Oolite Darwin Awards

[Capt. Reynolds]

Oh God, I've got a couple of these...


1. Not my fault, honest guv!

I'd finally found the bad guys on a medium-level Random Hits job. Went merrily charging into the middle of the pack and let auto-target decide which one I was going after next. Everything got a bit frantic, and in the middle of it all I killed the primary target - but there were about five different ships all insulting me at once. Part of my brain picked up on something that had flashed through the dialogue stream: "Did I just see something about a Q-Bomb? Nah, can't have done - I've got the detector, and that would have gone off if someone had dropped a-" WhoooOOOP whoooOOOP wh-BOOM.

Welcome to Spacebar City, population - me.

2. Honorable Mention - Curiosity bankrupted the cat.

On my way to a bar for a new job, I bumbled straight into a fight of epic proportions between the bar's patrons and the pirate fleet of a nearby Rogue Sentinel Station. I joined in, did my civic duty, and shortly there were no more naughty Vipers to be seen. The Rogue Station was spinning gently in my front view. Mister Brain has an idea: "I wonder what happens if I dock there?" The words "I wonder what happens if..." are my equivalent of TopGear's "How hard can it be?"

Ah well. I didn't want those 10,000Cr anyway.

3. Buyer's Remorse.

Found a SuperCobra for sale just as I'd reached the point where I could just afford it with part ex. It came in bog-standard spec, and I used my remaining few credits to beef it up a touch. I didn't have to worry about missiles because the game had transferred most of my current load-out across when I bought it. Suitably chuffed with my new toy, I took it out for a spin up to the W-beacon and back, and happened across a couple of pirates - time for a combat test!

Unfortunately, more of them showed up on the edge of the scanner as I was closing on the first two, and pretty soon I was completely defensive against seven. A quick look down at the missiles - time for a Q-Bomb, methinks. Straight-line at max power for a moment to get them all on one side of me, then deploy the Q-Bomb before hitting the injectors.

Injectors that I forgot I hadn't bought yet.

Press Space, Commander.

[Cody]

Injectors that I forgot I hadn't bought yet.

That's a good one - one gets a similar feeling when they've been damaged unnoticed in the chaos of a firefight.

Welcome aboard, Capt. Reynolds!

[Diziet Sma]

Part of my brain picked up on something that had flashed through the dialogue stream: "Did I just see something about a Q-Bomb? Nah, can't have done - I've got the detector, and that would have gone off if someone had dropped a-" WhoooOOOP whoooOOOP wh-BOOM.

Welcome to Spacebar City, population - me.

G'day, Capt. Reynolds, and welcome aboard..

Aye.. that delay in the siren going off has nearly caught me once or twice.. I'm not sure how I can improve it, but will be looking into it.. keep your eyes peeled for version 1.3 of the detector if I succeed.

[Cmdr Darkstar]

I'd just like to recommend a Darwin Award for the pilot of the adder who tried to scoop a cargo pod at the same time as I did.


(Unfortunately I died not long after. I had almost reached the Geisgeza station aegis when up popped a squad of pirates - two pythons and two cobra-1s - popped up. I ran as soon as I saw they were offenders - my ship was damaged and I wasn't in the mood for any more fights - but had hardly and flue left for my afterburners. They managed to take out my rear shields and started destroying cargo before I could get out of range, so turned to fight - just as another pirate fleet showed up).

I think I might avoid Geisgeza now (regardless of it's unusual oceans and mountain slugs). First attempt to go there, I ran into thargoids. Second time, Oolite crashed. Third time, got in a fight with someone who fired two missiles into my face at point-blank range. Fouth time, mass pirate attack as described above. I think the planet must be jinxed.

[Darknirv]

I was the cause of a darwinian death.

I decided to sit in front of a stations docking bay with my hitch-hiking Adder, seeing how close I could get without smashing myself into oblivion. So I'm playing with my view and see a Python coming into dock.

The Python gets really close and changes course to avoid collision. Fair play I think and move out of the way so he can dock. He swoops back round to dock again completely missing the docking bay all together and slamming into the station. So I scooped up his cargo and sold it

[Dawn Trader]

Currently docked in gal 2 at a confederacy planet called Veneer.. looking for bounty... runing low on missiles so I bought a couple of Q missiles then went hunting.
Found a good high value Fugitive and started plotting his course with the intent to come in at his 6 and slightly below and get the angle on him... only at the last moment, he made a crazy Ivan and found us going head to head. I loosed a missile and realized at the last moment that I sent out a Q missile at very short range. He disappeared just before that great blue wall reached my ship and press commander.

[Diziet Sma]

I loosed a missile and realized at the last moment that I sent out a Q missile at very short range.

Oh man.. I laughed 'til I choked..

