In Eve, Friends Don't Let Friends ...

... do level 4 mining missions.  I started doing level 4 missions for Core Complexion last Tuesday and of course had to do a level 4 mining mission.  After all, how could I complain about something if I had never done it, right?

I actually did 3.  The first time I fumbled around and then developed a plan for the second mission I did.  I set up Wandering Rose in a Covetor and Rosewalker switching between a Scythe and a Mammoth.  The mission still took an hour to complete and I was pretty sure I would never do another level 4 mining mission.

Then the third mission presented itself.  Ice harvesting.  I'd never done that before.  So I flew to Rens, picked up ice harvesters for my Covetor, and set out to havest some worthless ice.  That took about an hour to complete also.

Ice Harvesting

Most of the time I've done courier missions and even two kill missions in a shield-tanked Hurricane.  The courier missions were fun and provided practice flying my Prowler.  I even ducked into two low-sec systems to make deliveries.  For this carebear, that was an adventure.

Fighting the Angel Cartel

The kill missions were an adventure.  In the first one, Smuggler Interception, I faced Angel Cartel Machariels, battleships that were very popular in Alliance Tournament VIII. 

In the second kill mission, Shipyard Theft, I just have to note the actions of the Core High Admiral in the first pocket.  I got really excited when I first saw the ship, because I had never seen an NPC with a bounty of 1 million outside the newbie Epic Arc before.  So I dispatched the support ships and gave chase to the battleship.  The High Admiral stopped short of a group of ships, allowing me to engage the High Admiral.  A bait ship?  You betcha.  A group came flying past the High Admiral and started pounding on me.  I quickly beat a hasty retreat, but in the span of about 30 seconds I lost a quarter of my shields before getting the situation under control again.  The High Admiral?  He stayed in place and started repping himself.

I still had to deal with the High Admiral.  So after dispatching the support ships in that group, I began a 1v1 with a regular Admiral in a battleship.  I started circling the Admiral and sure enough, the High Admiral slipped behind me, putting me in a cross-fire.  With the High Admiral having repped all of his shields and some of his armor, I made the decision to rush the Admiral in the hope I could outrun the damage from the High Admiral.  That plan worked, but by the time I could turn around, all the damage I had inflicted on the High Admiral had been repaired.  Aargh!  But at least I was able to finally kill the stubborn battleship before it could link up with the last three battleships in the pocket.

The important part of the last week's mission running is that Wandering Rose's faction with Core Complexion went up from 6.04 to 6.37 since last Tuesday.  Perfect refining is finally within sight.