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General expected number of misjumps in a system?

willtron3030

SOC-12
Peer of the Realm
Consider a hi-pop industrial system TL11-12, with heavy exploitation of system resources out to the kuiper belt... Mainworld has a starport A or B, and a spaceport or three are scattered among other points in the system. Also assume that in-system jumps are not common.

How many misjump events, both departures and arrivals, would you expect to occur in the system in a week/month/year? Inbound misjumps would be much rarer than outbound, so we could limit the discussion to outbound jump mishaps.

Is this number proportinal to dtonnage of interstellar trade going thru the system? Is it significantly affected by the balance of smallship/large-ship traffic?

I know @Spinward Flow has looked at the numbers from the POV of a single merchant ship perambulating the void. But what would the In-System Traffic controllers expect to see in their system?
 
Consider a hi-pop industrial system TL11-12, with heavy exploitation of system resources out to the kuiper belt... Mainworld has a starport A or B, and a spaceport or three are scattered among other points in the system. Also assume that in-system jumps are not common.
Micro-jumps (less than 1 parsec) can be done using a Jump-1 drive, but are usually impractical for interplanetary distances of less than 8 days (192 hours) duration on maneuver drive power. It's at this point that I refer you to the Interplanetary Distance by Time and Acceleration chart to determine how far a ship can get in 8 days/192 hours in one-way transfer orbits to decide if a ship will want to micro-jump or not. Note that a micro-jump round trip will consume 2 parsecs worth of jump fuel for that ship (Jump-1 outbound, Jump-1 inbound) to avoid needing to transit on maneuver drive power the whole way.
How many misjump events, both departures and arrivals, would you expect to occur in the system in a week/month/year? Inbound misjumps would be much rarer than outbound, so we could limit the discussion to outbound jump mishaps.
Misjumps inbound to the system will be rare events.
Misjumps outbound from the system would be dependent upon fuel quality (starport specified above indicates that refined fuel is available), maiintenance status (not all ships get annual maintenance in a timely enough fashion) and distance from gravity wells when jumping. With the type A/B starport for the system, I would expect enough system defense patrols to make pirate attacks an exceptionally rare event (not impossible, but would have to be a unique event). Note that pirate attacks are possible at type C starports and below, which lack enough system defense presence to ward off would-be pirates (per LBB2 starship encounter tables).

So, all things considered, in napkin math terms, I would expect 0.01% of inbound jumps to the mainworld to be misjumps.
Outbound misjumps would probably be in the under 1% range (probably closer to 0.1% or lower) owing to the availability of refined fuel, annual maintenance facilities at the starport and the relative safety of "patrolled space" protected against piracy.
For reference rolling 2D6=12 is a 1/36=2.78% chance outcome on straight dice rolling (in CT) that requires additional DM in order to misjump (unrefined fuel being the most obvious DM). Note that 0.1% is thus 3.6% of the 2D6=12 results ... or literally rolling 000 on 3D10.
Is this number proportinal to dtonnage of interstellar trade going thru the system? Is it significantly affected by the balance of smallship/large-ship traffic?
Not ... really ...

The important thing is that misjumps will never be 0%.
The chances for one can be zero for individual starships, but will never be zero for ALL starships passing through a system (to and/or from).

The greater the quantity of starship traffic, the more opportunities for misjumps there will be.
It's kind of like being a "good driver" who never gets into a traffic accident or fender bender collision with other vehicles ... and yet we can switch on the radio in almost any major city in the world and there will be routine traffic reports of vehicle accidents multiple times per day snarling traffic somewhere in the city.

Small craft cannot jump, so they are substantially "not relevant" to the question of misjump opportunities.
Large ships (particularly the really large 1000+ ton ones) will usually take measures to ensure their opportunities to misjump are minimized towards zero.
It's mostly going to be the "small time" fledgling line operators who can't afford annual maintenance on time that are operating on tight margins with the threat of bankruptcy (and/or repossession by a bank) and thus don't have the reserves to keep up their annual overhaul maintenance that are going to be the misjump risks, even with refined fuel. The quantity of starship traffic that falls into this "low end and poorly maintained" category is going to be the most likely culprit for why misjump chances cannot ever get down to zero.

