A 900 ls Code Red Rat chain
14 Feb 2016Uvelius Sång
Just a quiet saturday evening at the Rat Cave, meaning that Dispatch was sweating with half a dozen cases. We got in a Case Red at 21 minutes oxygen left, which would be plenty. But the client was new to Elite and had first to figure out how to send friend and wing requests; yet he did say that he was 6 days from a target star.When I and a colleague Rat arrived, the client logged in as advised by Dispatch; I was standing by in normal space to measure the distance to his beacon. So the clock ticked and ticked while the clioent logged in, set wing and beacon ... I measured the distance, which looked as quite close at first, but came out as a hefty 902.0000 light seconds from the star -- this client tried to supercruise to the next system and got stranded. Another rat was already on its way to cover the distance, though with no orientation on the client, and was half way in his general direction. The thing is that you don't get any clues about the client's position once he logged out; so it was important to point the ship correctly and then move in a really straight line.
I pointed my GutterRat to the client's signal, jumped, confirmed and it was just a looong journey in Supercruise.
While the thrid rat orientated after my ship, we chained up in distances between 910 and 930k ls, to be as close to the client as possible when he logged in again -- and the oxygen timer would tick again.
When the client finally logged in, we invited him in our wing (in a CR case, that migfht be better than waiting for an unexperienced client), I was ripped out of Supercruise almost in an instant and saw him! No instancing.
The client, an Expert in an Asp with Fuel Scoop, was pasted in Limpets by us three and could happily continue his journey.
Bottom line: Never try to sc to another system. Even if you would get there eventually, it wouldn't work ... you have to hi wake to get to a system, no m,atter what.
Uvelius, for the Fuel Rats, signing off.
Need fuel? http://www.fuelrats.com