As reported by INN on Thursday, Curatores Veritatis Alliance invaded Pandemic Legion territory in Providence, kicking off an intense battle that saw PL lose a 56b Rorqual and a 32b Hel supercarrier plus other ships for a total of 122b ISK lost, while inflicting 36b ISK in damage on CVA’s fleet.
Background
Since Yulai Federation’s withdrawal from Providence in mid-February, PL has consolidated sovereignty over all former YF systems, including JEIV-E, XHQ-7V, and more. PL’s advance put them right on CVA’s doorstep, and the two alliances now share a direct border between PL’s system of 8P9-BM and CVA’s F-YH5B. Provi-Bloc might be down, but they are certainly not out…as PL were about to painfully discover.
The Fight
CVA have never been ones to sit back and wait for a fight to come to them, and after scanning the expensive Rorqual earlier in the week, had immediately began planning an operation to destroy it. According to CVA FC Miss Kesha, they had intelligence that the Rorqual was active in the region, and when they spotted it in 8P9, immediately assembled a mixed fleet to go after it. The operation was nearly in jeopardy from the beginning, as PL dropped a fleet onto some unrelated CVA forces in F-Y…the exact system where CVA were staging their dreads.
Fortunately, Miss Kesha told INN, the PL ships didn’t notice or didn’t engage the dread fleet, opting instead to follow a small gang of Osprey Navy Issues through the gate into 8P9. The Hel was waiting at zero on the other side of the gate, and the CVA fleet tore into it, lighting a quick cyno and landing their dreadnought fleet right on top of PL’s supercarrier and five combat-fit Rorquals. The battle’s time line tells the rest of the story: immediately after landing on grid, the dreadnoughts annihilated the Hel, then in the next minute took out the blingy Rorqual plus two of the other Rorqs.
By this time, PL had begun to react, and the tide of battle immediately turned. After the Rorquals, CVA only took down two more PL ships, both dreadnoughts, while losing six dreads, two interdictors, and two heavy interdiction cruisers. In all, 21 of CVA’s 29 ships were destroyed in the battle, compared with 12 of PL’s 79.
However, thanks to the Hel and the Rorquals, CVA handily won the ISK battle. To add insult to injury, Doomchinchilla, who lost the 56b Rorqual, also lost a 1.6b pod. At least he seemed to have a sense of humor when he posted on Twitter about the loss.
Miss Kesha was also satisfied with the outcome. “We had a really nice formup with just a bunch of the most trusted people I know in Providence, with an extremely nice outcome for us against an enemy that seems overwhelming at times. Everyone had a lot of fun and was rewarded with some nice kills.”
The Aftermath
One interesting side effect of PL’s unchecked expansion in Providence is that they now have dangerous neighbors: PL’s D-GTMI system in Provi directly borders F9E-KX in Catch, owned by Drone Walkers, who are members of Legacy Coalition. Legacy and TEST have been antagonistic toward PL’s imperialism, and have joined Provi-Bloc as third parties on numerous occasions in the past in order to fight PL. Several things may happen as a result of this new state of affairs. TEST and PL may have an uneasy standoff, the presence of each keeping the other in check. TEST may launch a large-scale offensive against PL, either on their own or in concert with CVA, in order to retake territory in Providence. If that happens, TEST may give some or all of the territory back to CVA, or they may keep some for themselves, retaking the NPC stations from PL in order to reap the benefit of the station changes that are going to happen at some indeterminate point in the future.
Alternately – and perhaps least likely of all – is that TEST would sit idly by and watch PL continue to carve up Providence. One must imagine that Legacy would not want a larger and stronger PanFam directly on their doorstep, and that something will be done sooner rather than later. Even if PL are merely going to rent out the systems, surely TEST would prefer to be the ones reaping the rental income rather than watching their rivals grow richer.
In the meantime, CVA and PL will continue duking it out, although if those fights keep going the way Thursday’s did, PL will surely not be looking forward to them.