So the number of misjumps per week/month/year are going to be highly context dependent upon the types of starships, and the upkeep of their maintenance schedules, that will be arriving and departing from the system. More starships passing through, more dice rolls ... so in that sense the interstellar trade quantity is relevant, but the tonnage quantity should not bias the percentage chances for misjumps all that much (high chance for lots of traffic, low chance to nearly no traffic, is not the way it should work out). More like the "clunker/junker" starships are the main risk factor, so the more of them in the traffic pattern the higher the overall risk for misjumps.
But what would the In-System Traffic controllers expect to see in their system?
Honestly ... with a type A/B starport the starport controllers would expect to see a lot of ... compliance ... with their orders over comms.
For those who don't comply, the "space lanes" ought to be patrolled well enough by system defense to "compel compliance" if craft (large or small) fail to comply with orders from starport control.
 
RAW Book 2, the only factors that affect misjump are fuel quality and being too close to a gravity well.

The second should "never" happen. That's what navigators are for and it's not even difficult. The first, if that's routine then you're looking at about 3% of the traffic misjumping, whether in or out of the system.

Misjump is Bad. It's lethal. Stuck in Jump space for 6 weeks and arriving tanks dry, no power, in a starless void...that's bad. That's what the little blue pills are for. You can luck out, but, boy, is it bad. Not something you mess around with unless you have absolutely no alternative. No one would do it routinely.

Mind, misjump is much safer than Low Passage, but Jump is controllable, LP is not. LP is a desperation I hope someone never finds themselves in.
 
Jumping too close to a gravity well is sometimes a case of "May die vs Will Die"... pursuit by hostile ships, for example.

In most of the cases I'd want to be making a trip in-system of >7d, it's because the majority of the trip is inside the star's jump-shadow.
And,for such worlds, the ability to jump at risk of misjump is unidirectional: outbound only.

Also: CT Misjumps are MUCH harsher than all later editions, and other systems include other factors
MGT2: the engineer's check is 4+ on 2d6+skill +attMod+Astrogator'sEffect-Maint(0 to 2)-fuel(0 or 2); fail by 3 to get classic misjump.
MGT1: fail engineer's check by 8 for classic misjump, or else arrive within "Inner solar system" (1-2 AU?)
MT: classic misjump is super rare. No roll needed if >100 diam, refined fuel, and not overdue for maintenance/repairs. The mishap roll needs to be 11-14... 15+ is destroyed. If it's due only to late maintenance, it's 2d; otherwise 3d for that mishap.
 
1. Manoeuvre drive has an increased acceleration potential of upto nine gravities.

2. If time isn't a factor, and it's more of a case of a regular schedule, you can use sublight drives.

3. I think if the system is fairly empty, and there is something worth jumping to subparsec distance.

4. In terms of capital outlay and operating cost, if you can get by without jumping and a jump drive, you should; you don't have to pay for the jump drive, possibly a specialized engineer, nor the fuel. The margin would be greater than eight days.
 
what you really need to know is what percentage of ships are down on their luck and using unrefined fuel (10% chance misjump for each one), ships of any kind who are past due on one or more annual maintenances, the number of ships with new versus seasoned Astrogators, how many ships leave the system with damaged Jump Drives, and anything else that might apply.

I'm a T20 guy, and there are enough ways to misjump there that it worries me, and it's just a game!

and then there is all the Posts in CotI that give me more options for misjumping. makes me wonder why I want to leave a safe planet. oh yeah, the adventure & travel!
 
what you really need to know is what percentage of ships are down on their luck and using unrefined fuel (10% chance misjump for each one), ships of any kind who are past due on one or more annual maintenances, the number of ships with new versus seasoned Astrogators, how many ships leave the system with damaged Jump Drives, and anything else that might apply.
Pretty much this, yeah.
 
But what would the In-System Traffic controllers expect to see in their system?
I'm not sure that they would see anything. They're limited by light speed delay for any information inbound or outbound. Any ship which misjumps into the system may require emergency services but you won't know until that first message arrives. As for outbound traffic, is the jump event detectable? If so, then is there a difference between a normal jump vs. a misjump?

Personally, I like the idea that there is a detectable difference for observers not on the ship. It could be an adventure in its own right to try an figure out where it might arrive as well as when.
 
As for outbound traffic, is the jump event detectable? If so, then is there a difference between a normal jump vs. a misjump?
Jump flash is detectable (per T5). One can presume that systems with access to high-enough technology and the interest to do so can establish some kind of Very Large Array satellite network with adequate range and sensitivity.

It's not stated whether a misjump "looks" different from outside. If it's one of the CT "off-the-map" types, there's a strong case that it would. The later editions' "right hex but you're in the Oort Cloud" misjumps might not.
 
