From Little Acorns Grow

It’s amazing how fast a concept can flourish. One moment there’s nothing, a cold, empty void, and suddenly, before you can count to ten, there’s a spark, followed by a fierce conflagration of ideas that blossom into exciting reality. Therefore, where there was no hope of it ever happending this year, mostly due to the culmination of the Second Thargoid War, Buckyball has been reinstated for a third season!

I think the spark that ignited the frenzy that spawned the Triple Eight (the title given to the third season of eight races) has to be down to the Elite Dangerous development team and the introduction of the new frame shift drive with the overcharge function. A discussion on the Buckyball discord began shortly thereafter focused on how this new mechanic could be used in races. Before long eight races were put up for “bidding” and, not very much later, eight patrons put themselves forward to host a race. It was that quick.

Buckyball seasons from experimental frameshift drives grow!

I was both excited and apprehensive about this. I was dying to try Buckyball again, and really hoping that there would be another season, but as the months passed this became more and more unlikely. I even had a ship prepared and engineered ready (more about that after the second race) but I felt guilty about dropping out mid way through the second season last year and was worried that all those same emotions and sense of burnout would return with a fury once more.

But as the old adage goes, nothing ventured…

The first race, once again hosted by Sulu promised to be a nice simple introduction back into Buckyball. Although, as you have probably gathered, with the unlimited class restricted to just one ship – the plucky little punches-far-above-its-weight Sidewinder Mk I. Now, the Regulation Cobra is a fun old ship, but as my time in game has been a lot less than it has been in recent years, and owing to my complete lack of skill in piloting My Favorite Headache last season I thought I would stick to unlimited this time. I hoped I would make a lot more progress if I just concentrated on one ship for each race, and one I know I’ll have a lot of fun flying. As I have said, I already have engineered one of the RushFleet’s ships specifically for Buckyball but I had also partly engineered the sidewinder too, and so, a love affair with the Finding My Way began to spout!

Cmdr Leeya Geddy and her beloved Sidewinder Mk I

All we had to do this time was to run a simple, preset course, starting and finishing at Wright Station in the Okinura system. No need to determine an optimal route this time (or so I thought), each location had to be visited in a certain order. Even simpler! Marvellous, I thought, a few runs in my trusty Sidey and I’ll have this course sussed. There were a few simple shenanigans to perform but they were similar to ones I had done before so they shouldn’t have been much of a problem either.

Oh boy! Was I wrong!

The first couple of problems I thought I had prepared for – this is a trip of a few hundred light years and there’s little point in attempting this unless you have a grade 5 engineered FSD, the one in the Finding My Way already had one by this time and, with the deep charge experimental and a size two guardian frame shift booster, it gave me a jump range of 40 light years. Then there’s the tiny fuel tank. A 2a fuel scoop should deal with this just fine, so long as I select only fuel stars in the auto-router. But I had neglected to take into account just how hot a Sidey can get. And that’s both the size two slots used up, leaving only a size 1 slot for a shield.

To deal with the heat, and to help with being able to jump while fuel scooping (which I thought would give me an advantage) I decided to swap out the slightly overcharged power plant and engineer a nice cool low emission one, and also swapped the deep charge experimental for the thermal spread on the FSD. Yet this gave me very limited power which meant that the shield had to go. I engineered the lightweight hull to take as much punishment as it possibly could but I would still have to be careful and this would come to severely limit my options later on.

The scientific installation at LFT 1748, the required tunnel situated right at the top of the structure.

The first shenanigan was a Buckyball staple, flying through a tunnel at the scientific installation at LFT 1748, then flipping over and flying straight back through from the other side. It didn’t take long to find the correct tunnel and was easy to find again once I’d studied the place for a while.

It’s a pretty long tunnel, so if your approach isn’t straight enough you can panic a little and this is what happened to me on my first few trial runs but I never really had a problem here. It lulled me into a flase sense of security somewhat because the size of the Sidey’s fuel tank soon presented yet another complication.

The route to the first location was fine but the route to the second, Ruchbah 2 would always plot via the red dwarf binary system at NLTT 2224. Only you don’t drop out of hyperspace at the red dwarf, you drop out at the white dwarf despite these stars being filtered out of the route. The thing with having to go and visit a body or orbiting installation at a system is there is no time to scoop.

And, pretty though they are, once you’ve flown through the tunnel at LFT 1748 then plotted a route to Ruchbah, then jumped away and hit the white dwarf you have no fuel left to go any further, and a 7000ls trip to scoop that fuel. The only way around this is to add another bookmark that bypasses this system and then jump to Ruchbah from there.

Next shenannigan was proving to be tricky. Ruchbah 2 is a large, hot world with over 4g of gravity. Landing there wouldn’t normally be a problem but doing it fast would require practice…and a shield! So I was going to have to approch more slowly. The rings also play havoc with the gravity breaking approach but seeing as my gravity breaking skills are limited to orbiting bodies only at the moment this mattered little to me. What was concerning, however, was making sure to land on the correct side of the planet to avoid the next jump being obsured, which means plotting the route to the third shenanigan had to be done before you begin your approach so you can make sure the next jump is behind you before attempting a landing.

Ruchbah 2

The third shenanigan is the centerpiece to the whole race. We had to land within 400 meters of the abandoned mining settlement of Dav’s Hope, take off and perform a Limbo under the gantry (the regulation cobra is too big for this so comanders had to disembark and jump over it). Easy, really, if you take it nice and slow but Sulu wasn’t going to let it be as straight forward as that!

Oh no!

He gave us a choice, the faster we flew under the gantry the more time would be taken off the total. Just one minute for going over 100 m/s right up to six minutes for travelling at an insane 600 m/s! As you can see on the left, there isn’t a lot of room to spare and there is a speaker post right in the centre of the main thoroughfare that gives you mere milliseconds to pull up afterwards.

Because of my lack of a shield I found that 100 m/s was my only option here. Any faster and I risked leaving the multiple twisted carcasses of all my runs, along with my dreams of becoming a better Buckyball pilot, rotting on the surface of Hyades Sector DR-V C2 – 23 a5.

I was beginning to regret my strategy.

The next stop was more of a respite than a shenanigan, the Christian Terminal outpost at Cail was somewhere where we could refuel and repair, the repairs being much needed but it also changes the strategy. You don’t need to scoop here or have much fuel dropping into the system because you can refuel at the place we have to land. It was the penultimate stop that would cause me the biggest problem.

This was the final shenanigan, flying through the pillars of the Red Tunnel Drilling installation closely orbiting body a3 of the Ququve system.

So, two more problems here. Firstly, the installation comes under attack as soon as you arrive and that makes you a target. Secondly the whereabouts of the “pillars” are not immediatley obvious. So much so that on my first, what I thought was a completed run (after many failed runs due to explosions and poor flying) I discovered, whilst uploading the evidence, that I had flown through the wrong part of the structure. Problem, after problem, after problem. Plus I was still overheating. So, just to be able to initiate a hyperspace jump whilst still fuel scooping and not overheat at all, I added a heatsink launcher.

Complex Buckyball runs from seemingly simple Buckyball runs grow.

My first actual completed run was dire. Landed on the wrong part of Ruchbah 2, a pathetically slow limbo under the gantry at Dav’s Hope, and it took me an age to locate the pillars at Red Tunnel Drilling. And then an extra jump appeared out of nowhere on the way back to the finish. That little heatsink affected the jump range just enough to put the cowpat icing on the mud cake of my run. I was aiming for a finish time under 30 minutes with the bonus time subtracted from that. But, as you can see, my (as far as I’m concerned) sub standard attempt only netted a time of 32:20 with the bonus subratcted. Deeply frustrated, I decided it was time to completely alter my strategy.

Gone was the low temperature powerplant, back in with the overcharge. Gone was the thermal spread on the FSD, back in with the deep charge. And I put a fully engineered biweave shield in a size one slot along with the heatsink that I would now most definately need if I wasn’t to get melted to lump of metal and seared flesh around one of the stars. My jump range was still a tiny bit substandard but I noticed the G5 engineering hadn’t been completed to 100%, so I put that straight and that gave me the range I needed. It was time for a much bolder, Buckyball approach. I was going to get a decent time or fly this ship to pieces trying!

Beefy, sado masochistic sidewinders from cool, delicate sidewinders grow.

I practised flying a lot faster under the gantry at Dav’s Hope and found that this new beast of a ship was a lot tougher than I imagined. It wasn’t long before I was flying under that thing regularly at over 300 m/s! Back to the start and this time, I was flying in anger!

This time I didn’t care if I overheated, didn’t matter, just fly through it, pop a heatsink if need be. I was still a little careful at Ruchbah 2 but managed to approach much faster than before and landed hard enough to warrant a bounce! Managed to pass under the gantry at 406 m/s but this came with a flip and in my confusion I flew the damn ship upside down, scraping along the ground and back into the settlement. It took a while to get re-orientated and then it was off to Cail. Manged to get my ship to rear on the pad at Christian Terminal before docking but it wasn’t too bad, but then it was time for Red Tunnel Drilling again.

The pillars at Red Tunnel Drilling. Well camouflaged!

Those damn pillars! I swear, they relocate to a different part of the installation every time I visit! They are invisible until you are almost on top of them. It took me what felt like a millenia to find them and, eventually, I did. Now it was just the two jumps to Okinura and the finish.

27:25! Not bad, but I knew I could do so much better!

More practice, more hurtling toward the gantry at Dav’s hope, including a violent connection with the crossbar that wiped out my shields and all but wiped out my hull too! Yet more familiarisation with the layout at Red Tunnel Drilling and it was time for a final attempt. There wasn’t much time left, I would have enough for, at most, another three goes.

The pass through the tunnel couldn’t have gone much better and I broke through to orbital flight over Ruchbah 2 in record time, although I hit the ground so hard and with a bit of forward momentum that I flipped. Took a while to reset and land properly and it was time for Dav’s hope. On the way I overheated drastically on the second scoop -jump as the key I had assigned to the heatsink just wouldn’t work!

I was heating up beyond 200% and the hull was falling apart, yet still I plouged ahead, scooping while the FSD charged until it was time to turn toward the target system and jump. I arrived at Hyades Sector DR-V C2 – 23, the heatsink finally deployed, and I was cool again! Landed fine at the abandoned mining settlement, took off and backed up to just over 300m to make my approach for the Limbo, I accellerated to 500 m/s throwing my little ship toward the gantry and hit the crossbar full on once more. Somehow, it only minimally damaged the shields and I backed up for another go.

This time I made it, pulling up just in time to skip off the ground, causing me to spin wildy around to face the settlement. Then up, up into the sky to make my way to Cain and then on to Ququve.

This time I knew exactly where the pillars were and I happened to jump in right in front of them. I sailed right through, albeit a little more cautiously than I was happy with and then went back to the finish.

So! How well did I do this time?

Thirteenth! And with a bonus adjusted time of 23:24! I was very proud of myself, and was particularly satisfied, rather than frustrated that I could have saved at least a couple more minutes, maybe a bit more from all the mistakes I made in that run.

I am gravity breaking more consistently, flying more dangerously and with far less fear. And that last run was the most fun I have ever had, not just in Buckyball but in the entire game of Elite Dangerous!

Insane, ecstasy fuelled Buckyballers from frustrated, burned out Buckyballers grow!

A massive congratulations to Sulu for hosting a mighty-oak-tree-mendous (sorry) race! And massive congratulations to Alec Turner, Caelum Incola, Shaye Blackwood and Ozric for their incredible times in both classes and another massive congratulations to EVERYONE who took part. You are all, without exception, incredible human beings!

