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Post by erisred on May 2, 2017 0:23:36 GMT -5
Doc Vargas rubs his chin, thinking. He waits politely for the exchange between the cap and Peng to finish, then asks "I take it we are sticking to the main then? Because with the added fuel tankage we could cut across from ShiraLea to Beeta, and from there directly to Mantan. If so, what makes all those backwaters so interesting? Just wondering."
I know this isn't the usual OTU thing, but it was how I read the LLB's way back all those years ago and that's the way I want us to do things in this game. It will make mains very important and make eventually having J2 or J3 *very* useful. As it is, there will be times you have to travel several jumps, weeks and weeks, just to get to a system a couple of parsecs over unless you have a J2 or J3 ship, and in this TU, there are next to no J2 ships and J3 ships are just a theory.
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Post by carlos on May 2, 2017 5:06:13 GMT -5
Doc Vargas rubs his chin, thinking. He waits politely for the exchange between the cap and Peng to finish, then asks "I take it we are sticking to the main then? Because with the added fuel tankage we could cut across from ShiraLea to Beeta, and from there directly to Mantan. If so, what makes all those backwaters so interesting? Just wondering."
I know this isn't the usual OTU thing, but it was how I read the LLB's way back all those years ago and that's the way I want us to do things in this game. It will make mains very important and make eventually having J2 or J3 *very* useful. As it is, there will be times you have to travel several jumps, weeks and weeks, just to get to a system a couple of parsecs over unless you have a J2 or J3 ship, and in this TU, there are next to no J2 ships and J3 ships are just a theory.
Ah, OK. Sorry, I missed that with the empty hexes. That is going to take some getting used to. Then disregard Doc's comment. |
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Post by Mighty Darci on May 2, 2017 7:04:32 GMT -5
OOC: Because, as I posted somewhere in one of the Introductory posts, I'm running Jump as having to go from occupied hex to occupied hex. No jumping to empty hexes, jumping from one...after a mis-jump yes, but you can't plot a jump to an empty hex.
I know this isn't the usual OTU thing, but it was how I read the LLB's way back all those years ago and that's the way I want us to do things in this game. It will make mains very important and make eventually having J2 or J3 *very* useful. As it is, there will be times you have to travel several jumps, weeks and weeks, just to get to a system a couple of parsecs over unless you have a J2 or J3 ship, and in this TU, there are next to no J2 ships and J3 ships are just a theory.
Ah, OK. Sorry, I missed that with the empty hexes. That is going to take some getting used to. Then disregard Doc's comment. |
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Post by erisred on May 2, 2017 12:23:06 GMT -5
Jump drives, IMTU (this one anyway) jump from charted and plotted mass to charted and plotted mass. So, ship's can't just to empty space. They have to jump to a star system or some other object both large enough and charted well enough for a ship's software and flight controls to lock onto it.
Seeing stars is easy. You can see them many, many, parsecs away, much further than a Jump can be made. You can jump to systems with stars within your ship's computer and flight control's range...that's 1 parsec for almost all ships that are known to be in existence. But the things that might be in empty hexes are small and cold and very hard to find.
"Empty hexes" aren't really empty, of course. There are rogue planets and small brown dwarfs out there floating in complete darkness too small to give off enough light or enough of a mass signature to be found. However, occasionally, these objects are found, often through mis-jumps, and even more rarely they are large enough and in a stable enough position to be "charted" and allow plots to be made to them. Once they are found, charted, and plotted they are called "deep space jump points."
Finding deep space jump points in "empty hexes" is one of the things Scouts do. Space Navies and large Trading Companies have specially trained personnel and specially designed and equipped ships working on this. For a small company or independent ship to find a new "passage" is very, very, rare.
When rogue planets or brown dwarfs that can be charted and plotted, ie. used as deep space jump points, are found they are usually kept deep dark secrets. Governments and Navy's want to keep them secret so they can use them to bypass and cut around enemy fleets. Trading companies keep them secret because it gives them trade advantages both in time and in opening up new areas for trade. Only when it is more profitable to make these passages public than to keep them private does the public find out about them.
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Post by ffilz on May 2, 2017 13:04:25 GMT -5
I like this. I don't like empty hex jumps just because they remove the "terrain". Having SOME possibility of discovering a deep space jump point is cool, and of course totally under GM control.
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Post by erisred on May 2, 2017 15:29:47 GMT -5
I like this. I don't like empty hex jumps just because they remove the "terrain". Having SOME possibility of discovering a deep space jump point is cool, and of course totally under GM control. Yep!  Sometimes I'm tempted to go with something like what is in Terry Mixon's Empire of Bones, Pournelle & Niven's Mote in God's Eye series. |
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Post by raikenclw on May 2, 2017 20:57:54 GMT -5
Even if we can't use empty hexes, the question of why Cho is willing to swan about on the way to Mantan still stands. Why not head there as directly and quickly as possible, then send us out on our own to plant her subordinates in likely sounding spots? It makes sense that way . . . and more importantly, we could fast-forward to dropping her off, then start back/sidetracking with her underlings without being under the unblinking eye of our Patron (like 99% of CT PCs).
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Post by Mighty Darci on May 2, 2017 22:41:28 GMT -5
Finding deep space jump points in "empty hexes" is one of the things Scouts do. Space Navies and large Trading Companies have specially trained personnel and specially designed and equipped ships working on this. For a small company or independent ship to find a new "passage" is very, very, rare. Perhaps with my background I might have some experience with this that might be helpful in an emergency? |
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