[Ranthe]

Having taken Atomic Annie to war at Ramaza with the Ramazan Liberation Front, on this particular run I'd taken out around 12 Ramazan gov ships, scooped up some Gov survivors and gone back to the Link base to refuel and rearm. I'd launched again and was tracking some Escape Pod beacons in the vicinity of Ramaza Station when I came across a trio of civilian ships behaving most oddly. At first I thought they were some of my RLF buddies (some of whom I could nominate for a Darwin, seeming to prefer engaging their erstwhile comrades and in one case ramming his own wingman), but these quickly turned out to be a bunch of Fugitive malcontents with some rather large bounties on their heads. Well, I'll have some of that, thank you very much!

Locked onto the first target - a Redback - then onto the next: a Tanker with a 138CR bounty! So I lined up and poured my forward mil laser onto him, destroying him in short order before returning to the Redback... who by that stage had opened fire with his laser and had launched a missile at me. Immediately hit the ECM, jinked out of the way on injectors for a few moments, then thinking I'd dealt with the inbound I turned my attention back to the Redback and his mate.

Hey, didn't I just ECM that - WHAM!

"Press Space, Commander."

[Capt. Reynolds]

Dammit, I went and did another one.

I'd started a new Commander and was just approaching beam laser purchase time, so I was still avoiding the corridor as much as possible (although I should probably have removed the Deep Space Pirates OXP as well). I was merrily jump-driving in and I saw a nice big asteroid, still outside scanner range.

"Hmm," I thought to myself, "I wonder if I can kill that asteroid with a pulse laser while travelling at jump drive speed?"

No. No, I can't.

Squish.

Press Space, Commander Pancake.

[Diziet Sma]

<chuckles>

I was still avoiding the corridor as much as possible (although I should probably have removed the Deep Space Pirates OXP as well)

There is a narrow band between the corridor and the zone inhabited by the Deep Space Pirates.. once you find it, you can usually avoid 'complications' on your way to the Station..

[Gauntlet]

First time I deployed a quirium cascade mine... Arrowing into the midst of a swarm of pirates with the Witchspace fuel injectors lit up, deployed mine, watched the pirates streaming behind me falling off the scanner waiting for the mine to deal my righteous fire only to watch with horror as the cascade reaction tracked my velocity just off my cobra's stern... press space commander

[DaveG]

Well, apart from flying straight in to the Nav beacon (as mentioned before) my personal favourite was on escort duty. We were in an anarchy system. Lots of pirates. All of them destroyed after a several particularly impressive dog fights, with my kill count doing well. In the meantime, my mother ship has wondered off and is complaining I'm out of scanner range. Reset course, Hmm - about 35Km away. Hit J, and plow straight up the Boa's exhaust pipe... Press Space Commander...

[Capt. Reynolds]

Shooting Yourself In The Foot

Arriving out of WitchSpace, I was greeted by an "Alien vessel reported in system" message on my HUD. It took me about two seconds to spot it - a Thargoid Carrier, merrily wombling its way down the corridor, and practically big enough to see from two star systems over. I decide to go do my civic duty.

Of course, whenever you actually need to get somewhere in a hurry, every trader and his dog are around, mass-locking you continuously. Even with the Military Injector Upgrade (which is brilliant) I was perilously low on fuel (as in, none) when I eventually scooted up behind the by now HUGE carrier.

There was already quite a posse of Naval and private ships nibbling at its heels by the time I got there, and seemingly having no effect on it whatsoever, judging by the green shield splashes their lasers were creating. I decided on my game plan - stay at stand-off distance, and under no circumstances get close enough to be engaged by whatever point-defence systems that big ol' thing packs.

This particular one of my Commanders (who goes by the unfortunate name of Quabbs) has a very well-stocked array of missile pylons - default loadout is a Q-Bomb, an I-Missile (those things are really good), one "dealer's choice" pylon (at this point, it was another I-Missile) and to round it off, a Cascade Missile for those situations where you want to make something very, very dead indeed. This looked to be one of those situations.

20km range, arm Cascade Missile, target, launch. Off potters the big, lumpy missile of blue death. Hmm, I think to myself, I'm not really sure that a single Cascade Missile is going to do the job. Better play safe. So I arm an I-Missile, fire that off, and then the other one too, just for good measure.

I know what you're thinking - I accidentally dropped the Q-Bomb. Well, I didn't. What I managed to do was arm the second I-Missile, swing the nose towards the carrier, wait for the lock and then launch, but not notice that I hadn't locked up the carrier.

I'd locked up the Cascade Missile.

It was at this point that I discovered how much faster an I-Missile is than a Cascade Missile. The big boy was only about 5km from my ship when the I-Missile caught up with it, and everything went a bit blue and spherical.

At least I was spared the ignominy of what would have been some pretty epic name-calling by the other pursuers, who almost certainly would have been caught in the blast as well...

[Mad Dan Eccles]

Damn you, Capt. Reynolds. That was a perfectly serviceable keyboard.

[Diziet Sma]

Congratulations on inventing a new way to BSOD yourself, Capt. Reynolds!