I am proud to finally announce the official release of the "A Zoner's Guide for travelling in large Vessels - part 2". After the project was cancelled by ORI Spa and Cruises over 5 years ago we did not think this day would ever come. Yet after a lot of hard work and fund raising we were able to acquire two "Nephilim" Dreadnoughts and rebuild them to suitable expedition ships.
Although these Ships are still based on the legendary "Jinkusu" class, they lost a lot in regard of combat capability. But the "upgraded" Nephilim class scores in Bridge Design, docking access for smaller vessels, emergency exits and also the new sunscreens on top of the ship proofed absolutely great in lurid areas.
Both Ships were modified for the Journey at the Livadia Shipyard: great mechanics although you might face problems if you like to change the lightbulbs on your vessel.
I will now show you a rough Overview of the expedition, for further details please get a copy of the one thousand three hundred and thirty seven pages long Guide at a Zoner Base near you:
Edge- and Border Worlds:
This is the part of Space most suited for our Colony Ships and Carriers. Vast empty Systems and close to no real Danger except the occasional Asteroid field.
Zoner Captains of capital ships with absolutely no love of adventure should stay here.
But this guide is not for them anyway...so lets move on to house space...
BRETONIA
Bretonia is the first official House Space you will hit when leaving Omega 49, which is a nice starting point for Zoner Adventure.
First thing you will encounter here are rocks....lot of rocks. At times it almost feels as if the bretonians deliberately put whole fields of trash, stones, metals, mines, more stones and so on in front of every jumphole you try to use.
So why using jumpholes then you might ask...which brings us to the second problem in bretonia.
No matter how good you are at docking on trade lanes with a colony ship or sliding into jumpgates...using the official routes here will sooner or later end in a meeting with the authorities... and this my friends... is a matter for another whole guide altogether. But to give you a quick idea of what the problem is:
you basically have two different law organizations.... the navy and the police. Who is in charge at what point...i dont know. But neither do they. So a navy officer might give you some information or offer while the police guy next to him is telling you the exact opposite. Either way the police usually likes to have 5 million credits...doesnt really matter what the offense...it is 5 million for all of them. The Navy on the other hand just likes to escort huge ships...preferably out of bretonia it seems... but it doesnt matter what you do as soon as both parties are present it will ALWAYS end in a fight. So just get prepared for problem number three:
You might at first mistake their battleships for Freighters or Transporters due to their small size... which is exactly the problem: They are rather hard to hit, especially as you can easily loose sight of them...
So if you should encounter any bretonian lawful i suggest to just power up weapons and blow them to kingdom come...
GALLIA
Next Stop is Gallia. I can absolutely recommend this House Space for elderly Zoners or Zoners who value their privacy.
You can easily use the official routes here and the few traders you might pass along the way are usually friendly folk.
The only problem you may encounter here are the jump gates. Built differently from their Bretonian counter parts, you need to initiate the docking procedure rather early in order to give the gate time to fully open up...otherwise you might damage your ship and even get stuck in it....but dont worry it is unlikely in these parts that you cause a jam.
KUSARI
The Zoner who is interested in Tradition and Superstition must visit Kusari. There are like a million different groups and cults and pirates, all with their own claim to be better than the other. Towards Zoners, at least in capital vessels, they all seemed friendly. We did not meet any official authorities on our travels through Kusari, so we unfortunately cannot give you details or tips about them. But feel free to share if you should find one.
Traveling through official routes as well as jumpholes is no problem within Kusari Borders.
LIBERTY
Every Zoner who likes to meet a lot of different people and see a lot of fighting might book a flight on a zoner carrier to liberty today!
You also should visit Bethlehem Station in the Pennsylvania System, where the great ORI fought off the hordes of libertonian invaders.
After that a trip to planet manhattan and the many stations in front of it is absolutely recommended.
You will meet a lot of traders, pirates and fellow zoners along the way....and also the liberty navy.
The navy is a bit...odd.
Their Ships are rather small and their individual fighting capabilities are nothing to be afraid of. The problem is that you might start the fight against 2 or 3 of them but in close to no time they multiply...and multiply and suddenly there is the whole navy in front of you....even ships you already burned get repaired within minutes and come back to fight...again and again and again...
So be prepared and take enough ammo with you.
Also the fines for flying around in capital vessels varies from officer to officer....we had demands in a range from 15 to 40 million credits.
But as in bretonia i recommend no to pay any fines given.
RHEINLAND
Rheinland itself lies close to the outer rim territories, which makes it easy accessible for a fast vacation trip. There are a lot of industrial companies and trade organizations and a few unlawful groups, all of which are not overwhelmingly friendly but nothing more than a minor annoyance for a zoner vessel.
As you can guess with all the mining going on, there are a rather large number of asteroid fields, belts and whole nebulas...so get ready for towing your ship out of a lot of different sorts of rock.
As in all house space the authorities are not too happy to see ships so much better than their own flying through their systems...
The Rheinland Military Battleships might look like crap but dont get fooled by it...thanks to german engineering these ships are able to cloak around, jump through systems or even outrun you in cruise mode through special formation tactics.
But this all sounds a lot more scary than it actually is...these ships are rather huge for house ships and their maneuverability matches our own...which means fighting them is a lot easier than the tiny ships of other houses.
So enjoy your vacation in Rheinland and remember...speed and the ability to cloak does not make them stronger.
NOMAD WORLDS
ever wondered what its like in the back of beyond? here you go.
Now i hope you have a good idea where to go next with your mobile colony, also i recommend the full guide. Get it for free at any zoner base.
Last thing i would like to mention is that in order to provide the zoner community with this great piece of literature, we are currently selling the original Expedition Ships ORIZON|Dakun and ORIZON|Uzed.
### incoming Transmission ###
Source: Somewhere between Bretonia and Gallia
Encryption: none
Subject: Expedition "ORIZON" - Travellers Guide
ID: Wotch Schisky of the "Talisker" trading vessel
Incredible work there ORIZON.
I hate that i missed the supposedly graceful manner you made your way through those pesky asteroid fields, but the view of two of our best and prettiest ships hovering there in front of these minor planets is breathtaking. My whole crew (that'd be me) was staggered:
Keep up the good work, and if you meet the Bretonian Piracy Agency on the way, they still owe me some money.
I think it might be... 5 million?
Gonna grab the full guide soon, and i am sure some connoisseur will soon purchase the ORIZON|Dakun and the ORIZON|Uzed