Multi chart cargo / passenger / parcel contracts

[Bugbear]

A simple idea, 'cause excluding some of the native missions, there's little reason for using the Galactic Witchspace drive.

In essence, I'm suggesting that we have contracts that require one or more Galactic jumps. These contracts would have to be priced accordingly, to allow for the fact that each G jump costs 5,000 Cr.

It would also suit the commander that has familiarity with multiple charts, and would add a third dimension to meeting contract deadlines. e.g. for a contract that starts in the south west corner of chart 2 and ends in the mid north of chart 4, is it faster to traverse chart 2 or 3 before jumping, or perhaps a combination of all three charts?

Also, you'd need to beware the 'dead end' contracts that would terminate you in a section of a chart where there is no way to leave.

How hard would this be to add to the game?

[cim]

The difficulty at the moment with this is that you can't read system data for a chart you're not in. It wouldn't be too difficult for an OXP to work around this, though, by hard-coding the data for planet names and positions into a script.

[Tricky]

I actually converted all the systems procedural algorithms into JavaScript for an OXP about 18 months ago. That could quite easily be used for this situation.

[Diziet Sma]

This raised a question in my mind that I've never seen addressed..

We all know how in-game time for witchspace jumps is calculated, but how much in-game time does a Galactic Jump take?

[Cody]

... but how much in-game time does a Galactic Jump take?

By the ship's clock, a gal-jump is instantaneous. There's been some discussion about it before - I'd like to see it take a fair bit of in-game time.

[Diziet Sma]

Agreed.. that doesn't seem right.

[cim]

My theory is that a normal witchspace jump is like a valley - you descend into the valley, returning to your normal altitude on the other side - requiring quite an expenditure of energy and time to reach your destination.

A galactic jump on the other hand is like stepping off a sheer cliff - it takes virtually no time or energy, specialist equipment is needed to survive the results, and it's impossible to reverse the action.

Something like this:

[Diziet Sma]

Ok.. yeah.. I could see that.. nice analogy.

[Cody]

Interesting theory, cim - makes sense, does that (more sense than my crazy theory of the Eight, anyway). <chuckles>

[Mauiby de Fug]

... but how much in-game time does a Galactic Jump take?

By the ship's clock, a gal-jump is instantaneous. There's been some discussion about it before - I'd like to see it take a fair bit of in-game time.

Indeed. I seem to recall that given enough of Smivs' Gaa-drive pods, (ie 7 + 1 standard Galactic Hyperdrive), the instantaneous jumps, and the behaviour which allows you to travel to the closest planet to your current coordinates in the next galaxy, I was able to jump to a neighouring system within 7 light years of a planet faster via hyperdrive than actually standard jumping to it...

[Bugbear]

... but how much in-game time does a Galactic Jump take?

By the ship's clock, a gal-jump is instantaneous. There's been some discussion about it before - I'd like to see it take a fair bit of in-game time.

Indeed. I seem to recall that given enough of Smivs' Gaa-drive pods, (ie 7 + 1 standard Galactic Hyperdrive), the instantaneous jumps, and the behaviour which allows you to travel to the closest planet to your current coordinates in the next galaxy, I was able to jump to a neighouring system within 7 light years of a planet faster via hyperdrive than actually standard jumping to it...

Hmm...around 40kCr (not sure how much the Gal-drive pods cost) to jump <7LY in next to zero time. I really hope the contract was worth it

[Cody]

I really hope the contract was worth it

<grins> I know someone who, only yesterday, went from G3 to G1 via a rapid series of gal-jumps in order to reconnect with a mission.