Missing a Magnate and mashing a Mammoth

I'm back, and curious to see if my earlier scouting will bag me any targets. I have a few systems to roam through, so ditch my scanning boat for a stealth bomber, aiming the Manticore towards our static wormhole once my system checks are completed. Core scanning probes are visible on my directional scanner in the neighbouring class 3 w-space system, although there aren't any ships at either tower. My glorious leader is around but not in w-space just yet, having had the sensible idea to export our loot and bring back fuel for the tower. Jumping from high-sec empire space to a class 2 w-space system bordering our neighbouring C3 and then in to the C3 itself has her see a Buzzard covert operations boat somewhere in the system, which sounds like my target. It will be slippery but I'm ready to try to catch the scout.

Fin stores the fuel and stows the Bustard transport, and chooses a Flycatcher interdictor to help with the hunt. Although the interdiction sphere launcher has a relatively long cool-down between charges, the destroyer-hulled ship is more agile and better able to intercept a cov-ops boat than the bulkier heavy interdictor. To make the ship more able Fin has fitted a sensor booster too. We should give the Buzzard a run for its money. At least, once it finishes scanning. There were only three signatures in this system a couple of hours ago, surely it can't take this long to resolve them all, particularly not in a cov-ops frigate designed for such exploration.

Finally, the probes disappear from the system, recalled to the ship that launched them. The only question now is where the scout will go first. Fin is sitting on our wormhole in the home system, I am on its K162. Not a Buzzard but a Magnate appears—local, judging by its name—and not on this wormhole but elsewhere in the system. That's good news and bad, as the frigate will be much easier to catch than a cov-ops that can warp cloaked, but there's no guarantee the Magnate will warp close enough to our wormhole to catch him. I don't think we should wait for him to come to us, I think I should find him first.

I think about checking the class 2 system, warping to that wormhole, but when the Magnate reappears on d-scan I open the system map and interrogate the other wormholes. The frigate's moved to the exit to low-sec, and now he's dropped of d-scan again. Maybe he jumped. I warp to the wormhole and loiter with intent, happy to see the wormhole flare a minute later. The Magnate has checked the exit and returned, now polarised and about to reveal himself to my waiting stealth bomber. I decloak and... she warps clear. But she hasn't warped to the tower. Her vector was almost directly upwards, which would take her to the wormhole to C2a. I follow behind.

I get to the wormhole in time to see the Magnate jump to the C2. I follow behind, ready to catch her on the wormhole in the C2 or, more likely, to follow and catch her return. I decloak and activate my sensor booster, which will allow for a super-quick lock on a target, but have the wormhole selected in anticipation of the Magnate jumping right back home. Ack! I've been caught in the heat of the chase and have forgotten about the one weapon that would make a difference here. I call Fin in her interdictor to jump to C3a and warp to the C2a wormhole, ready to bubble, but I imagine I'm too late in doing so. Damn my lack of awareness.

The Magnate appears and, sure enough, jumps back to the C3 where, sure enough, Fin hasn't managed to break the laws of physics and warp to meet her yet. I follow and again miss getting a positive lock. The Magnate aligns and warps almost instantly. The frigate's not even relying on warp core stabilisers to keep it safe, as I'm simply not even getting a positive lock, not even with a sensor-boosted stealth bomber. It would be impressive if it weren't frustrating me. Fin arrives on the wormhole and I apologise for being so slow in calling her across. The Magnate looks to have gone back to its tower, and with the chase apparently over Fin heads home for the night.

I reflect on the hunt for as I warp to the local tower to keep an eye on the Magnate, only to find the ship has gone. The capsuleer's off-line, I imagine, making it time to go home too. I warp to our wormhole, dropping short out of habit, and see it flare. Could it be...? I decloak and get ready for one last attempt, and the Magnate appears and slips through my targeting systems yet again. That's one tricked out frigate. I follow back to the tower again, where the pilot swaps the Magnate for a Legion strategic cruiser and appears to warp towards the C2. I tentatively warp to the wormhole myself, wondering what the pilot could do with Legion if she can make a Magnate impenetrable, but don't see a jump through the connection.

I hold for a minute before jumping to C2a myself, where d-scan shows me nothing but an empty system. Maybe the Legion is covertly configured, or maybe now the pilot has gone off-line. Either way, I've lost her. But jumping back to C3a has new contacts, one in a Loki strategic cruiser and the other in a Viator transport ship. The Loki, at one tower, is beyond my means in a stealth bomber but the Viator, at the other, could be a target. It can cloak, though, so even if it collects planet goo it could evade me. And surely the pilot of the Magnate has warned her colleagues that a stealth bomber with intimate knowledge of the system is making a nuisance of itself here. Despite my new targets probably being warned, I lurk outside of the tower holding the Viator for now.

The Loki drops off d-scan, making me wonder where it is until it warps in to this second tower and reappears. It's good to know it can cloak. It's even better to see it swapped for a Mammoth hauler. Now that is a nice and soft target to end the night on. No sooner is the hauler boarded than its engines engage, and it is off to the inner system. I try to see where it is headed but narrow azimuths between each planet from this far out makes it tricky. I make my decision and warp behind the Mammoth, watching as it warps to see that I am indeed heading to the same customs office.

My stealth bomber is perfect for this kind of ambush, and certainly much better than my covert Tengu. There is no recalibration delay on decloaking and the torpedoes fired from siege launchers hit these big targets much harder than the heavy missiles of the strategic cruiser. It really is a simple matter to decloak, lock on to the Mammoth, and destroy the ship in a single volley. However, when my sensor-boosted ship has locked on to the ejected pod and is now shooting that, I realise that the magnetar phenomenon in this C3 probably gave my torpedoes a helping hand in popping the Mammoth in one hit.

Pop goes the pod, and I scoop, loot, and, hmm. I would normally loot and shoot the wreck after scooping the corpse, but there is a fair amount of planet goo that has survived the explosion. I think I'll have that. It's a bit risky, but with a bit of care I should be okay. I jump home, swap to a cloaky Crane transport, and return to the customs office in C3a. I can't take all the loot in one haul, so I grab what I can, drop that off in a jet-can in a safe spot, then go back for the rest. The jet-can as an intermediate spot helps keep the stolen goods safe from others and prevents polarisation issues from jumping between systems too quickly. I can hide in the safe spot and wait for the polarisation effect to disperse before taking each load home, in case I get jumped myself.

All is quiet. I get all the planet goo safely home, where it sits in the hangar with a freshly frozen corpse. Despite the Magnate evading my lock, I manage to get a ship kill and podding this evening. Yep, I caught a pod but not the frigate. Still, whatever the ship-fitting skills, you have to admire capsuleers who don't communicate important information, like hostile pilots roaming the system.

