fun action out roaming null in assault frigates, interceptors, and destroyers. Last night I had just gotten home late from a busy evening running errands and was logging in to run my PI and catch up on any important notices, when I heard a fleet organizing on coms. I finished logging in, pulled my Worm out of the hangar, and joined up.
We were running with an inexperienced scout, but people need to start somewhere; we were in Space Monkey Alliance territory and there were a lot of active ratting systems nearby, but we went a dozen or so jumps without being able to catch the ratters. Kynric started having connection trouble, and had to bail; one of the other fleet members stepped up and took over as FC, but fleet discipline suffered a little and coms grew cluttered.
That is probably why our scout accidentally ended up +2 from the fleet instead of +1, and how we blind jumped into the same gate camp fleet again on the way back - the scout wasn't in system to see local spike when they jump portaled ahead of us. Luckily they were slow on the lock; we made it back a system and tried to figure out what to do. Our wormhole chain exit was one system beyond them and we had to go through the system they were camping; we had two possible entrances to that one, though, so as our scout got in position we moved to the other connecting system. Their camp moved, anticipating us. They also had plenty of friendly pilots docked up in the system we were in, keeping tabs on our movements; we went back and forth, playing gate chicken for a while, until our scout announced they had pulled off from the gates and gone to an offgrid safe. We decided to chance it, jumping out of one system to send them to the other gate, then immediately turning around and jumping back in and warping to the camped gate. We went through. They were landing on grid, and I got bubbled; a couple of our pilots made it past, but I and one other had to try burning back to gate. I got scrammed, then webbed while I was 8k away; more and more of the fleet redboxed my Worm and my shields were bleeding.
I made it to the gate, though, at 4% shields remaining; my Worm has a beast of a tank, almost 13k EHP. <3 At that point, I was very, very glad I had spent the extra isk on tech 2 shield rigs and I was also very, very frustrated that I was still camped in out in null. We started discussion options like temp logging or just coming back tomorrow on coms, and I quietly fumed.
Then I realized how bad my mood was getting, and I decided to change it.
Define the moment, or else the moment will define you is a slogan I have tacked to my wall at work. Marketing people will tell you that perception is reality. In Eve, we use propaganda to rally ourselves and our friends and to demoralize enemies. No amount of propaganda will change the objective facts, but it can shape the way people feel about things - the way it is interpreted and experienced, which is arguably even more important. My spiritual advisor put it in a more tongue in cheek way: Pull the wool over your own eyes. Pick and choose what lies you'll believe, and if you don't find any you like, tell your own.
As cynical as that sounds, it's one of those things that works. I'll also note that Eve is quasi-famous for its bittervets. Every game has the bitter veteran players, and they absolutely have every reason to be bitter over things... but being bitter is a choice. I know veteran players who are still happily playing the game, because they don't let themselves get caught up in the crap. Some day I'll be angry and bitter, but until then I am going to keep deciding to be optimistic and enthusiastic.
The Space Monkies jumped a prober into the system we were in and started scanning, so I began bouncing safes and I re-evaluated my night. Yes, the roam had gone toes up. No, we had no kills, and I didn't even get to shoot anyone. Yea, we were being chased by far too many people for us to fight... but in the tactical game of maneuvering, we were holding our own. Not only had we escaped their gate camp three times now, but half the fleet got home already. Sure, we were now the hunted instead of the hunters, but I sure as hell wasn't anyone's easy prey... if they wanted my wreck, I would make them work for it.
My mood picked up. Things were going better, even if nothing had changed in game; I kept bouncing safes, and we talked options on coms. We had the guys that had slipped past, and another pilot or two from the home system were available now; we still didn't have the numbers to take their fleet head on, but we had ~options~. We knew what they had and where they had it.
A couple of the guys at home reshipped into rapid light missile caracals, figuring they could clear the interceptors and dictors pinning us down; if nothing else, it'd be a fun way to YOLO some cheap cruisers. We coordinated the elements of our fleet, and then made a charge towards the gate SMA was camping.
We cross jumped.
I don't know if it was the new pilots showing up in local or what, but the scout reported them jumping out as I and the other stranded pilot jumped in. o.o Not the conclusion we had planned on, but people were tired so we all went home and called it a night. The roam had been unsuccessful, but it was a fun night by the end of it and I went to bed happy.
o7
-K
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