Oolite Bulletins

I can't understand how to use these space lanes. Can anybody explain a bit ?

Hi Mad Hollander.

Please excuse me if I've misinterpreted your question but I think some of the recent discussions may have confused you...

A space lanes is simply the direct route between any of these things:

Planet
Sun
Witchpoint Beacon
...and arguably some others

Apart from being efficient routes between each other, the only real significance is that the witchpoint to planet lane is the only area populated by ships in the core game (i.e. without oxps).

There's been quite a bit of discussion about it recently because it can be tempting for beginners to exploit this and leave the lane to head to the planet very safely even in the most dangerous of systems.

So lanes could be thought of as straight lines. You only use them by following them and their only advantage is that they make the shortest distance between two points.

I hope that helps. If not, you shouldn't have to wait too long before someone more useful comes along

Redspear wrote:

...the witchpoint to planet lane is the only area populated by ships in the core game (i.e. without oxps)...

Hang on a sec, I forgot that other ships go sunskimming too

That should be, "the lanes are the only places populated..."

Redspear wrote:

That should be, "the lanes are the only places populated..."

Hmm... the off-lane rock hermits are populated too.

If, on the other hand, you are referring to the L1, L2, L3 and L4 lanes of, for instance, Clymangus' vector-map of Galactic Chart One.. they are mostly background "colour", to make the Ooniverse seem more 'alive'.. I believe some passenger-liner OXPs use them as (NPC) routes, and they get brief mentions in other OXPs, such as cim's New Cargoes OXP, but they are not something the player can "use", as such, other than to identify a particular region of space.