Hyperluminal Travel

Hyperluminal Travel, also known as "FTL" (Faster than Light) refers to the movement of starships past the speed of light. FTL travel is the means by which the nations and spacefaring civilizations communicate, and conduct commerce, war, and diplomacy. There are various methods to travel faster than light, several of them unique, developed by spacefaring civilizations.

History of Hyperluminal Travel
The first civilization believed to break the light speed barrier was the Celestials, beings of incomprehensible power who inhabited the galaxy approximatey [] years ago.

Varieties of Hyperluminal Travel
There are several varieties to exceed the otherwise universal limit of the speed of light. These often vary from nation to nation and can involve warping spacetime, shunting into another dimension, creating a wormhole through reality, and several others.

Warp Drive
The Warp Drive functions off the principle of bending spacetime itself. This works around the lightspeed barrier by not moving the ship itself, rather the fabric of spacetime around the starship so that it moves faster than light. By far the most common form of FTL travel in the galaxy, Warp Drives are ubiquitous in the galaxy, an are relatively safe compared to other methods, although the possibility of a miscalculation is present. To use the Warp Drive, exotic matter with negative mass is required, known as Etherium. The negative mass enables the Warp Drive to create a bubble of distorted spacetime that moves the space around the ship faster then light. They do not need to travel through Hyperspace lanes, being free to travel without the limitations of a Hyperdrive. However, although Warp Drives are very fast, they do not even approach the speed of the Hyperdrive and thus are not used much for interstellar travel, rather mostly being reserved for interplanetary travel. Although interstellar travel is possible, it takes significantly longer then Hyperdrive travel. For this reason, most starships are equipped with use of both a Hyperdrive and a Warp Drive, the Hyperdrive for interstellar travel and the Warp Drive for interplanetary. The Warp Drive also has the limitation of not being able to be used deep in a gravity well.

Hyperdrive
The Hyperdrive is the oldest form of FTL Drive known to exist, and has been employed since the very eariest days of spacetravel. The Hyperdrive enables a ship to pierce the skin of Realspace and emerge in Hyperspace, a dimension parallel to realspace in which massive distances may be traveled extremely quickly in short amounts of time. Hyperspace is coexistent with realspace, so everything with mass in realspace has a mass-shadow in Hyperspace. Appearing as an etheral, swirling realm of silver-grey light where mass is represented as denser grey shadows compared to the swirling silver light of empty space. Making a jump through Hyperspace requires a significant amount of energy. Hyperdrives are extremely rapid, traveling a distance often in the hundreds of parsecs in a day or two. However, Hyperdrives are limited to existing Hyperspace Lanes. If Hyperspace can be likened to a vast, three-dimensional sea, then Hyperspace Lanes can be equated to regions of rapid current through which a ship can travel. Systems connected by Hyperspace Lanes are often centers of commerce or trade due to the ease of access.

Wormhole
A wormhole is a naturally-occuring breach in Realspace. A tunnel is formed across spacetime, breaching the vast distances between the stars enabling instantaneous travel across the galaxy. Although such wormholes can occur naturally, the only way to have effective and reliable travel is to use a Jumpgate, a massive structure that artificially creates a wormhole between two jumpgates. Travel between the two locations connected by the wormhole is instant and safe. In one second, a ship can be across an entire galaxy. Although travel is instantaneous, it takes an absolutely massive amount of energy to power the installation. For this reason, jumpgates are rare in the galaxy, and only empires with the means to build, maintain and power these structures make use of them. Despite the enormous amount of energy, the wormhole has many advantages, the most obvious being that travel is instant, and travel is not hindered by Hyperspace routes or the slow speed of the Warp Drive. However, ships that pass through the wormhole need to have some other form of propulsion if they wish to move beyond the gate. Another limitation of the Wormhole is that once the two jumpgate installations are 'linked', it takes a long time and not insignificant amounts of power to link them with another jumpgate. Despite this, the advantages of the Wormhole lead many interstellar empires to attempt the construction of one of these, and they are often the lifeline connecting far-flung corners of the gakaxy, and for some empires the backbone of their interstellar travel.

Otherspace
Otherspace travel, as understood by the majority of the galaxy, is a form of interstellar faster-than-light travel developed by the Consortium. It is not well-understood and the underlying theories behind it are vague, but it appears to have relations to both hyperspace and the principle of imaginary time. Otherspace drives are known to be capable of operating inside of gravity wells.

Users

 * The Raion Consortium