Tales from the spacelanes...

[LittleBear]

The legal system of Elite (and therefore Oolite) is pretty barbaric. Any crime however minor will earn the Commander an Offender tag. It is legal for any Commander to kill any ship with an offender tag. The level of offence determins the bounty and the bounty goes down over time (each time you make a hyperspace jump). So in the Oolite legal system if you comit a very minor fau par (like removing the 'do not remove' label from a matterss or accidently hitting a a friendly ship) the penalty is still potentally death. Anyone may legally kill you, but only for a short peroid of time and only for a small rewards. As a minor offender you'll most likley get away with it as you are not an offender for very long and neither bounty hunters or the police may bother to risk a 30 c missile or damage to their ship to pick up the 2 Credit Bounty on your sorry ass. If you are committing more serious crimes then it's a lot more likley that you will be killed as you stay 'fair game' for much longer and both hunters and the police are more likley to bother terminating you. But any offence in the Elite universe can result in death.

[Cody]

Always 'andy to 'ave a silk around, guv'nor.

[Commander McLane]

Building Control.. SOS!
I've seen signs also that Nuit stations blow up with alarming frequency. A cluster of Nuits visible on my approach to, or departure from, orbital station.. a sudden flare, and they seem fewer. Mind you, those stations do seem to be thrown up with indecent haste.. more being added, even while I'm docked.. so if Building Codes are violated now and again, with sub-standard workmanship in the reactors leading to tragedy, I'm not surprised.
I suppose it could also be terrorist attack, or a careless docking by a ship full of ordnance..

This is due to a bug in the nuit station OXP. Please check if you have the latest version. If you have and the bug is still present, report to the OXP creator and temporarily deinstall it until a corrected version comes out.

They don't make 'em like they used to
Speaking of ordnance.. I'm less pleased than I used to be with those so-handy homing Beacons marketed as 'scoopable'. Maybe with popularity and mass demand being met hastily, and factory workers forced into too-long shifts, we have seen their quality-control standards drop? Nowadays, I buy a Beacon Launcher, deploy one, depart, return to retrieve it, do the usual alignment and approach, see the on-screen message 'Beacon scooped'.. but it doesn't reappear on my rack! No sign of it on the scope either, now - presumably it's disintegrated utterly, during the scooping process. This has happened to me repeatedly, in my current ship - a BoomSlang - having a rack with 6 spaces and at least one of those left vacant for the Beacon. I can only assume that the more recent batches of Beacons are less hardy - the old ones could be rammed and just bounced off, intact - scoopable - reuseable!

Same as above. Check that you have the latest version of the OXP. If it worked in previous versions of Oolite, it may be broken in Oolite 1.75 due to changes of the scripting interface. In this case a new version of the OXP may be available.

[Smivs]

if you comit a very minor fau par (like removing the 'do not remove' label from a matterss

Thankfully the Spelling Police are a bit more forgiving

[Fatleaf]

Thankfully the Spelling Police are a bit more forgiving

Good job, as a lot of us here would have a Fugitive rating by now

[CaptSolo]

At present I only accept level two and three Random Hits missions. These guys have five or more defenders generally piloting poorer ships than the Cobra Mk.III. It is wise not go for the mission target right off. Eliminate his protectors first otherwise you will be blown to bits, unless you have a really powerful ship or you are a really good combateer. A cloaking device comes in handy but de-cloak before you attack and it is often helpful to cloak afterwards as well.

I accepted a level three liquidation on this vile person flying a Salamander. Following my advice above I cloaked when they were ID'd on the scanner and positioned my ship behind the rear craft. Then ensued a hectic session in which my blood pressure must have risen exponentially. Fortunately a Galcop was on the scene creating a diversion, but otherwise they are virtually useless. To cut a long story short I managed to eliminate my target's protectors and he was naked as a new born babe, but the metaphor ends there. I applaud the creators of this OXP for their humour. The following messages were received by the mission target before he expired:

You'll find that today is a good day to die!
Shameful megaweed head! I'm so out of here!
Mean imbecile! You'll never catch old fender bender!

