THE FORMIDINE RIFT MYSTERY (Part 4)

[G4RY]

Man that Salome discord is packed! I thought we might get away with a mega instance for all of us but there's no way.

I'm going to sit it out to be honest, i can't be bothered with trying to get into the instance, i haven't even looked at this discord group. But it seems to me that even getting close to 46 Eridani will be a pain. The alien ruin's were bad enough with the disconnects. Every system within a 100ly radius will be rammed with players trying to get in by the sounds of it.

Does anyone know who is streaming the event?

 

[MONTItheRed]

CHILDREN OF RAXXLA - INTELLIGENCE TEAM DISCOVERY REPORT​

"REBECCA" is cancelled out, leaving us with "

Why is REBECCA cancelled out?

 

[SpocksOddSocks]

Why is REBECCA cancelled out?

Well, there is a character in several of Drew's Oolite books called Rebecca Weston. Many hints pointed to the old lady in reclamation being the same woman, and it was her Cobra that was sending out the signal.

 

[RevLogos]

I'm still bothered by the Generation ship stopping at an asteroid. The whole premise of the Generation ships is that they don't stop until they reach their destination. Stopping would have added months to years to an already incredibly long journey. It doesn't make sense. A much better scenario would have been that the ship was impacted by an asteroid, and while making repairs, the crew member was exposed to the pathogen.

Fair question. I'm not entirely sure its stationary. If in orbit about the main star, the orbit would move so slowly that its relative position to the 10th planet probably wouldn't change much for centuries. At any rate I think the position is fixed by game mechanics. I doubt the Voyager probe(s) are moving either.

I won't complain about game limits. As for the asteroid, it is possible they found one in an elliptical orbit that would pass close enough that a survey team in a shuttlecraft could reach it without stopping the ship. It may have been nothing more than a target of opportunity.

Bigger question for me is, where are the shuttlecraft? For that matter, where are the landing craft? Weren't they supposed to colonize some planet?

 

[-Denali-]

I think Lave will be the end destination. So many parts of the video clue seem pointless, the only explanation I can think of for all the erroneous lines is if they were giving clues to both the start and end system but settled when players found the answer to one. Too many clues point to the original Elite and 46 Eridani is an easier answer to get without them. A beginning in an ending, Lave being the beginning for everyone in the first elite and the ending of the event.

Someone please take back this tinfoil hat. I don't want it sirs, I do not want it!

Edit: Also, Tionisla is near Lave (controlled by a Lave based faction even).

 

[[Diplomacy] Carnegie]

Some of the experts certainly seem annoyed to have so many amateurs underfoot. But the strategy that they came up with may be the only realistic way to make SOME use of the hundreds (thousands?!) of us volunteers they received, given the ~30 ship instance limit.

I'll also be trying to help, but following one of the semi-official livestreams... hope the organizers are kind enough to put them in wings with the main characters.

Edit: If it weren't for the limits of game mechanics, I could really see us little guys coming together

It will be ironic if there was no opposition to Salome who show up.
At this point, I'm not sure why they'd bother, given the overwhelming numbers of people wanting to support her.

 

[ironshirt]

Met her a few weeks ago

Spoiler

 

[RevLogos]

Met her a few weeks ago

Seems odd FD would use that name for an NPC. Did she survive the encounter?

Is Rebecca still alive, as a character? In Reclamation she was in the hospital for "replacing this, replacing that".

 

[[Diplomacy] Carnegie]

Seems odd FD would use that name for an NPC. Did she survive the encounter?

Is Rebecca still alive, as a character? In Reclamation she was in the hospital for "replacing this, replacing that".

Kickstarter backers got to supply NPC names (you think FDev chose 'Maggie Milk-Snatcher? ), so the name probably came from a fan of Oolite.

Drew's short story Altera covers what happens to the Old Woman/Rebecca after Reclamation.

 

[CMDR Poet Starwind]

Kickstarter backers got to supply NPC names (you think FDev chose 'Maggie Milk-Snatcher? ), so the name probably came from a fan of Oolite.

Drew's short story Altera covers what happens to the Old Woman/Rebecca after Reclamation.

Mmm. Not according to Drew's dates.

