The Quest To Find Raxxla

[Han_Zen]

Personally, I can't believe Raxxla is inside or in close proximity to the Bubble. Assuming it is a physical place, people would have found it over the thousand years since the rumors began.

"Hey, I found Raxxla! Yeah, it was in orbit around a moon. The moon had three minor wreckages, one distress beacon, and other stuff."

That wouldn't make sense from a narrative standpoint. So I think it's either outside the Bubble (500+ LY away), or it’s no longer in the Bubble at all. Or—maybe the Pilots' Federation is actually the Dark Wheel. But that would mean Raxxla is inside a permit-locked system…

Anyway, there's something else that bothers me. Let's say you're an explorer in 2250, working with the technology of the time. It's slow and inefficient. Despite that, you manage to find Raxxla in just a few years. How did you do it? What did you have that humanity, with a thousand more years of progress, couldn't replicate?

Tin foil hat time. What if you had directions? After all, the Martian Relic was discovered just a few years before the myth of Raxxla was born. It’s only as big as a child’s hand. Maybe it’s some kind of compass—some kind of guide to Raxxla. I don’t know. But maybe we should start applying narrative pressure on the Federation to reveal the secret of the Martian Relic. If the truth has been hidden for a thousand years, the reason must be serious.

Donning a second tin foil hat, I’ll continue with my assumptions. Elite Dangerous has drawn some inspiration from the RPG Traveller, as far as I know. In that game, humanity was seeded in Sol by an ancient species called the Ancients. And I think Mars would be a perfect place for them to leave a message for future humanity. After all, humans could only reach it once they were advanced enough to take to the stars. Maybe they left a message—and a way to find them in another galaxy.

Okay, I’ve rambled enough. Still, I think we should push the Federation to finally tell the truth about the Relic.

There are basicaly two relatively simple explanations to how Raxxla was found before 2300 and never seen again.
The first one is as you say, the mars relic. It could be a map or a navigation tool. I’m not sure the Feds still has the relic.
If this is the case, er might need to find a second relic?

The other option is that Raxxla was relatively easy to find the fort time.
The original discoverers could have activated som old alien cloaking tech they found on Raxxla. Keeping it hidden for everyone else.

If Raxxla is cloaked, it could be in any system and still be practically impossible to find, without knowing where to look.

 

[Han_Zen]

I remember reading "Voyage to Arcturus" by the late David Lindsay which used the tenets of Gnosticism to create a scifi-fantasy world where the material world was made by a malevolent copycat creator who made a twisted copy of the "true and real world" by the original creator.

Unfortunately, the latter wasn't very popular because his world was based on pain & awakening. The false creator offered (false) beauty and pleasure. Guess who dominated?

If the Thargoids are the original ones then Witchspace is the true universe and our own universe is built on the foundations or ruins of the "otherworld".

The Guardians were no saints that's for sure, because any race that can build killer AI has a strong streak of malevolence in it's core.

This viewpoint is a very hard sell though, the Thargoids have been the "bad guys" for such a long time.

reference: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Voyage_to_Arcturus

The guardian ai decided that their creators were not sustainable and had to be removed.
The Thargoids were left alone.
They have proven that they can last. They traveled space long before the guardians left their home planet.
Thargoids aren’t good or bad, They are a constant in the galaxy.

 

[SHEA PARDH]

I am utterly convinced it is in the bubble, or close by.
Ever since I read the foundation series a few years ago it just made me think it’s right under our noses.

“Those with eyes to see”
“We know where Raxxla is and why no one has found it”
“A little bit obvious”

I suspect, too. Somewhat related, is this in the game? Has anyone looked at Saturn?

Saturn's Hexagon in Motion | Saturn – NASA Solar System Exploration

NASA’s real-time science encyclopedia of deep space exploration. Our scientists and far-ranging robots explore the wild frontiers of our solar system.

solarsystem.nasa.gov

 

[Reyedog]

I am utterly convinced it is in the bubble, or close by.
Ever since I read the foundation series a few years ago it just made me think it’s right under our noses.

“Those with eyes to see”
“We know where Raxxla is and why no one has found it”
“A little bit obvious”

tip of the nose. The big issue is having confirmation if its cloaked. Moved or Moves and if so maybe its the concept of following a trade lane that leads to empty space. or does it? We don't know. I think it has evolved over time on how to find it and how to access it. We might be looking in the right places but we are missing key elements to trigger something.

 

[Darrack]

I suspect, too. Somewhat related, is this in the game? Has anyone looked at Saturn?

