Can starships determine where other starships are heading? via "Scan the Enemy" or "Slice Enemy's System" to hack into the system and retrieve coordinates if its been entered into the system? or any other means?

I suppose you could allow a hack the navi computer check if you like. Although based on the movies it seems like that isn't really an option.

scans or recordings of ships jumping are shown as being able to determine a rough direction but most sources indicate that's all unless someone is transmitting destination coordinates to the ships. (Say a base that is evacuating to the transports and other ships departing) and those transmissions are intercepted.

Still if you want to allow it go for it IMO though it should not be easy.

I would ask the players to roll computer to analyse the sensor log (if the hyperspace jump was in range) and then roll astrogation to determine where the ship is heading. The second roll should be a pretty difficult and probably can, at best, only give multiple possible locations.

I go with a Daunting: Astrogation to determine the exact course of the jumping ship (provided it's within sensor range, of course). If that succeeds, then it's a Knowledge (Outer Rim) or (Core Worlds), the difficulty of which depends on how many relevant planets lie along that trajectory.

For my bounty hunting game, I intend to go with opposed Astrogation checks. A good Astrogator can plot a course that is hard to predict and/or follow.

The 'last known trajectory' should create a range of potential destinations with say an Astrogation Hard check.

If your players want to confuse the enemy... go a light year on one trajectory on a trade route, then stop, and head to where you want to go.

I think the only way would be a direct undetected hack into their navi computer of the fleeing ship. The sheer number of planets along even a hyperspace lane would make any other information pointless imo.

Slight tangent here: is it obvious what a vessel's sheild rating in each defence zone, or do you need to scan them each round?

(Yes, I am comfortable with my use of the word "slight". )

Slight tangent here: is it obvious what a vessel's sheild rating in each defence zone, or do you need to scan them each round?

(Yes, I am comfortable with my use of the word "slight". )

Tough call.... every round seems rightish... Shields typically won't be angled a whole lot during combat... maybe once before someone GtA and again after....

Remember that when a ship leaves port, they are "required" to designate the next planet they are travelling to in order to determine openings along the best jump points as well as a way to send out rescue missions if the ship is ever reported lost.

While it's not accurate as many smugglers leave false information behind when they leave, it can help with at least getting a general idea of the direction they are heading, even if they are jumping elsewhere.

Additionally, you have the following approaches and options:

1) I can understand the idea of slicing the console, but I can't see that being done remotely as it hasn't really been done in canon. Most of the time someone's sliced a navicomputer, they're sitting on the ship and accessing it for recent jumps and schedules.

If I were to ever allow it, I'd make it a Daunting roll at the very least, possibly throw in some Red Dice as well just for safe measure.

2) If the group thought ahead, they could plant something onto the ship; not a basic tracer, but perhaps something that sends out a message of whatever is being put into the Navicomputer. Things like this have happened before; in particular, a member of Wraith Squadron ordered her R2 unit to tamper with an astrogation check and send those new coordinates to her allies.

Not quite ideal, but the theory is still sound.

3) As others mentioned, mapping out the trajectory. I haven';t written any rules on it since it hasn't come up yet, but I would basically allow the players to make an Astrogation roll to determine which planets are along the route (perhaps Average, but Difficult would work). Someone could also gauge the speed they are travelling at when hitting lightspeed to help determine the location of the final stop, but that is also pretty difficult.

It's possible, but in canon, there's been a large amount of guesswork involved to find the EXACT location of where the stop will be from trajectories.

Usually, they look at the planets along that line and make guesses where they would have gone based on the quarry. If they know the quarry well enough to know a few favorite hideaways, they can guess where they would need to stop to make a clean jump to that final location.

In the end, it's really up to how you want to handle it, but that's a few of the notes I have from my experiences. I hope they help!

I'd say you could make a guess at where a ship is headed based on their exit vector, but that would only give you a heading not a destination or distance. And if the ship changes course for some reason mid-trip, there is no way to know.

Being in hyperspace is pretty safe outside the Core Worlds.

Well safe from pursuit anyway. It's not as safe about running into uncharted stuff I suppose...

The 'last known trajectory' should create a range of potential destinations

This actually has some canon backing.

In ESB, in the scene where Han manages to elude a pursuing Star Destroyer by clinging to the back of the command section, the commander's conclusion is the ship jumped to hyperspace, and tells his staff to immediately begin calculating possible destinations based on the ship's last known trajectory.

But in the end, it's ultimately guess work, as for all the pursuer knows the ship could have just made a short jump to a nearby system, then plotted a course in an entirely different direction, or might even have been crazy enough to make a "blind jump" to a destination that's not on the conventional astrogation charts.

I'd say a Hard difficulty Astrogation check would reveal likely destinations, but once the pursued ship is in hyperspace, it's very much akin to finding a needle in a haystack the size of your average SUV.

But in the end, it's ultimately guess work, as for all the pursuer knows the ship could have just made a short jump to a nearby system, then plotted a course in an entirely different direction, or might even have been crazy enough to make a "blind jump" to a destination that's not on the conventional astrogation charts.

