Original or copy?

It is quite easy to spot the Crane or Manticore BPCs sitting in my hangar, and the corporation's Tengu BPC is a beautiful sight. But when a copying job finishes I have terrible trouble trying to spot the BPO amongst the many BPCs when they all get thrown in to the same bin, as they all look the same, such is the wonder of digital information. However, the original remains more useful than the copies and so I need an easy way to distinguish between the two types of blueprint.

I know that I can call up the information panel for each of the blueprints to see if it is a copy or the original, but it can be quite frustrating to have to filter the original from the copies in this way every time I look in a hangar, especially when the option to 'sort by type' doesn't seem to place the original in a particular position. Even the tool-tip doesn't seem to offer a clue as to the authenticity of the blueprint.

I wonder if I am missing an obvious hint, but I would really like for there to be a graphical distinction between BPOs and BPCs, a way to quickly and easily visually identify a blueprint's type. In the same way Tech II and Tech III items are easily identified as such, a small signifier in a corner of the blueprint would be really useful to highlight it as an original or copy.

Posted in Gaming | 3 Comments »
Tags: eve online, mmorpg, penny ibramovic

Slow Club at Scala

The house lights go down but the band don't appear on stage. A little longer passes before a ripple of excitement passes through the audience, just as Slow Club does. Strumming acoustic guitars, Charles and Rebecca squeeze their way from a side door to the centre of the venue and play their first song in the midst of an already enraptured crowd. 'Did you like our elaborate entrance?' Charles asks, now on stage and plugging a guitar in to an amplifier. I think it's safe to say we most certainly did, as even a small stage in a small venue can present a barrier to the kind of intimate performance we just enjoyed.

Slow Club don't shy away from the audience at all. Even though Rebecca claims that she is trying not to talk between songs too much, announcing quickly that 'oh look, the guitar is ready' to start the next song, she is always ready to share her thoughts. Charles takes a moment to ask everyone with a camera to take a photograph at the same time, so that he can use his own camera to snap all the flashes going off towards the stage. After the band whistle through the middle-eighth of When I Go Rebecca interjects that it was their best attempt at getting it right so far, causing the pair to lose their place in the song and pause to think about what line comes next. Any awkwardness that may be felt by the band comes across as charming and playful banter.

This is their biggest gig so far, and apparently Slow Club were quite worried about it. But all their worries are allayed soon after seeing the packed audience and hearing the continued appreciation for their songs, which relaxes everyone. Most of the songs from debut album Yeah, So? are played. Rebecca's vocals soar on Sorry About the Doom, more upbeat numbers like Giving up on Love get everyone bouncing, and the respectful hush of an attentive audience is felt strongly during the quiet There is no Good Way to Say I'm Leaving. Charles is surprised when Dance to the Morning Light gets cheers when it is announced to be played next, saying that it 'never gets that reaction, it's the very definition of an album track', but it seems he underestimates the song.

There is only one blemish on the wonderful collection of songs played, and that is perhaps the fault of an inattentive sound engineer. When Rebecca starts pounding on her low tom the heavy bass note pumped through the PA reverberates all the air in the venue. All I can hear is a steady, low-frequency buzz swamping just about everything else, Slow Club almost unheard beneath the resonance. But the problem with the sound is only for one song and is soon forgotten. Coming to the end of the set the pair acknowledge that when a band says they only have three songs left they really mean they have 'well, three-and-a-half', so even though there are a few sad calls from the audience when they close the set with Trophy Room Rebecca tells them to 'deal with it'. We know they're coming back as much as they do.

The encore is glorious. Slow Club recreate their first single, standing at the front of the stage, once more playing, encouraging the audience to be the chorus of voices heard on the recorded version of Let's Fall Back in Love. It's a wonderful rendition, the band leading at least a hundred in song and handclaps, everyone swept up in a wave of happiness and positivity. The whole gig feels less like a night out and more like a night in with friends, Slow Club making us welcome in to their world. Rebecca reinforces this idea when she quotes a friend of theirs, saying that if we buy Slow Club's album tonight we could take the band home with us. Noting that they also have bags and t-shirts for sale she says that if we buy all three then they will do even more than just come home. Rebecca would 'definitely look through your Sky+ box for Eastenders, Charles will do more slutty stuff'.

