Making a wrong turn
23rd July 2010 – 5.25 pmI have a bomber to replace, let's see if I can do so by finding empire space. The home system's static wormhole is resolved nice and quickly, although I wonder if the signature of HFU is portentous. I jump my Buzzard covert operations boat to the class 4 w-space system on the other side. The directional scanner shows only one planet and two moons, leaving me plenty of system to explore. I bookmark the wormhole back, launch probes, and start warping around the system to look for activity.
The inner system holds a tower, seen on d-scan along with an Orca industrial command ship and a Proteus strategic cruiser. Locating the tower doesn't find the ships, though, and they are now both gone from d-scan too. It is possible they are collapsing a wormhole or maybe the Proteus is escorting the Orca out to empire space, to sell loot or buy fuel. I won't really know for sure until I either see them again or find the exit they are using. I start scanning.
My scanning of the C4 finds lots of rocks and gas, which isn't particularly unusual, and a radar site. But I can't seem to find the system's static wormhole. I even discard the final signature in the system, after hoping that a simple process of elimination would result in resolving the wormhole, and I am left with an system empty of further signatures. I must have missed something.
Indeed I have missed something. Whilst scanning the system I return to loiter near the wormhole leading back home, to monitor any traffic that may pass through. It is only when I am wondering where the system's static wormhole could be that I notice the wormhole's reference. It is an X877, a wormhole leading to a class 4 w-space system. In other words, the system's static connection. I jumped through not our own static wormhole but a K162, I simply wasn't paying enough attention.
The mystery solved, I jump back and scan the home system a second time, this time actually making sure I resolve the static wormhole. Scanning should proceed more smoothly now. Our neighbouring C4 has quite a few ships visible on d-scan from the wormhole and I soon find the tower. There are some strategic cruisers, battleships, and some smaller craft, with only two of the thirteen ships piloted. There isn't a point in the system where the tower is out of range of d-scan but I don't think it really matters, warping off to a celestial body to launch probes before returning to keep tabs on the pilots. The system's static connection is found straight away and I jump onwards in to another C4.
I was last in this class 4 w-space system around two months ago. My notes show the system to be occupied but not where the tower is, and now that I have time I go looking. I find the tower and drop out of warp almost on top of an artillery battery, but luckily my cloak holds and I can move away carefully. The tower holds two Mammoth indusrial ships and a Helios covert operations boat, all piloted. Their presence makes me wish I still had my stealth bomber in case they are planning to move. I continue scanning, noting the wealth of anomalies but dearth of other signatures in this system. The string of class 4 systems continues, as the static wormhole sucks me through to another one.
At least this C4 is unoccupied for a change. I can scan in relative safety. I resolve a wormhole quickly but it turns out to be an incoming connection from another C4 system and reaching the end of its natural lifetime. I scan all my way to the final signature before finding the static wormhole, this one leading to a class 2 system. I may find a way to empire space yet. Jumping through and starting my scan finds a wormhole almost on top of the one I came through, which is convenient. I almost don't have time to find the tower in the system before warping to inspect the scanned wormhole. It's a static high-sec exit! Oh, but it is also reaching the end of its life.
Without knowing how long the exit wormhole to high-sec will last I won't risk jumping through, particularly as I don't know how close to a decent market hub the destination system is. I will head home to take a break, hoping that the wormhole will have collapsed by the time I get back and I can scan the new static wormhole for a stable connection to high-sec empire space. The systems on the way home show no change in activity and, out of curiosity, I poke my nose back in to the C4 connecting in out the home system. The Orca and Proteus are back at the tower, now with a Tengu for company. Maybe they found the high-sec exit earlier and were able to use it. But I must be patient a little longer.
3 Responses to “Making a wrong turn”
You WH pilots are absolutely insane, and I have no idea what all your K162/X877 stuff means.
Occasionally when I'm bored in low-sec, I'll probe out a wormhole and go a couple jumps deep into random WH space, but it's always just a blind "Oooh, probed out a new WH here" and jump through (with proper bookmarking, of course). To be able to navigate with a purpose is incomprehensible to me.
Arrhidaeus pretty simple, any WH with a name tag designated as a K162 is always the exit end of a WH. As well a WH designated as anything other than a K162 is the static or entrance. So a WH desinnated as X877 or any alpha numerical like that would be the static connection/entrance to that WH.
You wacky empire pilots, with your 'stargates' and 'autopilots'. Before you know it, you'll be wanting to get out of your pods to stretch your legs by 'walking' in 'stations'. Crazy!