Space Flight

Sublight Engines

Last Descent limits small vessels to sublight engines, which are incredibly slow. Small vessels are only used to ferry people or cargo within the same solar system. With the fastest small vessel, a trip from Earth to Mars still takes fifteen days.

These drives are called Feynman Drives, and are high yield ion thrusters.

FTL

Medium vessels or above are capable of equipping a Warp drive. The standard warp drive can achieve speeds of up to 18 parsecs per year. This allows these crafts to make the trip from Sol to Alpha Centauri (a distance of roughly 1.3 parsecs) in roughly twenty eight days. Faster warp drives exist, but they are often restricted to large or capital vessels.

Take the vessels FTL speed and multiply it by four. This is the amount of parsecs per year the FTL drive can achieve.

For example a trip from Sol to Kepler-22 (190 parsecs) would take 10 and a half years with a craft of a speed of 18 parsecs per year.

Stasis Chambers

All medium vessels that are fitted with an FTL drive, are also fitted with cryogenic stasis pods, that allow for long distance flights. A person suspended in a stasis chamber only requires a minimum amount of fresh air and nutrition, which is supplied by the chamber. Ageing is effectively halted, so are the symptoms of most diseases, while being in stasis.

Older and cheaper vessels sport a cryogenic unit. It suspends the person in a cryogenic sleep. These pods require specific adjustment for the person in question, and require vast amounts of energy to operate. In case of failure the person is unfrozen. A person wakes immediately if the pod ceases to function. If the pod is damaged the person may even take harm from being unfrozen too quickly, slowly or by being unfrozen partially.

Newer models use a suspension pod. Upon entering the pod, a suspension liquid is flooded into the chamber. This liquid keeps the person in stasis, and supplies the person with oxygen and nutrients. The pod requires little power, and the internal core can last to several months without an external power supply. However the liquid has to be replaced regularly.

Many stasis pods and chambers can emergency eject in case of disastrous failure. All pods have an emergency transponder installed. Cryogenic pods only last for a few days, while suspension pods can last for months, or even years. After power failure however, the person suspended dies.

Salvaging

Space debris is often salvaged and reused. Many make their living of salvaging broken station parts, ships, mining equipment, satellites and other space debris. Under the law, all ships are required to pick up and transport cryogenic and suspension pods back to safe harbour. However pirates have been reported to pickup the pods, mark the inhabitants "dead", and selling them as slaves.