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Tags: bustard, buzzard, crane, eve online, flycatcher, legion, loki, magnate, mammoth, manticore, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, pvp, viator, w-space

Running the gauntlet of empty w-space

After yesterday's shenanigans I think I'd better swing by our tower to see if it's still there. Popping the Noctis of a significant fleet to deny them a good hundred million ISK in profit may have caused some ire in them, but it's good to see they haven't taken it out on our tower. It's still here and intact. I doubt the same could be said of the sites in our system, and I launch probes and scan to see what's left of them. We have one anomaly and all of the non-anomalous sites, which is pretty good. I suspect the sole remaining anomaly is a result of the Sleepers repopulating, though. One extra signature could be the dying wormhole of yesterday's incursion, but turns out to simply be some more gas. I activate the ladar site and head to our neighbouring class 3 w-space system to explore as normal.

An off-line tower sits in range of the K162 in C3a, and I launch probes and perform a blanket scan of the system as I warp to the only planet not in range of my directional scanner, which isn't that far away. Getting closer sees two active towers and a Merlin frigate, and closer still shows the Merlin to be unpiloted. My probes report it as the only visible ship in the system, and with no anomalies and three signatures in the system I don't have much to scan. I imagine that resolving the signatures will find an extra wormhole, along with our K162 and the static connection, as they are generally the source of stray signatures in such tidy systems. Sure enough, the static exit to low-sec empire space is accompanied by a rather lovely looking outbound connection to class 2 w-space. I have more to explore.

Jumping in to C2a has two bubbles on d-scan and nothing else. Okay, not 'nothing', as an adjustment to d-scan's settings shows seventeen off-line towers scattered around. As all the towers are bare, small, and of the same type I imagine their number matches the number of moons in range, their being anchored a defence mechanism against invasion. It's probably working for now, as the one on-line tower on the edge of the system is on-line and unharmed. There is only an unpiloted Ibis frigate visible at the moment, making the system inactive, and scanning gives another relatively simple result of six anomalies and six signatures. Resolving the signatures finds the two static wormholes, one to class 1 w-space and the other an exit to high-sec. It's another supersoft C2! No wonder the locals feel the need to protect their system with anchored towers.

There's a distinct pattern to today's exploration. Continuing in to C1a I again see nothing but bubbles on scan, with that one alluring planet out of d-scan range. This time, though, there is no active tower on that distant planet, making the system unoccupied and, according to my scanning probes, inactive. Very inactive. I have thirty-five anomalies to think about bookmarking and twenty-two signatures to sift through. With no one living here I ignore anything that isn't a wormhole as I scan, resolving one, then two connections. The first is a static exit to low-sec, and the second is empty space. My probes are lying scumbags! I suppose I resolved the previous static wormhole minutes before it died and picked up the new one on my probes seamlessly.

The w-space constellation is terminated for now. I jump out of the C1 to low-sec to be by myself in a system in the Derelik region, one hop from a dead end. There are no anomalies, though, and the one extra signature turns out to be a ladar site. I head back to w-space, through to C2a, and out to high-sec, where I scan again. I pick up two anomalies and two extra signatures, giving me a rubbish magnetometric site and a spiffy K162 from more class 2 w-space. I jump in to take a look around, seeing two towers on d-scan from the wormhole, as well as noting probes whizzing around the system. I locate the towers, confirm there are no obvious ships here, and think about heading home. I doubt I'll catch the scout and, besides, I've been out in space for a while now. Penny needs food badly. I can always come back later.

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Tags: eve online, ibis, merlin, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, scanning, w-space

A bit of experience, a bit of luck

Oh dear. That Cheetah I saw earlier has mutated. It's no longer a covert operations boat but a ten-ship battle fleet. I went to empire space, for what turned out to be some disappointing ratting, having spotted the Cheetah on my directional scanner as I was leaving the home system, and returned wondering what he'd got up to in my absence. He's called in his buddies to pillage our system, that's what. Five Tengu strategic cruisers, a Scorpion battleship, Navy Scorpion, Maelstrom battleship, and two Basilisk logistic ships look to be ransacking our anomalies, stealing all the profit we'd probably never realise anyway. The cheek of it!

This is an opportunity. Fighting on home turf puts me at an advantage. I know all the sites, there are safe spots for me everywhere, and I even have a tower here for protection and a change of ship if necessary. It's a simple matter to find the anomaly where the fleet is, see that they aren't salvaging as they fight, and lie in wait for a squishy salvager. As the fleet makes short work of the Sleepers I get myself in to a suitable position to wait. It won't do to simply be in the site, or to try to get close to the wrecks, as the Noctis could work from anywhere and getting close runs the risk of early discovery. Instead, I get myself to a comfortable position far enough away to be able to warp to any point in the site in a matter of seconds, which also happens to conveniently double as a suitable point of retreat.

The Noctis is in the system now, my directional scanner picking him up, although combat continues a little longer. I suppose the Noctis could have a cloaking device fitted and be hiding between fights, but that shouldn't affect me. Here we go. All Sleepers are destroyed in this site, drones are recalled, and all the ships warp out. I keep updating d-scan and see drones being redeployed in the next site awfully soon. I think I need to anticipate a quick reaction time from this fleet. At least, once the Noctis gets here. The salvager drops off d-scan again, which seems odd, but when he reappears as the site I'm in despawns it looks like he was waiting for the site to become invisible to a ship's passive scanner before entering. I can understand that.

I align my ship to the bunch of wrecks over two hundred kilometres away and watch as the Noctis warps in. Once I am sure where the Noctis will drop out of warp, and almost before his warp engines cut out, I fling my covert Tengu in to the heart of the site to intercept him. I decloak a few seconds from landing, get my systems hot, and once my cloaking recalibration delay ends I start raining missiles on a warp-disrupted Noctis. Damage him, dammit, damage him! I'm chewing through the shields of the Noctis but it seems pretty hardy, and with the speed the fleet seemed to get between sites I am concerned that I won't have time to pop a simple industrial ship before some rather more powerful ships come to show me what damage really is.

Anticipating the fleet's return I align back to my monitoring spot, shortly before the Noctis starts taking armour damage. That's more like it. His armour drops quickly, and the hull barely offers the capsuleer any protection at all. The Noctis explodes in a way I find quite gratifying. The salvager was aligned back to whatever wormhole he came through and the pod is in warp pretty quickly, but I honestly wasn't worrying about catching it. Don't get me wrong, I was aiming to catch it on the way out, but the fleet warps in before the flames surrounding the wreck of the Noctis have even died down. Yep, that's a quick reaction time.

I reactivate my cloak and warp out as more ships warp in behind the first arrivals. Being aligned, or at least far enough away from the Noctis to cloak immediately, has probably saved me from retribution this time, but I still got the kill. Now I wait to see what the fleet will do. It's possible they'll stop and return home, but with ten ships against only one confirmed hostile I doubt it. At least, I hope they aren't so cowardly as to turn tail and run at the first sign of difficulty, not with the firepower and pilots they have available. And it seems they'll continue. The fleet holds in the cleared anomaly for a couple of minutes before warping to the anomaly they have already started, at about the same time as a new Noctis appears on d-scan.