The band leave the stage, but the encore isn't over. Donning acoustic guitars again they play their way up to a balcony and serenade the audience a second time, this time with their Christmas song. When the audience surprises Slow Club with impromptu whistling along, repeating the band's motif from earlier, the pair can't help but giggle in appreciation. Another audience sing-along finishes the encore, but rapturous applause brings Slow Club back once more. Completely unprepared for such a reception, they don't have a final song rehearsed, but decide to struggle through Apples and Pairs, Charles freely admitting that 'it might go tits up'. The few pauses and occasional strangled note only add to the charm that has enveloped the night in the warm blanket of belonging. When someone shouts out 'I love you' to the band Rebecca replies 'if only it were that easy'. But sometimes it really feels like it is.

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Tags: gig, scala, slow club

More motivation for Lai Dai mission running

Cranes, Bustards and Manticores, oh my! I may not have been terribly successful with my recent invention jobs, in league with an industrial and corporation friend, but a decent number and variation of Tech II ship BPCs are returned. Even though not all of the BPCs have been handed over to manufacturing to build the ships, my thoughts turn to installing more invention jobs to keep the BPCs flowing. After all, there is not much point in having multiple R&D agents working on datacores if you're not going to use them.

Naturally, I cannot use the datacores for invention if I don't have them, and to get hold of them means visiting my R&D agents. Although I didn't need to relocate too far when building up my standings with Core Complexion, Inc. the R&D agents specialising in mechanical engineering are scattered to the four corners of high-sec space. Even in Tigress II, my own Crane, the sixty-odd jump round-trip to visit the agents can get a little tedious. This is where having an auto-pilot and some spare time comes in handy. I set my destination, activate the auto-pilot, then keep myself entertained for the journey.

Meanwhile, my industrial partner heads to Lonetrek and makes about five jumps to visit all her R&D agents and pick up a new batch of datacores. I may have started improving my standing with Lai Dai to get the Caldari starship engineering datacores, but the added benefit of having all the agents lumped closely together looks good too. I shall have to investigate the availability of mechanical engineering specialists in Lai Dai. Far less travel time could be a good motivator to continue my mission running for the NPC corporation.

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Tags: eve online, invention, mmorpg, penny ibramovic

Guitar Hero 5

Guitar Hero 5 is visually and thematically Rock Band 2, but with better drums. Moving on from Guitar Hero: World Tour, the new game has less stylised and more realistic-looking avatars, less stylised and more realistic-looking venues and audiences, and the career mode concentrates more on moving between venues than set lists, all much like Rock Band 2. But with better drums.

One nice touch about Guitar Hero 5 is the welcome attention paid to getting you playing quickly. A greater amount of state information is now saved between sessions, reducing the number of button pushes needed to get anywhere. If you play the same character on the same instrument at the same difficulty level most of the time it used to be a minor chore to make the same selections every time the game is loaded. But no more, as all those options are saved. To start playing the game you only need to push one button to accept that nothing has changed from last session.

Continuing play is nice and quick, but beginning your first gig can feel tiresome if you decide to create your own avatar. The number of options and ways to change your character's look is impressive, but it can take what feels like an age trying to come up with the right look when you really just want to get in to a gig and start playing. This only needs to be done right once, though, and the ability to customise your character to get it looking just right gives a greater personal touch to your virtual rock star. It would be better if there were more clothing options available, as there doesn't seem to be much added over the rock, goth or punk options of Guitar Hero: World Tour.

Like other editions of the game, avatars of famous rock stars occasionally crop up to play their own songs, which adds another level of verisimilitude to the notion of playing along with the band. Some of the avatars of the famous can also be unlocked to become available to be picked for your virtual band, but this leads to a problem where a hand-picked female singer croons in the part of a male vocalist, or vice versa, quickly breaking immersion in the gig. The curious aspect of this nonsense is that the problem isn't present in Guitar Hero: World Tour, where singers are swapped in and out as their sex requires, but it is an obvious problem in Rock Band 2. I don't think the designers of Guitar Hero 5 should have been as quick to borrow so many ideas from the other franchise.