Altera commences in 3270, Reclamation begins in 3297. Unless she met a friend with a Blue Box, or revisited Raxxla, I'd have to say Altera ("Other") was between Finis and Reclamation.

I thought Rebecca had undergone the nanite-rejuv process, but I could be wrong. Would have extended life span, but the end comes as a sudden gooey puddling or some such.

 

[RevLogos]

Mmm. Not according to Drew's dates.

Altera commences in 3270, Reclamation begins in 3297. Unless she met a friend with a Blue Box, or revisited Raxxla, I'd have to say Altera ("Other") was between Finis and Reclamation.

I thought Rebecca had undergone the nanite-rejuv process, but I could be wrong. Would have extended life span, but the end comes as a sudden gooey puddling or some such.

Altera provides a glimpse into Rebecca's life as she struggles with the conspirators to find the secrets. Sort of a Total Recall meets Groundhog Day meets Men in Black. She's figured out how to deal with the memory wipes, by leaving her new self clues. The events occur about the same time the Zurara completes its mission. In the news of the day, Corine Loren is just born.

A bit over 3 years later she discovers the Zurara. In the logs she complains that she might have her mind wiped again, because it has happened several times before.

I don't know what else she might have discovered back in the core in the years since, until she meets Salome in the hospital. But she had her memories then. Quite possibly she discovered the reason for the Dynasty missions. Salome may have discovered Rebecca's stash of information, or a key to get it, perhaps from her ship in the Tionsla Graveyard. Or maybe Rebecca and Salome met up again before her death in May 3302.

 

[Tanksy]

Fair question. I'm not entirely sure its stationary. If in orbit about the main star, the orbit would move so slowly that its relative position to the 10th planet probably wouldn't change much for centuries. At any rate I think the position is fixed by game mechanics. I doubt the Voyager probe(s) are moving either.

I won't complain about game limits. As for the asteroid, it is possible they found one in an elliptical orbit that would pass close enough that a survey team in a shuttlecraft could reach it without stopping the ship. It may have been nothing more than a target of opportunity.

Bigger question for me is, where are the shuttlecraft? For that matter, where are the landing craft? Weren't they supposed to colonize some planet?

In the Canonn thread, I provided a detailed report of the Gen Ship, and along with that I also started a discussion on the ship's speed, and how the logs seem to have a mysterious number, possibly a date which is running off of the Earth's clock. If it were true and the ship was using Earth Time to date the logs, then "a few days" for the ship was 84 and a bit years on Earth (time between Log 2 and Log 3). However, the doubt comes in to play where the latter logs have much less Earth Time between them (Where Doctor Munroe dies "two days ago", between Logs 3 and 4, only 30-something years have passed in Earth Time), where they somehow may of slowed down the ship in response to current events. Log 1 and Log 2 have a gap of only 8 years Earth Time, so I assume that either the ship was slowed, or the ship purposefully went slow from the beginning, and came alongside the asteroid matching it's speed and path, let the scientist do work, then accelerated to reach the speeds it would of been going, if the asteroid wasn't of interest.

Let's not rule out that the ship might of been doing any number of scientific studies, and reporting back to Earth some how. It does have a huge transmitter on its nose.

Edit;

My main posts where I discuss my findings and theories on the speed are Here and Here.

 

[Jorki Rasalas]

The fact it was Tionisla is interesting.

She appeared very briefly in open some weeks ago too - that was in Deciat, I assumed accident then (and likely free engineering), but Tionisla could mean something.

Well, we know of at least one ship's transmitter there, and a group of Ham enthusiasts to help broadcast a message

 

[IliteratSqirel]

Left for 9 months, seems I came back to what appears to be new and exciting events that may turn out to be more of the same. I can still remember ages ago thinking "Ha, I figured it out" and racing back out to the Rift yet again to carefully scan a series of incredibly uninteresting planets.

Hello to all the names I recognize .. and those I don't.

Looking forward to your new book Drew. I read and re-read all of the official stories based on the certainty that there were critical clues there in, one of the things that burned me out a bit was how little they had to do with ED the game, I like the idea of writing from a commentator perspective who happens to maybe just know what's about to happen.

Welcome back. And yes it seems as if you've come at an interesting point.

I hope her message doesn't turn out to be "Remember to pick up your free PP decal packs from the Frontier Store."