I know I shouldn't take a shot at this second Noctis. Null-sec pilots excepted, few capsuleers are stupid enough to simply throw more ships at a problem and hope it solves itself. I also note that one of the Tengus didn't return to the cleared anomaly, dropping off d-scan not to be replaced, although I didn't update d-scan regularly enough to see what cloaked ship must have obviously come back to guard the Noctis. The fleet isn't simply sending a second Noctis in hoping I've gone away, this one is protected. And yet I can't help myself. The Noctis warps in to the site, starts dragging wrecks behind its obviously-aligned self—including the wreck of the first Noctis, with plenty of Sleeper loot surviving but most of the salvage destroyed—and temptation washes over me.

This is lunacy. I'm warping back in to the site, towards the new Noctis, knowing that I will be countered. Even so, I decloak, aim for the Noctis, and watch it warp cleanly away. I cloak again, surprised that I am able to, just as a Tengu decloaks ten kilometres from me. But for the curse of incompetence do I get to warp away, in time to see the fleet return once more. I suppose the other ships were aligned to this site too, and I would have had no chance of destroying the second Noctis in time. Even so, they made a mistake too. The Tengu guard was really quite slow in reacting to my presence, and the Noctis was too fast. Had he held his position for a few seconds longer, reciprocating my lock to prevent my cloaking, he could have given his guard time to disrupt my warp engines and give the fleet a prize Tengu kill.

I was more than a bit lucky. I knew I shouldn't have gone back for a second shot but did so anyway. I won't always be lucky with panicky salvagers and will need to listen to my voice of reason sooner rather than later. But I got the kill on the first ship and caused some disruption to another fleet in our home system. I'd better leave them alone now, for the sake of my own health if nothing else. I warp off to a distant safe spot and go off-line.

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Tags: basilisk, eve online, maelstrom, mmorpg, noctis, penny ibramovic, pvp, scorpion, tengu

Shooting at a shadow

I'm flying solo tonight, let's see what mischief I can get up to. There's a tower, some drones, and a Buzzard covert operations boat in our neighbouring class 3 w-space system, and I doubt they are all together. I find the Buzzard piloted inside the local tower, moved since my last visit to this system two months ago, and the drones are predictably elsewhere in the system. I don't care to look for them, but I warp out to launch scanning probes when it seems that the Buzzard isn't up to much. I start scanning and manage to subliminally affect the local pilot, as he launches his own probes and starts scanning too. I resolve one gravimetric site and three wormholes before the Buzzard warps out. I'm not likely to catch the cov-ops, though, so ignore him and examine what I've found.

The static exit to high-sec empire space is expected, a K162 from high-sec is fairly boring, but the K162 from class 2 w-space interests me. It interests me less when I jump in to see a tower and no ships on my directional scanner. A blanket scan of the system reveals only two anomalies and six signatures, which are quick enough to skim over. Gas, rocks, and another connection to high-sec as the second static wormhole are all that's here. I have high-sec options galore tonight, but I can't think of anything to do with it. The exit from C2a leads to the Domain region and half-a-dozen hops from Amarr, which is dandy, I suppose, but I head back to w-space to think of something to do.

It looks like the Buzzard's followed me in to C2a but there's still little I can do about him, so I continue back in to C3a. Seeing a Coercer destroyer blip on d-scan in the system and thinking about the Buzzard's necessary return here I head home and swap my scouting boat for a stealth bomber. I take the Manticore back out to take a look around, checking the two exits in C3a whilst I'm waiting for any ships to show themselves. One leads to the Everyshore region, the other comes from Sinq Laison, and both are fairly convenient in one way or another. It would be more convenient had I stayed in my scanning boat so that I could look for more wormholes here. Jumping in the Manticore was rather rash.

I head home and swap boats again, and back in my Tengu strategic cruiser I return to high-sec to scan. I find nothing in the system in the Everyshore region, but the Domain system positively lights up for a high-sec system, with nine signatures to keep me busy for a couple of minutes. I resolve a Sansha hideout, two magnetometric sites, a wormhole connecting two high-sec systems together, a second wormhole coming from class 2 w-space but dying, and some rogue drone asteroids complete with their own Hulk exhumer. This is high-sec space, so I'd better not shoot that Hulk.

As I am finishing scanning an Imicus frigate jumps past my cloaked Tengu through the dying wormhole to the C2 beyond, but I don't feel like chasing him. He may not be able to warp cloaked he could easily return to high-sec and wait there until I leave him alone. Wormholes connecting to high-sec are more for logistics than fun. The final signature turns out to be another wormhole, a healthy K162 from class 3 w-space. I can continue my exploration there. But as I approach the wormhole it flares. Thankfully I carry my w-space habits across to exploration in empire space and am still cloaked. I call full stop and wait to see what happens.

It takes a while but eventually a Tengu appears in front of the wormhole, shedding its session change cloak. And immediately it jumps back to the C3. What an excellent opportunity! The Tengu is now polarised and can't simply jump out to high-sec to escape attack, but if I follow I won't be polarised and have exactly that escape route should my attack turn out to be going badly. This is the ideal time to test my covert Tengu against another covert Tengu. Without pause I decloak and follow the other ship in to the class 3 system.

I decloak as soon as possible on the other side of the wormhole, getting my sensor booster active and my weapons systems ready. The other Tengu's waiting for the session change timer to end is only playing in to my hands, least of all because it isn't protecting his polarised ship one bit. There he is! I get a positive lock, activate my warp disruptor, and watch as my missiles fly right past the other ship as it enters warp. Brave Sir Robin has warp core stabilisers fitted, how very disappointing.

I curse my changing fortune and reactivate my cloak, exploring the system to find the Tengu pilot now swapped in to a shuttle at one of the two towers here. I think I've scared him in to inaction, though, and rather than hoping he'll come out to play I head back to high-sec to see what that Imicus pilot is up to instead. I risk the ageing wormhole to take a peek in C2b, where d-scan shows me four towers and three industrial ships. Popping a hauler would be worth having the wormhole collapse on me, particularly a static wormhole heading back to high-sec when I have two separate high-sec routes available to the home system already. I zip around locating the towers but only to find none of the haulers piloted. It's not a night for hunting, it seems.

A piloted Merlin frigate sits at another tower in C2b, but I doubt he will do much without a sparring partner, so leave this system behind and head homewards. C2a remains quiet, as does C3a, so I jump home, slap an analyser module on my Tengu, and head high-secwards to see what I can find in those magnetometric sites. A Cheetah blips on d-scan just before I leave the home system but, again, I'm unlikely to catch him. I'll look for the new wormhole when I get back, and continue to high-sec where I'm reminded why I don't clear magnetometric sites in high-sec any more. The rats are pathetic and the loot rubbish. I'd have been more profitable by staying at the tower and not firing my missiles. I'm going home.

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Tags: buzzard, cheetah, coercer, eve online, hulk, imicus, manticore, merlin, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, pvp, tengu, w-space

Following a frigate

I'm home, safe, and sitting on a K162. I've kind of been chased out of the class 5 w-space system connecting to our home, but only after almost destroying one of their strategic cruisers in transit. The death of the Noctis salvager was just fate, and I had to shoot it to get through the wormhole to the Tengu. But some rather more agile tacklers appear at the stripped-down tower and I thought it best for my health to return home. That's not stopping me watching the connection for more movement, though, least of all to see if the pilots will come looking for us. I sit and wait for a while but it instead seems that we have succeeded in blocking their route, and that no other ships will come this way. Now glorious leader Fin and I can take a second look in the other direction.

