When analyzing the EVE Online game board, one needs to take into account past events, how they will impact the present, and what the future will entail in consequence. Test Alliance Please Ignore has played their card, hoping for a beneficial future. But have they taken into account the present situation and the past on which it is built? Let us take a look.
Test’s involvement in the Casino War was littered with instances of inconsideration from their allies. After Test provided much of the heavy lifting during the Casino War, Northern Coalition (NC.) and Pandemic Horde (PH) saw fit to expel them from the north. They tasted what they had themselves served. Just as the Imperium had to move to Delve, Test was also fleeing south in the face of overwhelming odds. With them they brought Circle-of-Two (C02). They had betrayed the Imperium when the coalition needed them most. The Imperium tolerated Co2 for the sake of its diplomatic agreement with Test. They had acted against us once before in Fountain and were nearly destroyed. Once again Test had acted against the Imperium and we offered our hand in the hopes that they may finally realize the reality as it was – NCPL will use and then discard you at the quickest convenience- rather than what they wished it were.
The Logic Escapes Me
The logic in Test’s present actions escape me, as the aforementioned facts are nothing less than common knowledge. The above paragraph is not “INN Spin” or “war propaganda.” Progod, Vily, Dran, and others in Test are also well aware of all of the above as facts. And despite all of this they have decided to once again side with entities who in the past have betrayed them. Any logical action taken needs to be firmly rooted in the reality of the past. When this is not the case we can consider the action as illogical. The claim that this is all done as some nebulous quest for content does not track. Test was engaged in a conflict in the east fighting an enemy. By definition this was content. Why one would turn 180 degrees and decide to shoot your ally while working with said previous enemy does not seem to be a prerequisite for content to occur. One can only speculate on the factors motivating Test leadership in taking such actions. At the very least we have established how present actions are not rooted in past reality.
What can we say for the future if present actions are not rooted in past reality? If everything that transpires as perfectly as Test hopes it will in the war – Goons are removed from Delve and destroyed – and what is the likely actions groups like PL and NC. will take? Very likely they will look at Test and attack them for no less noble reason than Test is attacking the Imperium: “content.” At the end of a hypothetically successful war with Test, the grand prize is in turn falling victim to the same entities that had attacked them in the past. Maybe I am wrong but this is based on historical evidence that we are all aware of.
Even so it is unlikely that such a war will be successful. The current iteration of the Money Badger Coalition lacks the funding that the Casinos provided for them in 2016. The disparity in super capitals has long since vanished and the Imperium is more than capable of going head to head with entities that for years were considered undisputed super capital powers. Goonswarm itself, which is the core of the Imperium, has shown itself to be uniquely durable, having survived and surpassed all previous such attempts at extermination.
Lastly our unique leadership and organization is unmatched anywhere else in EVE I am reminded of a scene in Game of Thrones, in Episode 5 of the first season, where Robert Baratheon is speaking to Cersei. “What is the bigger number, five or one?” Of course she answers five. But he then holds up his left hand fingers spread, “five?” Then lifts his right hand forming a single fist, “or one?”
As various personalities within the MBC will compete with one another, PGL saying one thing, Vince another, Noraus something else, frictions will emerge. The Imperium does not even need to destroy the entirety of the MBC to be successful. Only one or two entities needs to realize the consequence and decide that suddenly it’s no longer in their interest to carry out this invasion. The Imperium, on the other hand, is quite aptly described as that one fist. One coalition, one leader, one united goal. When that entity within the MBC does peel off and the MBC begins dissolving I am certain that our coalition too will suddenly feel the need to “look for content somewhere” and very likely that somewhere will be east of Stain.
