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Bentenmaru - FTL

The Bentenmaru performing an FTL jump.

Faster-than-light (超光速, Chōkōsoku) (or FTL) travel or communications involves the transportation of matter, energy or information at speeds exceeding the speed of light, through subspace.

Details[]

Travel[]

Subspace ~ Genesis

Transition from normal space to subspace.

Many large ships (and a few smaller ones) are equipped with FTL drives or boosters. Ships with an FTL drive are referred to as Class-I spaceships and ships without are Class-II (these require a booster to be equipped to perform an FTL jump). For FTL travel, ships must pass from regular space into subspace. The action of entering subspace for FTL travel is often referred to as a jump (跳躍, Chōyaku) and the action of exiting referred to as a touchdown (タッチダウン, Tatchidaun).

Ships entering subspace create a distortion in space, making FTL jumps easily traceable. Exiting subspace creates a similar distortion, and ships coming out of subspace give a distinct signal even if they are of the same class - unless they are brand new from the factory dock and were built to spec, any modification or repair will make the signal a bit different. The distortions in subspace caused by the use of the FTL drives can be utilised to drag ships out of subspace [1]. In the right circumstances, there are also capable of temporal displacement [2].

It is hard to do high precision FTL jumps when close to large gravity objects such as planets and stars, thus spaceships usually travel further from such locations before so. However, if coupled with long term observation data, it is possible to perform precision jumps even right next to a star [3].

The energy used for an FTL drive is ridiculously high, the generators used are comparable to stars, while contained in such a small engine, meaning the energy density is much higher than stars. The technology was not well developed before the War of Independence for both the Stellar Alliance and the Colony Federation, and they lacked the technology to produce the high energy generators - thus they relied heavily on the generators produced by the Galactic Empire, which did not have official contact with both factions yet. At the begining of the war, the price of manufacturing the FTL drive could easily carry 2 extra digits more than the ship. Even though the price decreased fairly quickly due to the quick technological advancement during the war, the FTL booster built for the Odette II (or Hakuchou as it was then known) was still 5 times more expensive than the Hakuchou itself [2]. The price of building Class-I and II ships are pretty much the same during the main story, due to the Galactic Empire being much more advanced in such technologies [2].

The advancement in FLT technology does not increase the distance that can be traveled in a single jump, it just increases the accuracy of a jump [4]. The further the jump, the less accurate it is, so theoretically, the distance one can jump through subspace is not limited, it just becomes much more dangerous in the sense that one might get completely lost after an inaccurate jump.

Communications[]

Through the same means as used for FTL transit, FTL communications can also be sent through subspace, allowing people to speak to one another in real time even if they are light-years apart. There is a service providing company/group of companies monitoring the signals, and connecting mobile devices to the area's signal relay stations or spaceships. The network goes beyond the boundary of the Galactic Empire and works in the frontier as well. Although FTL communication signals are much harder to crack, they are easily noticable and give out information about the communication amount and frequency.

FTL communications can be seen in subspace as threads of light [5].

Other[]

The Stellar Slayer was originally a system for channeling energy directly to form a large FTL energy network through subspace. It was turned into a weapon and planned to be capable of firing jets of plasma directly from a star to almost any target location at FTL speed [3].

External Links[]

References[]

  1. Sailing 11
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 Miniskirt Pirates Volume 10
  3. 3.0 3.1 Miniskirt Pirates Volume 5
  4. Miniskirt Pirates Volume 4
  5. Mouretsu Pirates: Abyss of Hyperspace
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