An Amarrian, Minmatar, and PL Walk into a Bar

“This is a super bad idea.” I was not the only one to voice this when TeaEarlyGray HOT suggested we go into the plex where Fweddit waited with at least 15+ destroyers and frigs. We had 5 in fast cruisers and frigs.

“We’re kitey so we’ll just burn away.”

“Someone is going to get caught and die in a fire.”

“Maybe.”

“They have a Griffin.” I was particularly wary of griffins as not a half hour early, Killer420 and I had experienced the full effect of what it was like to be permajammed by one. We had spied three Amarr in a novice plex in frigs, and taken our two frigs to go kill them. It should have been a fun fight, but instead they uncloaked a Griffin and permajammed both of us.

Needless to say we went into the novice plex.

“I’m caught!” It was Tea.

“I’m not caught.”

“I’m caught again!”

“I’m away…”

For thirty seconds we all scattered, trying to gain range on the Fwedditers. As we were doing so, a conversation popped up from Predator Elite, one of the Amarrian FCs. I flew with Pred in nullsec long before I ever joined Faction War, and was one of the people that convinced him to join the Amarr, back when I joined the Amarr myself. I accepted the conversation, but minimized it so I could focus on the fight.

Tea started calling primaries, but Fweddit started to run away.

“What on earth?”

“Did that really happen?”

The guys were a little incredulous, but I didn’t really blame Fweddit for bailing. It’s not like their tech 1 fit Thrashers can do much against us once we’re set up to kite.

I noticed that Predator had now convoed my alt, on my other screen. He must be excited about something.

I opened the window back up. “What’s up Pred?”

“Do you guys want to go kill that PL gang?”

First, I laughed. We had seen the PL gang a while earlier over near Amamake, after attempting to gank their obvious bait Dominix on a gate. They had at least 30+ with Oneiroses, Prophecies, Tech 3 cruisers, faction battleships, and etc. The Minmatar didn’t really even have a main fleet up. I was in Tea’s group that had 5-7 or so, Anz had a little gang up of 4-5, and then there were other corps roaming around doing their own thing.

I mentioned on coms, “guys, the Amarr want to know if we want to go kill PL.”

We talked a minute or two about whether it was even remotely possible. It was decided that it was probably not remotely possible.

“Susan, this isn’t Fweddit asking is it? Because there’s no way I’m getting into a fleet with Fweddit.”

“Nope, it’s Pred.”

What followed was some very strong adjectives and descriptions of where Pred could go, and what he could do once he got there, which I will not repeat here.

“You do realize, that Predator Elite was the one that lit the cyno when PL dropped on us last time, where we lost three dreads, right?” One of my, now Dreadless, alliance mates pointed out.

The probability of the fight happening dropped. I mean, lower than it already was.

“In all the time I’ve known Pred, he’s never back-stabbed someone he’s called a truce with.” I cringed as I said this, hoping that Predator was not about to make a liar out of me.

What followed was at least twenty minutes of people chattering back and forth what would need to be done for it to even remotely happen. This seemed to distract them from who we would be doing it with. We would need to get into a single fleet. But, no one made a move to decide who’s fleet we would move to. Then we’d have to get on joint coms. Eve Voice? Or invite the Amarr to our Minmatar coms? What would we bring? How many could the Amarr bring?

At first they could bring 15. Then 5. Then maybe more. We could bring 6. But then 5 from somewhere else, and maybe this other group would bring some Tornadoes.

It was not going to happen.

“Tea, make a new Wing and invite Pred to it.” I told Pred we were inviting him to a Wing position so he could invite any Amarr he wanted. We had to start somewhere, and we might as well see how much we could pull together.

We continued talking about what we would need. Should we bring battleships? If we brought something too shiny they would drop supers. They might drop supers anyway….

Predator Elite accepted the fleet invite and started inviting his guys into fleet. We managed to merge some of the smaller Minmatar groups into our fleet, with the Periphery alliance promising to bring a significant number of Tier 3 BCs. The Tier 3 BCs changed things considerably, bringing some much needed DPS to the field.
LNA split into brawling battlecruisers and Augorors. Pred’s guys brought a mix of Augorors and battlecruisers as well.

“They have a Damnation on the Huola gate in Kourm.” Someone mentioned.

“Amarr in Kamela, warp to Kourm. Minmatar in Huola, undock and warp to Kourm. Guys in Kourm, warp to the Huola gate. Let’s do this.” Predator took the reigns.

We jumped onto the Damnation and began to let loose, as the rest of our fleet, and Pandemic Legion’s landed.

