Flieger, grüß' mir die Sonne, grüß' mir die Sterne und grüß' mir den Mond. Dein Leben, das ist ein Schweben, durch die Ferne, die keiner bewohnt! - Hans Albers, F.P.1 antwortet nicht (Adaptation in the 80s: Extrabreit)

Saturday 11 October 2014

Bugs buzzing

Third night, and it stats badly. I hope the crash reports the little programm sends to them will be useful. There is a time, however, when I can get really back into play. Jay!

Starting at Aulin, the black market accepts transactions again, so I can finally sell all that cargo from the missions which expired during last session´s crashes. Then I accept a transport mission to Opala for 9k Credits. The hyperjump is successful, and hope rises. However, exiting supercruise at the station is not smooth at all, contrary of what should have been fixed with patch 2.05.

In Opala there are two fetch missions where I know that I can get the coffee and tea from Eta Cephei, so I accept them, total value 45k Credits. Leaving the docking area, I note a hollow blip. I turn around in order to scan and get to know the CMDR. However, this guy seemed to have followed me, and as I complete my 180 degree turn, I am crashing right into him and get destroyed. Don´t know about him, as the killscreen does not give any name.

Restart from Opala, after 70k Credits for insurance got deducted. More than my current run will profit me. First, I have to find a jump route to Eta Cephei, which is not easy, because not in a plane with Opala. I have to shift the view downwards and thus loose direction to Opala. With a little bit of spatial imagination, I finally manage to plot a course, via LHS3006, Lalande, LP103-294. Enter hyperspace. It is stuttering and I worry, but (c)hyperspace spits me out in LHS3006. Next jump. Enter hyperspace, I note that my EDtracker suddenly veers my head view to the right, and instead of an exit, the client crashes again, I am back on my windows7 desktop. Sigh. Restart, relog, "could not connect to server", second try works. Next try for hyperjump, same thing, crash.

Maybe it is a buggy system, so I switch to Naraka. It works! I exit hyperjump in Naraka! Yay! Although, my head view again veers off in hyperspace. Next jump, must be LHS1446. Crash, "server not connected", red start-button, playing a tutorial mission, start button white again, this time trying "solo" play mode. "Sever not connected", then again red start button, playing a tutorial mission, still red button.

After some 20 minuntes, writing these lines, white start button again, next try to LHS1446 in "open play". Wish me luck. Jump! The hyperspace animation starts again a bit blurry, something I connect to something going wrong; but it gets clear again, and I exit to LHS1446.Yay!


 But something is off. I get a message that "1 astronomical object detected", repeatedly. Also, I want to but cannot drop from supercruise. Only after the "frameshift cooled down". Something is still very wrong, I guess. How many tickets should I open?

Hyperjump to Eta Cephei works on first try. The giant blazing sun greets me, but it is difficult to get in the mood with all these bugs buzzing. As I exit, a message pops up "1 astronomical object detected", and I follow up with a D-scan and get "5 astronomical objects detected". Exit from SC at the Isherwood Station causes a freeze. I have to kill the client via Task Manager.

Restart. It has become a nail-biting issue in the meanwhile. Back in without problems, although it takes a while before the button turns white. I supercruise again to Isherwood Ring. Approaching, I get repeatedly "1 astronomical object detected". Exit from supercruise works after about 10 seconds of freeze.



I have finally arrived. Of course, my fetch missions have expired in the meanwhile. As compensation, I accept and immediately serve all coffee- and tea fetch quests I can get hold off. Not many, this time, but enough to buy 50 tea and 50 coffee units for trade. The bulletin board loads very slow, about 5 seconds. I wanted to travel a bit today but I hardly dare anymore.

There are a lot of Coltan and Uraninite fetch quests here, also some Lepidolite. I have the impression that extraction systems are very rare, anyways. None in jump range with the 12ly of my Lakon Type 6. So far, I could not make use of the extra cargo space. Maybe I should have stayed with the Cobra? Thing is, I love the Lakon-style cockpit view.

I plot a course to Vetr, an extraction site, via Ross1069. Let´s see if I can make some sense out of these fetch quests. And maybe they buy coffee and tea over there. Wish me luck with the hyperjumps...

Ops, ship is overheating, how come? 150%. As I enter hyperspace is blurry, bad sign. But it works, I am in Ross1069. I get the "1 astronomical object detected" thing, follow up with a D-scan and detect 3 more. Repeat scan, again 3 objects, repeat, again. Bug, must be the same 3 objects all the time.

The last two jumps, I was always on my desktop when in hyperspace. Maybe this is a work around to prevent crashing???

No overheating on the next jump. Again the obviously buggy "astronomical object", set course to Solovyov Colony. Ops, interdiction, actually my first one in the whole beta2! I boost away before I can identify my hosts. Exit supercruise again causes a freeze, jeeez, I am quite sore of these bugs. They for sure kill the whole mood of the game!

It tuns out that Vetr is a tiny extraction and refinery colony, and guess what, no freaking minerals for sale except for Bauxite. Great. Bulletin board takes 20 seconds to pop up. One coffee fetch mission for 11k, at least. I spot another, but the board hangs again for 10 seconds and it is gone before I can act again because of the 5 minute timer.

At least I can sell my stuff on the market, for a little profit. I remember my D-scans and try to sell them, but the universal cartographics menu hangs and does not open. In fact, the whole client hangs with it; after a minute, "unable to retrieve cartographic data from server".

