Exploring w-space systems

I'm active early, hoping to lay the foundations for later ambushes. I take my Buzzard covert operations boat out to scan today's w-space constellation to look for likely targets or sites of interest. I find the home system's static wormhole easily enough and jump through. Our neighbouring class 4 system also connected to us only four days ago, as well as a couple of weeks before that, and remains unoccupied. As I have recently started noting the static wormholes in each system I visit I know I am looking for a connection to a C1, which sounds promising even though the C4 is empty of activity.

Not only do I know what kind of static wormhole I'm looking for but it sits almost on top of the homewards K162, making it really easy to find when I make an initial scan to get the return wormhole's signature. Rather than ignore the rest of the signatures in this C4 I perform a quick blanket scan of the whole system, but there is nothing that looks likely to be another wormhole. I quickly discount a couple of ladar sites and there is perhaps a radar or magnetometric site waiting to be discovered, but I leave it to head onwards to the class 1 system.

I've been in this C1 before too, although it has been five months since I was last here. The system was unoccupied then and remains so now. As the C1 probably leads out to k-space this could be a potentially short and uninteresting expedition, if I only find two empty w-space systems. But sifting through the nine signatures resolves a K162 as the first wormhole I discover, leading in from a class 2 system, a clear indication of activity. I keep looking for the C1's static wormhole instead of jumping directly through the K162, soon resolving an exit to null-sec k-space that is not helpful for us but interesting none the less.

A radar site is the last of the nine signatures in the C1, finishing my thorough scan. I take a shufti in the null-sec system, briefly appearing in 0-7XA8 in the Stain region, before jumping through the K162 to the class 2 w-space system. As the wormhole must have been opened from the C2 system it is not surprising to see a tower on my directional scanner, but a little disappointing not to see any ships. I locate the tower, confirm that any activity in this system stopped a while ago, and scan for the C2's secondary connection.

Scanning is quick, as the system is sparse, kept clean by the inhabitants. Besides the static connection to the C1 through which I entered, three signatures resolve to a ladar gas mining site, a K162 from high-sec empire space, and the second static wormhole also heading to high-sec empire space. I check both destination systems through the exits to high-sec, bookmarking the empire side of the wormholes, and head homewards. There remains no activity in the systems and little to investigate. Once back at the tower I drop copies of all my bookmarks in our shared can and take a break.

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Tags: buzzard, eve online, mmorpg, null-sec, penny ibramovic, scanning, w-space

Close and quiet

It's early, I'm alone, there is a new w-space constellation to explore. But maybe I'm not alone, as although there are no colleagues of mine awake I see some scanning probes on my directional scanner. Perhaps a wormhole has connected in to our system and a K162 waits to be found. I was about to scan the home system for our static wormhole anyway, I can always look for a second—and active—connection.

I am able to resolve only the one wormhole in the system, which is odd. Maybe the wormhole was opened earlier and someone has come in through the connection from the other direction. I warp to the wormhole to start my greater exploration, and bumping in to an ally there answers the question of whose probes I saw. We both bookmark the connection and prepare to jump through, and all the scanning probes on d-scan disappear as we each recall our own set.

Now I have help in scanning it should be more efficient. There is not much to find through our static connection, though. The clear d-scan result hides a tower anchored to the outer planet, where an unpiloted Tengu strategic cruiser and Chimera carrier sit silently in the shields. The class 4 system looks to be kept relatively clean by the powerful combat ships, only two signatures to be found, although the occupants aren't so fussy as to worry about clearing the five anomalies also present. The two signatures are obviously the K162 we jumped through and the system's static wormhole, making finding the next connection routine, and we are soon in the adjacent class 3 w-space system.

I've been in this C3 a couple of times before, my notes indicating a tower being anchored around a certain moon when I was last here four months ago. The tower is still in the same place, holding a Cormorant destroyer and Crucifier frigate safe whilst the ships' pilots are inactive. Scanning finds plenty of rocks floating in the system, along with a wormhole leading out to high-sec empire space. Two systems to k-space is a small constellation and with nowhere else to explore and no one to shoot I take the time to be thorough in my scanning. The C4 is thoroughly mapped already and this C3 only holds more rocks, some gas, and a radar site. No more wormholes gives me the choice of high-sec or home, and I choose both.

I jump out to empire space to reconnoitre the exit system before returning to our tower to copy my set of bookmarks for colleagues to use. I am asked to make use of them too, stuffing my Crane transport ship full of Sleeper loot and salvage, and making a trip to a high-sec station to inject more float in to the corporate wallet. But there is little else to do for now and, after I park my Crane back at the tower, I take a break.

There is more potential for activity on my return. Now a wormhole actually has opened in to our home system, a class 2 w-space system connecting to us. The C2 also has an exit to high-sec space, and that it was opened from the other side indicates some sign of activity that I am not going to ignore. I board my Manticore stealth bomber, copy across the new bookmarks, and go roaming. I jump in through the K162 to the class 2 system and am soon floating invisibly around the occupants' tower, which initially lacks capsuleer life but is made more interesting when a Hound stealth bomber arrives.

