My first million!

After my less-than-salubrious start to EVE Online missions outside of training I started to get the hang of space combat. Even if the agent assigning me the mission assures me that it is a simple matter of warping in to a location, picking up something that has no reason to attract unwanted attention, and warping back out again, I prepare myself for a fight. I have my small selection of ships available (and not, as I almost wrote, 'at my disposal', just in case I curse myself), and the missile-armed Kestrel is my ship of choice for combat at the moment.

The missiles hit for more damage than a cannon shot although recharge more slowly. However, when a single missile can destroy lighter craft the advantages become more readily apparent. They become even more obvious when four launchers can fire simultaneously at the same target for quicker destructive bursts, or independently on multiple targets for expedient despatch of several lighter craft in a single volley. The missiles are also effective at greater ranges than cannon fire, letting my craft stay out of range of most cannon fire directed towards me. I'm sure there will come a point, perhaps soon, where ECM techniques start being deployed and missiles become less effective in some situations, but for now they are an excellent tool.

Also fitted to my Kestrel, which I have named Autumn Leaf for reasons apart from it sounding good that escape even me, are shield and armour booster fittings that help restore damage to my shields and prevent damage to my armour. These come in useful and have quite possibly prevented another loss of ship when I was targeted by a powerful pirate also firing missiles.

The missions are going quite well now. I fly in, try to gather some information on the pirates, or 'rats' as I believe they are referred to in the galactic slang, and then engage them on as many of my terms as possible. I target the closest ones, keep them at distance as my missiles home in on them, then pick out the next couple of targets after the current ones are destroyed. I am aware that training of a certain skill will allow me to lock on to more than two targets at once, and I will be sure to train that skill at some point soon. Since abandoning the mission that destroyed three shiny new ships I have not failed another since, and this has let the mission reward money come rolling in.

Not just mission reward money; shooting rats brings in bounties as well. I was rewarded with over 120,000 ISK after a single mission with multiple encounters, which was quite a boon. I am still not entirely sure that 100,000 ISK is a lot of money to a successful privateer but it feels like a lot for the moment. With the mission rewards and bounties rolling in, as well as not having to pay for new ships every ten minutes, I found myself going to bed last night with my vault account at a comfortable 998,000 ISK. So close, but with a few salvaged items sold on the market overnight I woke up and boarded my ship to find I had broken the one million ISK mark!

I hear the first million is the most difficult, let's see what else I am able to accomplish.

Posted in Gaming |
Tags: eve online, kestrel, penny ibramovic