If you haven't noticed already, A Band Apart abandoned our most recent Null Sec gains over the weekend and pulled back from Scalding Pass. We made this decision for a variety of reasons, but essentially this is all part of the program and the plan. Yes, believe it or not we have one.
Moving the Alliance towards a more active and engaged role in zero space is not something that happens overnight. That would be foolish, and foolishness would not be a responsible method of leadership. From the very beginning we've been taking steps to slowly and methodically move the entire Alliance towards a goal, but this takes time. The first step along that path was to bring a zero space focused Corporation into ABA, which we did with the 57th Overlanders Brigade. The next step was to take a few systems suddenly and keep the investment light, just so we could all learn more about how the mechanics work. Both of those phases have gone well.
And then an opportunity arose in Scalding Pass. After some initial concerns, we decided to take advantage of that opportunity. And this is nothing against those involved, but it just didn't work out for us. It is rather complicated, but several factors made the situation rather difficult. Logistically the opportunity happened too quickly, despite our best efforts it took much longer to deploy properly than we had anticipated. We learned a lot of good lessons in that regard and will be better prepared next time. Secondly, and this is 100% my own fault, I screwed up the settings for the initial timers. Honestly finding and managing Sov thru all the various and sundry windows is a learning process for me as well. We had a very small window available to us, and to be fair, I derped it.
After that, we never really had another chance to re-set. And that was because of the biggest reason, politics. Let me back up a bit and set the stage. One of the best things about Null in my opinion is ownership. It is something you can't really appreciate until you have it. A lot of our pilots got the chance to experience what that feels like over the past two weeks and that is a good thing. But it is also important to earn what you own, to feel like it is yours, to fight for it, defend it, and keep it. In my opinion that is critical, especially for our Alliance. We are just getting started. We had aligned with another Alliance under temp blue standings, something we do not ever do. Another group, which was blue to those guys, but not blue to us - lived a couple systems over in a station they did not own. But that was owned by our allies. This meant that we could not retaliate against the neuts without poking our allies. Essentially our hands were tied.
Once we fully appreciated the political problems we decided rather quickly to not fight for the systems. Why waste even more investments over a situation that was not going to be a long-term possibility. So we decided to play the string out a bit and see what happened, but start moving assets out almost immediately after we arrived.
Again, this is nothing against our friends. We appreciated the chance, but the situation was not for us. We want to take Sov, fight for it, hold it, and keep it for ourselves. But we just weren't ready yet. So we are taking the next step right now. Our scouts are out and about looking for our next opportunity.
We are building and preparing assets. Pilots are training. Supply chains are being built. Doctrines prepared. So that next time we can move in quickly, set up shop immediately, and be better prepared for the long haul. We may even set up a base in an NPC Null region to help that process along.
We haven't given up. This is a journey for us and we want to strike when we are ready, prepared, and capable. We've learned a tremendous amount. And we will learn more as we go along.
Who knows where we will end up next.
PS: If you'd like to be a part of our eventual domination of New Eden, please consider joining the 57th Overlanders Brigade. They need experienced and dedicated pilots to spearhead our operations.