War in Tionisla
17 Sep 2018Thunktone
3304 September 11, TuesdayThere's a war coming in Tionisla, or so I've been told by my contacts in the Alliance Rapid-reaction Corps. They've been preparing for this for some time, building up their influence from a beachhead at Kingsmill Camp. They plan to take the whole system.
The Lave Fortune Organisation, who we'll be fighting, seem decent enough. A brewery corporation as far as I can tell. I've done some work for them in the past. But I don't like the idea of any corporation taking over such a populous system. There are more than five billion people here.
Social Tionisla Labour are the current democratic rulers. Well, I normally support democracy in systems as populous as this. But they just haven't found friends amongst the movers and shakers in this region. The cooperative ARC should be better placed to defend the people of Tionisla. Real Politik, or am I just making excuses? Sometimes I don't even know.
But right or wrong I've been doing ARC's dirty work.
Hopefully this'll clear some space for the military preparations. I'm doing some other trading on the side and making tens of millions of credits. And bringing various supplies back to ARC, they won't be starved out of Kingsmill.
I doubt the war will be as profitable as this trading, but I've never really been one to fight for the money.
3304 September 12, Wednesday
16:30
I just finished my haulage missions, having done most of the work before I slept. I took on a bunch of side missions and arbitrage cargo as I spread that biowaste around the old worlds, and made around 20 million credits all together. Not bad for a day and a bit's work.
Fighter Club may, or may not, be participating in the war tonight. It hasn't started yet and we need to wait for the militaries to come to blows before we weigh in as privateers.
Besides, I was awarded some neo-fabric insulation for a couple of those haulage missions, something that's been hard to get recently. I have enough to unlock the corrosion resistant cargo bays. No more having to rush to a station when I nick stuff from the 'goids.
So I'm taking my Orca to the barnacle forest in Hyades Sector AQ-Y d81. I've never been before but apparently it's the best place to collect meta-alloys. Then I just need radiation baffles and I can get the goop-proof storage.
18:30
Wow, close encounter of the turd kind, should've worn brown trousers. One of the meta-alloy fragments got wedged up against a barnacle and I was using my boosters to try and drop down on top of it, when an interceptor arrived. It came right to the barnacle my SRV was now leaning against. I got these photos of the traction beam in action.
I thought I'd lost the meta-alloys when I saw them lifted up towards the 'goid, but they dropped back down when it was done. Maybe they're harvesting something else? A fuel perhaps. It actually helped me out by moving the meta-alloys somewhere more accessible.
22:30
I was a little late to fighter club, but not too much. The war started just in time so I switched to my Viper and got stuck in.
As usual the enemy navy was no match for a small wing of independent pilots. We were taking individual massacre missions rather than wing ones and I wish I'd been a bit more ambitious. I completed a 32, an 8, and two 10s with quite a few kills in-between. But the others were doing 80s and 90s quite successfully. I could have destroyed a lot more ships if I hadn't stopped so often to scoop materials.
I still like taking my Viper to war, especially alongside larger ships. If I didn't have a wing with me I'd go to a high intensity war zone and support a large navy vessel. I can deal some serious damage if I have a big friendly target nearby. And a small, fast ship can do things the big guys can't. Like chasing down the enemy Cobras that try to run away and let their shields recharge. Or just fighting other Vipers, the big guys often struggle with those. Sometimes I do too, but I can usually beat them.
We swung the war well into ARC's favour.
3304 September 13, Thursday
18:30
Fighter club will meet again tonight, but in the meantime I've been doing some reconnaissance missions. War-time scans are a great opportunity to go looking for in times of war. They often offer five very rare gizmos as a reward, along with three or four megacredits. You get plenty of time to finish them, and if you're a good driver you can do four or five per hour. With the data from the scans and the gizmos as reward, they make a great way to prepare for engineering a new ship.
I did four scans and took one mission to liberate four pilots from the enemy. I hadn't done a liberation mission before but it seemed like it would be similar to a scan mission. I just took my Orca since I was pretty sure all I needed for any of the missions was an SRV and a small cargo hold. Everything went smoothly so now I just have to nip over to Sharon Lee to claim my bounties for all the illegal skimmers I destroyed, then it's off to battle again.