Next race is in late May and is hosted by MrIndigo.

It will be called Ring Tossers.

Be there!

More Effin’ Life!

I must admit, I finished Geddy Lee’s biography with a tinge of disappointment. Not because I hadn’t enjoyed reading it of course but because, here and there, Geddy hints at large parts of his writing that he was persuaded to leave out. That his editor didn’t think we’d be interested in. That, somehow, his memoirs would have seemed far too bulky had it all been left in. Yet I fail to see how this could be. My Effin Life is the most thoroughly engrossling autobiography I have yet devoured. Geddy’s writing is vivid, compassionate, funny (often hilarous), tragic, horriffic, insightful and poignantly philosophical. He writes about the wave of his life as if we are surfing it right with him and, if I’m being brutally honest, I could have done with an awful lot more of it.

Firstly, we are given a fascinating insight into his young life as the son of immigrant Jewish holocaust survivors, trying to come to terms with the juxtaposition of his Jewishness and growing up amongst gentiles in fifties and sixties Toronto. We see how having to face the, often brutal, reality of predjudice from his peers begin to mold the Geddy Lee we adore today. We see how his desperation to escape the rigidity of his upbringing especially during the loss of his father drove him into becoming the fastidiously dedicated musician who has so enlightened our lives these past decades. By the end of chapter two, he is on the brink of joining (in my very humble opinion) the greatest rock band of all time and we are desperately eager to hear it.

There is, however, a piece of the puzzle that is Geddy Lee which is fundamental to our understanding of him. A whole chapter of the book is dedicated to describing, in shocking detail, the experiences of his parents, mainly his mother, during the Holocaust of the second word war. There is no holding back with the horriffic narrative as Geddy relates to us the terror his elders were subjected to during those times.

It is very difficult to read, and must have been even more difficult to research and write. As I came to the end I could’t stop shaking, and tears began to flow – so powerful and bleak is his observation. Yet the chapter contains healing as well as torture, and though the journey on which we are taken is overwhelmingly terrible, we are left with a stong sense of relief.

We then realise how lucky we are that Geddy exists at all. The story of the romance that existed between these two brutally oppressed teenagers both of whom regularly cheat death, surrounded by and are the recipients of unspeakable cruelty, become separated and yet still find each other soon after their liberation by the allies is staggering.

It’s more or less all Rush from then on. Although Geddy does address personal issues that deal with the conflict that being in a successful rock band and trying to raise a family inevitably brings. We learn of the difficulties original drummer John Rutsey appeared to have with playing in a full time band, especially one where his bassist and guitarist wanted to go musically in a different direction to him. We feel like a fly on the wall when Neil turns up to that, now legendary audition. We learn of all the drug taking the trio indulged in that, once they realised it was becoming detrimental to their music, they had no problem giving up. Like most groups, Rush spent the bulk of their early touring lives supporting more established acts like Kiss, Aerosmith and Hawkwind and we find out which bands were helpful and which were most definately not! We learn that Geddy can really bear a grudge! We see how being away from their families for such long periods can affect a touring musician in bizarre ways. We see how their approach to writing music changes and matures from album to album. We learm how fame affects Geddy and see how he has to change his way of life to deal with such invasiveness.

We are taken right through all the stages of Rush’s career, up to 2112, to Moving Pictures, to Hold Your Fire to Test For Echo. We gain more insight into their break with Terry Brown and their relationsips with subsequent producers. Mishaps, when recording, mishaps during touring and almost losing whole recordings before mixing.

Alex silently feeling less important as he sees Geddy’s obsession with keyboards seduce him into gradually marginalizing the guitar. Neil becoming more and more alarmed by the attention of his adoring fans and withdrawing from meeting with them completely to save his sanity (we hear this, of course, in the lyrics to Limelight) and we also learn of Geddy’s adoration of Neil’s writing and in particular his drumming.

Geddy doesn’t just concentrate on the band either. We get a lot of candid confessions on how he had been neglecting his relationship to his wife and how they were becoming alienated from each other due to their busy independent careers. Unlike most high profile marriages though, they get through it all with patience, therapy and hard work and are still very much in love to this day. We hear about all sorts of things, but the light that shines brightest through it all is just how dedicated a writer and performer of music Geddy Lee really is, and how incredibly close he is to his bandmates. We always knew what a tight knit band they always were, but exactly how tight I had never fully realised. Rush endured and thrived where other bands, whilst being great songwriters and performers, couldn’t last more than a few years as the same lineup. It seems vicious tantrums, childish outbursts and arguments over royalties were never on the itinerary for Rush.

I’ve always thought that Alex Lifeson is the most underrated guitarist in the world, and was very heartened to hear Geddy echo this statement. I love the way Geddy describes Alex’s genius, how he so spontaniously creates and writes music. We cannot ignore Alex’s utterly chaotic sense of humour and mischief, sometimes getting the other two into all sorts of trouble. The more you read, the more you realise that not only do the three compliment each other perfectly in skill and viruosity, but also in personality and temperament. You would be very hard pressed to think of another band as talented, close, and successful as Rush.

It all comes crashing to a halt, of course, when the tradgedy of Neil losing his daughter in a freak car accident and then his wife to cancer eleven months later hits the band. Geddy lets us realise how badly this affected he and Alex. How they worried about their dear friend as he nurtured his “little baby soul” by spending endless months travelling solo on his bike across North America. We get to learn how throwing himself into the solo project that would spawn the marvellous “My Favorite Headache” helped him cope during the time Neil was stuggling with his losing his whole family. This then gives us a unique insight into how difficult it was for the band to write, record and then tour the album Vapor Trails when Neil eventually felt he could return to being a professional musician once more.

The seemingly heady and blissfull days of the final two albums then drive the book towards its conclusion. Geddy treats the time encompassing the Snakes and Arrows and Clockwork Angels periods as some of the happiest times he’s ever had as a musician. So much so that we can hardly blame him when he resents how happy Neil is when their final tour finishes on August 1st 2015.

Geddy comes to terms with it, of course, but the tone as we witness him slowly realising that this is most likely the end is painful to read.

The final pages are hard to get through. Seeing Geddy hear of the news of Neil’s illness while he is walking in England’s Lake District, and then reading about how they spend their last months with him, all the while keeping the illness a secret from everyone was very moving. And then when Neil finally passed, the funeral, the drinks they had to remember him by, its as if Geddy’s grief wells up out of the page and smothers you so completely it’s impossible not to let the tears flow.

It’s plain that Geddy misses his friend desperately. A bassist and his drummer need to share a special, close relationship on stage and Rush were one of the few bands where it was shared offstage too. Geddy and Alex are still hurting, as we all are as dedicated Rush fans to some degree, not only because of the death of Neil but also because of the death of Rush.

I get the sense from this book that I need to “let Rush go”, so to speak. It was a fantastic time while they were performing, full of the very best rock music you will ever hear. We are all exceedingly privileged to have lived during this time and, as a dedicated fan, I am proud to have been a tiny part of their story as it raced along. But there will never be any more Rush. Geddy and Alex may well write and perform together with other musicians, but both acknowledge that it will never be Rush. It’s almost as if I have been set free from the burden of yearning for them to reform and start performing once more. And this is a tremendously reassuring understanding.

Yet this is not the end for Geddy. He may not say it directly (lots of “maybe'” and “if the time is right”) but I get the idea he is itching to get writing and recording with other musicians and I’m pretty sure he would love to play new material live again. I really wouldn’t be suprised to see at least one more album followed by a modest tour. And when he does, it’s a safe bet Alex will be involved too.

LIke I said at the beginning, I enjoyed this book tremendously, but I can’t help wonder about all the stuff Geddy was told to leave out, or cut shorter. I’m all for being succinct (and am regularly wanting in this regard with my own writing) but I could easily read a whole other book of stuff that wasn’t mentioned in this one. I’m not saying he should, I’d much rather he wrote more music instead, but there must be a thousand and one more wonderful stories from his life I would love to read.

The Next Level Of Exploration!

Now, I’m no seasoned explorer. I suppose would describe myself, despite having reached “Elite I” in exploration, as only actually being in the region of Scout, or maybe Surveyor. Barely halfway to being Elite. I still have a long, long way to go and there are explorers out there in the black whose ground I am not worthy to even grovel on. But that doesn’t mean I haven’t come an awful long way to get to where I am now. I’m a slow learner, I suppose, but recently I’ve felt I have finally reached phase two, if you will, of exploration expertise.

Just before my first ever exploration voyage in my Krait Phantom: Waves Of Hanajima

When I began exploring it was simply to choose a destination, make sure I used a ship with a seventy plus light year jump range and then get there, and back, in as few jumps as possible. Back then a system would just blend into the next system and even though I made a point of FSS scanning every single one, it seemd to take forever to get to where I was going and then, once there, even though the destination was kinda cool I was both too mind numbed by the journey out and half dreading the journey back to really take it in properly.

Oooo! Neutron star! How nice!

And that is basically how I conducted my exploration endeavours until I upgraded my PC and downloaded Odyssey. Now, Odyssey changed exploration completely for me, as it did for most people.

One of the first bio signals I ever discovered! With the Brenda Zephyr in the background.

Scanning for exobiology on tenuous atmospheric worlds is a huge bonus for exploration….

On one of my alternate accounts, I travelled in a 55ly range Asp Explorer to the tip of one of the spiral arms…. 60,000 light years there and back, give or take. It took a long, long time – the best part of a year in fact, but it gave me invaluable experience. Finding exobiology became a lot easier, and I began to learn what to look for in a system that might make for an interesting screenshot. Yet I was still just picking a destination (in this case the next DSSA carrier on the way to where I wanted to go) and using the galaxy plotter to plot a direct route. Again systems just came and went and began to merge into one another and there were times when all I wanted to do was to travel the next few dozen light years as fast as possible to drop all my bio data off at the nearest Vista Genomics.

The DSSA is actually a godsend for budding explorers. Many old school explorers, before the time when the galaxy plotter would plot more than 100 light years, tend to scoff at the ease of exploration in Elite Dangerous these days. You have to hand it to them – some of them needed to use trigonometry to find their way anywhere outside the Bubble. I myself hold intrepid early explorers such as the legendary Zulu Romeo in awe. It was such a dangerous occupation back then, filled with the risk of getting lost, running out of fuel and crippling space madness due to not seeing a soul for months or even years on end. Remember – there was no engineering back then either! Now we have the Deep Space Support Array – a distribution of fleet carriers donated by wonderfully altruistic commanders, spread across the entire galaxy offering a range of services from repair and restock, to Universal Cartographics and Vista Genomics. Some even sport a bar in which exhuasted spacefarers might relax and somewhere where accident prone exobiologists might restock their first aid packs and energy cells. There are usually two in every region of the galaxy meaning there will always be somewhere reasonably nearby to land, rest, recouperate and sell your data.

Another tool that helped an immense amount around that time was my discovery of Elite Observatory. This is a fantastic little application that you can install alongside Elite Dangerous and it can tell you a number of things that may not be immediately apparent during the FSS scan. Elite Observatory will tell you, aurally if you so choose, what interesting aspects exist of any body that you scan. This can be a great tool for finding places from which to take marvellous screenshots. Close to a gas giant’s rings? Highly eliptical orbit? Ringed landable body with atmosphere? It’s all pointed out for you when you scan in case you want to investigate and view some of the astounding vistas to which it points. If there’s one thing that drives us explorers around the galaxy it’s the lure of a beautiful screenshot!

