UA Mystery Thread 3: The Canonn

[CMDR Corlas]

I maintain my earlier assumption that the UA's use morse because they detected us using morse to communicate first. The purpose of the simple vector art of our own ships is to give us a simple communication about something we already know, so that we can more quickly understand their "language". It's the groundwork phases of establishing communication.

Either that, or they are scouting our and gathering data in preparation for a military strike by some unknown power.

 

[who?]

Actually dug up that Galnet entry again out of curiosity:

As further alien artefacts claiming to be from Soontill are being sold on the open market, the results of the initial scientific tests have been revealed.


“We were looking for key markers,” explains Chief Xeno-Chemist Lyran Betar. “Elemental make up, crystalline structure, anything that indicates it could have originated from human hand.”


And the results? Inconclusive. The research team’s results clearly state that no known human technology could have created the relics, yet they do not quite align with known Thargoid materials. Whatever they are, they are indeed very old, with isotopic dating indicating that they could well be tens of thousands of years old.


Jean Molyneaux, a historian from France, Earth, suggests we look back at our own past to determine the home of these relics. “Imagine an alien travelling back two thousand years into mankind’s past. The varied culture, arts and building materials of the Aztecs, Greeks, the Shang dynasty, what have you, the alien could think they were all different species, if that was his way of thinking…”


The community seems wary of awarding these artefacts any title yet, given the fifty years of false hopes since Soontill was first mentioned by the Thargoids. However, reports indicate that these relics have now arrived at labs on both Mars and Capitol for further testing, and with any luck, we may soon finally agree on what these relics are, or are not.

Source

Very old.. does that mean they've been here all along. Or maybe they were sent via non-hyperspace means and only just arrived here recently.

 

[b_laiskiainen]

AI was banned less than 50 years ago.

Okies...

http://youtu.be/O6z5OK8J5pg

Mr Brookes says here something about AI having been created several times with bad consequences, though.

 

[Ratking15]

looks like rizal done all of them apart from the new ships in 1.4

Ah so maybe those need to be done too?

 

[rizal72]

Ah so maybe those need to be done too?

As I said few posts ago I'm almost sure that the new ships will hear the morse of the most similar ship: the Imperial Eagle will receive the morse of the Eagle.
The Assault Ship and the Gunship will hear the morse of the Dropship.

 

[Timsk]

Well, in trying to relocate yesterday's UA that points elsewhere, I've come to the conclusion that nilreb and Zenith were right and that I was indeed in ADR GW-W D1-52, rather than one jump away. I've toured around the systems close to D1-52, looking for another system at 139LY from Merope. Nope. Can't find one. Here's the results of my limited search:

ADR GW-W D1-52 (0 Ly from D-52!)- UA, Merope 139 Ly
ADR XK-N B7-2 (6.91 Ly from D-52) - UA, Merope 141 Ly
ADR TE-P B6-3 (9.10 Ly from D-52) - No UA (missed an SSS), Merope 132 Ly
ADR TE-P B6-2 (10.7 Ly from D-52) - No UA, Merope 131 Ly
ADR UE-P B6-0 (14.9 Ly from D-52) - UA, Merope 140 Ly
ADR GW-W D1-53 (15.90 Ly from D-52) - No UA, Merope 132 Ly
Arietis Sector EQ-Y B0 (9.71 LY from D-52) - UA, Merope 142 Ly
Arietis Sector EQ-Y B1 (12.9 Ly from D-52) - No UA, Merope 145 Ly
Arietis Sector YJ-A C1 (18.93 Ly from D-52) - UA, Merope 144 Ly

All the UAs pointed straight at Merope, the buggers. I bumped at least one to death just for doing that exclusively.

Therefore, if not a bug, perhaps it had something to do with what was in my hold (ah, that old cherry again - it's a new release, you never know), which was 5 x Occupied Escape Pods, 2 x Ancient Artefacts, plus I think a small survey cache (might be wrong on that one).

If the video didn't show what I observed, I'd be thinking I'd imagined this for sure.

 

[b_laiskiainen]

Well, in trying to relocate yesterday's UA that points elsewhere, I've come to the conclusion that nilreb and Zenith were right and that I was indeed in ADR GW-W D1-52, rather than one jump away. I've toured around the systems close to D1-52, looking for another system at 139LY from Merope. Nope. Can't find one. Here's the results of my limited search:

ADR GW-W D1-52 (0 Ly from D-52!)- UA, Merope 139 Ly
ADR XK-N B7-2 (6.91 Ly from D-52) - UA, Merope 141 Ly
ADR TE-P B6-3 (9.10 Ly from D-52) - No UA (missed an SSS), Merope 132 Ly
ADR TE-P B6-2 (10.7 Ly from D-52) - No UA, Merope 131 Ly
ADR UE-P B6-0 (14.9 Ly from D-52) - UA, Merope 140 Ly
ADR GW-W D1-53 (15.90 Ly from D-52) - No UA, Merope 132 Ly
Arietis Sector EQ-Y B0 (9.71 LY from D-52) - UA, Merope 142 Ly
Arietis Sector EQ-Y B1 (12.9 Ly from D-52) - No UA, Merope 145 Ly
Arietis Sector YJ-A C1 (18.93 Ly from D-52) - UA, Merope 144 Ly

All the UAs pointed straight at Merope, the buggers. I bumped at least one to death just for doing that exclusively.

Therefore, if not a bug, perhaps it had something to do with what was in my hold (ah, that old cherry again - it's a new release, you never know), which was 5 x Occupied Escape Pods, 2 x Ancient Artefacts, plus I think a small survey cache (might be wrong on that one).