It is a wonderful step forwards that none of the songs available in the game are initially locked from solo or multi-player gaming. There is little more frustrating in a multi-player game than having to spend precious time with friends unlocking content that you unlocked during solo play weeks before. But not with Guitar Hero 5, where you can play any song at any time. Taking advantage of the availability of all the songs is the addition of user-definable set lists, a feature I often wanted whilst playing Guitar Hero: World Tour. Instead of being stuck with the standard set lists featured in the game or creating ephemeral set lists, that disappear after use, a whole slew of personalised set lists can be created. This is fabulous, giving players the opportunity to put together a string of songs they enjoy playing that can be called up quickly and easily instead of trudging through long song lists and selecting tracks individually each time the game is loaded.

Despite all the songs being available immediately, there is still content that can be unlocked. The career mode awards stars for good performances and completing challenges, unlocking later gigs and venues for access to further challenges. The challenges effectively replace unlocking song content by instead unlocking cosmetic content, such as new avatars and outfits, and are a neat addition to the game. Each challenge is tailored for one or more instruments, encouraging players not to limit themselves to only one instrument, and to play multi-player. Whether you need to get a certain score, refill the star power a number of times, or get a streak of a certain length, the challenges add a new facet to gameplay that will get you repeating songs for more than simply to try to beat a high score.

When trying to see how big a streak you are hitting, or whether the familiar star power is ready, the user interface isn't quite as clear in Guitar Hero 5 as before. The indicators are all smaller and more discreet, the only clear indicator being the score multiplier. Maybe the user interface has been shrunk to accomodate multi-player gaming more easily. On the one hand, it is more difficult to view current progress quickly whilst not losing your place on the note track. On the other hand, the various indicators don't really show anything necessary to play the game. The exception is the score multiplier, which is useful to recognise quickly when determining whether to use star power or not, and this is the one standard indicator that is easy to spot at a glance.

Of course, it is rewarding to see progress when attempting a challenge, so it is good to see that when a challenge is accepted a new and clear indicator in the form of a disc appears next to the note track. The challenge disc fills up in an obvious manner as progress is made, which reinforces the idea that the other indicators don't really offer meaningful information during standard play and are probably more distracting than helpful.

Gigs in Guitar Hero 5 are all one song long and, although they are ostensibly grouped in venues, they are otherwise uncollected. Whilst the lack of forced grouping allows for disliked or unchallenging songs to be skipped, it creates an overhead that wasn't present before. My problem with single-song gigs is the same problem I have with choosing music on my iPod, and is why playlists and random play were created. There are occasions when I don't want to make all the decisions. Having to make a new selection at the end of every song played in career mode unravels some of the effort made in creating flowing gameplay. And if a new venue is been unlocked it is annoyingly automatically selected, requiring you to scroll back to select the venue just played in if you are trying to play sequentially.

There are benefits to having multi-song set lists. And although the user-definable set lists are a great addition to the game the lack of any pre-defined set lists adds a burden to the player. It would have been handy to have the songs from each venue in career mode collected together as pre-defined set lists, which can then either be modified or copied and then modified, giving a starting point on which to base your own set lists. The only set lists I don't enjoy in Guitar Hero: World Tour are those with songs I don't like, and the game would be improved significantly if I could choose to play the set lists without particular songs. I don't necessarily need to create everything from scratch.

Conversely, Guitar Hero: World Tour has also introduced me to a large number of highly enjoyable songs by bands and artists I have never heard of or wouldn't think I'd enjoy, only realised by the convenience of playing through the pre-defined set lists. Guitar Hero 5 has the right idea but takes it too far in both directions. The complete flexibility requires a significant investment of time in defining your own set lists, only really made possible with considerable experience of the songs available, where the experience can only really be gained by playing the songs more than a few times. I find it an advantage being forced to play unfamiliar songs initially, but it only really works if I also have the option to decide at some point that I don't want to play them any more. As it stands, there is no option in Guitar Hero 5 to play a group of songs that isn't user-defined, but I don't want to rely on my own impetus to pick for a set list songs I don't know too well.