Towards the end of my alt’s journey back to the Bubble, I became fed up of exploring in the same old ship and decided to take out a ship that was immensely fun to fly rather than one that was better suited to exploration.

And so, after switching back to my original account I opted for the Imperial Courier. Not all that good for exploration really but lighten it as much as possible and give it a fully engineered FSD with a Class 3 fuel scoop and Guardian FSD booster and it has a sevicable jump range. There is still room for a couple of SRV bays, surface scanner, AFMU, shields, everything you need. Plus if you whack in some 3a enhanced thrusters from Professor Palin and fully engineer them then, because it is already rather light it will now travel very very fast.

With the courier, I was beginning to get into the philosophy of exploraiton.

“But you don’t need a fast ship for exploration!” I hear you wail. No, you don’t – you’re right, of course, but I didn’t want to just explore – I wanted to explore and have lots of fun. I also wanted my courier to look great so I gave her a chrome paint job and named her the Silver Machine. All part of the fun! Also I wasn’t going to travel all that far. Just a couple of thousand light years from the Bubble and back, the main focus being exobiology.

Finding a water atmosphere is always a bonus.

There was no planned route – I didn’t care where I went, and I discovered more in 4000 light years of travelling than I did across an entire region in my other account. Only a few first discovered systems but plenty of first footfalls, lucrative exobiology and some of the most beautiful vistas I had ever seen.

Having fun in the Silver Machine netted me my first Stellar Screenshot!

I managed to make just under a billion credits with that little trip. Up until that point it was by far the most fun I’d ever had exploring. And it was this that gave me the encouragement to fly to Colonia, scanning bios all along the way, so I could purchase a fleet carrier once I had arrived.

I have already related how that trip went. No straight lines this time, apart from when I was nearing the end, of course. I couldn’t wait to get that carrier! I meandered from nebula to nebula, finding some of the best views I had ever seen. I was getting there, exploration was slowly becoming far more joy than grind.

My attempt at Cmdr Orange Phoenix’s Fungoida Forest!

You may already know I have also documented my first shakedown trip with that carrier (the Esmerelda Weatherwax). I had devised a new way to travel through the galaxy by using the Spansh Fleet Carrier Route Plotter. I would send the carrier ahead, jump my hauler after it and then sending it away to the next waypoint once I had caught it up and dropped off any data I had accumulated. Culminating at the Collection of Wonders I thought it was a great way to evolve my exploring.

Yet once I finally began travelling away from the Collection of Wonders it felt like more of a regression. Here I was, just travelling in a stright line from system to system, just like before, and even though there was a break every dozen or so jumps, it began to feel as tedious as my first ever foray into the black. Something needed to change, and I wasn’t sure what that something was.

Time to return to the El-ahrairah’s Request

I thought maybe I had better fly upwards and downwards of the route the carrier was taking but I wasn’t sure what to aim for, or what to use as a lure rather than just blind jumping around. There was a nebula off in the distance but I was no longer keen. Nebulae are beautiful places to visit but almost eveyone makes a beeline for them and there isn’t all that much left to find unless you want to spend an awful lot of time in them. I like to keep on the move as much as possible. I don’t know why but I began to type in the title of the nebula on the GalMap. I began with the sector name and followed with the A-AA. Now most seasoned explorers already know this but when I did this a large list of heavy “h” mass sytems dropped down underneath the search box.

Typing the sector name and A-AA or even A-AB

“What is a “H” mass system?” I hear some of you cry!

Lets take the very first system I “first discovered” – PLIO EURL KR-W d1-18. The “d” in the d1-18 on the end represents the mass of the system with “a” being a low mass system and “h” being a high mass system. Neutron stars tend to be at least a “d” mass whereas black holes tend to be at least “e” mass, “a” mass tend to be brown dwarfs, “b” mass red dwarfs and so on. I searched through the list of “h” mass systems, clicking on each one until I found something I had yet to see in Elite Dangerous. A wolf rayet star! It wasn’t too far either. Once I arrived there though, to my dissappointment, it was, of course, already discovered, but I seemed to have found a new way to search for interesting systems. Now, I have since discovered that most of those high mass systems are proto stars but a few of them are well worth visiting. With a bit of luck, no one else will have either!

I also used a method I had tried previously (without much patience back then – I must admit) of eliminating all the stars but the non-sequence and unusual stars from the galaxy filter, and then searching upwards and downwards of the straight line route my carrier was taking, and I noticed something I had ignored before…

In the picture on the right, the arrow points to a distant, barely visible misty dot. It’s much easier to notice as it moves while you pan the galmap up and down. The first time I noticed one I moved the galmap towards it to find out what it might be.

As you can see here this misty dot (just right and down of the centre) is now much bigger. It is just a case now of selecting each type of star in the galaxy filter until we find out exactly what it is.

Here I’ve selected and the deselected each star type until I found the correct one. It’s a proto star. Most of them seem to be proto stars, but, sometimes…well, we’ll see a bit later.

And so that is how I carried on, exploring in giant waves up to 2000 light years above and below the straight course my carrier was using. I swtiched back to the El-ahrairah’s Request so that I could travel a bit more freely like this. Finding an interesting system to head towards above, reaching it, then diving back down to the the carrier, handing in data then sending it off before diving down below to some other interesting looking system before heading back up to the carrier’s new location.

Another phenomena I discovered by only selecting the rarer star types (non squence, wolf rayet, giant carbon and white dwarfs) was a field of hundreds of white dwarfs and neutron stars. It was there that I discovered the system from whence I had my second stellar screenshot winning picture, the one at the top of the post. I was over the moon with this! It was such a beautiful system it was hard not to take a great screenshot there to be fair.

A field of countless neutrons and WDs in the PUEKEAU sector. Most of them stiil not yet visited! Go! Discover!

I was also trying my best to find my very first unvisited black hole. I had found plenty of them using the filter method but every one had already been discovered. One morning, I found an “f” class black hole on the way to the field of neutrons and WDs I described earlier. I travelled there, expecting to find it already had a name next to it. I reached the penultimate system, jumped, dropped out of hyperspace and….nothing on my scanner. Then it popped up out of nowhere! I was the first one here! I yelled out for joy, jumping up and almost punching a hole in the ceiling. And, by Braben, it was such a cracking system!

My very first previously unvisited black hole! You can just see the lensing effect over the galaxy there.

There are many other phenomena out there in the black that I am also eager to “first discover” and another app that has helped me immensely with this is EdCopilot. Now this wonderful toolkit can do many, many things but currently I’m using it mainly for its exploration assistance. I was now less concerned with finding bios on tenuous atmospheres (although I’m still more than up for finding some of the rarer species) and more concerned with those beautiful vistas, rare phenomena and fascinating systems. Like Observatory it will announce all sorts of useful infomation about the system you have just entered and any bodies you discover using the FSS scanner. Unlike Observatory (currently), however, it will tell you when there is a biological signal on a non atmospheric world. Now you can easily glean this particular information without any apps at all just by looking at the “FEATURES” box in the top right hand corner of the FSS scanning screen. But bio signals on non-atmospheric bodies are exceedingly rare. After hundreds of the word “NONE” in that box when scanning non-atmospherics I tend to zone out and probably would miss it but EDCopilot just blurts it out for you. It was this way that I found my very first non atmospheric lifeform.

I was using the filtered galmap search and discovered another misty dot, discovered it was a “g” mass type O star system, and plotted a route toward it. Once I arrived I was thrilled to find no else had been there and even more thrilled when EDCopilot announced after scanning the sole body orbiting it had a bio signal. A surface scan revealed Prasinum Bioluminescent Anenomes – something I have never seen up until that point. I braved the risk of both extreme high temperatures and a high gravity landing and excitedly made my way down to the surface!

As you can see I had switched this time to my DBX Hrairoo – a ship I had never used for exploration before and I am slowly falling in love with it. Once down, even on the night side of the body it was so hot I barely had enough time to run out of the ship, scan the anemone, and then get back in again before getting killed by the heat. It was a very close run thing (note: Frontier Developments need to add a thermal protection module for suits). I managed all three scans but it was far too risky to take a screenshot of my Cmdr on foot on the surface of this body!

And so my exploration endeavours continue. Again I am continually being blown away by the beauty that unfolds before my cockpit as I fly through the galaxy. I no longer use the Spansh carrier route plotter, it seems to be limited to already discovered systems so now I just forward the galmap five hundred light years towards my ultimate destination, find an interesting looking system and jump it there, then zoom up or down a couple of thousand light years in my DBX towards some curious looking phemomena. I still have a long way to go before becoming an expert explorer, but even so I feel like I have now reached the next level of exploration.

Exploration in Elite Dangerous is a slow burner. To begin with it’s tedious at best – long passages of dullness interspersed with mildly interesting curiosities. However, if one perseveres, if one can abandon the eagerness to reach the next destination, the mediocrity evaporates and is replaced by wonder at even the seemingly simplest of interstellar systems. Oddities now appear more frequently, intriguing myteries whose sirens’ song entices you away from your carefully planned route. Now exploration will deliver an overload of dopamine, as you constanty search for the nugget of gold at the end of the next rainbow. And when you find it, (and you know that you eventually will) the feeling of exaltation is unmatched by any other video game.

Furious With Frontier!

I thought it was over. I’d finished it. The Rush Fleet was complete! It had been a lot of hard work, and I had lost a lot of sleep obsessively hammering this website out on the keyboard. The relief when I published the last two ships for the last Rush album was overwhelming.

And then, all excitedly hopeful about what would be announced in the new format, “Frontier Unlocked” this coming year in my favourite game of all time, Elite Dangerous, Frontier Developments dropped a bombshell.

At first it was fine. ZAC IS BACK! Wonderful wonderful Zac!

And Update 18 – “Take It To The Titans”. I’ll admit, a lot of this Thargoid stuff is a little outside my playstyle zone but it’s all been incredible to watch on other players’ streams and to see the mind blowing screenshots on social media. And what I have played of it has been tremendous fun! The whole Thargoid War Arc has been utterly breathtking, even though I’ve only really dabbled in it. This “culmination” looks really, really exciting!

I was also very pleased to hear that powerplay was being totally reworked and would be a lot more engaging! It’s something I’d always wanted the Fleet to be involved in but was always put off a little by it’s current, cumbersome iteration. Now I’m very excited to finally be able to begin seeing what roles the fleet can fill for the various powers of the Galaxy!

And then, what I presumed would be the the icing on the delicious cake Frontier would be serving us this year, there will be a new feature added to the game! What will it be? New planets to land on? New life to explore? Base building? Racing circuits? What? It’s so exciting! I felt I was riding the crest of a wave!

But it all was to come crashing down…

It was all so perfect! There are 19 Rush albums (not including “Feedback” an EP of covers – how could I name any ships after songs that weren’t written by Rush?) and 38 ships. Easy! Two ships per album. Nice and neat for my simple, autistic OCD brain to get itself around. Okay, there was a bit of a problem with the Cobra Mk IV to get around but it was an easy problem to solve.

But…there will now be new ships. Just think about that for a second.

New ships!

I just stared at the image of the Python Mk IV which now graced my screen. The colour drained from my face. Panic began to ferment inside my belly. I felt as if a gaping hole was opening up under my feet and I would disappear into it, falling for eternity. Where in the name of Braben would I put any new ships? And there were going to be four of them? How is that going to fit neatly within the framework I had based the whole concept of the Rush Fleet on? What am I going to do? I can’t cope with this! I certainly can’t not include them, but neither can I have some albums with three ships and others with just the two! I could include each of the solo albums by Geddy and Alex but, they aren’t strictly Rush albums are they? And I could include the live albums but as they don’t include any new material that isn’t anywhere near an elegant enough solution for me.

