Celebrity Death Match #5 Kirith Kodachi

Kirith Kodachi- Author of the inner sanctum of the Ninveah (16th August 2009)

First off I want to say Kirith is one off my favourite bloggers. I like his writing style and a lot of the experiences he writes about are relevant to what I do myself. Also he is one of the most active bloggers in the blog pack and I always smile when I get another update from him on the capsuleer app on my i-pod.

So who better to fight in a Celebrtiy Death Match than him? Exactly.

Kirith had been added to my address book a little while ago but I haven managed to pin him down until earlier this week. I had already briefly discussed a duel with him on his blog posts and he seemed really keen. I convo’d him earlier Saturday morning and he promptly replied. He explained he was a little busy at the moment but if we both had time later to do it then. We briefly discussed ship class and location. A Battlecruiser fight it was to be! Yay! My favourite! The location worked out really well for me too as I already parked up a Drake in Emolgranlan in preparation for my fight with Kane Rizzel. I hope he doesn’t read this.

I have actually been stuck in a wormhole for most of the day Saturday and it gave me time to find out more about what I was getting into. I found Kiriths skills listed in his blog and spent some time assessing what ship he would bring and what weapons he would fit. My conclusion was that he himself would be quite likely to fly a Drake and I expected him to fit it with assault launchers. I cursed the tiny drone bay as I couldn’t decide between ECM drones or combat drones. In my fight with Wensley he had shown how effective they can be and I figured that even if I manage to jam him 2 cycles it would probably turn the fight in my favour. A lot of our missile and shield skills are comparable and both of us have Battlecruisers trained to level 5. It was sure to be a close fight. He was likely to fit a microwarpdrive even if he would not come in a Drake so I decided not to fit one myself initially as his navigation skills are higher then mine anyway and he would catch up with me in the end. Instead I took the mwd off and slapped on another large shield extender, hoping to outlast him.

The actual fight took place on Sunday when I had renewed opinions about Frigate class vessels after my scrap with Roc Wieler. I had returned to Emolgranlan to wait for Kirith or Kane Rizzel. But after some time waiting and no replys from Kane I decided to go to my main base just outside Amamake to setup a few Frigates for future fights. I had only just arrived there and sods law; I get a private convo from Kirith. Bingo!

Kirith had limited time however and I sped the 11 jumps back as quick as my pod would take me. On route back we both agreed the rules; no warping off, no pod kills, a fight to the death. We decided to stay in the 0.5 security system, meet at planet 1 and for me to take from his jetted can to get aggro. I would then warp to planet 2 and wait for his arrival.

On arrival I docked and strapped myself into one of the two Drakes parked up there. Aptly named ‘Super Fast Barn Door’ it was not the ship I intended to take in the first instance but I had changed my mind. I chose for a mwd over the extra shield and fitted ECM drones.

I undocked the ‘Super Fast Barn Door’ and warped to planet 1. To my surprise, as by now I had convinced myself he would fly a Drake, he sat there waiting next to a can in a Myrmidon. Interesting. I proceeded with the illegal act of thievery, tut tut, and warped to planet 2.

The long distance warp drive shut down and the microwarpdrive activated giving me about 5 k distance when Kirith landed just behind me. His ships name ‘pistols at dawn’ made me laugh as we locked horns. As I would have expected from a blaster fit Myrmidon he made his way in my direction at a steady pace and I struggled to keep him at any distance. My targeting system seemed to take forever getting a lock on the foes ship but when they did my trusted Scourge Fury Missiles didn’t hesitate and did what they do best. His shields shattered within a few volleys, I remained calm knowing that that doesn’t mean anything. His armour immediately felt harder as only fractions of the indicators turned red with every volley.

At this stage I had not received any damage just yet and found a comfortable 10 k orbit of my rival. To obsessed with working out if I could win this I forgot to check on my drones and surprise surprise; the reason I hadn’t received any damage yet was because the ECM drones had been taking the flack for me. There were only 2 of them remaining so I decided to leave them out in the hope they would at least get a lock on him before they too bought it. On my head up display Kiriths ship had been blinking yellow and I finally noticed his ECM drones but too late. Jammed! Mental note; change overview settings to include Ewar drones. I had been wondering why he didn’t launch any drones and why I wasn’t receiving any damage back.

Twenty seconds lapsed before my slow targeting restarted and missiles returned to their duty. Whenever (6 times) I lost control of my targeting system, and thus also the orbit around Kiriths vessel, I manually directed my ship away from his rapidly approaching Battlecruiser. The 2 small ECM drones that I had remaining in space finally got a lock on their target not once but twice in a row. His armour eventually melted, however slowly. His duel armour rep setup did wonders in repairing the tough shell surrounding the fragile hull.

By now however I was sure it would break, I overheated my launchers and it did. The hull was paper thin and split quietly then erupted in a large plume of smoke and rubble. His pod had ejected and sat among the wreckage, lit up by the explosions orange glow.

For the duration of the fight, and it took some time, both of us remained silent. Kirith had written in our private chat window; ‘you are going to win, I'm out of cap boosters’. Maybe if I would have seen it in time I would have stopped and offered a rematch, then again maybe not. I was happy to take the killmail and we both knew what we where getting into. Lessons where learned for both of us in this fight I think and no hard feelings I hope. Maybe we can battle it out again someday…in frigates.

This now makes celebs 3 –me 4!

Related links/posts;
Kirith version of events; LINK PENDING
M3 Killboard link; http://www.darthninjabadger.com/m3CorpKills/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=2994
Celebrity Death Match Killboard; http://818-k.eve-tools.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=9