Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

Many new High Frontier players see the cards for the solar sails and dismiss them as not suiting their purposes. The thrust is low, low enough that the sail will not propel a heavier rocket, and the solar feature means that beyond Mars solar sails will be unable to operate. Since most of the real estate on the board is beyond Mars many players look at the solar sail and pass it over for something more powerful. This is a shame, because used properly the solar sail is one of the most effective thrusters in the game. Hopefully this article will show you how you can use a solar sail more effectively. Part 1: Tricks of the Trade There are a variety of 'tricks' to using the solar sail, and once you master them you will find that the solar sail can be a very powerful tool in developing the solar system. While the advanced (black) solar sails are better everything you want to do can be done with the basic (white) sails, and the material below assumes that you are using them. three is a high priority. However, it is certainly possible to create a solar mission that has a mass of more than four, though this limits your options somewhat, and you still need to keep your rocket mass below eight at all costs. Note though that the ESA privelige of adding +1 to your thrust is a very big deal to the solar sailor. For a player using the ESA privelige, solar sail rockets with a mass of 5-7 function like anyone else's sail rockets of mass 1-4, and they could mount a mission with a solar rocket of mass 15 and still have a thrust of one. An ESA solar sail rocket with a mass of four or less gets +2 to its thrust and this allows you to do even more remarkable things. Whatever you decide to do, you need to plan your mission based on what mass your rocket will have and you can do the most when this mass is low.

Trick #2 - Disposability The second thing tou need to understand about your solar sail is that it is a disposable thruster. Whether you want to aerobrake and let Trick #1 - Mass the sail burn up in the atmosphere, or jettison the Firstly, you need to understand the need to sail once you reach the asteroid belt, you must keep the mass of your rocket low. The 'magic' understand that there are almost no circumstances mass number is four; a rocket with a mass of four where the solar sail will return to low Earth orbit. (and no fuel) is the heaviest rocket in the probe But that's okay! In fact, it was your plan all category, and rockets in that category get a +1 along. Boosting a new sail to LEO only costs you bonus to their thrust. It may not sound like a lot one water token, and using it will save you a lot but every point counts and sometimes that one more than that in fuel. The solar sail mission point of thrust is what makes your mission work. typically involves shipping one component to its The second magic mass number is seven - any destination, decomissioning the sail, and then rocket with a mass of more than seven gets a -1 boosting it again to deliver the second component. penalty to their thrust, so a basic solar sail rocket This might take longer than just making one with a mass of more than seven cannot leave LEO. mission but it also means that you don't need to Since the ideal mass of the solar sail rocket have the cash to boost everything all at once. is four or less, and the solar sail has one point of When you send your robonaut out to the asteroid mass on its own, you generally want the solar sail belt, you don't need to have even bought your to carry components with a mass of three or less. refinery yet! You can get it later. This will necessitate making two trips to your So when you plan your mission, don't destination, one to deliver the robonaut and the worry about the return trip. Your goal is to get the other to deliver the refinery. If you are using the components of a factory out to their destination, solar sail then buying a refinery with a mass of and the solar sail doesn't need to come home.

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

Trick #3 - Sunward Ho! The thing that many people miss about the solar sail is how big a bonus it is to get a bonus of two to your thrust while within the orbit of Mercury. There may not be a lot down there, but you don't need to stay there; those two burns can get you a long way. This is especially the case if you examine the board closely. You will note that there are two spots on the board in the Mercury zone that have lines that pass outward through the Venus zone and into the Earth zone without passing through any burns. These spots are the ones below the SolVenus L3 and L4 points respectively. Using these spots allows you to get back into the Earth zone where you started with two extra burns to spare, and you can get to a lot of places this way. I'll show you how in the next section. The plan is to position your solar sail rocket in a prime spot in the Mercury zone, and then in one turn speed to your destination. Finally, increasing your thrust to four means that your solar sail rocket can make direct landings on sites with a size of three or less instead of only size one. This is a pretty big deal because while the size one sites are not worth a whole lot (unless you are good at rolling ones) a site with a size of three has some decent potential, especially if you have brought a buggy robonaut. In cases where your chosen site is too large for the solar sail to perform a direct landing, you will drop your payload into an outpost which will eventually include a thruster that can perform a landing on an adjacent or nearby site. Bear in mind that some of these routes do use the Slingshot and Moon Boost rules from 8.3 A and B respectively, and include the expanded board. I use these rules even in a basic game - they are simple enough to teach and make sense to anyone who knows even a little about space travel. For the record anyone who wants can click this link to look at my house rules for Basic HF. http://www.boardgamegeek.com/article/8155442# 8155442 Here is a diagram of the inner solar system with my regular starting points.