Heck, he would only really need to jump out of sensor range, I'd reckon that would be slightly less risky than a blind jump to another system.

I suppose you could allow a hack the navi computer check if you like. Although based on the movies it seems like that isn't really an option.

How would you have a way in to hack? Star Wars doesn't presume that everything is wirelessly linked. t mean, an open comm channel would work, but aside from that?

I suppose you could allow a hack the navi computer check if you like. Although based on the movies it seems like that isn't really an option.

How would you have a way in to hack? Star Wars doesn't presume that everything is wirelessly linked. t mean, an open comm channel would work, but aside from that?

I never said a good chance or much room for success......

Plus for it to even be worth bothering the target ship has to not suspect anything and not be concerned with masking it's destination. If they're trying to be sly without even necessarily being aware of anyone tracking them they're going to change course after departure. If I was in the business of smuggling I would always drop out of hyperspace shortly after system departure, re-compute my course, then jump again, as a matter of routine and insuring I wasn't being tailed or tracked.

Not a criticism of your idea. I'm playing a slicer in a game that's about to start and "how can I find a vector to access things in order to slice them" is a thing I've been thinking about a lot.

No offense taken. Not even something I would really even allow probably but I could see some might allow it. Given the size of the galaxy and even allowing for the nature of hyperspace lanes, in my game without some kind of knowledge from the ship itself there just wouldn't be anyway to have any sort of reasonable idea where to look. Vader dispersed a whole fleet to check as many likely routes as possible for the Falcon in Empire and in the end didn't find them, Fett tracked them and reported they're destination.

3) As others mentioned, mapping out the trajectory. I haven';t written any rules on it since it hasn't come up yet, but I would basically allow the players to make an Astrogation roll to determine which planets are along the route (perhaps Average, but Difficult would work). Someone could also gauge the speed they are travelling at when hitting lightspeed to help determine the location of the final stop, but that is also pretty difficult.

It's possible, but in canon, there's been a large amount of guesswork involved to find the EXACT location of where the stop will be from trajectories.

Usually, they look at the planets along that line and make guesses where they would have gone based on the quarry. If they know the quarry well enough to know a few favorite hideaways, they can guess where they would need to stop to make a clean jump to that final location.

In the end, it's really up to how you want to handle it, but that's a few of the notes I have from my experiences. I hope they help!

Sublight speed would have nothing to do with how far you go in hyperspace. You don't have to have a "running start" to get further away.

Finding a trajectory and gaining any kind of concrete knowledge, especially along a main hyperspace route, would be next to useless too, as you have no idea how far along the route they go. If anything, I would say jumping to a remote world NOT on a hyperspace route would be somewhat better, but still very very hard to do, and that is taking a direct route there. Like mentioned before, if I was a pilot trying to hide from someone who might be trying to track my "last known trajectory", I would make a bunch of smaller jumps to confuse any pursuers before setting in for my final jump.

If a player was trying to track someone and hacked the opponent's navicomputer using their computer skills, I would allow them to gain the coordinates but only if the computer had received them already and was in the process of calculating the jump.

3) As others mentioned, mapping out the trajectory. I haven';t written any rules on it since it hasn't come up yet, but I would basically allow the players to make an Astrogation roll to determine which planets are along the route (perhaps Average, but Difficult would work). Someone could also gauge the speed they are travelling at when hitting lightspeed to help determine the location of the final stop, but that is also pretty difficult.

It's possible, but in canon, there's been a large amount of guesswork involved to find the EXACT location of where the stop will be from trajectories.

Usually, they look at the planets along that line and make guesses where they would have gone based on the quarry. If they know the quarry well enough to know a few favorite hideaways, they can guess where they would need to stop to make a clean jump to that final location.

In the end, it's really up to how you want to handle it, but that's a few of the notes I have from my experiences. I hope they help!

Sublight speed would have nothing to do with how far you go in hyperspace. You don't have to have a "running start" to get further away.

Finding a trajectory and gaining any kind of concrete knowledge, especially along a main hyperspace route, would be next to useless too, as you have no idea how far along the route they go. If anything, I would say jumping to a remote world NOT on a hyperspace route would be somewhat better, but still very very hard to do, and that is taking a direct route there. Like mentioned before, if I was a pilot trying to hide from someone who might be trying to track my "last known trajectory", I would make a bunch of smaller jumps to confuse any pursuers before setting in for my final jump.

If a player was trying to track someone and hacked the opponent's navicomputer using their computer skills, I would allow them to gain the coordinates but only if the computer had received them already and was in the process of calculating the jump.

Just a point I'd like to make: in the X-Wing novels, they made comments about getting up to speed before jumping to hyperspace and needing that speed to arrive. Whether or not it is part of mainstay canon is up for debate, of course, but it is still a fact to consider.

As for your tactic, that is where that guesswork I mentioned comes into play. . .

Thanks for everyones help. I'm still debating about how its going to be done, but these suggestions are more than helpful!

3) As others mentioned, mapping out the trajectory. I haven';t written any rules on it since it hasn't come up yet, but I would basically allow the players to make an Astrogation roll to determine which planets are along the route (perhaps Average, but Difficult would work). Someone could also gauge the speed they are travelling at when hitting lightspeed to help determine the location of the final stop, but that is also pretty difficult.

