Tracking ships

[Tforbes]

Remembering to include the hex/parsec that they start from. Jumping from one side of the system to the other still takes one week but adds to the potential destinations.

true. I had forgotten about that.

Quick tangent... is it possible to Jump but not go anywhere? Like, intentionally enter Jump space for a week and pop out exactly where you left? If you needed to hide or protect something for a week that could be an effective way to do it.

 

[Sigtrygg]

Yes, according to prior canon at least.

 

[Condottiere]

Insystem jumps are possible.

Going by Azhanti, the minimum distance could be close enough that it could be reached through normal thrusters from the point of departure, fairly quickly.

 

[MasterGwydion]

It would seem to make a huge change to warfighting as well, as one stealth scout ship per system, with some couriers to back them up, and you know where everyone leaving the system is going, if you can hit the Difficulty anyhow.

It also means that anytime someone jumps to an empty hex, the starport they left out of knows where they jumped. Might be something to pass on to the navy or law enforcement as a potential illicit fuel dump.

 

[Talon Greyfeather]

Ehhhh .... this doesn't seem to be a game breaker to me.

If you witness the jump - let's say sensor lock on the target vessel is enough to determine direction. An Astrogator should be able to plot potential destinations based on the ships jump signature anyway. It may take more time without the analyzer software ... maybe I need another check to search/find the target ships jump rating - but this wouldn't be that hard to do even without the software. I know this is a Jump-X ship ... so where could it be going based on where it is now? I pull up my sector map and I can get potential target hexes pretty quick. An Astrogator plotting the course based on the jump entry should get you pretty darn close (finally a good use case for an astrogation roll!)

At my table this would be a Referee roll. Players wouldn't know until they get there. If they have the software maybe they get a confidence factor, but you don't need specialized software to tell where they are going. Maybe the software does it faster because it can calculate all routes (not sure how as I thought an Astrogator was required to do route calculations) ... but the rest is just detective work.

Game breaker ... not imho. YMMV

 

[Sigtrygg]

MMDV

An enemy can follow you

The game is now different, and not in favour of the PCs.

Just try it, next time your PCs do something questionable have them followed to the next system by people who want to ask them questions

 

[Condottiere]

Interstellar travel isn't cheap.

So, it would have to be worth it to the pursuers to spend money, to, uh, pursue them.

 

[Fluffy Bunny Feet]

Pursuit need not be physical. Messages detailing your alleged crimes travelling on X-Boats ahead of you. You register with the Starport after you come out of jump and up comes the flag that your ship is wanted (or a crew member is) for high crimes. Things go down hill quickly from there.

 

[Condottiere]

 

[MasterGwydion]

Ehhhh .... this doesn't seem to be a game breaker to me.

If you witness the jump - let's say sensor lock on the target vessel is enough to determine direction. An Astrogator should be able to plot potential destinations based on the ships jump signature anyway. It may take more time without the analyzer software ... maybe I need another check to search/find the target ships jump rating - but this wouldn't be that hard to do even without the software. I know this is a Jump-X ship ... so where could it be going based on where it is now? I pull up my sector map and I can get potential target hexes pretty quick. An Astrogator plotting the course based on the jump entry should get you pretty darn close (finally a good use case for an astrogation roll!)

At my table this would be a Referee roll. Players wouldn't know until they get there. If they have the software maybe they get a confidence factor, but you don't need specialized software to tell where they are going. Maybe the software does it faster because it can calculate all routes (not sure how as I thought an Astrogator was required to do route calculations) ... but the rest is just detective work.

Game breaker ... not imho. YMMV

Just out of curiosity... Why does jump tracking even work? Seems to me like watching a plane take off from the airport and magically knowing where it is going. I don't care how well you know the capabilities of the aircraft or how closely you monitor its take-off, that will tell you nothing about where the plane is going.

 

[Hardwire]

Leaving aside game mechanics, outside a broad idea, probably not.

You know the volume of the starship, you could probably measure the energy surge from the jump drive, and you know which direction the nose is pointing at.

You have a direction, and energy divided by volume tells you how many parsecs.

You have a notion of which ten square light year area that the starship jumped, and could narrow down what's interesting enough in that system they might want to visit.

The other issue is the Vastness of the system, you may be able to tell what system they are likely jumping to but there is no way to tell where in the system they were targeting. You could arrive on the opposite side of the system from them and that is to far to tell where they are.

 

[MonsterX]

Jump tracking could work because jumping is supposed to emit a burst of particles. If these have a directionality to them, then you could analyze that and see which direction the ship jumped. From that, you would know what star is in its path. The ship being pursued could jump to an empty hex instead, short or long of the star they appear to aim for, in order to foil pursuit. This is a good strategy - but they better have fuel with them for a second jump in that case as the chance of ending up close enough to anything to reach it before the air runs out is just a wisker above zero.

To track a ship you have to witness the jump occuring, which presumably means tracking the ship - as the rules suggest you need to be doing to make this work.

Therefore, no, starports can't see all the ships jumping out, unless they are in a small gravity well, and the ships are all jumping very close by, in which case they could theoretically manage it. If you don't want to share this information, just fly a little farther away.

It is likely only relevant if you are chasing someone and are on the verge of catching them and they jump away just before you catch them.

Authorities were always able to chase PCs by sending messages to authorities and offers of bounties. This kind of tracking might be used against PCs once in a while - but it seems more likely PCs will be in a position to need it, since they'll be the ones who want to chase ships from system to system. Also, it only works under very specific circumstances, you need the right equipment and it doesn't always work. So not a game breaker.

 

[MasterGwydion]

The other issue is the Vastness of the system, you may be able to tell what system they are likely jumping to but there is no way to tell where in the system they were targeting. You could arrive on the opposite side of the system from them and that is to far to tell where they are.