A represents the point below the Sol-Venus L3 point. B represents the point below the SolVenus L4 point. Both these spots are useful because they have paths that lead into the Earth zone wothout costing any burns. The Sol-Venus L5 point isn't nearly as useful because there's a burn leading out to it (though you can do the Mercury flyby) and the one line out that you can use doesn't get you to too many places. Part 2 - Suggested Routes C represents a starting point for a mission If you're still having a hard time picturing to Ceres that uses a special trick. It is only one how you are going to make your solar sail mission space away from B but using that burn before you work, I've prepared a variety of route maps for you make your big launch the the outer system makes a big difference. to show you how you can get almost anywhere D is the "Rabbithole," the Sol-Mercury L3 within the orbit of Jupiter or sometimes even further. All the major asteroid groups are covered point. It can be used for many destinations that as well as the Jupiter Trojans and some of Jupiter's would also use the A starting point, but such a flight path costs one extra burn. However, it has moons as well. the advantage of taking one less turn to get to.

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

E and F are spots that can be used to initiate a Mercury Flyby. Most of the B routes use a Mercury flyby but E and F are just as good to start these from. However, if you don't want to Telegraph your intention to do a flyby B is the better starting place, and they can all be reached in one move from LEO. After writing this it occurred to me that you might not want to use D because you have to pass a radiation belt to get there and it's better to wait until your modified thrust is increased by the solar effect. If that is the case you could use G or H instead. G is the immediately obvious one but H is actually superior because you could also do a Mercury flyby from the same point. All these routes assume you are using a basic solar sail in a rocket with a mass of four or less, so when in the Mercury zone your modified thrust will be four. The number appearing in the circles on the route is the number of remaining burns the rocket has when arriving at that point on the board. Note: Diagrams for the routes are at the end of the article. Route A2: Jupiter Flyby

This route can get you to the Hygiea family of asteroids (though Hygiea itself is too big for a direct landing) or you can make a Jupiter slingshot. This really illustrates the power of the Jupiter slingshot because this can really get you places. You can make it all the way out to the Trojan camp Jupiter Trojan asteroids (and can land on any of them) or to Comet Nejumin I or to Okyrhoe. You can also set yourself up for a Saturn mission (though you can't actually make it to Saturn) by dropping off payloads on the route in to the Saturn system until you have enough there to make a complete rocket. You could also set yourself up on Comet Schwassman Wachmann I, which makes a decent refueling stop on the way to Saturn, and at size 2 it is pretty big for a D site (but is still landable). If you wanted to go for a Callisto mission, you could stop your sail at the burn that leads to the Hygiea family. Once you have assembled enough parts for a conventional rocket there, you send it to the Jupiter flyby and have it pass through Route A1: Lutetia - Elara - Hertha the double aerobrake that leads to the Sol-Jupiter L1 point. You have four free burns to play with at This route uses the straight line leading out this point (one of which you just spent) which are of the Sol-Mars L3 point as a "bouncing" spot. enough to get you to Callisto without spending any This line is useful because it has lots of spots fuel. where a turn can be executed cheaply. This route leads to both Hertha and Lutetia, which are both Route A3: Mars Needs Sails! great starting spots if you want to go after Metallic sites. Elara is the largest of the Jovian Himalia If you want to get a solar sail to Mars this Moonlets that you can land on and makes a good is the best way to do it. You can get your solar sail refueling point if you plan on exploring Jupiter's all the way to the polar insert if you want, though moons. landing there is tricky. Most people will use the Note that all these sites can be reached with aerobrake - let's face it, the sail is not coming one burn to spare. This means that you could use home anyway. The fact that you can get your sail the Rabbithole (or points G or H) as a starting to Mars with two burns to spare means that you space and save yourself a turn, or you could send a can use the Rabbithole instead (at the cost of one mass 7 rocket out there and still have enough extra burn) and you could have a mass 7 rocket at burns to get there (though landing on sites the same time. becomes more difficult). This route also shows a number of other minor destinations; namely Nyx, Nereus, Olijato, and the Koronis Family "sweet spot" where you

