Among the ruins - speculations regarding the future of the North and its population

**Kireiina** · 2011-06-02

Stagnation. With the DRF block owning a significant power dominance and the most lucrative space in the game there's no real threat to them other than each other or eventual internal decay.

Is there a site that collects online population numbers? I wonder if the collapse of the NC will actually cause a noticeable drop in players online even though null-sec is a minority population in Eve.

**HeliconOne** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by Kireiina

Stagnation. With the DRF block owning a significant power dominance and the most lucrative space in the game there's no real threat to them other than each other or eventual internal decay.

Is there a site that collects online population numbers? I wonder if the collapse of the NC will actually cause a noticeable drop in players online even though null-sec is a minority population in Eve.

You're not going to see a mass unsubbing of accounts from the NC playerbase, a few people will loudly proclaim Fuck This I'm Done but most will stick around. Whether they stay with their current alliances is a different question though, and depends on whether the current NC leadership can wake from its present coma to give them a plan and some clear direction for just what they want to do next, or hand control over to someone else who will. They've probably got 2 or 3 weeks at best before corps and individuals start glancing sideways at the exit door and speaking to recruiters about joining other alliances. But hey, Vuk said he'd put everything else away and was back to lead so I'm sure he's busily working on a strategy right now for his alliance's next move!

I wouldn't say stagnation is inevitable, but with that many supercaps and Elite PVP egos sitting on that much ISK with no significant external threat to their space, there's a real danger of everyone either getting fat and complacent and morphing into NC 2.0, or of the whole arrangement collapsing in drama and faggotry.

**Pripyat** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by Kireiina

Stagnation. With the DRF block owning a significant power dominance and the most lucrative space in the game there's no real threat to them other than each other or eventual internal decay.

People announced stagnation and mass unsubbing when Tech became the most valuable ressource and the NC where sitting on it.
Actually people predicted The End Of Eve when BoB owned everything from Fountain to Feyth too yet here we are a few years later.

**tgr** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by Pripyat

Actually people predicted The End Of Eve when BoB owned everything from Fountain to Feyth too yet here we are a few years later.

There were a few changes between BOB's heyday and their downfall that had a marked impact on their ability to project force, though.

**Dwergi** · 2011-06-02

I've actually come to believe the line that nothing lasts forever. The NC did pretty well, all told, but I just can't see 6 years of stagnation coming. Will the DRF stick together as long as the NC did? I don't know, but I have my doubts. I think the biggest wildcards right now are Raiden and NCdot. If Raiden/NCdot settle into Vale/Tribute and decides to keep White Noise blue, it'd make it much more difficult to displace the north if one so desired.

However, I think a shake-up is in the works with regards to tech and supers - if that happens, there's no telling what will happen. If Delve returns to being the richest region in the game with Tribute relatively poor, will the DRF have the energy to do anything about it? They'll be coming off the back of a 6 month war, most of which will have been spent grinding structures - tech getting rebalanced as part of the Incarna set of patches would put them on the back foot. Additionally, I think Solar and xDeath were along for the ride more than a central part of the campaign. Whatever holdings they acquire out of it, they'll probably want to reinforce and rent out rather than overextend themselves in the search of R64's.

I'm not particularly worried about stagnation at this point - I think the majority of the doomcallers are NC members and/or particularly xenophobic towards Russians. It doesn't take a lot of effort to see that this entire campaign has been stamped as the invasion of the "Russian RMT bot hackers" rather than as a good, old-fashioned, content-generating war. And it's incredibly hypocritical coming from members of the most stagnant entity EVE has ever seen - at least BoB had the courtesy to get disbanded and destroyed a couple of times.

**Teth** · 2011-06-02

This thread raises some interesting questions and no one can answer all of them, we don't even have all the info yet.

