In my next session, I am planning to task the players with boarding a cargo ship in order to retrieve a rebel agent and some key cargo.

Since they don't have access to a Start Destroyer and cannot "just" pull-in the cargo ship in their landing bay, how would you handle this?

A few questions related to this topic:

- If you don't disable the hyperdrive, what stops the cargo ship from just running away in hyperspace?

- Is it really supposed to take only 1 turn to make the astrogation calculation? The skill description states that a triumph can reduce the time to a minimum...but if it already takes only 1 turn this seems pointless.

- Can you jump in hyperspace if you are under the effect of a tractor beam?

At this point my boarding procedure looks like this:

1) Disable the hyperdrive

2) Disable the engine

3) Maneuver the ship into boarding position

4) Force open the other ship door (or cut a hole!)

5) Board!

I don't want to hand-wave it too much, since this will be setting a precedent on ship boarding that will most probably affect the rest of the campaign.

Your steps seem fine. It's pretty hard to board ships. Most often, pirates will attempt to sabotage a ship that they are planning to board by infiltrating the crew or sneaking aboard while it's still at rest (spaceport, etc.). Also, I'm fairly certain that hyperdrives cannot be used while a ship is held in a tractor beam.

Also, I'm fairly certain that hyperdrives cannot be used while a ship is held in a tractor beam.

I would agree. Luke was pretty green when this happened to the Falcon. But, you would have thought Ben, Han, or Chewie would have thought to yell, "Make a jump!" if this was the easy way to defeat such a beam. Either that or it would have taken way too much time. Either way, same result.

In your sequence you might be able to flop 1 and 2 or remove 1 completely. I'm not sure if RAW mentions it but I've always assumed you needed to be at least moving forward in order to jump to hyperspace. We never see a craft just static in space when it makes the jump.

assuming the ships sublight engines are disabled via combat, sabotage, tractor beam or some other means, you could pull along side it and simply connect to the other ships docking doors, slice via computers or cutting device to open the other ships doors for you.

Some ships use specially designed assault pods that cut thru the other ships hull where they connect for boarding, believe one such ship is mentioned in the Dangerous Covenants book.

A pirate's best friend would be ion cannons and attacking close enough to a gravity well to make a jump to hyperspace impossible (or having false mass-shadow technology).

- Can you jump in hyperspace if you are under the effect of a tractor beam?

Doesn't look like it. The tractor effect says you can't move until you shake the beam loose. I'd be hard pressed to find someone that didn't consider jumping to hyperspace "moving."

- Is it really supposed to take only 1 turn to make the astrogation calculation? The skill description states that a triumph can reduce the time to a minimum...but if it already takes only 1 turn this seems pointless.

They never outright say how long it takes but there are published adventures where it takes 4 turns, if I'm remembering correctly. The GM can pick a number of turns based upon how far/hard the jump is and are you going along established routes or something off the map. I think for play convenience, a lot of GMs rule that while it takes that long for the astrogation computations to work out, the PC only needs to spend one turn plugging in the data and can do other things while the computer crunches the data.

Exactly - judging by what we see in the movies at least, one enters the information, then waits on the computer. It's suggested there are ways/levels of entering data that allow the computer to spit out a 'safe' route faster (advantage) or spit out a route that has less deviation (success).

Most people on the forums seem to run with ~5 round calculation.

Some people have also used the notion of "jump point" where you have to tell the computer what direction/general location you're going to be when you flip the switch, which can lead to a couple more turns of flying to get to that point if you were forced to change directions/drop close to a planet.

Several ways to stop a ship

Dragging an asteroid into a know hyperlane to force the ship to revert, then move around said asteroid to rejump

Ion cannons, ion bombs, ion mines, Ion Missiles.

Finding a flaw in the ship design which allows you to disable the ship with some well placed shots

Sabatoge... via cargo, passenger or treason crew member

Tractors would work... if they are strong enough

The problem with option 3 is it depends on someone in your team knowing the design well enough to know its weaknesses which requires a lot of study and knowledge of what ship you are going after or a very, very high level of knowledge of spacecraft designs in general. It also requires that there be such an exploitable flaw in the design and that the ship's owners or crew haven't corrected the flaw.

Ion cannons are the old pirates standby, of course if you've not got those, you can use the regular ships guns and get some ideas here-

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/99058-take-out-that-starship-component/

The problem with option 3 is it depends on someone in your team knowing the design well enough to know its weaknesses which requires a lot of study and knowledge of what ship you are going after or a very, very high level of knowledge of spacecraft designs in general. It also requires that there be such an exploitable flaw in the design and that the ship's owners or crew haven't corrected the flaw.