Saturn's Hexagon in Motion | Saturn – NASA Solar System Exploration

NASA’s real-time science encyclopedia of deep space exploration. Our scientists and far-ranging robots explore the wild frontiers of our solar system.

solarsystem.nasa.gov

Yep we've looked at that a few hundred pages back
The Sol system in game is a bit out of date now as far as moons etc go, i still think everything points to Titan

O7

 

[SHEA PARDH]

Yep we've looked at that a few hundred pages back
The Sol system in game is a bit out of date now as far as moons etc go, i still think everything points to Titan

O7

Yes, I see there are several. I honestly don't think Titan is interesting purely from the same point of view as Polaris not being interesting. It's permit-locked and there is basically zero point in investigating it until we get notified otherwise. We can bucket it together with Lave 2 and a few other places like that - say there is 10% chance one of them has something to do with Raxxla, and we can't do anything about that, so let's focus on the other 90% chance it's somewhere else in the universe.

The logo doesn't really line up with the storm being it unless there was something specifically inscribed INSIDE the storm - assuming it is the storm on Saturn, perhaps a body in a polar orbit that has to line up for whatever Raxxla is to become visible. I have to admit I haven't been there myself to check and since now I'm sitting in NGC 188 (where I still have some research to finish), I'm not going there anytime soon.

 

[SHEA PARDH]

Btw, the hexagon on Saturn is simply a sine wave with 6 periods on a circle. It happens when the vortex at the pole rotates at a different speed than the surrounding atmosphere band, and if it happens to meet the exact resonant frequency for it to attain the regular shape, you get the N-periodic wave around the pole which in Saturn's case looks like a hexagon.

Here you can play with this:

Sine around circle

www.desmos.com

 

[Reyedog]

When I first got into this quest, the first thing I felt would be cool would be either a nebula; dark nebula or black holes regarding Raxxla. But I’ve come to the assumption it’s very likely bubble based.

There’s a vid of the Devs during a particular live stream (still can’t find it) where one quips ‘they can’t even find Raxxla’, personally I suspect it’s hidden locally and is so dull and bland Cmdr probably ignore it every day, my strongest suspicion is the rings of some planet.

Ignoring mining hotspots, these were relatively unexplored. And what were we given along with the Codex? Scanners!

View attachment 423262

Eg: On the brow of the mother of galaxies (Milton’s Chaos); is s system with one large ringed body. Here be dragons?

So The third planet in this system has a very large ring and has a gas giant as a moon.

 

[Tifu]

Hi all, I visited the Tannhauser Gate station in Aztlan yesterday and while I found the system and station intriguing nothing unusual happened - till today. I got my second tip-off mission, only the second every since my return to ED late last year. The first btw, was a no-go since it required access to a medium pad and I was in a large ship at the time (the accept key was greyed out).

Here is an edited snapshot of the mission, I'm sending the unedited version to @Rochester , @Macros Black & @Jorki Rasalas so they can corelate the system against the Codex lore and the other tip-off missions (& their locations). Just to temper expectations, this is probably one of the missions that FD wrote off a long time ago along with the storylines as Rochester has previously mentioned.

I'll brief everyone on what happened after the visit.

The Aztlan system is unique in having a single sun orbited by one planet (an ELW) and having just one orbital station - the Tannhauser Gate which many Bladerunner fans probably recognize:

The Tannhauser station itself, an Orbis, has a unique & intricate tiling which I don't recall seeing on any other Orbis station. If, on the other hand, you have then please mention the system & station name so I can add it to the list of unusual station in ED.

Here is a 50+ second video of Tannhauser station rotating. If you spot anything unusual then alert us asap please.

Source: https://youtu.be/hWyOSCfX9IU


Another short video of my DBX entering Tannhauser station.

Source: https://youtu.be/FF10DXaMaC8


The station's main board is fairly ordinary.

The market is not, this is what a large station has if it's orbiting a planet with no settlements or hubs.

Despite that, the system is in a Boom state which tells me that the dominant player minor faction present (White Templars) is very active.

There is also an ALD Empire capital ship and a mega-freighter in the system. The latter generates a defend ship mission once you're near.

I was planning to visit the capital ship in my next visit but the tip-off mission popped up, so my next Aztlan visit has to wait.

 

[Reyedog]

Hi all, I visited the Tannhauser Gate station in Aztlan yesterday and while I found the system and station intriguing nothing unusual happened - till today. I got my second tip-off mission, only the second every since my return to ED late last year. The first btw, was a no-go since it required access to a medium pad and I was in a large ship at the time (the accept key was greyed out).

