Pimpin' Aint Easy

Exciting Times...

For your friendly neighbourhood Bastards. As Spectre has begun to cover in his blog, the ragtag fugitives of the Python Cartel have turned our way in force, looking to join up with our motley crew.

Over the past several months, some of the largest pirating forces in Metropolis have merged with the Bastards. First it was the mighty members of Black Flag for which we owe so many good fights and now we see the core of another corp swindling into our vagabond ranks.

It certainly is an exciting time with The Bastards gaining new friends and a lot of new members. Congrats must go to some of our newer members who are beginning to become full members such as Hallan and Viginiti. You guys have been awesome.

The Ho' Train has Arrived

In respect to our countless mission runner victims, we decided that the least we should do is provide some novelty to your killmail if you refuse to pay our extremely reasonable ransom demands (well a pirate has

 to eat).

To achieve this, many members have decided that we should add a twinge of win t

o the mission busting ranks and pimp out some faction cruisers. Mr. Frog for example has opted for a full on face melter 900dps Navy Issue Vexor, whilst I kept in line with Mynxee's yearning for things that are long and black with a sexy 750dps Vigilant. Others you may see include Phantasms, Gilas and probably a few Fleet Issue Stabbers.

Their of course could be many other additions to the pimp mission busting squad, only time will tell what monstrosities will be seen in your missions.

Many would argue 'Yeah, but they don't exactly do much more damage over a T1 variant for the increase in price? why bother?' Well to be honest...look at the state of that Vexor! It could hide in a tree and be all like Surprise! bitches. The Vigilant is all like dark camoflauge and green lights. It's just hiding in space ready to eat your face off. The Phantasm could damage your ship just by bumping into it. I mean come on, who doesn't want to fly a ship that comes with a full set of steak knives?

Isk is not really a problem either with the whole 2 Machariels, Faction Scorpion, Rorqual and full freighter amongst the zillions of kills in between. The Bastards thought that it was only right we gave something back to our loyal mission runner fanbase.

Stimulus Here To Rock The House

Last night toodled along like many of recent. The new guys were performing mass logistics in moving their stuff from Avenod down to Evati. Our hauler alts were frantically bringing in new toys from the nearby trade hubs.

I had decided it was time for a new Heavy Interdictor. San had a lot of experience flying both the Onyx and Devoter. Whilst I cannot argue with their abilities in 0.0 space, both kind of lacked the maneuverability and versatility to be uber effective in low sec too. I had decided now with Gallente Cruiser V under her belt, that San should try out the Phobos.

It was set up in a manner different to many Phobos you would see but my new ship named 'Axe Swing Dance' in order to bring it uber MC Hammer luck. For those not in with the phenomenon please watch this video and check the dance for yourselves at 1 Minute 35 Seconds. It will change your life to know the wonders of the Axe Swing Dance.

Our fleet of gank battlecruisers, a Phobos, Ard's insatiable Rapier goodness and Sarge in a Vexor for unkown reasons headed up towards the Python Cartel's old home. In hitting Klogori, Spectre who was catching us up informed us of a Battleship heavy gang tailing us.

We decided to wait at a planet and see what they would do...

Local began to fill. A single Hurricane came into the planet's orbit. We proceeded to tackle and take the bait down immediately. Not seconds after the Hurricane ruptured it's hull, their fleet dropped. Initially 2 Armageddons, a Megathron, Falcon and Drake.

The Falcon had warped in 70km away. Ronin made the call that fast tackle whir up the engines and rush the pilot. Hallan's eyes lit up in his unrivalled gung-ho rifter skills and burned full pace for the ECM specialist along with Maltrox donning the same. Ard seamlessly tranistioned from cloaked subspace and engage his MicroWarp Drive, Sarge turned his Vexor about and I also gave the order to overheat the propulsion. 

