Today, I just did a little bit of bounty hunting in the rings of Bindi 10. Tried the little fighter in VR - best gameplay ever in E:D!

Not so good gameplay: The Thargoids.

Well, what did I expect?

Was waiting for the Aliens since the beginning of season 2. Always new hints, new artifacts, new riddles. Was always thinking about what the Thargoids would be like. Had some good ideas, how to tell a little story about an invasion of the Sol bubble. But in the end - whatever I was going to tell -, the Thargoids would have been nothing then a bunch of new NPCs. Maybe a little bit harder to kill, but not more.

The Thargoids could have been real nightmares. They could lure in witchspace and attack all ships in range. Jumping from one system to the other would have been really dangerous. Some commmanders could be directly destroyed, some could be blinded by light and experience blackouts. And the Thargoids would be unbreakable. Yeah, many trigger-happy guys would have made their try, but in the end, the all would have failed.

And then, the Thargoids would have launched the invasion, based upon some sabotage which the did to the commanders with the blackouts. An exodus to the Colonia bubble would have started, where most commanders could find shelter and play the game all the way they were used to. Other commanders would have stayed in the old bubble and guide the attack from underground. They would form a guerilla. And then, humans would strike back, which could eventually lead to a standoff.

And eventually, the Thargoids would become nothing more than another NPCs faction in one row with the other three big factions. In the end, there might have been some sort of collaboration with some humans and maybe a lot of fight, wherein the Thargoids would be extremely strong but beatable opponents.

All this didn't happen.

The Thargoids are nothing but mainly useless, funny looking NPCs. Nobody of FD seemed to think about the trigger-happy guys, who found a way to kill a Thargoid within only some hours. And now, after two weeks, we already have the second tier of anti-Thargoid weapons. First tier is nerfed and useless. That's extremely bad story-telling!

But maybe it is just what FD wants this game to be - unfortunately. Maybe it's also what a lot of people within the international community wants this game to be. Maybe FD wants E:D just to be a game of grind and nothing more. Maybe they think, that this is what a game has to be like.

Well, Thargoids, fuck off!

If FD doesn't manage to turn the rudder and give the story a completely new drive, then the Thargoids are useless for me - just like Powerplay. But they are no cause for me to quit the game. There are still so many things I want to experience and to find out. So I will go on!

Bad guys in the rings of Bindi 10, I'll be back tomorrow!

Very good turn today!

Took my brand new Corvette and exchanged some weapons. Have now 2 gimballed Multicannons class 4, 2 Beam Laser turrets class 2, 1 Beam Laser turret class 3 and 2 Pulse Laser turrets class 1.

Went to Bindi 10 with that ship. I call it "Onkel Hotte" which is German and means "Uncle Hotte" (ha ha). At Bindi, I started bounty hunting at the Hi-RES. Soon became uninteresting and boring, because Onkel Hotte blew everything away. Some Vipers, that tried to get in my back (not very difficult at a Corvette), were busted by my little fighter.

That was booooooring!

But then, I had the idea, to switch over to the fighter. Corvette is heavy shielded and armoured, so my hired pilot shouldn't have any problems to handle enemies, if I'm not on board.

And damned, that was FUN!

Sweeping around with that little rocket and giving the bad guys some blows with these fixed lasers is fun as hell!

Tomorrow, I will check this out in VR.

Unlocked that Bill Turner last evening. Access to Alioth system was simple - just got friendly with one special minor faction and obtained the permit. Leveled up then to tier 3. Now there are only two more engineers to unlock (and maybe even more to be unlocked by these two - I'll see).

But my old Anaconda became a little bit boring. So I decided to build up a Federal Corvette. Started with that yesterday, but couldn't find the right modules. EDDB seems completely broken here. Had to search for a while today in the morning. Fought also my first fight against an NPC Anaconda. Soforttod - Anaconda: 1:0. NPC got away. Everything was so new for me that I forgot to launch my fighter. If I had, the Anaconda maybe would have been killed.

Now my Federal Corvette is completely fitted and I brought the first 18 tons of Kongga Ale to that engineer gal at Shinrarta Dezhra. In the evening, I will unlock her and have a look what she can do for me.