Fin's got herself in to a stealth bomber, lined up on the K162 for an opportunistic bombing run, and stays there in the Manticore as I scout the class 3 w-space system in my covert Tengu. The Vagabond cruiser remains at the tower as it did earlier, doing nothing, but a new contact has appeared in a Heron frigate, and he's moving. The ship is outside the shields of one of the three towers in the system and is launching probes. I am too far to try to catch him and and he cloaks before I get in range to cause mischief, but the frigate cannot fit a covert operations cloak and will need to show himself when he warps.

I estimate the last-known position of the Heron as best I can and move closer, opening my system map to orientate myself with the direction the two wormholes here lie in. I call Fin over and ask her to sit near our K162, in-line with the planet holding the tower, so that she has a good chance of catching the Heron if it tries to visit our home system. And there he is, and there he goes. He decloaks and is warping to our K162, probably the first wormhole his scanning probes resolve, and I tell Fin to get ready. I follow behind the Heron, choosing to drop far short of the wormhole, which seems to be a common manoeuvre of ships that can't warp cloaked.

Sure enough, the Heron drops out of warp far from our K162, and although I am nearby I am not close enough to guarantee catching the ship. My systems will suffer a recalibration delay when I decloak, and without locking on to the ship I will need to rely on physical proximity to prevent the Heron from cloaking and moving slowly away. I push my Tengu towards the Heron, judging the best time to decloak so that I can burn and bump in to the frigate whilst my sensors recalibrate, only to see the Heron keep its distance. The ship's moving away from me and towards our wormhole. And towards Fin.

I suggest not using a bomb launch, as the frigate could probably enter warp before the bomb detonates at the end of its ten-second flight. The stealth bomber has quick-locking systems that don't suffer a penalty when decloaking, and we only need a positive lock for the Heron to be ours to destroy. Sadly, the frigate cloaks after ten kilometres or so, before either of us are in optimal positions. And cloaked ships can no longer interfere with other cloaked ships, so even though I am close I cannot sneak up and surprise our target. But I think I'm close enough and pointing in the right direction to risk showing myself.

I decloak and burn through empty space. A couple of seconds pass but my aim was good, as the Heron appears when my Tengu speeds a couple of kilometres above it and disrupts its cloak. I try to perform a barrel roll to get myself back pointing at the frigate as I gain a target lock, Fin now decloaking to join the fun but still too far to get her warp disruptor active. It's okay, I manage to lock on to the Heron and missiles spew from my launchers. The frigate's shields drop quickly but, to my disappointment, the ship warps clear. What went wrong? I don't think I suffered finger trouble, so I think all it could be is that the Heron has warp core stabilisers fitted. That's such a shame.

The Heron's slipped past us, but it was a good hunt. I return to the tower, where the Heron fled to, and sit cloaked watching the pilot. It's not likely that he'll come out again but it's best not to assume. Besides, there's a second wormhole here for the local capsuleer to explore, that of the static exit to low-sec empire space. And it looks like he's found it, as the Heron warps in that direction. Fin has moved to the exit wormhole and I am following behind the Heron, but when we get there we see no sign of the frigate. All is explained a minute later when the ship returns from low-sec, having landed on top of the wormhole and gone out to reconnoitre the exit.

I should have known better, as the pilot has show typical behaviour, in my experience. I ought to have gone directly to the wormhole instead of second-guessing myself and dropping short again. As it is, the Heron is free to return from low-sec and warp back to his tower unmolested. Of course, we'd have needed both my and Fin's ships disrupting the frigate's warp engines, if he has warp core stabilisers fitted as suspected, but we could have been in a good position to do that. And now we've missed our shot. Never mind, we got to engage some big and expensive ships, and chased a smaller ship around a w-space system. It's been a pretty decent night.

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Tags: eve online, heron, manticore, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, pvp, tengu, vagabond, w-space

Intercepting exports

I was thinking about having a night off from space and, as I find myself here anyway, my heart may not be in it as a result. But if there's one lesson I've learnt during my mercurial moods it's that I'm keen on exploration. There's no direct scanning that needs to be done currently, as Fin's ahead of me in our neighbouring system and bookmarks are already available, but a new system to visit is like a gift. My glorious leader reports a Vagabond cruiser and pod sitting at one of the three towers in the class 3 w-space system, and as I go to join her she tells me of a Ferox battlecruiser and battleship heading out to low-sec empire space through the C3's static wormhole.

My arrival means we can monitor one of the other two towers, as the Vagabond and pod don't seem active and we need to determine what activity it is we're seeing. As a pod returns from low-sec and a Rapier recon ship heads out it looks like ships are being exported, but where from? The local towers seem to remain empty as ships and pods fly backwards and forwards, launching scanning probes finds nothing in the C3 that Fin hasn't already scanned, and there are no other wormholes. Unless the ships are disappearing in to the vacuum, there is only one other route available to them. I jump back through our K162 and scan the home system.

One new signature is a ladar gas harvesting site, which I activate as I resolve a second signature, a K162 from class 5 w-space. Poking my nose through to take a look in the C5 has two Tengu strategic cruisers, two Orca industrial command ships, a Noctis salvager, and a partial tower visible on d-scan. I locate the skeletal tower to see the Tengus and Noctis piloted, the Orcas not, all ships sitting in the completely undefended force field in front of a ship maintenance array and nothing more. This looks like the source of the ships being exported.

Finding the source of the activity gives us advantages. We can engage on the wormhole connecting the C5 to our home, or our home to the C3, or even the C3 to low-sec, giving us plenty of opportunities to chase, should we need them. We can also monitor the tower directly and see what ships are being exported before having to make a quick estimation as a ship decloaks on a wormhole. At the moment, it looks like we'll be meeting a Tengu or two, or a Noctis. As I relay this information to Fin and watch for movements a new contact warps in to the bare tower in a Helios covert operations boat. He didn't come from the direction of the wormhole so it's unlikely he's been scouting the route. We probably remain undetected.

The first Tengu warps out of the tower towards the wormhole. I alert Fin but she's still in the C3 and most likely in the wrong ship. Even so, my glorious leader tries to give chase, but loses the Tengu as it jumps to low-sec. That's okay, we have a second Tengu to wait for and it would probably be better to tackle it by itself anyway. Fin returns home, swaps her covert Tengu for a covert ship-killing Legion strategic cruiser, and plants herself on the K162 in our home system. Now we wait. The second Tengu moves but doesn't warp. It crawls out of the tower's force field, giving me a tempting target considering the lack of defences on the tower, but it doesn't get anywhere near the kind of range from the tower it would need to be for us to be able to pop it before it could get back. We need a clearer shot.