With it a fair bit of initial work it will be possible to set-up a bunch of set lists, featuring favourite, challenging or unfamiliar songs, or an eclectic mix. And the number of set lists that can be saved ensures that a good selection can be created. But these set lists do not compensate for the lack of set lists in the gigs, if only because of the goals for playing in career mode. There is no longer a 'rock rank' that progresses slowly with each performance. Instead, up to five stars are normally awarded for each performance, with up to three more for each challenge. Once you have scored those five stars there is little incentive to play the song again in career mode, as nothing more is gained. It is more likely for you to play your own set lists instead, for the continuous string of gaming that it offers.

The 'quickplay' mode, where user-created set lists are stored, doesn't award stars for performances, though. And it is possible to be awarded six stars for a perfect rendition. So whilst there is little reason to play individual songs in career mode once a five star performance has been achieved, it will still be galling to finally get that perfect performance only to have that extra star not count towards your character's career. Being able to play set lists in career mode would help to strengthen a feeling of progress without continually having to play individually picked songs solely in the hopes of not making a single mistake.

Finally, being able to import songs from previous Guitar Hero games is a nice option, which has the potential to avoid switching between games unnecessarily. It's unfortunate that not all the songs from previous games can be imported, but my main gripe is the cost. To import songs, the unique code that is included with the boxed Guitar Hero game must first be entered, and then the transfer itself costs Xbox Live points, which cost money, and this seems to me to be too much. The unique code prevents a second-hand transfer of the songs, but if I prove that I am the original owner of the older game with this code then I object to also needing to pay for the transfer. At the same time, if someone is willing to pay to import a limited selection of songs I don't see why they can't take advantage of a borrowed copy of the previous game. The cost as it is strikes me as an unfair and controlling demand.

Guitar Hero 5 is another excellent game for fake plastic instrument rocking. The updated graphics are much welcome, as is the unlocked nature of the core content, that of the songs. Being able to play quickly and without much fuss is fabulous, as is the possibility of multiple similar instruments, allowing any player to play their fake plastic instrument of choice, even if that leads to four bass players having an orgy of funk. Some of the new features are flawed implementations of good ideas, others are simply good ideas. Where the monotony of only playing individual songs in career mode fails, having dozens of user-created set lists succeeds. The drive to beat previous scores may no longer be as dominant, but challenges add a new dimension to gigs to compensate. With a new selection of rock and pop tracks, current and classic, Guitar Hero 5 has plenty to keep fake plastic rockers entertained.

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Tags: console, guitar hero, xbox 360

Elwynn Forest Bastards

And you will know us by the trail of dead Hoggers. Welcome to the Bastards¹. A healer who goes AFK, an aggro-happy warlock, a self-centred paladin, and a psychotic shaman. It's the perfect group. The shaman starts as we mean to go on, slaughtering Bambi as we exit Stormwind in to Elwynn Forest, following up by stomping on Thumper. There are going to be no happy endings. We're just glad he's on our side.

Despite numerous ret-cons elsewhere, notorious lowbie-killer Hogger remains an elite mob lurking amongst similar-looking gnolls near the Westfall border. We run almost a direct path to his grounds, trampling the occasional spider and kobold, two of us reaching 7th level on the way, turning up just in time to slay an almost-dead Hogger and over-heal the killing mage. The first kill is always the easiest. It is then a matter of waiting, scanning the area to find where the tenacious dog will respawn.

The second Hogger kill is as smooth as it could be for four low-level lunatics taking on an 11th level elite mob. Out of mana and low on health, we stand over the bloody corpse of Hogger as a non-Bastard lowbie turns up. 'There's no point sticking around to help this other chap', I assure the group, 'because he is too low-level to pick up the quest to kill Hogger anyway'. To prove it, I guide us north to Westbrook Garrison, where we pick up the quest to kill Hogger. Oops. Back south we go, and this third time we each take a paw from Hogger to prove his death. It's good we only number four, for I'm not sure what token the fifth member could take from the corpse.

