Hey all!

I've recently come across something that has me stumped. In the campaign I'm running, I had my players exit hyperspace (in Y-Wing and Jedi Starfighter) at Long Range from their contact-ship (YT-2400), which was under attack by pirates.

As they exited hyperspace, I set all of the player speeds to be "1", while the pirates and YT, which had been dueling for a few rounds, at their max speeds.

They players went to charge in to the rescue, but quickly stumbled over why the Accelerate maneuver is a separate maneuver from Fly (or at least why they are both Pilot Only - they would have to take 2 system strain in order to perform both in the same round)

They were confused as to why, if they're trying to reach the YT ship, the Accelerate Maneuver wouldn't ALSO reduce the range band. If they're moving faster, wouldn't they also be moving closer?

Any help would be appreciated!

It has to do with how piloting is represented in this system. It's not a matter of physical movement so much as a representation of the pilot dividing his attention between piloting (as in "not crashing") the craft and doing whatever else he is doing (what the players are actually spending maneuvers and actions on). In this case moving in a way that will get you closer or farther away relative to another object in space requires the pilots attention, and accelerating requires the pilots attention.

It's that "relative" thing that's got you and your players confused. See to account for the action of a space combat situation the system assumes that everything is always moving about. Now, if you're not also making an effort to move TOWARD something (represented by the maneuver fly/drive) then you're just moving about, at best keeping pace with the other object.

Next time you start the players that far away from an objective that also moves, run it as a chase instead of normal movement. That should work more in the way your players expect as "moving toward the objective" and "other stuff the pilot can do" are two separate rolls and functions. Should make a little more sense in the players heads. Once you've gotten to close range you can switch to normal movement rules, assuming there's even any more moving to be done..