Looking for ships, getting a Legion
24th September 2013 – 5.59 pmI come on-line and settle in for another evening of scanning. Not that I got far yesterday, as I recall. But already I see four unexpected signatures in the home system, so I launch probes and get my mojo working. The first signature sits where the K162 from class 5 w-space was unsuccessfully collapsed—or successfully critically destabilised, depending on your point of view—the second where our static wormhole has been for the past couple of days. W-space is glitching, it seems.
The C5 K162 isn't there any more, neither is any other wormhole to take its place. It's a ghost signature. I trust our static wormhole is actually present, so concentrate on the other signatures, which are a known pocket of gas, a K162 from class 2 w-space, and an actual C5 K162. That'll do. I'll check the class 2 system first, as it may simply lead out to high-sec.
Jumping to C2a has nothing appear on my directional scanner, which is apparently a bit of a change from my previous visit eighteen months ago when there were fifteen towers in the system. Now there isn't even one, and although the system is hardly tidy the twenty-three anomalies and eight signatures won't take much time sifting through. So sift I do, and all I can find of interest is the static exit to high-sec. Whoever came this way must have disliked what they saw and killed their connection.
As the exit from C2a leads to an unremarkable system in Genesis, I head straight back to w-space, across C2a to the home system, and back further through the other K162 to C5a. There are no Tengu strategic cruisers bouncing back-and-forth like flies trying to use an open window this time. Indeed, all looks quite sleepy in the system, with two towers visible on d-scan, no ships, and my being spat eight kilometres from the wormhole. If the towers weren't so easy to locate for reference I'd turn around now.
There are six planets and six moons, spread almost equally, with only one planet hogging two moons for itself. I warp to the first tower easily enough, noting its location and tagging the corporation, before warping to where the second should be but isn't. Apparently this tower isn't as easy to find as it should be, sitting off-grid from the moon. I've seen this before, although it seems to be rare.
I consider slowboating my way towards the tower's actual location before a bit of maths shows me how long I'd have to do this, and realise that, with no one in the system, I may as well drop probes and resolve its position the easy way. Done. I'd better keep this bookmark for future visits, so mark it appropriately, and now I'm out of here. I warp to the wormhole and jump home, and make my first visit to our neighbouring class 3 system.
A tower and no ships, what a delightful surprise. The tower belongs to a three-member corporation too, so I don't think I can expect to see anyone come on-line, and I simply launch probes and scan. Data, relics, gas, gas, gas, gas, gas, wormhole, gas, gas, relics, and data. That's pretty boring, even when reading it back. To think I spent time identifying them all. And with the one wormhole I suppose I'm going to low-sec.
Exiting C3a puts me in The Forge, an almost-convenient number of hops from Jita, and although there are plenty of potential pirates in the system both stargates look clear. I think w-space is quiet enough that I can spare the time to buy the replacement Legion strategic cruiser I carelessly lost recently—even with a Navy Issue Caracal appearing a hundred kilometres from the wormhole, as it promptly warps away again—particularly as I managed to somehow ignore the direct connection to Amarr the other day.
The shopping trip is simple enough. I go home, ditch the Loki, take my pod out to low-sec, and have my auto-pilot point me stargate-to-stargate to Jita, as I buy the ship and modules en route. The total seems more than I expected, so perhaps I should be more careful with this one. The first hurdle is getting the ship home, but this is achieved easily enough.
Still the stargate in low-sec is empty of ships, and still w-space looks clear of any other capsuleer, even with one last look in C5a and C2a in my Loki after stowing the Legion at our tower. I'm finished for the night, happy with at least being a little productive.
4 Responses to “Looking for ships, getting a Legion”
I never autopilot in a pod. It takes only half a minute to get a shiny new Ibis. And it's a lot more EHP around me (not to mention a warning when locky-siren-boom-locky) if someone chooses to go criminal.
Ah, well, I use the autopilot only to highlight the route. I don't actually give up the reins.
I've yet to encounter a tower that is offgrid from the moon warp-in. I've tried (unsuccessfully) to make it work on my own POS's. Do you happen to know how to set it up that way?
-E
As I understand it, the anchor points are pre-determined and fixed. I was a little taken aback when I first witnessed one of our towers being anchored, as Fin dropped it where we landed and then it blipped a hundred kilometres behind us. There was no choice of position.
Maybe the couple of off-grid towers I've seen are owing to minor bugs. I can't really say.