Blueball or blob: how reppers defeated Burn Amarr

Before everything else: why ganking in Niarja doesn't count for Burn Amarr?
Because ganking in 0.5 is a common practice. If you check the Uedama system freighter kills, you see a dozen or two dying every day. Ganking freighters in Niarja is like doing Sisters missions in Osmon, ratting in Deklein or scamming in Jita local: part of an ordinary day in New Eden. Of course Goons can have a weekend where they focus on one activity, but it wouldn't make waves outside of their own circles. It's like me doing mining missions in Hodrold and showing newbies how to do them. No one cares, besides participants. Now imagine that I announce that I'm going to mine in YA0 top belt in a stupidly blinged ship. That would be something. But after I noticed that Goons are waiting for me, I'd mine in highsec instead and claim it's the same.

Burn Amarr - just like earlier Burn Jitas - meant to be something extraordinary. Something that defies common knowledge and surprise people who think that they are safe if they follow the industry standards of hauling. Early Goon statements made clear that they meant to burn Amarr and defy those who think they are safe. This clearly didn't happen. If you said "I'm safe to autopilot since I stay in 0.7+", you were right. When you came back to your computer, your freighter arrived to Amarr. Yet Goons claim their Niarja ganks are the same.

I blame the main strategic doctrine of the Imperium "blueball or blob". It means that if complete and devastating victory cannot be guaranteed, the fleet is ordered to stand down to deny the chance of victory to the enemy. This isn't a bad idea. Most players are simple socials who play for fun, not for win. "Blueball" (I hate this sexist term) them for a few times and they go away in search of "good fights". In terms of Burn Amarr it meant avoiding defeats like this: This run failed (probably bad warpin, too many noobs in the fleet or unexpectedly high SP freighter pilot) and the anti-gankers celebrated on local and then went on repping the Rhea. Of course the Goons could keep bumping it and come back with a larger fleet. Losing one run full of newbie catalysts is absolutely not a devastating defeat, rather a learning experience. But they were paralyzed by the fear from defeat and let it go instead. They went on killing antitanked freighters which they could overkill and when they realized that they can't find enough of those, they retreated to Madirmilire and Niarja.

The problem what they didn't realize is that the time-limit of the event worked against them. The anti-gankers had to defy boredom for only two days and the weekend was over, the event was over and they won. And to do that, anti-gankers needed nothing but a fleet in being: some repping ships in space (even if AFK) and some local channel trolls. As Goons couldn't assess the real strength of anti-gankers without the chance of giving them a victory, they had no option than avoiding a direct clash (a gank without overwhelming force).

So the reppers, the gate-instalockers and the ECM flyers broke burn Jita without doing actually anything. Just by their presence and the indoctrinated fear from uncertain combat of the Imperium, they stopped the gankers to actually gank in Amarr.