The biggest question first is "Where will the DRF stop?". Is Tribute, Tenal & Branch enough or do they want Deklein and Fade / PB too? Let's be honest that is allot of space to defend, SOV to pay and basically a pain in the ass. But it's a huge e-peen.

rzr and rawr are unlikely to fold IMHO. They will shed their carebears and industrialists and the PVPers who are left then have to decide what to do. Can they realistically contest SOV in the north still and do they want to co-operate with goons and the DC?

The softening of the DRF is also inevitable. The NC acquired legions of Jews who didn't pvp over their stay in the safe rich regions. I think that is inevitable over comming years for the DRF too.

Tech and supers wise I think CCP will do something about Tech sooner or later. Supers I'm not so sure they are broken. What I'm really disappointed in about the fall of the north is that we never actually tried the 250 dreads VS supers plan. It was talked about, it is on paper an isk efficient way of putting a dent in a super capital fleet and making an enemy think twice about deploying them. Over time Dreads can be replaced much faster than supers etc. You never know maybe the DC will come under direct attack and will try it yet.

One thing I am confident of tho. Eve is not dead and the nullsec SOV map of June 2012 will hold endless surprises.

**Pripyat** · 2011-06-02

RZW and MM shedding the fat become ~lean mean fighting machines~ , half of NCDOT and PL joins them to be part of the Underdogs.

**Teth** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by Pripyat

RZW and MM shedding the fat become ~lean mean fighting machines~ , half of NCDOT and PL joins them to be part of the Underdogs.

This vision of the future excites me. Take me with you!

**Dwergi** · 2011-06-02

I'd honestly be surprised if anyone joined the shambling corpses of MM and RZR - for the majority of nullsec, they've been the enemy for most of a decade. If NCdot wants to be underdogs again, they could reset the DRF and try to defend sov in the north. Plenty of underdogging there.

I would also think that leaving Fade, Pure Blind and Deklein alone would play into the DRF's hands. They'd have reds a few jumps away, while still keeping a very defensible position in Branch, Tenal, Vale and Tribute - even that's a vast tract of space to actively defend, but not as impossible as trying to take the entire north. Stopping at the borders of Goon territory would most likely lead to a truce, with neither entity wanting to get drawn into a war.

I think RZR and MM will either swallow their pride and become Goon pets or relocate to NPC space to harass the DRF. However, Razor's deployments have shown that their active PvP force numbers in the hundreds, not the thousands. Whether or not they could even hold their own against much smaller entities (like, say, Ev0ke or Merciless) is an open question for me. Whether they're even capable of not being top dogs is another question - they've been kings of the north for so long that I think many people would outright quit over not being able to dictate their own destiny.

As for dreads, I think the biggest change required would be to make their siege time 5 minutes - it would allow dreads to possibly tank long enough to coast out of siege and catch carrier reps, making it not utterly suicidal. I think that if you currently dropped 100 dreads on 10 moms, you would probably win the battle, but you would lose 20-40 dreads in the process. I don't know if that's the case, because last time it was tried all the dreads blackscreened and died.

**HeliconOne** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by Dwergi

As for dreads, I think the biggest change required would be to make their siege time 5 minutes - it would allow dreads to possibly tank long enough to coast out of siege and catch carrier reps, making it not utterly suicidal. I think that if you currently dropped 100 dreads on 10 moms, you would probably win the battle, but you would lose 20-40 dreads in the process. I don't know if that's the case, because last time it was tried all the dreads blackscreened and died.

Yeah, the 'oops we all blackscreened and died without firing a shot like CVA did' aspect is half the reason that nobody wants to try dropping dreadfleets on supercap packs, especially with the current large supercap groups meaning that you need bigger and bigger dreadfleets and so you're increasing the odds of a HILARIOUS SERVER MELTDOWN event. If you drop 100 gankfit dreads on 10 supercarriers, sure, in perfect conditions the supercaps all die (along with about half the dreads I think, but I can't be bothered to do the maths right now), but in practice half the dreads bounce off each other from the cyno and drift out of range, and the supercaps have multiple tools at their disposal to break the hictor and dictor tackles and escape.

