Space Travel

Long-distance space travel takes time and is boring. You will prefer egocasting in most situations, unless you’re a bioconservative, trying to keep a low profile, or in a region with habitats that are close together.

In Eclipse Phase, spacecraft are primarily dealt with as a setting environment rather than a vehicle/gear to use. Most ships are piloted by ALI and self-maintained by robots. In certain circumstances, however, you may be called on to navigate or pilot a ship with Pilot: Space, repair it with Hardware: Aerospace, or control sensors, ship functions, and weapons with Interface.

Local Travel

In densely inhabited planetary systems such as Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, most travel between cities, surface stations, and orbital habitats is by shuttles (lander and orbital transfer vehicles) using small hydrogen-fueled (or sometimes methane-fueled) rockets. This form of travel is incredibly cheap, very fast (hours or days), and avoids the occasional glitches that crop up during egocasting.

Distance Travel

For distances beyond a million kilometers, almost everyone egocasts. However, thousands of ships can be found crossing the Solar System at any given time. Bulk carriers haul cargo on regular routes between habitats and planetary systems. Ice and volatiles mined from the gas and ice giants are transported in from the outer system. Other freight includes anything that can’t be fabricated locally, from artisanal and proprietary goods to rare elements, living things, antimatter, and qubits. Other ships include military vessels, cruise liners, nomadic scum swarms, and private craft. Almost all of these use fusion or plasma drives. These ships lack the thrust to escape from the gravity wells of large planets or moons, so they station themselves in orbit and use smaller shuttles with higher thrust to transport people to and from planetary surfaces.

Space Travel Basics

Spacecraft use reaction drives (Spacecraft Propulsion), meaning that they burn fuel (reaction mass) and eject the heated output in one direction, which pushes the spacecraft in the opposite direction. Travel involves a period of high-acceleration burn for several hours at the beginning of the flight, where reaction mass is spent to drive up the craft’s velocity. The ship then coasts for the majority of the flight at that speed, until it approaches its destination, where it flips over and burns reaction mass in the opposite direction to decrease velocity.

Though some craft burn roughly half their reaction mass to get up to the best speed possible, this doesn’t leave much room for additional maneuvering or emergencies. Many craft therefore only burn a fraction of their fuel in initial accelerations, so they have some to spare in case they need it. A few tricks can be used to save fuel and build speed, such as slingshotting around the gravity wells of larger planets or aerobraking in a planet’s upper atmosphere.

Ships operate at zero g, with the exception of habitat modules (generally only carried by larger ships) that are spun for low simulated gravity. Periods of high acceleration/deceleration also produce temporary “gravity” in a downward direction, towards the burn.

Space is a valuable commodity on board spacecraft, so room is tight. Sleeping and personal quarters are rarely bigger than large closets, just enough room for a sleeping bag and personal effects. Depending on the size of the craft, there may be a communal recreation area. The crew tend to only be busy at the beginning and end of a trip, when they must deal with acceleration/deceleration and maneuvering around other space traffic. The rest of the trip they spend dealing with repairs or otherwise killing time with XP, VR simulations, or AR games. Spacecraft have their own local mesh, but they are usually too distant to interact with the mesh networks of other habitats without significant communications lag, so they make do with their own archive of entertainment options. Many long-haul ships are crewed by hibernoid morphs, who hunker down for long naps between duties.

Spacecraft Propulsion

Hydrogen-Oxygen Rocket (HO): Optimized with improved engines and light-weight materials, these are still the same rockets used to first reach the moon. Their high fuel-consumption rate counterbalances high thrust-to-weight, so they are rare except with groups too poor to manufacture metallic hydrogen.

Metallic-Hydrogen Rocket (MH): Metallic hydrogen is a solid but unstable form of hydrogen created under exceedingly high pressures. It can be stabilized in tanks with carefully controlled electrical and magnetic fields. Small amounts can be swiftly and explosively reverted to conventional hydrogen gas, propelling the rocket with great force. Metallic-hydrogen engines are necessary to escape the gravity wells of most planets, thanks to their high thrust-to-weight ratios, so are common in planetary landers and short-range vehicles.

Plasma Rocket (P): This drive heats hydrogen into plasma and accelerates it using a powerful electrical field. Though they have a low thrust-to-weight ratio, they are more fuel efficient than metallic-hydrogen. Plasma rockets are superseded by fusion and only used in older craft, notably scum swarms.

Fusion Rocket (F): Similar to a plasma rockets, fusion rockets require significantly higher temperatures and pressures, resulting in a more efficient use of hydrogen. Fusion rockets are the most common form of propulsion for long-distance spacecraft. However, their thrust-to-weight ratio is too low for escaping the gravity wells of most planets.

Antimatter Rocket (AM): Antimatter rockets are the most efficient rocket systems. They mix small amounts of antimatter into the hydrogen fuel, producing enormous amounts of energy relative to the hydrogen consumed and an exceptionally fast and powerful exhaust. These rockets carry a heavily shielded magnetically contained antimatter storage vessel. Though safe, the vast energy release possible if there was an accident means that antimatter rockets are forbidden from docking with habitats or coming within 25,000 km of any inhabited planet or moon. Instead, cargo and passengers are transferred using a shuttle or other small craft. The high expense of antimatter production means that these rockets are only used in military vessels and fast couriers.

Travel Times

Travel times around the Solar System vary drastically, depending on current orbital positions. Travel between points within the inner system usually falls between 2 weeks and a month. Travel to/from Jupiter and Saturn usually runs around 2 or 3 months, respectively. Travel to, from, or between points further out takes months (6 at least) or even years. Slower craft like bulk carriers and scum swarms double these times. Fast transports reduce them by half, however, and antimatter couriers can make a journey in a quarter of the time. These times also assume the craft must accelerate up to speed; a ship that is already traveling at high velocities can reduce the time.