Eve Online is huge, and it’s nigh impossible for one major group to control all of the conquerable space and protect it from any attacks. That’s why the Imperium is looking to now glass and burn down regions of space, removing any structures and Ihub upgrades, and in effect salting the land to make it harder to rebuild after the fires have died down. It does this with the “highway” that connects Delve to Fountain, Cloud Ring, and the western North, allowing the Imperium to cast a shadow over the land, a shadow that their supers and titans can jump to from the safety of the Keepstar. Now, the shadow has spread further.
You could be forgiven for thinking that the Keepstar in 6RCQ-V had been taken down; the Imperium had not travelled up north for some time along the highway, but last weekend’s move op stopped there. The reason was that the next Keepstar was to be placed in KQK1-2, which sits on the border towards Tribute. This extended the jump range of the Imperium fleet and opened up a new host of targets. The crawling might of the Imperium slowly takes one step forward each time it deploys, purging more lands and forcing our foe from their homes into allied space.
The jump ranges for a super/titan from KQK1-2 can be seen here.
The following regions’ systems fall under direct jump range from the Keepstar:
After the Fade war, which purged GOTG and C02 from Fade, we saw the Imperium had cleared the majority of targets within range. After a long campaign, Imperium leadership decided to stop the assault and leave it for now. If NCdot and friends don’t offer much of a fight in the protection of their space, we could see Imperium forces still having the drive to move forward and carry out the installation of another Keepstar, furthering the range and in effect taking more systems away from the Northern alliances. Only time will tell. For now, the entosis grinding of Ihubs and sacking of remaining structures have already started.