The pilot of the Hound swaps enticingly in to an Orca industrial command ship, making me wonder if he intends to collapse one or other of the two wormholes in the system. It is vicious but I tingle at the thought of snaring another expensive ship, although the feeling doesn't last as the pilot swaps again to a Maelstrom battleship. At least the Maelstrom will put up a fight and require strategy and support to defeat, particularly if it goes out to engage Sleepers. But the pilot swaps again, back in to his Hound, before logging off. I suppose he was simply checking fittings or performing system checks. Either way, the system is deathly quiet.

Guiding my Manticore in the other direction, back through the home system and through our static wormhole, only finds corporation activity. A couple of inattentive strategic cruiser pilots shoot Sleepers in the neighbouring C4, and the C3 is as quiet now as it was earlier. I return to lurk a little longer in the C2 but, apart from a disappearing Iteron hauler, there is little to keep my attention. I jump home and warp to our tower, stowing my stealth bomber in the hangar and relaxing with a Quafe. W-space can be quiet some days.

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Tags: chimera, cormorant, crane, crucifier, eve online, hound, iteron, maelstrom, manticore, mmorpg, orca, penny ibramovic, scanning, tengu, w-space

Simple scanning

Some cryptic bookmarks are available but I may not need to decipher them. There is chatter in the corporation channel about collapsing the static wormhole, which would thankfully make the current bookmarks obsolete. A new constellation would open up to be explored where the creation of bookmarks could be better supervised for clarity of abbreviated information. The only problem is that although we have enough capsuleers and ships to throw through the wormhole we don't have much expertise in ensuring they all end up on the right side once the connection is collapsed.

Our normal overseer in wormhole collapse is stranded in empire space but he is willing to talk us through collapsing the wormhole. And by 'us' I mean 'not me'. I trust my colleague's calculations but am less certain about all our recent recruits' communication skills, particularly when some confuse wormholes with systems. The guidance will rely on solid communication and getting unreliable messages about who is where because of a wormhole/system fuzziness will only confuse. Communication skills and uncertainty about terms and definitions can be improved, but not before we throw battleships with abandon through our wormhole. I shall merely view this operation from a distance and make notes for later.

To everyone's relief the collapse of the wormhole goes smoothly, if a little slowly, and I flick the systems of my Buzzard covert operations boat in to life again. The scanning probes are already in the system and have performed a preliminary scan before the wormhole was killed, and now a second scan will reveal the new signatures since then, which will only be the respawned static wormhole. Resolving a single signature is simple and I warp to and jump through the wormhole in to a class 4 w-space system. I've been here before, four months ago, and it remains a quiet, unoccupied system. There are six anomalies and five signatures present, giving us some Sleepers to shoot and little scanning to complete, which is good.

I go looking for the system's static wormhole and soon resolve a link to a C1, which gives me warm feelings about finding soft targets. Of course, the class of w-space system is solely a reflection of the level of danger the indigenous Sleepers present, although there is a general correlation between capsuleer threat and w-space system class. Only the stronger and better skilled pilots set themselves up to face the greatest Sleeper forces. The class 1 system is not likely to hold anyone too powerful, and not being able to squeeze a battleship through its static connection effectively limits possible external threats. But all I see on the directional scanner is a tower and a Crane transport ship.

Locating the tower also finds the Crane sitting unpiloted inside the shields. But there is another ship that my glance at d-scan missed, the wreck of a covert operations boat floating outside the tower. I suppose someone forgot to activate their cloak and the tower's defences punished the lapse of procedure. Their loss is my gain, as I think I'll loot the wreck. It would be embarrassing to muck it up and leave a second wreck close to the first, but I've done this enough times not to make a mess of it. I grab some Sisters core scanning probes, an expanded probe launcher, and a couple of coprocessors, the latter suggesting the pilot lacked some skills to fit the boat adequately.

Checking the rest of the system finds it otherwise empty and inactive, and launching probes reveals only three signatures to resolve. Two wormholes are found by myself and a second corporation scout—one a static exit to high-sec empire space and the other a K162 coming in from a high-sec island—as Russian scanning probes appear on d-scan. There's not much I can do about them directly, so I head out through the static connection, dock, and contract a copy of the bookmarks I've made to our stranded colleague. But on my return in to w-space an Imicus is uncloaked near the wormhole, and I take an opportunistic shot in my armed Buzzard. The Imicus reacts quickly, moving to and jumping through the wormhole back to empire space before even the first rocket hits. It's a moment of excitement, though.

I return home to copy to our shared can the bookmarks mapping the w-space constellation, and swap in to my Manticore stealth bomber. I head back to the C1 and lurk around the high-sec wormhole, waiting for nothing to arrive, until a second stranded colleague finds his way to us and I pop out to guide him home. As we jump back to w-space the wormhole enters its end-of-life state, which will no doubt discourage high-sec tourists from entering, sending me homewards. To end the evening, the few anomalies in our neighbouring C4 are cleared with a fleet of four strategic cruisers. No hitches and no surprises makes us eighty million ISK richer after loot and salvage is recovered, letting me sleep peacefully.

