The weekend started out fairly typically for Isogen 5.
I logged in on Saturday afternoon to find 2-3 people online with Foedus out scanning in the chain. It wasn't too long before Foedus calls out that he's spotted some NOHO (a well known and sizeable WH corp) pilots moving around in a LS at the end of our chain and asking if I was up for losing some ships if he finds their home.
I have no illusions regarding our corp's ability to go toe to toe with NOHO but I'm always up for a fight and it was an off peak time for them.
Given that they live in a C6 magnetar, the likelihood of us getting a kill before we all died was also reasonably high if we got into a brawl due to the high DPS buff so I logged in my Gnosis and said 'sure, why not?'.
Wasn't long before Foedus scanned through 4 WHs from the LS into Polaris (NOHO's home system) and 3 of us started to make our way up the chain while he scouted.
We also invited Glyndi from Honeybadgers to come along since he was near a LS that was connected to NOHO's static so he'd meet us there.
The residents on NOHO's static were Quantum Origins and they also had 2-3 pilots online so we held the fleet 2 holes out of Polaris and I moved my own scout into the Quantum Origins hole to keep an eye on them.
It quickly became apparent that Quantum Origins were having some sort of scrap with NOHO as there was a frig wreck on the Polaris entry hole and Foedus shortly announced that there was a QO Wolf asking for a 1v1 in Polaris local.
This complicated the situation a little.
Around this point, NOHO made the situation even more complicated by warping a Hulk and a Skiff to their ore site and starting up a mining op in the middle of all this. Only NOHO...
Given the rarity of the chance to kill NOHO miners in their home system and that the ships fighting on their hole were of minimal value, Foedus made the call to wait until their fight was over and then going after the miners.
And so we waited.... and waited some more...
The Wolf pilot ended up having a Deimos buddy and the 1v1 turned into a drawn out 2v2, then another 1v1...
To make things even more annoying, the Hulk pilot had left the ore site at some point and was now idle in a POS. The Skiff was still mining away happily though and Foedus was still hungry for some miner blood so we continued to wait for the hole to clear.
About 45min later Glyndi, who has been sitting patiently in the connected LS, calls out that a QO Leopard just jumped past him into their hole. Spotted.
Almost immediately I see the Deimos and Wolf warp to the LS so I tell Glyndi to bail, which he does, obviously forgetting to bookmark the hole.
The Leopard pilot hits the POS and swaps immediately to a Vigilant, warping it to join his mates on the LS.
This tasty target is enough and we go for it.
We had another corp mate log in and join us by this point and our fleet is now 2 Ishtars, a Zealot, a Caracal and my Gnosis.
We jump the fleet in and warp it to the LS, obviously landing just as the QO ships are warping off. Fast tackle is overrated.
'Hulk is back at site, warp to NOHO hole!'
In the meantime, the Hulk had re-joined his Skiff friend and was again at the ore site.
At this point there is still a NOHO Vexor sitting on their hole, along with who knows how many cloakies, but whatever, we came here for a fight and we were gonna get one started by killing their miners!
Our whole fleet warps to their hole, jumps through and warps right past the Vexor sitting there to our premade bookmarks for the miners.
We kill the Hulk without incident but the Skiff is 50km off. As the Hulk goes down, 2 NOHO response Ishtars warp in at range and drop curators. My Gnosis is hardly fast and there's nothing I can do against the Ishtars so I make the warp back to their static hole, hoping to find something close range like the Vexor to shoot there, leaving the rest of our fleet to catch and kill the Skiff which they manage to do.
At this point I also see a new ship on dscan in the QO hole with my scout:
'Kronos on D.'
It looked like the Vigilant pilot had swapped into it but I don't give it much thought as it could be someone new, or just the ship he likes to log off in, and I move my scout back to watch the LS.
My Gnosis lands on the Polaris static by now and finds it clear. Disappointed, I jump out to see if the QO guys are around and find to NOHO Vexor orbiting at 20km on the static side. Game on!!
I point it, overload and do my best to get into web/scram range in time but he notices and moves away from me, easily out speeding my slow ship.
'Er, Kronos on the lowsec...'
'Kronos jumped out...and back...'
'Guys, get to this lowsec!'
My scout is still watching the LS hole and to my very high amazement, the QO Kronos had warped to it, double jumped himself and was now just sitting there while I'm shooting a stupid NOHO Vexor on the Polaris hole and the rest of our fleet is finishing off the Skiff's Pod and scrapping with NOHO Ishtars.
I haven't decided yet if its bait or stupid but either way, I kinda want to shoot it!
I decide I don't REALLY care all that much about the Vexor and given that it is not pointing me, I hit warp to the LS and call for the fleet to get there at best speed.
Sometime around this point it occurs to me that the Astarte command ship that had been on dscan the whole time was probably boosting...
I land on the LS hole and tackle the Kronos.
It shortly tackles me back, followed closely by the rest of our fleet landing, along with a QO Wolf and Deimos; bait it is. The battle is joined!
It's extremely obvious that the fleet we have can definitely not kill a bastioned Kronos so Foedus grabs his diplo hat and calls NOHO in to help us kill it and they form up some Ishtars and other kitey ships, along with a Scythe for reps, to assist.
We quickly force the Wolf off the field and force the Deimos to jump out but by the time NOHO get there our Caracal is down and the Zealot and my Gnosis were pushed into structure and forced to jump, leaving the 2 Ishtars holding down the fort while we go 1 jump over in LS to rep in a station before re-joining the fray.
By the time I get back, NOHO have pushed the Kronos through to lowsec and I land as it jumps back into the WH so I follow and engage on that side.
NOHO spend some time trying to kill the Deimos in LS but he also jumps back and when NOHO re-join us we have enough DPS to finish off the Kronos and kill off the Deimos who had also been repping like a champ.
Fun fight indeed!
10/10 would tackle Kronos on LS again.
Miners:
http://isogen5.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_related&kll_id=24937617
Kronos:
http://isogen5.eve-kill.net/?a=kill_related&kll_id=24928323
(Cruor is unrelated, was from QO's scrap with NOHO earlier)