Hard to say about something that's made up.

There might be something like a clean flash for a smooth transition, but this could be very much like sonar signatures, where an experienced operator can detect if something is off, as each hull, engine and configuration might be distinct and distinctive in their operation.
 
To be fair, most crews won't even recognize that they've misjumped until they arrive at their destination (whenever and wherever that might be). Presuming that an outside observer might be able to deduce that a ship has misjumped from their flash signature is probably taking presumption too far.

Controlled jumps last 1 week.
Misjumps can last from 1 week to 6 weeks. Being "stuck" in jumpspace for longer than 1 week is a big clue that you've misjumped ... but you aren't going to know that (as a crew) until you fail to exit jumpspace after 1 week.

Another way to think of this would be that jump flashes when entering jump space all look essentially the same to an outside observer ... whether you're jumping 1 parsec, jumping 6 parsecs or misjumping 36 parsecs. The jump flash recorded by an outside observer is not going to contain "navigation signature info" such that you can look at the jump flash and deduce "oh, that starship just jumped 2 parsecs coreward" because of the "shape" and brightness of the flash.

In other words, jump flashes don't work like elevator buttons (read the ones lit up to know where the elevator car is going next).
 
Misjumps can last from 1 week to 6 weeks.
Story is that the crew knows how long a jump will be as soon as they enter jump, they just can't tell before hand.

So, in theory, for a "long" misjump, they should know immediately that they've been waylaid.
In other words, jump flashes don't work like elevator buttons (read the ones lit up to know where the elevator car is going next).
It's been noted elsewhere that you can't tell to where a ship is jumping to by observing it.
 
It's been noted elsewhere that you can't tell to where a ship is jumping to by observing it.
Well, energy output, divided by hull volume, plus direction of the prow.

Should tell you the destination hex.

T5 basically lets you see size (or rather, flash intensity is proportional to ship size code) but not energy expenditure.

I don't see anything in the rules about ship orientation making a difference (and there generally isn't a pilot skill task roll for Jump). The Jump Drive History wiki entry has something about the first Jump Drives being non-steerable, needing to sort of be kicked away from a gravity well; shortly thereafter, slight improvements allowed aiming them (discovered because the prototypes went the wrong way) so if your sensors have high enough resolution to figure out which way the ship is pointing, maybe you can get direction too.

Doesn't explain how XBoats can Jump to arbitrarily chosen destinations though.
 
Well, energy output, divided by hull volume, plus direction of the prow.

Should tell you the destination hex.
I was part of discussion about whether you could do that and the result we decided on was that yes you could theoretically do it but you had to be very close like S1, S2, or S3 (so zero to roughly 5Km) in Traveller5 terms and remember that jump flash is Size (usually Size-7 for ACS) +4 when outbound so that's gonna be pretty bright that close so you'll need to take that into account. Most of the actual information comes just before Jump when the bubble is forming or the grid is charging and of course it's easier to do with a grid since you can watch it as it charges to catch the pattern.
 
Misjumps inbound to the system will be rare events.
Misjumps outbound from the system would be dependent upon fuel quality (starport specified above indicates that refined fuel is available),

Why so? I guess the same factors will apply to inbound and outbound jumps...

To be fair, most crews won't even recognize that they've misjumped until they arrive at their destination (whenever and wherever that might be).

According MT:SOM, misjumps use to produce nausea on crewmembers, so they're likely to recognize it.

Even if not, a jump lasting more than a week (so 5 on 6 misjumps) will alert the crew before they reach destination...
 
Thrust-vectoring the Jump Drive exhaust?
Jump drives are not "rockets" that action/reaction thrust you across interstellar distances. (n)

At best, they are small children handed a present to rip open ... which tears the fabric of space/time and the starship "falls through the hole" into a higher dimensional "space" (jumpspace) that they emerge from about a week later at a distance from where they fell in.

If it helps, think of them as "reality drain" drives that suck your ship from place to place, rather than as "rockets" that shove your ship from place to place ... because once you jump, it's all "downhill" from there until you "hit bottom" and get tossed back out into normal space/time.
 
ISTR jump lines in T5, that is, a jump is always a straight line to the destination. Objects in normal space can disrupt the jump line and precipitate a ship out of jump space even after it has jumped. The jump line can also indicate direction, and combined with the jump flash signature also provide a good likelihood of determining the jumping ship’s destination.

I can’t provide the references at the moment.
 
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