Surprised Oric hasn't posted about this, but I saw this in PCG and thought I'd post it here.
In EVE online, there have been scams, infiltrations, double-crosses and backstabs for years, but nothing like this: the dissolution of the most powerful single alliance in the history of EVE - Band of Brothers. What's most chilling for the former members of that alliance is that the person who takes much of the credit is a CEO of their arch-nemesis, the GoonSwarm corporation born of the Something Awful forums. In the early hours of February 5, GoodSwarm leader 'The Mittani' posted to the official EVE forums, announcing that BoB was no more. he had, thanks to the help of a high-ranking defector, disbanded the entire alliance, and loted its offers.
The traitor, 'Haargoth' of Black Nova corporation, had decided he no longer respected the BoB alliance his corporation belonged to, and was in fact ready to betray them to GoonSwarm. The two huge alliances, which had been warrning on and off for years, both had spies in each other's ranks. Never, though, had one been so well placed as Haargoth. He was able to steal a huge amound of BoB assets, but he was also able - thanks to his directorship powers within Black Nova Crorp - to elect not to pay the Alliance Fee. It's a comparatively small amount that EVE's rules demand each corporation in an alliance pay every month. But if any one of them refuses, the entire alliance is broken. With, it turns out, dramatic consequences.
Capturing space in EVE is all in a name. In order to build player-owned space stations and shipyards, an alliance must officially hold sovereignity over the solar system. To reinforce and defend them, it must hold them long enough to reach the higher sovereignty levels, permitting powerful defensive structures.
BoB had been operating out of the region of Delve for several years, and had previously fought-off an incursion by Goon and Russian forcer. Delve was a fortressed region, thoroughly entrenched.
But when the alliance the holds soverignty ceases to exist, all their defensive options are lost. Their stations and shipyards are instantly vulnerable. Just by deleteing the name of his alliance, Haargoth had left the gates of the fortress wide open. Band of Brothers rapidly reformed as 'KenZoku', but their enemies were not going tro allow them the weeks required to re-establish high level sovereignty and rebuild. Fleets from GoonSwarm, Pandemic Legion and the Northern Coalition - all long-term enemies of BoB - descended on Delve. Thousands of players, all attacking together. Their capital ships began tearing down player-owned structures, blowing up near-priceless capital ship construction installations that had been left defenceless.
The cost of all this for the alliance formerly known as Band of Brothers is incalculable. Several thousand players hav eeach sunk hundreds of man-hours into the BoB project over a number of years. Haargoth's act of betrayal has potentially cost millions of man hours of work, and the real-world equivalent of tens, maybe hundreds of thoughsands of pounds of damage to virtual assets. it is griefing on a scale that the Goons, fuelled by their philiosophy of chaos and disruption, had previously only dreamed of.
All of this is perfectly within the rules, say developers CCP. What 'The Mittani' and#Haargoth' arranged was not an exploit, it's the way these game mechanics are intended to function. It was just a catastrophic act of sabotage - just like you'd expect froim the ruthless dark future of New Eden.
Ripped directly from PCGamer magazine.
www.pcgamer.co.uk
- Vicious Out.
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Originally Posted by ez64
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