Scanning is the w-space equivalent of fishing
1st January 2013 – 5.42 pmIt's me in an empty system once more. Maybe we should think about getting another pilot or two in here, but I don't know how to go about finding other people. So I'll hide my head in the sand and, after scanning as usual, visit our class 3 w-space neighbours through our static wormhole. But there's no one to borrow a cup of sugar from, to disguise that fact that I just want some company, as a tower on my directional scanner is bereft of ships, and so pilots. I'm back to scanning. I warp out, launch probes, and blanket the system, showing me two anomalies, seven signatures, and a Fin. Hello, my glorious leader is on-line.
I give Fin a sitrep as I locate the tower in C3a, so I can loiter outside it and watch for new arrivals as I scan. And finding towers is generally a quicker process when I consult my notes, which hold information about every w-space system I've visited, but today I bear ahead forgetting that I have this information. And, coincidentally, the process is quicker than it would have been. Despite my most recent visit to this system being only three months earlier, and the tower ostensibly remaining where it was, there is a typo in my notes. I know this, and not that the tower has moved, because the planet I have listed as holding the tower doesn't have as many moons as it needs. I suppose I could have worked this out either way, but I dare say finding the tower manually has saved me time.
And with Fin up to speed and my cloaky strategic cruiser sitting outside the tower, I scan. The full spectrum of sites are recognised and ignored, not being interesting in an inactive system, leaving me with the static exit to low-sec as the only wormhole. The wormhole isn't even healthy enough to use, wobbling all over the place at the end of its life, which stops me poking through to see where it leads. But not fearless Fin, who dives through ahead of me to a system in Placid, saving me the rather unpleasant visit to Gallente space. I would say it's worth collapsing our static wormhole and taking a second shot at exploration tonight.
Home we go. Massive ships are thrust through our wormhole in a controlled manner, leaving us but not it in our home system as planned, and a new connection to resolve. Jumping through the replacement wormhole has us in a bare-looking class 3 system. D-scan is clear, with three planets sitting out of range in three different directions. Launching probes and performing a blanket scan of the system reveals fifteen anomalies and nineteen signatures, which makes me suspect we are in an unoccupied C3 with a static wormhole to null-sec. But we can all be wrong sometimes. Some structures are scattered around one of the planets, and there I find an on-line if inactive tower, and one owned by reds. Lazy reds, with a surfeit of sites. The worst kind, with 'not even enough respect to mine for us', says Fin.
Out of the many signatures are resolved five wormholes, two weak-ish and three chubby, which is plenty now that we are just roaming for easy targets. In no particular order, we have an N968 outbound connection to more class 3 w-space, a K162 from high-sec, a K162 from null-sec, a static exit not to null-sec but high-sec, and, finally, but resolved first, a lovely looking K162 from class 2 w-space. I land here last, so head to C2a, whilst Fin continues in class 3 w-space through the N968. J111011 is a neat number, but is it a neat system? Kind of, I suppose. It's neat in that d-scan is clear from the wormhole, but not neat because d-scan is clear from the wormhole.
Exploring finds no occupation or activity in C2b, which is curious for a class 2 system. Scanning, as Aii comes on-line to make our numbers swell to record levels for the month, has only one anomaly and eight signatures to sift through, so it seems that the lack of occupation has not slowed down site activation. And all that's left are rocks and gas, a super-stable static exit to high-sec, and, thankfully for my sanity, a second wormhole. Sadly, for my exploration, the other connection is merely a K162 from null-sec. Okay, that's enough for me. It's not that there isn't more to explore, as the k-space systems could hold more potential, but more that, after my recent luck in finding targets, a quiet night isn't such a hardship.
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