Or you just shoot the craft woth turbolasers till its HT is maxed. You risk the cargo, but that'll otherwise do it.

Not a good idea if you want the ship fit to fly when you are done.

There's nothing that says you can't activate the hyperdrive while being held in a tractor beam. However, that would cause the hyperdrive engine to accelerate to one bajillion kilometres per hour while the rest of the ship remained stationary. The result sounds like a Critical Hit with a +149 modifier. But sure, it's totally an option.

For capturing ships intact ion cannons are your go-to weapons. Once the ship exceeds its system strain threshold it's mostly just floating around making pretty blue sparks. Then you just need to come alongside, shoot out a boarding tube or send someone out in spacesuits (unless your airlocks are of compatible designs, in which case you just dock with it) and make a hole in the hull.

When it comes to astrogation there are no solid RAW for calculation times, but I run with a 4-8 rounds base time depending on the route you're taking; if the navigator has the Galaxy Mapper talent this gets cut in half. Then the time taken is reduced by 1 round for each success beyond the first on the Astrogation check. Failure on the Astrogation check adds 1 round per failure. So yes, knocking out the hyperdrive is a good tactic; as the GM you might allow your players to make targeted shots against the hyperdrive, allowing any critical hits (possibly costing an extra Advantage or two to trigger to keep it from getting too OP) to diretly affect the hyperdrive instead of rolling on the table.

Also keep in mind that ships need to be a certain minimum distance from planets and other astronomical bodies before they can jump to hyperspace. Start the ship out at Close range with the planet and tell the players that once it gets to Extreme range (or Long, if that suits you better) it can make the jump.

Unstoppable Force (Hyperspace Drive) + Immovable Object (Tractor Beam) = Ship being ripped in half as the astronomical energies have to go some where. At least that is how I see it.

Safeties would kick on and shut they hyperdrive down - Tractor Beams are a gravity effect - as far as they system knows you're still sitting on a planet. Not to mention it'd screw the hell out of your calculations.

There are also likely pirate groups, particularly closer to the colonies, that might engage in piracy via the sumolian method. Stopping a ship and then holding the shipping company ransom for X million credits to release the ship back on it's way. It beats ending up trying to fence two hundred million lawn chairs.

Dangerous Covenants has an assault boarding tube mod.

The problem with option 3 is it depends on someone in your team knowing the design well enough to know its weaknesses which requires a lot of study and knowledge of what ship you are going after or a very, very high level of knowledge of spacecraft designs in general. It also requires that there be such an exploitable flaw in the design and that the ship's owners or crew haven't corrected the flaw.

All it would take is a hard mechanics check for engineer to see "oh hey! Their maintenance shaft is open! That will lead right to engineering! I'll get my space suit on"

This is a narrative dice system, let the dice and players decide how they get onto the ship

Not a good idea if you want the ship fit to fly when you are done.

OP didn't say anything about flying it away, just that it had cargo and a person needed for recovery.

Besides if it's not a military ship they'll probably surrender after the first crit.

Thanks all for the comments.

In what adventure was the 4 rounds example given?

Also keep in mind that ships need to be a certain minimum distance from planets and other astronomical bodies before they can jump to hyperspace. Start the ship out at Close range with the planet and tell the players that once it gets to Extreme range (or Long, if that suits you better) it can make the jump.

Question: How long does it take for a ship at speed 4 to go from medium to long range?

1 Fly/Drive Maneuver I believe...

Question: How long does it take for a ship at speed 4 to go from medium to long range?

Page 245

It should take 1 ship maneuver

It take TWO (2) maneuvers to go from medium to long...I was reading the individual speed entries and forgot the general statement at the start of the section:

Moving between one range band and the next always takes two maneuvers regardless of speed, with the following exception...

I was starting to think I made mistakes in the way I was running things in the past. Reading only the speed 3-4 and 5-6 entries made me think that without speed 5+ you could not move out of medium range in the time frame of a battle. And that would have changed things a lot!

Thanks all for the comments.

In what adventure was the 4 rounds example given?

I think it was the adventure in the EotE beginner game box.

Thanks all for the comments.

In what adventure was the 4 rounds example given?

Also keep in mind that ships need to be a certain minimum distance from planets and other astronomical bodies before they can jump to hyperspace. Start the ship out at Close range with the planet and tell the players that once it gets to Extreme range (or Long, if that suits you better) it can make the jump.

Question: How long does it take for a ship at speed 4 to go from medium to long range?

It doesn't work like that. It is always recalculated after every range shift so it would never start at medium.