Facing the despair of a C5 chain
20th March 2014 – 5.49 pmNo change at home sends me straight through our static wormhole, where I start another day with a clear result from my directional scanner and nothing in the system out of range. Is there also a static exit to null-sec? My notes say yes. Okay. Launching probes and scanning the twelve anomalies and fourteen signatures has my being distracted by a data site, being weak like a K346, but the static wormhole is right next to it, second hit.
I keep going, there may be K162s. There's gas, there almost always is, and a second wormhole crops up, but also from a weak signature. That'll be a sucky outbound connection, as well as the only other wormhole in the system. First up is the K346, with the winged serpent of Oasa shining from the other side, where a few pilots mingle and a handful of extra signatures look tempting. But in a fit of optimism I decide to check the other wormhole in the class 3 system first.
The outbound link to class 5 w-space fills me with a little dread. I can almost sense the endless chain of H296 wormholes, all of them lighting up their K162 as I initiate warp, pinging the signature to occupants of the next system in the chain, negating all of my effort in scouting for activity. Yet through I go, drawn in by reminders of better times when the discovery scanner was but an idealistic vision of someone who wanted to make exploration visible, and didn't know it would also be used for passive evil.
I update d-scan in C5a to see nothing and no one, and although a territorial control unit sits on my overview exploring finds no occupation. My notes say that on my last visit I tried to catch a Viator transport scooping a tower, which doesn't really explain the lack of current occupation but it's nice to know that someone was here at some point. I also know that I am indeed scanning for an H296.
Three wormholes are resolved from sixteen anomalies and fifteen signatures. One is a dying K162 from null-sec, also from Oasa, seven hops from the C3a exit. The second is a stable K162 from null-sec, leading me in to a system in Tenerifis where no pilots and extra signatures encourage me to rat and scan, but a data and combat site, and lack of decent rats, has me scurrying back to C3a soon enough. Back to C3a and through the only other wormhole, the static connection to more class 5 w-space.
Occupation but no activity on d-scan this time, a tower without ships. I warp out, launch probes, and scan, three anomalies and seven signatures distilled to two wormholes, the inevitable H296 and a dying K162 from class 5 w-space. It's C5 all the way. Ignoring the wormhole at the end of its life, I dive in to C5c, where d-scan is clear, a blanket scan with my probes reveals four anomalies and ten signatures, and I find my second tower lacking ships of the night.
Another three wormholes. The H296 again, an EOL null K162, and, to mix it up a bit, an outbound connection to low-sec. I think I can stand exploring one more system before giving up, after seeing what low-sec has to offer. I appear in a faction warfare system in Devoid, and realise that the wormhole clearly wasn't opened by me given the destroyer wreck sitting on top of it. Onwards, I suppose, and through C5c's H296 to C5e.
Towers and ships. Big and scary ships, and small and scary ships. And not forgetting this K162 now blinking away to any pilots of the scary ships paying attention, both big and small. That's enough for me on this all-or-nothing night, still hating the discovery scanner. Either there is no one to alert and so no one to surprise, or there are pilots to surprise that the discovery scanner is happy to alert. What a pointless mechanic in w-space.
4 Responses to “Facing the despair of a C5 chain”
You assume you are the one that opens up all those C5s? There are lots of larger alliances occupying C5/C5 systems. If you would take all their chains at any one point and combine them, I would not be surprised if they would cover a good percentage of C5/C6 space.
In the corresponding C4/C4 chains however, I dont think people open up their static (or the static of their static) all that much.
True. It depends on the current activity of the system and if any K162s are present. If no activity and no K162, it seems reasonable, but not certain, that I could be opening the static wormhole.
After your previous comment, I've been actively re-assessing my attitude towards the discovery scanner, but as I write and schedule posts quite a bit in advance this one escaped the net.
Penny, I used to feel like you do but after living in a c6 now for 2 months the wh's I go ugh at are the c4's because they seem pointless to me in that you can't get capitals through them. We live in a c6 with a c5 static. K space is always just a roll of the wh away and a wh is so easy to roll in c5 and c6 space. Typically if we need to bring in or move out ships we will get a ls k162 in the static, or roll till we do. A hs is usually within 3 on the chain always, ns we usually have 3-5 ns k162's in the chain which gives ample roaming opportunities. And if we want to run homesites we just close all the home connections and do capital escalations. I honestly don't know why I hadn't tried this out before now.
That's a good point about C4 chains, Z, as the definitely will not exit to k-space and can seem just as extensive as C5 chains. In this case, it's more that I tend to scan to a definite end of the chain, not just to a convenient exit, and the higher-class of w-space system tends to prolong any attempt to terminate the constellation.