Newcomer / Intro Getting Back From Sag A*

withnail67 · Sep 4, 2020

Today I docked at Jaques Station, Colonia after a 4 day trek along parts of the Colonia Connection Highway and, as I'm already this far out from the Bubble, I've decided to swing past Sagittarius A* before returning to my home system.

Looking at the Galactic Map, I'm already a little concerned about the return trip, due to the sparse coverage of stars between the Galctic arms. Is it a viable route to head straight back to the Bubble, or should I head back part of the way towards Colonia first? I'm flying a Krait Phantom with 52.6ly jump range that can do ~7 max range jumps between refuel stars.

Please Note: As I play on console, I've not been using any Neutron Star boosting as, by the time I've looked up and used the virtual keyboard to type in the next target system (along with stopping to repair my FSD) it isn't really that much quicker.

Cheers,
Withnail67.

Para Handy · Sep 4, 2020

withnail67 said:
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Looking at the Galactic Map, I'm already a little concerned about the return trip, due to the sparse coverage of stars between the Galctic arms. Is it a viable route to head straight back to the Bubble, or should I head back part of the way towards Colonia first? I'm flying a Krait Phantom with 52.6ly jump range that can do ~7 max range jumps between refuel stars.
.....

You should have no trouble. Even before engineering I traversed Hawking's Gap and that is far sparser than the Norma Expanse on your direct route.

Dommarraa · Sep 4, 2020

The last gap before the bubble is a little sparse if you are high or low, but even with about 20-25ly you can go in a straight line back.

Dommarraa · Sep 4, 2020

BTW - You dont HAVE to rely on manual entry and Spansh for Neutron Star plotting.
Go Up or Down 1000ly, have the correct Gal Map Route settings, and the game will plot a pretty decent NS route for you.

withnail67 · Sep 4, 2020

Thanks for the replies. I tend to travel a little above or below the direct route as I've found more previously unvisited systems that way, but not far enough to make much of a difference. I will also have to try getting closer to the belt of Neutron Stars as it would certainly save some time when I'm travelling rather than exploring.

As a back garden astronomer I'm rather envious of the view you'd get if we lived closer to the hub rather than "Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral Arm of the Galaxy "

Ashnak · Sep 4, 2020

withnail67 said:
As a back garden astronomer I'm rather envious of the view you'd get if we lived closer to the hub rather than "Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral Arm of the Galaxy "

Considering the cosmic radiation background (and remember, a supernova is for life, not just hogswatch!), I'd doubt that there would be a "you" who could enjoy the view.

withnail67 · Sep 4, 2020

Ashnak said:
Considering the cosmic radiation background (and remember, a supernova is for life, not just hogswatch!), I'd doubt that there would be a "you" who could enjoy the view.

Very true! I guess effective radiation shielding is less of an issue in an online game

As an aside, my preferred solution to the Fermi Paradox is; the Earth may be incredibly unusual, in being the right distance from the Sun to allow liquid water to flow as well as having an oversized Moon to stabilise it's axis of rotation and a strong magnetic field to deflect radiation and plate tectonics. I wonder if life (and by extension intelligence) is far more common when protected by a nice thick, planet wide, ice sheet?

To digress yet further, one wonders what such creatures would make of the night sky if they broke through the ice? Which brings us back to Douglas Adams and the "Krikkit Wars"*

*In his book "Life, The Universe and Everything", the inhabitants of the planet Krikkit see stars for the first time and decide they don't like it and they all "have to go"!
Hehe!

Vetinari · Sep 4, 2020

In one of the sequels to 2001 Europa has life under the ice, which comes out to sleep. But the implication is the Monolith was helping them to evolve so not necessarily natural but the same conditions.

Tifu · Sep 4, 2020

There's this adage that world history will be split into BAI and AAI after that event happens. Before Alien Intelligence and after. It's probably going to be true.

aRJay · Sep 4, 2020

withnail67 said:
Very true! I guess effective radiation shielding is less of an issue in an online game

As an aside, my preferred solution to the Fermi Paradox is; the Earth may be incredibly unusual, in being the right distance from the Sun to allow liquid water to flow as well as having an oversized Moon to stabilise it's axis of rotation and a strong magnetic field to deflect radiation and plate tectonics. I wonder if life (and by extension intelligence) is far more common when protected by a nice thick, planet wide, ice sheet?

To digress yet further, one wonders what such creatures would make of the night sky if they broke through the ice? Which brings us back to Douglas Adams and the "Krikkit Wars"*

*In his book "Life, The Universe and Everything", the inhabitants of the planet Krikkit see stars for the first time and decide they don't like it and they all "have to go"!
Hehe!

For a much earlier take on seeing the stars for the first time read Isaac Asimov's novelette Nightfall I much prefer it to the novel length expansion that Robert Silverberg did.