Overkill Sleeper fleet

The home system is back to holding me and the static wormhole, at least as long as it takes me to resolve the wormhole and jump through to see what our neighbours are up to. Not much. A tower and complete lack of ships appears on my directional scanner, and a black hole looms in the background. Launching probes and scanning the class 3 w-space system shows what lazy bastards the locals are too, with twenty-two anomalies and fifteen signatures littered around. It's not the worst system I've seen though, and it won't take long to scan.

Before I look for wormholes I want to locate the tower. My notes from four months ago tell me it will be bubbled, not that it matters for my interdiction-nullified Loki strategic cruiser, and although the bubbles remain the tower is now off-line. A new one has been erected, the previous occupants gone. It's not difficult to locate the new tower, giving me a false sense of accomplishment for the evening already, and so I scan.

Two wormholes are plucked from the noise. The static exit to low-sec leads out to the Metropolis region, and I find myself briefly in a system not close to anywhere and without other signatures. The other wormhole in C3a is now dead, apparently. Maybe it's good that I popped out to low-sec first. And so it's back to low-sec, after waiting for polarisation to end, and towards a stargate to hop to a different system, looking for more wormholes.

A couple of signatures one system across in low-sec yield a combat site and a wormhole, an outbound connection to more class 3 w-space. That'll do. D-scan is clear from the K162, though, a tower from nine months ago now off-line. Exploring the system has my bumping in to a tower of some new occupants, but no one's home. No ships are at the tower, no ships appear under my combat probes when performing a blanket scan of the system. All I see is the tower, and nine anomalies and six signatures.

A tower, nine anomalies, six signatures, and a second tower. Rather than assuming there was just the one I actually explore the whole system to avoid surprises later. Good scouting tonight, Penny. Scanning gives me gas, a relic site, more gas, gas again, and the static exit to low-sec. Standard dullness. Out I go, this time to a system in Genesis, also the middle of nowhere, but this time with three extra signatures offering some kind of promise. I resolve a combat site, relic site, and a K162 from class 3 w-space, letting exploration continue in my native environment.

Again I see only a tower on d-scan, the lack of ships not being particularly inspiring, but maybe there is a K162 to find. Or a fleet will turn up a few seconds later. A Guardian logistics ship, two Deimos heavy assault cruisers, three Talos battlecruisers, a Brutix battlecruiser, Augoror cruiser, Legion strategic cruiser, Prophecy battlecruiser, Harbinger battlecruiser, three Oracle battlecruisers, and a Sacrilege heavy assault ship is serious overkill for Sleeper combat, but the fleet is in the single anomaly in the system. Maybe they don't want to waste time.

Warping in sees the fleet smash the Sleepers with the ruthless efficiency of a People's Glorious October Revolution Tractor Factory, but they leave the wrecks behind when warping out. Whilst I can't quite believe a fleet with so many available and active pilots would skimp on the protection for a salvager I have seen similar peculiar decisions made before. I may as well loiter and see what happens, just in case a lone Noctis warps in believing the system is safe and secure.

D-scan is clear again, but no salvager appears. I still haven't explored the system fully, but I am loath to leave my perch in case I miss my opportunity of an ambush. I really would like to know if the fleet is local or not, though, and if they remain in the system, particularly given that I am sitting in the only anomaly. D-scan stays clear, so I risk decloaking in my perch, launching probes, and blanketing the system. And, from their hidden vantage point, my combat scanning probes reveal seven signatures and all of the ships elsewhere in the system.

That makes sense. I wouldn't have thought a decent-sized fleet would be mobilised for a single anomaly, so they are probably pillaging the relic and data sites too, at least for the Sleeper loot and salvage, although judging by the strength of the signatures there are only two of those sites. Still, maybe I won't have to wait long for a salvager to come. And indeed I don't. The only problem is that he's flying a Legion. Well, that, plus the fleet warps in behind the strategic cruiser to keep him company.

I think it's time to call it a night. There's no way I can do anything to disrupt this fleet's operation. I bring my probes in to the system and scan for their wormhole, assuming they are not local, and am not surprised to see that they don't flee. They know what they're doing and would probably welcome the fight. A quick scan resolves a K162 from class 2 w-space that's destabilised to half mass, which must come from their home system, but I'm not going in. It's just informative to know it's there. Instead, I turn around and head home. At least I found some activity this evening.

Posted in Gaming |
Tags: augoror, brutix, deimos, eve online, guardian, harbinger, legion, loki, mmorpg, oracle, penny ibramovic, prophecy, sacrilege, scanning, talos, w-space