This is starting to turn into the same discussion as the 'fix supercaps' thread though :/

**Dwergi** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by HeliconOne

This is starting to turn into the same discussion as the 'fix supercaps' thread though :/

Stop only talking about supers then.

**Don Peyote** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by tgr

There were a few changes between BOB's heyday and their downfall that had a marked impact on their ability to project force, though.

Like them losing their Sabre BPO

**Gyncognito** · 2011-06-02

The thing about MM/RZR is that they are rich. Like filthy roll around in a swimming pool of money soaked in blow rich. Names matter in eve. Especially names with deep pockets. If you were anywhere near tribute last night you prolly got at least one ship bumped into the sun by the massive stampede of freighters and caps heading south. They weren't all filled with abalest seige launchers and shield power relay I's either.

They sat out there for years with the core systems maintained in a very steady state. That money doesn't evaporate cause you loose sov. NC never welped that cap fleet cause they never really engaged it past 020. They could theoretically mount at least one more jihad of reclamation sorta like bob did....or move on to greener pastures.

Yes, MM and RZR are egg shells filled with a creamy carebear center. That center just evaporated. The point is that with the right leadership (LAWL!) they have the money and the name recognition to attract what's needed to become relevant again. That being said,

and time will tell. People called bob dead in one way or another long ago...yet there's Raiden(.) on the forefront of this tribute free burn. The alliance names might of changed, but the killmails still say DICE, Finfleet, etc. Those old corps got rich and connected back in the day. That money and name has been able to carry them through the lean time to what might be a new dawn.

Now here's a question I'd like answered. With NC's now obvious cascade, goons stand at the gates of mordor. What other major region in eve hosted more US tz people the the last year of NC?

**Dwergi** · 2011-06-02

Trying to take Deklein would be dumb. There's no reason as Mittens is probably desperately spamming convos with every diplomat and CEO in the DRF going "Blue? Blue? BLUE?" right now.

That and the inevitable TZ war that would occur make it a Sisyphean task - much better to leave the remainders of the NC with some territory that they can cling onto while declaring victory, having stalled the Skynet invasion at the borders of Deklein. Russians have space, DC has space, everyone can declare victory - EVE at its best. To make this convincing, it'd be good to poke some meaningless border system in Deklein and let them "save" it, so it seems like you withdrew when encountered by their superior military might rather than just give up out of sheer boredom. It'd be good for their egos, you see.

**Barry Zuckerkorn** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by Kireiina

Stagnation. With the DRF block owning a significant power dominance and the most lucrative space in the game there's no real threat to them other than each other or eventual internal decay.

They "stagnated" in the drone regions and built up the force we see today.
The NC was in the same situation owning the most lucrative space and most assumed that after the destruction of IT that there was no real threat, but look where we are now. There will defiantly be another threat to the DRF. Because conflict is what drives EVE.

**Don Peyote** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by Barry Zuckerkorn

They "stagnated" in the drone regions and built up the force we see today.
The NC was in the same situation owning the most lucrative space and most assumed that after the destruction of IT that there was no real threat, but look where we are now. There will defiantly be another threat to the DRF. Because conflict is what drives EVE.

And war... War never changes

EDIT : You're the first KWyz

**KWyz** · 2011-06-02

Hah.Clearly then, this forum needs more schooling.

I believe that many of us here agree on the best outcome for this war: more war. Let's face it, seeing stuff blow up is fun. Especially in big battles.

For me, the main failure of the NC was that it chose not to go out with a bang. People were a lot more preoccupied with their own well-being, and this leads to a very boring show. There were more blue balls in this war(in regards to somewhat even fights) than at a Braveheart fan gathering.

Obviously it can be argued that such blueballing leads to the survival of the fittest corps in the big alliances. Think of IT and who survived from among them. But it's not necessarily the best show out there. Like someone kept calling out in the relevant discussion on EVE-o uncensored: the best way to get rid of supers is to destroy them.

