First off, Wild Die to Angel because Ivan once again touches on the core "cavemen vs. spacemen" theme. And a Wild Die to Davis because Punkey hit on Swims-in-Black's core motivation. I just couldn't award it at the time because I didn't want to give too much away.
You are maybe a few million miles from the Gate... so, REALLY really close. Maybe 3-4 times the distance between the Earth and the moon.
So close that if you were going to stop, you'd have to get into the crashers and fire the cruise engines full power to stop in time, and you'd have to be running for those couches within say, the next 3 minutes.
Making a "false ship" on sensors I believe is what Dieter is saying and Gatac is worried that they'll just use a telescope to determine which signature is the real ship.
Yes, they can use telescopes and laser rangefinders to aim weapons. The distances are such that you would need to lead your target slightly even with a laser, so it's not an instant kill. Part of my assumptions for space combat in this game is that:
1. Computers HELP, but as in all good space opera, the characters are the ones who contribute the bulk of the work.
2. Intuition plays a bigger role in targeting than you think. When you have a ship launch 8 identical decoys, all moving erratically with several miles between them, you have to use your best guess when you fire. If you're close enough to see them, it gets easier. ECM/ECCM plays a big part in Imperial battle.
Hiding your ship is difficult in this situation because they already know where you are and where you are intending to go. Plus at this point Akamu might be coasting but it's still several hundred degrees hotter than everything around it. Luckily, heat can be spoofed or decoyed.
Convincing Swims is a big part of any of these plans working. I was assuming someone would be persuading the hairy bastard prior to any other planning. But you have to convince him in the next 3 minutes else he'll be stopping the ship. E has a good argument, but remember that he's not human. He may not have the instinctual care for your planet, so you gotta put it in his terms. Give him reasons why he shouldn't just open the bay doors and space you all and be done with it.
Let's see.... Punkey asks about dialing the Gate while in-flight. Arketta or any of the crew could explain it to you, but it's called "threading the needle":
1. You go full-burn towards a Gate, which, let me remind you, is only 500 feet wide.
2. You transmit your code timed to open the portal split-seconds before you pass through.
3. You pass through the portal going too fast for any point-defense batteries to track you.
4. You abort the portal split-seconds after you get through so they can't simply pursue you.
There's no redial function on a Gate. The only way they can figure out where you went is if the Gate-station or any pursuers took video of the starfield through the other side. They can match that with known configurations - basically a fingerprint - and determine where you went, but that takes time.
There's danger, of course. You could mis-time your transmission and end up passing through the Gate BEFORE it activates, which means you are still under fire and pursued. You could miss the Gate completely. You could HIT the Gate, which would kill you all. You could mis-time the abort code and still be pursued. You could be hit by point defense.
