Captains Log

The Fourth day of Siege

On YC 1120126 we went and destroyed the LFA Territorial Claiming unit in F9E-KX resulting the system being out of LFA sovereignty. There was no hostiles to stop us. The D-GTMI Infrastructure Hub was scheduled to come out of it’s last reinforcement cycle and we were heading back to take it down. Proviblob was again trying to defend it and this time had the upperhand as they were already in the system when our fleet was returning from F9E-KX.

Titans and Motherships

We could’ve waited and get a Titan to bridge us in the system, but after the last few days we had seen that the Proviblob wasn’t really that dangerous threat. So we decided to get in to the system via the Jump-gates. Our scouts reported (again) a Battlecruiser fleet at the Jump-Gate we were supposed to get in and Mobile Warp Disruption bubbles around the gates. Normally this would be a bad idea to jump in to a system via gates, that had bubbles and a hostile fleet waiting. Specially as we were in Battleships that were slow. But as stated – we didn’ t consider Proviblob really a challenge so we jumped in.

On the other side we were immediately ordered to use Microwarp Drives to get out of the bubbles and align to friendly outpost – while engaging the hostile fleet. I aligned the =JBS= Reach & Pop II as told and ordered the MWD to engage. After a short burst of speed we were suddenly slowed down. Enemy Malediction-class Interceptor had engaged and activated its Warp Scrambler on my ship, causing the MWD to disengage. At the same time my Tactical Officer reported several hostile ships locking their weapons on us and opening fire. The situation was severe – I was still inside the bubble and unable to warp out – and the Malediction holdin on to me would’ve made it impossible dispite the bubbles.

I called for our FSI ships to start repairing me as my shields quickly disolved and I begun taking damage on the armor. None of them were able to do that at the moment and things begun to look severe. But then – for some odd reason - the Malediction disengaged and I was able to activate the MWD again driving quickly out of the bubble. My armor was almost completely destroyed as I was closing to the edge of the bubble. It was going to be really close. Then suddenly a FSI ship managed to lock on to me and do some repairs – it wasn’t much, but it was enough. I made it out of the bubble and immediately ordered us to warp. As the Warp Drive activated I sit back in my chair and sighed in relief. Our armor had gone completely and I had only 74% of structure. It is no doubt that the FSI that managed to give few rounds of recycle, saved me.

At the outpost I waited a while as our Carriers were doing repairs to our ships – including mine. This was the second time I had escaped destruction barely. I started to feel that this ship was blessed.

Unfortunately, the repairs took so long that I was unable to return to the battle before it was over. It was a nice effort from Proviblob – but again they failed horribly. They were still trying to counter our Battleship fleet with Battlecruisers. It seemed clear, that the Providence residents were not really committed to the defence and willing to risk expencive ships. And they didn’t have the numbers either. In the end, the Proviblob Fleet was destroyed yet again and with minimal losses (Battle Statistics).

After the hostile fleet was driven out of the field – we held the system firmly and went on to destroy the IHUB. Now only thing to do was to capture the station which was coming out of it’s final reinforcement in few days.

The Massacre of D-GTMI

After the fourth battle for D-GTMI, the hostiles were mostly staying away. Some random straglers were trying to get out of the area and few were trying to evacuate their assets from the station – it seemed thet Proviblob did not believe in their possibilities to stop the evitable fall of D-GTMI. However - to their credit – they did muster a last defence, this time with very able forces. What resulted was one of the largest battles in recent history of the universe – and the largest massacre.

On YC 1120128 the station in D-GTMI came out of its final reinforcement cycle. We had had reports of large Providence force assembling to defend the station. As the gates were guarded by our support, the hostiles jumped ships in to the system by Titan-bridges. There were two scirmishes that are worth to mention.

As most of the hostile outposts were taken down by us, they didn’t have many safe locations to form up. And since we held the system and had large forces, they decided to bring ships in by deep-space cynos. They had a cyno up over 400 AU away from the system and jumped in ships. Even tho it was far away – we decided to engage them. As the second cyno light up – we warped. The warp was longest I had ever made and took forever. I was starting to fear, that the hostiles had already escaped as we would arrive. And partially I was right. Most hostiles had already warped away or were about to, as we landed. We did manage to engage and destroy few battleships. This didn’t have a real effect in the battle for the system, but it had a psychlogical effect on the Proviblob – there was no place they were safe. And this feeling was about to be strengthen.

The hostiles had one outpost in the system where they were assembling. Our scouts were keeping an eye on them and we managed to trap several capitalships outside the outposts shields. Our capitals were brought in and engaged and quickly destroyed the enemy. The rest of the Proviblob capitals were inside the shields – but if they felt safe, it was a false feeling.