It looks like we may not get that clear shot at a solo Tengu, as a pod returns to the tower after dropping off the first one. The pilot boards an Apocalypse battleship, but is only settling in to the ship as the second Tengu finally warps. I tell Fin to get ready, as this is our target, and she decloaks as I warp behind the Tengu towards the wormhole. I drop short of the wormhole, so that I don't decloak and potentially spook our target early, and I want to hold in this system to start with anyway. If Fin catches the Tengu it may want to jump back to try to catch Fin off-guard, and if he does I'll be here waiting. If he instead returns fire I can hop in to the home system to help Fin. It looks like she may need some help too, because as I approach the wormhole cloaked the Apocalypse drops out of warp and follows behind the Tengu.

With the Apocalypse and Tengu gone from the system I decloak my Tengu and prepare my systems, so that I'm ready for whatever comes my way. I am waiting for Fin's call that the Tengu is caught and fighting back, ready to jump through the wormhole, when the unexpected happens. The Noctis that was at the tower drops out of warp on to the wormhole too. I'm getting a bit of a reputation, as it seems the salvagers can't help but throw themselves at me, and this really isn't helping. We'd both eyed-up the pilot as a target for having an obnoxious name but would have let her go in favour of engaging a combat ship, but it seems that all three ships entered warp before their vanguard could relay information about the Legion waiting on the other side of their static wormhole.

Fin's got the Tengu and says it's clear for me to jump, but I can't resist popping the Noctis first. I lock on, disrupt its warp engines, and start shooting. I'm not surprised that the salvager doesn't fancy jumping through the wormhole to the firefight on the other side, but she's not going back to the tower here if I can help it. I accelerate to ramming speed and give the Noctis a nudge, in case she has warp core stabilisers fitted, and one nudge is all it takes to keep the salvager around long enough for it to burst in a satisfying explosion. I aim for the pod but it warps clear, so with my personal vendetta against salvagers cleared I jump home to help Fin.

The Tengu is certainly pinned down, and it and the Apocalypse are shooting back. My arrival surprisingly calms the situation down a little, as the battleship turns tail and heads back to the C5, leaving us the strategic cruiser to pick apart, which was what we wanted in the first place. But the Tengu returns to the C5 too, so we both follow. The Tengu still has nowhere to go on the other side of the wormhole, and as he's now polarised he has even fewer options available. The Apocalypse has warped away and I'm aware that he could return in a different ship, as could the Noctis pilot, and potentially the Helios pilot too. I suppose it all rather depends on what ships they've already exported and what's left in their hangar.

I'm updating d-scan regularly, watching and expecting a new ship to be brought to bear. And here he comes, a Rook recon ship now visible, no doubt planning to use its ECM to break our target locks on the Tengu to let him warp clear. The Rook warps in just as the Tengu's polarisation effects end, as he finds he can jump through the wormhole again, shields looking perilously low. Fin follows but I'm stuck, having joined the fray late and left a minute to kill with the Rook before I can jump again. Fin chases the Tengu but it slips away from her, and all the Rook does to me is jam my systems. I take a moment to loot the Noctis wreck on the wormhole, shooting it once the Rook gets bored of jamming me and doing nothing else and warps away.

Pocket clear, I cloak and return to watch the tower for further movements. The Tengu taunts Fin before as it leaves for low-sec, saying 'I'm passive, rats are scarier than you', pointing out that our energy neutralisers weren't as effective as we'd hoped. But if rats routinely knock his Tengu's shields down to 30% and has his colleague rush to get a Rook to save him, I recommend he switches to an active tank. Still, it was a good fight and close at the end. But that's probably our one chance, as when the pod returns the pilots board a Vigilant cruiser and Arazu recon ship. That's my sign to leave the system before I can't, and I head home.

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Tags: apocalypse, arazu, eve online, ferox, helios, legion, mmorpg, noctis, orca, penny ibramovic, pvp, rapier, rook, tengu, vagabond, vigilant, w-space

Buzzing a Buzzard

I get back to the home w-space system as my glorious leader arrives. I'm not staying long, though, simply swapping to a stealth bomber and returning to our neighbouring class 3 system, where I noticed a lone pod on my directional scanner. I update Fin to the situation and warp to the tower to see the pod where I expect it to be, floating in the force field. He's not doing anything, unsurprisingly, and as I still have another wormhole to explore in this system I leave him for a few minutes to get settled. I warp my Manticore to the K162 from class 6 w-space and jump through.

Six ships and a tower are visible on d-scan from the wormhole. I locate the tower easily enough and see that not only are there no pilots here but there are also almost no defences protecting the tower. Only four guns are dotted around the force field, and there aren't even any hardeners safely ensconced inside the shields. For a tower in class 6 w-space I'm amazed that it remains intact. Still, there's no one here and nothing happening, and I don't quite fancy shooting it for hours on end, so I head back to C3a to see if the pilot in the pod is up to any mischief yet.

There's no change in our neighbouring system. I'm hoping my earlier assault on a visiting fleet's Noctis salvager went entirely unnoticed by the local pilot. He wasn't around when the fleet came in and started shooting Sleepers in the few anomalies here, nor when I surprised the Noctis pilot hard enough to scoop his corpse in to my hold, only turning up when I took the opportunity to loot and salvage the few Sleeper wrecks that remained when the fleet scattered back to their class 5 system connecting to this C3. Morbid tea parties aside, this is pretty much why I scoop corpses and shoot wrecks, because it leaves no physical trace of earlier ambushes. I imagine pilots are more likely to be active if they arrive in a system that doesn't contain wrecks and a corpse or two.

It's not the pod pilot who makes the first noise, though. A new contact pipes up in the local channel, perhaps making a faux pas, perhaps not. He's in a different corporation but the same alliance as the pod, and addresses him directly. And apart from knowing that this second capsuleer must be in the C3 I have no idea where he could be or what ship he's in. This is the only tower here and I've seen no other ships come in or out. And now there's more activity. The addressed pod pilot boards a Helios covert operations boat, warps to a safe spot, and launches probes to start scanning. His aren't the only probes in the system, though, the other pilot looks to be scanning too. More interestingly, even though the Helios is in a safe spot he doesn't appear to be cloaking. I wonder how long he'll stay like that.

I need a different boat if I'm to catch the careless Helios. I head home and swap my Manticore for my scanning Tengu strategic cruiser, with Fin planting an interceptor on our wormhole in case of visitors. Sadly, the Helios has found the control to activate his cloaking device by the time I get back to the C3, leaving me little to do but wait with Fin, albeit on the other side of the wormhole to her. I'm now in a worse ship than before, the speed and locking time of the Tengu rather less suitable than the stealth bomber for catching a cov-ops boat, but it's the best I can offer for now, and at least I can alert Fin to any movements on this side of the wormhole.

Here's movement. It's the talkative fellow, in a Buzzard cov-ops. He's found our wormhole first and is keen to take a look inside, perhaps prompted by his ship decloaking my Tengu when he drops out of warp almost on top of me. I tell Fin he's coming through, but the agile little bugger evades her interceptor and gets clear of the wormhole. 'Want to get a HIC?', Fin says. That's a jolly good idea, certainly much better than my sitting here looking dumb. I jump home, warp to our tower, and get an Onyx heavy interdictor warmed up. I check its systems, swap out the cloaking device for another missile launcher, and warp back to the wormhole, jumping right back to the C3 and inflating the warp bubble.

