OGame.Origin

• For the first 14 minutes 59 seconds after the activity stops (*) will be shown next to the planet name. Beyond 15 minutes a time is then displayed in place of the star (15 min). This time value is shown up until 59 minutes 59 seconds (59 min) and then after that point there will be no activity indicator displayed next to the planetname.

• If you scroll over the planet picture, you will see another activity indicator. When there's an activity at the planet (for the first 14 minutes 59 seconds), you can see an orange triangle:

• Third way of seeing activity is via espionage reports. Whenever you probe a moon/planet, you will see activity report which tells you if there's been any activity at the planet/moon. Activity report is under resources and you see it in any case, no matter what your espionage technology is. If there's activity only at moon and you probe a planet, the report will show no activity vice versa. If you're probing a planet with a moon, this is the only way to see whether the activity was made on planet or moon. It will look like this:

Quoted

Your espionage report shows abnormalities in the atmosphere of the planet which suggests activity within the last 15 minutes.

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Your espionage report shows abnormalities in the atmosphere of the planet which suggests activity within the last XX minutes.

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Your espionage does not show abnormalities in the atmosphere of the planet. There appears to have been no activity on the planet within the last hour.

Quoted

State June 12th 2010

• General :
  - A * appears on the home planet when you login.
  - A * appears on the current planet / moon when you logout.
  - A * appears on the NEW location at changing the current planet / moon.
  - A * appears on the current planet / moon with EVERY click on all menu items.
  - NO * appears with click on Support / GameForge / Help / Board / Rules / Imprint.
  - The * (or the time) from the planet and the associated moon overlaps. It appears always the last activity.

• Events :
  - A * appears on the current planet / moon with click on relaod at eventlist, sensor phalanx and fleet movement.
  - A * appears on the current planet / moon with autoreload at eventlist and fleet movement.
  - NEW foreign fleets ONLY appears in the eventlist when reloading the overview.

• Flights :
  - A * appears at departure on the starting planet / moon.
  - A * appears at arrival on the target planet / moon. Exception mission ACS defend - NO * appears.
  - A * appears at return on the starting planet / moon.
  - A * appears at abort on the current planet / moon.

• Special situations :
  - Normal * behavior for banned players without vacation mode.
  - Normal * behavior for inactive players. ( i and I )
  - NO account deletion in existing PURCHASED DM
  - NO * from activation of vacation mode.
  

Quoted

NO * after 35 days inactivity. ( No account deletion in existing PURCHASED DM )

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3. How can I use activity?

Activity is a very important part of the gameplay. There are many strategies based on it.
First of all, you should know that server forces you to log off at 3:00 AM ST. As logging in again creates activity, players with no activity at homeworld at that time are not online. So, attacking after 3:00 AM ST is quite a safe way to prevent ninja or to carry out slow actions such as MoonDestruction attacks.
But the "art of hunting" is far more complicated than this. In this guide we will show you just some very basic informations, since we all know that reading a guide will teach you much less than experiencing.
First of all let's say that * can be created by 2 different kind of events: any activity on the planet/moon made by the player himself or any kind of fleet contact. Probing can help you understand which was the kind of activity shown, and in case there is a moon, to understand if it was on planet or moon, but your probing will create another * which will overlap on the previous one, so you could miss some important details for your chase this way. That is why a good hunter will spend much more time looking at you patiently on galaxy view rather then carpet probing all your planet/moons at 2:40 AM waiting for a lucky shot!
That is the best way to understand your prey's habitudes and fleetsave style. Simply looking at galaxy view, you can figure out his usual online/offline times, when he usually fleetsaves, when and possibly where the fleet comes back, if the player is online before or after his fleet landing and most of all, if he commits any remarkable mistake.
You won't need to probe that much either. At the contrary, knowing when and where to send a single probe is the perfect completion to your hunt. You don't need always to look for the fleet, but maybe just to see how much deut there is on the planet/moon, to see if anything changed since the last time you probed that target, to check for similarities or differences towards other panets/moons of your prey, to see if your probe is the last activity done on that planet/moon, and many more things you could like to have "just as informations".
Moreover, seeking a target by his activity stars is the only way to catch "un-catchable fleetsaves" such as deployment between moons (recalled or not), moon-df or moon-colonization fleetsave as well. Of course some mistake on the defender side is needed, but even the most careful player has some day in which he cannot take all the necessary precautions or in which he has to act differently than usual. If you know which are his habitudes, you'll notice it, if you just random probe, you'll miss him even if he made all the possible mistakes.
Scared? You'd better do, so you can finally figure out why one of the several untold rules of this game says: "being paranoid in ogame is never a bad idea"!

For further details about how to hunt a fleetsave, check the Fleetsaving Guide.