So, whatever the future holds, i got no grudge against the people who displaced the North. I just hope that whatever everyone does, it'll be with a bigger bang than endless ganking. Not because ganking wouldn't win wars, but because real fights fuel more than forum smugness.

(of course, real fights also need smart commanders who know how to fight them and take advantage of their results, so lacking these makes any discussion moot)

**CCP Nozh** · 2011-06-02

Current FCON is not the same FCON from provi days. So they cannot go back to providence. I'm surprised -7- got reset because they held sov in CR and i assumed they are part of DC. They even have a system in Pure Blind.

**Habitual Line Stepper** · 2011-06-02

Originally Posted by Dwergi

Trying to take Deklein would be dumb. There's no reason as Mittens is probably desperately spamming convos with every diplomat and CEO in the DRF going "Blue? Blue? BLUE?" right now.

Hahah, someone from Merciless talking about desperately blue'ing everyone.

**Dwergi** · 2011-06-03

Originally Posted by Habitual Line Stepper

Hahah, someone from Merciless talking about desperately blue'ing everyone.

Blame Garst. Though burning the north is a big enough objective that we'll tolerate being blue to Raiden, PL and NCdot for a while. We're not blue to any of the DRF alliances, apart from temp blue while hitting big targets. Our blue list is longer than I'd like, but it's only temporary.

**HeliconOne** · 2011-06-03

Originally Posted by KWyz

For me, the main failure of the NC was that it chose not to go out with a bang. People were a lot more preoccupied with their own well-being, and this leads to a very boring show. There were more blue balls in this war(in regards to somewhat even fights) than at a Braveheart fan gathering.

What was the last alliance that actually went down in some glorious Custer's Last Stand battle? Failure cascades don't work like that.

**Gyncognito** · 2011-06-03

Yah, there's always that one battle that leaves one side glancing at the exits. It doesn't even have to be a sound defeat. Then two weeks later you just happen to be moving some shit to jita and OOPS...all of my assets are in low sec now? How did that happen. Then you're either:

a) that guy cheerleading from lowsec
b) Mr. Rally Hat guy telling everyone 'WE CAN DO EET!'
c) Bittervet who evac'd and dropped roles a full month ago.

2 weeks after that systems starts dropping sov out of own pure shame alone. It's a testement to the pure spiteful pride of Delve itself that IT was able to hold sov so long after their cascade. Anyone who's been around the block knows how this works and saw the signs internally last month. Notice the sharp decline in fleet participation. Bittervets were already rolling. Everyone else was waiting on a cyno jammer to cycle or some shit.

**Sansa Comfrey** · 2011-06-03

I think the DRF groups will leave Pure Blind and the rest of the west alone too. Kinda annoyed by that, I was really looking forward to NCdot and Evoke having their revenge tour against MH. But now that they have (or will have) the M-O Taisy gate for themselves, there's no real reason to move on to ec-.

**Ripline** · 2011-06-03

Originally Posted by Sansa Comfrey

I think the DRF groups will leave Pure Blind and the rest of the west alone too. Kinda annoyed by that, I was really looking forward to NCdot and Evoke having their revenge tour against MH. But now that they have (or will have) the M-O Taisy gate for themselves, there's no real reason to move on to ec-.

And there's the timezone coverage issue we already saw in Geminate before PL was hired. Goons & Co can leverage their US TZ presence for any real defense.

**Horus** · 2011-06-03

Originally Posted by Praesus Lecti

You'll see all the NC alliances lose a good number of their members but I expect nearly all of them will try to get into either Goons or Test/Gents/Bdeal so they can "remain NC". Fully expect to see Majesta and RAGE cascade into oblivion followed shortly by Stellar Polaris and Gypsy Band. Any NC B-F Team that haven't sworn fealty to Goons will probably find themselves facing TEST roaming gangs flooding their space.