[Cody]

Reriveza… most noted for the Rerivezaian mountain lobstoid and the Rerivezaian evil poet, and a fine place for a short sojourn. But it was time to hit the ’lanes again… to get back out there on patrol, so with an empty hold I launched and loitered around the station, waiting for a convoy going my way. Soon enough, a Boa plus four launched and opened a tube to Geonbi… right on my route through to Veveesve, where I’d pick up the Serenic Arc and loosely follow it all the way to Tirizaan. Geonbi, mildly famous for its hoopy casinos and its great parking meters, is a nice safe multi-gov level 12, where the ’lanes are usually clogged with traders and Vipers. I reckoned that the convoy wouldn’t need my back-up there, and I’d be able to jump straight on through to Veveesve… I was wrong. The traders were there alright, but there were very few Vipers… and lots of bandits… groups of them all the way in-system. One long running firefight, it seemed… traders being gutted and spewing pods all over the place; their escorts battling away, with my assistance; watching pirates scoop pods and then gutting them in their turn… glorious! Eventually, I made it to station space with my hold nearly full of free booty and another fifteen kills on my tally… I’d taken some damage, so had to repair and re-ordnance, then I was ready to resume the patrol…

Two pirate Pythons after the same pod... I gutted them both shortly afterwards:

[DaddyHoggy]

Reriveza… most noted for the Rerivezaian mountain lobstoid and the Rerivezaian evil poet, and a fine place for a short sojourn. But it was time to hit the ’lanes again… to get back out there on patrol, so with an empty hold I launched and loitered around the station, waiting for a convoy going my way. Soon enough, a Boa plus four launched and opened a tube to Geonbi… right on my route through to Veveesve, where I’d pick up the Serenic Arc and loosely follow it all the way to Tirizaan. Geonbi, mildly famous for its hoopy casinos and its great parking meters, is a nice safe multi-gov level 12, where the ’lanes are usually clogged with traders and Vipers. I reckoned that the convoy wouldn’t need my back-up there, and I’d be able to jump straight on through to Veveesve… I was wrong. The traders were there alright, but there were very few Vipers… and lots of bandits… groups of them all the way in-system. One long running firefight, it seemed… traders being gutted and spewing pods all over the place; their escorts battling away, with my assistance; watching pirates scoop pods and then gutting them in their turn… glorious! Eventually, I made it to station space with my hold nearly full of free booty and another fifteen kills on my tally… I’d taken some damage, so had to repair and re-ordnance, then I was ready to resume the patrol…

Two pirate Pythons after the same pod... I gutted them both shortly afterwards:

What a fantastic story - I find myself being envious of your adventure EV!

[Cody]

I find myself being envious of your adventure EV!

I know this much, DH… by the time you’re my age, and have the spare time to get as immersed as I can, you’ll wish you were forty again.

[DaddyHoggy]

I find myself being envious of your adventure EV!

I know this much, DH… by the time you’re my age, and have the spare time to get as immersed as I can, you’ll wish you were forty again.

Touche!

[CaptSolo]

I know this much, DH… by the time you’re my age, and have the spare time to get as immersed as I can, you’ll wish you were forty again.

[old geezer]Arggh matey, I'll be pestering nursey to let me play Oolite 4.0 until I "mingle with the twinkling stars"[/old geezer] Quotation from Little Big Man as spoken by Dustin Hoffman.

My tale (much like EV's):
On second leg of the grand tour of chart 5: I did not expect much trouble on my next stop - Biesmaan, rich industrial, dictatorship, tech level 13. I was mistaken. Just as in El Viego's recent tale, it was virtually non-stop encounters with pirate bands. These guys had been making mince meat of traders and I returned the same treatment onto them. In short order my cargo hold was full either from the remains of pirate attacks or the gutting of fat pirate Pythons.

I continued my trip in-system but the torus drive had barely revved up when I was mass locked once more. There before me was an all too common scenario and after mopping up the bad guys all that remained were the delicious flotsam. I dropped a Cargo Shepherd and continued my trip to the station.