Here is an edited snapshot of the mission, I'm sending the unedited version to @Rochester , @Macros Black & @Jorki Rasalas so they can corelate the system against the Codex lore and the other tip-off missions (& their locations). Just to temper expectations, this is probably one of the missions that FD wrote off a long time ago along with the storylines as Rochester has previously mentioned.

View attachment 423434

I'll brief everyone on what happened after the visit.

The Aztlan system is unique in having a single sun orbited by one planet (an ELW) and having just one orbital station - the Tannhauser Gate which many Bladerunner fans probably recognize:

View attachment 423435

The Tannhauser station itself, an Orbis, has a unique & intricate tiling which I don't recall seeing on any other Orbis station. If, on the other hand, you have then please mention the system & station name so I can add it to the list of unusual station in ED.

Here is a 50+ second video of Tannhauser station rotating. If you spot anything unusual then alert us asap please.

Source: https://youtu.be/hWyOSCfX9IU


Another short video of my DBX entering Tannhauser station.

Source: https://youtu.be/FF10DXaMaC8


The station's main board is fairly ordinary.

View attachment 423437

The market is not, this is what a large station has if it's orbiting a planet with no settlements or hubs.

View attachment 423440

Despite that, the system is in a Boom state which tells me that the dominant player minor faction present (White Templars) is very active.

There is also an ALD Empire capital ship and a mega-freighter in the system. The latter generates a defend ship mission once you're near.

View attachment 423441

I was planning to visit the capital ship in my next visit but the tip-off mission popped up, so my next Aztlan visit has to wait.

Very interesting to be sure have you cross checked if the station has been there for a long time? Cause the market seems to have the issue that incorrectly placed stations have made by players in which it is only populated by biowaste and hydrogen. I'll have to go down and take a look as I am doing a wide field search in one of the planets rings I am at currently. Need to take a break from it lol. Flying for 20 plus hours alone in normal space is driving me space crazy. Keep thinking I see small moons in the asteroids.

 

[Zimous]

Personally, I can't believe Raxxla is inside or in close proximity to the Bubble. Assuming it is a physical place, people would have found it over the thousand years since the rumors began.

Tin foil hat time. What if you had directions? After all, the Martian Relic was discovered just a few years before the myth of Raxxla was born. It’s only as big as a child’s hand. Maybe it’s some kind of compass—some kind of guide to Raxxla. I don’t know. But maybe we should start applying narrative pressure on the Federation to reveal the secret of the Martian Relic. If the truth has been hidden for a thousand years, the reason must be serious.

Completely agree with you, if Raxxla was anywhere near the bubble we would have found it by now. Tinfoilers will claim you fly into a WH upside down singing a pray for it to trigger (jk), but the reality is there's nothing to find in the bubble anymore.

As for the martian relic I also agree and was hoping we could pressure FDev to release more information on this through a GalNet article, to clarify what is this relic about. The truth is the relic was found 12 years before the first mention of Raxxla, so the relic could have been the first clues to it. Perhaps it's really far from the bubble and no one has ever found it, there's nothing telling us it's close to Sol or that has even been discovered. All we have is rumors and possible clues.

 

[Zimous]

Disregard this reply...

 

[Zimous]

I am utterly convinced it is in the bubble, or close by.
Ever since I read the foundation series a few years ago it just made me think it’s right under our noses.

If that was the case don't you think we would have found it long ago? Literally thousands of commanders have searched the bubble one way or another, many of them hardcore nerds who tried all sorts of theories and ideas. Do you think you can do better than them and you will find something where they all failed? It's highly unlikely, not to say utterly impossible at this stage.

If there's anything to find it won't be close to Sol as we all thought. Of course I can't say I'm sure 100%, but to be fair I see a lot of theorizing and tinfoiling but most will only talk about it and not move a muscle to actually look for it. Easy to make crazy theories when it's others who have to do the hard work, or when that theory can't be replicated or experimented using in game mechanics (therefore pointless theories).

 

[PilotB]

It can be inside the bubble just not visible within the usual navigation methods. If a system was for example only visible in the Nav panel and not the galmap the chances of it being discovered even if it was near sol are next to 0. There are also some systems are are ontop of each other hiding the secondary star in the map. There's options but whatever it is whereever it is there's some form of obfuscation.

 

[Tifu]

Very interesting to be sure have you cross checked if the station has been there for a long time? Cause the market seems to have the issue that incorrectly placed stations have made by players in which it is only populated by biowaste and hydrogen.