With muliple Hogger kills under our belts we take a tour of Elwynn Forest's quests, following a route that by pure coincidence intersects every mineral node in the zone. The group perform admirably as they move from quest objective to quest objective, alternately smiting wolves and bears, both creatures daring to interrupt my mining. I now have a bank vault full of copper ore waiting to be smelted, ready to make any mail armour the druid and warlock could ever want. I am focussed to provide for the group's needs.

Giving up on finding red bandanas on scattered Defias Brotherhood mages, near the Eastvale logging camp, we return to Westbrook Garrison where we are tasked to collect gnoll armbands. The new pieces of cloth to find are blue, making it an entirely different quest. Hogger interrupts our gnoll massacre as much as we interrupt his evening stroll, Hogger winning only the once as he bundles in to a brawl we start with two gnoll camps. We even try to help another mage kill Hogger, but misjudge whether we should heal the PC or kill the NPC. The PC dies a split-second before Hogger, the mob's tagged-grey colour becoming a vivid my-kill red immediately before death, leaving the mage with no paw to pick up. I apologise to his corpse before returning our attention to the gnolls.

I think we end up with seven Hogger kills for the evening, and that one mage. Another mage we encounter, a human, we merely stun-lock, thanks to overhearing a curious request in the guild recruitment channel.

The Bastards reach 10th level as a group by the end of the evening, mayhem and destruction in our wake. Azeroth beware.

1. Actual guild name to be determined. Return to post.

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Tags: azeroth, kiska, melmoth, mmorpg, world of warcraft

Crane pleasure cruise

I pop out of w-space to keep my industrial operations running. My module sales keep ticking over nicely, and I need to keep an eye on market stock levels, but I am mostly concerned with researching the material costs of the new rig blueprints, so that I can liquidate the salvage I have accumulated. With the BPOs back in the laboratory being researched I head back in Tigress II to my Lai Dai mission base, giving me the opportunity to run missions whilst I wait for an indication that others are ready to explode some Sleeper ships.

Asking for the current entrance to w-space gets me a system twenty two jumps away, which is nothing for a Crane transport ship. I undock and head to the wormhole system, getting myself ready for combat. A quick check of the auto-pilot system shows that my journey can be shortened if I head through low-sec for a while, but as five low-sec jumps for a two-jump overall reduction doesn't seem like a good compromise I stick to high-sec systems.

I am soon in the destination system and ask for a guide to the wormhole. A corporation colleague obliges, and I get myself pulled in to w-space. It is only when I try to warp to the corporation's tower that I realise there has been a miscommunication. The corporation is currently using a two-system set-up, one being a permanent w-space base with laboratories for reactions, and the occasional sortie to Sleeper sites as they spawn, the other a roaming tower that is moves between suitable w-space systems, harvesting sites quickly until the system is bare. I wanted to get to the roaming tower, where Non-sentient Ship is stored, but I am guided to the permanent tower.

There isn't much for me to do in the w-space system with the permanent tower, if only because I have no other ships here apart from the Crane I travelled in. Oh well, it may be a twenty two jump trip back but I'm still in the gorgeous Crane. And a friend turns up in her Crane, making our small region of space officially cooler than the cosmic background radiation. The evening isn't a complete waste, as I get to take a few pictures of our two ships ignoring everything else in the universe.

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Tags: crane, eve online, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, w-space

New canvas bike cover

My old canvas motorbike cover had seen better days when it disappeared. I can only assume that the cover blew off the bike in the wind and someone threw it away, mistaking the dirty and ripped cover for a discarded rag, and I can't blame them for that. It may be an unexpected cost but at least the cover going missing makes me buy a new one. This time, I get a cover not made of canvas but space-age materials! Unfortunately, the space-age happened forty years ago.

The new cover has an elasticated skirt, pulling it snug at the ground and making it less likely to be tossed around by the wind. The material is also more effectively waterproof. Whilst the canvas cover kept the water off well enough, it would eventually waterlog and the bike would get wet underneath. Not so with the new material, which repels water like duck's back. The problem is that it tears at the slightest stress.

