Wormhole types

After compiling my collection of wormhole colours I realised I was perhaps missing an important component, that of the wormhole's designation. The letter and number combination is used to identify crucial information, mostly used to determine whether a wormhole is safe to pass through or help in the calculations for collapsing a wormhole. I didn't include the designation in my original posting partly because it was outside the remit of what I was trying to achieve, which was to identify w-space class by colour, and partly because it would have significantly delayed the post, as I only needed to find one wormhole to get a pair of images but would have needed to find two distinct wormholes to get the respective designations.

Not only would gathering the designations have taken a lot more time and scanning but the information is freely available on various other sites, easily found by a simple search on any of the designations. I saw no reason to duplicate the effort or information, particularly as the other sites have a complete list of wormhole designations, accompanied by durations and mass limits of wormholes. Kudos to the compilers of these lists for taking the time to research and format the information and, most importantly, knowing where to look. Never the less, I started creating my own table of designations because I believe the lists are missing one important detail.

Each list I have found detailing wormhole types has information about the designation, single-jump mass limit, overall mass limit, wormhole duration, and w-space class or k-space security level of the destination system. What the lists don't provide is the origin system of the wormhole. It may not seem initially important to give that information, as you must after all be in the origin system in order to see the specific designation and not the K162 signifying an exit, but this quote from the EVE University site has spurred me to compile my local data in to this post:

The k162 will give more approximate information about the entrance system by using 'show info', but it's impossible to determine original mass/time limits.

I do not mean to pick on EVE University, as all lists imply the same, but know your wormhole colours and understand that the designation determines the origin system as well as the destination system, and you can infer the mass and time limits of the wormhole. It is only 'impossible to determine' the limits if there is no way to link the origin system to the designation, and it just so happens that the currently available lists do not provide this information.

[Edit: I note that the EVE University guide to wormholes actually has a misleading error in the table for wormhole names by destination. It has rows for 'intra-k-space wormholes', based on security status, but even though the wormholes connect to k-space most of those listed actually originate in w-space. This is only really a labelling problem, but it highlights the misinformation I aim to correct with my own table.]

Experience and my own colour guide can help you determine the class of w-space is on the other side of the wormhole, and now, with the following table, you will also be able to determine the mass and time limits of the wormhole, all without having to jump through. At least, when cross-referencing the wormhole type determined here with a site detailing information on that type, which I have linked to but am not duplicating. I am not intending this to be the definitive guide, as others have far more information, simply showing that there is an important extra column needed in the other guides so that it will no longer be considered impossible to tell what wormhole you are looking at when confronted with a K162.

The rows indicate the originating system, the columns the destination. Determining the wormhole type from looking at a K162 can feel a little backwards using the table, but it should be clear with a little thought. For example, if you are in a class 4 system and drop out of warp to see a K162 that, from its colour, you recognise comes from a class 3 system, you can determine from looking at which wormhole connects from a C3 to a C4 that the wormhole is of type T405. This now gives you the information required to find the wormhole's mass and time limits as normal.

I have read comments that question the utility of my matrix of wormhole colours, and no doubt the same comments will feel applicable to the above table. The comments generally ask why there is a need to rely on memorising colours when normally used sources of information will tell you where the wormhole leads, and jumping through a K162 will tell you exactly what system lies on the other side. It's a good question, particularly when understood that many pilots refer to more complete databases when exploring, letting them know the system class, the effects of any phenomenon there, how many jumps have been recorded, along with Sleeper kills and capsuleer ship kills.

Personally, I prefer to explore using my wits and information I can gather myself. It is perhaps a naive way to live in w-space but I feel it connects me more to the events around me than getting a website to tell me everything. But even if that weren't the case, there is a lot to be said for gathering as much information as possible without putting yourself in harm's way, and there is no simpler way to avoid a threat than by not jumping through every wormhole you find. If you can drop out of warp far from a wormhole and determine all of its statistics without having to jump then surely that is safer than having to jump through just to get its designation. You may need to jump through anyway, in order to scout thoroughly, but getting as much information as possible before the jump should be a goal of any competent scout.

The table is, naturally, incomplete and will likely remain that way for a while to come. There is also some duplication, notably when known space connects with w-space, but not ambiguously so, as each type has the same characteristics regardless of where it appears. There may be the possibility of two different types leading from the same class to a different class of w-space, but I have yet to encounter this situation. There may even be an error or two. As with the matrix of wormhole colours I will update the above table as and when I uncover new information along my travels.

Posted in Gaming |
Tags: eve online, mmorpg, w-space