Caldari Championships, the First Day
Yesterday saw the first round of the Alliance Championships. Organized by the Caldari Gaming Commission, held in an undisclosed system. The matches proved to be exiting affairs with sometimes surprising results, stunning competitors, onlookers and gamblers alike.
There were five teams who scored a flawless victory against their opponents. The first of those was claimed by the United Confederation of Corporations against the Distant Star Alliance. The second alliance who scored a flawless victory was Band of Brothers, owing much to Blacklight in his Navy Raven. Blacklight was the first of many others in this round to prove that the Raven is still a mighty ship that should never be underestimated when under the hands of an experienced pilot. Another flawless victory was claimed by the Five who fought against Freelance Blood Alliance, Five tactics appeared to be simply: hit them hard and fast. Prime Orbital Systems showed that drones do provide a tactical advantage when they won their fight against the EVE Federation Alliance using these tenacious little fighters; without losing any of their main ships. The last flawless victory was earned by the Stain Empire who also used an abundance of missiles against The Core Collective, in this case a Raven and his friends ended up destroying an Apocalypse within seconds.
Aside of the streams of missiles another tactic we saw often in the first round was tanking. Most notable among the tankers was Jade Constantine in a Raven who held her ground against Force of Evil's Zealot for a long time. After using up all her cap recharges, she was no longer able to continue the tanking and went down fighting. Kunming from Kaos Empire showed us that a Deimos can take a fair beating and still remain flying to see his team beat Imperium Alliance. This battle saw Kozak of KAOS Empire in a Navy issued Megathron fighting the Navy Raven of EternalDark of Imperium Alliance. Kunming's Deimos aided Kozak and together they defeated the Raven. Kozak was also the only one to use the new armor repairing drones in this Championship.
Pilots across New Eden were surprised to hear the result of some of the fights, Ascendant Frontier won their match against the Pirate Coalition. Ascendant which started as a peaceful alliance has seen more combat then they might have wished for when G and IRON took an interest in their region. They cannot be considered a novice when it comes to fighting any longer, as proven in their first fight and victory of the Championship.
Mercenary Coalition who was the second favorite with the bookies lost their match against Aegis Militia in a long and intense battle. If you hear people talk of the Tempest that just wouldn’t go down they refer to this match. Kristie from Aegis Militia piloted a Tempest and in the end of this match, when the cruiser and frigate were long gone, she had a long battle against the Mercenary Coalition’s Megathron flown by EyeShadow. The Tempest was fitted with hardeners and several cap draining modules to steal the energy required to maintain her tank just that bit longer than the Megathron’s. It was a very close fight and you can find the free holoreels of this match here.
Another match that was eagerly awaited by the public was between G Alliance and the Imperial Republic of the North. These two alliances are close friends of each other and fight along side against Ascendant Frontier and recently Band of Brothers. The match was a close call but Imperial Republic of the North won in the end and Buddrow of IRON confided in me that they even offered to return G’s modules that survived the fight. G showed their good will and assured IRON they could safely keep their modules.
Chribba wins the admiration of all when he entered the arena alone in his Apocalypse. He knew he wouldn’t last against three opponents, but he lasted longer than some of other teams which consisted of three pilots. Sadly a great number of teams had to forfeit their fight because they were engaged otherwise or could not assemble a team of fighters on such short notice. Ekliptika did not compete because of an unforeseen loss of their battleship earlier that day. Forsaken Empire was late and missed their fight.
A detailed list of alliances that advanced to the second round can be found here.
We wish them all good luck on the battlefield.
