Weeks of intense fighting, grinding, and pushing by the Amarr Militia culminated today in a full-on offensive of the system of Saikamon in The Bleak Lands, and ended in the capture of that system for the Amarr Empire. This ends a historic run by the Minmatar of 50 days of full warzone control, a feat not likely to be matched by another faction in the near future.
The Amarr Militia held maximum numbers and dominated the system all day, encountering various levels of resistance. After 12 hours of solid plexing the system was reclaimed just after 00:00 Eve time.
EN24 reached out to several prominent members of both the Amarr and Minmatar militias for comment on the fall of the system, plans for the future, and their impressions of the lengthy Matari stay at the top of the factional warfare hill. These Militia members were all involved in the battle of Saikamon to some extent, and are all active factional warfare soldiers.
EN24 has truncated the following statements where appropriate.
Amarr:
EN24 asked:
Is this the beginning of a new day for the Amarr?
What makes this push different than the others?
Is Saikamon significant to future operations?
How do you plan to keep the ball rolling?
edeity, CEO and Founder of Holy Amarrian Battlemonk [AMONK], member of Factional Warfare since 2012, and media producer had this to say:
Though you are of low born similar to myself, we may always look upon the true faith of Amarr as the guiding light in these times of uncertainty.
I deign to answer your questions though you are not in service to this the true faith because it may be of merit to those whose faith waivers to know of our actions and what they may foretell. A reckoning for both those who openly challenge the might of all that is holy and also those who with guile in their hearts show pretense in service but secretly plot the destruction of the heart of our faith that has never failed us, a heart that beats red with the blood of purity and sacrifice.
Is this the beginning?
It is a sign, a symbol of a fresh start of the continued great work that has been underway since before our spiritual ancestors took to the stars, leaving Amarr Prime to collect service in blood and labour. It is the opening of a great harvest, a reclaiming as some would say of the Matari and all who do not hold deepest within their souls the darkest burning embers of progress to unification of all humanity under the one god.What is different?
We have been cleansed of unbelievers and now forged anew our forces are uniting the scatters drops into one unstoppable force. Cleansing with holy fire we cannot abide the abomination of desecration and wanton disrespect of the holy places, first and foremost the spiritual birth place of the great savant, most holy Kurniainen. We come for the defilers, the heretics, the slaves that do not turn to our faith. We come for their people. Though many will be made slaves again, their pilots of pure capsuleer blood we task to a higher purpose. Your sacrifices will be cherished.Significance
A beachhead for our collectors and sanguinary has now been established. You shall see increased activity of their holy works. As more flock to the faith of their birth and the faith of their conviction, our numbers shall swell. More shall be given to the god, more shall drink of and bathe in the red sacrifices to yet be made. We cherish the task, the work above all. More systems shall fall. Our agents both overt and covert prepare the ground work. Rise from your hiding brothers and systems. Now is the time to pledge openly your loyalties.The Plan
It is eternal, and undying. We serve. We collect. We give. More beach heads will be established, then critical systems, such as Arzad and Oyonata shall be taken. Then the holy places. We shall then have our full strength, and be ready for the unveiling of the final stages of a great reaping. Our enemies, their friends and those of idle hands whether spiritual or martial shall fall. Once again these lands shall be under the rule of the true god behind the throne. The Order of Tetrimon will again take precedence over the politics of appeasement of the Theology Council. Pray for deliverance for those you hold dear, for no mercy shall be spared for any not of the full unrepentant faith of our ancestors.All shall be conquered. A harvest has commenced.
Quinlin Harpy, CEO of Maidens of the Chalice [MOTCC] had this to say:
This is personally the first time I’ve really been involved in Amarr FW (I’ve primarily done Caldari/Minmatar in my time) and my entire basis for joining Amarr is to essentially get it back on its feet again and we’re all working together to try unite the militia into one big group with the same objectives rather than 30 different groups doing their own thing.
From what I’ve seen in FW this hasn’t been too different to most other pushes, my alliance alongside CRIME.NET (Really cool guys actually) first pushed Kamela about a week into my alliances creation and managed to get it vulnerable however we couldn’t get the numbers. However with Saikamon, we managed to band together as a militia and had people from all different backgrounds being active, plexing, fighting and working as a team.
The capture of Saikamon quite important because it is one of the active entry systems into the warzone and is relatively close to the trade hub in the area – Amarr. This makes the logistics of bringing in ships and supplies a lot easier for us as we can now dock in the station rather than relying on citadels which we have been. It gives us a strong foothold in the warzone with room to expand.
