Editing Battle of Asteri (section)

= Summary of Events =
''All times below are in UTC-4 (United States Eastern Daylight Time).''

At 12:36PM, [[yodabird19]] sieged the Vask Authority [[siege station]] "AsteriCargoDepot", located in northern [[Asteri]]. As was typical of engagements between the Ilios Alliance and Vask Authority at the time, [[FellOffBridge]] responded to the siege by bringing the "ARMAGEDDON" battlecruiser, which yodabird19's [[gunship]] was not equipped to combat. However, this time, yodabird19 attempted to stalemate the battlecruiser, by enabling his [[Starship Gravity Well|gravity well]] and circling the (much slower) battlecruiser outside of weapons range, but inside of interdiction range, so it could not leave. His objective, in this case, was to hold the battlecruiser in place for so long that it would run out of  [[Hydrogen]] fuel. 
<br>At 1:33PM, approximately one hour after the siege began, yodabird19 sent a message in the [[Ilios Alliance]] discord, claiming that ARMAGEDDON was "running on fumes fuel-wise", calling it the "best chance to sink armageddon we've ever had". It is now understood that the battlecruiser was not actually out of fuel, but rather that FellOffBridge could not stay on the server, and was searching for a way to disengage from the situation. Incidentally, yodabird19 ''also'' had to leave at this time, but was able to have [[NovaManGood2110]] log on and swap with him as the pilot of his gunship. 10 minutes later, at 1:43PM, FellOffBridge was forced to release the battlecruiser (which he was able to do because NovaManGood2110 was outside of engagement distance at the time) inside of the siege station.

[[File:Boa plan.png|thumb|The Ilios Alliance plans how it will guard ARMAGEDDON for a full 22 hours.]]
While successfully releasing one's ship inside of a friendly claim is, in most cases, a conclusive end to that ship's involvement in the battle, and a guarantee of the ship's safety, this case was an exception, because the claim in question was a [[siege station]] claim. These claims can be captured by sieging them during their siege window, a 1-hour period that recurs every 24 hours. The siege window for Asteri Cargo Depot, of course, had passed, and would not recur for approximately 22 hours; however, desperate to capture or destroy ARMAGEDDON, the Ilios Alliance, spearheaded by yodabird19, decided that it would guard ARMAGEDDON for the full 22 hours, preventing Vask Authority from recovering it before the siege window reopened the next day.

[[File:Boa fakelogs.png|thumb|Faked DM logs between Vask Authority and Vega leadership show Vask Authority offering Vega a 1,000,000 credit mercenary contract to rescue ARMAGEDDON.]]
At 3:40PM, with approximately 20 hours until the siege window would open, [[Vandrayk]] of Vega contacted the leadership of the Ilios Alliance, stating that Vask Authority had offered them a mercenary contract for 1,000,000 credits to to "get them out of this situation with combat intervention". As proof, he posted logs of a purported DM between [[Vandrayk]], [[MaidPierce]], [[WitherV]], [[_Clone1137]], and [[FellOffBridge]]. It would later be revealed in the [[Vask Authority Leak]] that these logs were faked, and indeed that the entire Vegan intervention in the Battle of Asteri was premeditated between both Vega and Vask Authority, with the 1,000,000 credit payment being ceremonial and later quietly refunded.
<br>However, this was not known to Ilios Alliance leadership at the time. Vega offered the Ilios Alliance a chance to outbid Vask Authority - in essence, to pay off Vega from intervening in the situation. Ilios Alliance leadership were given one hour to discuss the deal and return with a verdict; following a 3-1 vote against accepting the deal, at 5:32PM the Ilios Alliance contacted Vega and rejected their offer.

Following a few small prelude skirmishes around the station, in which [[DearGhost]]'s [[Gunship]] and [[z4nityy]]'s [[Starfighter]] were sunk by Novan forces, at 6:28PM, with 18.5 hours left on the clock, a joint Vega-Vask Authority fleet numbering in 11 warships warped in to AsteriCargoDepot. Defending Ilios Alliance forces, which numbered 9, were collected inside the siege station radius near ARMAGEDDON. Most Ilios Alliance defenders had been scrambled to log on and arrive in warships in preparation for the confrontation, and a large fraction of them were not seasoned combatants. Due to the sheer size of both the attacking and defending fleets, both sides were forced to rely on chat comms rather than voice comms, resulting in a rapid breakdown in fleet organization on the Ilios Alliance side. As the weight of the attack fleet pushed on the defenders, Ilios Alliance forces were pushed northeast of the station, where 8 ships were sunk in the space of 9 minutes, between 6:42PM and 6:50PM. 

After the battle, Vega forces patrolled the area while Vask Authority recovered ARMAGEDDON, towing it back to their space station [[Apollyon]] in [[Regulus]]. 

20 days later, on 16 July, [[_omni]] would kill FellOffBridge in [[PvP]] while he was piloting ARMAGEDDON, allowing [[yodabird19]] to create a station claim over the unpiloted battlecruiser and finally capture it intact.