The Battle for T22 – EVE Online

I logged in to play EVE one unassuming Wednesday evening to be met with the kind of activity and buzzing excitement usually limited to the offices of pre-invasion war rooms.

“What’s… um… what’s going on?”  I quizzed the Corp chat, after ten minutes failing to decipher the messages in a rapidly scrolling chat channel.

“It’s the T22 POS op”, someone replied, “it’s on the forum.”  Which indeed it was; displaying characteristic inobservance, I’d completely failed to notice – talk of a recent forum security breach had perhaps diverted my attention.  Tonight was to be RPSH’s biggest action since moving to PC9 and the Syndicate region two months before.  JE, our local rivals in the neighbouring system called T22, continually refused to meet us in an open fight and it was time to turn up the pressure and force their hand by attacking their Player Owned Station, or POS.  JE’s ships would have to leave the safety of their hangers or risk us slowly melting this extremely valuable asset with volleys of missile and laser fire.

The fleet that had amassed for this operation was, in internet gaming terms, an astonishing organisational feat.  As someone whose experience of arranging stuff online peaked with a clan that found an eight-a-side Counter-Strike match a paralysing logistical dilemma, I was beyond impressed.  This op, with the combined efforts of several different corps, involved almost 100 pilots.  Everyone was then divided into sub-fleets each with leaders receiving orders from an overall fleet commander.  Excitingly, the main battleship fleet that would be attacking the POS was bolstered by five carriers: the vast, one billion ISK monsters I wrote about last month.  Still unable to fly a ship that wouldn’t be vaporised in the main assault, I found a role in the support fleet flying my fast-moving interceptor frigate.

Our job here essentially involved watching the door.  The operation would take place in T22, a system ships could only enter and leave via one jump-gate.  With a bunch of us sitting there, we could guard the main fleet’s back as they went in to attack the POS, and deal with any sorry individuals trying to escape.

So it was that I warped my ship to the PC9 gate in T22 and sat with about ten others inside a warp bubble that would serve to catch any entering ships, preventing them warping to safety.  And happily, it wasn’t long before a few friends turned up to play.

During the confusion of us exploding an unfortunate pilot who haplessly warped into the system, a corp unrelated to the operation, but enemies nonetheless, called Bright Side of Death had appeared in visual range.  They seemed to have a few ships in T22 when our assault began.  Realising something big was happening, they went to leave and found us barring their way.  If they approached us to jump out, they’d suffer losses before they could escape so they sat grumpily a hundred or so kilometres off, out of our effective weapon range.  They’d occasionally swoop in to fire off a few missiles or send some drones in to harass our smaller ships, including my frigate, necessitating a couple of evasive manoeuvres to avoid getting splattered.

One of one TWO screens I took of this event – I’d be a terrific war photographer, I really would.  Here, everyone’s drones are out cus we’ve just seen off a Bright Side of Death attack.

Meanwhile, the main assault was in full swing and our commander offered us brief updates on the situation.  He was able to receive instructions from the fleet commander; as members of the support fleet, we were in a separate comms channel so couldn’t hear the chatter from the attack ourselves.  It was strangely isolating, sitting on the gate as the main event raged elsewhere.  Apparently, only a single member of JE was at their station to oppose us, manning the POS’s defence arrays.  This wasn’t particularly unusual because a POS could sit there for quite a while absorbing damage – it takes a long time to destroy one completely.  Presumably a rescue fleet was being mustered which we could then batter to pieces.

Something I’d seen on the RPSH forum, in the thread detailing this operation, flashes to mind.  A cryptic message, posted by an unfamiliar user saying only: “that’s useful to know”.

With Bright Side of Death orbiting us menacingly, a request came over the comms for someone to deal with a crow (a small frigate sized ship) that was annoying the main assault fleet.  One of our ships fitted with a cloaking device was invisibly sneaking towards it to provide us with a location to which we could warp and engage in a surprise attack.  Another interceptor pilot and I were given the task.

This was exciting.  It was like my own little sub-quest within the main story of this massive attack; I would get to a) be useful, which is something an EVE noob rarely gets to experience, and b) get a look at the massive POS battle.  “Hurrah!  Also: screenshots!”  thought my brain.

“OK, warp to me.”  The cloaked pilot gave us the go ahead and we hit warp.

I emerged ninety odd kilometres away from the attack fleet.  Our numerous ships were flinging balls of different coloured light towards the POS, a structure something like a giant wingless dragonfly, the missiles erupting on its surface with a distant thump.