It is needless to get labourious here. Suffice it to say my lasers had more work to do before I docked. After unloading and refueling I headed out again toward my Cargo Shepherd. Upon returning my cargo hold was full once more. The tally: 24 kills and a profit of 7554 cr.

[Staer9]

It is needless to get labourious here. Suffice it to say my lasers had more work to do before I docked. After unloading and refueling I headed out again toward my Cargo Shepherd. Upon returning my cargo hold was full once more. The tally: 24 kills and a profit of 7554 cr.

Profit of 7554!!! thats almost double my record... with what nows seems a pityful 4236 Cr

Right on commander

[Azured]

The days of piloting my brand new and neatly polished Cobra 3, not yet even named at that time, out of Lave station's funnel seem to be so far in the past as I once again lock the witchdrive of Profitable Justice to my next destination. That is my way of life, to be always on the move to a new section of the galaxy, vowing to never return to a planet once visited. I pull up as the station beacon appears in my crosshairs and engage "the Witcher", as I've come to call it.

As I appear in my destination system, I barely even take note of it's facts - a system engulfed in anarchy, a specimen of planetary stone age in space, just waiting for me to deliver awe-inspiring computers to the poorly nourished and educated masses. A small reminder of danger, not yet fully suppressed, reminds me that this is probably the most pirate infested system in the galaxy. I don't care, really. I scored my first fifty bandits with a barely dangerous pulse laser, then upgraded to a beam laser to kill twice that number. Just recently I've found myself toting two brand new mil-specced lasers that have already seared their way through the hulls of many foolhardy and cocky pirates. With the brand new shield boosters and a new energy unit I was fairly confident even this backwater would bow to my combat superiority.

It turned out, however, that foolhardiness comes in bunches.

I'm making my way in-system, already many have fallen before me. I even have a couple of them still thinking about what went wrong in my cargo hold. I spot a Cobra similar to mine on the starboard side, scanner shows it to have a clean slate. Even though my scanner doesn't show them, I can see several craft approaching from the opposite direction. In just a few moments this part of the stellar void will have a lot more density. The approaching fleet comes within scanner range. Asps, Mambas, even a couple of fat Pythons plus many more. Just about everyone is already a fugitive. I do not hesitate. I plot an intercept course just before the Cobra's pilot starts frantically screaming for help.

My injectors got fried a couple of hops ago, so I can't just barge in to save the clearly outmatched Cobra. Instead, I line up the farthest Mamba and let loose with my laser. Shooting across the whole attack fleet seems to get their attention, and as the Mamba blossoms it's guaranteed I'm not their buddy anymore. The Cobra quickly revectors as the whole pirate fleet shifts its attention on me. I saved the other Cobra, now it's time to save my sorry behind.

My frontal shield collapses under intense laser fire. Just before I perform an Immelmann turn, my cooled down laser burns another Mamba. These guys have really high bounties. A hint of fear creeps in. No time for that, I think, as I level my rear laser on an approaching Asp and let loose with a long burst, nearly cleaving the Asp in half. He quickly turns away, but isn't yet giving up as he seems to try to jam a missile up my thruster. Instinctively I activate ECM and turn again to finish off the Asp. I fly through its wreckage, laser fire still splattering against my shieldless hull. My energy reserves start depleting rapidly.

Time to turn the tables. I lock on to the Python following me and let loose a missile. It gets neatly blown apart by ECM. I lock on to the second Python and launch again. This time the missile streaks through and the Python seems to shudder under the impact. I finish it off with laser fire. The rest of the pack seems to lose its cohesion after their prized cargo hauler explodes.

After that, I just engage one enemy after the other and splash them. Missiles, laser fire, it's all just a blur. The battle takes me almost to the front step of the orbital station before it's finally over. I dock manually, as usual. Can't afford to have some dumb computer mess up my craft on the finish line...

[Cody]

Good tale, Azured... welcome aboard.

[Smivs]

Welcome Commander.
Life can be full of surprises out there can't it, specially for the other guy!