I want to go to the neighbour LT16016, maybe they finally have some minerals. I sell the rest of my tea and coffee for about 60k profit. At least, and finally, I seem to have found a trade route!

I arrive at LT16016, whew. They system is totally unexplored. Three suns orbiting each other, looks very cool! But scanning is buggy. I am very close to objects and the scanner still does not list them. And where is that mining station, which I came for? The rings of one planet which refuses to reveal are very bright, meaning tight asteroids. I am curious and want to drop in there, just to see how it is. Yes, indeed. Full of asteroids and whitish fog. Great to see that there is some variety with those rings.



After a meditative break, back in supercruise those planets finally show on the scanner, also an extraction site. A pity that I do not have my Cobra anymore, lest I could go in there for a bit of bounty hunting, for a change. Now, where is that station! Hm, using the D-scan again makes the contacts disappear. Bug. But it is weird also without bugs; this planet does not seem to have an orbit. Lots of objects revolving around it, moons. But no orbit line for the planet itself? There is a second ring planet, which seems to be exactly in the same orbit. At least the same orbit line connects them. This line is far away from the three suns which I discovered. But they must revolve around something! No matter how long I search, no sun to be seen. Maybe this planet is indeed orbitless, a pseudo-sun for the four (?) moons? It is difficult to see without proper identification, they all still show unknown despite all my scanning efforts via targeting, even flying very close to them. Buggy.

So I set course for NLTT49528, supposedly an industrial system. Maybe I even find the station there? My original plan is abondoned, I am in the middle of an exploration trip. With a Lakon Type 6. Well, there are worse ships, at least the cockpit view is nice. At the last moment before jumping, I spot something move before the vast starlight darkness of space. I move closer. At last, the D-scanner reveals 14 astronomical objects! Two more ring planets with moons. For those, I do indeed spot an orbit line around the three suns, which are about 1600 ls away. It is a very interesting system, but maybe I am just not good in astronomy.

Since I know now to look out for pins of light, I discover another ringworld with moons, 7 objects. I spot another planet, without rings this time. Exploration really gets to me. I have a goal; where is that mining station?



Another speck in space! This system has a lot of planets! A planet, three object. I read about that unproven space/planet formula, which nevertheless relatively accurately predicts distances of planets from the sun. So I follow a line farther out of the farthest planet, roughly at double distance. No luck, I do not find anything anymore. And the station eludes me. It may also be a bug; I have read in the ED forums that there are sytems which do not have stations despite having allegiance or even a population numbers, after all. What a pity; finding the station would have been a reward in itself!

Jump to NLTT49528. Fullerton City is 6.000 ls away. What a flight time. D-scan shows 16 objects, but they do not appear anywhere. Actually, after a minute, they appear at least in the left menu. But I want to dock and have a drink now.

So, finally I get to see one of the newly introdocued Ocellus Stations. I did not realize this from outside; they looked more impressive in the screenshots... I just realized it when the station logo was different, that of an ocellus station. The commodity market has high supply of crop harvesters, cobalt, basic medicines, domestic appliances, wait... they also have all minerals here! So, my odysee finally brought me back to my initial goal. Well, well. The station is also well stocked... all ships are purchasable here. And the outfitting menu is also well stocked. In particular, a thruster, scanner and power system could be of interest. Or should I save for better frameshift drive? On this occasion I realize, the screen shows my current range as suddenly 15ly, not as before 12ly. Weird.


Checking the bulletin board, there are plenty of missions to LHS64. I grab two transport missions for ~100k Credits and some more until my hold is full. Nice, never had so much profit in one run in this beta! Cartographics are still bugged and hang the client for a minute. Now quick, take off before the mission time runs out. The new thruster I installed is disappointing; I do not realize any difference to before.

Arriving in LHS64, and I am so goddamn glad that the crashes seem to be a thing from the past now, I make 200k Credits within 15 minutes. Locke´s Claim, my first stop, has again 100k worth of transport missions, to the in-system station Fisher Platform. Nice! Cash and equipment to buy, a good reason to stay here a bit! There is a self-loop of uranite-fetch missions, as they are also sold at this very same commodity market. A 60k transport mission takes me back to Locke´s Claim.

When I want to launch, my ship seems to be stuck in the access lift. Have to relog. Locke´s has again a lot of valuable missions for me. I can finally make use of my big cargo hold and fill it to the brim, back to Fisher, then jump to Fullerton in NLTT49528.

I spend there the 430k Credits which I just earned for a better 4F frameshift drive (176k Credits), which raises my optimal tonnage from 315 to 350 tons. Two point defense turret for 18k Credits. A G3 powerplant, yielding 1000 more power capacity. While flying, I notice that my rightmenu suddenly gives my a jumprange of 19ly/15ly. Weird. Maybe the powerplant upgraded the jump range, too? Or the whole game still is too buggy to be reliable.

For a while I make good profit, until on the next trip to LHS64, the client finally crashes again. Timer is running out on several missions because I took time to collect quite a bunch. After the crash, again a blue circle in space, hyperjump blurry and endless. I restart three times, same thing again as described at the start.

Sigh. I guess the missions have timed out in the meanwhile. Time to go offline, I guess. I should prbably send this whole blog entry as one huge ticket...



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