I’m absolutely at my wit’s end; shaking and tearful with despair! I’m listening to the whole Frontier Unlocked all over again hoping that there’s something that…

…wait. What was that?

At least four new ships? Arf did say “at least” didn’t he?

Erm…Frontier?

How about another nineteen?

Lovely Jubbly!

The Delanderby begins her mammoth Tritium mining endeavour

The gas giant just hangs in space, looking for all the world like a giant, chocolate cream marble, surround by a dazzling, wide series of rings of milky white. Slowing supercruise down to a crawl, the Delanderby fires a single, lone probe toward the wafer thin icy hoops. I just sit there and wait. Everything is silent. Everything is still. The scan completes, and a complex pattern of orangey-yellow discs interrupt the brightness, shining like beacons of potential. I casually scroll through the signals now over-populating the navigation panel. Void Opals, Low Temperature Diamonds, Alexandrite – I’m not interersted in such riches. It’s not long before my target shows and there appears to be plenty of it.

Tritium!

And many overlaps too, there even appears to be a triple hotspot! I point the nose of my beautiful Imperial Cutter at the glowing triforce of disks and gently cruise down to the grindstone.

The El-ahrairah’s Request investigates a Lagrange cloud on our way to Colonia

So, I have an apology to make. There will be no more Buckyball blogs this season at least. And the reason for this is threefold. Firstly my love affair with Elite had been rekindled in such a profound way with Double Trouble that the exploration itch needed scratching. I coudn’t ignore it. And it just kept getting itchier and itchier, to the point where it was becoming painful. Secondly, the following Buckyball race, a re-run of Back to Pareco, was a source of great frustration. I could only submit a below par unlimited run. And my regualtion run, after dozens of failed attempts, was even worse. Thirdly, the dreaded RL was rearing its ugly head and making gaming time difficult causing me to have to miss the next Buckball (Braking Badly) altogether. Which was a great shame. As soon as I could I climbed back into the El-ahrairah’s Request (my ASP explorer with a sellar screenshot winner’s paintjob) to continue my journey to Colonia. The frustration of Buckball had gone, and was replaced by wonder, serenity, and a complete escape from reality.

A particularly stunning ringed water world!

My main goal…no…not goal as such. My main dream in Elite Dangerous has always been to explore the fullness of the Galaxy.

Inspired by the likes of Cmdr Commander Picard and Cmdr William Diffin, I’d always dreamt of, one day, leaving it all behind and travelling to the very furthest reaches of the Milky Way. To lazily saunter around the core. To see the spectacular sights other commanders had seen before me but also to discover my own space jellyfish, my own black holes, my own ringed Earthlike worlds. To find rare and beautiful phenomena and report them back to the community so that everyone else can see them too. My trip to Colonia had so far been full of wonder, ringed water worlds, bark mounds, rare biologicals. Yet I knew there were even greater treasures waiting for me around the galaxy. My plan had been to fly to Colonia via V1357 Cygni and scan as many biologicals as I could. This would hopefully give me a massive payment on arrival – enough to buy my very own Fleet Carrier! And some of the sights and disvoveries I was stumbling across on my way only whetted my appetite further!

Some stunning landscapes on the way to Colonia!

The black has been calling to me for years. And this past month the pull has been far too strong to resist. My trip to Colonia had begun many months ago, and by the time the penultimte Buckyball race (Prison Brake II – Brake Harder run by Ashnak) came around I only had about fifty jumps to go.

I took a look at the rules for the race. It looked fun. It looked simple. It looked quick. Right up my alley! But...but…

The El-ahrairah’s request is such a joy to fly. And it’s engine noise sounds like a Rolls Royce Merlin. And it gives such a beautiful view from its cockpit. And such beautiful views were obligingly revealing themselves to me system, after system, after system.

A nebula I took a little detour to. on the way. Bark mounds, Lagrange Clouds, NSPs – you name it!

Sorry, Ashnak. The Asp won out.

It was now a race to get to Colonia as fast as I could. I needed to hand in that data! I still investigated any worlds I thought interesting but it was mainly just jump, honk and scan from then on.

Walknig amongst the King of Tubus – Tubus Cavas. Big payout for this species!

Suprisingly it wasn’t until I was only two jumps away from Colonia that the undiscovered systems stopped. I thought it would be much further out. Don’t Colonians explore? Also, it was strange finding another group of human colonies this far from the Bubble. And the whole place feels different. Wilder, rougher, more free.

Finally, I’m here! Now, where is Vista Genomics?

Travelling here in my Asp Ex had been marvellous, but I wanted my exploring to be more…more intrepid, and I remembered fondly exploring as Leeya Geddy in the Rushfleet’s Working Man. Which meant I would need to get myself a Hauler. And this time it would be yellow! Just like dodgy dealer Del Trotter’s three wheeled Reliant Robin van in the London based sitcom “Only Fools And Horses”. Thanks to a suggestion from Lave Radio, I would be calling it the Lovely Jubbly! How could I call it anything else? I would need to engineer it too, which, even though I had plenty of blueprints pinned from the Bubble, would mean getting an invite from Mel Brandon. I needed those 2a enhanced thrusters! Anyway, as soon as I arrived here I made my first mistake. I handed in all my data at Jaques Station when I should have handed it in at one of the Colonia Coucil stations and received the invite straight away. Still, I managed to earn around 4.5 billion which, added to the 3.5 billion I already had gave me a decent amount to purchase my carrier.

How much, I wonder?

And here she is! Cmdrs I present to you the Esmerelda Weatherwax!

I’ve only outfitted her with the exploring basics for now. Refuel/Repair, Rearm/Restock, Universal Cartographics and a Vista Genomics. I may go on a little shake down excursion in the Hauler to be able to put in a bar as well. “But why explore with a fleet carrier?” I hear you cry. Well, I want total freedom, for some that definately doesn’t mean dragging a fuel hungry beast around with them. But I want to be able to change ships whenever I feel like, no matter where I am out in the Black. I want to able to constantly check in and drop off my data, I want to be able to land on high g worlds without worrying about lost data if I foul up. I want to have a reason to survey rings in stunning systems and then mine those rings for fuel as a break from exploring. I aim to travel light. If all that means I have to mine a couple of thousand tons of tritium every 5000 light years or so, it’s a great trade off as far as I’m concerned.

Now it was just a question of which ships I should import from the Bubble to take with me on my travels.

The El-ahrairah’s Request.

Well, I couldn’t leave my beloved AspX behind now could I? I would miss her beautiful engine noise terribly. Don’t have to import her from the Bubble!

The Red Hare.

First I ordered my Krait Mk II. Engineered purely for combat I needed her to help win wars for Colonia council and hunt notorious pirates for bounty vouchers. Mel Brandon rather likes those. Not much use out in the Black except she has a fighter bay and I do like to have a fighter handy when exploring. I can always lighten her loadout and refit her as more of an explorer, once I’m done fighting.

The Delanderby.

Expensive to import all that way – almost half my remaining budget, but I need a miner to get fuel. And she’s the best and most efficient one I have. I just love the noises she makes – hence the name.

The Hrairoo.

I coudn’t leave her behind. I just couldn’t. I’m not sure I really need a DBX with everything else I’m taking but…no…

I love this ship. Dearly. It’s why I named it so.

The Waves Of Hanajima.

What can I say? She’s a Krait Phantom for Braben’s sake! I took my first major expedition in her. She’s also a ratship and, well, you never know.

The Brenda Zephyr.

How could I leave dear old Brenda Behind? That trip I took half way across the galaxy to meet up with Picard is full of such lovely memories. Huge jump range with an extra fuel tank and all the bells and whistles so I can leave the carrier behind when I want to venture deep into sparse starfields.

The Palamino.

I’ll be visiting a fair few black holes I expect! Plus I might go for quite a few long voyages in her. I’ve fully engineered her now and I’ve managed to squeeze everything I need in there.

I’m really looking forward to spending quality time with her.

And, finally, let me present my now fully engineered Hauler, in whom I’ll be doing the bulk of the exploring. The Lovely Jubbly…

Trotter’s Independant Trading Co. Colonia – Beagle Point – Peckham

In fact, I also decided to visit the engineers I’m using in character.

Which was interesting.

“Ere ‘y’are! Barnty Varchers. Undred fahsand, just like yer wanted. You wot, mate? Course their legit. Musta popped firty dozen wrong ‘uns, mate – all brown bread. Cross me art deyr da real deal or me uncle’s not Albert. Nah go and work yer magic on me awler, will ya?“

“You wot, mate? Occupied escape pods? Wiv da poor live sods still in em? You’re avin’ a tin barf, aintcha? I bet the last fing dey wanna see when dey wake up is your ugly mug, mate. Nah, yer can keep yer bloody tinkerin skills…”

“Wossat? Grade five life suppote?”

“Har many pods wozzit?“

Sorry, couldn’t resist it.

I feel the only thing left now is to keep mining that Tritium (that and roaming various bodies searching for occupied escape pods for Etienne’s Meat Emporium). Now, I used to stuggle a little bit with mining. It was nice for the first few hundred tons or so but then it tended to drag. This time, however, I’m up to 1500 tons and I can’t wait to get back out there. For some reason, once I start firing off those prospectors all my troubles and worries start to melt away. It’s just me and the ice, with the gas giant silently watching over me way off in the distance. And, believe you me, it’s therapy I’m sorely in need of at the moment. Strangely enough it’s very simillar to a real life occupation of mine, mucking out horse stables, only a lot less brown.

The Delanderby drops out of supercruise and glides gently down towards the quiet, hanging field of emormous ice lumps that stretch as far as the eye can see. Beyond, the gas giant hangs there, still, silent, immovable. A pair of signals appear on the scanner, interrupting the tranquility. I gracefully turn the cutter’s huge bulk around to face them. Two Imperial clippers, very much the worse for wear wearily scan my cargo racks. They are not interested in limpets. They sluggishly turn away, and dissappear back into the icy fog. Satisfied they are gone, I spy a juicy pair of jagged ice balls spinning gently mere yards away from each other. I fire off a couple of prospectors, the sound of their chugging engines fading away as they propell themselves purposefully towards their goals. They hit, one after the other and, to my delight, both asteroids have a high percentage of Tritium.

My hardpoints deployed

My nine limpets out, waiting

Lahv-ely Jubbly!

Re-Ignition

Jackson’s Lighthouse. The initial terryfying drop of the rollercoaster that is Double Trouble

You’ve all had those dreams haven’t you? You know the ones. The great ones. The ecstatic ones. The ones where you can fly. For me they usually follow a day where I’ve spent a period having about as much fun as it’s possible for a Homborger to handle. I tend to get them when I’ve been particularly successful at something, or when I’ve discovered a new thing that’s more fun than I ever thought possible, like the first time I galloped on my horse. The wind rushing into my face, his mane streaming out behind his neck as his hoofs thunder out the rhythm underneath (depressingly, not something I’ve had an opportunity to do these days).

They’re pretty rare all in all. It’s just…I’ve been having them every night for the latter half of the week.

Since the last Buckyball, wonderful though it was, I stopped playing Elite Dangerous.

Completely.

I had become totaly numb to it’s lure. I tried No Man’s Sky. It was quite fun for a week or so but, well, it’s not the same. It’s a game, not a simulator. The planets of each system all huddle together on one side of the star (which you can’t really get close to) and all those lush worlds and creatures all start looking the same after a while. It’s fun, mysterious, and bright but it didn’t hold my attention much after 50 or so hours.