Currently my emphasis is on recruiting, recruiting and more recruiting. The main problem Amarr Miltia has currently is lack of numbers/lack of people working together which we plan to solve. The night we took Saikamon was really strange as we actually had around 25 guys active from early EUTZ all the way up to early USTZ, which is where we usually fall behind, for example in Kamela we would get the contestation level up to around 90% and then come USTZ have no one there to keep it that way and it would fall right back down to 65% again. We’ve got open communications between all the active leaders and veterans in the Amarr miltia and we’re working together towards each system we deem nesessary to take, having miltia veterans such as Dame Death and Edeity is really helpful for us because they’re super active and always offer really good advice on strategic targets etc. due to their experience in the warzone, most of all they’re really cool dudes. So to keep the ball rolling our plan is communication, recruitment, activity pretty much.
HOLY HAV0X, a new player who has recently adopted the Factional Warfare lifestyle, had this to say.
The fight started for me, because I noticed that Saikamon was the 2nd highest contested system in the war effort. I believe it started a few days ago at around 38%, so I just flew here. I met the locals, one being a crazy russian whos also been a large part of REVOLUTION., Koizumi Taira. Our conversation went something like this.
Me: Hey this seems like a nice system with a high level, that’s ajacent to high, want to take it and start a revolution?
Koizumi Taira : Yes.
Me: ok brb
From this we power lifted the system. After that first day I think we raised it something like 40%, with each day more and more hero’s and fc’s kept piling into the effort, till it broke. Now I will say that we did employ a strategy of hitting multiple systems at once, in order to shift the front line away from the pirate infested areas. Saikamon was more of a moral victory, just to see if we could plant a flag on the map and hold it.
My goal is to reshape the warzone so that both sides are having fun and making decent isk/LP! I also might set up a new freeport market on the front lines, but we’ll see what the future brings.
Adiirus Tsuruomo, a veteran who has recently joined 24th Imperial Crusade, shared his thoughts:
With the vacancy of a large unifying force left by Dirt N’ Glitter among others, the capture of Saikamon provides the opportunity for the numerous small corporations and alliances to coalesce around. That said Amarr Faction Warfare has a long history of in-fighting amongst its own members. With the changes with the Citadel expansion especially the relatively inexpensive engineering complexes that at this point can be erected inside hostile territory, there will need to be a new style of system control for any successful campaign to reach a conclusion. The obvious solution though clearly not any easy one is a complete purge of any non-blue player owned structures in controlled Faction Warfare space. Making enemies not friend will create additional challenges if the warzone continues to operate without a clear leader. The path forward is not clear for Amarr at this point, but there is hope in the form of possible future leaders coming forward. Dalamarr Shimaya and Quinlin Harpy, for example, both showed incredible skill as fleet commanders during the final siege to take Saikamon.
Is this the beginning of a new Day for the Amarr?
Possibly, however it is dependent on the various groups of Amarrians to coalesce around a common set of goals. If they do not, this will just be a continuation of the saga created by the departure of past groups.What makes this push different than the others?
The push to take Saikamon went relatively well considering the lack of any effort to communicate that it was the system to take. After pushing the system into 70% contested and keeping it there, with some flux during the Australian and Russian time zones, it drew enough attention for both Russian and European groups to not only hold contention but draw it to vulnerability. Amarr was successful this time, continued success requires real leadership.Is Saikamon significant to future operations?
Other than the obvious tactical advantages of having a dockable location in low-sec, not much. Its importance is likely to be short lived as other systems provide better staging locations both by way of hub access to Amarr or in jump range, Hula and Arzad come to mind.
Minmatar:
EN24 Asked:
Is this the end of an Era for the Minmatar? Is that a good or bad thing? Why?
Is there anything that makes this push by the amarrs special? Can they keep the ball rolling?
Is Saikamon significant to future operations?
You have held the warzone longer than any faction ever has or probably ever will, what are your impressions of your time at the top of the hill?
Verlyn, member is Minmatar Secret Service [ROMSS] and longtime Matari warrior had this to say:
Well, I may get fried for this but I actually welcome the Amarr getting their homes back, as long as they stay there (which no doubt they wont…).
But it’s like last time where they pushed us all the way to Resbroko and we pushed them back all the way to where we are now.
That said, the Amarr do seem to beat a lot of chests when they start rolling in, but do suffer from that typical lack of endurance and willpower we thrive so well at, as they are quite the spoiled bunch. I have confidence they’ll just fall short on their advance once again.
Now as to your question of what it was like being at the top of the hill?
I would say it was pretty boring, as norm engagements just became clusterfuck escalations inside one system, against only one Amarr corp full of risk-averse Russians, ie Crime.Net, ie Kamela, and pirate blobs, for almost 2 months … boring and uninteresting gameplay.
I would not participate in conquering the entire warzone again, as it kills its own content.