It's possible, but in canon, there's been a large amount of guesswork involved to find the EXACT location of where the stop will be from trajectories.

Usually, they look at the planets along that line and make guesses where they would have gone based on the quarry. If they know the quarry well enough to know a few favorite hideaways, they can guess where they would need to stop to make a clean jump to that final location.

In the end, it's really up to how you want to handle it, but that's a few of the notes I have from my experiences. I hope they help!

Sublight speed would have nothing to do with how far you go in hyperspace. You don't have to have a "running start" to get further away.

Finding a trajectory and gaining any kind of concrete knowledge, especially along a main hyperspace route, would be next to useless too, as you have no idea how far along the route they go. If anything, I would say jumping to a remote world NOT on a hyperspace route would be somewhat better, but still very very hard to do, and that is taking a direct route there. Like mentioned before, if I was a pilot trying to hide from someone who might be trying to track my "last known trajectory", I would make a bunch of smaller jumps to confuse any pursuers before setting in for my final jump.

If a player was trying to track someone and hacked the opponent's navicomputer using their computer skills, I would allow them to gain the coordinates but only if the computer had received them already and was in the process of calculating the jump.

Just a point I'd like to make: in the X-Wing novels, they made comments about getting up to speed before jumping to hyperspace and needing that speed to arrive. Whether or not it is part of mainstay canon is up for debate, of course, but it is still a fact to consider.

As for your tactic, that is where that guesswork I mentioned comes into play. . .

Oh I havent read those books so I'd never heard it before. Thanks for citing the source, I'll have to check that out.

In fact it is a common Rebel tactic to do a short jump in a false lead direction then jump to their actual destination. They never do a straight jump to their base/rendezvous point. Because of the potential to possibly guess where they are going.

The Star Destroyer following the Tantive IV followed it through hyperspace by correctly guessing their destination based on their last known trajectory. And likely because Vader figured Tatooine when it was one of the options.

In fact it is a common Rebel tactic to do a short jump in a false lead direction then jump to their actual destination. They never do a straight jump to their base/rendezvous point. Because of the potential to possibly guess where they are going.

The Star Destroyer following the Tantive IV followed it through hyperspace by correctly guessing their destination based on their last known trajectory. And likely because Vader figured Tatooine when it was one of the options.

In Vader's case, he probably cheated using the Force to foresee where the Tantive IV was going to pop out of hyperspace. Much the same as he likely used the Force to "confirm" that Hoth was the location of the Rebel Base. It's likely not infallible, thus the homing beacon aboard the Falcon to track the ship to Yavin 4, and with as much riding on the line for that stunt as there was (he and Tarkin were letting a known traitor escape Imperial incarceration, and the Emperor's been shown to not be the forgiving sort), it was probably better to hedge their bets.

3) As others mentioned, mapping out the trajectory. I haven';t written any rules on it since it hasn't come up yet, but I would basically allow the players to make an Astrogation roll to determine which planets are along the route (perhaps Average, but Difficult would work). Someone could also gauge the speed they are travelling at when hitting lightspeed to help determine the location of the final stop, but that is also pretty difficult.

It's possible, but in canon, there's been a large amount of guesswork involved to find the EXACT location of where the stop will be from trajectories.

Usually, they look at the planets along that line and make guesses where they would have gone based on the quarry. If they know the quarry well enough to know a few favorite hideaways, they can guess where they would need to stop to make a clean jump to that final location.

In the end, it's really up to how you want to handle it, but that's a few of the notes I have from my experiences. I hope they help!

Sublight speed would have nothing to do with how far you go in hyperspace. You don't have to have a "running start" to get further away.

Finding a trajectory and gaining any kind of concrete knowledge, especially along a main hyperspace route, would be next to useless too, as you have no idea how far along the route they go. If anything, I would say jumping to a remote world NOT on a hyperspace route would be somewhat better, but still very very hard to do, and that is taking a direct route there. Like mentioned before, if I was a pilot trying to hide from someone who might be trying to track my "last known trajectory", I would make a bunch of smaller jumps to confuse any pursuers before setting in for my final jump.

If a player was trying to track someone and hacked the opponent's navicomputer using their computer skills, I would allow them to gain the coordinates but only if the computer had received them already and was in the process of calculating the jump.

Just a point I'd like to make: in the X-Wing novels, they made comments about getting up to speed before jumping to hyperspace and needing that speed to arrive. Whether or not it is part of mainstay canon is up for debate, of course, but it is still a fact to consider.

As for your tactic, that is where that guesswork I mentioned comes into play. . .

Oh I havent read those books so I'd never heard it before. Thanks for citing the source, I'll have to check that out.

Not a problem. I may have misread it (last time I read one was back in November), but if memory serves correctly it came up during the Wraith Squadron arc.

It may have been just a requirement to have a certain speed in realspace that carries over into hyperspace, but then it makes me wonder why you need realspace speed if it doesn't impact distance and calculations. . .