“Prepared for” and “reacted to” are very different things.
While I understand emotions are likely running high right now, being rude to the CEO of the group that just summarily evicted you in 48 hours, especially after they compliment you for your fighting spirit and offer you the potential of help in the future, seems rather foolhardy.
I’d also like to add my thoughts on Origin and what lessons can be taken from it. This may not be particularly welcome to all pilots involved, but I have what I feel good reason to do so, and no particular reason to keep it secret any more.
Starting in November of last year, I (really) was approached by a third party who wished to see Origin burned to the bedrock. Their offer was generous enough for me to consider it, and by mid-December Origin had been seeded by multiple Hard Knocks scouts and associates. A dossier was created to collect intel on Origin and its inhabitants. A brief look over this information will leave several glaring weaknesses immediately obvious to the more combat experienced reader.
As it turned out, the eviction never took place. Hard Knocks’ growing involvement in the destruction of the DCU coalition and the burning of Cobalt Edge left many of our pilots feeling we had bigger concerns than taking a contract at this point. The scouts and Deep Space Transport carrying the beachhead Astrahus were withdrawn from Origin on March 22nd.
To my surprise (and no small amount of ironic amusement) an eviction ended up taking place anyway exactly three weeks later. The forces involved were overwhelming and professional in their execution, and so Origin fell.
This next part of the post is not specifically aimed at the members of Alexylva Paradox, but does use them as an example. My hope is that they do not see this as an attack on their character, but rather take it on board as a few of the lessons to be learned. I also hope that any readers who are less knowledgeable about how war is fought in Anoikis may find this useful.
There were three major weaknesses in Origin’s defenses:
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A large, but mostly inactive membership
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Only a single online moonblocker
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A reliance on allies to aid with defense
I feel confident in my assessment that had ALXVP sought to fix any of these weaknesses they would have had greatly increased chances of success.
The first and most basic line of defence in a wormhole system is the so called “moonblocker” Starbases. By anchoring these in the orbits of the system’s moons, the inhabitants can prevent any would-be invaders from setting up a Starbase of their own to base from. This is important, because unlike the much larger Upwell structures, a Starbase can be anchored and fully operational in less than an hour. ALXVP had half-completed this job, but made the mistake of mostly anchoring Small Amarr towers and leaving them offline. This left them vulnerable and easily destroyed to make way for an invader’s replacement.
The remaining two entries in the list are heavily interlinked. There is no better defense than having a membership who actively live and operate in their wormhole. As the list at the bottom of the dossier shows, in three-and-a-bit months of observation only fifteen members of ALXVP were identified as “active”. Fifteen capsuleers out of a potential ninety-four. Of those fifteen, two left the corp part-way through the observation period. To any watching party, this simply screams profitable target full of vulnerable assets. Any group wishing to be able to anchor and defend a Fortizar must be prepared and capable of doing so on their own strength.
This leads nicely into the remaining point. I recognise that ALXVP’s calling of allies in this case is perfectly justified (and sensible) given the numbers arrayed against them, but an Anoikis corp must never rely on having allies as their main strategy. A competent invading force will have such total control of the incoming connections that allies are simply never given the opportunity to arrive.
Despite planning fairly extensively on how best to kill you all, I do wish you the best for the future. Hopefully this will be an rejuvenating process for Alexylva Paradox; it would be a shame to see your flame go out forever.