So what is this Distant Worlds nonsense. I’ve been flapping my lips about it to everyone, so a brief summary is required.

One of the things one can do in the game of Elite: Dangerous is explore. The galaxy as created in the game has some 400 billion stars and only a tiny proportion in a small area of the Inner Orion Spur (“the bubble”) is inhabited. The rest of the galaxy is unknown and largely uncharted, save for those brave individuals who head out into the black and bring back information about the stars, planets and other, stranger things, to be found way out there. (And making a good chunk of money from selling the data!).

In 3302 (game years correspond to real years, 3302 was 2016, 3305 is 2019) an expedition was organised where a large group of commanders would coordinate to explore some of the far reaches of the galaxy. Well, three years later with the advance of technology, longer jump ranges (and let’s be honest, some interesting additions FDEV made to exploration in a big patch) it was decided to repeat the exercise, but on an even grander scale. In the end, perhaps 15,000 individual Commanders (players) set off on an expedition to explore and map systems from the bubble to the farthest reaches of the opposite side of the galaxy. On the way, they would engage in mining operations, gathering materials so that a space station could be constructed just a couple of light years from the mega black hole at the very centre of the galaxy.

So here’s what I’m going to do, in order to do justice to a large chunk of time I spent doing a thing I really loved and indeed am still doing.

I was going to just write up the one post and summarise the whole business, but instead what I plan to do is to write up, a bit at a time the journey, perhaps in lumps that correspond to the different stages and waypoints of the journey.  I mean this is already a long long post and I’ve not even left yet!

I’ve installed a plugin especially for this so I can upload a lot of very pretty pictures and have them display in some (as yet undetermined) pretty gallery format as I have a LOT of screenshots and it will be nice to have them somewhere I can easily look over in posterity.

It’s actually quite amazing the amount of hours of my life over the past have gone into this project. Even before the departure date on January 13th, there was much preparation to do.

It was quite easy to decide what ship to use. My Anaconda, the Dragon’s Quest was the best choice, if a boringly predictable one. With the right engineering, the Anaconda can run a huge jump range or with a bit more compromise, a still large jump range, with a lot of extra modules installed. Not that I’ve used my fighter much, but it’s been nice to have when I did. Similarly, I was planning to have the capacity to repair and refuel the fleet if required and the necessary limpet controllers and such were required for that. No other ship could give the same combination of range and flexibility. Still, by far and away the largest single ship choice was the Anaconda, so yes it was the boring, if correct choice.

The Dragon’s Quest

It would be appropriate at this point to mention Commander Cyrilynn (aka Trish) my partner in crime for this whole business. Without her encouragement, there’s a good chance I wouldn’t have embarked on this enterprise, but she was keen to see what we could find out there and committed to keeping me company throughout the boring empty spaces, as well as the exciting new finds. She may well not be flying the ship, but she has spent as much time as I have on this project, playing vicariously via streaming media, watching over my shoulder in a virtual way and acting as encouragement, company and secretary as required. She has not only been a vital part of my journey, but the story of the gaming grandma who can’t quite manage the controls, but wants to be part of the event has touched a few people in the fleet, with the result that she is considered a member of the event in her own right, a ship commander with her own entry on the roster of participants. 

All of which sums up a preamble to what will likely be a lot of words on this subject, in (I hope) smaller chunks from now on.