CATCH: The system of 36N-HZ saw action in the early morning hours of January 11 as TEST and the Imperium traded killmails for shield titans. The fighting surrounding the exchange saw the arrival of fleets from many of the participants in the war, as well as more distant entities like NCdot and Pandemic Legion.
The initial tackle on the Leviathan of 2timer from TEST was made by members of the Sword of Damocles alliance, and from there, the race was on to save or kill the massive Caldari vessel. While the ship’s defenders brought in Hurricanes to kill interdictors and provide screening, the attackers quickly responded with a strategic cruiser fleet or Proteii and Legions. TESCO command destroyers provided significant disruption to the Imperium forces, splitting the T3-fleet’s logistics group into three separate chunks at one point.
Things got more interesting, however, when the Ragnarok of Federico Constantine jumped into the fray, leaving a fleet of Machariels behind waiting for a bridge he would never open. The Ragnarok warped off of the combat grid, but was unable to escape before enemy fleets were able to tackle it and begin battering its shields. Another titan was quickly found for the Machariel fleet—and carefully made very sure he would not jump as well.
TEST dreadnoughts and Force Auxiliaries also jumped in to the Leviathan’s defense, but the Imperium response swiftly arrived in the form of nearly a score more titans, four dozen supercarriers, and over a hundred other capitals.
With the Leviathan dead, Imperium subcapitals repositioned to attempt to save the stricken Ragnarok while the capital fleet cut down the remaining TEST capitals. Unfortunately, Imperium Force Auxiliaries could not be brought in to save the Rag, as the pilot had accidentally launched a mobile cyno inhibitor instead of a mobile depot. With the subcapitals landing in a stop bubble over a hundred kilometers from the Ragnarok, the titan’s fate was sealed. With the Ragnarok’s death, TESCO forces began to draw down, as did the NCdot and Pandemic Legion fleets who had initially pounced on the Ragnarok.
Another crisis moment occurred when the Imperium supercapital fleet went to extract to their staging of HY-RWO. As the cyno pilot went to light his beacon, he found the system unexpectedly cynojammed. The system’s owners, Against All Authorities, had installed and onlined a cynojammer without alerting the Imperium, and no representatives of -A- were available to turn the jammer off. As a last resort, Imperium dreadnoughts forcibly offlined the jammer, and the supercapital fleet jumped out to HY-RWO without further incident.
The final toll of the battle stands at 340b ISK, with the Imperium edging out the ISK war, taking 161.82b and inflicting 173.39b ISK of damage. When asked why his titan was so shit-fit, Federico Constantine responded, “I didn’t want to invest in shield mods because I’m just going to get an armor titan.” I’m sure the PL, NCdot, and TESCO pilots involved will join me in congratulating Federico on getting free from the shackles of titan ownership.
