Eve Online is a famously tedious game set in a science fiction universe called New Eden. Detractors — and even some of those who love it — deride the game as "spreadsheets in space" and "the most thrilling boring game in the universe." But Eve is also home to rich and amazing stories. It's the stuff of great space operas. It's the stuff of history.
The following is an excerpt from the new book by journalist and author Andrew Groen, titled Empires of Eve: A History of the Great Wars of Eve Online. It is the true history of how political ideas first began to take hold in Eve, how that led to the creation of its first governments and political icons and how those governments eventually collapsed into a state of total war from 2007-2009.
This story takes place chronologically near the middle of the book during the climactic last stand of the Russians of Eve Online.
But it was also about more than just stubbornness. Many members of the Coalition of the South were not exactly gracious in victory. Some members of their coalition could be found spouting nationalist, even racist epithets and hate speech about the Russians.
"Russian dogs."
"They're selling ISK to feed their families."
"Their ships were bought with Russian brides."
The intent was to disparage the Russian players and make them lose all joy for the game until they quit. It had the opposite effect. It gave the Russian players a rallying cry and a reason to fight. Victory in Eve is very often accomplished when one side simply gives up and moves on or falls apart from internal strife. In this case, the opposite was happening, and the Russian players weren't going to be booted out of nullsec until they lost every ship they had.
Red Invasion
Red Alliance waged a guerilla war against the new lords of the land. Under the leadership of fleet commanders Studik, Death, and Mactep, small groups of 20-30 Red Alliance pilots would venture out into enemy territory to hunt.
Bizarrely, they were ignored for days, even weeks as they stalked and destroyed their enemies. The Coalition of the South had been banging the propaganda drum, announcing the demise of Red Alliance, and this led most people to believe that any Red Alliance members they saw were stragglers and nothing to be feared. They were wrong.
It was time to go on the offensive.
These Red Alliance raiding gangs quickly racked up a kill tally of over 500 ships on their hunts, and only lost a tenth as many in return. But they weren't going to defeat a coalition of thousands with hit-and-run tactics. They needed to win battles. They'd put the hurt on their enemies, and been a nuisance, but it was time to go on the offensive.
Red Alliance selected one system as the key to its traditional home region of Insmother: C-J6MT. It was centrally located in Insmother, contained valuable space stations, and was the gateway to eight other star systems. On May 24, 2006, Red Alliance attacked and took C-J6MT away from the Coalition. It quickly built defenses, preparing to defend the system at any cost. The Coalition could never have stopped the surprise attack, but it certainly planned to take the system back.
The War for Insmother
On May 25, those 70 tired Russian pilots were grouped up around their defensive starbase, waiting for the battle they knew was coming.
A fleet of over 400 Coalition of the South ships warped into the system and began organizing for battle. For the Coalition of the South this was a chance to snuff out a pest. It defeated Red Alliance weeks ago and believed vanquishing them here was key to stopping future attacks. They wanted to swoop in and smother the flame of Red Alliance.
When the Coalition fleet arrived they were full of bluster. Many of them were still spouting the same old Russian epithets in the local chat channel. Every major battle had gone their way, and they believed victory was a foregone conclusion.
The Coalition of the South fleet was massive but weakly organized. It showed up with hundreds of ships of all makes and models with very little in the way of true strategy. The Russians, on the other hand, were extremely well organized and knew exactly what they planned to do. After months of guerrilla warfare they were a finely tuned fighting force. Every pilot in Red Alliance was outfitted with the exact same ship — called a Tempest — with the exact same components, the intent being that every pilot would be on the same page as every other pilot at all times. They flew in packs of 10.
The Coalition of the South dreadnoughts unpacked their heavy artillery and unloaded on the defensive starbase while Red Alliance pilots charged the enemy lines. In their small packs they swarmed the Coalition dreadnoughts like a pack of bees: difficult to hit, and packing a punch. The damage they were doing to the dreadnoughts forced the rest of the Coalition to try to defend them. Rather than destroying Red Alliance's defensive starbase, the Coalition was now on their back foot just trying to keep their own valuable ships from being destroyed.