We did okay at first, but then started losing logi. With the trust between the Amarr and Minmatar still a bit shaky, we only had tech 1 logistics on field, not to mention nothing much bigger, or more expensive than a general battlecruiser.

Predator continued calling targets, rapidly switching in order to attempt to break through their logi, until we lost four logistics. And then, the call was made to bail.

“We did pretty good, considering.”

“That was still super fun.”

A few BCs were lost, as well as at least five Augorors. But everyone on coms, both Amarr and Minmatar were pretty ‘awake’ at that point. The fleet was finally together in one place, we had everyone on the same page, in coms, and felt more or less organized.

“Can we try that again? We’re going to need to ship up a bit.”

“Yeah, those augorors evaporated once they got primaried. We will need tech 2 logistics for sure.”

There was a moment’s hesitation. And then, several LNA members offered to bring Guardians.

“I can bring a Guardian.”

“I have one too.”

“I can bring a battleship…”

“I can bring a Bhaalgorn?”

“NO!” There were several resounding negative reactions to that suggestion.

“Nothing shiny. No faction BSes. Or they will more than likely drop supers.” Predator said. We already knew there was still a chance they would drop triage, if we posed a problem.

The fleet reshipped, several people shipping up to BSes, and the logistics switching out for Guardians. People also started swapping out for ECM drones, sensor dampeners, and neuts.

“In a fight like this, you can never have too many neuts.”

We were almost ready to go, when our scout told us PL was leaving back through Auga.

We pursued.

To Amamake. And then to Gulm. PL was on the move, and they seemed oblivious that they had a huge militia fleet trailing behind them.

Predator cursed a bit, crankily. “Someone scout ahead and go tell them to stop already so we can fight them.”

The scout did as he was asked. Conversations were opened. And rather quickly, PL turned around and came straight back for us.

They wanted this fight as much as we did, and were probably intrigued and bemused by the joint militia fleet coming at them.

We set up on the Egmar gate, our logistics burning off a ways. PL dropped a BS on us first, and it was quickly called primary.

Predator started barking orders. “All DPS on this battleship. Get those damps on those logistics. Spread your ECM drones around. Come on people, more DPS.”

We switched to a SFI, killing it. And then, the first Oneiros. And then, the second Oneiros. Our own logistics were holding. “But it’s tight.” One of the Guardian pilots admitted. We were obviously winning this, with two of PL’s logi already down.

“Cyno up.”

Well, of course there’s a cyno up. It IS Pandemic Legion after all.

Nothing came through at first, so Predator Elite continued calling primaries.

A single Thanatos dropped into the mess.

“Someone tell me when he triages.”

“He’s triaging!”

“Hell, let’s primary the Thanatos.”

We cut through his shields like stiff butter, and then started pounding at his armor.

“Second Thanatos in!”

“He’s in triage, so there’s nothing he can do. We have maybe two minute. Come on guys, all DPS possible on that Thanatos!”

The Thanatos still had quite a bit of armor left.

“This is going to be close.”

His armor crept down, and you could practically hear people’s hearts beating loudly when they spoke on coms, and imagine their palms sweating.

“This is soo close. He’s going into structure! We probably only have a few seconds left guys. Overheat everything! Don’t burn anything out but overheat as much as you can!”

“Half structure! Come on guys. OVERHEAT. OVERHEAT!!!” Predator Elite was pretty much shouting at this point.

“He’s almost down. Come on, more DPS. Come on!!”

The Thanatos exploded.

And chaos erupted on coms. –a cacophony of Amarr and Minmatar excitedly talking about how they had just killed a Pandemic Legion carrier.

“Guys, we did it!”

“Oh my god….”

“You’ve got to be kidding me!!!”

“Second cyno!” PL dropped several more triage in, including at least two archons.

“Okay, let’s primary this one last faction BS, and if it’s obvious they’re saving him we’ll deagress.”
The battleship got reps and everyone started deagressing. There was no way we could burn through 3-4 triage carriers, especially with archons on field.

“Oh, they are SO mad.”

The guardians kept up their cap chain, and logistics, keeping everyone alive as we prepared to get out.
“Aggression down in 3…..2…..1…Everyone JUMP.”

We were through.

“Good job guys.”

“Yeah, that was awesome.”

“Awesome logistics there Guardian pilots!”

“Great FCing Pred.”

“That was great.”

Things calmed down a bit. The Minmatar and Amarr split, the Minmatar being able to dock up, where the Amarr could not.

“Well, see you guys in Kamela tomorrow.” Someone said cheekily, as Pred’s group prepared to log out of Minmatar coms and leave fleet.

“Yep. Tomorrow, it’s back to killing each other. Fly safe guys.”

“See ya.”

Just another day in the Amarr-Minmatar warzone.