No time to observe.  I searched for the crow on my system overview.  There.  I hammered the keys to lock the target and engaged my microwarpdrive, burning as close to it as possible, maximising the damage of my short-range weaponry.  Just out of range of my warp disruptor that would have pinned him in place, the crow realigned and escaped.

Support Fleet’s warp bubble.  Us (the purple squares denoting a friendly fleet member) sitting inside.

Bah.  I jetted back to the gate to join the rest of the support fleet.  Failed to get my kill and… failed to remember the screenshots too!  Arg.  There’s a lot to think about in an EVE fight; lots of buttons to press, things to turn on and off at the right times and stuff to keep your eye on.  The thought to take screenshots was utterly washed from my head.  That’s my excuse.

Oh well, there was still Bright Side of Death’s frustration to enjoy.  Their four ships remained stuck off the gate, periodically buzzing in at us like angry seagulls.  Eventually, they rushed us, somehow getting out without suffering any losses, the cads.

With the exit of Bright Side of Death, came intel over the comms about a Mammoth (a big freighter type ship) running in supplies for JE’s besieged POS.  “Go and hassle him would you Arsey?”, our fleet commander requested.

“No problem.”

I warped to the location I thought I had been given.

“Ok, there’s another ship here and all the stations turrets are targeting me.” (imagine me trying to sound calm as my shields vanish and my ship’s power core quickly drains).

“Have you gone to the POS?  He’s gone to the POS…  Yeah, get out of there.”

I’m still unclear on this, but I think I went to another extremely heavily armed station, when I should have awaited the Mammoth in empty space next to a nearby moon.  I am the best at EVE.

“Yeah, I’m fucked.”  I declared.  My capacitor was completely empty so warping out wouldn’t be possible.  My armour was now being eaten too.  Hammering the warp button, I awaited death.  But somehow, my capacitor had regenerated just enough power, and I warped.

“You dead, Arsey?”

“Nah, got out.  I’m awesome.”  This probably sounded a little unconvincing.

I was on my way to the correct part of space when:

“OK, everybody get out.  They’ve dropped motherships.  Get out, get into PC9 and find a safe.”

“Erm, confirm?  You still want me to go after this Mammoth?”

“No, get out.”

A cyno field had appeared next to our assault fleet – a beacon onto which huge ships, systems away, could warp.  Huge ships had done just this.  Ships huger than our huge ships.  Supercarriers.  Seven supercarriers, also known as motherships, had appeared and melted our entire carrier fleet in seconds.  There was nothing for it but to try and escape, our attack force hopelessly broken.

Sitting in a safe spot in PC9 we tried to work out what had happened.  The supercarriers belonged to Evoke; compared to us, a massively wealthy and powerful corp.  Had they simply seen our carrier fleet and dropped in an opportunistic ambush?  The more sinister and troubling possibility was that JE had dropped the cyno for them, as allies, which would leave RPSH well and truly trapped in poop pantry.  This, as it turned out, was exactly the case.

Speculation was rife.  Had someone related to JE hacked our forums, seen the details of today’s attack and orchestrated an overwhelming counter offensive?  Or was it simply an extremely rapid, on-the-fly response to our incursion?  Either way, to add insult to injury, it was all instigated by the single member of JE who was present at the battle, manning their station’s defence array: he dropped the cyno to summon in the supercarriers.  As RPSH’s corp boss, Eben “Glorious Leader” Rochelle wrote in the debrief:

WTFpwnd in the face by an Evoke hotdrop of 7 motherships. Wow. A total of 1 JE pilots was involved, good work JE you proved your awesomesauce.

But it wasn’t quite over.  As we were sitting in space, confused and shell-shocked, Bright Side of Death, evidently bearing a grudge, were quietly scanning down our safe position.  They suddenly appeared, warping in to exact lasery revenge and forcing the second hasty retreat of the evening.  Gits.

As a result of this operation and the sudden appearance of a hostile 400 man alliance, RPSH evacuated PC9 the next day treading a delicate and volatile diplomatic path so we could all escape more or less intact.  Now we wait, like tigers, catching our breath, sharpening our claws.  Your time will come JE.

Or y’know, we’ll find another enemy we can try and punch in the face.  Whatever works.

Thanks to RPSH’s Lucious Desire for providing technical guidance and preventing me writing anything likely to start a war.