So I’ve recently been writing a search-the-galaxy sort of fic for Star Wars, and realized I needed very desperately needed to know about one very important thing:
Specifically, hyperspace travel times.
To help me I found this lovely resource; Black Cat’s Star Wars Hyperspace Travel Times Page. This page contains pretty much everything I think you need to know about hyperspace travel times, at least to make your fic vaguely realistic. It’s a fairly short read, but I’ll summarize the version I use here.
The table above shows base travel times between regions. The original page describes how these travel times are affected by two factors; the speed of the hyperdrive and the location of the destination.
Speed of Hyperdrive basically means if your ship is more high tech/high quality/newer, it might have a faster hyperdrive. The base travel time assumes a x1 multiplier, so a faster hyperdrive might be only a x0.5 multiplier (halving the travel time, I believe), while if your ship is older/cheaper etc., it might have a slower hyperdrive, e.g. a x2 where the time would therefore be doubled. (I’ll freely admit I don’t use this variation much so I may be misunderstanding it slightly).
Location of destination is what the top map is for, and basically why I’m making this post instead of just linking you to the page. If your start point is in the same region (e.g. Mid Rim to Mid Rim) or in the same quadrant as the destination, the travel time is halved from the base travel time. The original page describes the quadrants as being delineated by “two perpendicular lines cut through the centre of the Deep Core" , but references a book which is unnamed and has no map. So, I made my own, which is the top picture. It is by no means official, but I figure there can’t be too many ways to cut two lines through the centre of the Deep Core, so I’m probably not far wrong. (HERE is a much bigger version of the top map).
Edit: The table should be read by going down to the region your start point is in, then going along to the destination region. You may notice some of the numbers are slightly different; this is to account for possible added distance going toward the Core, because you could be travelling from the very edge of, say, the Outer Rim. The table is a table of averages, so knocking off or adding on a couple of hours here or there to account for more or less distance could help keep things more realistic.
Generally I tend to stick to the Base Travel Times table (pictured), rather than the Specific Travel Times table which is also on the original page, because they have discrepancies and the former covers a much wider scope, so is easier to use. The original page also describes a calculation you can do yourself to figure out travel times, but I’ll freely admit I’m too lazy for that xD
The source the original page cites is “various pages on Wookieepedia”, so I guess it can’t be too far wrong.
Of course, if you want, feel free to just ignore hyperspace travel times. I can think of one memorable instance when TCW does, and that’s only one xD
(P.S. The observant perusing the larger version of the top map might notice one marker/planet name that looks different. That’s the one I added in, and is therefore completely unofficial. First person to spot it and drop me an ask can have…something xD)