The new material needs to be damaged before tearing becomes a problem, but all it takes is a single snag for a hole to appear and then the tear cannot be stopped. Snagging is easy when a cover is removed from and replaced on a motorbike every day. It isn't long before a couple of inevitable small rips turn in to foot-long tears in the fabric, and there is not much I can do to fix them. The material cannot be repaired with stitches, as that would only multiply the number of minor holes ready to be torn open. Needless to say, the cover becomes rather worse at keeping rain of my motorbike.

My only option is to buy a replacement cover and I move away from the modern material back to a canvas cover. It may be less effective at keeping all the elements off my bike, but it is likely to last several years before needing to be replaced, not a measly six months.

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Tags: motorbike, weather

Moving on up

Drumming through the Ozzfest gig in Guitar Hero: World Tour is fun and challenging. As I am able to post some good scores and feel comfortable through most of the long set I push on to the next couple of gigs as well. There are a couple of tracks that trip me up, and the No Doubt song doesn't quite know when to finish, but I can certainly see the progress I've made since beginning to play fake plastic drums. I have some level of coordination and limb-independence, and fills and breaks I thought I'd never get the hang of fall in to place comfortably now.

I remember the progression in difficulty that occurs throughout the gigs, where the final few gigs on medium difficulty are comparable to, if not harder than, early gigs on hard difficulty, and with that in mind I wonder if I could perhaps play an early track on expert difficulty level. I enjoy Band on the Run and recall it being fairly simplistic on drums, so I raise the difficulty and tentatively choose the Wings song to attempt as a solo track, outside of a gig. The note track flies down the screen more quickly, making me nervous immediately, but this is only to allow greater differentiation of note timing and once the beat is picked up I simply play as normal.

It seems silly to be slightly intimidated by the 'expert' difficulty level, but its name and threatening skull don't help. Never the less, I manage to play Band on the Run with some level of competence, spurring me in to attempting the early expert level gigs. I play the first two well enough, picking up the added beats comfortably, thanks to the experience gained from all my practice, and continue to play three more, until the songs get difficult enough to warrant practice in training mode to analyse the new patterns at a slower pace. But I am really quite impressed and pleased with myself for the personal progress and entertainment I am still getting from fake plastic drumming.

Admittedly, I am only mucking around on expert difficulty in Guitar Hero: World Tour because I don't have the new game yet. 'Order Guitar Hero 5 now for delivery on the release date', suggested the website of the company I order from, leaving me giggling in expectation of a weekend of rock drumming glee. But the Friday of the release date comes and goes without the postman thrusting an exciting package through my door, as does the Saturday. With no postal service on Sundays my weekend of rocking is going to be more mundane than hoped.

There is only one course to take, and that is to write a snotty e-mail to the internet company. It isn't really a problem that the game hasn't turned up. After all, it will get to me eventually and I'll play it, but it's the principle of raising expectations to generate sales that irritates me. I get a form reply back, blandly stating that it is not always possible to meet demand, which is sad if only because a simple message keeping customers informed could have avoided some frustration, as well as offering an opportunity to buy elsewhere. Unlike the company, I will stick to my word and never buy another product in advance from them again.

At least the delay in receiving Guitar Hero 5 has the positive effect of encouraging me to try the expert difficulty level, which in turn strokes my ego pleasantly. I'm still looking forwards to getting the new game, though.

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Tags: console, drumming, guitar hero, xbox 360

Twin Drakes, plan B

The flaw in my plan becomes obvious as soon as I return to w-space, and when everyone kindly tells me the plan is flawed. Having two Drakes many systems apart, fitted and ready to scramble, only helps return trips to w-space when the static wormhole¹ opens to a system close to where you enter. If the wormhole throws you out thirty jumps from where you entered you still have a long journey to reset your position, the two ships not offering any benefits. However, it is a good plan, only the implementation that is flawed.