If the video didn't show what I observed, I'd be thinking I'd imagined this for sure.

What were you flying?

 

[Timsk]

What were you flying?

Yesterday a Python, today an Asp (to make it a bit easier for the there and back)

 

[Zenith]

I don't dispute your video evidence. It clearly pointed another direction.
The following checks seem to show that yours was the odd one out. Let's keep it in mind if it happens again for anyone else.

 

[TFW Primus]

Yesterday a Python, today an Asp (to make it a bit easier for the there and back)

Is it worth heading back out there in your Python to try it again just to make sure that variable that changed didn't impact the results? Maybe dropping them from a Python causes them to point somewhere else. Or maybe it was just a bug.

 

[simulacrae]

Or, if they've been carrying Onionhead - spaced whales.

...

I'll get my coat.

Psychedelic Space Whale says ..... Duuuuude !

Spoiler

 

[Eoran]

OK so it seems that the dropped UA does start its sequence from the beginning each time its dropped.

While flying a Sidewinder, I tried the following:

* dropped UA
* scooped it (roughly half way) through the second repeat of the 7 word/triangle Sidewinder code sequence
* repeated this 3 times

Each time it started broadcasting Morse from the beginning of the Sidewinder sequence.

Also when from a distance (1km or so), and when viewing from the cockpit, the dropped UA Morse is definitely much clearer than up close. The high pitched tone that dropped UAs usually have isn't audible at range but the Morse is. You have the ambient cockpit sounds of course, but it's not so bad.

Oh and I also tried dropping it in a Salvageable Wreckage and it just beamed Sidewinder back at me (the wreckage seemed to be a Type6 or 7 class transport, or bits of it anyway). Tried ensuring it landed in the middle of the wreckage, and also tried dropping it there and flying +1km away so I wasn't the closest thing, and let the sequences run for a bit. Still Sidewinder.

Right, I'm heading back to get my Asp.

 

[Timsk]

The following checks seem to show that yours was the odd one out. Let's keep it in mind if it happens again for anyone else.

It was odd, and worth looking out for, yes. Think I'll try and recreate the circumstances more fully with the next attempt.

Is it worth heading back out there in your Python to try it again just to make sure that variable that changed didn't impact the results? Maybe dropping them from a Python causes them to point somewhere else. Or maybe it was just a bug.

Yes, back out in the Python with as close to the same behaviors and hold contents as I can manage. It was an unscooped floater that pointed the wrong way, no dropping involved.

My theory is that some combination of events caused it not to 'see' me (or discounted me as a threat after it's scan) to cause it to move to pointing at Merope from where it was really looking, as already noted by others at first arrival.

 

[TheDayman]

Okay so I was reading this till about page 511, somewhere around there but I was seeing all those binary sounds the UA puts off starts with HH....

Well, I Googled HH which lead to a Wikipedia article which mentions an astronomical object called a Herbig-Haro object... any help?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbig–Haro_object

Edit: AAANNDDD I should've kept reading. Someone already figured it out. Yay!

 

[CMDR Corlas]

My theory is that some combination of events caused it not to 'see' me (or discounted me as a threat after it's scan) to cause it to move to pointing at Merope from where it was really looking, as already noted by others at first arrival.

Maybe drop a UA from silent running or a similarly cold ship?

 

[TFW Primus]

Maybe drop a UA from silent running or a similarly cold ship?

Someone tried that a few tens of pages back. They were still scanned and it still pointed to Merope.

 

[Popov Le Magnifique]

Okies...

http://youtu.be/O6z5OK8J5pg

Mr Brookes says here something about AI having been created several times with bad consequences, though.

And the Federation has done it again with the UA. It knows morse, our alphabet to represent ships in 3D through a scan, it points somewhere. People are forgetting the Federal Security convoys, why the Federation? INRA? Hm.

Or it's still AI, but they merged with Thargoid "technology" when they got banned and kicked into deep space.

 

[Dommarraa]

Just a heads up for anyone who uses the Anarchy 49 Arietis as a place to dump UA and the other loot in the Dark Region. System is about to flip to Dictatorship, guess the Long Range Smuggling missions are having a big effect on Anarchy systems (Unfetterd dont seem to offer them very much)

 

[Darwin]

Well done to MJK and all the Bletchley Park codebreakers. Us lesser sceintists can only try and follow in your footsteps.

As I spent a very long time looking for a UA pre 1.4 and not finding one, I took the oppertunity now to actually find one of my own.
And find one I did, in ADR UE-P B6-0

I am hoping there is still more to find out, other than the sounds and orientation. There are some tasks I was wanting to try if I found one pre 1.4, (Sell it at Leonard Nimoy! etc)
Is that a wild goose chase now, or should we still be using the increased numbers to actually experiment with, to find out anything extra (other than the pointing at Merope bit)?

Mine is called Herbert btw, and while taking the obligatory selfie, I had a thought sparked from some pictures on the thread today.

Now they are scanning ships, could the markings be the representation of a Clipper?

Spoiler

And here is Herbert

Spoiler

 

[Uncle Bert]

My theory is that some combination of events caused it not to 'see' me (or discounted me as a threat after it's scan) to cause it to move to pointing at Merope from where it was really looking, as already noted by others at first arrival.

I had a similar experience on Friday. I jettisoned a UA and it refused to point to Merope for ages. I was back and forward to the galaxy map, then suddenly it was pointing to Merope. I've got video but it's late tonight. I'd be inclined to agree with your statement above. The server connection hasn't been wonderful over the past few days. Maybe the vector is calculated server side before the UA orients itself.

UB