So last night's NinjaFleet Salvage TearOp was a success by attendance standards, and we even killed a T2-fitted Drake! It was at a high cost, however.

Early in the op, we were salvaging and looting the field of one Hellz Hitman, when he started shooting at members of NinjaFleet, then warped off. Those with aggro warped out, retrieved gank ships, and warped back in, sitting on the gate and waiting for him to return.

When they announced that he had arrived and been pointed, I warped out and back in to the gate to watch the light show. I even targeted him in hopes of freaking him out/causing him to CONCORDOKKEN himself on me. When I saw that he was trying to warp scramble me, the following was broadcast on voice:

Hey guys, he's trying to scram me! Oh, here comes CONCORD and... Wait. Crap. Nooo!

I had been looting his mission with all the rest. To his credit, he knew he was going to die, and had the presence of mind to pop the expensive frigate first, followed by several other frigs and a cruiser.

I should never have assumed that nothing was up when he left and came back. I should never have come to watch when he had aggro on me and I had nothing on him. I should never have warped to zero. I should never have presumed I was safe, even in such a large fleet. Lessons learned.

My public shame. I estimate my losses at 120 million ISK. This ship had served me well for over a month of intense salvaging, so she had paid for herself in ISK and tears, but it was still depressing to lose an expensive asset in such a boneheaded way. The loss represents about two days of income on my trading alt, but still... it hurts!

But that's OK, because we also got his Drake.

I haven't sorted through the loot yet, but the take should be decent for the op. At one point we had 21 people in fleet with only one alt, making it the largest NinjaFleet to date. Warping into a room with 60 wrecks, seeing 15 purple names pop into your overview, scatter, DEVOUR the field, and warp away in under 90 seconds or so... it's magical. I don't think I'll ever get tired of it. Not a lot of tears were had, but several missionbears were very impressed with the display.

As for the Firetail, I've already fitted a replacement. I'm going a different route this time, giving up the silly notion of running all my salvagers, tractors, AB, and scanners at once in order to break the 2k/second barrier. Whee!