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Tags: buzzard, crane, eve online, imicus, manticore, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, scanning, w-space

Scanning, roaming, returning

Roaming w-space ends early, before I've even left the home system. My Manticore stealth bomber drops out of warp in to empty space, the bookmarked location no longer holding a wormhole and being another arbitrary point in space. The bookmarks I copied are no longer current, but instead of scouting I sit and wait at the tower. I learn that a scout became isolated in empire space with the collapse of our static wormhole and a second scout has just scanned a new route for him to return. The second scout is already coming back to the tower with a fresh set of bookmarks for our w-space constellation and I can copy them instead of scanning from scratch.

The returned bookmarks are skeletal, enough to get a pilot from our tower to empire space but little more. It's a enough for our needs, but as no activity is reported along the short route there seems little point in taking my Manticore out for a roam. Instead, I board my Buzzard covert operations boat and head out to see what else I can find. I jump through our static wormhole to a vaguely familiar class 4 w-space system, having been here only two weeks ago. My last visit saw the system hold a K162 to a C5 where I engaged a Hoarder industrial ship that colleagues swiftly popped, but today the C4 seems quiet. I move on to the static connection leading in to a class 1 system.

There is no occupancy in this C1, although intelligence suggests that some jumps occurred earlier and perhaps a K162 remains in the system. I launch probes and start scanning. The signatures of known wormholes are included in the description of each bookmark, so it is easy for a later scout, like me, to ignore them and not duplicate effort. And my effort now isn't wasted, as I manage to find another wormhole in this system almost on top of the exit to high-sec empire space. The K162 comes in from class 2 w-space system, which looks promising, and once I determine that the two final signatures in this C1 are only gravimetric mining sites I jump through the inbound connection.

My directional scanner reports two towers in the C2, and a couple of ships too. It is straightforward to locate the towers, the second one I warp to holding a Tristan frigate and Coercer destroyer inside its shields, both ships piloted. There is no other activity on d-scan so I open up the system map to see where I need to warp to for passive d-scans to cover the rest of the system. Actually, maybe I'll just sit around this planet, what with it being the only one in the system. But even though it seems that I can see the whole system from this lonely planet the star is actually out of d-scan range, which will at least let me launch scanning probes without being detected.

Warping to the only directly navigable point in the solar system out of d-scan range of the two towers plants me directly in to a warp bubble. It seems quite sensible to me for the occupants to have anchored the bubble here, as it is the obvious place for visiting capsuleers to warp to, but without any physical objects to decloak covert ships or anyone monitoring the location the bubble is of limited used beyond being a slight annoyance. It is trivial for me to navigate out of the bubble and launch my probes safely, letting me begin scanning. I'm not expecting to find much in such a small system but, being a class 2 system, there should at least be another outbound connection.

I find and resolve a wormhole to high-sec empire space, along with a few ladar and gravimetric sites. Even when a Buzzard joins the other two ships at the local tower and swaps to a Badger hauler there is not much to get excited about. And with everything scanned I may as well head back and get my Manticore again, giving me some firepower should a capsuleer start to act recklessly. On my way back through the class 1 system I pick up a recruit who has scanned his way in from the high-sec system and is trying to get to our home system. I take pity on this trial-by-scanning and guide him back to our home system, although I abandon him at the wormhole so that he has to find our tower himself. As he is in warp to the tower I am in my Manticore and heading back to the C2.

There are hints of activity in the class 2 upon my return. The Badger is no longer to be seen in the system and the Tristan is gone, leaving the Coercer alone. I assume that the Badger has gone out to high-sec and I lurk with intent on the exit wormhole in the hopes that he returns soon, but I just float in space and watch the wormhole wobble for a while. Luckily, some drama is happening elsewhere, a Legion strategic cruiser and scanning probes seen in our neighbouring C4 system where a corporation fleet is engaging Sleepers. The fleet can overpower a single Legion but they have no tackle to prevent him fleeing, which is where my Manticore can come in handy. I leave the C2 system behind to help look for the Legion.

The Legion leaves the class 4 system and is spotted in the C1, where I am now, but he's not on the wormhole connecting to the C4. A brief sweep with d-scan shows the strategic cruiser's location to be in the middle of space, either in a safe spot or at the exit of a newly spawned wormhole. As the fleet entertains thoughts of trying to scan the Legion's position an alliance member mentions that he 'sold' the C1 system to the Legion pilot earlier and thinks that perhaps he shouldn't now shoot him. I have no qualms about engaging the strategic cruiser, particularly as the system was found on a routine corporate/alliance scanning operation and there is no way I would consider the system to be anyone's to sell for personal gain. But the ethical question combined with logistical considerations gets the fleet turned around and fighting Sleepers again, whilst the lack of other activity causes me to simply head back to the tower to sleep.

