Lacking in spirit
4th September 2012 – 5.56 pmA new radar site in the home system and bookmarks leading out to empire space greet my arrival in w-space. All seems dandy for a roam, until I warp to the bookmarked static wormhole and end up in empty space. It looks like I have to scan my way out as usual. Launching scanning probes finds an extra signature, this one a magnetometric site, along with the new static wormhole which I resolve. Jumping to our neighbouring class 3 system looks pretty dreary, with a tower and no ships on my directional scanner, but locating the tower almost has a surprise for me.
The well-positioned canister almost catches me, but not quite. Besides, no one is home to see my ship decloak. I warp out, launch probes, and blanket the system to reveal twelve anomalies and fourteen signatures, which seems like a lot these days. More signatures could mean more opportunities, and it seems that way today, as an initial rock site is followed by resolving a K162 from class 2 w-space and a T405 outbound connection to class 4 w-space. I continue scanning through lots of gas and a radar site to find the static exit to low-sec, and finish up with a magnetometric site.
I poke through the exit to low-sec to appear in a system in the Solitude region, seeing a ratting Proteus strategic cruiser leave moments after I arrive. That means I am alone in the system, and I too should probably pop a rat because of my once-again ailing security status. I can only find a cruiser in the rock fields, but my security status is only just negative at the moment and it may just be enough. I introduce the rat to my guns and move on, back to w-space and through the K162 to C2a.
The wormhole is now reaching the end of its life, as evidenced by its wobbly nature, but as it was healthy when I found it I have a few hours before it is due to collapse. As it turns out, that's plenty of time to see two towers, no ships, and no anomalies from the wormhole. A single planet out of d-scan range tempts me to warp across to look for playthings, but all I find is a third tower in a system still empty of ships. I'm not even going to scan for more connections, instead heading back and in to C4a to look for activity.
This is more like it. A tower is on d-scan along with a Mastodon transport and Hulk exhumer. Even so, there aren't any jet-cans or drones to suggest the Hulk is mining ore that the Mastodon is collecting, so it's no surprise to locate the tower and ships together, with no pilots to be seen. All is not lost, however, as my notes from almost two years ago indicate the static connection leads to class 2 w-space, which could be worth looking for. On top of that, warping around finds a third tower, which not only has a bunch of ships but some pilots too.
A Tengu strategic cruiser, Zealot heavy assault ship, and Purifier stealth bomber are piloted at the third tower, and an Oracle battlecruiser and Mammoth hauler float empty. And here's Fin, my glorious leader coming on-line with what would be impeccable timing, if only the ships in front of me would warp out of their tower. Instead, Fin has plenty of time to tell me that she killed our previous static wormhole because it led to a crappy system in low-sec. It's not much better now, and I tell her that 'we have another crappy low-sec exit' in Solitude.
Fin suggests collapsing the wormhole a second time to get a better connection. That would normally be a good idea and I'd zip back home to help, but for some reason my heart's just not in it today and I can't bring myself to get excited about collapsing a wormhole. We all have good days and bad, I suppose, so I leave the dozing C4 pilots behind, make my apologies, and park in a quiet corner of the home system to find inspiration elsewhere. At least I find on a final check that my security status is indeed raised above zero again, sitting at a whopping 0·0007 rating. I feel positively law-abiding.
3 Responses to “Lacking in spirit”
Hi, Penny… is it? I've only been reading your blog for a little while now, so if my inquiry has already been addressed, please forgive a noob.
I know you keep a spreadsheet of your wanderings in w-space, but I wonder how you keep track of all the bookmarks you must have. Obviously you don't hang on to two-year-old bookmarks for wormholes the way you do system notes, so how often do you clear them out? Every day? Once a week? Every time you log on or log off?
Keeping safes would seem OK, as they probably don't change much, but if you could go into some more detail about how you manage to keep track of it all, I'd be very grateful. I haven't played in almost a year, but the lure of w-space is strong! Thank you.
I keep a fairly simple system of bookmarks. At least, I think I do. It's just a matter of working out which ones to keep and which to delete, which you already allude to.
Bookmarks made in the home system are stored pretty much as normal, tidied in to folders and used when necessary. The only bookmark that needs changing regularly is that to our static wormhole, or those of other random connections in to our system.
But any bookmark made in a w-space system that is not home is unlikely to be relevant after our connection to that system is gone, which is generally under a day for most wormholes. Other wormholes in that system will be replaced, sites will be cleared, and even towers moved. These are not worth keeping.
However, there remains a possibility that we will connect to the same system with subsequent wormholes, or, if we are collapsing connections, within a day. So rather than delete everything, and rue it the moment we connect to the same system and have Hulks mining away in a gravimetric site we had bookmarked five minutes ago, I have a simple stack system.
I have a folder labelled 'old'. All the bookmarks in that folder are deleted when I first come on-line for the day, and then the bookmarks for wormholes, external sites, and towers from the previous day's scanning are moved from their respective folders to become a big mess in the 'old' folder, where they stay until the next day. The only exceptions would be safe spots I find, which hopefully will remain useful even with a long time between system visits, and are stored in an archival folder.
This lets me have a folder layout where I can keep relevant internal and external sites, wormholes and towers, but without have them becoming unmanageably numerous, whilst still allowing for the occasional lucky connection.
Thank you so much for the informative reply!