The Battle of B-R5RB or the Bloodbath of B-R5RB () was a massive-scale virtual battle fought in the MMORPG space game Eve Online in January 2014 (YC 116 in-game), possibly the largest player-versus-player battle in gaming history at the time. The 21-hour-long conflict pitted the Clusterfuck Coalition and Russian alliances (CFC/Rus) against the N3 Coalition and Pandemic Legion alliance (N3/PL), and involved over 7,548 player characters with a maximum of 2,670 players in the B-R5RB system at one time. The in-game cost of the losses totaled over 11 trillion Interstellar Kredit (ISK), an estimated theoretical real-world value of US$300,000 to $330,000 (equivalent to between US$ and $ in ), as derived from the contemporaneous market value of PLEX, an item purchasable with real currency that can be redeemed either for subscription time or traded for in-game currency.
Part of a larger conflict known as the Halloween War, the fight started after a single player controlling a space station in the N3/PL-controlled star system B-R5RB accidentally failed to make a scheduled in-game routine maintenance payment, which made the star system open to capture. Being a key staging area used by N3/PL in the war, the CFC and Russian coalitions began pouring players into the system in a swift offensive, and N3/PL moved in a large fleet of players as a response. A massive battle erupted in the system, and numerous smaller engagements occurred throughout the game universe as players attempted to block reinforcements from joining the battle. CFC/Rus gained a clear win by inflicting heavy losses on N3/PL and successfully capturing B-R5RB. The losses totaled 576 capital ships, including 75 Titans (the largest ships available to players), along with thousands of smaller vessels.
To commemorate the sheer size and cost of the battle, the game's creators, CCP Games, erected a permanent monument in the system B-R5RB named "The Titanomachy", consisting of non-salvageable capital ship wrecks.
Background
Eve Online is an MMORPG space game in which players engage in a variety of activities including mining, piracy, manufacturing, trading, exploration, and combat. The size, scale, and intricacy of the game world and its economy and politics means that accomplishing anything consequential typically involves joint efforts by many players over days, weeks, even months and years. Players may form corporations (clans, guilds or alliances in other video games), and these corporations in turn can formally join in alliance with other corporations. Many of these alliances create informal coalitions to work toward common goals and fight competing alliances. Despite the prevalence of coalitions in the game, there is no formal in-game mechanic providing for these "super-alliances". The Halloween War was a conflict in the game universe which started around Halloween in late October, which pitted the player alliance coalitions CFC and Russian – the latter so-called because of the real-world nationality of many of the players – and their allies against the N3 and Pandemic Legion player coalitions and their allies. B-R5RB, located in the Immensea region, served as the staging ground for all Pandemic Legion fleets. A few days before the fighting in B-R5RB, the CFC and Russian coalition suffered a decisive loss to N3 and Pandemic Legion forces in the Battle of HED-GP in the Catch region, due to the N3/PL's "Wrecking Ball" formation.
Between the coalitions involved, the Battle of B-R5RB involved 717 player corporations and 55 alliances. In the Clusterfuck (CFC) and Russian (Rus) coalitions, RAZOR Alliance, under the command of user Lazarus Telraven, was a major participant within CFC, as was the Goonswarm Federation and Stainwagon, and within Rus, Solar Fleet, Darkness of Despair, and Against ALL Authorities were majorly involved alliances. On the side of the Pandemic Legion and N3 coalitions, Northern Coalition and Nulli Secunda were two of the major alliances involved.
In Eve Online, players can claim sovereignty over some star systems if they make payments (typically at that time about 1 billion of the in-game currency Interstellar Kredits) to CONCORD, the in-game, non-playable security force, and claim a star system using a Territorial Claim Unit. Sovereignty grants the controlling player "reinforcement timers", that is, real time waiting periods of several days designed to allow defenders to rally. Without sovereignty, or if, as was the case with B-R5RB, sovereignty is lost, the star system is vulnerable to immediate attack from hostile players.
Battle Prelude On January 27, 2014 (YC 116 in-game), the one-year anniversary of the immense Battle of Asakai, player corporation , a member of Nulli Secunda, mistakenly failed to make a scheduled payment to CONCORD. The user Manfred Sideous of Pandemic Legion claimed that he had enough ISK in his holding corporation wallet and had autopay checked, raising the possibility of sabotage or an in-game bug.
Outbreak of conflict An enemy scout discovered the Nulli Secunda alliance quietly attempting to regain control with units called Territorial Claim Units (TCU), which are used for announcing control over a star system. Lazarus Telraven, a fleet commander of the player coalition Rus, made a decision to launch an early attack instead of waiting until his coalition's fleet scheduled muster at 14:00 Eve time (which is equivalent to GMT). His fleet destroyed the enemy TCUs, and RAZOR Alliance, one of the player alliances under Telraven's command, took the station and set up its own TCU in order to establish control of the star system. At around 14:00, with an hour remaining before Nulli Secunda could regain control, the CFC and Russian coalition sent a capital fleet to the station. Capturing the B-R5RB system would enable the CFC and Russian coalition to trap Pandemic Legion assets, including hundreds of capital and sub-capital ships, thus preventing those ships from joining the war. CFC and Russian coalition forces scrambled to gain control of the system, with thousands of players logging on and preparing their fleets. Lazarus Telraven had command of about 1,000 players with some 255 ships. His two fellow commanders, Mister Vee and Vily, were at their real-world jobs and thus Telraven had sole command of the fleet.
