Friday, November 4, 2011

Little to no Resistance

I’ve now flown with the Minmatar militia for a little over three months, and I’ve seen and experienced quite a bit in my time here. From huge capital battles to small, spontaneous skirmishes, it’s been a fun three months so far.

I admit, I was somewhat concerned when I first joined the Minmatar, having been in the Amarr for over a year. How would it feel shooting people I once flew beside? Would I be accepted into the Minmatar ranks or labeled an Amarr sympathizer and ostracized? I guess I didn’t really need to worry. It all turned out okay.

I do know that the Minmatar went through a period of time where they were very inactive in the USTZ. That all started to change a few weeks ago, as more and more logged in to shoot at the Amarr. I was reluctant to hope that it would last—maybe it was just a weird flux. But, weeks later I am still seeing significant more activity then during my beginnings in the militia.

In fact, I got a little concerned as to how to write about everything that happened this week. There were multiple cap battles, battles with neutrals, battles across different time zones, small skirmishes, etc. I thought…maybe I could just post one big post linking all the battlereports, but probably only the nerdiest of pvpers would be interested in all of that.



So, I’m amused when I see Amarr comments as to how the Minmatar will not engage, or offer little resistence. They smack in local about us not engaging, I read it in their interviews on sov wars, etc. and I wonder if we’re even playing in the same universe.  At first I thought maybe it was a time zone thing, but things have been pretty hot in both time zones lately.

I’m also confused when the Amarr become very vehement that they didn’t batphone. Most of the Minmatar pilots I fly with view batphoning as a standard, expected mode of operation for the Amarr due to the repeated, verifiable hot drops we have experienced over the past few months. But, for some reason, many Amarr seem to think that the Minmatar are delusional  in thinking that they will do such a thing.

So, why such a complete conflict of perspectives? I think it’s largely due to the fact that no militia is a centralized unit. I’ve often felt that the Amarr were one of the most organized militias, but they probably have their own cliques and groups the same as any other. While a few corporations may consistently call on neutral help, this may not be the MO of other corporations and it is easy to see why these other corporations would be confused when we expect this of them. To us, they are all just ‘the Amarr.’

Why they claim we do not engage or offer little resistance, I can’t say. The killboards show a much different story, and I know that I’ve certainly not been languishing in the station much this week.

Ahh, the wonders of militia politics.

2 comments:

  1. Traditionally/historically, the Amarr owned the Euro TZ, and the Minmatar owned the US/Oceania TZ. US 'Late Nite' used to rack up a disproportionate number of Amarr kills. However, that's been changing lately, and I don't think it's always the case now.

    Still, most times I've come on late US time space has been really dead, with no Amarr active, and those few doing their best to avoid the Late Nite roaming gang.

    I do think it odd that both sides always believe they are 'winning.' But again I think it's a case of individual groups of better pilots winning most battles for each side, and the rest just so much cannon fodder and KMs.

    ReplyDelete
  2. It's because we're just coming off a long period of inactivity for the Minmatar in the EU evening timezone. For pretty much all October the Huola-Auga area was so deserted you could have flown an Amarr-flagged freighter all the way through it and back again every night.

    Batphone-wise . . . yeah, I've never had batphone support in an Amarr militia fleet, not once. I've never even seen a friendly supercap in FW space. I can't help laughing when the Minmatar tell me about the Amarr batphoning, though, because the Amarr say exactly the same thing about the Minmatar! In fact right up until last week there were a good few people in the Amarr Militia convinced you guys were blue with PL . . .

    ReplyDelete