I get the bubble up immediately because timing is important and I feel safe doing so. We're only waiting for a Buzzard, and any ships that warp in to my position will hit the edge of the bubble and give me a chance to escape homewards. And here's the rest of we, as Fin jumps in to join me in our bubble trap. Except that's not Fin, it's the Buzzard! My bubble's up, but I have no interceptor. I need to try to prevent the cov-ops from cloaking, and the only way I can do that is by locking on to him. That's fine, as I need to do that to shoot at him anyway, and to my surprise I gain a positive lock, even as the Buzzard starts burning hard past my bows.

Missiles pepper the Buzzard's shields, its speed mitigating much of the damage, and a bit too late I activate the web module that Fin thought about adding to the Onyx. Good choice. It slows the cov-ops down just enough, letting Fin enter the system and pounce on our target. Now he's going nowhere. Well, by 'nowhere' I mean the edge of my bubble, and there's not much I can do about that. But even if he gets outside my bubble he's not going much further with his ship, as Fin has a vice-like grip on the Buzzard. I try to move closer to the combat but the bubble's penalty to my velocity means that even at full burn I can't cover the two kilometres or so needed for the Buzzard to explode where his pod will also be trapped. The cov-ops is destroyed, the pod warps free. I should probably train my heavy interdictor piloting skills that final level.

We loot and shoot the wreck, my second kill of the night and Fin's first. And this really is Fin's kill, being sharp and getting me moving when I was sitting like a lemon. If she hadn't been here the Buzzard would hardly have noticed a threat. But I think the Buzzard also made a mistake in our favour. It looks like when he jumped back here the pilot made a bee-line for his tower, which unfortunately sent him flying through the wormhole's locus, preventing him from cloaking immediately. Had he turned directly away from the wormhole he probably would have been able to cloak and avoid my target lock. But his panic is our gain.

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Tags: buzzard, eve online, helios, manticore, mmorpg, onyx, penny ibramovic, pvp, tengu, w-space

Another notch for a Noctis

I'm back in space and looking for something to shoot. I was in our neighbouring class 3 w-space system six weeks ago and the tower I have listed remains in the same place, although no one is home. A blanket scan confirms no obvious ships are in the system and shows me three anomalies and seven signatures. I resolve two ladar sites, one radar and magnetometric site each, and three wormholes, the last of which I finish scanning as a Zephyr, of all ships, warps in to the tower I'm floating outside of. I reconnoitre the connections whilst the prototype scanning ship gets his bearings, bookmarking a static exit to low-sec, a K162 from deadly class 6 w-space, and a K162 from class 5 w-space. It's not looking too friendly for the C3 pilot.

The Zephyr does nothing. I watch him for a minute but he goes off-line, probably after updating his skill queue, giving me a window to check the exit system in low-sec. I find myself in the Heimatar region and one hop from the notorious Amamake system again, and with more w-space behind me I choose not to scan here for now. And although I'm not actually too concerned about exploring class 6 w-space systems I get the general impression that any pilot living there is probably more experienced than in lower-class systems, so I head through the K162 to class 5 w-space instead. Like it's going to make that much of a difference.

Two towers are immediately visible on my directional scanner from the wormhole, along with a Rifter frigate, Reaper frigate, Noctis salvager, Iteron hauler, and only two moons. The towers have to be around those moons, so I scout them first before thinking about launching scanning probes. The Iteron and Reaper are unpiloted at one tower, but a Drake battlecruiser sits piloted at the same tower. Maybe I overlooked his presence on d-scan a moment ago. Then again, he immediately warps to another planet, which suggests both another tower and that this pilot has perhaps only just turned up. I follow in his wake, after noting the piloted Noctis and Cheetah covert operations boat at the second tower around this planet.

There are at least four more towers in this system, which is perhaps not unusual for this class of w-space, and three Drakes on d-scan, plus a second Cheetah. I locate the Drakes at one of the towers, only for two of them to have dropped off d-scan by the time I find the third. It's possible they've gone to C3a to engage Sleepers, so I warp to the outer planet again to check on the Noctis, hoping it will become a target. I don't find the Drakes directly but pick them up on d-scan again. I head to the wormhole to the C3, dropping short in time to see the third Drake jump through. Oh good, I have that system scanned, which will make hunting the Noctis so much easier. The main problem is deciding when to follow the fleet.

If I jump too soon it's possible the fleet won't have got themselves organised and will still be sat on the other side of the wormhole, giving the game away a little early. Even if the fleet has moved in to an anomaly, the Noctis could be sat on the wormhole waiting to be called in to the first cleared site, which may provide a nice sitting target for a moment but also an opportunity for the salvager to jump home and call the fleet to his aid. I don't want that either. I wait a few minutes, hoping for the fleet to move on and the Noctis to have made a safe spot, or maybe warped to an arbitrary moon in the system as a half-way measure, and jump to the C3. I appear to be in luck, as I am greeted by no ships.

I don't see any Sleeper wrecks on d-scan. Opening my system map shows why, as all three anomalies are out of range of the wormhole. I warp across the system to see the three Drakes and an unexpected Tengu strategic cruiser in an anomaly with Sleeper wrecks. Whilst the combat continues I make a suitable tactical waiting point just outside the anomaly, far enough away to be able to warp in to the site at a moment's notice, yet close enough to remain in visual range. All I need now is the Noctis, it so far remaining invisible to d-scan. Ah, there he is now, which is hopefully a good sign.

The site is cleared of Sleepers and the Noctis warps in. But the fleet doesn't warp out, making it look like I was spotted and that the combat ships will guard their salvager. Even so, I get ready. I bookmark a wreck within a couple of kilometres of the Noctis and align my ship towards it. Maybe I could risk a shot anyway. I probably won't last long against the combined fire of a strategic cruiser and three battlecruisers, but it shouldn't take long to pop a Noctis and unless their Sleeper combat ships have a warp disruptor fitted I should be able to flee easily enough. Oop, it doesn't matter, as there they go, one, two, three, warping out of the site and in to the next.

As the last ship enters warp so do I. It's easy to spot the increased acceleration of the exiting ship and my warp engines ignite immediately, thanks to being aligned, and I decloak and get my systems hot, seconds away from introducing myself to the Noctis. I get a positive lock and start shooting, approaching the Noctis in expectation of having a new corpse I'll need to scoop quickly. Warping in as the fleet warps out gives me the maximum amount of uninterrupted time to engage the salvager, but if they come back I don't want to be caught fumbling with loot or corpses. And speaking of loot, there is an unlooted wreck the Noctis is towing behind it, right next to my ship. My missiles are happily chewing away at the salvager's armour, I have little else on my mind right now. I open the wreck and move the Sleeper loot in to my hold to get a some pre-emptive profit.

