Post by Reno on Dec 14, 2005 1:23:38 GMT -5
A couple of you may know how it works, but for the benefit of those who don't (and anybody else who wants to read it), I'll explain how hyperspace travel in the Star Wars universe works.
Hyperspace is basically an alternate dimension through which ships can travel to move faster than the speed of light, which is impossible in our universe, according to conventionally held physics beliefs.
Objects large enough to generate their own gravity in normal space (stars, planets, very large moons, probably Death Stars, and black holes, among other things), create "mass shadows" in hyperspace. Flying into a mass shadow in hyperspace is a surefire guarantee that you won't come out alive. This is why hyperspace routes have to be so precisely plotted.
Nearly all ships have failsafe mechanisms that will cause a ship to revert to realspace (as our universe is known, compared to hyperspace) if it's about to run into a mass shadow. This is what allows the gravity well projectors on an Interdictor Cruiser to work. Interdictor Cruisers use their projectors to create an artificial mass shadow in hyperspace, causing any ships passing through hyperspace there to revert to realspace and preventing them from jumping back into hyperspace.
Traveling through hyperspace actually uses very little of a starship's fuel. However, the acceleration of jumping into hyperspace (which is something like the DeLorean in Back to the Future having to accelerate into time travel), eats up massive quantities of fuel.
In hyperspace, it isn't possible to steer a ship. Therefore, travel can only occur in straight lines. A single trip from one system to another will usually consist of several jumps. Essentially, a ship will jump in a straight line, drop out of hyperspace at a certain point to make a course correction, and jump back into hyperspace, repeating this process as many times as necessary to reach the destination. All this is glossed over in the Star Wars RPG rules, but it's still happening.
In fact, systems commonly used as transit points on routes between major systems are favorite ambush points for pirates. If you know that there's a lot of traffic between Coruscant and Corellia, for existence, you can calculate the most likely route it would take between those two systems. This allows you to wait in one of the transit points and attack ships that drop out of hyperspace for course corrections.
So that's the basics of hyperspace. Hopefully it wasn't TOO boring of a read.
Hyperspace is basically an alternate dimension through which ships can travel to move faster than the speed of light, which is impossible in our universe, according to conventionally held physics beliefs.
Objects large enough to generate their own gravity in normal space (stars, planets, very large moons, probably Death Stars, and black holes, among other things), create "mass shadows" in hyperspace. Flying into a mass shadow in hyperspace is a surefire guarantee that you won't come out alive. This is why hyperspace routes have to be so precisely plotted.
Nearly all ships have failsafe mechanisms that will cause a ship to revert to realspace (as our universe is known, compared to hyperspace) if it's about to run into a mass shadow. This is what allows the gravity well projectors on an Interdictor Cruiser to work. Interdictor Cruisers use their projectors to create an artificial mass shadow in hyperspace, causing any ships passing through hyperspace there to revert to realspace and preventing them from jumping back into hyperspace.
Traveling through hyperspace actually uses very little of a starship's fuel. However, the acceleration of jumping into hyperspace (which is something like the DeLorean in Back to the Future having to accelerate into time travel), eats up massive quantities of fuel.
In hyperspace, it isn't possible to steer a ship. Therefore, travel can only occur in straight lines. A single trip from one system to another will usually consist of several jumps. Essentially, a ship will jump in a straight line, drop out of hyperspace at a certain point to make a course correction, and jump back into hyperspace, repeating this process as many times as necessary to reach the destination. All this is glossed over in the Star Wars RPG rules, but it's still happening.
In fact, systems commonly used as transit points on routes between major systems are favorite ambush points for pirates. If you know that there's a lot of traffic between Coruscant and Corellia, for existence, you can calculate the most likely route it would take between those two systems. This allows you to wait in one of the transit points and attack ships that drop out of hyperspace for course corrections.
So that's the basics of hyperspace. Hopefully it wasn't TOO boring of a read.