Welcome back, dear readers. In the previous installment of the Goonswarm classic, The Saga of Delta Sqad, we were introduced to the men of Delta and regaled with an account of the earliest days of their settlement in the region of Querious. Today’s episode of the Saga follows the Men of Delta as they carve out a space of their own in a hostile region of space, setting up their own farmsteads and dealing with a variety of villainous interlopers. The themes of the saga speak to many of the foundational values of Delta culture, as the tireless yeoman farmers remain adamant in their belief in no-not-believin even as their very existence is threatened by sinister forces.
Shooting POS of Many Kinds
It has previously been related that many of the newbee-veterans of Delta– accustomed as they were to shooting POS in every sort of previous war– were quite confused to find few POS in EVE Online in 2021, but quickly resolved to call all kinds of structures POS, as this was the simplest way to allow those bold warriors to shoot POS once again. There was a new kind of POS that the veterans of Delta called a Jump Bridge, because its function resembled that of ancient relics once referred to as jump bridges which were used to convey men from one place to another in ages long past. One of these POSs was in P-Z and many men of Brave Newbees and TEST Alliance used it to travel, so the men of Delta shot it. After a while, a lot of orange-boxy dudes appeared through the Jump Bridge and made their violent intentions known, brandishing many fine weapons and slaying several Delta Hounds in a vulgar display of power.
This began a period known as the Jump Bridge Times. In these weeks, being well aware of their manly duty to exact revenge for the slaying of the Hounds, the steadfast men of Delta were determined to kill this Jump Bridge POS. Many times the men of Delta made the journey over the ridges to the neighboring valley of P-Z in order to shoot this POS, and many times dozens of men of Brave and their TEST cousins were summoned in its defense. Still, it was widely known at this time that the men of Delta were amongst the stubbornest of Goons, and this proved to be true as the men of Brave were unable to match the Deltas’ steely resolve: eventually, fatigued from weeks of fighting, the men of Brave failed to appear in a timely manner and the POS was defeated. Jarl Aritzia stuck his spear through the Jump Bridge to make sure it was dead, and the men of Delta commenced much merrymaking. One man erected an MTU, and the jubilant Deltas then discovered that it was possible to drag an entire structure wreck around space this way and that in a manner that appeared ridiculous, and this fueled their merriness further. Then they spent fifteen minutes trying to loot fuel blocks from the wreck because nobody knew about “safety settings” and how they could stop you from stealing treasures. Why would anybody not want to steal treasures? The men of Delta didn’t really get the point of all these extra buttons but they figured it out eventually and shortly thereafter they got those blocks. This event marked the end of the Jump Bridge Times, and this raid was widely considered to have been a great success and the men’s morale was improved.
There was another kind of POS in Querious at this time and it was called an Athanor. This POS mostly kept to itself but there were several men of Brave Newbees who frequented this POS and sometimes mined nearby and shit-posted from it, and thus this POS soon became known to all of Delta Sqad. One day the men of Brave were gloating about enjoying “sucking Goons’ goo” and taunting the noble Deltas about how Brave men could suck goo better than any Goon ever could. The men of Delta weren’t sure why anyone would want to suck their goo but were hesitant to judge another man’s life-choices in 2021, as many considered it a mark of wisdom in these times to leave those sorts of questions to lesser men. Still, it seemed a shame to the upstanding men of Delta that the men of Brave were enjoying themselves in Delta’s countryside and grazing their Procurers on Delta lands without paying Jarl Aritzia a visit or seeking his permission as was customary. Due to these indiscretions, the men of Delta agreed that this POS should be destroyed. Aritzia and Dalmuti rode here and there visiting each small village of W6V until a large band of fearsome Deltas was assembled. Drawing their sharpest torpedoes, they crept to the edge of the 9CG gate in UYU until they could see the POS: several Brave farmhands were tending to their Procurers there, but they were quickly scattered as the Hounds of Delta bore down upon their POS. Nothing of note happened during the POS shooting, and the POS was reinforced in short order and the men of Delta rode back to W6V.
Upon returning to the Athanor in UYU again the next day, Delta’s men found that no men had been raised in this POS’s defense, so they began to shoot the POS again. Then, as the last of the armor was about to be stripped from the Athanor, a large band of Brave men appeared in a cowardly sneak-attack. There were many of these men, as if the whole region had been roused to defend this POS, and they had brought many of their cousins from TEST alliance with them as well. They rode many Jackdaws and though the men of Delta quickly traded their Hounds for some of their most fearsome Ruptures, even such things were no match for the cowardly kiting capability and massive alpha-strike of these expensive, fancy destroyers. Many Ruptures and Scythes met their ends that day and the men of Delta were routed and driven from the field, yet still these men stood resolute in their commitment to destroying the Athanor. As soon as the men of Brave and Test returned to their lands, the hardworking and stoic Deltas returned and reinforced this POS again.