I foresee IRC sliding over into Tenal from Cobalt Edge, White Noise will take most of Tribute with Solar Fleet and Red Alliance solid in Geminate and Raiden covering most of Vale.

i agree with him

also evoke-trimk999 will take deklein. (or evoke part of tribute together with white noise) with help of Pl raiden and who else need.

about branch probably some minor helper will get parts of. probably someone have interest on ex circle of two pocket near venal

irc where looking for tenal since max 2, so probably will take part off. even if i think that hardly they gonna hold that for much. as soon someone wanna it. they will lose it

**Gyncognito** · 2011-06-04

Crashing on the Venal couch

100% of Rzr's deployments over the last year have been to southern npc space. The last year of their history has been "Lets go to curse and rekindle that old flame.' Scroll back through the threads and you'll see quite a few 'lol wtf rzr in curse' threads. The problem was that the blue list rules all. They kept getting called back. I think they were struggling the most with what they realized was coming. The fact that they saw it coming might make it easier to accept or everyone might say 'that's the last straw.'

We should know pdq by the alliance numbers on dotlan.

Cannuck · 2011-06-05

Originally Posted by Gyncognito

The only wild I see here is that MM/Rzr have owned the north since north's were able to be owned. It's an identity thing. As long as those names exist there's going to be some aspiring skymarshal wanting to go on a holy crusade to take back the homeland. They need only wait for the momentum to die off.

If you're expecting IRC to hold tenal or even CE against anything short of an ibis swarm...you're mistaken. 100% of any usefulness they've managed in this campaign has been at knife point from PL and their DRF overlords. What ever entities take tribute will quickly find themselves with IRC as the MH of their new coalition, yet without any historical ties and being the friend of little more the convenience.

If the miracle of H-w doesn't rematerialized then I just don't see those entities giving up and going away. They'll be shadows of their former selves to be sure, but I think you'll see the Rzr/MM version of TRI MK (whatever) for awhile. They'll be a crew of bitter vets that'll harrass the crap outta the north until they quit for WoTs or coalesce into a NC(.) style invader force.

Honestly, when was the last time razor lived in ANY of the space it owned? MM at least lives in tribute. Tenal is a gd ghost town and has been for years. They should have rented the place out and at least then they'd have a speed bump to stop the IRC juggernaught...

Renter vs Renter. Two scrubs enter. One scrub leaves. THUNDERDOME!

u mad ?

**Don Peyote** · 2011-06-05

What an excellent post

Originally Posted by Gyncognito

100% of Rzr's deployments over the last year have been to southern npc space. The last year of their history has been "Lets go to curse and rekindle that old flame.' Scroll back through the threads and you'll see quite a few 'lol wtf rzr in curse' threads. The problem was that the blue list rules all. They kept getting called back. I think they were struggling the most with what they realized was coming. The fact that they saw it coming might make it easier to accept or everyone might say 'that's the last straw.'

We should know pdq by the alliance numbers on dotlan.

To be fair, Razor's deployments have hardly set the world afire ; their attack on Providence yielded little, I don't even know what was happening when they went to Curse. Razor have become the old man of the north. But hopefully yes, they might be re-invigorated by losing their home (See Star Wars : The Empire Strikes Back at the end where they're all like "FU Empire we'll get you!")

**Gyncognito** · 2011-06-05

I guess it all hinges on the number of force wielders they have coupled with the amount of ships they have able to make the Kessel Run. The odds seam bleak. However, I think most people's analogy of choice would have more to do with the loss of their sith lords and a second death star.

**Wildside** · 2011-06-05

I cant wait to make whole 0.0 in eve a wasteland of russians(that either hotdrop you with 200 supers or logoffski), renters(that got orders to safe up at first sign of neutrals) and bots.

**Gyncognito** · 2011-06-05

-1 for lack of pastey white guys, death metal, or prison tats.

Try this for the trifecta:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbtlPCbhVGw

Edit: I'm sorry, the Hitler thing was good.

**Hexman** · 2011-06-06

Originally Posted by KWyz

For me, the main failure of the NC was that it chose not to go out with a bang.