I tried other games, all sorts of games.

Nothing.

It felt like video gaming was dropping off my fun radar completely. But the next Buckyball was coming up and I felt I was going to be doing it as much out of obligation than leisure. Still, during the previous weekend I became obsessed with checking the BRC (Buckyball Racing Club, c’mon, you should know by now) discord, waiting for Raiko, the race sponsor, to post details of the race.

Sure enough, up they popped. The forum thread was begun and I started to pour over the rules. And there were rules. Lots of rules. And the rules included shenanigans. Lots of shenanigans. It pretty much hurt my brain. But, like most Buckyball courses, I expected it would become a lot less complicated once I’d scouted the route and tried a few of those shenanigans out.

The Afterimage. Ready to race!

And so I took out My Favorite Headache to have a look around. Starting at Hoshide in the Adivarakhe system, we need to use Jacksons to boost our FSDs to get to the distant main systems in just two jumps. There were only three, each with two places to visit, and an optional shenanigan at every stop. The shenanigans came with bonuses off your total time. Quite generous bonuses, in fact. Generous enough to make each one almost essential. I was intrigued. It looked intense, but promised exceptional fun!

I had multiple shots at the shenanigans and they were nowhere near as tricky as I feared. They mostly involved acrobatics around, or through, various parts of the installations. Apart from one which invloved travelling for 5km by SRV before recalling your ship. I wasn’t too sure about that one. My flyving technique leaves a lot to be desired. It’s fine for 2 -3 km and then it turns back into rollving and uncontolled bounceving. It isn’t long before it gets back to flyving again but in lots of different directions at the same time. But I was willing to at least give it a go.

Getting the FSD boost needed to reach the three systems where all the fun takes place.

I had several dry runs in the Cobra. I would explode at least once on every run but eventually I managed to get around unscathed. I wasn’t happy with my handling of the regualtion ship, I hadn’t played for about a month and I struggled with its drifty thrusters. And that wasn’t my only problem.

For the rest of the prep week and the first weekend of the race I would be running on limited sleep. One of our pet rats had to have a tumour removed and Wifeborger and I would share the nightwatch duties. Nothing worse than waking up on the morning after a ratty operation and seeing a gaping maw where there had been a beautifully sewn wound. Been there. Done that. Never again! So she would watch for the first four hours and I would wake up at 3,00 am and take over. I didn’t have a choice this time, Elite would have to wait.

Approaching White Grove Homestead – we have to fly though a tunnel here.. You can just see some.

The problem for the following week was, even though I could then sleep through the night, after 5 days of limited sleep I found myself too tired to play late evening and not being able to wake up in time to play in the morning. I was really struggling to find time in game. The prospect of this being the first Buckyball race where I would not be able to register a time loomed before me like a gaping, black hole.

For a bonus we can fly through one ring, then the other and back again through the first. They spin awfully fast.

I decided to ditch the regulation class. I was having a lot of fun in the unlimited class during the last race and I remember particularly enjoying scouting out the course in the Rushfleet’s iCourier the Afterimage. So I opted to use that.

I was so glad that I did!

The Afterimage is such a lovely craft to fly. Just performing those loops through the rings at White Grove Homestead in the Beatis system felt effortless and free. Then it was time to tackle Neff Hub.

All you have to do here is just dock and leave. But, of course, there is a shenanigan here and then an advanced shenanigan. For a bonus of two minutes you can just fly around the back of the station before you dock (just like The Empire Hustle) But you can double that to four minutes by entering the docking slot, then exiting it, then you have to loop around the rearmost habitation ring both before and after passing around the back of the station. Then you can dock! So that’s what I chose to do.

I like to use my vertical thrusters when performing loops so I can keep an eye on the obstacle I need to loop around. Especially when that object is spinning and there are struts and solar panels to avoid. And as I pulled up and gazed at the greenery inside the ring while I sailed gracefully around a fire re-ignited within my soul.

Approaching Neff Hub. The rearmost habitation ring in the distance. This…this is where it happened.

This game, this game. It is so beautiful, exhilerating and full of awe. The way we can fly. The way our ships behave. The way each ship has a personality of its very own. The things we can do. And the community that is the web that binds us all together, the things that this community creates for us to do. Every moment of sheer joy that I have had interacting with this remarkable jungle of code, hyperspace jumping for the first time, splitting an asteroid to reveal the core, watching the deep red sunrise in a bright pink sky in a oxygen atmosphere, getting caught by and then totally hypnotised by the way light is bending around a black hole, discovering my very first “first discovered” world. Hyperdiction by Thargoids, harvesting Meta Alloys from barnacles, investigating Guardian Ruins, discovering bark mounds in nebulae, collecting raw materials from volcanic vents, successfully completing an on foot stealth mission, finding a rare and lucrative plant species I had never seen before, going silent running whilst smuggling personal technology into theocratic stations…the list is almost endless. It all passed though my mind as I made that initial loop. It felt like the engine of a Dodge Charger roaring back into life, like the secondary section of a rocket, exploding with the fire of thrust and taking over when the main section had dropped away and all had gone quiet.

All this I had done and loved, and yet there is still so much more I have yet to experience in this marvellous game!

And then as I came back around to the mail slot to finally dock in the station I noticed there was an orca blocking the entrance and in my desperation to get around it I crashed and exploded. I just laughed out loud. It had been a long time since I had been that happy. I just took my rebuy and, continuing from Neff Hub, I carried on around the course.

Approaching the Conjunct Transmittal Satellight. You canj just about see the tunnel from here.

The rest of the course is also a joy, apart, maybe, from one shenanigan, which is my fault. We’ll get to that later.

So it’s on to the Vodyanes system and the Conjunct Transmittal Satellight. We just have to fly through the long tunnel that runs right through but, for a bonus minute (Bootlegger) we have to flip around and fly back through it. The first few times I did this in the Afterimage I nailed the flight assist off flip and then boosted at over 700m/s back through. It felt so exhilerating! I could almost feel wind rushing through my hair. I was deeply in love with Elite once more! For my final submission run, however, I was a lot more careful.

Next was on to Lewis Gateway to pick up a ton of beer to take back to the start for yet another bonus! Then it was on to the final system, Nauani.

Flying through the superstructure of the Intermutual Interchange at Nuani.

The penultimate challenge here is just to fly through the superstructure of the Intermutual Interchange but, for the added bonus (named “Breaking and Entering”), we also have to fly to one of the side silos. Open the entry door by firing at it or ramming it, fly through the tunnel and open the exit door by firing or ramming before escaping. If you’re too slow, the missiles the installation sends at you will explode your ship. The first time I tried this in the Cobra I rammed and lost almost all my shields and hull. The second time I used frag cannons and got hit by missiles and destroyed, but the Afterimage just sailed through, using missiles to open the doors.

Flying through a silo tunnel of the Intermutual Interchange after having destroyed the doors.

Now it came to the final obstacle. The surface port of Lanchester’s Folly. We only have to dock here and then leave but for a six minute bonus (Total Recal) we need to drive an SRV 5km away before we board the ship and fly home. We were allowed to recall our ships before the 5 km but we still had to travel that didtance before boarding. Now I was struggling with this. My record was 4km before losing control completelty and making it not worth my time. I fully intended to include this shenanigan in my submission but I kept messing this up the most. On the final morning of the race I still hadn’t managed to complete a run and so when I had managed to get around the course unscathed, being extra careful not to take much damage, I saw I had enough hull left for the “Iron Bucky – Driving Commander Daisy” challenge of flying the whole course, without shields, and still having above 90% hull remaining. When I landed at Lanchester’s Folly I had 92%. I wasn’t going to risk sending out the SRV. Maybe, if I got back in one piece, I’d do it on another run. So I launched and set the waypoint back to Hoshide.

About to dock at Lanchester’s Folly. Should I deploy the SRV here or not?

Something else had been happening since the re-ignition of my deep love for Elite. I hadn’t really noticed it, but I was beginning to bag almost every single gravity breaking maneuver. Somtimes I would break too soon or approach a bit too cautiously but I never overshot. And even a cautious gravity breaking approach is usually quicker than a standard approach. Sometimes I even almost forgot to drop out of supercruise as the option appeared way sooner than I was expecting.

Back at Hoshide at last! Still 92% hull left!

On the approach to Hoshide I managed to perform a textbook approach. Carefully flew in through the mail slot, and docked. Sold my ton of beer. I could now, finally, submit a time.

Once evening came on the final day, though, I was just too tired to try again. It had been a very busy couple of weeks in RL and I had nothing left. That single effort would just have to do. Maybe I wouldn’t be too far from the bottom of the table.

14th out of 25? Yeah! I’ll take it!

Fourteenth? Out of twenty five racers? Hey! That’s not too bad at all!

I don’t think I can thank Raiko enough. His forum thread spiel about the Lonnigan Brothers creating the race and enforcing the rules is just glorious. And as for the race itself…

Thank you Raiko! I owe you everything. I will have your babies – if you wish!

As for the next race? Well it’s being run by the incomparable Psykit. So we know what kind of thread design we’re getting at least. But as for the place, exact date (sometime in August) and name of the race we’re all still mostly in the dark. She’s mentioned it might be a re-run of the Pareco ring.

It might be nice to have a straightforward one for a change!

Can’t wait!

You Are Required To Maneuver Straight Down This Trench…

Tricky, but, with patience and perservereance…possible.

I think…frustration…is the key word for this race. Not because it was a frustrating course, or because my flying was particularly rubbish this week, or even because unfortunate things happened during any of my runs (which is a Buckyballing given for any race) but because RL decided it was going to take away from my gaming time. I was actually lucky to get in the runs that I did and that I spent a large part of the previous week scouting, calculating and practicing.

And it was such a pity. Because if you hadn’t taken part in this race you may well have missed the race of the season.

I think it’s safe to say the vast majority of Buckballers, both new and old, were looking forward to this race immensly. And, I think it’s also safe to say that even though expecatations were high, we were all blown away by the sheer thrill of racing through this course. Even without the 2 bonus tricks it’s a toally engrossing, fast, and variable fly.

Now, the main reason I’m using Leeya Geddy to do the Buckyballing this season and not Cmdr Homborger is because she has every single ship in the game (not the Cobra Mk IV) at her disposal. Many of them highly engineered. This makes it possible to have a huge choice when selecting the most appropriate ship for the unlimited runs. But, before I wanted to worry about getting an unlimited time down, I needed to get a regualtion time. So, it was time for My Favorite Headache to shine once more.

Approaching the first tunnel into Peyson Holdings.

The genius of this course is that there are six different structures to fly though spread out over five systems. And the whole course can easily be done in a regulation Cobra, even flying conservatively, within 30 minutes. Some of the ace Buckyballers were even almost halfing that time! It’s the mark of a great course. Plenty to do with a minimum of jumps and supercruise time. Sgurr has managed to get the balance of this race spot on.

Now we come to the two bonus maneuvers.

There was the Turner Tactical Bonus (named after Buckyballer and Emergent Gameplay Discoverer Extrordinaire Cmdr Alec Turner) where, when hurtling toward just one of these tunnels, or gaps, we could turn off flight assist and flip around the opposite way to fly through the obstacle backwards. This was worth a twenty second bonus. Not bad! But then we were also given, should we choose to do it, a ninety second time bonus if we did a coriolis trench run at the start/finish line – Gaensler Station. Now, in the minds of most pilots, a coriolis trench run is something only an elite pilot can manage, and that it can only be done without flight assist. It wasn’t something I would even consider being able to do. Yet there it was, with that very juicey ninety second carrot dangling in front of my nose. Sgurr also helpfully provided this essential video tutorial on how it can be done.

