Let me start off by saying what an amazing night last night! Best fight had in a long time in EVE with excellent attendance! TIDI obviously kicked in but CCP came through in the end and the system held just fine.
Let me continue by explaining my relationship with I Want Isk;
Organising #EVE_NT is something I do because I enjoy the community aspect of EVE and wanted to create an event for like minded people to catch up and share good times. Partly to attract higher attendance and to please guests, I spend a lot of time and effort into creating content and gifts for the event. This is achieved by negotiating deals with sponsors both in-game and in real life.
I Want Isk helped the first #EVE_NT as a sponsor and wanted to be a bigger part of the next one. The total amount offered was 500 billion isk to be distributed via raffles and tournament prizes. Please note that specific details on how this is split is not available as the entire sum has not been received and these details will not be available until then.
After EVEbet blew up a Supercarrier a few months back I suggested to the I Want Isk owner, Gonz, it would be a cool idea to blow up a Titan to promote the event and their website, using part of the sponsorship isk, rather than additional cost. We agreed 100 billion isk from the budget would be used to do this in-game promotional event.
After posting the original thread and talking to people in-game and on social media it became clear pretty quickly that (of course) large numbers of pilots would turn up. The biggest single entity would be RvB led by infamous Mangala Solaris and a organised defence fleet would be required. Shadow Cartel was also scheduled to come along and I asked W0Wbagger if he would take control of the defence fleet, as I certainly have no experience in these massive fights.
Thanks to W0Wbagger, Paquito and Hunlight we managed to get a T3 fleet organised, in which I would later fly myself. At great personal expense I fitted the Titan and Titan-pilot, bought 4 carriers and 80 ewar frigates (for dead pilots to return in) to make the event last as long as possible and get maximum exposure for #EVE_NT and I Want Isk.
Shadow, Snuff, Dead Terrorist, Immediate Destruction and Bastards all committed personal assets to this fight, expecting to lose everything to the massive NAVPOC fleet. I want to take this opportunity to thank all those pilots involved willing to lose several hundreds of billions of isk in assets to make this event possible.
A fight ensued, a big-ass fight! More and more pilots filled local and outnumbered us 6 to 1. We kept at it and Snuff and Shadow scrambled to get lost pilots back into the fight we were sure to lose. RvB fought an amazing fight and nearly tipped the balance in their favour. Hunlight our FC called targets like a machine, coolheaded and steadfast, W0Wbagger kept an eagle eye on our losses and judged if we were able to continue or had to bail. Our bail out point was set at 20 guardians left (from an initial 40) and at one point the fleet dropped to 22 left. By using wormholes and cynos some dead pilots managed to reship and come back, no spare ships were pre arranged. It was close but in the end, to all our surprise, we tumbled over the breaking point and seemed to be holding the field!
The RvB carriers left on field were let go and local was invited back to come finish off the Titan (now refit to civilian fittings). As promised the Titan died, with in the end 800 people on the killmail. Significantly more than the 200 man defence fleet.
What an awesome night! Or so I thought. Knackered after a whole day of hardcore EVE I got a poke from I Want Isk owner Gonz, asking if I wanted to defend myself in front of their board and e24 reporter Bobmon about the ‘failed’ event.
‘Failed’ event?!? What are you talking about? Iron Bank (BL) led the charge of me ‘rigging’ the event and the defence fleet ‘winning’ the event and shooting the Titan.
Unlike my usual self, I am lost for words. Let me just be clear that no agreements had been made with I Want Isk about how this event was to go down, I simply got 100 bil to make it happen. The agreed prize was 20 billion isk for the killmail. That’s it, that’s all there is too it.
Just because the defence fleet won, the opinion of some is that this is unfair. I disagree but am tired of arguing the point. The defence fleet won, but only just, and had fully expected not to, but put their isk on the line regardless. This said, my suggestion to I Want Isk would be to pay the 20 bil to the incredibly brave (and lucky) Drake pilot who got top damage, I will personally pay 20 bil to the SC pilot who got the final blow.
I had a great night and again want to thank everyone for their involvement and attendance.
If I Want Isk would have paid for the defence fleet I agree the prize should not go to one of it’s pilots. But they didn’t. At great personal cost for each pilot involved came to fight and that’s that. But opinions differ.
For anyone organising future events like this I recommend you have rules and regulations clearly stated before the event. I will endeavour to make things clearer for future events. I will note however, that the overwhelming feedback I have received, from all sides, is wildly positive, with many getting their first taste of a huge fleet fight and first titan killmail (made accessibly by the awesome NPSI guys of RVB ganked and spectre).
I want to thank I Want Isk for putting up the initial funds to allow for this ingame event to happen and whatever decision is taken on their end regarding the prize money or future event sponsorship, I hope to keep a working relationship with them.
Kind regards,
Nashh Kadavr
CEO Bastard Alliance
Organiser of #EVE_NT