Battle for B-R5RB Pandemic Legion and N3 moved to retake the system from CFC and Rus, but the Russians destroyed all Territorial Claim Units anchored in the system. N3/PL then deployed their super-carrier and carrier fleet in the "Wrecking Ball" formation just off the system's space station, a formation which had previously defeated the CFC and Russian alliance. As the conflict was a surprise and occurred on a Monday workday, CFC and Rus decided to take advantage and gain field superiority before N3 and PL could respond and so deployed their entire capital fleet to the system. Meanwhile, they deployed their sub-capital fleets to N3 staging systems, including I-NGI8 and GXK-7F, to delay any reinforcements. N3/Pandemic Legion ships finally arrived at around 15:30.
Each side then attempted to rush all available pilots into the system, and the game's time dilation software engaged. Time dilation is a game feature created by developer CCP Games to handle heavy loads on the game server without the game lagging or disconnecting players. In time dilation, the game slows to ten percent normal speed, with each second of game time displaying as ten seconds of real time. The two sides traded Titan kills every hour, when their Doomsday weapons could fire again, and the system became filled with warp disruption bubbles, making extraction difficult. For a while neither side gained any real advantage, though CFC/Rus managed to on-line their Territorial Claim Units and held a slight lead in the number of enemy Titans destroyed. Throughout the engagement, related battles played out across the entire game universe as fleets tried to block reinforcements, destroy fleeing capitals and super-capitals, or trap pilots attempting to enter the fray.
The tide of the battle started to turn when Manfred Sideous, the initial N3/PL fleet commander, handed control to Vince Draken, CEO of the player alliance Northern Coalition. Vince Draken managed to concentrate fire on and destroy several CFC/Rus Titans and also forced some additional Russian Titans to leave the system with depleted shields and armor. However, N3/PL overestimated their success and began to focus their attacks on the Titan belonging to Sort Dragon, the commander of all remaining Russian forces in the field. This Titan had very high damage resistance, and Sort Dragon drew upon his entire fleet to assist in repairing it, enabling it to hold out much longer than most other Titans up to that point. By the time his Titan fell, the CFC/Rus had managed to destroy five N3/PL Titans, putting the alliance well ahead. James Carl, a member of the N3/Pandemic Legion coalition, reported to the Associated Press that "It looks like CFC is winning, but we're hoping now that all of our US players are online, we'll turn the tide". But when the US time zone players logged on and reinforcements became available, PL did not see the numbers they had expected, and the CFC blockaded adjacent systems to prevent them joining the battle. Eventually, N3/PL could no longer destroy any Titans, and ordered a retreat. They switched their fire onto CFC/Rus's Dreadnoughts in an attempt to take out as many ships as possible during retreat. Due to their spy network under Intelligence Commander Tobias Deidorm, CFC knew that N3/PL had ordered a retreat and deployed Interdictors and Heavy Interdictors to prevent the withdrawal. N3/PL lost several more Titans, Super Carriers, and Capitals in the extraction, with many trapped by the warp disruption bubbles strewn throughout the battle area. The battle definitively ended when the Eve universe went offline for its regular daily maintenance at 11:00 UTC on January 28, disconnecting all players.
Aftermath Over 7,548 unique characters participated in the overall battle, of which 6,058 participated directly in the B-R5RB system with a maximum of 2,670 in system at the same time. These numbers included 717 unique player corporations and involved 55 unique player alliances. Joystiq called the battle potentially the largest recorded PvP battle in any game to date. On the CFC/Rus side, approximately 3670 capital ships were involved, including roughly 143 Titans, 273 Supercarriers, 817 Dreadnoughts, and 233 Carriers, as well as thousands of sub-capital ships. N3/PL brought against that about 1616 capital ships, including around 72 Titans, 172 Supercarriers, 355 Dreadnoughts, and 414 Carriers, and thousands of sub-capital ships. The 21-hour-long conflict resulted in the loss of 75 Titans, 13 supercarriers, 370 Dreadnoughts, and 123 Carriers, along with thousands of smaller ships and innumerable fighters and drones. N3 and Pandemic Legion lost 59 Titans, while CFC and the Russian coalitions lost only 16. CFC/Rus also lost 2 Supercarriers, 106 Dreadnoughts, 5 Carriers, and over 1900 sub-capital ships, while N3/PL lost 12 Supercarriers, 259 Dreadnoughts, 112 Carriers, and over 1250 sub-capital ships.