Dying to a ghost
9th March 2014 – 3.33 pmI'm looking for some excitement in space. Or, I dunno, maybe just a way to pass some time. No signature churn in the home system gives me only our static wormhole to resolve, and I'm on my way. Jumping to our neighbouring class 3 system and updating my directional scanner sees a tower and Iteron V, which gives me a possible target, one I'd better find before the discovery scanner announces my arrival.
Nope, no easy hauler kill tonight, not with the Iteron missing a pilot. There is also a second tower around another planet with more ships, but again none of them piloted. I launch probes to scan, and, holy crap, do something with your system, people. Thirty-two anomalies is a bit much. Thankfully there are only seven signatures to sort through, which resolve to give me two fat wormholes and two skinny wormholes.
The first fat wormhole is the static exit to low-sec, leading to Sinq Laison. The second chubster is just another route to low-sec, through a K162, sticking me with a pair of poor-choice outbound connections. Rather than reconnoitre them first and make my choice as to which I'd prefer to explore through, the plainly idiotic discovery scanner forces me to rush through each as I warp to them, trying to make the most of the short time I have before the locals can react to the new signature being passively pinged to their interface.
The first outbound wormhole is a V301 to class 1 w-space, where all looks clear on d-scan on jumping through, and opening the system map shows there to be nothing out of range. Okay, I can relax a bit and slow down again, alleviating the artificial stress added by the artificial need to rush caused by the stupid discovery scanner for no real purpose. And being able to survey C1a properly sees a ghost site sitting amongst the anomalies.
I launch probes and poke at the thirteen signatures in the system to look for K162s, see how safe it will be to attempt the ghost site. The static wormhole leads to null-sec and, although there is another wormhole out there, in weighing my options I think that being ambushed in a ghost site may well be the most exciting event of the night. I'm gonna do it.
I head home, refit my Loki strategic cruiser for the ghost site, and return through C3a to C1a, seeing no change in either system. Let's do this. I warp in to the site, scan each can, and pick the least-worse of them to hack first. First can, hacked and looted. Second can, hacked and looted. Can I manage a third? I get to it, start hacking, and in warp Angel rats. There's no explosion yet, so I keep on hacking as the rats start pecking away at my shields. But hold on, this is more than pecking.
My shields are dropping quite fast, seemingly taking more damage than in the ghost sites in our home system. Of course, our pulsar helps boost my Loki's shields there, and in previous instances I've been moving instead of sitting still hacking. Sadly, by the time I realise all of this, my shields have dropped dangerously low, which is just the right time for the Angels to detonate the site. The resulting explosion evaporates what little shields I have left, and rips through my relatively unprotected armour. As the rats warp clear, I am left sitting in my pod in empty space, next to the wreck of my Loki.
That wasn't quite the excitement I was after, so I suppose I should be careful what I wish for. I should also use this experience to moderate my behaviour for future ghost sites, so that this mishap doesn't mishappen again. Still, never mind. Mistakes happen. I take my pod home, come back to my poor ex-Loki in a destroyer to loot and salvage what remains, and now I suppose I should spend the rest of the evening getting a new ship.
The low-sec K162 in C3a comes in from Placid, a mere thirteen hops from Jita, which is easily traversed in a Crane transport. I sell as much loot as I could carry on my way out here, buy a new Loki and all the fittings, less what I salvaged, and somehow manage to have our wallet show a net gain. It's not great that I've had to blow a wad of ISK on a replacement ship, but good that our wallet continues to move upwards.
A return to Placid has my blasting past assault frigates in faction warfare space, and it's only when I get to the wormhole to C3a that I remember we still can't assemble strategic cruisers in w-space, just re-jig the subassemblies. Never mind, the low-sec system is quiet and has a station, I can put my new ship together there. So I do, leaving the new Loki in dock as I take the Crane home, before returning for the maiden voyage of Ghost of the Bounty. It's a short voyage, just across C3a to the home system, as I'm tired and just want to sleep, but it's successful. May we fly many more together.
5 Responses to “Dying to a ghost”
I orbit the can (at 1000m) while I hack at a ghost site. Might not have saved you, but might've.
Yeah, that was mentioned to me after the loss. I will definitely not be stationary next time.
So how much tank does one need to survie ghost sites? I fear losing my Legion in such silly PvE with even more stupid hacking game...
Hana: you want a hard tank against explosive damage, which you get when a can blows. Cans always blow up: either when you hack one and fail, or later when the rats blow all the cans. The rats blow all the cans after being on grid for perhaps 10 seconds. Each explosion's damage is 8000/10000/12000/14000, in highsec/lowsec/nullsec/wspace.
You also need a general omnitank to tank the pirate rats, who have plentiful warp disruptors. I am not sure what their DPS is but perhaps 800 or so, and I expect flavored according to their faction. This damage must be tanked for perhaps 20 seconds before the rats all zoom off.
Note that if you are not certain you can tank it, and the pirates appear while you are hacking, it's best to rein your greed and get away from the can immediately so as to be outside of its explosion's sphere of effect. (I don't know what that radius is, though I would like to.)
@Von Keigai thank you very much for these informations, it was very helpful.