Worth The Price

Not often you fly a ship that gives back more than what you put into it. I'm not talking about ISK return. Once you fly the same ship over and over into battle it kinda grows on you. You get to know the little quirks. Like how the microwarp drive responds when making a tight turn, or how one guns' timing is off by a few microseconds.

I've had the pleasure of flying a ship like this recently. One of the finest frigates from the Imperial fleet. The Imperial Navy Slicer. It has seen a fair few battles and has never ran from one.

Sure, I could replace it with another, but it wouldn't be the same. Not the same machine.

I remember flying into Aeschee once and seeing another Slicer on scan. Jumping into the top belt, it didn't take the other to come and try to destroy me. Quickly getting lock and firing upon the imposter, he went down much faster than myself. However he is just as fast as I, and was able to get out of range.

Another close fight occurred with a Dramiel. He thought it would be an easy gank, he was sadly mistaken. A few exchanges of fire sent him trying to get some range to recover from losing shields and most armor in only a few volleys. He came in again at higher speed, this time the laser mountings were straining to keep up, landing a few glancing shots. It was enough to put the Dramiel into structure and he ran for the hills.

Today in Old Man Star a corp member got killed by a gang of frigates, including a Slicer. I picked up the fight on scan but was too late to help. I quickly went to my secret hanger and boarded the Slicer. I found the gang and warped in solo with the intent to cause some damage. Cause some damage I did. The enemy Slicer quickly tried to catch up with me as I burned away from the main gang. After chasing me for a few seconds, we ended up over 100km from the gang and it was just me and him. Darting around with laser beams lighting up the darkness, it was glorious. Instead of being cautious, I took charge and flew straight at him with guns overloaded. We hit structure at about the same time. Only difference is that I had a damage control and he exploded. After seeing this, his gang left me to the spoils.

Next door I seen a Daredevil and decided to go for it. This was the last mistake this ship will ever make. Pulling range helped at first, but I have never seen a Daredevil so fast in my life. I was able to get him to structure before he caught my ship. With a 90% web on me I didn't stand a chance. The odd thing here is that even though he had me, his buddy still had to come in an whore on the mail.

The loss was tragic, but it will only be missed for a short while. That Slicer was worth every ISK.