The Falcon was pointed by Hallan, an excellent tackle. With the pilot too busy trying to jam out the gank DPS of our Battlecruisers, he had few modules left for the rush that had hit him. His missiles managed to take down Maltrox's Rifter but alas it was in vain. By now the Axe Swing Dance had the infinite point on from 28km away while the Vexor and Rapier repainted the outside of the Recon ship with Republic Fleet EMP.

The remainder of their gang were remote armour reparing one another. By now, they had dispatched with several of our Battlecruisers including Frog's Man Brutix and Spectre's Girl Brutix. A lesson to all that tanking a Brutix simply ends in the same manner as an untanked one. Difference is that Frog was pumping nearly 1000dps into the enemy before succumbing to them.

The Megathron pilot was getting worked over now. We had removed the majority of the remote repair drones on show and began to eat up at the armour. Shader's Brutix fell under the fire as the Megathron ran out of Hull Points. 

By now, my Phobos had burned back into the fray. Taking primary fire from the Drake and a single Geddon. The armour resists held well on her, taking minimal damage. I pointed and webbed down the Armageddon as the remainder of our gang gained a firing solution upon it. Down the Amarr behemoth went but taking Ronin's monster Hurricane with it.

By now. our forces were scattered, ensuring that they both escaped in low armour/hull to repair and return. I tanked them for long enough

 before leaving in low armour.

The initial engagement had lasted well over 5 minutes. We were unhappy with them holding the field however. Kulmid logged on just at the right time. His Abaddon had moved into position upon the Orfrold gate and jumped in. Ard had made the man a warp in next to a new Tempest class battleship. 

I dropped warp the same time as the mighty Abaddon which beared all fire down upon the Tempest. Not long after landing, Stimulus replied with a fast paced group of Heavy Assault Ships. With two Battleships, a Zealot and Cerberus along with the Drake, our Abaddon had no chance of tanking the damage. 

I turned my Phobos about, saluted to the brave crew of Kulmid's ship and overloaded my MWD to escape the clutches of the Zealot. Round 2 most certainly went to them.

Again, The Bastards are not happy when we can't hold the field at the end of the engagement. With our HQ only a few jumps away, we decided to show our amicable enemy a real remote repair gang returning with some big guns including several Dominix, a Typhoon and a Megathron.

Stimulus were still looting the remnants of ours and their lost brothers when Mr. Frog, Flashfresh and Sarge landed. The blasters or Frog and the combined torpedo bombardment of Sarge and Ronin alpha volleyed through any chance that the Tempest and Armageddon had to remote repair.

Another Falcon had appeared, attempting to change the engagement in favour of Stimulus. Once again Hallan fired up his Leeroy Jenkins drive in a new Rifter followed by a contingent of Bastards and Python fast tackle. Thinking better of it this time, the Falcon pilot jammed out the local threat and managed to cloak and warp.

At this point I was duelling with the Zealot pilot. He made an uncharacteristic error and became webbed for a matter of seconds. This was enough time for Kulmid to open up with his distinctive 'Amarr Navy Purple' reducing the Zealot to low armour in seconds. However, the superior speed of the Heavy Assault Ship escaped my web through Inertia and he burned out of Mega Pulse Laser range. The Cerberus thinking better of the engagement decided now was a good time to cheese it.

All that remained was the lowly Drake which escaped the first fight going into armour. On this occasion, there it was an inevitable face melting  from the firepower now on show.

The battlefield was then cleared of the remnants whilst pleasantries were exchanged in local. This was undoubtedly one of the best set of engagements that we had taken part in in a very long time. The fights lasted in excess of 5-10 minutes at a time. People actually began to run out of ammunition as we would by standard take maybe 1 or 2 reloads to a fight.

To all the guys in Stimulus, what a great evening and we hope to replicate the fun again soon. It's hard to get such good fights these days but you 100% delivered on that one.

I leave you all with my bored musings whilst we waited for a gang to form. I will probably make some more in the near future but here is a one off Bastards Wallpaper for you all!

Picture Link