Wasting Time

So today, I log in and things are kinda slow. No one but greens in local. What a good chance to get some practice in! I bug Duke to come out and play with me to which he gladly agrees. We fight to hull because Im a noob and forgot to insure my ship. Duke comes out in his Wolf, and I have a TD fit with optimal range script. Worked pretty good imo, it cut his falloff and optimal by almost half, allowing me to tank his smaller amount of damage. He was buffer fit, so an extended fight with a Vengeance is a guarenteed loss.

We then ship up, me to my Sacrilege and him to a Tempest. For some reason, I thought the Tempest was a battlecruiser. Duke confused by tossing in Tornado and as such, my noobness showed through. Upon getting in range, Duke promptly killed my capacitor with his heavy neuts. I was in range, trying to nos and rep, but it just wasnt happening. I didnt even get half Duke's shields down before I hit hull and warped to station to lick my wounds.

Soon, I saw Tawa, a Tusker in local. I shout out asking what ship he's in today, either jag or enyo. We agree to an AF 1v1. Asking in corp if he uses booster alts, I get mixed responses. To be on the safe side, I invite Tawa to fleet and undock. He's about 200km from me undocking, so I warp us to my Bosena gate pounce. 130km from the gate to be exact. Thats a long as flight to make with just an AB and now warp drive. We'll get to that point later....

Anyhow, we start out roughly 100km from each other, and slow boat in range. Soon, I figure out that I didnt change fits from fighting Duke earlier, so I have no point to lock Tawa down. He easily keeps range at about 12-14km. I toss the TD with optimal script on him and hope he comes closer. Unfortuneately, he doesnt. I overheat my web to reach, and close the distance slightly. Tawa adjusts, resetting range, my web turns off. I ate through half his shields and he had some bleed through to armor! Woo hoo!

And now, the start of at least 20 or 30 minutes begins. Tawa dips into range, trying to get me to waste ammo, and it works. I eat through his shields and armor after several rounds of this. He destroyed my shields, as they always tend to be, and my armor is taking heavy damage. Then I realize I forgot to turn on the repper. Soon enough, my armor is back to 100%. I started this fight with 20 minutes left on my Exile Booster, so my repper was easily handling the damage. Yeah, the fight lasted long enough to wear out the booster. WTF?!

So we continue our dance, neither of us really gaining the upper hand. Being a Gallente ship, I know its going to have a tough hull, so I try to conserve my rocket stockpile, only shooting when I know they will hit. I dont know if Tawa was orbiting me at 10km or manually flying throughout the fight, but I started to slingshot (I think thats the tactical term for it) myself back and forth to him. Doing this allowed me to get back to the 13km or so range he liked to stay, and then approaching him brought me in web range and soon rocket range. At some point, he figured out what I was doing, roughly 75% structure I think, and I had to adjust to aiming my ship where he was heading in the orbit.

This worked out better for me than just approaching him because it put in range faster and for longer periods of time. I eventually ran out of my Inferno missiles, and switched to the Nova rockets I had. Getting distracted by talking in corp, Tawa repped to full shields often between dipping into my range of damage, forcing me to eat through them each time.

Eventually, I started to run low on ammo, roughly 500 rockets left. I know this is only a couple reloads away from running out. With this in mind, I stopped letting him rep to full shields and started actively going back in and out to hopefully make him make a mistake. With 50% structure left on his hull, I dipped in, and risked burning out my AB to keep in range long enough to either explode his ship or force him to warp off.

Eventually, I break his willpower to stay and he warps off, to my satisfaction. No killmail to provide as no one blew up. I considered this fight to be a draw until I finally broke down and forced myself to actually fly tactically and get damage on him as I could. I consider him warping out of a 1v1 to be him surrending and me winning.

Now, you need to understand, this was a long ass fight. For the longest time, I asked to just end it and call a draw, to which Tawa refused. I offered first a 30 million isk get out of jail free card. Again, Tawa refused, claiming my ship is worth more than that. Well, the hull itself isnt worth more than 30misk for sure. Another 5 or 10 minutes pass and I offer 50 misk to end this torture. Neither of us can kill the other, hes too far away for me to hit and he cant break my tank. And again, I get rejected with comments about how Im buying wins with my meta 4 DC and my atype reppers. Eventually, I just get tired of this and force myself to do what I mentioned above. I will admit to asking in corp if Ill get kicked for bringing in help. To which, most likely yes, I will get kicked. Also to which, no one in corp is comfortable in assisting in a 1v1, even one as annoying as this. So no corpmates helped in this 1v1 and Im glad they denied me the assistance.

However, being told I buy wins by using meta 4 dcu and atype reppers is an insult. The first rule of EVE is to not fly what you cant afford to lose. Just because you cant afford atype reppers and a meta 4 dcu are not my fault. I can, so I fly with them. The only reason I use the meta 4 dcu is because I have to so the fit I have fits within the ships CPU limits. I use the a type repper to add more to my tank, which if Im not mistaken, is to keep me alive during a fight. Ive lost several ships fit in this way and yeah, it makes me sad, but I move on and do it again.

I dont buy wins by using the best modules I can afford, thats called Risk vs Reward. If I risk a repper thats worth twice or three times the hull of the ship it is repairing, I am risking to lose that module any time I undock and use it. I can afford to lose it, or else I wouldnt even use it. Sorry if youre a broke ass pirate. My apologies if youre a risk averse pilot who doesnt want to risk an exspensive module to increase your chance of survival.

Buying the best modules you can afford does NOT guarentee you will live through all engagements. As has been shown by my very own killboard.