Pretty much this.

I must say I was very disappointed that after Br1ck, Rage and Majesta left Vale/Geminate about a month ago, the ammount of decent fights (those where you actually shoot at ships shooting back at you and the adrenaline gets pumping through your system) went down to almost zero. I think I caught one last fight in which I was flying my triage carrier (was doing guardians in all previous fights vs Br1ck), we beat MM and then I never saw them again in battle - with my limited schedule for playing, it became B-O-R-I-N-G.

I was expecting them to wake up when Tribute invasion begun. Even expected to see the goons swelling their fleets and have nice fights over systems, but they simply gave up. Very anti-climatic.

**Sansa Comfrey** · 2011-06-07

Originally Posted by Hexman

Pretty much this.

I must say I was very disappointed that after Br1ck, Rage and Majesta left Vale/Geminate about a month ago, the ammount of decent fights (those where you actually shoot at ships shooting back at you and the adrenaline gets pumping through your system) went down to almost zero. I think I caught one last fight in which I was flying my triage carrier (was doing guardians in all previous fights vs Br1ck), we beat MM and then I never saw them again in battle - with my limited schedule for playing, it became B-O-R-I-N-G.

I was expecting them to wake up when Tribute invasion begun. Even expected to see the goons swelling their fleets and have nice fights over systems, but they simply gave up. Very anti-climatic.

You can have good fights with an enemy, or you can wield a supercap superiority on them. You don't get both.

If you stopped getting good fights after a certain point, the blame is not with your enemy.

**Matos** · 2011-06-07

Originally Posted by Sansa Comfrey

You can have good fights with an enemy, or you can wield a supercap superiority on them. You don't get both.

If you stopped getting good fights after a certain point, the blame is not with your enemy.

You can't blame them for choosing a boring victory over an interesting defeat though.

**KWyz** · 2011-06-07

Well, a victory is a victory, there's no point in discussing that.

Like I said before, a lot of people, including myself, believe a lot of good things may come of this, as long as the blue list of the attackers stays smaller than the one of the people they just displaced.

**Hexman** · 2011-06-07

Originally Posted by Pripyat

People announced stagnation and mass unsubbing when Tech became the most valuable ressource and the NC where sitting on it.
Actually people predicted The End Of Eve when BoB owned everything from Fountain to Feyth too yet here we are a few years later.

Hasn't eve been dying for like 4 or 5 years now?

Originally Posted by Sansa Comfrey

You can have good fights with an enemy, or you can wield a supercap superiority on them. You don't get both.

If you stopped getting good fights after a certain point, the blame is not with your enemy.

Not placing blame on anyone, just saying this is what happened. I play this game to have fun not to hurf-durf about what others do, even if I troll them on the forums. I've gotten blobbed before and when the servers don't crash I've had fun whether I was on the winning or the losing side. The only times I've raged about it is when I blackscreen and can't play, that's when everybody acually loses.

**bigbritches** · 2011-06-27

edited for clarity

I had some gf between RAGE and DRF. Did the sub-cap thing and got to shoot at supers, too. Even in 020 when module cycle lag was over 10 minutes. At least we were fighting and we had reasonable expectations of victory. Whole damn campaign was at a standstill (from my point of view.)

Then PL came in and steamrolled with massive supercap superiority. Never saw the thundercats. After that, it was all, "We can't beat that. Thx for showing up. We'll get them next time."

Problem was, that was the word every time until there was no next time.

Other issue was the choice of Maelstroms for alphafleet under lag conditions. Mael and Abaddon get the same alpha. But abaddon has a better tank, while Mael had a better rate of fire. Under severe lag, dps doesn't count for shit. So our Maels were popping while DRF abaddons weren't.

Another big problem was the inability of NC FCs to come up with any strategy other than alphafleet blob. That doesn't work too well when the other guy brings a bigger/better blob.

**darkwing** · 2011-06-28