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--- info:ftl:ripple [2023/09/24 05:03] – Jarvis
+++ info:ftl:ripple [2024/05/19 17:03] (current) – Jarvis
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 Often, the ship's computer will be used to track incoming projectiles or likely weapons fire from enemies and be used to perfectly time Ripple Flares to destroy incoming attacks.  The flaring of the drives will eventually burn something out, though, so it is not a defense with indefinite endurance.
+===== Ripple Drive Collisions =====
+You may wonder, what happens if two ships collide while traveling FTL using Ripple Drives.
+The answer: not much.  One of the key principles here is that there are no inertial forces at play; if a Ripple Field is disrupted, the ship just harmlessly stops in place wherever it happens to be.  And what can disrupt a Ripple Field?  Another Ripple Field!
+Ripple Fields rely on a carefully choreographed series of 'ripples' along the hull of the ship, similar to oars on a galleon.  Two Ripple Fields coming in contact with each other is like the oars getting caught in something, except the 'boat' in this case has no inertia, so instead of continuing to sail forward, it just stops.
+So two ships colliding at FTL will just harmlessly both come to a dead stop, albeit rather scary close together; how close together depends on the sizes of the ships involved, as the size of the ship determines the size of the ripple field around it.  Small ships could easily as close as 5 meters apart; large ships perhaps 20 to 40 meters apart.  Close enough that the pilots should coordinate activity to make sure there is no collision.  This is one of the primary jobs of the pilot "babysitting" the ship under FTL.
+Real life aircraft follow radio beacons as waypoints, and thus there are flight paths in the sky; starships do the same thing, except they go from Comm Relay to Comm Relay in order to pick up communication during a voyage.  As such, most ships fly more or less the exact same path as they travel from port to port; this is how come, even though space is big, these 'collisions' are not uncommon.  How common they are depends on the trade lane in question; obviously, the more congested, the more likely they are to have collisions.
+As such, the more densely populated trade lanes have coordination to try and make sure the different paths don't intersect; it's a bit like Air Traffic Control, giving each ship some spacing in 3-D space to try and make sure it doesn't hit another.  Such a system is not usually deemed necessary on less populated routes.
+==== Ripple Drive Collisions: Vs. Stationary Targets ====
+Okay, so we've covered ripple-on-ripple collisions.  What happens if a ship going FTL collides with something not going FTL?
+Interestingly, not much; FTL objects can interact with FTL objects, and non-FTL objects can interact with non-FTL objects, but generally speaking an FTL object will pass through non-FTL objects as if they aren't there.  At least, to a point; certain cosmic bodies have energies, densities, or other qualities that can cause FTL interactions.  For instance, many stars and some planets; it is therefore considered more safe to not chance it rather than to try and pass through them.
+If an FTL object were to try and pass through a planet, and fail, then it would emerge stationary and likely within that planet's atmosphere. It would then most likely dead-drop to the surface.  Thus, you can't take an FTL run at a planet as a form of attack; depending on many factors, your ship could emerge high enough to burn up and break apart harmlessly, or close enough to the surface to only do minor damage.
+In the 'best' possible case, your ship will fall on something on the ground and explode violently due to the various volatile components of a starship; but franky, bombs generally do a much better job and are far cheaper.  The ship is becoming a weapon in spite of FTL, not because of it; you could do the exact same effect with more precision and accuracy without trying to involve FTL travel.
+A more likely scenario is for two objects to try to leave FTL at the same place at the same time.  In such a case, it isn't really an FTL collision, but more or a 'same place at the same time' collision.  The answer here is simple; when coming out of FTL, continue to use the ripple drives to move away from the system/com relay's 'entry point' at sublight speeds until you are within the system's 'safe zone'.  Each populated system and comm relay has a designated 'safe zone' under which no ship will run their ripple drives; this provides plenty of room for ships to come in, and use their ripple drives as 'bumper car' bumpers, sort themselves out, and then approach using local flight control.
+==== Ripple Drives: Intentional Interference ====
+So is there a way to knock a ship out of FTL for whatever reason?  Piracy being an obvious one.  The answer is, of course, yes: all you need is a device that's generating a Ripple Field, preferably over a large area.  A bit like a fishing net, where the biggest constraint is the size of the net requiring a good deal of energy to keep up.  Since ships tend to go along trade lanes, a pirate can take a reasonable guess as to where to set up their net.
+However, more often, there are logical 'short cuts' which can be taken.  Let's say you're going from point 'A' to point 'D'.  Obviously, the fastest way to go is straight from A to D; however, the trade lane goes through points B and C which have comm relays or other populated systems.  There's not enough traffic straight from point A to D to warrant the infrastructure of comm relays, etc.
+Thus, a pirate can set up a net on an 'unofficial' trade lane between A and D and hope to get lucky.
+This said, the chance that a ship will happen to fly through the relatively tiny area your ripple 'net' can cover is pretty close to zero; space is a big place, and setting up a large net is beyond the capability of most pirates.  That's more of a job for a whole military task force; a CSS City Ship would have sufficient power generation to set up a huge net to cover a lot of area, but a pirate wouldn't have that kind of budget.
+So, what a pirate is better off doing, is operating near a comm relay.  'Throw the net' over a target ship by moving your ripple net around the ship quickly as it emerges to use the relay, and jam comms.  And thus, this is how most pirates operate.  Or gathering intellegence; if they know a ship is going to take a short cut, or have some way to influence ships considering a short cut, they may know quite precisely where to set up a net.