Faster Than Light Propulsion
From SPID
Conventional Faster Than Light Propulsion is the primary interstellar mode of travel for small vessels and technologically primitive space faring races. It is the first mode of interstellar travel developed by all known species in the universe, due to it's relatively low energy input requirement and technological ease of implementation.
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FTL Mechanics
FTL mechanics work on the basic principle of warped spacetime. An electrical current is applied to an FTL Field Coil, which generates a local disruption in spacetime. This disruption causes the space "ahead" of the field to become compressed relative to that field, and the space "behind" it to expand. Due to spacetime's need to be in balance, this propels the vessel and the spacetime inside the field through the surrounding spacetime, causing the vessel to appear to be propelled forward at superluminous speeds relative to a motionless observer outside the field. However, because the vessel is moved forward along with a localized packet of spacetime and is motionless inside that packet, causality is preserved.
Measurement of Velocity
Faster Than Light speeds are determined based on the ratio between energy output and the "Motionless Frame of Reference Velocity", or MFRV. These units are called Magnitude.
The energy mechanics of FTL propulsion are quite peculiar. At the low end, relatively little energy is required to jump from one Magnitude to the next. However, as one reaches the high end of the scale, closer to 1 Billion c, increasingly more and more energy is required to increase Magnitude.
As you near 1 Billion c, further increases in energy bring you less and less close to 1 Billion. While Magnitude 10 theoretically exists, infinite energy would be required to reach it.
The highest FTL Magnitude reached to date is Magnitude 6.8.
FTL Factors:
where c = Speed Of Light
Magnitude 1: 1 c
Magnitude 2: 10 c
Magnitude 3: 100 c
Magnitude 4: 1,000 c
Magnitude 5: 10,000 c
Magnitude 6: 100,000 c
Magnitude 7: 1,000,000 c
Magnitude 8: 10,000,000 c
Magnitude 9: 100,000,000 c
Magnitude 10: nearing 1,000,000,000 c
Efficiency
FTL Propulsion requires a relatively low power input to achieve a desired result, but since the system requires a constant energy stream to maintain that result, it is not very energy efficient over distance. Interspacial Conduit technology moves objects farther for less energy. The upside, is that FTL Propulsion is relatively simple to implement compared to Interspacial Conduit technology.
