Today's history is more interesting than the present
19th February 2013 – 5.42 pmFin's been busy reconfiguring our tower. I don't ask how, or why, as I probably won't understand and will only get confused. My glorious leader has also scanned the w-space constellation to our neighbouring class 3 system and out to high-sec empire space. I've actually launched probes and am performing a blanket scan of the home system as I am being updated. I find it comforting to make an initial check of home, even if a colleague has done so recently. I don't think you can check for incoming connections too frequently.
There are no new signatures that I can see, so I head next door to C3a to see if the Scorpion battleship Fin spotted earlier is still around. Not that I can tell, he isn't. My notes point to a previous visit from almost two years ago, which involves a skirmish or two. At first, I personally don't think it's worth linking to the posts where my Manticore stealth bomber misses catching a Helios, a fleet ambushes us and I escape, or a follow-up in which my Manticore pops a local Noctis salvager, as they aren't particularly spectacular. But I notice that pilot q2eve appears in the middle of it all, the same q2eve that I ambushed again recently. I knew I'd seen her more than once before.
Regardless of my brief history with C3a, there's little point in scanning a scanned system, so I exit to high-sec to take a look around empire space. The wormhole takes me to a system in the Tash-Murkon region, where Fin is currently exporting goods and importing... I dunno, something industrial. I launch probes and scan. One anomaly is picked up on a blanket scan, and although I choose to pop a few rats whilst scanning I turn out to be beaten to the site by a Tengu, the strategic cruiser warping out, leaving wrecks behind, as I warp in. Okay, just scanning in that case.
A weak wormhole looks good from the scanning results, and better than the rocks of the other signature in this high-sec system. And even though the outbound connection to class 3 w-space would be good normally, its wobbly, end-of-life state makes it less attractive. But I'm in high-sec, and the one aspect about high-sec that I actively enjoy is the ability to use stargates safely. I hop one system across and scan again, hoping that a system with no stations is less-travelled. It seems to be, with no pilots currently in the system, and five signatures is a good result.
Rocks, Sansha's Nation rats, a wormhole, a radar site, and a second wormhole. The first wormhole is a K162 from class 1 w-space, which is tempting enough without the Magnate currently approaching it. The frigate jumps to C1a, with my cloaked Loki strategic cruiser close behind. I'm aware that the wormhole connects to high-sec and that I'll get maybe one shot at the Magnate, so I give him a tick to get comfortable before following, hoping to catch him already decloaked and vulnerable. But jumping in to the class 1 w-space system sees no ship on the wormhole, and nothing on my directional scanner.
I hold my session change cloak, on the assumption that the Magnate is doing the same, still hoping to get a single, devastating volley off before the pilot can get his ship back through the wormhole to high-sec. But when my session change cloak drops and there is still no sign of the Magnate I have to admit that I gave him a little more time than was necessary. He's obviously moved on, maybe even just cloaked and moving slowly away from me. There's no sense in waiting for a ship that won't be caught, so I cloak, warp clear, and start scanning.
A single, heavily bubbled tower in C1a has a piloted Buzzard covert operations boat inside its force field, providing little engagement opportunity, so I start sifting through the ten anomalies and twelve signatures for wormholes. Three K162s are resolved in total. The first is uninteresting, in coming from high-sec. The second also comes from high-sec, which makes the third high-sec K162 rather disappointing. I can take the hint, and head back to high-sec, although through the wormhole I used to enter the system. Because once in the familiar high-sec system I can warp directly across to another bookmark, without needing to scan, to a wormhole that turns out to be better than the C1 K162.
The second wormhole is a K162 from class 2 w-space. This is better than the C1 K162 because class 2 w-space systems have two static wormholes, one to k-space and one to w-space. As the wormhole I'm sitting on comes to high-sec k-space, there is a second to find in the w-space system that will lead to more w-space. That's worth looking for. And that's if there's nothing to find in this C2 system itself. Which there isn't, as it turns out. A tower floats lonely in the system, without ships, and even without hangars. Scanning for the other static connection reveals mostly gas, plus one radar and magnetometric site each, but eventually finds the connection to class 4 w-space. Onwards!
C4a is not much better than C2a. It's a bit worse, in fact, as there isn't even a bare tower. Unoccupied and inactive, I'm back to scanning pretty quickly. Working through ten anomalies and seventeen signatures doesn't seem and arduous to start with, but when the signatures get weaker and weaker, and still no wormhole appears, I fear that I'm heading towards a horrible chain of class 5 w-space. Then again, I believe C4/C1 wormholes are pretty weak too, so I keep scanning!
I keep scanning, resolve the final signature to be the static wormhole, and find it to be the H900 connection to class 5 w-space. Well, I scanned it, I may as well use it. I jump to C5a. Hullo, three Tengus, a Drake battlecruiser, and two Sleeper wrecks appear on d-scan. There's a tower too, but the wrecks suggest the ships are up to mischief. Sadly, the presence of a Cheetah cov-ops and some scanning probes deflates my new-found perkiness pretty quickly, as the newly opened wormhole I've entered through will have been spotted by any decent scout. Let's hope he's not decent.
Two Tengus drop off d-scan, hinting at the scout's competence already. A passive scan brings up three anomalies, and the wrecks are in none of them anyway. Maybe the ships are clearing a rock or gas site of Sleepers in preparation for an industrial operation. But by the time I've warped out to launch scanning probes in readiness and returned to the inner system the third Tengu has also gone. I find the Drake in the local tower, and it's hard to say whether he was part of the operation or another reason the Tengus were scared off. Either way, I doubt anything will happen in this system now, which is just Pennytalk for 'I can't be arsed to scan any more'. I turn tail and head home for the night.
Sorry, comments for this entry are closed.