Jebi Vjetar, longtime Matari FC, former CEO of Kill ’em All, Let Bob Sort ’em Out, and the producer of the excellent Eve-Log twitch stream had these thoughts to share:
i’ll tell u truth komred
we let them have it
we also allowed their capital ihub bashing “fleet” to live. i personally was sitting on 2 titans and 50 dreads and called it
it’s time for Minmatar to hit tier 1 so that we can all sell our LP
1 this is an end of an era for the Minmatar, strengthened by the fact that the leadership is afk. following winning the warzone twice and genociding the amars, people are abandoning ship. Det Resprox is literally killing Ushra’Khan. feel free to bold this on your website. he can eat shit. if i was normal i would be killing him over and over again every time he logs in on his dumb alts. instead of having a 200 man ragnarok blob, he is single handedly ensuring the Minmatar people have 2 firetails blob
2 edeity makes it “special” by shitposting on reddit/youtube. the dude unironically refers to his fleetmates/corpmates as minions. those dudes have no chance of doing anything besides being tools of the Minmatar people. if they rise above their stations, then the eye of sauron is looking. on top of this, i have roughly 200m 24th LP which is there to kill their markets at will for extended periods of time. u r all welcome for dirt cheap slicers and nomens. the ball is kept rolling by the Minmatar peoples pushing for tier 1. without the “old guard”, i doubt Det can fc a fleet capable of defending Auga or Huola
3 saikamon is a shitty backwater meaningless system where nothing happens. dudes sporadically go there and “gatecamp” the hisec. when the situation was reversed, the Minmatar people did Arnstur and those places first. literally mirrored across the warzone relative to Rens/Amarr trade hubs.
4 it was stupidly easy following the genociding the amars. i would have prefered if someone actually fought. knowing that mira davorsha led the last stand of the amars (where they attempted to flip Auga) sullys the memories of actual good fights. maybe sometimes in the future we will get another Burn Huola. the Minmatar are still in full control of the warzone, and as the jaded salt pendulum swings the people will probably delete their accounts. During this time of 18 months where the amars was eating shit, we were all making 1b+ isk per hour per account. The amars dont have the FCs, members, isk, connections, logistics or assets to actually fight. they can only split push and are welcome to do so. they need to get their shit together before we can fight on equalish terms
Jerel Andomer, longtime Matari Terrorist and member of Matari Brotherhood shared his thoughts:
The Minmatar Era began when our people first rebelled against their Amarr overlords and will end when the last free Minmatar takes their dying breath. This conflict most think of as the Amarr/Minmatar War is just a border skirmish at most. Our dominance of the war zone was only a symbolic victory and their retaking of Saikoman even more so. It means nothing in the grander scheme. We will continue to fight both in the lawless spaces and the developed systems. Our battles will be fought as much with words and deeds as blood and bullets. And we will not stop until all Minmatar are again free.
Ustag, longtime member of Italian Corporation Global Isk Network who has seen both captures of the warzone had this to add:
As a former Fleet Commander of Global Isk Network, and on behalf of all my Italian komreds which fly everyday to kick the Amarr’s ass out of the Warzone,
I assure that our efforts in fighting the Amarrs are still at their best.They are too confident after getting just one star system, and now they are yet heavily involved in defending it. We are hitting them and we will hammer them here in the Warzone as well as in Providence, where they hide under the CVA’s protection.
Let them come, we need fresh slaver meat for Lorenso’s famous ragu!
Sara Jane-Smith, member of The Minmatar Secret Service had these thoughts to add:
If you ask me, Saikamon was the Amarr pulling at straws after being denied Kamela, Eytjengard, and Arzad, where they attempted to bounce back and failed repeatedly. Saikamon is close enough to Amarr and far enough from Heimatar and Metropolis, that they decided they could settle for ANYthing.
I wouldn’t say this is a new age for minmatar, or the end of an old, Saikamon will be retaken, the war will continue, most likely in a more appropriate fashion for Amarr, like in Arzad. But nothing’s going to be handed to them.
As an Eve player, and as a blogger of the game, I am really hoping to see the Amarr come back to fight the Minmatar in a major way. Conflict is good, and despite issues with structures pertaining to factional warfare these pilots are doing what they can to enjoy the game and help others to enjoy it too. It is obvious from this article that the Amarr are itching to take back their warzone and just need the pilots to do it, and that the Minmatar are more than willing to let them have a go at it. There are good and easily accessible fights waiting to be had in the tinderbox that is factional warfare.
I have played Eve online since 2014, and while I have done everything from being a Lowsec pirate, to a factional warfare hero, to a Nullsec F1 monkey, I am mostly a solo player trying to make connections though combat and emergent gameplay. I am currently trying to figure out how to live in wormhole space. If you have a story to tell, I want to help you tell it! I write from time to time in my personal blog Honorbro if you would like to read more. – Ishtar Komarovo