I think that's quite possible- and why wouldn't she, now that the free package has been amended to include Felicia Winters' decal.

 

[Jorki Rasalas]

Someone drew (pun intended!) up the Formidine Rifters badge ages ago (18 months? More?). Now we have found the Zurara how about a new design showing it and perhaps asking FD if we could have it as a ship decal?

I visited her yesterday, took photos and a couple of vids. Saw the whole galaxy just hanging there. If anyone is going out you definitely need to have some jumponium. EDD routing comes up with WAYPOINT in a route plan-beware, it means you need to find a waypoint because it cant because there's no stars close enough, i.e. you need to plan around that point and maybe use fsd injects. One WAYPOINT isnt so bad, but when you get three or four consecutively then you have a problem.

Reports of griefers there; I only play solo or PG so had no problem. She's at the first planet, a HMC terraformable with nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere, so guess she droppped the terraforming kit then the cargo handlers did their job. Didn't see any sign of a satellite in the vicinity. Didn't come across any ELW they might have been looking for.

 

[Archon Valec]

Someone drew (pun intended!) up the Formidine Rifters badge ages ago (18 months? More?). Now we have found the Zurara how about a new design showing it and perhaps asking FD if we could have it as a ship decal?

I visited her yesterday, took photos and a couple of vids. Saw the whole galaxy just hanging there. If anyone is going out you definitely need to have some jumponium. EDD routing comes up with WAYPOINT in a route plan-beware, it means you need to find a waypoint because it cant because there's no stars close enough, i.e. you need to plan around that point and maybe use fsd injects. One WAYPOINT isnt so bad, but when you get three or four consecutively then you have a problem.

Reports of griefers there; I only play solo or PG so had no problem. She's at the first planet, a HMC terraformable with nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere, so guess she droppped the terraforming kit then the cargo handlers did their job. Didn't see any sign of a satellite in the vicinity. Didn't come across any ELW they might have been looking for.

I love the idea of a decal!!!

Enough players were involved and it went on long enough - thats some dedication!

 

[Harley Quinn]

In the Canonn thread, I provided a detailed report of the Gen Ship, and along with that I also started a discussion on the ship's speed, and how the logs seem to have a mysterious number, possibly a date which is running off of the Earth's clock. If it were true and the ship was using Earth Time to date the logs, then "a few days" for the ship was 84 and a bit years on Earth (time between Log 2 and Log 3). However, the doubt comes in to play where the latter logs have much less Earth Time between them (Where Doctor Munroe dies "two days ago", between Logs 3 and 4, only 30-something years have passed in Earth Time), where they somehow may of slowed down the ship in response to current events. Log 1 and Log 2 have a gap of only 8 years Earth Time, so I assume that either the ship was slowed, or the ship purposefully went slow from the beginning, and came alongside the asteroid matching it's speed and path, let the scientist do work, then accelerated to reach the speeds it would of been going, if the asteroid wasn't of interest.

Let's not rule out that the ship might of been doing any number of scientific studies, and reporting back to Earth some how. It does have a huge transmitter on its nose.

Edit;

My main posts where I discuss my findings and theories on the speed are Here and Here.

Old tech running into relativity issues at high speed who would need to slow down and map out systems to see if suitable for colonisation. Someone else would need to do the math from earth time compared to ship time, but seems feasible

 

[Han_Zen]

Well, we know of at least one ship's transmitter there, and a group of Ham enthusiasts to help broadcast a message

The Lave region or Sol region are the only two places that really qualify to be at 'the heart or the core'.

In the Lave region, I think Tionisla and Reorte(departure point of the Dynasty expedition) are most likely. Alliance space is also a plus.

Sol region is the place if we are to continue on the 'path of souls' / 'Phaethon's reach' trail.

 

[Zeeman]

I get this impression from the tone of the channel too.

However, I still plan to be online at the time (for now), but doing what, and where is still to be decided.

Seems like a good reason for a bunch of independents to gate crash the party then. Social disobedience being fun and all...

Z...

 

[Muetdhiver]

I do think that when one remembers the "EXODUS" key to decrypt the messages leading to the rift beacons and tie that to a project called dynasty where planets are secretly primed/seeded for habitation I'm thinking big brass "out of context problem" panic room.