A thoroughly enjoyable tale.. a damn shame you didn't get to your last drop in time..
Ranthe wrote:
The next jump is to Cemabe – which is a Feudal system, TL4. Which undoubtedly means that there's no friendly fuel station waiting off the beacon. I'll either have to sun-skim or run the gauntlet to the main station aegis. Damn.
If you'd had The Feudal States OXP installed, you could have refuelled at the local Hunting Lodge.. somewhat pricey, but a lot closer than the Station or Sun.
Most games have some sort of paddling-pool-and-water-wings beginning to ease you in: Oolite takes the rather more Darwinian approach of heaving you straight into the ocean, often with a brick or two in your pockets for luck. ~ Disembodied
The next jump is to Cemabe – which is a Feudal system, TL4. Which undoubtedly means that there's no friendly fuel station waiting off the beacon. I'll either have to sun-skim or run the gauntlet to the main station aegis. Damn.
If you'd had The Feudal States OXP installed, you could have refuelled at the local Hunting Lodge.. somewhat pricey, but a lot closer than the Station or Sun.
D'oh! I have Feudal States OXP installed, but I didn't think of heading for a Hunting Lodge! I'll have to remember that for next time
Commander Ranthe: Flying the Anaconda-class transport Atomic Annie through Galaxy 2. Combat Ranking: Dangerous
"Big ships take more booty on your interstellar flights..."
Still in Galaxy Two with a couple of hundred tons of failed food contract to shift, I launch out of Ersoonve (Confederacy TL15) with an additional 300kg gold contract to Isonza and a passenger contract for In Er to Ramaza. Almost immediately I find myself in the middle of a firefight outside the station before I even get as far as the marker buoy! Atomic Annie starts taking laser hits from a Corsair with a Fugitive status, so I bring the Anaconda's forward weapon to bear and start firing. Within a minute three-point-two gigawatts of military laser burns through his hull and he explodes in a shower of shrapnel and plasma – though not before letting loose a missile that stubbornly resists repeated blasts of my ECM, so I hit the injectors until the missile self-destructs.
Now it's time to leave. I initiate witchspace jump with a vectored system departure... but when the countdown reaches zero the cumulative cost of Atomic Annie's extended system-skipping from Esrilees in the south-east sector finally catches up with us. For instead of the familiar wormhole tunnel into the up-and-out of witchspace, all I see is the familiar stars of Ersoonve to the background music of a witchspace drive failure alarm. Engineering contacts me within a minute and advises that the main witchpace initiator has blown out, the resulting radiation surge also irradiating a ton of food and rendering it unsellable. We have to jettison it. I just hope it was a container of wolf meat. I hate wolf meat.
Anyway, Annie's main witchspace initiator is soon reset, and this time we jump successfully to Ramaza (Dictatorship TL8). Now despite Ramaza station being my destination on this leg, I start manoeuvring to the local fuel station to top up my tanks. Even with her weapon load of a forward military laser, aft beam laser, ECM, seven pylons loaded with six hard-head missiles and a Q-bomb, Annie's main defensive weapon is her fuel injectors – and when she's running on full injectors an Anaconda doesn't exactly sip Quirium like a high-class Sotiqu courtesan at a HoOpy Casino. But just as I'm lining up for the docking cage I get bounced by a Moray Star Boat. I have to immediately abandon my approach and go to battle stations, Atomic Annie's ponderous bulk slowly coming about to engage her tormentor as blast after laser blast slams into her shields. Eventually I manage to bring the forward laser to bear, obtain target lock, and arm a hardhead for launch before hitting the firing control. Within a minute or so the Moray is toast, reduced to an expanding cloud of gas and cargo pods, so with a 47CR bounty added to my account I go to see what else I can scavenge. Fuel scoops engaged, course set for cargo pod intercept...
… and soon two tons of food are nestled safe and sound in Annie's cavernous cargo bay. Bugger. Like I don't already have over two hundred tons of food to shift. Why couldn't it have been something nice and valuable, like narcotics? Oh well.
By this time my battle with the Moray has taken me too far from the fuel station, so there's nothing for it but to continue in the main lane to Ramaza station, cautiously manoeuvring my way around other ships and resisting the temptation to burn what little fuel I have left to clear mass-lock, seeing as Annie's massive engines on fuel injection tend to swallow sun-juice like a bunch of thirsty bounty-hunters on a “Five-for-one” Leestian Evil Juice Happy Hour bender at Lobbie's Can-Can Lounge. It looks like the Ramazan civil war is still in full swing though – I watch with some trepidation a quartet of ships off my port side engaged in battle, at least one Dominatrix and a Pitviper. They're ignoring me though, thankfully.