Who says that while in jumpspace you follow a straight line to your destination? Who says that you don't make turns while in jumpspace, like floating with the ocean current in a boat. The current does not travel in a straight line. Even light doesn't travel in a straight line through space, so why should we expect jump travel to follow a straight line in space? So, if you are travelling in jumpspace, and it is not in a straight line, how do you "track" where the ship went by only witnessing its entry into jumpspace?

 

[MasterGwydion]

Jump tracking could work because jumping is supposed to emit a burst of particles. If these have a directionality to them, then you could analyze that and see which direction the ship jumped. From that, you would know what star is in its path. The ship being pursued could jump to an empty hex instead, short or long of the star they appear to aim for, in order to foil pursuit. This is a good strategy - but they better have fuel with them for a second jump in that case as the chance of ending up close enough to anything to reach it before the air runs out is just a wisker above zero.

To track a ship you have to witness the jump occuring, which presumably means tracking the ship - as the rules suggest you need to be doing to make this work.

Therefore, no, starports can't see all the ships jumping out, unless they are in a small gravity well, and the ships are all jumping very close by, in which case they could theoretically manage it. If you don't want to share this information, just fly a little farther away.

At what range can a starport detect the jump flash? If it is within their automatic detection range, why wouldn't they detect it? Also, if a starport has a gravitational analysis suite, that automatic detection limit is 1 parsec.

It is likely only relevant if you are chasing someone and are on the verge of catching them and they jump away just before you catch them.

Authorities were always able to chase PCs by sending messages to authorities and offers of bounties. This kind of tracking might be used against PCs once in a while - but it seems more likely PCs will be in a position to need it, since they'll be the ones who want to chase ships from system to system. Also, it only works under very specific circumstances, you need the right equipment and it doesn't always work. So not a game breaker.

See above, it disproves the rest of what you said.

 

[Hardwire]

At what range can a starport detect the jump flash? If it is within their automatic detection range, why wouldn't they detect it? Also, if a starport has a gravitational analysis suite, that automatic detection limit is 1 parsec.

See above, it disproves the rest of what you said.

Read the limitations of the gravitational analysis suite. Yes you can detect somethin 1 parsec away, in 3.26 years.

"Of course, since gravity waves propagate at the speed of light, a jump emergence detected in a system one parsec away will have occurred over three years previously"

 

[MasterGwydion]

Read the limitations of the gravitational analysis suite. Yes you can detect somethin 1 parsec away, in 3.26 years.

"Of course, since gravity waves propagate at the speed of light, a jump emergence detected in a system one parsec away will have occurred over three years previously"

Yes, but it still means that you are observing that ship jumping. So, you can still track it. Your information will be 3+ years out of date if you try to jump to the location that ship jumped to, they will have been gone for 3+ years, but you can still do it.

Edit - No matter how close the ship is that jumps, you can never observe the ship's exact moment of jump in the exact moment the ship jumps, because the light has to travel to your eyes. So, 5 meters, 5 million kilometers, or 1 parsec, doesn't matter. As long as it is within automatic detection range, you are golden to track it.

 

[Hardwire]

Yes, but it still means that you are observing that ship jumping. So, you can still track it. Your information will be 3+ years out of date if you try to jump to the location that ship jumped to, they will have been gone for 3+ years, but you can still do it.

Except you are witnessing them emerging from the jump and not entering a jump. The only information that the gravitational analysis suite is that something arrived there. it tells you nothing of what t was or any additional information about the ship, so at that point you just see a blip.

You need to observe them entering a jump.

 

[MonsterX]

Yes, but it still means that you are observing that ship jumping. So, you can still track it.

no, since this is just seeing that someone jumped somewhere, 3.26 years ago. The rules for using jump tracking say you need to be tracking the ship, which reasonably means you need to see it with your sensors. Detecting a jump just tells you there is someone is jumping somewhere. It doesn't give you a fix on their location, vector or any other information about their ship. The rules on this are frustratingly vague, but the other sensor rules suggest that the information you get from jump detection is very minimal.

You can put crazy interpretations on the words in the rules to come up with crazy results if you want something to complain about. I'll stick with reasonable interpretations, so that I don't have to get upset about it breaking my game.

 

[MasterGwydion]

no, since this is just seeing that someone jumped somewhere, 3.26 years ago. The rules for using jump tracking say you need to be tracking the ship, which reasonably means you need to see it with your sensors. Detecting a jump just tells you there is someone is jumping somewhere. It doesn't give you a fix on their location, vector or any other information about their ship. The rules on this are frustratingly vague, but the other sensor rules suggest that the information you get from jump detection is very minimal.

You can put crazy interpretations on the words in the rules to come up with crazy results if you want something to complain about. I'll stick with reasonable interpretations, so that I don't have to get upset about it breaking my game.

Which rules on jump tracking? So far, we have seen three different rules for "jump tracking" in this thread alone.

 

[MasterGwydion]

no, since this is just seeing that someone jumped somewhere, 3.26 years ago. The rules for using jump tracking say you need to be tracking the ship, which reasonably means you need to see it with your sensors. Detecting a jump just tells you there is someone is jumping somewhere. It doesn't give you a fix on their location, vector or any other information about their ship. The rules on this are frustratingly vague, but the other sensor rules suggest that the information you get from jump detection is very minimal.

You can put crazy interpretations on the words in the rules to come up with crazy results if you want something to complain about. I'll stick with reasonable interpretations, so that I don't have to get upset about it breaking my game.

Deep Space Explorer's Handbook. page 22 under the Gravitational Analysis Suite.

"A search and plot requires a number of hours equal to 1Dx10, multiplied by the distance, in parsecs, being searched."

Plot is its location. You got this location by using the sensor data of the ship performing the jump.