Normally at TMC we get killmails that involve supers and poorly fit industrials, with the occasional combat ship or PLEX hauler wandering into our sights. Sometimes they are so baffling, so ridiculous, and so blingy that they become immortalized as examples of EVE stupidity. Those that are worthy are the ALODs, the Darwin Awards of space.
Recently, we received a killmail from a certain Swaghetti Yolognaise, a capsuleer from lowsec. Besides making me contemplate drinking an entire bottle of vodka to try to forget what the hell happened in the fitting screen, I also took up the task of writing about it to try and determine if there was some method to the madness.
Glancing at this fit, one immediately recognizes bling in the form of not only officer modules, but deadspace and faction mods as well. Coupled with low meta and Tech II mods it almost seems that our ALOD was trying for the award for most diverse fit one can possibly get. If he had just fit a civilian and a storyline mod he would have had something like a royal flush of pure failure.
Now looking at this ship, then to my vodka, then back to the ship, I see that the pilot broke a cardinal rule of ship fitting: don’t dual tank. Whatever gains might be made in the realm of survivability are lost due to the complete lack of any other type of support module. This fit also appears to be running the armor and shield reps on board indefinitely, as the presence of cap boosters and nosferatu module indicate.
The Phantasm is a shield-oriented ship, with a bonus to AB velocity. However an AB is curiously absent, ignoring what is probably the most powerful bonus of the hull. There is a shield tank to be sure, but the wisdom of the choice of modules is questionable at best. The modules are some of the best and most expensive in the game, with Estamel’s Adaptive Invulnerability Field not even being available on the market as of writing this due to its rarity.
What gets even weirder is that this fit actually killed a Proteus before it met its end. Yes, a well fit Proteus was killed by this Frankenstein of a ship. Oddly enough a triple-trimarked, double plated Proteus with an EANM fit somehow died to only 2300 damage. This appears insane at first glance, at least as insane as the Phantasm fit.
However with a bit of digging, TMC managed to find out why the Proteus died and suddenly things made a lot more sense. The Proteus was the subject of a freak glitch which CCP has refunded according to Serj Reaper, the pilot. In this glitch, he jumped a gate which caused his ship to move all his subsystems and modules to his cargo, leaving him with a naked Proteus. It was suspected that connection issues caused this freak glitch, and since the failfit Phantasm happened to be there at the time, Swaghetti killed the Proteus with little effort. Serj also was podded by the Phantasm, but this glitch extended to his pod, as when Serj spawned back to station his slave implants were still plugged in.
[15:26:35] Serj Reaper > It glitched… As i jump through gate all subsystems imploded and couldnt warp as cargo to big for 0m3 cargo as ship was to big
Even stranger, Swaghetti has been the subject of an ALOD before, and in a horribly fit Phantasm no less, which leads to suspicion. According to Serj, who has previously encountered this pilot, Swaghetti Yolognaise seems to join corps he doesn’t like, and proceeds to lose expensive ships to make the corp look bad. This would explain his previous loss, and horrible killboard.
[15:29:20] Serj Reaper > he joins corps he doesn’t like and loses a 30b yolo ship
In short, Swaghetti Yolognaise is likely a troll account that belongs to someone who has a lot of ISK and a bone to pick with some lowsec corps. One theory is that he is a super pilot’s alt who, for whatever reason, stripped the fittings off his supers. The use of the metagame in this regard is quite rare, but it has the ability to discredit corps by polluting their killboards. By being a horrible player, the owner of the account can effectively do what wars cannot: break their enemies. By making the corp look bad through their killboard stats, recruiting new members becomes more difficult if the corp draws from a recruiting pool that values such things.
In the end, a Curse put the ship out of its misery. The Curse pilot must have been surprised at this killmail, as it is indicated that the officer invuln dropped.
We contacted the Curse pilot, JP Snake, who told us of the timeline of events:
[16:56:46] TMC > So… congrats on the new Officer invuln. Tell me how the fight went
[16:58:08] JP Snake > Thanks, and absolutely. I was originally soloing in kedama when I saw a phantasm on dscan. I checked around the medium but realized he was at a safe. I popped some combats and got his location, but turns out he was warping away as soon as I landed.
[16:59:30] TMC > so he didn’t try to intentionally fight you?
[17:00:48] JP Snake > Well, he warped into tama and I followed, then found him 100km off a novice. I warped 50, and started to burn towards him and he started to yellow box me.
[17:01:15] JP Snake > I’m sure he could of warped out if he wanted to.
It is heavily implied that the pilot intentionally fought the Curse to lose his ship, giving more credence to the idea that this is a killboard troll. It is also noted by JP that in the first 15 minutes after the kill, he got several evemails to get a hold of the officer invuln that was dropped in the process.
Congrats to the killer of this failfit, and a warning to corps: keep your recruitment process tight to make sure trolls like this stay out of your corp. If someone has a big enough chip on their shoulder, they will do things like this to spite you. Be careful CEOs. Be very careful. Or, recruit him so you can execute him and steal his stuff the instant he undocks. Your call.
Note: A correction was made to this article after it published to reflect that the shield and armor modules fit had no impact on sig radius or speed.
This article originally appeared on TheMittani.com, written by Vos.