Round 15

Dates and Times

Signups opened on Wednesday 19th October 2005 at 21:00 GMT

Ticks started on Friday 28th October 2005 at 21:00 GMT

Ticks ended on Friday 23rd December 2005 at 21:00 GMT

Round Summary

Following 1up's huge margin of victory in the previous round Round 15 saw eXilition return to the playing field in order to take them on again. The other major alliances for this round were Angels, who had recruited a large number of ex-Ministry players, NewDawn and, at least at first, Insomnia. eXi also NAPed Subh, now playing as a separate alliance, in preparation for the round. Prior to the round such notables as NoS disbanded. As the round kicked off the spotlight was firmly on 1up and eX, the only alliances to have won in the last four rounds and they did not disappoint. War broke out almost instantly between the two and with large numbers of hostile fleets focused on each other from virtually straight out of protection both saw their initial growth stunted.

Two weeks of intense war saw both alliances battered down but eXi emerged stronger and seemed to have the upper hand over 1up. With eXi rising to the top of the rankings Angels understood that if they were to have any chance of winning the round they would have to deal with them. Joining forces with 1up they combined to hit eX hard and take huge numbers of roids off them, dropping them down to an equivalent roid-size to 1up and allowing Angels to move pass them to take the overall #1 rank. After a few days of this eX changed their targeting and switched full force onto Angels, reclaiming the top spot for themselves. Meanwhile ND had climbed up to third, and as Angels lost their roids took the roid lead for themselves, and 1up remained in 4th, lacking roids but able to gain some on the nights eX did not target them.

While 1up had gained most of their roids via attacking eX, ND had gained a good chunk of theirs off Angels, the fattest alliance for much of the first 3 weeks of the round. Four days of consecutive roid losses for Angels, coupled with the difficulty of making an impact on eX and hoping to force ND off targeting them, led to Angels hitting ND, and regaining their roid lead. This situation however did not last for long. Angels and 1up turned back to eXilition and continued to target them. Of course this enabled ND to move up to #1, by virtue of staying out of this devastating conflict. eX, picking up more allies in VGN, took the fight to 1up, concentrating on beating them down and keeping them out of contention.

Shortly before this Insomnia had declared war on LCH in response to increasing hostilities between the two. This war did not last long however, with the sides pulling back after the first night. Unfortunately for Insomnia following on from this LCH were able to gain more roids and rise past them in the rankings. Hurt by this and unable to recover Insomnia dropped further down. On top of this they were suffering from problems internally with HC and officer activity an issue. With 3 weeks to go in the round Insomnia disbanded with their members scattering through the universe.

In the meantime 1up had been hammered down out of contention and eXi were by now targeting Angels and surging ahead of them in the rankings. Although most of the universe could see that once eXi had finished off Angels' chances of winning the round they would turn on ND, Angels and ND were unable, or perhaps more accurately unwilling, to work together. With a little over two weeks left in the round ND were some 30 million score ahead of eXilition and eX were still finishing off Angels, along with fighting off incoming from 1up. The question on everyone's mind was would eX have time to pass out ND? After a concerted attempt to remove Angels from contention had moved eX sufficiently clear in second they were able to turn their attention towards ND. In this they were aided by LCH, who preferred to see their old r13 allies eX win the round than ND.

eX/VGN/Subh and LCH all turned their attention towards ND. Angels and 1up continued to target eX but they had lost their early round focus and determination by this late stage. While both eX and ND dropped massive numbers of roids eX were able to outgrow ND scorewise. The nature of the stats this round was vital here. Huge Xandathrii frigate fleets were able to roid almost any other Xan planet, due to the Vsharrak firing after the Tzen. eX were able to gain XP by landing on many of ND's biggest planets, who had grown roid-fat through the round. Often these attacks, even if they lost some value for the attackers, would gain score and annihilate ND's Vsh fleets. On top of this ND simply lacked the military capability to deal with eXi. They crashed large amounts of fleet on eX planets and in the space of a week eX had climbed past ND and now held more roids than them.

Utterly demoralised and by now going inactive ND had little chance left of winning the round. eXi streaked ahead in the final days of the round, eventually winning by over 50 million. The #1 planet of the round was BlackG, of LCH, who together with the #2 planet Cat, also of LCH, had been pNAPed to eXi throughout the round. The winning galaxy of the round was 17.9, whom all the high ranking alliances finished with some representation in.

What a neat artcile. I had no inkling.

See Also

• Ship Stats
• R15 EORC
• Alliances in R15