It takes a little while to pop the Noctis, longer than a stealth bomber would take, but it pops. I snap at the pod with my targeting systems, and am pleased to get a positive lock and my warp disruptor active on it. As my missiles get to to the chewy centre of the pod I loot the wreck of the Noctis, trying to be as efficient as possible, before turning my fire on to the wreck as I scoop the frozen corpse to my hold. No need to scoop, loot, and shoot, as I did it on the fly. All that's left for me to do is get out of there, and I burn away from the pocket to get safe. The Tengu and one of the Drakes return just in time to see me cloak, with nothing they can do about it. Safe, I warp back to my monitoring point, where I bask in the warmth of a good kill.

The Drakes and Tengu leave the site and the system. I don't suppose they're coming back. And there's a Sleeper battleship in this anomaly that remains unlooted, holding a good seven million ISK in its wreck. I'm having that. I warp in, loot it, then warp out again. But if the fleet isn't coming back maybe I can have the loot in those cruisers too, and probably the salvage. I return home, drop off what I've collected already, and go back to the cleared anomaly in C3a in a salvaging destroyer. It is a simple matter to sweep up the handful of wrecks left behind, netting me about eighteen million ISK in total, which is a pretty good addition to the podding. And as I head home with my loot I notice a pod on d-scan, which is probably local. Maybe the evening isn't quite over yet.

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Tags: cheetah, drake, eve online, iteron, mmorpg, noctis, penny ibramovic, pvp, reaper, rifter, scanning, tengu, w-space, zephyr

Stumbling across yesterday's system

New sites continue to appear in the home system faster than I can despawn them. This is untenable! Maybe some rocks have gone since yesterday, but in their place is, um, oh, a wormhole. Okay, there are no new sites today and instead there are two wormholes for my exploration pleasure, a static connection to class 3 w-space and a K162 from more class 3 w-space. I jump through the K162 to see what's in the system I'll designate C3b. Nothing is evident on my directional scanner from the wormhole, so I launch probes and perform a blanket scan of the system. My probes show me one ship, seven anomalies, and four signatures. I find the ship as a Probe frigate in a local tower, piloted but inactive, and I scan quickly to resolve all three additional signatures also as wormholes.

The extra wormholes are not as exciting as I first thought, with a static exit to low-sec empire space, a K162 coming from low-sec, and a K162 from class 2 w-space that would be interesting were it not at death's door. I exit through the static connection to find myself in the Khanid region, where a Blood Raider anomaly is picked up by my on-board scanner. With no one else in the system I think I can spare a few minutes to pop some rats, but two interruptions by passing pilots later I'm feeling I've had my fill of low-sec and return to w-space. Or maybe I'll continue with low-sec, as there is the K162 to explore beyond, which takes me to the Kador region. I'm by myself and a mere three hops from high-sec, but there are no anomalies for me to play in.

Rather than scan this system I head homewards, noting the disappearance of the Probe in C3b, where I have a static wormhole to investigate. Our neighbouring class 3 system is a little familiar, this being my fourth visit in total and the last one only a fortnight ago, and I warp to the tower listed in my notes to flump in to a mist of bubbles. I can't say they bother me, nor does the presence of nine ships in the tower, as they are all lacking pilots. I warp out, launch probes, and start to sift through the... hmm, twenty-five signatures is rather a lot for no guaranteed excitement. I think I'll go back to low-sec and scan those systems, as there are generally much fewer signatures, giving me a positive or negative result more quickly. I can return here if I don't find anything.

Scanning finds nothing in the system in the Khanid region, but my probes pick up three additional signatures in the low-sec system in Kador. Even better, despite one site being filled with rocks the other two signatures are both X702 outbound connections to class 3 w-space. I have more to explore, and I didn't have to wade through two dozen signatures to get here. I pick the X702 I'm floating in front of and jump in to C3d, named as such because I bookmarked it second. D-scan shows me an Orca industrial command ship and a tower, and I am thoroughly gobsmacked to see the Orca merely parked unpiloted inside the tower's force field. I note the tower's location and return to low-sec to look in C3c instead.

Another clear d-scan, but opening my system map to get an idea of what's in range and what isn't shows me a bunch of bookmark pins stuck in various places. This shouldn't happen, as I delete my w-space exploration bookmarks daily. Actually, every other collapse of our static wormhole, I suppose, as I don't want to be unprepared in case of coincidences sending me back to the same system. Coincidences like this, as I was only in this C3 yesterday, where Fin scanned it thoroughly as I stumbled in to a pair of Drake battlecruisers clearing Sleepers on the other side of the constellation. Fin's detailed scanning is showing up clearly on the system map, and although I wonder how many of the bookmarks are stale I don't suppose much has changed in a day.

The position of wormholes will likely have changed in this w-space system, as these are in constant flux, but the outbound connection to a deadly class 6 system remains, apparently this type lingering for a day or more. Apart from that nugget of information, this system looks as quiet and boring as it was yesterday. Well, except for the Buzzard covert operations boat just warping in to the tower here. A new contact is always interesting. He does nothing for a minute and then starts crawling out of the shields.

The Buzzard's slow movement out of the shields would be much better were he crawling in my direction, but he's heading for the opposite side of the force field. I bookmark a defence on that side of the tower, bounce off a moon, but return only in time to see probes scattered around and the Buzzard crawling back in to the shields. He was lucky. That kind of behaviour is a little careless and has got other scouts in to trouble before.

I may as well scan whilst the Buzzard scans. I resolve the new static exit to low-sec, and a second wormhole with an Anathema cov-ops sitting on it. I warp in to find a K162 from class 4 w-space, which the Anathema jumps through as I land. I follow and apparently look suitably threatening, even to an agile cov-ops—although I suppose any two ships meeting in w-space is a potential threat—causing the Anathema to jump right back to C3c. I follow and again decloak early to try to get a positive lock on the tiny target, but the cov-ops is agile and cloaky, warping away from my failed attempt to stop him. I follow to the low-sec connection, although you could argue I'm not really following him but warping in the only other direction I've scanned. Either way, I warp to the wormhole the Anathema fled to, only to have another failed attempt at locking the ship and disrupting its warp engines. There's no shame in missing a covert operations frigate.

That's probably my excitement for the evening. I go back to C4a to have a proper look around, curiously enough spotting an Anathema on d-scan. Maybe I chased the wrong one. I launch probes and blanket the system, revealing three ships, all of which I find at a local tower. A couple of frigates are empty but a Badger hauler is piloted. Maybe the Anathema is somewhere out there to find but I've already shown how tricky they are to catch today, and I'll have better luck on a slow and bulky hauler. I would have better luck on a slow and bulky hauler if he were to do anything, which he doesn't, and with my glorious leader here and calling me home I'm not inclined to watch a ship float passively for an extended period.

Heading home has the Buzzard in C3c still scanning, C3b quiet, and our static wormhole killed by Fin. Good job, as C3b holds some good anomalies and no one to get in our way. To end the evening being productive we both board our Sleeper Tengu strategic cruisers and explode our way through four anomalies, returning home through a now-dying wormhole to bring back a Noctis salvager each to sweep up the wrecks and leave the system tidier than we found it. We collect almost a quarter-of-a-billion ISK in loot from the Sleeper wrecks, returning home safely without seeing another soul. There has been plenty to explore, some harmless chasing around, and profiting from Sleepers. It has been a good evening.