While the Red Alliance Tempest formations swarmed the enemy dreadnoughts, the defensive starbase was annihilating the Coalition's smaller battleships. One by one they were popping like fireworks as the starbase's kill tally notched ever higher.
The packs of Red Alliance Tempests weaved through the enemy fleet almost with impunity, with each group of 10 ships coordinating attacks on one specific enemy. The damage that the seven groups of battleships were inflicting began to rise, higher and higher. The Coalition fleet was simply outmatched. Not in numbers or in firepower, but in strategy.
When the smoke cleared, the Coalition found itself down hundreds of ships, and the Red Alliance defensive base was still standing and fully repaired. Red Alliance decided to give the starbase a name in honor of its stunning performance in the battle: "The Meatgrinder."
One day later, the Coalition returned, but was again turned back. Red Alliance took bigger losses this time, but again made the Coalition hurt much more badly than they did. In an important twist, Red Alliance managed to take down the flagship dreadnought of the Coalition of the South fleet commander, who was named "Chowdown." With its commander taken off the battlefield its lines of communication were disrupted — a symbolic blow that knocked the wind out of the Coalition's sails and embarrassed its leader.
When the smoke cleared, the Coalition found itself down hundreds of ships.
The next day — the third of the siege — the Coalition pilots arrived in low spirits. At this point, what hope could they have had in removing the Russian fleet if they'd already failed twice? But Coalition commanders hoped they could win by grinding down the Russians. Even if it lost these battles, the Coalition had four regions full of hundreds of miners and workers to replace its ships. Red Alliance didn't have that luxury. Every ship was priceless.
"And so again we fought," said one of the Coalition's fleet commanders, Lallante. "We brought the full weight of [four] alliances to bear on this one system where they were holed up. But they kept staying up all night to defend, and coming up with brilliant strategies to kill our dreadnoughts."
Predictably, the third day was a disaster for the Coalition of the South. Red Alliance destroyed four more Coalition dreadnoughts, and once again pushed back its enemies.
Morale had hit rock bottom in the Coalition of the South, but Red Alliance hadn't beaten it yet; it had merely stood its ground. The Reds were sturdy enough to hold against a foe trying to push them out, but they were a long way from taking back the hundreds of systems lost in the initial assault.
Death
In the following days there were no big engagements, but the Coalition still maintained a presence inside C-J6MT. At all times it outnumbered Red Alliance two to one inside Red Alliance's own system. The Russians were patient. The Coalition was blockading Red Alliance in the system, but it was getting tired. Day after day, Coalition forces inside C-J6MT weakened until finally its numbers were equal to Red Alliance.
The Russians saw their advantage. They attacked and wiped out the Coalition blockade, removing any dispute as to the true owners of C-J6MT. After months of fighting and a weeks-long siege, Red Alliance had forced a stalemate and stopped the retreat.
C-J6MT had been conquered by an alliance with more grit and determination than has been seen before or after. But to take the rest of Insmother — and regain the Southeast — Red Alliance would need allies.
Fortunately for it, within days it would find the most powerful ally it could possibly imagine.
This is only the beginning
The conflict between Russians and the Coalition of the South is just one story in the vast interstellar drama that is Eve Online. Nearly 13 years after the game's release, the Eve community continues to be one of the most dynamic and fascinating cultures in gaming. Just last week another, massive war broke out. Sources tell Polygon that it's being funded almost entirely by a third-party, online casino and Groen himself says it could upset the balance of power in the game for years to come.
But in order to understand the future of Eve Online we must understand its history. The Siege of C-J6MT is just a small part of that history, plucked out of context from the much grander story of the game's early years. Studik, Death and Mactep are all recurring characters, and to know them you must go back to their origin at the dawn of the game in 2003.
For more about Empires of Eve: A History of the Great Wars of Eve Online, head to the official site.
To hear more stories from journalist and author Andrew Groen, check out Polygon's Backstory podcast where he talks about the birth of Eve's first titan-class starship.