Posted in Gaming | Comments Off on Scanning, roaming, returning
Tags: badger, buzzard, coercer, eve online, legion, manticore, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, scanning, tristan, w-space

Deterring a Drake

The static wormhole clings to what little life it has left, collapsing almost an hour after it was expected to. But goes it does and now we can explore our new w-space constellation. A corporation scout resolves the new static wormhole in our home system and three more of us use him as a beacon to warp to. We hold and wait at the wormhole until the scout in the neighbouring system declares the directional scanner to be free from targets before jumping through ourselves. The only activity in this class 4 system is all of our probes zipping about scanning various signatures, the occupation that I noted on my last visit ten weeks ago having departed cleanly.

Our expert scout is the first to locate a wormhole and, again, we take advantage of the collaborative scanning effort to warp to his position when he sits on edge of two systems. The scout jumps through to the class 1 w-space system and spies a tower and a Drake on d-scan. As d-scan also reports some Sleeper wrecks accompanying the battlecruiser it looks like we have a target. The wormhole bookmarked, I turn my Buzzard covert operations boat around and head homewards to board a more suitable ship. But before I am even back at our tower the Drake disappears. My return is not in vain, as it lets me copy all the bookmarks our expedition has gathered so far to our shared can for the benefit of other capsuleers.

Rather than head out and continue scanning I swap in to my Onyx heavy interdictor in case the Drake returns. I take the HIC out of our system and plant it firmly on the wormhole leading to the C1, joined by a couple more pilots enjoying the thrill of the non-existent hunt, waiting for the Drake to return to the unfinished anomaly. In the meantime, our scout has found the static wormhole in the class 1 system, an exit to high-sec empire space.

I ask the scout to place his boat on the exit wormhole in the C1 so that our small offensive fleet can set up camp. He agrees and warps to the wormhole he has resolved. Camping a wormhole connecting to high-sec space is pretty futile, as any competent pilot can easily escape through the connection to safety in empire space. But occasionally a pilot will panic and reveal himself before the session timer ends, giving us a brief window of engagement. Besides, the w-space constellation is small today and, despite the camp's futility, if the Drake doesn't return we won't have much else to do.

The high-sec wormhole we have in the C1 is even less likely to bring in any targets, as our scout drops out of warp to find it reaching the end of its natural lifetime. Not many high-sec tourists will want to jump through a dying wormhole. Well, except for the Cheetah cov-ops boat who turns up as our scout sits cloaked nearby. We jump and warp to his position at the wormhole as another ship enters the system, the Drake returning from high-sec. It looks like he has come to complete the anomaly he started, warping away from the wormhole as he sees our fleet reaching it.

I doubt the Drake will want to remain in w-space now that he's seen us, but the wormhole camp becomes much more effective with him in the system. My HIC's warp bubble can be used to good effect to stop ships warping directly to the wormhole, and the battlecruiser's travel from the edge of the bubble to the wormhole will give us a good opportunity to test his shields. But our scout wasn't on top of the wormhole when we warped to him, dropping short to prevent getting decloaked, and in turn I dropped short of the scout's location to prevent decloaking him, leaving me twenty kilometres from the wormhole.

I engage my reheat and burn hard towards the wormhole, not activating my warp bubble just yet as the module reduces reheat boost to almost nothing. I cover the wormhole, in the optimal position to activate my bubble, but the Drake must have already turned around and been in warp, as he reappears on top of the wormhole and not listing on the edge of the warp bubble. It is a simple matter for the battlecruiser to jump back to high-sec, no doubt happy to leave the Sleepers behind and in return keeping his ship and pod. But the Cheetah is still somewhere in the system and my warp bubble is encompassing the exit wormhole.

An experienced cov-ops pilot would have no qualms about passing through the warp bubble of my Onyx, as a cloaked ship will remain cloaked even if it can't warp. Warp to the wormhole, hit the bubble, manually navigate to the wormhole and jump. But as we are here we may as well keep the operation alive. Scanning probes are now seen in the system, no doubt those of the Cheetah. It looks like he is probing the wormhole back in to the class 4 system connecting to our home system. The Cheetah has little reason to head that way except out of curiosity or to try to pull us away from the exit wormhole, so we simply split the group and send a couple of pilots to monitor the wormhole homewards, keeping my Onyx and a support ship covering the exit.

The Cheetah not only finds the K162 but jumps through to the C4. With the cov-ops ship in the other system we have a much better opportunity to catch him when he jumps back, holding his boat in the warp bubble and potentially 'bumping' him to force his cloaking device to de-activate. I drop the Onyx's bubble, as soon as its thirty second activation time expires, and warp to the C4 K162 to set up a new camp, w-space on both sides. But as I am in warp the Cheetah returns from the C4 in to this class 1 system, evading our Loki strategic cruiser and Federation Navy Comet frigate, and warping to the wormhole back to high-sec empire space as my Onyx is in warp in the opposite direction. He jumps out of w-space safely.

It was either blind luck or a clever ruse by the Cheetah pilot to jump through to the C4 and back again so quickly. He knew he had to get past two combat ships, one quite agile, and had no way of knowing that the wormhole would be free of the Onyx. Either way, he manages to escape. Our hunting operation winds down, with no more ships in the system and the slowly dying exit to high-sec unlikely to bring others in. We head home and swap ships for some Sleeper combat, clearing a radar and two magnetometric sites in our neighbouring C4. I get to end the evening piloting my Damnation command ship again and getting paid seventy million ISK for the privilege. W-space is treating me well.

