Originally by: ChoppinBrocolli

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Goonswarm

Most of GoonswarmÆs initial focus came from where I wanted my own corp to go. The fundamental, founding philosophy of GF was to function from empire as a group of mercs for hire. With that goal as our aim, our early months/years were one resounding success after another. We found other pilots of similar desire and began to build something truly special.

Then EVE evolved and, with the advent of cap ships (and talk of Tech 3 requiring 0.0 research) we gambled and placed a foothold in 0.0, as an opportunity had presented itself to do so without openly declaring hostilities with the intention of taking real estate from someone (which would make us look quite un-mercenary-like).

That gamble turned out to have two major consequences (among other minor ones) û we, in no uncertain terms, dominated the arena of capital fleet combat for nearly a year, easily outstripping any other alliance sans the major powerhouses such as BoB / RA, etc... This sent us far ahead of the curve in 0.0 potency and in being able to control 0.0 real estate (whether that control was for ourselves or for a client). The other consequence was that it created a home that required regular maintenance and defense.

The former is an advantage that is now long gone. The latter turns out to be relatively difficult to manage for a PvP alliance that prided itself on being small and almost exclusively invitation only. Either way, for quite some time, many of us were already struggling to see how we could continue to play the mercenary card in our current (now former) space.

Alliances today with less than 1200-1500 members can't realistically hold their own space unless they team up with others, which was counter to GSs stance/style/decision etc to remain neutral/independent as possible. By way of GSÆs 'elite' mentality and our just plain small size, GS alone always lacked the manpower to do much on our own. This was our choice and it proved to be both a boon and a bane on many occasions.

GSÆs specialty was always being the ætip of the spearÆ, such as we were last year in the war against D2. We were always a comparatively tiny alliance. The largest GS-only gang I have ever seen in over three years topped out at 108 pilots. Considering the impact weÆve had, I still find that rather amazing.

The Coalition

The Coalition was conceived with the best intentions for the alliance as a whole based upon the reading of the situation at the time. It was not the way I would have steered the alliance, but my path was considered to be growing stale by far too many.

So we took a chance to go completely and violently æindependentÆ and everything that could go wrong did go wrong, including massive holes in both leadership and participation for a variety of reasons. I was not prepared, nor did I want, to spend several weeks / months leading yet another æcrusadeÆ of alliances. By a trick of fate and a case of bad timing, thatÆs exactly where I ended up again.

I kept the alliance alive for the past few months mainly because I had hoped Dri Kulsane would be able to return and find a way to take it in the direction he originally intended. When that didnÆt happen, IÆm sure many saw the writing on the wall.

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