As soon as I'm finished with this, I will go back to bounty hunting to come closer to Combat Elite. Will search a planet with a nice pristine ring and at least one hi-RES. Then I'll see, what my Corvette can do, even if it didn't visit an engineer up to now.

No entry yesterday. Grind was too hard. Wasn't able to write a word.

Got some good ideas from the forum. Wanted to fit my FdL with railguns and MCs. Railguns should get a grade 1 modification from Tod "The Blaster" McQuinn. So I had to collect sulphur. And so I drive around the whole day, collecting sulphur.

The good message: I could make quite a lot and I could do some fine rolls at McQuinn's. Finally, I got three fine railguns, which I installed on my brand new Imperial Courier. But fighting with this thing is not so fine. Not against NPCs. It's more a ship to avoid interdictions (yes, same idiot than the day before yesterday tried it again; got away) or to make some idiots angry.

After that, I decided to unlock that Bill Turner. 50 tons of Brommelite. Well, where to get this shit?

Mining.

Fuck. But ok, I took my old Anaconda and fitted her for mining. After that, I've spent the whole afternoon today in mining in ice rings to get this shitty Brommelite. And finally, I got it - just to see, that I need a permission for Alioth system.

Ok, I came up to here, so I will also come to Alioth. Maybe not this evening, but I'm pretty sure I will make it tomorrow. Then, there are only 2 Engineers left to unlock up to now.

Let's see what comes next. I don't know by myself.

Had my contact with the Thargoids yesterday. Jumped into a signal source, where a Thargoid flower scanned and looted some destroyed ships. As I came close with my DBX, the flower reacted a little bit pissed and sent out his drones, but they let me go as I gained some distance.

Yeah, impressive. Cool sound. But not more. No chance to kill such a thing alone.

So I decided to do something for my fleet and pimp some modules. I wanted to start with the multi-cannons of my Fer de Lance. So I started to Wolf 397 to visit the engineer (is it the "Dweller" or that other guy? Don't remember the name). But I didn't want to go there with my FdL. There's a lot of gankers there and I'm not so experienced in avoiding fights.

Solution: Transfer Hauler. Built it up, went to the engineer, looked what I needed and then got back. On my way through Wolf 397, an idiot tried to gank me. Experienced or not: I escaped with 95% hull. Yes, that's the way we do it! Not able to fight, but we can run!

After that, I wanted to collect some bountys. So I searched for a system in the vicinity of Rind with a gas giant and pristine rings. It took me half the afternoon to find one: Bindi. There's a High RES, where I could do some hunting. Tried to kill an Anaconda. Wrong decision. Got away with 4% of hull.

But I got away!

The second try was a bit better, but my FdL is terribly fitted. I think, I will try Plasmas, Railguns or fixed Multis.

But tomorrow. Enough for today.

No new logbook entry yesterday.

Couldn't write, because I wasn't in my home system ... and I was drunk as hell.

Today in the morning (just being able to think again), I made the last 40 jumps to Deciat. And there came the big cha-ching for me. More than 150 million Cr.. Made my day!

The rest of the travelling was not very exciting. Most planets were already discovered. The route planner took me back to the center level of the galaxy, where most explorers travel. Nothing more to discover for me.

Back home, I made a short visit at Sol. Docked at Abraham Lincoln and modified my suit a little bit. Now, I wear a good coat and some heavy boots. Looks much more like me than this romper suit.

After that, I had the idea to visit the Thargoids. So I went to Maia and Merope. But no Thargoids up to now. Maybe I'm doing something wrong. Searching in the wrong place, for example. Should take a close look to the forums and compare the navigational data there.

I hope they don't kill me on sight. My DBX is still fitted for exploring and large jump ranges, but not for combat. No weapons, no energy.

Damned!

I was on a good way yesterday. I had a little bit of time and thought, I could manage to do some 30 or 40 jumps. But after some minutes, there was the incoming warning that the servers will be down in 30 minutes for an update.

Well ... fine.

So I had to stop and to come back this morning. But ok, I made my way and ended up at about 140 jumps until I reach Deciat.

