Crossing Aridia
24th August 2013 – 3.57 pmI have time for a short poke around the constellation. If I'm lucky, there will be a planet gooer in our neighbouring system which I can pop and come straight back home, satisfied with a brief stint in space. But what are the odds? Home looks bare, and I'm relying on our static wormhole to take me somewhere promising, so even though two towers appear on my directional scanner in the class 3 system it's a shame that there are no ships to go with them.
My notes suggest this system is even occupied by blues, which would be disappointing. But that was two years ago, apparently, as I unintentionally skip back a visit by stunningly managing to mis-type the system's J-number in to my notes. The actual previous visit was a year earlier—apparently me and this system get together on a once-a-summer basis—where my notes say nothing about blues living here. So what is it, notes? Have the blues-turned-grey gone one-eighty on me and are now red, or what?
The locals are still grey. Or the new locals are grey. I don't really know, but our corporations have no obvious animosity between us. And if they don't bring out a hauler or salvager there won't be by the end of the day either. I'll scan. The eight anomalies and five signatures hold no surprises, just a wormhole, two data sites, and a relic site. The wormhole will be the static connection exiting to low-sec, and I may as well see where in Aridia it takes me.
Meh, who cares which system in Aridia I've appeared in, it's all a big vacuum. Still, no one else is around, unsurprisingly, so I launch probes to scan as I point my ship towards a rock field to look for a rat. I pop a cruiser, and resolve a drone site and a wormhole, which I guess to be another unfortunate class 3 system with a static low-sec exit. Yep, called it. But maybe this C3 has capsuleers inside waiting for death to pay them a visit rather than experiencing the purgatory equivalent that is Aridia.
Nope, it's just another class 3 w-space system. Well, less than that, as there isn't even any occupation, despite my hopes that a clear d-scan result from the wormhole meant my entrance was just luckily out of range of anyone. But even though my notes suggest two towers anchored somewhere they are both now off-line, the owners looking to have been evicted at some point in the last two months. That's a shame, but with the static wormhole opened it probably means I have a K162 to find. Let me do that.
Ten anomalies, seven signatures. It's a bit gassy, but one wormhole crops up. The T405 outbound connection to class 4 w-space is a good find, but doesn't explain the opened U210 like the K162 I find last. Well, I assume that's a K162, and not as interesting as the T405, as I dive down the rabbit hole to see where it takes me: an occupied but inactive C4a. Okay then.
A blanket scan of the system reveals six anomalies, five signatures, and no ships, with exploring finding two towers on different edges of the system owned by different small corporations. And actual scanning resolves two more wormholes. Sadly, the K162 from more class 4 w-space is at the end of its life, and the static connection to class 1 w-space would be much more enticing if it weren't also dying. But if the C4b pilots opened the wormhole to C1a, and the C4 K162 is still around, there should be enough life left in this P060 to poke my nose through and catch someone being careless. Besides, if the wormhole does collapse of old age, getting home from a class 1 system is hardly going to be a chore.
Hello! A tower is visible on d-scan, and so is a Hulk exhumer, Drake battlecruiser, and two Bestower haulers. Any of them make viable targets in this system, so I start swinging d-scan around looking for the tower and hoping that not all of the ships are there. But, of course, they are. I warp across looking for pilots and again am disappointed, seeing four empty ships float inside the tower's force field. And there's nothing in the system outside d-scan's range. Okay, that's my quick look over, both in this C1 and the w-space constellation. I can come back later for more exploration, but right now I'm off home for a sammich.
3 Responses to “Crossing Aridia”
Aridia is actually quite lively at the moment because it's where Test went to sort itself out after losing the Fountain War.
We're having an ongoing fight with the local Russian residents.
That's interesting. I'll have to pay more attention when I inevitably get kicked in to that region again.
I confirm, Aridia is currently quite busy.