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Tags: buzzard, cheetah, comet, damnation, drake, eve online, loki, mmorpg, onyx, penny ibramovic, sleepers, w-space

Taking the scenic route home

The atmosphere at the tower is pricked by the scent of blood. A new wormhole connects to us from a class 2 w-space system and our scout finds a Cormorant destroyer salvaging on the other side. There are also a few Drake battlecruisers creating the Sleeper wrecks to be salvaged, giving us two choices of targets. I board my Onyx heavy interdictor and prepare to move out alongside a Wolf assault ship, but the Cormorant disappears before we even leave the tower. The Drakes remain in the system but no new wrecks appear, and they only loiter a little longer before disappearing themselves.

Our scout looks for a wormhole in the class 2 w-space system and I go out to join him, now in my Buzzard covert operations boat. The C2 should be familiar to me, as I bombed an Iteron unanchoring tower defences only a month ago. Revisiting it now gives me a chance to update my records, as I imagine my notes are now wrong on the tower locations here. I find one tower has been moved out of the system, a new one anchored, and one where it was last time. As I am distracted by bookkeeping my colleague resolves a wormhole, an exit to high-sec empire space, which couples with the connection to our own class 4 w-space system to provide the two expected static wormholes in this C2. The exit from this system is also only four jumps from Jita, which is convenient for anyone wanting to hit the market. But I would like to know if the previously seen ships came from high-sec or entered through a K162, and I continue scanning.

There is another wormhole in the C2, an outbound link to a class 3 system being interesting but unlikely to carry raiders in to this system. The resolution seems to come from finding the fourth wormhole in the system, a K162 coming in from another C2. I jump through the inbound connection to find only an off-line tower on my directional scanner, but there is a planet further out of the system that could hold activity. Warping out to investigate reveals a a Viator transport ship, Helios cov-ops boat, Drake battlecruiser, and Dominix battleship all piloted inside the shields of a second tower. It is fun to learn that these four pilots comprise fully two-thirds of the corporation controlling the tower.

I warp back to the inner system and launch probes, returning to monitor the four pilots as I perform a blanket scan at maximum probe range, keeping each of my actions out of d-scan range of the tower. The scan shows only a single anomaly in the system and five signatures, at least two of which should be wormholes. As it looks like all five signatures are out of d-scan range of the tower I should be able to resolve them discreetly, which I start to do. I manage to bookmark some rocks and gas, and the second wormhole, before the pilot of the Viator swaps in to a second Drake, followed by the other pilots doing the same. I quickly move my probes out of the system as four Drakes warp away from the tower. Looking for the battlecruisers is easy, a brief check of the inner sytem finding the ships and now their drones on d-scan, a refined search locating them in the lone anomaly here. Targets!

I communicate my find to colleagues and those who are paying attention start warming up their ship's systems. I warp in to the anomaly to reconnoitre the situation and find the Drakes sharing capacitor or shields between themselves, and that they aren't moving much. I bookmark a couple of wrecks and head out of the system, returning home to swap ships myself. Needing some firepower to overcome the Drakes' impressive shields I choose my Sacrilege heavy assault ship, and I guide a colleague in his Vagabond cruiser out to the K162 of the target system. A third ship arrives, an Onyx heavy interdictor to provide superior warp disruption effects, and we are ready. I give the command and two of us jump through the wormhole in to the class 2 system, disappearing from the Onyx's view much like the wormhole does.

The Onyx does not follow us because it cannot, the wormhole collapsing behind us! It is my own fault, I failed to check the status of the wormhole thoroughly, only taking its lack of wobbliness as a sign of health. Instead it turns out to have been critically unstable and on the verge of collapse, but as the mass limit is displayed by the wormhole's size, and size is relative in the vastness of space, it is difficult to tell by looks alone the mass-health of a wormhole. I should have called up the information window to be sure. But there's nothing we can do about it now. I warp us to the anomaly to engage the Drakes, but there is no sign of them on d-scan and indeed the pilots completed the relatively easy anomaly in little time.

I have often worried about getting trapped on the wrong side of a wormhole, isolated from the home system with no easy way to return without assistance. I mitigate this risk by generally only using heavily unstable wormholes when in a scanning boat so that I can at least find my way to empire space and not be trapped without an exit. So it's considerable relief that we are in a C2 system, which generally has two static wormholes, and that I was able to scan the second connection before I swapped ships. More importantly, this second wormhole leads out to low-sec empire space, so we won't have to hit the self-destruct buttons today. I warp the two of us to the wormhole and we jump out of w-space.