Occasionally during the long drag to the station another ship in the lane hails me. No, Tanker Bastian's Thunderbolt, I do not want to buy a Trumble off you. It took a lot of work to get the last infestation out when I scooped a canister of the buggers a year ago... I swear that during sun-skimming you can still get odours of scorched flesh from behind the nav console!
After what seems like an eternity I finally reach Ramaza aegis, and dock on autopilot with no incident. In Er packs up and disembarks, we refuel again and sell some computers, machinery and luxuries. We also pick up some booze and furs before our departure.
You know what I said about the Ramazan civil war while on the inbound leg? Well, true to form the bloody conflict found us again immediately after launch, as once again Atomic Annie is engulfed in a furball battle. Once again the ECM and lasers are warmed up, and soon I take out an Ionics Whitetail before receiving heavy fire from a Dart on the aft shields. I try and engage the Dart but he's too manoeuvrable, so I disengage and hit full power towards the witchspace beacon, letting the local plods take care of the rest. Annie soon clears the fracas and we have space clear enough for a standard vectored departure, so jump is initiated to Isonza (Dictatorship TL9).
Upon arrival at Isonza I get mass-locked by a civilian convoy as well as two GalNavy formations shortly after departing the beacon. I manage to manoeuvre past all three groups, and hit the torus drive – only to shortly get mass-locked again by a bounty hunter in a Pitviper, the Murderer's Executioner. The Pitviper is happily overhauling me and it won't be long before he clears out of range...
… until we both notice a convoy under attack on our port side. By unspoken mutual agreement, Atomic Annie and Murderer's Executioner simultaneously turn to investigate. It turns out the convoy – two Dominatrixs, a Pitviper and a Mamba escorting the Boa Confidential Gastronome of Dimadi V – is the same one that I encountered earlier, and they are desperately fighting off a bunch of rogue Ionic Whitetails that are obviously intent on ripping the Boa apart to claim her cargo. Atomic Annie and Murderer's Executioner both race to the convoy's aid like a pair of avenging angels and engage the Whitetails, each ship locking on to one raider after the other and methodically eliminating each target in turn. The Whitetails now find themselves the hunted instead of the hunters, as Annie alone racks up five kills and 148CR in bounties before all the raiders are chewing vacuum!
The Boa convoy soon reassembles and forms up on Confidential Gastronome – just in time to see a GalNavy convoy sweeping past like a bunch of tarts on parade. Murderer's Executioner heads off as well, leaving us behind and waiting for the speedier ships to clear mass-lock. But just as I'm thinking we've had our quota of excitement for this haul the GalNavy fleet opens up with massed fire on a target out of scanner range, and my friend the Pitviper appears to be engaging the same target from the other side of my scanner. What the...?
Before I know it, we're engaged in another battle with the GalNavy boys pounding the foe with plasma cannon while Murderer's Executioner ducks and weaves around what turns out to be another furball fight. A Dart suddenly appears on the Pitviper's six and starts tearing into his shields – but the Dart blunders right into my forward sights in the process and I immediately take him out. I search for another target... and find it's already all over. Whoa!
Murderer's Executioner thanks me for the assist, and I wish him well in return before hitting my injectors to clear both the GalNavy and Confidential Gastronome convoys. It's a long slow burn, but eventually I break mass-lock and soon arrive uneventfully at Isonza, unloading the gold and watching my credit account leap up by a not inconsiderable amount.
Still have to shift some of this two hundred tons of food though!
Commander Ranthe: Flying the Anaconda-class transport Atomic Annie through Galaxy 2. Combat Ranking: Dangerous
"Big ships take more booty on your interstellar flights..."
Keep the log of the Atomic Annie coming Ranthe. I am really enjoying reading them, it is good reading about the challenges of a trader in the Ooniverse.
Find out about the early influences of Fatleaf here. Also his OXP's!
Holds the Ooniversal record for "Thread Necromancy"
Agreed
I must confess I thought you were crazy when you started playing with an Anaconda, but it sounds like are having a great time and making a go of it. And having tremendous fun! Kudos.
Commander Smivs, the friendliest Gourd this side of Riedquat.
Agreed
I must confess I thought you were crazy when you started playing with an Anaconda, but it sounds like are having a great time and making a go of it. And having tremendous fun! Kudos.
I have found the joys of trying something I thought was going to be tedious but turned out to be great fun. That was 'fixing' the cargo capability of the player Adder, installing a passenger cabin and run a taxi service until I had enough for a S9. Great fun with the complete change of game play. I am almost convinced into an Anaconda myself. But the S9 is such a sweet ship it is a thought to park it up.
Find out about the early influences of Fatleaf here. Also his OXP's!