Since the Proviblob-fleet was a mixup of several alliances and corporations, the security was minimal. This resulted in us having the password for the outpost. Our battleships were warped out from the outpost and then told to warp in the outpost – after we had set the password for our ships computers. The enemy was surprised as we landed right in the middle of them. We immediately started to bumb the capitals out of the outposts shield while other support were deploying Warp Disruption Bubbles outside the outpost – making it impossible to warp in or out of the outpost. After several enemy capitals were bumbed out of the shields and then quickly shredded to pieces by our capitals, the hostiles did not have any options but to order retreat and their capitals jumped out of the system.

The Proviblob was already had some severe losses – but they still had a large capital fleet and were committed on defending the station. This was to be their last and most costly mistake. As the numbers in the system kept rising it was clear that all kinds of phenomenom were starting to effect as there were warp drives activatated, jump portals opened and communications all over the system. I noticed that the Targeting systems onboard the =JBS= Reach & Pop II were getting really slow and the overview was having hard time to keep track of the grid.

=JFS= Reach & Pop II engaging hostile capitals

Allied fleet in battleformation

So when the Proviblob deployed their capital fleet on two gates trying to destroy our SBUs before we could capture the station – which wasn’t a bad tactic really – they fell to the subjects of these anomalies. Our battleships and capitals (including fifteen Titans and tens of Motherships) were deployed to engage their fleet and all this resulted in a complete and utter massacre of the Proviblob fleet and capitals – with absolutely minimal losses. Ship after a ship capitals were destroyed as our Battleships were shredding through their fleet. At the same time Atlas Alliance also made a drop of capitals to the system engaging the proviblob ships on the other gate.

Videocapture from the final battle

I watched in astonished horror and respect as our titans opened fire and dozen of hostile capitalships were immediately destroyed. The fight raged for a long time and only few capitals were able to escape (only to be later destroyed in the system by our support). After the Proviblob was completely annihilated – we went and captured the station and system. This was a remarkable victory and a severe blow for the Proviblob since it was their main staging system for their assault on Catch (Battle Statistics).

-A- Titans on the field

The Aftermath

In the course of the week there had been 5 largescale battles in D-GTMI and several others in and out of the system. Battles rageing in the moons, planets, asteroid belts, jumpgates, outposts and stations. Hundred ships destroyed and thousands of lives lost. Yet – it had been inevitable that the system would fall. The shear power of -A- and it’s allies were too large of a force to be stopped. The GoonSwarm fall had even aided Proviblob as -A- had divided its forces to capture areas in Querious, but there were still no chance for the Proviblob to stop our advance.

After the fall of D-GTMI, there were lot of public discussion about it. CVA was blaming -A- and U’K for bringing allies on the field (such as Systematic Chaos and Atlas Alliance). This was from an alliance, that had less than 20% on each and every fight in the field. Proviblob had not just one or two alliances in it – it had dozens, as well as individual corporations. Blaming us for having friends showed the blindness of the CVA leadership.

And after the horrible loss of their capitals, Proviblob power-alliances (such as CVA, LFA, PXF) started to blame each other and it was clear that the Providence was in clear panic. Several smaller alliances and corporations were seen evacuating their assets from Providence and LFA was kicked out (along Sylph Alliance) out of the inner-circle of Providence leadership. There’s been even rumours that LFA is considered hostile to CVA – which is so far unconfimed to me.

All Against Authority wasn’t really planning on burning Providence – they had just driven the hostiles out of Catch, which they consider their space, and to make a point captured the D-GTMI station. Now -A- offered peace to CVA. The terms were not bad at all, as -A- even offered to return the D-GTMI and its station back to Providence holders. Only thing -A- demanded, was a CVA promise that they would never try to invade Catch again.  CVA considered this to be unfair and was refusing to accept. They felt that accepting peace they were declaring themselves losers and would be seen no longer seen as a powerful alliance. It is absurd for them to even think, that they could keep their reputation. They had miserably failed to protect several systems including one of their most important station. They had lost majority of their capitals as well as hundreds of smaller ships (Total losses, Losses by Shiptype). Several of their allies had started to realize the situation and were leaving Providence and even the larger alliances were fighting each other. In my opinion – accepting the peace would’ve been the best (and smartest) choice, and it would’ve not had that big of an effect on their reputation. More over, it would’ve most likely increased their reputation of being solid and smart – able to realize when they were in a fight they couldn’t win.

But CVA did not accept – they were blinded by their ignorance. All Against Authority was so far not been planning on to invade Providence any more – but the blunt and badly judged refusal of the peace has resulted that the -A- is now fully committed on driving the CVA out of Providence. What becomes the other larger and smaller alliances living in the Providence, is to be seen – but CVAs time is beginning its end.

The fight is far from over and there will be lots more of fights and it will take a long time to drive CVA out of Providence – but it will happen.

Next... U'K returns Providence...

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 14th, 2010 at 13:52 and is filed under The Providence Wars. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.