22:30
Another successful evening of battle. I was more ambitious this time and took on a massacre 70 mission. I completed it reasonably comfortably, although I took more damage than last night. And I didn't scoop so many materials, although I still looked for the high grade stuff after taking out a big ship.
I was wrong about the war being less profitable than the trade. Since fighting broke out I've made over 50 million credits. This week will be my most profitable within 3.000 Ly of the bubble.
3304 September 14, Friday
It's been a hot and uncomfortable day. I took a tour of the engineers to tune my new Gutamaya Eagle. I wanted to maximise the jump range to make the tour a little easier, so I visited Felicity Farseer first. I bought the enhanced thrusters from her which, along with the temporary FSD booster, set my cockpit on fire every time I jumped to a new system.
It was all worth it though, this thing is a lot of fun. I'm getting 600 ms-1 without boost and it turns pretty well too. If I can find enough proto radiolic alloys I'll be able to strip it down and get it even faster. The aim is to be faster than a seeker missile.
The other aim is to push myself to improve my flight skills. I've fitted fixed multicannons, lightweight of course and loaded with incendiary ammo. It isn't designed for war, but I'll give it a trial-by-fire tomorrow.
3304 September 15, Saturday
20:00
My ARC allies weren't about when I got back to Tionisla, so I took on a black box recovery mission. With the FSD booster removed it was two jumps to Kebes. There was no great drama as I scooped the boxes, but they sent some heavy hitters to Tionisla to chase me down. I made over half a million credits in bounties fighting three of the dangerous and deadly anacondas that interdicted me. Got a nice million credit bonus from ARC too, it was quite a profitable mission in the end. Lots of great materials too, I love anacondas. I shall be doing more of these missions in future now that I know about the perks.
Alright, so Social Labour's security forces saved my hide, but I was quite impressed with how my little Eagle handled. I did do a significant portion of the damage, once they had distracted the Anacondas and their Condors.
The next mission was to bring a traitor to justice. He was hiding out with pirates in Lave. Just a novice in a diamondback scout, but he had a more experienced wingmate protecting him. I took out half his hull, but when his shields went back up I had to bolt. Unfortunately I boosted too far away and my scanners lost track of them. I'll let him think he's off the hook and have another go tomorrow. And if I fail again I'll just have to finish him off with my Viper.
Someday I'll get myself a more specialised assassination ship. A Fer-de-Lance maybe.
21:30
I found the wake of CMDR Darrch Streynjer, one of the ARC/Fighter Club pilots I've been flying with, near a combat zone. So I dropped in to play. Checking my comms, I found he was on the Red Wing channel, beyond my clearance. Another pilot, CMDR Hans v. Volldampf, was fighting too.
My contribution only lasted half an hour, but my Eagle performed far better than I expected. For a start, it lasted half an hour. I was sure it'd be one-shotted within ten minutes, or that I'd burn it with the boost or the incendiary multicannons. I had a few fires, but heat won't become a big issue until I can keep the fixed weapons on target a little longer, short bursts are fine.
The shields went down three or four times, stripped down 2Ds were always going to be a bit feeble. But, to my surprise, this thing can take a few missile hits without having to run home crying. I did have to boost out of a couple of dogfights to let the shields recharge, but it's very, very good at that.
My favourite moment was a dogfight with a Taipan. It just couldn't bring its weapons around to shoot at me, I was glued to its tail. Took a while to land enough hits to destroy it, but it was fun. I could greatly improve my performance against smaller ships if I switched to a gimballed class 2 multicannon, or even turreted. A turret would help with the heat too, so it might be worth considering.
I only made about 60,000 credits in the combat zone tonight, but then I was specifically looking for eagles and taipans to play with.
3304 September 16, Sunday
10:10
Just boarded my ship in Ing Ring and checked out the starboard services. ARC have taken over! Must've been a quiet surrender because I'm sure gunfire would have woken me up. There's no sign of a struggle around the landing area either.
I shall do one more little massacre mission just to make sure. I need the practice. But I'm not going back to battle right now, rather to see if I can find that deserter.