And what’s more, he showed us how to do it with flight assist on.

That’s the first tunnel done, now to fly directly across to pass through the second!

I thought to myself, bugger it! I’m going to have a go.

I had a really hard time using the Cobra, prompting rebuy after rebuy after rebuy. So I swapped out for the Rushfleet’s Sidewinder (the Finding My Way – now fully engineered) and decided to try it in that.

It’s really daunting as you carefully enter the superstructure. Those corners swing round frighteningly fast, and every girder hums and groans, the stress of the metal creaking menacingly as it sails by your canopy. There is a small opening at each corner, and that’s our ticket into the superstructure, then all you have to do is navigate your way along one straight side of the superstructure and out through the opening at the next corner, while the whole thing is spinning. Sounds utterly daunting. As soon as you approach that opening, your heart sinks to your feet. But you have to go for it!

Here it comes…

I had decided to practice with the station spinning towards me, as I thought that would be quicker than travelling along with the station spinning away (as shown in Sgurr’s tutorial). It’s a lot more difficult and the rotation kept tossing me out. The Finding My Way is rather tough and fast. I’ve engineered her that way. So there were never any rebuys and, after a handful of attempts, I succeded! I mean, the exit was a bit messy but I managed to get through! I was exhilerated! It was so much fun that I tried again and again, managing a few more successful runs. Ok, I thought, maybe I won’t do this for the regualtion run but for the unlimited? Why the hell not?

The second tunnel leading out from Peyson Holdings

The regulation run went quite smoothly. Probably could have saved a few minutes but for a first submission, for me, it wasn’t too bad at all. I decided to go to the tunnels at Peyson Holdings in the Yarolkis system first. It’s such a blast to fly though the two service tunnels that lead in and out of the large, circular planetary surface ports. In one end, flying between all the tower blocks and out through the other end. Then it was on to LP 241-1 to fly through the super structure of a Federal Capital Ship.

Now we can boost and plot our way to the next system!

Flying through a Federation capital ship is pretty straightforward. Plenty of gaps in the forward section there, although it really helps if you turn on night vision so you can see the supports properly. I thought about trying for a TTB here but I thought, no, not this time. Many a time I’ve confidently boosted through here only to go spinning off like a catherine wheel. After this, it’s off to the Tir Na Nog system to find more conventional Buckyball tunnels.

There are two installations at Tir Na Nog, the Chief Environment Authority and the Universal Employment board. Both are identical and there is only one tunnel in the whole of each installation that’s viable to fly through. I had familiarised myself with the layout and could find the right tunnel no matter which direction I jumped in from. You have to get your flight path just right though, or you could catch one of the girders that lay off to the side a little. That will end your attempt right away. Again, getting this right gives you a real high! Once I’d visited both installations and flown through both tunnels, it’s off to Vequess next.

The penultimate obstacle for my run was Agnews Folly in the Vequess system. We’ve been here before, only instead of flying around the station we’ve only got to fly between both of the surrounding orange support hoops that support the mail slot and the superstructure. Now, this is testament to how far I’ve come just this season. In the first race I had a lot of trouble getting this right and so didn’t bother flying under them at all. But now I can sail right through them every time. Although on this run I messed up the gravity braking approach (I usually mess it up, but even so it’s still a lot quicker than the conventional approach) which meant I jumped in behind the stattion rather than ahead of it. Didn’t matter, I don’t have to dock here, just fly through those hoops!

Flying though the support hoops at Agnew’s Folly

Then it was just a matter of flying through the Empire Capital Ship in the same system and then getting back to Gaensler Station. The whole journey took seven jumps, with obstacles to fly through on four of them and I ended up on the leaderboard the following day.

Tenth! That’s okay, I can live with that.

Tons to do on this race, but still easily managing a sub 30 minute time. The mark of a real, classic Buckyball! And I knew I could do better. I wasn’t sure I’d have time to improve this run, but getting a full bonus time down on an Unlimited run was my goal.

I had initially done all my scouting in my Imperial Courier, the Afterimage, but I felt I needed something a little closer to the size of my sidewinder. So I decided to go with my Imperial Eagle, the Kid Gloves. I could have gone with By-Tor, my normal Eagle, but the Kid Gloves was already engineered for speed. I didn’t want anything superfast, just managably fast and 750 m/s was about right.

Now to practice a trench run with the new ship. This time, I struggled. Also, as the Kid Gloves isn’t anywhere near as tough as my little Finding My Way I kept viewing the rebuy screen. I was managing to get though occaionally but not consistently and never cleanly. Time was running out. There was nothing for it now but to attempt a run and hope for the best.

Okay, here we go. Take off, fly to the slot, immediately turn and sail around to the side of the station to face the trenches. I made a decision. This time, instead of going through clockwise, with the station spinning toward me, I’d follow the advice on Sgurr’s tutorial and go though anticlockwise. I flew to the corner, matched speed with the rotation, smoothly entered the superstrcture without a scratch. The station groaned and creaked ominously around me, threatening to crush my little fly of a ship as I made my way along. But I managed to fly right through to the end, continuously using my lateral thrusters to stay as centralised as possible, then with ever such a slight bump, flew out though the following corner.

I’d done it! I’d actually done it!

Can’t get too cocky. There’s the rest of the run still to fly.

Steady…steady…

It went really well. Peyson was smooth and fast. The Fed Cap Ship was a bit dark so I decided not to risk doing a TTB here. The tunnels at Tir Na Nog went well, as did the hoops at Agnews. Flew though them faster than I’d ever done. Then…then came the last obstacle, the Empire Capital Ship at Vequess. It was now or never. I lined up with that hoop thingy at the rear of the ship, threw the throttle forward, turned off flight assist and gently nudged the stick back to spin myself around and then pushed on it to stop my spin in what I hoped would be a 180 degree flip.

Flying backwards though the Empire Capital Ship

My nose danced around a bit, but, to my great relief, I had flown through almost perfectly backwards! Now to get back to Gaensler!

I did the things! I DID BOTH THE THINGS!

There I am! With a run time of 23:37 and then, with both bonuses subtracted, 21:47. A time I can truly be proud of. I was hoping now to be able to get back in my Cobra and both improve my Regulation run time and fit in both bonuses there but, well, I kept blowing her up in the trench and before I knew it, time had run out. It was a great pity. I would love to have had more runs with this marvellous race.

So, let’s look at the final leaderboards.

Still second from last. I just know I could have leapt a handful of places there. Really, really frustrated with that. But, again, just look at how many are on this list! So many new racers this year! I can’t repeat this enough that this is so good to see. Incredible how well Kevin The Stabber is doing. They have never raced before this season.

A lot happier with my Unlimited time for obvious reasons. So thrilled with having completed a trench run! Again, so many entries! It’s so exciting for the future of Buckyballing! Great flying everybody!

A HUGE thank you and MASSIVE hug to Sgurr. The last race was epic, but this? As Alec Turner has mentioned in the forum, this will be remembered in Buckyball circles for aeons. One of the classics! One of the greats! Let’s hope it will be re-run in Buckyball seasons for years to come.

Next race will be hosted in July by Cmdr Raiko and will be called

“The Galaxy’s End 2 – Double or Nothing!”

Stay posted to the Buckyball upcoming events page for info!

I can’t WAIT!

Burning Holes

Both Eerie and Wonderful! A Thargoid Structure.

There come times in one’s life when the effort you put in to something, something you genuinely care about and love doing, just wasn’t your normal one hundred percent. It was a good effort, sure, a decent effort. And it got an acceptable result. But, there was something about it that wasn’t quite as satisfying as you knew it could be. You know, deep, deep down, you could have pushed just that little bit harder, put in a little extra time, and the results would have been far more fulfilling.

Welcome to Buckyball Racing!

It was coming up to the time for the next race of the “Swift Sixteen” season – the ominously titled “Thargoid Structure Scramble” when the host, Cmdr Alec Turner himself released this trailer for it. I was rather looking forward to this race as it was but after seeing this I was utterly infatuated. I couldn’t wait. Leeya was really going to get her teeth into this one.

The premise of the race is straightforward. Begin at Artemis Lodge in the Celaeno system. Fly to HIP 17403, land near the crashed Thargoid ship on planet 4a and pick up a Thargoid Sensor. Visit any two Thargoid Structures in separate systems and, using the sensor gain access to them. Scan the device at the centre of each Structure and also collect one link device from either one (not both). Fly back to and land at Artemis Lodge.

Artemis Lodge at Celaeno

Now, this race was going to require quite a lot of preparation. We all had to scout out nearby systems containing Thargoid Structures and determine what would be the most convenient two to visit in regards to minimising amount of hyperspace jumps and amount of obscured jumps (meaning a jump that is obscured by the body you are launching from resulting in a painfully long ascent until the target system emerges from its shadow) and also the distance of the structure from the main star. The systems I selected were Pleiades Sector JC-V C2-9 followed by Pleiades Sector OD-S B4-1. A total journey in the Cobra of seven jumps.

Then it was just a case of leisurely running the course. Now, there is a risk of hyperdictions by Thargoid interceptors that can put a real dent in your time, and it makes the timing of the race as much down to luck as it is to skill. The last time we had to race through Thargoid infested space they were a real menace. Alec recognised this and introduced a new rule that gave everyone 1’30” off their time for each hyperdiction. Which turned out to be spot on!

I visited the crashed Thargoid ship (I’d been here before – many times) and collected one of the eerie, softly screaming sensors from the shadow of the hulk of the shattered xeno vessel and took it back to My Favorite Headache. Now, I’ve never actually transported a whole sensor before, only fragments of them and they are harmless. But as soon as I took off and selected the system of the first structure the corrosion began.

Collecting a Sensor at HIP 17403A 4a

The damn things randomly corrode a part of your ship every so often and if I was to take too long to get back to the finish and repair then my ship could suffer some serious damage. I flew to my first structure, landed, deployed the SRV, transferred the sensor from the ship to the SRV so the structure lets you get inside and set off.

The howl it emits as you approach…

These Structures are tremendously ominous places. They howl at you softly as you descend towards them; a gently disturbing noise, almost like a desperate lament for bygone aeons. Strange noises ghost around you as you marvel at their strangeness. An ethereal mist lit by seemingly unwholesome luminosities creeps around the organic tendrils that encircle the central mound. The mysterious Thargoid parasitic creatures we call Scavengers float around performing unknown duties and dripping goo. The whole place feels totally alien. Wonderful to visit, but unsettling at the same time.

I decided to stop gawping and head inside. The sensor was progressively corroding my SRV so I couldn’t hang around for too long. The door I had chosen to land near promptly opened up only to reveal there had been a cave in. I was to discover that there is usually only one way in to these structures and I would have to learn where they were and land near those doors. As it was I had to travel around the central hub in order to find a door which actually led to the centre of the organic complex.

Once I was in it was a case of getting to know the inside. If the outside felt strange, the inside felt yet stranger; as if I was travelling through the bowels of a giant space creature. The noise made by my tiny, insectoid vehicle echoed off the ribbed pathways and the Scavengers squelched around me as I cautiously took a side tunnel which would lead to the central chamber.

The Central Chamber, with the Thargoid Device hanging from the ceiling.

It wasn’t far. I scanned the device, turned back down the passage and searched for the chamber where I would find the “organs” (for lack of a better word) that would dispense Thargoid links. Now there is a known bug which is why the rules state that we can take a link from either site. Ideally, the links drop down from the three maws that grow around the edge of the area and, if you shoot them, they drop and the SRV can collect them. But sometimes they don’t drop and explode instead. A lot of commanders were having trouble with this so Alec decided that you could collect one of the Thargoid samples that were lying around ready to be collected if none of the links would drop. Fortunately, for me, a link dropped every time I shot one.

