[NickM]

Guys:

I remember listening to the designers of Blue Planet (was it 'War in Heaven?) talking about their game; one of the points they made was how they felt it was foolish for a warship to just 'sit there & be destroyed' & as such programed the game so enemy warships would jump out when the damage starts to build up.
So here's the question: Do capital ships need to have a 'jump point' to escape or do they have the ability to create their own (like the ships in B-5 do)? Or is it a matter of, if they want to escape they 'burn' to the nearest jump point & go?

[Black Wolf]

There are two kinds of subspace jumps. Short range, intra-system jumps can happen anywhere within a star system, but they can only go within the star system - they're linked to the gravity well if the star.

Intersystem jumps, I.e. Going from star system to star system, requires a subspace node, which is like one end of a tunnel. Jumping here can take you to a specific other node around a specific other star, but only that other node.

Post the end of FS1, the size of the ship involved doesn't really matter, since fighters on up can perform intersystem jumps, but the fighter scale drives remain more expensive to produce, so not every single fighter has them. At least an intrasystem drive is basically ubiquitous on fighters though.

[NickM]

OK so there has to be a jump point in order to 'jump'; OK I guess then the point the creators were making was that they programed the AI for the cap ships to try & escape if things get too hot rather than just "allow" themselves to be destroyed.