We may not have caught the Drakes but fortune smiles on us in another way, the system we exit to being only eight jumps from the other known exit to high-sec scanned earlier. It is only a short journey through low-sec and a few high-sec hops and we can both return to our tower with little fuss. It is interesting that such a journey is made with little fuss when I realise that I am passing by an old mission base. I used to be quite nervous about its proximity to low-sec space and worried about ever having to leave the security of high-sec, but now we're not only casually travelling through these systems but also considering engaging a Maelstrom battleship that we encounter. We lose track of the ship on a gate and don't concern ourselves about pursuing it, instead focussing on getting home. A few more stargate passages and we're warping to a wormhole, jumping through to w-space, and back in our home system after our little adventure.

Posted in Gaming | Comments Off on Taking the scenic route home
Tags: buzzard, cormorant, dominix, drake, eve online, helios, low-sec, maelstrom, mmorpg, onyx, penny ibramovic, sacrilege, scanning, vagabond, viator, w-space, wolf

A chain of dangerous space

The unknown awaits. A single bookmark in the shared can indicates our home system's static wormhole has been found but nothing else. I point my Buzzard covert operations boat towards the fresh connection and head out to explore today's w-space constellation. The wormhole needs time to stabilise as I move from a lazy orbit, checking the connection's condition for signs of aging and abuse, to gently teasing my way in to the central channel. But once opened I am sent to another world. The wormhole leads me to a system I visited about seven weeks ago, a bunch of anomalies and many signatures indicative of the lack of occupation. I launch probes and begin to scan.

The only signatures that look like they may be wormholes turn out to be rocks and gas, and hardly likely to evoke the same emotional effect as an inter-system connection, and I suspect that I am looking for an H900 or H296 wormhole. I pick a stupidly weak signature from my blanket scan and resolve it, sure enough locating a wormhole that turns out to be an H900 connection to a class 5 w-space system. The C5 also turns out to be unoccupied and full of signatures, and I start to sift through the higher-strength scan results, if only to move ladar and gravimetric sites to my ignored list quickly. A wormhole presents itself soon enough but the outbound link to null-sec k-space doesn't look like the system's static connection, which I find with a bit more scanning, resolving a link to another C5.

Jumping in to the second class 5 w-space system along today's route puts me in another system that remains unoccupied since my last visit. Scanning here is simpler with fewer signatures to choose from, the end result being remarkably similar to the previous system. An outbound connection leads to null-sec space and the static wormhole heads deeper in to class 5 w-space. At least scanning is getting simpler the farther out I get, this third C5 being a small system, only 6 AU across and holding four planets and three moons. The few signatures that are here are straightforward to find and resolve because of the compact size of the system, and it doesn't take long to find an H296 wormhole to yet another C5.

Finding a fourth class 5 system is almost enough to make me turn around but a cursory check of the system finds occupation at last, a tower and a ship turning up on my directional scanner. The ship is only a Probe frigate, though, but it isn't inside the tower's shields. I launch scanning probes to find the wormhole leading to the ship's home system, happy to have the motivation to continue. But the wormhole is not introducing itself politely to me, instead hiding amongst many other signatures leading to the ladar and gravimetric red herrings of w-space. Even once I am scanning the right signature, known to be that of an unstable wormhole, it takes several finicky adjustments before finally fully resolving.

Eventually I am in warp to the C5's static wormhole, a connection leading to a class 2 w-space system looking like a promising hunting ground. Once in the C2 my records make my hunt sound even more promising, noting that on my last visit to this system I popped and podded two ships with the help of my Onyx heavy interdictor. But that was five months ago and any occupation has since moved out, there being no towers or any kind of activity in this system beyond my own. I launch probes and make a quick scan of the system, the two dozen signatures convincing me to turn around and head home.

On my way back to the home system I shove my ship through the two null-sec connections to colour my star map with a couple more red dots of exploration. I visit HM-XR2 in the Delve region and RD-FWY in Insmother, the latter being a dead-end system. RD-FWY is close to another dead-end system and I consider making the short trip to visit it, but one jump finds a bunch of people in the local channel and I abandon my null-sec exploration for the comforting bosom of w-space. I return home, copy the wormhole bookmarks from my nav-comp to the shared can, and take a break.

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Tags: buzzard, eve online, mmorpg, null-sec, penny ibramovic, probe, scanning, w-space

Claiming a Covetor's crokite

The corporation is giving the wormhole a little push. It already looks quite wobbly but we'd rather it collapse now to give us new w-space systems to explore. I am doing my bit to help, by sitting cloaked at a distance. Collapsing wormholes fascinates me like a fiery ship explosion; there is a morbid curiosity in watching it happen but I'd rather not be in the middle of it. As is often the case, but not always, the operation runs smoothly and all ships are returned when the wormhole finally dies. Now it's time to scan, and we have four ships in the expedition fleet.

Our new static wormhole is easy to find in an otherwise empty system, and jumping through finds an unoccupied and inactive class 4 w-space system. Scanning is a quick process with four scouts. I resolve a wormhole at the same time as a second scout does, mine being the system's static connection to a C3 and his a K162 from a C2. We warp to each other's location, taking advantage of the tolerance of alignment times to effectively swap positions, so we can create bookmarks for each wormhole, jumping through the connection we end up at.

