A DED site

Report from OPSRD0013 (Omnipresent Ship Recording Device #0013)

 

After checking that all the crew were ready and the station personal were ready to accept the ships departure, Jon gave the order the undock. As the Hurricane glided out of the station into the emptiness of Hotrardik, the scanning crew were ordered to start probing out and identifying the signatures while the rest of the crew did the daily checks and navigation practice. In a short time the scanners had locked down an anomaly full of asteroids and a couple of sites that appeared to be inhabited by Angel Cartel pirates. The crew then got down to work pin-pointing and analysing the one remaining signature that was showing up. As this process was happening Jon realised that his crew needed a lot more practice in scanning, they were under-skilled and had very little experience in this field.

“Scanning complete sir” shouted out one of the ensigns. Jon walked over to the display and looked at the data. It appeared to be a DED site, rating: 4/10. After contemplating his next move, Jon orders the navigation crew to align and warp to the site. As the ship entered warp, his second in command, Leeroy, asked for a quick word.

“Are you crazy sir?” was the first sentence out of Leeroy’s mouth. “We aren’t setup for large scale action. Our fittings are all wrong, we need to be in a fleet if we are going to go in with this lack of shielding. We have a ship perfect for this six jumps away, it’s the same Hurricane hull, but it’s setup for taking loads of damage without relying on backup”.

Jon looked at Leeroy, considering his reply. “We will be perfectly fine. We have taken similarly fitted ships, smaller hulls may I add, to similar sized fights and walked out with no damage and lots of ISK and loot. I don’t see why this fight would be any different.”

“Will all due respect sir, we have no idea what is in that area. We have never seen a signature like this before, and we have never received a DED warning saying that it’s rated 4/10, whatever that means.”

Jon briefly considered this, turned to the navigation officer, and ordered to align down the gate and warp as soon as we were up to speed. “We’ll see what happens won’t we?” asked Jon to no-one in particular.

Little did Jon know that at the end of the gate was a veritable armada of all sizes of ships from frigates to battle-cruisers. As the Hurricane landed 45km from the blob of enemy ships, Leeroy looked at Jon, looked at the screen, looked back at Jon and quickly walked to his battle-station in the gunnery room. The battle started quickly, with enemy frigates burning to get under the guns. Drones were deployed and started to shoot down the frigates at a quick rate, but the frigates showed no signs of giving up. While the frigates were doing their dance of death, the larger enemy ships moved to their optimal ranges and started to hammer on the shields. As the warning alarms started to sound Jon knew that Leeroy was indeed correct, a differently fit ship was needed.

“Align to the station! Keep firing until we enter warp, keep the drones on nearby targets.” As the ship pulled the tightest turn that it could, Jon calculated that 3 more ships could be killed before the shields were in danger of collapsing. As the last frigate on field was destroyed all drones were recalled into the drone bay, and the turrets finished off the last cruiser within range. “Warp to the station” ordered Jon, “Leeroy, a word.”

“Yes sir?”

“You were correct. I apologize for ignoring your warnings. Was any damage done to the ship?”

“No damage done to the ship sir, all drones are in perfect order as well. No worries about the other matter. What’s the plan now?”

Jon smiled slyly. “I believe you said we had a ship capable of taking this amount of damage six jumps away?”

“That we do, in Frarn” smiled Leeroy.

“Then we are going to Frarn.” Turning to the ship intercom, Jon informed the whole crew on what was happening. “All crew, we are going to Frarn and picking up a different ship for that site. It is still a Hurricane hull, so all current crew will be coming across.”

A few minutes later the crew is happy and settled into the new Hurricane and in warp to the gate. Landing on the gate, the ship was ordered to jump in right away, and upon landing set to work clearing the remaining ships. Once the remaining stragglers were wiped out we went through gate to the second area of the site. As soon as the ship landed we received huge damage, and a Claymore was detected in site. Ordering distance to be put between our ship and the Claymore, Jon started calling primaries and assigning drone targets, leaving Leeroy to keep an eye on the shields, which were rapidly disappearing. As the incoming fire dropped off as the enemy ships were destroyed, and the shields started to regenerate themselves, the shields stabilized at around 60%, enough to be comfortable with. Once all the ships bar the Claymore were destroyed, Jon gave the order to close range and engage with everything. Drones pelted the sides of the enemy battle-cruiser, auto-cannons rained phased plasma at close range, and the lone missile launcher spewed out missiles as fast as they could be loaded and launched. Taking a beating, the Claymore finally died, and Jon ordered for the drones to be recalled and guns reloaded.

“Take us to the wreckage, I want to see what it was carrying” ordered Jon to the navigators.

Arriving at the cargo bay, he was greeted by all the engineers and scientists of the ship already crowded around two of the items that the Claymore had been carrying. “What did we get?” asked Jon, knowing that they must be worthwhile to have the normally clean-freak scientists in the cargo bay.

“It’s…deadspace. Sir.” replied one of the engineers. “This one is useless for how we fit our ships” he said, pointing to a Gistum C-Type amplifier, “but this one, well, it’s a gem. I can only think of one ship of yours on which this would deserve to go on, the Machariel.” Jon was amazed; it was a Gistum C-Type adaptive invuln field. Ordering the ship to turn around and dock up, Jon called the station and ordered the Machariel to be prepared for a fitting change, just a quick upgrade was what the station personal were told. As soon as the ship was docked, Jon put Leeroy in charge of sorting out the Hurricane and running the salvage mission of the sites, while Jon oversaw the installation of the new module, which on field testing gave the ship over 5000 more EHP than what it had before.

 

****

My first deadspace module, I am very happy.

I am moving to nullsec shortly, I’ll be helping USURP out against the BNI with the rest of my alliance. My poor Machariel might be waiting a while before it gets to show off its bling in public.

On the note of how I am going to be writing my blogs from now on, I think the third person works for me the best (The number of the OPSRD is how many ships I’ve lost, not including capsules)

Roam the skies,

Jon.