Space

Settled space

Most humans live on or in orbit around Earth. There are settlements on the moon (Luna City, Lunatic Republic of Liberia) and a terra-forming project is active on Mars, with around 10 000 locally-settled workers with families. The asteroid belt has a few hundred settled asteroid cities (totalling about 300 000 people, all in all).

The bulk of humanity lives in the solar system, but there are agricultural colonies and mining colonies in other star systems. There are also military training facilities and staging posts dotted around nearby star systems. Human-settled areas are sometimes referred to as Settled Space, though there has been some movement renaming them to Solar Federation.

There are alien species, though there isn't much interaction between humans and aliens (there is some, though it's usually only in space-ports, space docks and the like). The most prominent alien species in Human space is the Ape-cats (see p. ).

Space travel

The simple space travel rules say ``roughly 36 hours from planet to moon'', ``roughly 3-6 months from planet to planet'' and ``interstellar travel needs to get out of the gravity well before warping, so call it 72 hours each end and three days in warp (for a total of 9 days)''. Warp drives require a relatively shallow gravity gradient on both ``warp out'' and ``warp in'' points, so cannot be used too close to large masses. Additionally, when warping to inside the same gravity well, the uncertainty in exit point is magnified, so it is unwise to warp within a given solar system (it is done, occasionally, however).

Spaceships

There are two main types of spaceships, surface-to-orbit and planet-to-planet. the first type has powerful checmical rockets, to generate enough boost to leave a planet surface and thick, heavy heat shields to protect the vehicle during re-rentry.

Landers

Landers come in two basic sizes. The smaller size, suited for 12-16 passengers, can take small amount of cargo (some 10-25 kg per passenger) plus two pilots. The larger size is mostly used for shifting cargo from space to the surface. Load capacity max 23 tons or 40 m³ mathend000#. Large landers have two pilots.

Large landers can take passengers, but they usually lack passenger seats, so it can be problematic for take-offs. There is modular seating available for emergencies, though. With the cargo bay converted completely to passenger service, it can seat a maximum of 20 passengers.

System ships

System ships come in a multitude of sizes, though the normal disposition is to be composed of one or four spheres (in the latter case, enclosed inside a larger sphere). Most warp ships are designed to function both as passenger ships and cargo ships at the same time. When composed of four sub-spheres, the normal space-allocation is ``one sphere for command and crew, one for passengers, two for cargo'', though this varies. A normal ``sphere section'' (either a complete ship or one-of-four) comes in one of 3 sizes: 6m, 10m or 15m radius, for a total volume of 900 m³ mathend000#, 4 100 m³ mathend000# or 14 000 m³ mathend000# of space.

Maximum freight mass for intra-system engine only regulates maximum acceleration (and thus travel time). Warp engines have an upper weight limit, depending on the engine. If the ship is over this mass, the warp engine will not work.

Ships can move either via warp drive or by using intra-system engines (not unusually ion engines). One reason why intra-system hops is usually done via system drive in normal space, rather than warping is that short-distance warping near stars is unreliable, position-wise, so it'd be safer warping out and then back in. Though that would be *much* more costly than going there by warp (fuel costs for a single warp is the same as about four months of continous thrust with the standard ion engine). Fast courier ships usually do a double warp^7.1, to minimize travel time (at the expense of cost).

System ship construction

Designing a system ship is (basically) down to deciding ``one sphere or four'' and the sphere section size, then decide on what to stick in it. At a minimum, a system ship needs one galley, air purification units and an intra-system drive. Warp drive, lander bays and the like are recommended, though, and will be found on most ships.

Table 7.1: Space ship hull table

Section Single sphere Four spheres Hull

size volume weight volume weight section

(m³ mathend000#) (tons) (m³ mathend000#) (tons) cost

6 m 900 70 3600 630 10 000

10 m 4200 200 17000 1800 35 000

15 m 14000 440 57000 3900 70 000

Table 7.2: Space ship engine table I

Engine Weight range (t) Volume Cost

In-system A 0-250 30 m³ mathend000# 30 000

In-system B 175-500 40 m³ mathend000# 40 000

In-system C 400-1 000 55 m³ mathend000# 70 000

In-system D 800-2 000 120 m³ mathend000# 150 000

In-system E 1 800-5 000 250 m³ mathend000# 300 000

In-system F 4 000-10 000 500 m³ mathend000# 650 000

Table 7.3: Space ship engine table II

Engine Max weight (t) Volume Cost

Warp A 300 15 m³ mathend000# 100 000

Warp B 700 20 m³ mathend000# 120 000

Warp C 1 500 30 m³ mathend000# 150 000

Warp D 4 000 45 m³ mathend000# 180 000

Warp E 10 000 65 m³ mathend000# 220 000

Warp F 25 000 90 m³ mathend000# 260 000

Table 7.4: Space ship additional facilities

Facility Size Space use Weight Capacity Cost

Air purifier medium 45 m³ mathend000# 1.5 tons 20 persons 8 000

Air purifier small 30 m³ mathend000# 1 ton 10 persons 10 000

Cabin 1, basic 12 m³ mathend000# N/A 1 person 700

Cabin 2, basic 18 m³ mathend000# N/A 2 persons 800

Cabin 4, basic 24 m³ mathend000# N/A 4 persons 900

Cabin 1, luxury 24 m³ mathend000# N/A 1 person 950

Cabin 2, luxury 32 m³ mathend000# N/A 2 persons 1 100

Cargo foam N/A N/A 5 kg / m³ mathend000# N/A 30 / m³ mathend000#

Galley small 15 m³ mathend000# 1 ton 6 persons 750

Galley large 30 m³ mathend000# 1.5 tons 20 persons 3 000

Lander bay small 200 m³ mathend000# N/A 1 small 15 000

Lander bay large 300 m³ mathend000# N/A 2 small / 1 large 25 000

Laser battery light 30 m³ mathend000# 1 ton N/A 35 000

Laser battery heavy 45 m³ mathend000# 1.5 tons N/A 45 000

Footnotes

... warp^7.1

Some pilots do a single warp, since that saves checking position exactly at the remote end before warping back, saving somewhere between 3h and 36h depending on how far off target the landing was and the skill of the navigator, plus the 3 days of the actual warp