Holds the Ooniversal record for "Thread Necromancy"
So I finally get a nice kit to go bounty hunting, and I jump into some system with an already big battle going on between a group of GalCops and some pirates. So I swoop in and start "collecting bounties." One of the suckers dropped like 12 cargo crates when he died. Unfortunately, I never got any of of them, as there was some little scavenger jerk snatching up all the loot while I was busy not dying.
Turd's lucky I'm being a good guy (and there's cops around) or I would have turned my new lasers on him!
Star trading, across the Ooliverse. Always going forward, because there's no reverse!
If that happens once too often for my liking, then if there aren't any cops around, there might be a fatal 'accident'...
Yes, not good form... scooping booty that does not rightfully belong to them. Myself, have shown them the error of their ways. Always pleased when they eject, so I can show them the lavish furnishings of my cargo hold.
Really? Tell me another. Whoever provided that entry in the Planet Guide clearly skipped this sector of the chart entirely, and made it up. Or maybe they were just tired of living.
It's not like I crave the calm sanctuary of the more stable systems. My preferred itinerary is a diet of anarchies or the nearest I can get. You just see so much, well, life in those systems. Of course, sometimes it's your own, flashing past your eyes. And the locals can be a tad fractious. But in the end I invariably dock with more cargo than I started out with. Still, Edbeis really takes the biscuit.
I should have known all wasn't right in this part of chart 5. On the way out from Tiison I encountered one of those missionaries, you know, of the Witchspace Lobster sect. Let me tell you, his brain must have been well and truly thermidored. Seemed to think I'd eaten a close relation of his. Crazy as a box of fierce furry felines. Thing is, if these guys decide to show up and start peddling their beliefs, you just know the locals must have a few issues. He started taking a few potshots in my general direction. Seemed pretty harmless though. It was like watching someone trying to aim a laser by pointing the entire spaceship at the target. Hmm, come to think of it...
Maybe if you equipped an infinite number of these guys with an infinite number of lasers, one of them would eventually hit something. I decided to head over his way and take a closer look. I hadn't encountered this variety of Hognose before. A nice looking ship too. Wouldn't have expected anything less. I didn't have the heart to actually fire on him, he didn't seem to pose any real threat to me or anyone else he met, and he soon lost interest in fighting. At which point he informed me he wasn't afraid of anything, and suggested I was deficient in the limb department. I watched him continue on his way. I just hope the locals treat him gently.
On arrival at Edbeis it was mayhem all the way in. I found myself shadowing a couple of lone traders, so I helped fend off the local predators. But then the Thargoids showed up, and briefly everyone actually pulled together. It didn't last of course. I headed over to investigate some laser fire, and found three pilots with clean records fighting amongst themselves. That's what the clean living guys do for fun around these parts? I left them to it.
More laser fire, but the show was largely over by the time I got there. I helped mop up the last of the bad guys and resumed my course for the station, injecting past a couple of trader groups near the planet.
Before I was even in scanner range of the station I saw a stream of ships launching. Not your typical departure vectors - these ships were turning about and criss-crossing lasers. Another bar-room fracas turned ugly. I generally stay out of these things. It's not my fight, and it's like arguing with an idiot. Very soon you can't tell who's the idiot.
I requested docking permission - 15th in the queue dammit.
I find it's best to stay on the periphery. If you get in close, eventually someone turns their aim on you. And some of these guys have some serious firepower. A few close range shots from a Ghost Gunship that you were blissfully ignoring and your shields are gone. This is when those two trader groups showed up, and just sailed happily right into the middle of the action. "Sense" and "born with" crossed my mind. From my vantage point I couldn't tell which ones survived that decision.
The police ships seemed to be getting the upper hand, and the numbers were thinning. However, a couple of ships were kind of flickering in the distance. Cloaking devices mean trouble. Those are the guys who are going to come after you. Sure enough, talking of Ghost Gunships, trouble came my way. I got a few good hits in, but then I broke off as my shields began to disappear. When I came back, another vessel was firing on the gunship, and so I breezed in and finished the job.
And finally, docking clearance. There was still enough laser fire around the station to dissuade me from taking my time, so I injected towards the nav buoy and swung around. Klaxons and the screech of the shields informed me that someone had chosen that moment to target me, and, as the docking bay loomed, I noticed a message from the station informing me that my clearance was about to be rescinded to allow an urgent launch. And then I was in. And relax.
I fueled up, and then more klaxons. Jeez, now the Thargoids were back. I launched again. Not too many. I took down a pathfinder, and someone else took out a warship, and it was over. Except that Griff Krait who'd warmed up my shields during docking wanted to finish the job. Well, hard cheese mate.
So, get your guide books out, don't believe the entry in the Planet Guide, and get over to Edbeis. It has everything. Except sanity and common sense. And watch out for the Witchspace Lobster.