The Thargoid link chamber.

I collected the link, doubling the corrosion load of my SRV and made my way out of the central mound and back to my ship. As I took off and targeted the system I’d chosen for the second structure, the corrosion carried on eating away at My Favorite Headache’s modules in an ever more alarming manner.

I was getting some disturbing messages from my ship’s COVAS. “Hull breach attack! Taking internal damage” as I travelled toward the second site. Once I had landed, I again deployed my SRV and again I went to transfer the sensor from the ship but, to my dismay, the cargo hold was empty. I checked the damage to the hatch and it was substantial. A suspicious hole had been burned right through it! Both the sensor and the link must have fallen out en-route. I wasn’t going to get into this place. There was nothing for it but to go back to the start and begin all over again.

I was going to have to do this a lot more quickly!

Back at HIP 17403A 4a, the crashed Thargoid ship in the background.

This time, once I landed at the crashed ship, I hurried. Probably a little too much.

I completely lost control as my SRV twisted turned and flipped. I engaged its boosters to try to flip the thing back around again but ended up shooting into the air and getting it stuck fast in the wreckage. Nothing for it but to self destruct and go back to the start.

The Scavengers will let you be. Unless you shoot at them. Then you’re in trouble.

For the third go around I accidently shot the Thargoid Device instead of scanning it and was promptly assaulted by every Scavenger in the place.

SRV destroyed again, back to Artemis.

The fourth run around I actually managed to complete a successful run, albeit slowly, and still not managing to recognise the best places to land in order to avoid running into a cave-in. It took a while but at least I managed to get around relatively unscathed. I was also getting good at getting away from any hyperdictions. If those interceptors discover you are carrying a sensor they can get very nasty indeed. Nasty enough to finish your attempt right there. I just followed advice and boosted away once I had finished reeling from being ripped out of Witch Space, turned off flight assist and carried on boosting until the shutdown field finally enveloped my ship. Even though my systems were all off, I still kept hurtling away because flight assist had not been able to slow me back down again. Hence, most invasive Xeno scans were avoided and I could go on my way as soon as my systems snapped back on again. Hyperdictions were now merely a slight inconvenience rather than the total pain in the neck that they had been previously.

Another encouraging thing was I had managed to successfully perform a gravity braking manoeuvre almost every time I returned to Artemis. Now you can use gravity braking to greatly reduce your approach time to POIs on planetary surfaces too but I was having a lot more trouble with those. I decided I’d leave those out this time and instead concentrate on a glorious final epic braking trick to finish the race! Well, we’ll see how that went…

Anyway, by now it was the morning of the first day of the race and I could now go for a submission run!

There better not be a cave-in behind this!

It took a good few turns. I was mainly abandoning runs due to silly mistakes (more cave-ins, explosive crash landings, getting SRV stuck fast under the ship) but somehow, I just couldn’t get the final approach to Artemis right. I would mess up that gravity breaking manoeuvre every single time. Eventually I managed a salvageable time but even then I managed to roll my SRV and drive up the walls inside the structures, getting hopelessly disorientated in the process, and I still managed to mess up my final approach. I dropped out too far away from the station and just boosted my way toward it until I was close enough to dock. An early leaderboard shows my first time.

Quite a packed leaderboard for early in the week!

There I am – fourteenth, one from last, with a time of 33’20”. Not terrible, but it could be so much better! I needed to practice. Sort my landings out. Really pay attention to where the best spots were around the structures. Sort my SRV driving out. Try to nail that final approach.

I decided my target must be to break the thirty minute barrier. if I could do that, then I would be happy.

So I thought I’d give the Unlimited class a try. I could use a ship that could get to each system with just one jump making each attempt a lot shorter. And in doing so I could use it to rehearse for my final regulation run. I chose the RushFleet’s DBX, Xanadu. Small, and packing a huge jump range.

There she is! The Xanadu. Sporting a brand new purple paint job.

Now, I would have practised a lot more in Xanadu, but something happened midweek that distracted me rather. Heck, it pretty much distracted everybody. Update 15 dropped, giving us some of the most engaging content Elite Dangerous has ever deployed. So I played that for a bit with one of my other accounts, enjoyed myself immensely, then decided to leave it and get back to racing.

After a few practice runs I decided to go for a submission. And it went rather well. I decided I would make a standard final approach, however, as I had fluffed it up so many times before. As I approached Artemis at full supercruise speed, I reduced the throttle with six seconds to go until I reached the station (which is the minimum amount of time you can get away with without having to perform a loop of shame). The thing was, I reduced the throttle too late and found myself hurtling toward the finish line. There was nothing for it but to attempt gravity braking anyway. I spiralled in as best as I could manage, lined up on the station, waited until I was close enough and dropped out of supercruise right next to the station. Somehow, I had pulled it off!

There I am in the unlimited section in ninth place, and with a decent time of 27’32”!

Note the time in last place in the regulation class too. Yeah, that’s right. Just a tad slower than everyone else. It would take quite some effort to take longer than that.

After this, I was confident enough to have another go back in the regulation Cobra. It was the end of the week by now and it would be the last chance I had to complete a run as a busy weekend was on the card in RL.

Initially , the run could not have gone better – perfect landings, no getting stuck under the ship, only one badly obscured jump, and precise driving around the structures.

Getting good at driving inside the structure. No driving up the walls and flipping the SRV this time!

Then I jumped back into Celaeno.

I lined up the station, waited until the exact moment, reduced the throttle and spiralled my way in. The station approached like a rocket and I readied myself to drop out of supercruise. I would literally have a split second.

And then I sailed past, and straight into the ring system, ripping me out of frame shift.

Basically the worst case scenario. I had to wait an age, now, for my supercruise to cool down so I could re-engage it and make the short hop back to the station. When I dropped out I realised I still had just enough time to break the thirty minutes. Racing toward Artemis and recklessly blasting in through the slot, (much to the dismay of the traffic controller) I don’t think I have ever landed a ship quicker! But had I achieved my goal?

They go rather well with the weathered paintjob don’t you think?

No. As you can see, just nine seconds out. I couldn’t believe it. If I had just nailed that finish I would have easily made it under the thirty minutes. But my time was up.

Maybe in the next Buckyball I can do better.

As the weekend wore on the failure burned in my soul, like I was carrying my own Thargoid sensor in there. I couldn’t let it go. And so, on the final afternoon of the race, I managed to wrestle enough time from RL to have just one more crack.

It did not go as well, There were now two badly obscured jumps. I messed up some of the driving in the first structure. I did manage a reasonable attempt at gravity braking on the final approach but in my desperation I made a right pigs ear of landing on the pad itself. Had I finally managed to get back within thirty minutes?

60,000 light years worth of wear and tear.

Just! 29’47”! It was such a relief. It hadn’t pushed me up the leaderboard (in fact I’d dropped a place or two) but that didn’t matter. It was a decent run!

What a race though! A MASSIVE shoutout and thanks go to Alec Turner for running a fantastic event. Such a lot of planning went in and he’s managed it all perfectly! It simply couldn’t have been better. And what a way to experience the Thargoid structures! It has all been wonderful fun. The race forum has never been so alive, it feels, and the leaderboard…the leaderboard…

It’s been Eurovision. Anyone would consider the constant changes on the leaderboard to be pretty chaotic and exciting. Well, that’s nothing compared to Buckyball. Nothing! Just look at how close it’s been, how many times positions have changed and danced around each other. And it really is wonderful to see so many new faces this season. We all welcome you with open arms Cmdrs! The whole experience has been nothing short of spectacular.

Now, if you think Buckyball just can’t get any better the next race will be run by Buckyballing veteran Sgurr. It will be run between the 10th and 18th of June.

It’s name will be, “Tunnel-ish Vision”

DON’T MISS IT!

My Favourite Headache

New Cmdr. New ship. New season.

Don’t get me wrong – Buckyballing is one of the greatest, most fun things you can do in Elite Dangerous. It has a fabulous community. teaches you a lot of new skills and lets you see some of the most spectacular parts of the Bubble in an entirely new light. Not to mention that each race is a lot of fun and brings with it unique challenges.

But, after a season of Buckyballing, I feel I’ve sort of hit a ceiling. A ceiling I’m trying desperately to punch through. A ceiling I’m determined to rise above. The problem is, it’s giving me a headache. There are a lot a feelings of disappointment, of feeling unworthy, of feeling that I could, and should be doing a whole lot better than I am. And I almost got there with this, the first race of the new season.

Almost.

Introducing Cmdr Leeya Geddy with her Buckyball Regulation Cobra – the My Favorite Headache

Owing to the unprecedented success of the last year’s season of eight re-runs of classic Buckyball races, a second season of eight races for this year has begun! Most are re-runs of classic races but there will be a few new ones too. My main account, Cmdr Homborger, will not be taking part as he is halfway to Colonia gathering as much bio data as he can so he can buy a Fleet Carrier once he gets there; so this year the Cmdr I created to take care of the Rush Fleet once it had been transferred from PS to PC, Cmdr Leeya Geddy, will be taking over the racing.

And so we have the first race of the new “Sweet Sixteen” Buckyball season – “The Empire Hustle“. It’s a simple course, all we have to do is to begin at Agnews’ Folly station in the Imperial system of Vequess, fly to four other stations in Imperial systems (all of which happen to be Orbis type stations) but before docking we have to approach from the front and fly all the way around the rear before making our way back to the mailslot and docking. Sounds so easy and straight forward doesn’t it? Ought to be a cinch. I thought I’d lay down a decent time on the first Saturday morning and that would be that.

I haven’t really learned anything about Buckyballing have I?

I called the new Regulation Cobra the My Favorite Headache for two reasons. The first will be blindingly obvious to seasoned Rush fans. “Leeya Geddy” is a play on the name of the most awesome bass player of all time, Geddy Lee (who just happens to have been the bass player for Rush). Now, he released a solo album called, “My Favorite Headache” (I know there’e supposed to be a “u” in there, British people). But also because Buckyballing can be quite the headache sometimes. Especially if you’re the host I would imagine.

Anyway, back to my first attempts. I was finding that, on the run around the five stations, struts and solar panel arms were swinging towards me out of the shadows, seemingly as if from nowhere sometimes, only for me to crash into them and go hopelessly spinning off course. Once I did this twice. On the way to the rear of the station and also on my way back to the slot. Of course, the second hit caused me to cannon off into another part of the superstructure and that ended my attempt right there. Not only that, but a ton of real life interruptions were disrupting my runs, meaning I’d have to abort and go back to the start.

Flying around Gurevich Orbital in the Imperial System of LHS 1380

I was getting a little too stressed about all this and so, to calm down I fired up my original Homborger account and carried on my slow journey to Colonia (via V1357 Cygni). It really helped, but I couldn’t help wondering when I would get the chance to complete a run.

I complained about this in the Buckyball forum and was told that Night Vision was a standard requirement for this procedure. Of course it was. One of the most obvious things to do if you can’t see things properly because of shadows or if the sunlight on the station has been eclipsed by the body it orbits.

Without Night Vision
With Night Vision

Armed with this (rather obvious) bit of advice I completed my first successful attempt. I knew it wasn’t going to be a great time but at least it ought to have been an adequate time. When the first leaderboard was posted, however, my heart sank.

What a surprise!

