There's a restlessness to nullsec at the moment. The upheaval begun with the conquest of Atlas and AAA space continues to to generate aftershocks as alliances, mobilized for war and looking at a sovereignty map in flux, are tempted to see what they can harvest from the chaos.
Regular readers of The Edge (or those of you who've taken the time to read the back issues) will recall I wrote that the current expansion of the Russian Coalition (RUS - White Noise, Legion of Death, Red Alliance, et al) into space formerly occupied by Atlas and Against All Authorities (AAA) had moved a substantial part of its forces away from their traditional base in systems like Etherium Reach, the back door of Legion's sphere of influence. This, along with the use of their forces to secure recently won territories, I posited, left Etherium Reach vulnerable to attack.
Several days ago, the Northern Coalition took that advice and launched just such an invasion, attacking RUS forces and their renter alliances in Etherium Reach and elsewhere. Mind, they waited longer than I'd recommend, which allowed the RUS forces to settle their new frontier - freeing forces previously occupied there to return and defend their home turf. Earlier would have been better.
Further, they staged their invasion of Etherium Reach from Paala in The Forge and are presently attempting to take the gateway system, LXQ2-T. NC appears to be bottle-necked there for the moment, with RUS employing a 400 member blob to repulse NC's most recent attempt to take the system.
NC would do well to take a page from the RUS victory over Bobby Atlas. Rather than attempting to force their way into a blobbed and well fortified system by sheer force of arms, bypass that system altogether and attack the enemy at multiple high-value targets. This forces the enemy to either hunker down while you take their space and structures (which are often their forces' re-supply points), or spread themselves out and fight the war on your terms.
Sending an attack force into Etherium Reach by way of lightly defended L4X-1V, the gateway system to Molden Heath, would put NC forces in the RUS back yard. Once out of the 1VN-XC constellation, they could bypass LXQ, and attack the Red Alliance stations in the 6TT8-Z constellation; the region's largest concentration of stations and commerce. I imagine that might break the RUS concentration in LXQ.
Just a thought, lads. First one's free.
Game Night
7 hours ago
Damn i sure hope the NC leaders are reading this and the RUS isn't.
ReplyDeleteBtw what is your vision on the NC? should they continue to grow and become the biggest entity in eve or should they keep what they have now gather enough systems for everyone to live and then call it a day?
Really would love to see you write a article about them.
Rumour has it the NC attack on the Dronelands was pre-emptive strike as the belief is that the Russians were coming for Geminate once more.
ReplyDeleteI see the NC invasion as a field trip of the bored and restless. With goons and friends winning in Cloud Ring, the rest of NC needs something to shoot. My impression (ok, my guess) is that NC's invasion timetables did not really put much weight on where RUS troops were at any one moment.
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