GasBandit
Staff member
Didn't get to play my dark level tonight because I, on a whim, logged into the server I play multiplayer on just to check on stuff.
I knew it was a bad night when all the medbays except one were not showing up on my spawn list.
Fortunately, I did have that one medbay floating in the middle of nowhere with nothing but a solar panel, or this would have been a much, much, MUCH worse night.
So I spawn in, and start jetpacking toward DPF HQ's coordinates, fearing the worst - that I'd get there and find nothing but empty space. On the way I inquired of the leader of the APC (Anti-Pirate Coalition) if they'd raided a base today, and they said no.
I get there, and to my mixed relief and consternation, the main base structure is still present, but many of the ships are gone. My mobile factory is missing, along with two large drilling rigs (both 49 drills each), the Rubix, and my monsterous grinder ship - which still had all the parts from that capital ship I ground the other day in its hold. The only ships remaining are the small ones - Bob the builder, a couple fighters, and a small sized 5x5 drilling ship.
I check the base's medbay, and sure enough, it's ground down just enough to make it nonfunctional. I manufacture some medical supplies quickly and weld it back up to operational.
I go and get Bob the Builder, intent on repairing the turrets on the base which show obvious signs of disabled-by-grinding, when I see a red name come floating out of the gloom. He doesn't know I'm here, so I whip Bob around, lock the grinders in the "on" position and shred him to ribbons within a moment of him seeing me.
At first he plays innocent and offended ("Why you do dat! I /waved!") and I let him in on the fact that I see his faction leader's name on the parts of our base that they hacked to take control of (funnily enough, they only hacked one cargo bay, which was filled with 1 million kg of gravel. It must have disgusted them to such an extent that they didn't bother hacking any other cargo bays, where all the good stuff was stored. Got lucky there). He drops the pretense.
I don't waste time. Using Bob, I weld several large thrusters and a dozen gyros to the space base (which is 5000 tons, incidentally), fix up the turrets, add a couple more in the blind spots for good measure, start the base to manufacturing more missiles and gatling ammo, then mergeblock together all the remaining small-ships and start moving stuff. I fire off steam messages to Dust and Crow - don't ever get a response from Dust, Crow's got company over he says, and can't log in. So I'm on my own, as is usual these days.
I manage to move the amalgamated small ships 17km deeper into the oort cloud in a sorta-diagonal direction, then suicide, respawn at the space base, and sloooooowly move it out to the same place. I also get a tip from someone else who spotted my huge grinder floating in space - turns out the server crashed while the guys who stole it flew it back to their base, but its dampeners were on so it slowed to a stop with no pilot and sat there waiting. I manage to get to and recover Big Bob - lucky break, all the materials from grinding the G Dub are still in its cargo bay. I take it back to space base and merge it with the base so it can be moved together.
This shit took 4 hours, all told. The biggest loss is the Rubix, which was loaded with ammo but shut down to reduce lag (kicking myself over that one) - it being seized by a new, upstart faction represents a major shift in the server's balance of power. It's one of the most powerful warships on the server, and my faction is now very much diminished without it.
I knew it was a bad night when all the medbays except one were not showing up on my spawn list.
Fortunately, I did have that one medbay floating in the middle of nowhere with nothing but a solar panel, or this would have been a much, much, MUCH worse night.
So I spawn in, and start jetpacking toward DPF HQ's coordinates, fearing the worst - that I'd get there and find nothing but empty space. On the way I inquired of the leader of the APC (Anti-Pirate Coalition) if they'd raided a base today, and they said no.
I get there, and to my mixed relief and consternation, the main base structure is still present, but many of the ships are gone. My mobile factory is missing, along with two large drilling rigs (both 49 drills each), the Rubix, and my monsterous grinder ship - which still had all the parts from that capital ship I ground the other day in its hold. The only ships remaining are the small ones - Bob the builder, a couple fighters, and a small sized 5x5 drilling ship.
I check the base's medbay, and sure enough, it's ground down just enough to make it nonfunctional. I manufacture some medical supplies quickly and weld it back up to operational.
I go and get Bob the Builder, intent on repairing the turrets on the base which show obvious signs of disabled-by-grinding, when I see a red name come floating out of the gloom. He doesn't know I'm here, so I whip Bob around, lock the grinders in the "on" position and shred him to ribbons within a moment of him seeing me.
At first he plays innocent and offended ("Why you do dat! I /waved!") and I let him in on the fact that I see his faction leader's name on the parts of our base that they hacked to take control of (funnily enough, they only hacked one cargo bay, which was filled with 1 million kg of gravel. It must have disgusted them to such an extent that they didn't bother hacking any other cargo bays, where all the good stuff was stored. Got lucky there). He drops the pretense.
I don't waste time. Using Bob, I weld several large thrusters and a dozen gyros to the space base (which is 5000 tons, incidentally), fix up the turrets, add a couple more in the blind spots for good measure, start the base to manufacturing more missiles and gatling ammo, then mergeblock together all the remaining small-ships and start moving stuff. I fire off steam messages to Dust and Crow - don't ever get a response from Dust, Crow's got company over he says, and can't log in. So I'm on my own, as is usual these days.
I manage to move the amalgamated small ships 17km deeper into the oort cloud in a sorta-diagonal direction, then suicide, respawn at the space base, and sloooooowly move it out to the same place. I also get a tip from someone else who spotted my huge grinder floating in space - turns out the server crashed while the guys who stole it flew it back to their base, but its dampeners were on so it slowed to a stop with no pilot and sat there waiting. I manage to get to and recover Big Bob - lucky break, all the materials from grinding the G Dub are still in its cargo bay. I take it back to space base and merge it with the base so it can be moved together.
This shit took 4 hours, all told. The biggest loss is the Rubix, which was loaded with ammo but shut down to reduce lag (kicking myself over that one) - it being seized by a new, upstart faction represents a major shift in the server's balance of power. It's one of the most powerful warships on the server, and my faction is now very much diminished without it.
