Another lazy post, I’m afraid. There isn’t a huge amount to report from Catch. Rionnag Alba have our own constellation now and we’ve been working on getting its military index up so we can have juicy anomalies, complexes, and wormholes. I’ve done a bit of unsuccessful solo roaming and some small gang stuff. That’s about it, really.

Now I’m back, though, and we just got word from Manfred that its time to pack our bags and move South. We weren’t prepared for the invasion of the North. Everything had been rushed, we didn’t have objectives, and we lacked the FCs to mount a serious campaign. On top of that we’d also been slowly shedding some of our better PvPers and small gang FCs. So we’re heading back to Catch to lick our wounds, learn our lessons, train some FCs, and reset all but our closest friends. Hopefully the future involves roaming, fun, and far less burnout.

For us the Northern campaign was a failure but then nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Anyway, after a couple of weeks away I’ve logged back in, undocked, got shot at, shot at people, and docked up in the same ship I started in. Maybe soon I’ll have some stories to tell.

At least our allies were able to take advantage of the NC’s home defence effort to relieve them of sovereignty in 6GWE-A, E9KD-N, MI60-6, O-N8XZ, and C8-CHY as well as Ev0ke destroying the infrastructure hub in EC-P8R. So things could be far worse. Let’s see what we do next…

Once I’d read my alliance mails I went out shopping and gave Allii the money to buy a range of ships for use in all the upcoming fleet operations. While she was doing that Wensley began to move some key assets from GE-8JV to his new home in Nonni. The main move began with a heavy fleet setting out and making a series of jumps through low security space until we ended up in Aunenen. This is going to be our main staging system and the first couple of operations were based around getting capital and supercapital ships into the area. As you can imagine this was hardly an exciting time.

Since coming to the north I think its fairly safe to say that Against All Authorities have yet to make a real impact on the conflict. Our first few forays either met with no resistance or the NC responded with overwhelming force and we were driven from the field. In order to have a fighting chance we have teamed up closely with Atlas and Cult of War and will be operating in tandem with them. With a bit of luck this will help us start to make a real impact.

The number of scheduled operations has been surprisingly low. We have had good fun camping H-W9TY, the NC’s main staging system, in cloaking HACs. There was also a large fight in E-OGL4 that I was able to log on in time to take part in. My time has also been pretty limited so I have been missing out on things. Here’s hoping that we get some more good action soon, its not fair that IT seem to have all the fun.

I’ve not actually been doing that much solo and small gang roaming of late. This is mostly because when I moved in ships I only brought fleet and gang ships with me. By the time I’ve jumped around and fitted up a solo combat ship my time and patience is almost used up and I’ve been tending to go out and die in silly and frustrating ways, the latest of which was forgetting to switch from my battleships only overview and being ambushed by a Dramiel.

Lastly, the more observant among you might have noticed that I’ve changed corporations. Because most of the DKOD leadership is away from game at the moment the decision was made to put the corp into hibernation and the membership have moved to other -A- corporations. Most people went to Havoc but I followed some friends and moved to Rionnag Alba, a corporation full of drunken Scots and good times.

In the wake of the fall of D-GTMI and the failure of peace negotiations the allies turned their attention to 9UY4-H, the historical home of Ushra’Khan, which fell almost without a fight. There was another hiatus in hostilities during which time there was a series of scuffles over systems that dropped sovereignty due to corporations leaving Holder alliances. The next targets to fall were the Empire border systems of R3-K7K, Y-MPWL, KBP7-G, and G-5EN2. With these systems lost CVA had pretty much had their supply chain shut down. At this point a mass evacuation began.

With CVA effectively neutered and resistance limited to them incapacitating the services of unused stations and small gang scuffles it was time to decide the future of Providence. Not wanting to end its nature as an excellent place for small gang PvP and also with an eye on maintaining stability, Manfred Sidious and the rest of -A-’s leadership came up with a plan. Rather than installing renters into the systems and taking ISK from them for protection we would pursue a different approach. New Providence was to be a place where small alliances could come, hold some nullsec space, and develop until they were ready to move out and seize some space for themselves. They would not be blue to -A- and would not be expected to fight alongside -A- in times of danger. The only rule imposed on them was that there is to be no sovereignty warfare without -A-’s permission.

Before too long there were several interested alliances and the first proper purge of Holders began. The initial targets were Sev3rance and Cold Steel Alliance who, over the course of a week, were booted out and replaced by Daisho Syndicate and Soliditas XX. After a week’s rest the allies mustered for the final push. During a single “Hell Week” every single station system in Providence (except those belonging to LFA and Paxton) was captured and CVA was effectively removed from the arena of nullsec sovereignty. They still hold (and pay for) a couple of non station systems but the new Providence residents are able to clear those at their leisure and make use of the CVA-funded upgrades while they do. When we initially embarked upon this campaign most people assumed that we wouldn’t have the patience and focus to get through the grind of capturing all those stations but I hope we have proved them wrong.

Providence now looks very different with a bunch of small alliances occupying it. While they will band together when faced with a threat, such as aggression from Paxton Federation, there will no longer be huge defence blobs moving around via jump bridge. In short New Providence should be a very fun place indeed.

I know that this post doesn’t really compare with the first couple but the lack of fighting and the grind to capture all of the stations has sapped my will to write about it. I can now close this chronicle and move on to telling adventures of -A-’s part in the Northern War (or whatever people are going to call it).

Tacklin’ Ceptor pilots are cagey creatures loath to come within 15km of anything that may mess up their well-kept hair. They like wide orbits, long range weapons, longer range locks and showing up at the bottom of many, many KMs. They dislike seeing any red on their tank at all, as it not only makes the drawstring on their wallet pucker, washing bloodstains out of their shiny Gistii A-types and polys takes hours and makes them grumpy.

DPS Ceptor pilots (except for the Crow and missile Malediction, who are like the metrosexuals of the species), are rabid, fearless, bloodthirsty predators who use hullscars to attract mates. They like fast, tight orbits, rough sex, and feeling the heat of pretty explosions wash over their faces. They also think that dying builds character, you fucking pussies.

Six Strangelove (shamlessly stolen from a friend’s biography)

As seen on Scrapheap Challenge.

Tonight a 100% Minmatar Against All Authorities fleet removed CVA’s sovereignty in their last station system. CVA still have a few systems in Providence and they are by no means destroyed but tonight our pilots are celebrating mission accomplished. The threat has been removed from our borders and now we can concentrate on rebuilding the new Providence.