The class 2 w-space system looks clear, according to my directional scanner. But d-scan also only picks up one celestial body, and a check of my system map shows that I am near the outskirts of the system. I will need to warp around to look for occupation or activity, and I find both. There is a Covetor mining barge accompanied only by mining drones and jet-cans near the system's outer planet, whilst three more pilots sit passively inside a tower in the inner system.

Naturally, I alert the fleet to the barge's presence as soon as I find it and by the time I have located the tower our expert scout has joined me in the system. I leave him in his Loki strategic cruiser to scan the Covetor's position as I return to our tower to swap in to my Onyx heavy interdictor. The class 2 system's size helps us scan the Covetor covertly, the wormhole being out of d-scan range of both the gravimetric site and the tower, but it also means the warp time from the wormhole to the target will be long.

I get back to the connection to the C2 in my Onyx, joining a Harbinger battlecruiser and Tengu strategic cruiser holding station. With us all ready our scout prepares to initiate the scan, his probes arranged to pinpoint the Covetor as quickly as possible. We get the order to jump in to the C2 and hold our cloaks, as the scanning probes warp to their position and activate. A second scan is needed to get a precise enough hit and then we're in warp!

We drop out of warp on top of the Covetor and I activate my heavy interdictor's warp bubble, trapping the barge neatly. There is little ceremony in four combat ships popping a mining barge, and we pod the pilot because we can. I scoop the corpse to my hold and the Covetor is looted, one pilot even having the appropriate module fitted to let him salvage the wreck. There is no more action in the mining site and our Loki scout sees no signs of retaliation stirring at the local tower. It looks like we can claim the ore as our own.

I jump back to the home system and swap my Onyx for the corporation Bustard transport ship, an Iteron hauler already heading to the C2. The Iteron picks up fourty thousand cubic metres of ore, my Bustard collecting the remaining twenty thousand. All of the ore we recover is crokite, there being no arkonor or bistot left in the gravimetric site, showing how busy the local miners must have been. The crokite is returned safely to our tower, making a fairly decent haul for little effort, but the evening isn't over yet as we still have the class 3 w-space system to explore.

I swap ships again, boarding my Buzzard covert operations boat once more, and head out to the C3. Jumping in to the system finds it occupied but inactive, and launching probes reveals plenty of signatures and anomalies to sift through. I manage to resolve a K162 connection coming in from high-sec empire space, as well as finding the system's static connection to low-sec empire space, but there are no other likely looking signatures that will lead to more adventure. I take my Manticore stealth bomber out for one last speculative look in the class 2 system but only find a cheeky advert for our sister corporation serving as a floating headstone to the podded miner. I return home to rest for the night.

Posted in Gaming | Comments Off on Claiming a Covetor's crokite
Tags: bustard, buzzard, covetor, eve online, harbinger, iteron, loki, manticore, mmorpg, onyx, penny ibramovic, pvp, scanning, tengu, w-space

Scanning the Orca home

Empty systems often lead to uninteresting times, but we probably didn't need to lose an Orca to make the evening more exciting. Collapsing our static wormhole to look for a better w-space constellation goes slightly awry when our industrial command ship exits and drags the wormhole with it. The pilot has an exit to k-space that passes through a couple of quiet w-space systems, but the exit leads to a null-sec system.

Parking the big and expensive ship out in null-sec is bound to make our man nervous and the better option seems to be to leave the Orca in the class 3 w-space system for now. The C3 holds the static exit to null-sec and the Orca can hopefully wait for a suitable connecting route to open between that exit and one we find from our home system. And the search begins now.

I join a couple of other scouts out scanning, passing through our uninhabited neighbouring class 4 system to the C5 beyond. The class 5 system is also unoccupied yet holds no anomalies and only four signatures. A K162 wormhole leading in from a null-sec system perhaps explains the lack of sites, the null-sec visitors sweeping the system clean of Sleepers. The C5's static connection leads to another class 5 system, my first attempt to jump announcing a lack of activity as the wormhole stabilises before letting me through.

There are few signatures in this C5 too, allowing me to find a wormhole quickly. An outbound connection to null-sec is promising, maybe allowing the Orca safe journey home whilst still meaning a static wormhole can be found for other activity. But the scout behind me checks both null-sec exits and finds them to be fifty-five and seventy jumps away from the the Orca's exit. Null-sec is not only big but it encircles the whole of empire space, and it should be unsurprising that wormholes can lead to completely opposite ends of New Eden. In fact, I'm positive it is unsurprising, but that doesn't stop it being disappointing.

The static connection in the second class 5 system leads to a third, this one occupied. There are no ships on the same directional scanner reading that shows the tower but the system is big. Warping across the C5 reveals a Viator transport ship somewhere, as well as a second tower, but the ship disappears and neither warping around nor checking the towers allows me to find it a second time. A scout who isn't wasting time joyriding finds a K162 wormhole coming in from low-sec empire space, then two more wormholes. The second K162 enters from another null-sec system, but the static connection to the fourth C5 in a row is too much for my delicate constitution to want to continue heading away from home tonight.