Last place. Of course it was last place, it’s always last place. Why did I think it would be any quicker? But not only that, the commander in ninth place had only been playing the game for two weeks! TWO WEEKS?! And to rub salt into the ugly gaping maw of a wound that was my pride they were over three minutes faster than my best, hardest won attempt.

The problem was, and the reason I was feeling so bitter, was that I had promised myself that I would practice the occultic Buckyballing racing technique of “Gravity Braking” – the mystic art of using a body’s gravity to slow your ship down rather than the standard “throttle to three quarters” steady approach that takes an age to slow your ship until it’s at the perfect speed and distance to emerge from supercruise next to the station (in fact, supercruise assist uses this standard approach and there is plenty of time to make yourself a nice, hot cup of tea and drink it before you arrive). It’s an incredibly tricky skill to master and, if you visit the video section on the Buckyball Racing Club‘s website, you can see various examples of this. Also, the crazed SRV “flyver”, Cmdr Alec Turner has posted a classic example on YouTube.

Now there are two main schools of Gravity Braking. The classic, “Spiralling In” method and the more accessible, yet slower “Loop and Swoop” or “Loop of Fame” method.

I began experimenting with the spiralling in method but, no matter how many times I attempted the manoeuvre I always had trouble controlling my speed and would shoot past the target body like a blob of faeces from a territorial, muck spreading rhino’s anus. My sense of direction completely disorientated as I flew aimlessly in supercruise trying to crowbar my poor, protesting Cobra around to face the station.

I clearly needed far more time than I had to master that particular school! So I tried my hand at the Loop and Swoop and was pleasantly surprised that I managed to just about nail it on my first attempt. Whilst experimenting with this method I was able to get roughly an 80% success rate. Which was rather encouraging.

On my next session, however, I couldn’t get it to work at all. And was having particular trouble on the approach to Gottlob Frege Colliseum. That body was rather small and the station seemed to be orbiting at a much greater distance than the others which made it difficult to judge just how much throttle to use for the swoop part of the technique.

The approach to Gottlob Frege. How much throttle should I use?

Again, it was time to turn to the ever helpful and supportive Buckyballing community. Alec Turner advised that Gottlob was indeed a pain in the arse to approach, and that the station never seemed to be pointing toward the correct place. So! Ready or not it was time to begin another series of attempts, this time utilizing my unpractised grasp of the Loop and Swoop.

It did not begin well. Attempt after attempt had to be aborted either because real life would rather rudely interrupt (a phone call late at night, dog being sick, and once I got cramp in my foot, resulting in my knee jerking up sharply sending the keyboard which rests on my lap slapping me in the face), or because of a hardware failure (wireless mouse froze once whilst pulling up hard, leaving me spinning hopelessly into the vacuum) or because of shear, careless absentmindedness (how many damn times am I going to forget to commence recording before I start off?). There were also plenty of runs where I would totally misjudge the throttle needed to approach the station and shoot past it. I think I must have aborted around twelve attempts as the final day of racing was fast approaching. This race really was becoming quite the headache.

I think the scowl on my face as I made the solemn journey back to the start each time would have curdled milk.

It was the Saturday evening, just over twenty four hours before the final submissions would be accepted, I attempted another run. Hopefully, I thought, I can at least break the thirty minute barrier.

I was a little more careful with the station approaches which meant I was taking a little too long to drop in on them but I didn’t care. I seemed to be making much better time and I really didn’t want to mess up. I managed to make the entire run but did I manage to beak the thirty minute barrier?

I’m back!

Almost. Almost.

And I’m not last. In fact, I’m six places up!

Buckyballing may well be a headache sometimes, but it’s definitely my favourite one!

Now it’s time to practice Gravity Braking proper, and see if I can get to grips with the dark art of spiralling into the body to slow myself down. Strangely enough, I was playing on one of my other accounts just this morning and I tried it.

And it worked.

Firstly I want to thank Sulu for putting on one hell of a race. It has been a tremendous, unprecedented success with more commanders taking part and a record number of submissions handed in for the first race of the season. Buckyballing has never been so popular! Sulu has really had his work cut out validating all the submissions and producing the results tables. If it wasn’t for him, this race would not have been run.

Secondly, I want to thank everyone who took part. Both old Buckyballing Nutjobs through to returning commanders from last year and the new commanders racing for the first time. You have all made this community an absolute pleasure to be a part of.

It’s too late to take part in this race now. But the next is only a few weeks away and it promises to be an absolute corker! It will be hosted by Alec Turner himself and will be based on the classic “Thargoid Structure Scramble” from 3307. It will run from the 6th May to 14th May.

Sounds most intriguing does it not?

Don’t miss it!

Racing Against Death

“Oxygen Depleted in 0:09…”

And so…finally…we come to the end of the Buckyball season. The final race entitled “The Last Gasp – Resuscitated” might well be the race to end all races. This time, we aren’t racing for a time. We’re gambling with our lives. How far can we go? How many times can we dock and get back to the start before we die? We are, literally, racing against Death himself.

Unlike the previous race which looked like it might take a lot of research, maths and scouting but actually turned out to be reasonably straightforward, this race really does involve a fair amount of research, maths, and scouting. You see – we must begin at Rebuy Prospect in Fullerene C60. We have to get to at least three, and at most five stations as far away as we dare in order to sell our cargo of five tons of Buckyball Beer Mats (one ton per station). And then we have to make it back again to land at Rebuy Prospect.

Oh, wait a minute, there’s one itsy bitsy detail I forgot to mention. Before we leave, we must turn our life support off. With the life support modules that we are allowed in the regulation Cobra Mk III class, that only gives us twenty five minutes of air. If it runs out before we get back.

We die.

But first, even before we consider launching, we have to find bases where we can sell our beer mats. We can only land at outposts, because if we land at other coriolis or orbis stations then the artificial atmosphere will replenish our air supply and that would be cheating!

The clock doesn’t start ticking until we leave the artificial atmosphere of Rebuy Prospect’s coriolis station.

For myself, I decided to use the EDDB station finder tool to look for suitable outposts. I decided that having them all around a hundred light years away and only one jump away from each other would be the most efficient run. I thought that would be somewhere to start at least. I should be able to get a five station run with that. Five outposts at an average of a hundered light years away would mean a score of around 500ly. They would also have to be within 20-30 ly or so from the main star so I wouldn’t have to spend too much time in supercruise. I didn’t have a lot of time to play with this race as real life commitments would considerably eat into my usual Elite time, and I really wanted to choose stations at a distance that would be a bit of a challenge (for me at least – you know the trouble I tend to have landing at outposts) but should be quite doable too. I would only have enough time to have a couple of tries at this.

After about an hour of searching, and then scouting the stations in my DBX (some I would have to reject and then find new ones) I settled on Tanaka Landing (Ngargambo 106.84ly), Torricelli Terminal (Samnach 90.21ly), Gohar Refinery (Tripuru 110.47ly), Peano Orbital (Ross 409 97.85ly) and Weber Station (Jittabed 95.35ly). This gave me a total of 500.72ly.

And so I set off. Without life support you don’t notice any change until you exit though the slot, then everything is different. There is now no air in your cockpit to allow the sound from its environmental speaker array (a clever concept that translates everything we do in space into sound in real time to give pilots the illusion they can hear sounds through the vacuum of space) to reach our ears so everything is muffled. and the only sound is the sound of your breathing rattling inside your flight suit helmet.

It took six jumps to reach Tanaka Landing, rather than five because of the extra weight of the five tons of beer mats I was carrying. However, landing there proved to be straight forward as the pad allotted to me was on the same side of the station I dropped out of supercruise from. I landed, sold a ton of beer mats, took off and jumped to the next system.

Things went a bit downhill from there.

I had real trouble finding my allotted landing pads on the next four outposts, as well as a panicked take off from Gohar when I completely forgot which stations I’d already visited and which I had yet to visit. There’s something about flying with a limited air supply that addles your brain. The rattled breaths in your helmet, the muffled sounds of the ship felt through your bones rather than through your ears, and it severely affected not only my ability to fly but also my decision making.

Once I’d dropped off the last ton of beer mats I only had four minutes of air left, and, after the five final jumps back to Fullerene C60, only a minute and a half to get back to Rebuy Prospect. It seemed to take a whole day just to make the 200ls trip to the station and when I eventually dropped out only fifteen seconds left. It spun slowly before me as I boosted toward it in desperation, now choking as I fought for the last dregs of air left in my supply.

I’m not going to make it, I thought. I screwed up too many times.

NO, YOU’RE NOT GOING TO MAKE IT.

The sound of a voice like a thousand coffin lids closing all at once drew words in my brain. I looked to my right, and sure enough, there He was, sitting in the co-pilot seat in a black cowl, eyes of pale blue light and a smile that never left Him.

DON’T WORRY, I’M ONLY HERE TO ESCORT YOU TO THE REBUY SCREEN.

I fared no better on my next attempt, which really stung as I had no more time for any further ones. This was to be the only race of the Magic 8 Buckyball Racing series in which I would not be able to appear on the leaderboard. Not even on the bottom. I would just be far too busy the rest of the week. But then, a couple of nights later, I found I had forty minutes or so to myself and I thought I’d have one more run.

Nice, straightfoward landing at Peano.

I decided to do the stations in reverse this time, starting with Peano. It only took five jumps to get there this time as it’s much closer and the landing was pretty straight forward, sold my ton of mats, Ninteen minutes left.

The next station, Torricelli Terminal I had a little more trouble finding the pad but it wasn’t too bad, then came the landing at Gohar Refinery.

I need pad four! Where the Hell is pad four?

Ahead of me were pads two and three but I had to encircle the station to find pad four, my allotted pad, before landing and selling my third ton of mats. Keep calm, keep cool, try not to panic. Two stations to go, just under twelve minutes left.

At the next pad, Torricelli Terminal, I had trouble finding the pad too, wasting yet more time but at the last, Tanaka Landing, it was pretty straight forward again, although my approach to the pad was a little panicked and I took more time than I should. Dropped off my last ton of mats, took off, six minutes left!

Easy! Easy! Don’t panic and crash!

Now that my cargo hold was empty, it only took five jumps, rather than six, to get back to Fullerene C60. Of course! Why didn’t I do this in the reverse order the first time? Never mind, I dropped out of hyperspace with around three minutes to get back to the station, surely there was enough time!

I managed to drop out of supercruise with about a minute and thirty seconds of air left. Easily enough time! And when I sailed though the slot I still had a total of one minute and four seconds of air left.

I’m back!

I’d done it! The relief of actually being able to post a score on my final attempt almost brought tears to my eyes.

It’s done! I can take my time landing on the pad. It’s over.

Sigh! And there I am, at the bottom. Again. Where else? Who knows, if I had had more time I could have scouted out a further route? I did have plenty of air left after all. But it doesn’t matter. I have now managed to register a score in every single Buckyball race this season, and I’m damn proud of it!

Special thanks must go to the incomparable Alec Turner for running this race like a boss. Thanks Alec, it’s been an absolute banger of a race this. Special mention also has to go to Shaye (Wait…What? How?) Blackwood for that unbelievable score of 1453ly. How they can mange that I will never fathom! But also, and this is important, an extra special thanks must go to The High Wake for their amazing trailer they put out for the race at the request of Alec Turner. It can be watched here and if you haven’t yet seen it you really should watch it. And then subscribe to their channel and watch all the other wonderful animations they’ve done.

So that’s it commanders! The final race is over. It’s been an absolute blast taking part and being a member of this truly wonderful community! If you haven’t taken part and you would like to (I mean why wouldn’t you?) then I’m sure there will be another season next year, so look out for it!