Instead of having two ships in relatively distant systems, and travel in my fast transport ship to the one closest to the wormhole entrance, I need to keep one Drake in the w-space system at the corporation's tower and the other at my mission base, although I will still be using my Crane to travel between the two. Keeping a Drake permanently in w-space means an extra journey is needed initially. I first take Non-sentient Ship from my mission base to the POS, jettisoning my pod to return to A Matter of Brevity in k-space, piloting that up to my Lai Dai mission base and reuniting with Tigress II, my Crane.

It takes some time to move the ships around but with everything in place my transfers between w- and k-space will be much smoother and quicker. I don't need to rely on a cumbersome Drake to get me out of w-space, or ferry me many systems back home. The Crane is much faster, more agile, and is fitted with a cloaking device. Being a blockade runner, it is suited to running through low-sec systems more safely, making the appearance of the static wormhole in a high-sec island² less of a hindrance. The reasonably sized cargo hold of the Crane also allows bringing supplies and ammunition in to w-space, as well as moving Sleeper loot out.

There are no short-cuts in EVE Online. Despite my first impressions, getting in and out of w-space conveniently was never going to be as simple as keeping a spare Drake in a different region. On the other hand, once the initial effort is made the logistics simplify considerably. It takes a while to build a second Drake, fit it, and move one of the battlecruisers to w-space by itself, but now that it's all done I can enter and leave w-space quickly and with greater safety, enjoying every jump of the journey in the Crane. My opportunities have expanded considerably.

1. A w-space system with a 'static' wormhole means that the system always has at least one wormhole leading to a recurring security level—in our case, high-sec—although the location of the wormhole and the system it leads to is random.
Return to post.
2. A high-sec 'island' is a small cluster of high-sec systems that requires travel through at least one low-sec system in order to return to the bulk of connected high-sec space.
Return to post.

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Tags: crane, drake, eve online, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, scanning, w-space

Back to where I belong

Building my second Drake from the BPC is straightforwards, and I am soon smashing a bottle of champagne across the bow of A Matter of Brevity. Although I have a fair journey ahead of me to install the battlecruiser in a more convenient system, at least it is a journey I only need to make once. Thereafter, I can pilot the much faster Crane between systems, choosing the closest Drake to each wormhole as they open.

Trundle, trundle, trundle through space I go. Or, rather, my auto-pilot goes, as I load Guitar Hero in my pod and become my drumming legend alter-ego for the half-hour trip. Time passes quickly enough and I dock in to the corporation's headquarters, satisfied that the plan is coming together nicely. All that's left is to find out the system of the current wormhole entrance and head there to join in with the Sleeper destruction derby. I ask for the location in the corporation channel. 'Haaj... Let me check.'

'If you say 'Haajinen' I'll bite your nose off', I spit back. I haven't just spent the past day manufacturing and fitting a Drake, then piloting it across several regions, only to be told that a wormhole has opened up in the system of my Lai Dai mission base, a system I describe as being in the 'middle of nowhere', and one I am now thirty jumps from after purposely trying to make myself more available.

'It is Haajinen.' I'm liable not to believe him, being the same chap who sabotages my Crane invention attempts by stealing datacores from installed jobs, or by sneaking his pet ferrets in to my laboratory to gnaw holes in the blueprints. But he is also oblivious enough most of the time that he could be telling the truth. Even if he is lying, the worst that happens is I end up back at my mission base with my primary Drake, so I leave A Matter of Brevity behind and start the long journey back.

Of course, having piloted the Drake down to corporation HQ means I don't have my fast Crane to fly back, but a pod is still quicker than a battlecruiser. A bit more drumming practice later and I am most of the way to Haajinen. I have the good sense to stop off and pick up my Crane from my manufacturing base, which also lets me buy replacement gang warfare links, missing from the tower after the theft, before getting back to Haajinen and Non-sentient Ship.

I fit the warfare link to my Drake and hit vacuum. Joining the fleet lets a colleague guide me to the wormhole, which we both jump through. I warp to another member of the fleet, ship systems warning me of the perimeter outpost I am entering, activate the warfare link once out of warp and start locking on to Sleeper targets. I'm back!

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Tags: crane, drake, eve online, mmorpg, penny ibramovic, w-space