Back To Exploring

Ever since finishing my Sisters of EVE grind a few weeks back I just hadn't felt like playing EVE.  That changed this weekend as I hopped in my Cheetah and started scanning down sites again.

Saturday was an interesting time as I managed to finally find where all the gas sites are.  I found them scattered throughout non-Factional Warfare low sec in Heimatar.  I have to take a closer look but I think I could get into sucking gas into a Venture as a new activity, especially if it is profitable.  I've added Gas Cloud Harvesting V and Mining Frigate V to Wandering Rose's skill queue so I can take full advantage of my discovery.  I was a bit disappointed with my take when I ran a data site.  Only 2 million ISK in drops.  Yikes!  But I didn't have a guide in front of me and I pretty much forgot what cans I was supposed to scoop up.  Score one for stupidity on my part.

On Sunday I went over to the EVE University wiki and pulled up the information on the scatter containers and had the page open.  I also decided that I wanted to make some big money, so I headed out into null sec.  But I didn't want to crash in on an alliance and the intelligence networks they use to protect themselves, so I headed out to NPC null.

I had heard that if I wanted to travel in null sec, just traveling from gate to gate in a ship that is not interdiction nullified like an interceptor or a tech 3 cruiser was a bad idea.  Even though I was only going to make a bookmark at the gate instead of jumping through, I still warped to an asteroid belt in order not to make a straight line jump.  Since I was already there, I made a bookmark near the asteroid belt as well, just in case.  I then set a course to land 100 km from the gate and ... wound up in a bubble.

I didn't panic.  Almost, but not quite.  First, I checked to see if my cloak broke.  Nope, still cloaked.  Next, check my overview to see if any other ships were on grid.  None visible, which meant no cloud of drones would come looking for me trying to decloak me.  Good.  Next, identify the edge of the bubble and fly out of it.  Easy peasy.

Having escaped the bubble, I went ahead an proceeded to make my bookmark.  During this time I saw a couple of ships come by, either getting caught in the bubble or checking to make sure the bubble still worked.  I then decided that instead of traveling to the next gate that I'd visit another asteroid belt first.  So I traveled a good distance away from the belt, made my bookmark, and warped to a spot 100 km from my entry gate.

Or rather tried to.  That's right, I wound up in another bubble.  WTF!  After getting out of the bubble, I saw the row of 4 bubbles, two large and two small, lined up, each with a jet can in front of it.  I guess the jet can was present to decloak any ships as they flew directly from gate to gate.  Because I hit the bubble from an unexpected angle, I wasn't decloaked.  So I slowly motored away.

While making my bookmark on the gate, I saw that the patient tender of the bubbles got to make a kill.  I wish I wrote down what happened, but I saw a ship hit the wall of bubbles, another ship dive in, and then a pod appear.  I guess the victor tried to ransom the pod.  Either that or the loser didn't want to fly far because the pod turned on its self-destruct sequence.  At that point I realized I had not fit a salvager on my Cheetah.  I'll remember for next time.

In the second system I visited I found a relic site.  My first null sec exploration site!  I was a little nervous and abandoned a couple of hacking attempts when another pilot entered the system.  That was actually a good thing as one of the pilots was flying a Helios and tried to probe me down, using combat probes instead of scanner probes.  Thankfully combat probes don't work on stealthed ships.  I managed to eventually hack all the containers, but only got 4.5 million ISK in drops.  Well, and one tech 2 blueprint copy.  I guess Large Emission Scope Sharpener II rigs are fairly rare.  I can now make two of them.  Gives me an incentive to keep exploring and trying to find tech 2 salvage.

After booking marking 3 null sec systems and only finding combat and wormholes the rest of the time, I flew back to my home in low.  Along the way I found a few more gas sites and one more data site.  The site yielded another 2.2 million ISK in drops (two cans were empty) plus a 3-run BPC to make Medium Ancillary Shield Boosters. 

All in all, not the greatest weekend I've ever had exploring.  What saved the weekend was that I not only operated for a couple of hours in null sec, but that I also came away with my first tech 2 blueprint copy I've found.  Also, finding where I need to go in order to find gas clouds is a definite plus.  So perhaps I'm just better set up to have a more productive time next weekend.