Another post by me wondering about something in UW.
Wild Jumps for instance.
To me they seem to have two purposes:
1. You’re at Star A, heading to the jump point for Star B. For whatever reason, you need to jump long before you’re close enough to do so safely. You punch in the coords and push the button and pray that you jump to Star B successfully.
2. You’re at Star A, being chased by a Faction. If you jump to Star B, they will be hot on your heels. However, if you Wild Jump to Star C, you may be able to shake them. (And there’s no jump point to Star C from Star A.)
So for 1, it’s sort of jumping your motor bike from the back of a plane and trying to land on a road. You’re not in a good position to do it, but with luck, you can slide into the slot and make the jump.
2, however, you’re forging a new connection to a currently unlinked star.
So I’d imagine getting a bonus, just +1, for reason 1, as there is already a jump point, you’re just in a poor position to use it.
Or if you don’t like that, a -1 for the reason 2, as there isn’t a stable jump point for you to piggy back on.
Thoughts?
Just to throw my two creds in, a jump point in more of a (safe) preset. In both 1 and 2 your’re ignoring the presets and making your Nav roll. Of course, if you’re under fire, one might be more difficult than the other.
That would a Facing Adversity roll just before you make that wild jump. Would a failure give you a penalty on making that Wild Jump?
Conversely, it sounds like there should be a special move called: Plot Jump Point:
10+ You determine a region where there may be an uncharted jump plot. Making 3 successful Wild Jumps in this region will determine it’s exact location. Each Wild Jump will be at +1.
7-9 You’re close to a viable region. Make at least 5 successful Wild Jumps in the general area before using this skill again looking for the jump point.
6- Jump Point? What is jump point? Make at least 10 successful Wild Jumps from this system again before using this skill again.
Seems like a neat variation, though I worry it may be a bit crunchy for something that will only happen once a session, if that. However, if you’re running a “Beyond The Edge of Known Space”-style campaign, that would be a very cool rules expansion, since Wild Jumps would be common.
My personal take on Wild Jumps: You can theoretically Jump from anywhere to anywhere. Humanity has the maths and computers to make the calculations. But. It rarely works out. There are rules about Jump Space that humanity doesn’t understand. Those hidden rules have a major effect the destination, duration and safety of a Jump. It is known that gravity is just one of the forces that has an impact, but even then the actual effect is impossible to predict.
This is why a Wild Jump is always an unmodified roll. A mere ~17% of all Wild Jumps are actually successful, and no amount of real-space finagling seems to alter those odds.
Now, if a Wild Jump is a success, then there are likely commercial, military and explorer factions who would absolutely love to get the coordinates of a potentially safe lane.
I wouldn’t use 3, 5, and 10. PbtA games have a long and sexy tradition of six-piece clocks and six boxes in a row. I’d model the “discover a new jump point” plotting move off of that. It’s a project you can endeavor to accomplish. If you do the right things, assess the right info, respond to the MC’s moves, you can fill in boxes and find the jump point.
If you’ve got the right workspaces, that’s great!
If you don’t, well, you’ll probably have to successfully do some wild jumps, you poor bastards… Why are you charting Jump Space without a Navigation workspace?!?
In one of my current games, Jump Gates exist as physical gates the ship needs to use to get from point A to B. Any other jump can make it to point B, but it’s a wild jump. Of course, you need access to the jump gate and have to pay the right faction for the codes, unless you have access to some of the junkgates the space pirates have started making, or hacked transponders that override the access codes…