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Tags: anathema, badger, buzzard, eve online, low-sec, mmorpg, noctis, orca, penny ibramovic, probe, scanning, sleepers, tengu, w-space

Music of 2011, part four

Not quite before the end of the first month of 2012, I present my last collection of music from 2011. There is plenty to like here but I am sure I put off writing these reviews because of not wanting to revisit one album in particular. Had I done this earlier I could have chucked it away and had a much nicer playlist to listen through. Either way, now I can look forwards to the new music of 2012.

Echoey percussion opens album Geidi Primes by Grimes, before whispy vocals punctuate each bar. It's delightfully quirky, more so when the vocals become off-set by half-a-bar later in the song. Second track Sardaukar Levenbrech continues along the same trend but on an amazing tangent that takes the music and vocals on an oriental tour. And so goes the album. Catchy but somewhat incorporeal beats and vocals not so much thumping along but merrily taking a stroll down a canal path. A slight sense of urgency emerges with Avi but is dispelled again by the time Gambang appears, with its stilted loop. Geidi Primes is a wonderful collection of interesting and atmospheric songs.

I picked up The Devil's Walk in Sister Ray in London and, boy, do I regret it. I thought I recognised Apparat as a name I was looking out for. Or maybe it was the album art. I don't know. And as I was looking to buy some new music and the in-shop blurb was positive I decided to take the chance. I've tried to like the music but it is tedious monotony, either up-beat using the same tick-tock rhythm or a drearily slow snooze-fest topped with unremarkable vocals. Each track takes too long to start and too long to stop, not really knowing what they want to achieve, making it feel like an album of final songs, each one trying to be more inflated and full of faux-meaning than the last. I must remember that in-shop blurb is written to make you buy what it's selling, and that I need to be more discerning in the future. And now I can delete this crap from my iPod.

New punk band from Denmark Iceage are causing quite a stir at the moment, and they are definitely a band I recognise when I pick up their debut album New Brigade in Sister Ray. The album begins quite unassumingly, with just a sampled noise being played back a few times, but kicks off properly with White Rune. The music is pretty much what you'd expect from a good punk band, being noisy guitars and fast drumming. The vocals are suitably lo-fi and, although a little deeper than I would perhaps normally be comfortable listening to, work well for the overall sound. Iceage pound their way through twelve tracks of high-intensity music that doesn't quite tip the 25-minute mark, and it's gorgeous.

Not an album but an EP, but this release from Slowdance is worth including. Bright and poppy, we get four tracks of really catchy music on Light and Color, in both English and French. The EP starts with the fabulous Cake, where perhaps my attraction to the French language biases me somewhat, but the tune bops along beautifully with intermittent rumbles from the drums. And to prove it's not just the French singing that appeals to me, Sweetness and Spell keep the allure going, before climaxing in French with Les Reines. The singing is great, the music is nicely measured, and, perhaps best of all, the EP is available for whatever you want to pay for it, including nothing. Light and Color is definitely worth a look, and I'm going to be watching out for more from Slowdance.

I have to admit that I never really got in to Sleater-Kinney, which potentially makes the supergroup element of Wild Flag less important to me than simply being the next project of Mary Timony. And when the writing duties seem to be split between the different members of the band there definitely seems to be Sleater-Kinney music and Mary Timony music. This provides both the high and low point of the album for me, as Glass Tambourine is unfortunately Mary Timony at her most mechanical. Even though the introduction and bridge are energetic and interesting the song slows down to a snail's pace and doesn't really go anywhere. But contrast it against Something Came Over Me and you find the brilliance that Timony is capable of. Superficially similar in style to Glass Tambourine, also giving it the Timony hallmarks, the song is full of passion and honesty that comes across very clearly and, for me, makes getting this debut album worth it just for this song. There is much more to like, though. Opening track Romance is a great way to start the album and hooks me in to Carrie Brownstein's vocals, carried on through the exciting Short Version, and as each track swaps between the two vocalists there is a neat texture across the album. Wild Flag pretty much pulls together the best parts of Sleater-Kinney and Mary Timony in to a neat bundle, and I hope they continue to stimulate each other like this.

Eponymous debut album from SBTRKT starts off sounding a little like Apparat, but thankfully not much and not for long. I saw SBTRKT support Holy Fuck and although the performance of one man in an Aztec mask standing behind some samplers wasn't up to much I found the music to be interesting. With some buzz surrounding this album I thought I'd pick it up and see if I would remember much of the gig. Not really, no. There are guest vocalists aplenty on the album, the first one introduced in second track Hold On, which isn't really a problem but vocals tend to push the music in to the background, particularly in this genre. As I was initially attracted to the music I was hoping to hear more of that instead of some generic R&B warbling. It's fourth track Sanctuary where the music first really comes to the foreground, and it's a great track. It's a shame that there then are four more tracks where vocals grab all the emphasis, until Ready Set Loop, although that's more to do with my expectations than a problem with the album itself. Overall, it's a good album and worth listening to, but I was hoping for more music and less vocals, which ironically is opposite to what I wanted to see live.

Searching for some new music to end the year on brings up Unknown Mortal Orchestra and their eponymous album. A sampler song that gave me a taste of the album turns out to be first track FFunny FFrends and is so catchy and different from what can normally be heard that I buy the album on the strength of that alone. The perky drum beat and simple guitar riff play behind some wonderfully distorted vocals, making me bop along to the song. I don't think the rest of the album quite lives up to my expectations, but all the songs are along the same lines and are certainly good to listen to, just not quite as immediate as the first track. There are still some jolly good songs to enjoy, such as Thought Ballune, making the album a good listen from start to end, if not quite at the level I was expecting.

I have no idea how to pronounce The Dø which probably makes it just as well that I can order on-line. I do no research for this album beyond reading a review in the NME, but I think I'm okay at reading between the lines of their reviews these days. And Both Ways Open Jaws is a rather splendid find. The album really gets going with second track Gonna Be Sick, before stepping up a gear with the super-poppy Too Insistent, only to be surpassed immediately in poppiness by the wonderful Bohemian Dances. But trying to find the poppiest song on the album is a futile endeavour, as one song after another brings girlish glee to my grin with bright music and beautifully melodic vocals brought together. The Dø have produced a fabulous second offering, enough to make me think about getting their debut too.

My last dip in to new music for 2011 is second album Days by Real Estate. I find a track on-line that sounds pleasant enough and suggests I'm not about to make a mistake, so pick up the album and put it on rotation. And it is pleasant enough, with jangly guitars creating some straightforward songs that flow nicely and are relaxing to listen to. It all sounds rather similar after a while, to the point where I keep feeling convinced that at least one song is reprised later in the album, but it never gets repetitive in a bad way. I suppose all the songs end up feeling anonymous because none really stand out, but neither do any of them become a drag. Even if it isn't particularly outstanding, Days is a positive addition to my catalogue.

Posted in Audio | Comments Off on Music of 2011, part four
Tags: apparat, cd, grimes, iceage, mary timony, real estate, sbtrkt, slowdance, the dø, unknown moral orchestra, wild flag