Also read a bit about the Thargoids. Man, there are some really naive commanders!

"Don't shoot, they come in peace!"

Yeah, fuck. As soon as I can buy the right weapons, they won't come in peace, but become pieces!

Everyone who played Elite once in his lifetime knows, that the Thargoids are evil bastards. They will suck out your brain, fuck your mum and rape your hamster. Or maybe the fuck your brain, rape your mum and suck out your hamster. Or in another way. In the end, everything will be fucked up.

For the moment, they might act calm and sometimes even evasive, if not attacked or scanned directly. But the time will come when they turn into badasses. That's their nature. It always was.

And I think it will be fun when they fuck up the whole bubble.

Yesterday in the evening, update 2.4 came in. I had to wait a while until I could download it, but when it started, it worked fine for me.

Still being out for more than 10.000 lightyears, the first thing I tried out was the new route planning for up to 20.000 lightyears. So I set course directly to Sol, and BING!, the route was planned. Left panel said, there are about 250 jumps left. And I thought: "Wow!"

After that, I did some jumps, but I couldn't get really far, because the jumps took a lot of time. Servers were still very busy, I guess. So I stopped travelling and decided to continue today. I also wanted to wait about the first bug reports. I remember an update that killed the recording of exploring data for some hours. A lot of explorers jumped and scanned and earned no data at all.

Today in the morning, I had a close look to the forums and found some descritions of more or less funny bugs (such as missions from Sol to Colonia, that would give eventually 300.000 Cr.), but there was nothing written about exploring. A first glance at my own data also showed no problem. So I went on.

First thing was setting new course. I didn't want to go to Sol directly, but visit Farseer Inc., because there, I only have access to grade 3 upgrades. With my exploring data, I will boost this to level 5 directly.

And then, everything went absolutely fine. Jumping was quick and smooth, so I could make some lightyears. Ended up at 199 jumps still to go.

Ah, and then, there were first encounters with the Thargoids within the bubble. Didn't read carefully at once, so I thought, the Thargoids would pull some commanders out of witchspace and kill them. But then, I realized that there are non-human USS, where the Thargoids are active. Also read, that they won't attack without a cause. So I think, I can sleep good tonight and don't have to fear to be busted by aliens when returning to Sol.

Like Front 242 said: "The way the morning broke was quite unusual".

Like every morning, I started my DB-Ex and continued heading for Sol. But this morning, I forgot to start EDDiscovery as well as EDMC. The result: I missed the first five jumps and had to import them from my journal files. So I have now five jumps with unscanned suns. Looks bad in my timeline.

But ok, I won't go back all the way and repeat the scan, just for having the data on EDSM. All what counts is the money, that I will have in my purse at the end of the long way.

The rest of my travel yesterday and today in the morning is almost not mentionable. Yeah, I found some interesting HMCs and one (!) waterworld, but that's it. Next problem is, that I'm currently in the dark region between the arms. Route plotting to F, G or K stars (or even neutron stars) doesn't work here sometimes, so the plotter has to set course to some M stars. That means: A lot of ice planets on my way.

And besides: In a region with less stars, I run into already discovered stars more frequently. I guess, some other pilots had to change course in order to find scoopable stars. Not all ships can jump nearly 50 lightyears, what makes course plotting easier for me.

Oh, and today, the Thargoids will start over. I hope, the update is available, when I want to start my evening tour. And I hope, I don't run into the Thargoids when I'm returning to the bubble ...

Today in the early morning, I got from the nebula back to my old course. It took me some 500 lightyears to get back there, but I could manage to make another 1.000 lightyears. Right now, I have at least 13.000 more lightyears to go until I reach Sol.

On the last steps of my travel, I could see that I find less systems with valuable bodies. At the moment, I'm running into systems mostly with gas giants or ice planets. Sometimes there are also some very small HMCs, but I don't take the time to scan them all.

As far as I've heard, tomorrow 2.4 will start. Well, I hope the Thargoids aren't already waiting when I'm coming back. And if they do, then I hope that they see that I've no weapons onboard.

If not, then it might go "BOOOOOOOM!" and I'm back in Colonia ...