These Jackdaws were a cause of great sorrow for many of the men of Delta over the ensuing weeks, as each time Jarl Aritzia brought more men or different ships in hopes of fighting off these cursed destroyers, Delta’s cowardly enemies responded by bringing additional Jackdaw fleets until their numbers doubled those of the men of Delta and in better ships as well. Not content to concede their rightful grazing lands, the men of Delta resolved to destroy the P-Z Jump Bridge yet again so that additional Jackdaws could not be summoned. This was done and shortly thereafter the POS was reinforced again, and this time after the sacrifice of many valiant cruisers the day was won and the men of Brave lost their Athanor. Jarl Dmitryii Dmitrii installed his own farmhouse there and allowed as how the men of Delta would always be welcome to graze their Procurers there as compensation for their many weeks of hard work, and no Athanor in Querious was as happy a place as this Athanor became, and the men of Delta were contented each time they gazed upon its gleaming Loparite fields. The Athanor stands in UYU to this day. This is where this story of the Athanor ends.
Come to Where the Good Posts Are. Come to Delta Sqad Country.
Having vanquished the smol POS that let all these orange-box TEST mouthbreathers come at us willy-nilly from Delve, and riding high on a tidal-surge of weed-smoke and no-not-believin’, Delta Sqad decided that we were the captains of Querious now. So began a happy time in Querious, as unauthorized cynos continued to die, and the gentlemen of Delta Sqad donned their finest evening wear and decided to attempt the audacious: we would try our hand at sov warfare. Enthusiastic though we were, there was a serious lack of knowledge in this department: if sov was not done with POS, how was it done? What must we do? Luckily, we were told, even frigates could do sov things now. This state of affairs suited us just fine: we saddled our mighty Peenishers covered in many armor plates and we lassoed ourselves some ihubs. TAPI put a new jump bridge in P-Z once or twice and kinda sent some people to stop our Peenishers but we kept killin’ those jump bridges until TEST ultimately decided that frigate PvP was beneath them and left Brave to handle matters.
Now, we Goons typically fawn over cute newbees, and Brave sort of style themselves cute newbees, but we soon discovered that these folks were all cute-newbee-hat and no cattle: in almost no time at all those newbies started comin at our Peenishers in Navy Issue Brutixes and other fancy, big-city type of ships. We country folk thought this wasn’t very sporting especially given your average Peenisher can’t even run away while it’s got its rope on a hub, but there weren’t no other people around to help out so we put on our tophats and monocles and made some posts and decided we could pull ourselves up by our bootstraps. Our spacedad brought up some Vexors from 1DQ: we put armor reps and stuff on them and went to work, zooming around and active-tanking with multiple overheated armor reps like straight-up PvP movie stars. This worked good enough for a while until Kronos Hopeslayer found himself some more friends and now instead of two or three Navy Brutixes it was five or six. It was time to step up our game again, so we put armor plates on some ships and fit up some fine Exequerors to go with them. We even dug up some Hurricanes to play with, as there are two things Deltas are sure to love and that’s: 1) Good Posting and 2) Hurricanes. With a few helping hands backin up our armor cruisers, we continued to rope those ihubs. We broke sov in P-Z and put down a hub of our own. We worked our plot in W6V and raised those ADMs and even mined us some moon rocks. We kept fightin and kept tearing down Brave ihubs. Some nights we won, some nights we lost. We never knew what was in the cards, but we knew we were stirrin up trouble and havin a good time.
Querious Qrew Victorious?
And then the unexpected happened: before we even knew it, it seemed we had won! All of a sudden, Kronos Hopeslayer was nowhere to be found, and there were only a few cynos on the P-Z keepstar each day. Ihub after ihub was lassoed and corralled into the scrapheap. Sure, there was that Malo guy with his alt-alliance who’d still get mad and harass us with his fancy T2 Caracals, but after feeding him a suitable number of ships we Deltas put on our thinking caps and figured out how to do this new-fangled booshing thing that all the kids are doing in order to put Hurricanes onto Cerberi. Turns out if you can put some Hurricanes on it, the fancy Caracal ain’t that much tougher than a regular Caracal, or so we thought.
We Deltas were proud to see Querious had truly become Delta Sqad country, but this transformation wasn’t without its regrets. No more Kronos and friends meant no more trouble, and that meant we had to go find some, so we hopped in our trusty frigates and cruisers and rode over to TEST country around C3N, where we happened across some more folks in fancy Caracals. We still weren’t sure why a man would pay so much money for a stubbier-looking version of a Caracal, but we quickly stopped making jokes about them and went to work bubbling those Cerberuses and bumping them off gates so we could free their pure Caracal spirits from these hideously-deformed, overpriced shells.
C3N was fun, but one thing’s for sure: it was a long ride from our homestead in W6V. With nothing going in Querious, we Deltas were almost ready to move camp to greener pastures. But the fates had other things in store for the chiseled-jaw, perfectly-stubbled newbee-veterans of Delta Sqad: we were about to be tested as never before.
(Editor’s Note: The Saga of Delta Sqad is a multi-part epic literary experience chronicling the deeds of a dedicated band of stalwart heroes as they live, fight, and generally act goony in places where the enemy doesn’t want them. If this is your first encounter with the lads of Delta, be sure to read Part I, and stay tuned for more!)