P I R A T is a Russian High Sec Mercenary Alliance mainly active in Amarr space particularly in and close to the Amarr solar system proper. Since late 2013 they have destroyed at least 318 Planetary Customs Offices (POCOs) and planted one of their own in place of many of the destroyed ones. Most of their POCOs were then transferred to 1 man alt corporations in order to keep their revenue source out of harm’s way.
RvB also has a sizable POCO empire, mainly taken through conflict, but occasionally RvB is either given POCOs or has purchased them from their previous owners. This was the case in the Khopa system, where previously RvB had acquired 11 POCOs through the non-violent method. P I R A T, presumably wanting to add to their total, declared war on Blue Republic on February 25th in order to kill the POCOs in Khopa.
Over the next week P I R A T put the Khopa POCOs into reinforced mode on 3 different occasions. All three time RvBers made the trek to Amarr space to rep the POCOs as they came out of reinforced mode. Once RvB fleets arrived in and around Khopa, P I R A T forces would dock up and let the repping occur, although on one occasion they did briefly harass the repping fleet with long range Assault Frigates.
After 3 space jaunts to rep POCOs, only to be denied any actual fights, RvB decided to offer to sell the POCOs to P I R A T in order to get something of value for them. P I R A T refused the reasonable offer that was extended by RvB, so just destroyed the POCOs themselves, thinking this would be the end of the whole matter.
Instead P I R A T continued the war and moved into RvB space in the Onivura Constellation, 3 jumps from Jita. They were successful in killing stragglers and pods, especially in Jita. Each time RvB would come at them in force they would simply dock up.
Around this time a RvB Director, Yngvarr Khshayarsha, decided to come up with a more coherent plan to deal with P I R A T. He enlisted the help of The Marmite Collective, notorious trade hub campers, and frequent sparring partner of RvB, along with Ubiquitous Hurt (UHurt) a PvP corp known for streaming its exploits, based in the Amarr solar system. Both signed up for the war with the idea that Marmite would camp the campers, and UHurt would PvP as well as POCO bash and be given the good planets along the way with the timers set to come out in the US TZ, where P I R A T is seemingly less effective. In this way the ability of P I R A T to recapture their income stream would be made as difficult as possible.
Scouts were sent out and located at least 245 P I R A T POCOs close to the Amarr solar system. Then the steam roller went into action. Each day around 02:30 GMT US TZ fleets were raised to put 20-25 POCOs into reinforced mode, with most of the timers coming out 1.5 days later. These fleets were comprised of RvB members from both sides as well at UHurt members.
One and a half days later the EU RvB/Marmite/UHurt fleets would administer the coup de’ grace on the POCOs exiting reinforced mode. This went on for almost two weeks and when the shooting finally stopped 189 P I R A T POCOs were destroyed, worth almost 25bn ISK.
In recognition of their help to the operation Marmite and UHurt were given first crack at all the locations to drop custom offices of their own. Other locations were given out to random RvBer’s or left open for the general public to take.
While most agree that structure grinding isn’t a highlight of the EVE Online experience, the results of the efforts of the 3 organizations, RvB, Marmite, and UHurt showed what can be accomplished through co-operation and the sharing of intelligence. Everyone shared comms together and generally a good time was had by all. Similar operations will be planned in the future against P I R A T should they make large scale attempts to expand their POCO empire.
