A two-stage engagement against the Royalgarrison. Not my preferred kind, as I normally prefer raiding things that don't shoot back and drop spare parts, valuables and such...
Traffic in t23 was normal and included some Kusari folk, a Chrys and an Imperial both surprisingly peaceful and chatting. SUDDENLY! (dramatic, wasn't it?) a wild Royal appeared and following an exemplary display of laziness-induced eloquence, proceeded to engage the three of us. Not personally, no, he found himself a recruit to try out. He... wasn't as challenging as he was tedious to deal with. Gaston his last name or something along the lines, equipped as a short-range shotgunner, but otherwise quite inaccurate, using only guns. Uncannily evasive in terms of guided weaponry, maybe two missiles hit out of 25 and not a single, rotten mine. Most likely because the Maltese drones out of Cali make for excellent chaff, but just maybe the Royals have some new jamming gizmo (Ye, Tried to recover it. Nothing left but charred plastic) - after a while Cloud and Matthews joined me and engaged the other Royals. Overall, Cloud's plane got blown up by the same cluster of mines that took out his opponent while Matthews unsurprisingly died after inflicting a surprisingly good amount of damage. The Kusari finished his opponent off, while it took me... call it half an hour to finish that recruit. Overall we lost two planes while the Royals lost three.
I dragged my lightly damaged plane back to Hades, but on the way spotted another Royal, this time a robotic cruiser under GMS flag. Paid a Chrysie from before to keep it busy chatting and staying out while Carmine's heavies had time to engage and blow it out of the stars. After that Carmine only mentioned the IMG having a skirmish against a few maltese just off Cali with a Trident and some planes involved, Guildsmen did fine, chasing the Maltese party back to the station's safety.