A rescue operation to retrieve the Orca gets underway, although I'm unsure if the plan is to get it back through low-sec or the third null-sec system we find. I end my evening by visiting each null-sec system for more red dots of exploration on my star map. SNFV-I in Catch is uninteresting, the sixteen capsuleers in the local channel of R-6KYM in Etherium Reach may wonder briefly where I come from, and QRFJ-Q in Detorid is an empty and dead-end system. Curiosity sated, I return homewards to get some sleep at the tower.

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Tags: eve online, mmorpg, null-sec, orca, penny ibramovic, scanning, viator, w-space

Wrecking a Rook

There are bookmarks in the can, so I don't need to scan. I'll take my Manticore stealth bomber out for a roam, and with a few sites also bookmarked along with wormholes I may be able to cause some trouble. Our home system's static wormhole is as healthy as wormholes come and leads me in to a system I last explored a month ago, remaining as unoccupied now as it was then. I warp across the class 4 w-space system to venture through the static connection to a C5. My directional scanner is clear of activity after my jump in to the class 5 system, but the system is big and it is only after I warp around for a while that I appreciate just how empty space is. But there is still a wormhole leading to a C3 to explore, along with a K162 coming from a C4.

I head to the class 3 system first, as the wormhole is closer to my current position. Jumping in to the system sees a tower and Orca on d-scan, although I suspect the industrial command ship is unpiloted at the tower and unstowed because of its size. I find the tower and the unpiloted Orca, and a second, off-line tower elsewhere in the system, but no activity. I briefly poke my bow through a wormhole opened from null-sec space, for another red dot of exploration, appearing in 5-2PQU in Insmother. The null-sec system is not particularly interesting, aside from bordering with the Cache region, and I return to w-space. The C3's static connection only leads to low-sec empire space and heading back in to the C5 finds the bookmarked K162 no longer present. All is quiet, so I head home to take a break.

On my return a fleet has formed to engage Sleepers, a standard formation of battleships and Guardians being flown for the operation. I consider throwing my Tengu strategic cruiser in to the action but the fleet calls for some ECM support, and I have steered some training in that general direction. It is probably best to get some experience flying ECM boats against Sleepers and I am asked to bring a colleague's Rook recon ship out to fight, which sounds like fun to me. I board the unfamiliar vessel, make sure all the systems are on-line and functional, and warp to join the fleet.

Sleepers are locked, ECM systems are activated, and I get some successful jams. All looks peachy. A couple of failed jams inevitably brings the ire of the Sleepers down on me and the concentrated fire evapourates the Rook's shields pretty quickly, but that is only to be expected in an armour-tanked fleet configuration. My armour starts to drop—again to be expected, as repairs cannot be effected by the Guardians until damage is taken—and continues to drop. I start to hear warning alarms and I am aligning in preparation of an emergency warp, but too quickly the Rook pops, less than five minutes after I first board the ship.

There is no need to attribute blame here. It's immaterial whether my ship was added to the watch list or not, the new Guardian logistics pilot was paying quite enough attention, or if I was sitting entirely stationary when the Rook is 'supposed to be speed-tanking, flown like your Tengu'. Yes, there's no need to attribute blame because I am entirely at fault. I'll know for the next time I'm lent an ECM boat. And that time is surprisingly sooner than I expect, coming immediately after the anomaly is cleared. The fleet is continuing the Sleeper operation in to our neighbouring C4 with me in an ECM Scorpion, probably because I am less likely to destroy a battleship quite so quickly as a cruiser-sized recon ship. Or my colleagues have exceedingly short memories.

I think this is possibly my first serious flight in a battleship. I know I have sat my pod in a few before, moving a Rokh here, destabilising a wormhole in a Raven there, but I can't recall having flown one in to actual combat. I should perhaps get used to it, and the hull in particular, for my current skill training goal. Returning my focus to the present, the ECM bonuses the Scorpion gets lets me keep good control over the Sleeper battleships' systems, and the larger hull makes it more resilient to damage spikes. The anomaly is completed without any problems and we move in to a harder magnetometric site, looking to plunder some Sleeper artefacts. Again, the fleet works as a coherent unit and the site is cleared of Sleeper presence, ready for a salvager and analyser boat to sweep behind us.

We press on to the final site in the system, a radar site full of Sleeper databanks. Even the four battleships of the last wave cause no issues, the alpha damage quickly repaired by the logistics pilots before the ECM reduces damage to a trickle. It's all going so smoothly that I have to wonder why the ECM modules don't project beams of awesome from my ship. 'They do', says the squad leader, 'but they are too awesome to be seen'. That's not awesome enough. As a logistics pilot myself I've experienced the effect fleet ECM has on incoming damage—having coasted through the minimal damage when ECM has been available, and concentrated hard to repair the vicious damage that four Sleeper battleships can sustain—and it is rewarding to be able to personally bring such support to a fleet. Expanding my roles and understanding their intricacies in both PvP and PvE keeps me feeling useful and a benefit to the corporation. Getting the Scorpion home intact tonight is a bonus.

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Tags: eve online, guardian, manticore, mmorpg, null-sec, orca, penny ibramovic, rook, scorpion, sleepers, tengu, w-space