Journeys through Space

As with the trade system, I think any space travel system prompts the question "okay but why?"

You've got niche stuff like "how many hours does it take to get to the moon of this planet" where 99% of the time I don't care, but if you're racing to catch/escape from somebody then it becomes an important roll.

Then you've got the more important stuff relating to random events, ship types, and what exactly happens when you jump between stars.

As with the other sections, this is all untested, thrown against the wall stuff.

SPACECRAFT
Spacecraft fall into three broad categories.

• Boats can be flown by a single pilot, often with a few support crew. They are built for in-system travel.

• Ships require dozens of crew under a captain. They can use gates to travel to neighbouring systems.

• Arks are rare, colossal craft, requiring hundreds of crew. Their drives can jump to neighbouring systems without need for a gate.

CARGO CAPACITY
Any fixture space not otherwise occupied on a craft is designated as cargo, able to hold one standard container.

As a rough guide, expect the following capacity for each craft type, after allowing for standard fixtures.

Boat: 5 containers
Ship: 20 containers
Arc: 100 containers

POWER
Most ship drives are fuelled by condensed stellar fragments, commonly called frags. Some rely on less orthodox methods such as photonic sails or organic thrusters.

TIME AND FUEL
Orbits and routes are not reliable here in the Living Stars.
Here are the typical frag and time consumption rates for space travel.
Those marked n/a are not possible.

 

PLOTTING A ROUTE
Before launch, roll to calculate the time the journey will take.

A shortcut is always available, which halves the journey time but carries a risk. Use the result of the lowest die rolled for the journey time:

1. Gravity well. All passengers take d12 crush. Roll once only.
2. Underspace rift. Instead of halving the time, reroll using d12 instead of 2d6.
3. Mineral field. Craft takes d8 pierce.
4. Star flare. Craft takes d10 burn.
5. Ripple storm. Craft takes d12 crush.
6. Reality fracture. All passengers take d10 warp. Roll for each passenger.

LAUNCH
The craft consumes all of the frags required for the journey on launch. The destination can be amended to within the same orbit without any further frag cost.

If the launch is dangerous then the pilot must pass a Save or the craft takes d8 damage of an appropriate type. Ships treat any launch within a world’s atmosphere as dangerous. Arks are typically too large to be able to launch from a planet’s gravity, so never go directly to planets.

ENCOUNTERS AND EVENTS
For journeys taking multiple days, roll d20. If this is equal or lower than the journey’s length in days then the craft has an encounter on the way, detailed on the current star’s system page (to be revealed). Repeat this to see if there is a journey event (on-ship drama, table coming later).

JUMPING
Journeys to another star system require jump travel, which has the following special considerations:

• Ships mid-jump are isolated, so communication in or out is impossible.

• For each day travelled a week of time has passed outside of the jump.

• Being in jump can make machines behave strangely, so some choose to power down.

DOCKING AND LANDING
Safely docking in an orbital facility or planetary base is straightforward, following instructions from the dock.

Sometimes a craft will go to ground outside of a specific dock, such as in an uninhabited area.

If the docking or landing is dangerous then the pilot must pass a Save or the craft takes d8 damage of an appropriate type. Ships and Arks treat any landing outside of a dock as dangerous.

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