Yes, I did - Reddit, Steam and ED forum threads dating back to 2017-19 mention both the Tannhauser station and the Aztlan system. Also, the population of 20+ million is too high for a player colony. The most populated colonies I've heard of are in the (very) low six figures

 

[SHEA PARDH]

It can be inside the bubble just not visible within the usual navigation methods. If a system was for example only visible in the Nav panel and not the galmap the chances of it being discovered even if it was near sol are next to 0. There are also some systems are are ontop of each other hiding the secondary star in the map. There's options but whatever it is whereever it is there's some form of obfuscation.

I've had this idea as well, but I consider that a low probability. We somehow have a map that shows all systems in the galaxy including a quintillion that hasn't been visited yet, but it doesn't show that one right next to Sol? It's also pretty game breaking concept. Galmap has a bunch of problems as is with duplicate system names (which apparently aren't even consistent between accounts) - that mechanic if it existed and you triggered it would completely throw things off. Say you jump, what then? Suddenly then it shows up in Galmap? OK Maybe. But then it's in the player log and visited stars cache. You can't really "unshow" it then.

It's possible, but I don't personally think it's likely. You could sort of do a brute force search for this by dividing the bubble into 20LY spheres and verifying that everything in the navpanel is also in galmap. But I suspect we'd come up empty. It's not even that big of a search so maybe worth doing. Unless you need to be in a very specific system or have a specific jump sequence beforehand to trigger this - which makes this more of an event in the bubble, than actual system in the bubble.

If it's in the bubble, it's most likely an effect or concept that is in an existing system, likely populated already. Something like a hidden planet, or a cloaked installation, or a cloaked station, or an unmapped object (like Voyager probes were) or even a visual "point of interest" in the form of specific marking on a planet surface (something like what we found on Titania earlier in this thread).

The list of candidate mysteries so far in the bubble we had here include:

1. Vega satellite signals
2. Pareco and the fact that it has over 1 billion population with no planet (where do all those people live?)
3. Sol, including Titania (which we sort of traced from the station garden puzzle but we didn't wind up with definitive confirmation), Voyager probes, Martian relic, now there is a Thargoid "Titan" there, too - weird coincidence of names, btw.
4. Station number signals.
5. Shamash mystery (connected to Thetis signal) which apparently you can sort of trace all over the place around there (see Rochester's posts for some speculations regarding geometry of this).

That's not including permit-locked systems and planets, and numerous smaller bits and pieces here and there - like various listening posts, or tip-off missions.

Then there is "close to bubble" space which I'd consider anywhere under 2kLY from SOL (it's arbitrary, but that includes basically everything over and under, as well as behind all the way to Barnard's Loop and beyond, and well beyond Coalsack in the front. It's a huge volume of space that hasn't been even fully visited yet. This already includes both Thargoid and Guardian sites. And everything in that distance has been about half-an-hour trip for someone in a decent DBX for a very long time.

 

[SHEA PARDH]

Yes, I did - Reddit, Steam and ED forum threads dating back to 2017-19 mention both the Tannhauser station and the Aztlan system. Also, the population of 20+ million is too high for a player colony. The most populated colonies I've heard of are in the (very) low six figures

There is an ELW there, though.

 

[PilotB]

I've had this idea as well, but I consider that a low probability.

it's low probability but just an example of one way it could be hidden. The galmap we have is controlled by "The Pilots Federation" and we do know that there are systems inside the galaxy that we can't find in the map. There was an initial oversight with the search that let you find hidden test systems. That also confirmed they can hide systems from us in the map. It in no way confirms that they are doing so with anything major simply that the capacity is in place.

 

[Tifu]

There is an ELW there, though.

Yes, there is. Apparently, NPC systems don't work the same way as player systems. If this was a player colony, that ELW would be useless - you can't place any facility on the surface since we don't have atmospheric flight yet.

A landable icy world is actually more valuable in Trailblazer than an ELW. Crazy, but that's the way it works now.

 

[SHEA PARDH]

Yes, there is. Apparently, NPC systems don't work the same way as player systems. If this was a player colony, that ELW would be useless - you can't place any facility on the surface since we don't have atmospheric flight yet.

A landable icy world is actually more valuable in Trailblazer than an ELW. Crazy, but that's the way it works now.

No, they don't. ELW in an NPC system almost always bumps the population by huge numbers. In fact, that's how I made my money to buy a Phantom - just looked around for Agri systems in the bubble with high pop - it's almost guaranteed to give you ELWs, often multiple.