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

could fire a ISRU 0 laser robonaut and prospect all ten sites in one go. There is another route that gets you to the Koronis Family with more burns to spare, but that one requires a slingshot (see Route C, below). Also note that if you continued to follow the green line you would reach the Jupiter flyby and could reach all the same destinations as in route A2 in the same number of burns. Route B1: The Flora Family This route gets you to the Flora family, which is a good spot if you are going for an S space venture. Flora is too big to land on directly, though. It also puts you in raygun range of the Kleopatra family, though you don't have enough burns to make the Hohmann Pivot and enter a burn, unless the ESA gives you a hand. If they do you could actually land on Kleopatra if you wanted. Finally the route can take you all the way out to Comet Wild 2, though it doesn't have that much to recommend it. Route B3: To Greece Via Earth The beauty of the Mercury-Venus slingshot is that it can be followed up by other slingshots. The first one is the Earth+Moon route. This one isn't great because you have to spend two burns on a Hohmann pivot in order to gain the three burns the Earth+Moon flyby gives you, but that is enough to get you out to the Greek Camp of the Jupiter Trojans, and you can land on all of them except Hector and Achilles (which you could reach with a push from the ESA). Route B4: The Martian Way Heading for the Mars slingshot gets you a free burn and doesn't cost you anything extra, so this slingshot is ultimately just as powerful as the Earth-Moon run. It also follows a line that gets you to Psyche or the Vesta Family without having to brave the hazard of the Karin cluster. Route B5: "The King"

Jupiter is the King of planets, and combined with the Mercury-Venus slingshot the Route B2: The Mercury-Venus Slingshot Jupiter slingshot can really get you places. It gets you to the same spots as the A2 route but you have The one-two punch combo of the Mercury- one extra burn to spare. This is a big deal because Venus slingshot has enough power to get you into it gets you to a few places on the board that are orbit around Davida; no mean feat considering that difficult to access. It can get you into the Kleopatra it takes a Hohmann Pivot and a burn to get there. family (no other route gives you enough burns to The Karin Cluster point is really useful for this do it), or the Greek Camp Trojans. It sets up the because it provides you with a free turn, though at same Saturn mission launch points but with one the cost of a hazard space. Davida doesn't have a burn to spare, which means that with an ESA lot going for it though; Ceres is a much better C "push" you could make the Saturn Flyby (though site. this destroys your sail). This route can also get you to Psyche or It also gives you access to Jupiter's Vesta orbit, but there are routes to reach those that Galilean moons - you can reach Europa and are less dangerous. Ganymede, and are one burn away from Callisto. In the expanded game the Venus slingshot Io is also one burn away, but it's a hazard so you can only be reached during the Blue sector, so the are in raygun range. use of this route (and all the subsequent ones) have to be timed carefully.

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

Route C: C is for Ceres The C starting space is useful because it sets up a route that does the Mercury-Venus flyby in reverse order, hitting Venus first. Moving on to the C space from the B starting space spends an extra turn but saves you a burn next turn, and you need it if you want to make it to the Ceres family. It also gets you to the Koronis Family with lots of burns to spare. I like this one because it gets you to Minerva, which is is the sweetheart of the Gefion family. You can do a direct landing there, and it has lots of water. If you fail to prospect the site, you can use Minerva to refuel until you have enough fuel to take off and land on Ceres via lander. Part #3 - Conclusion All in all, a solar sail-powered rocket can get almost anywhere on the board. The Saturn region is the exception, but even Saturn is made accessible by dropping off payloads nearby and starting your mission from there. And don't even get me started on the Black sides of the sails. Gaining one extra thrust and losing one mass is great news for the solar sailor. And in the advanced game, the Mag Sail is absolutely unstoppable - you can do a Mercury-Venus-EarthMoon-Jupiter flyby route that upon leaving the magnetic field leaves you with sixteen remaining burns, which puts the whole Saturn system at your feet and can get you well on the way to Uranus or Neptune if you are using the expanded poster map. I hope these suggestions have fired your imagination regarding the use of solar sails and I hope you give them a try! Good Sailing, Peet Smith

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

Route A1: Lutetia - Elara Hertha

Route A2: Jupiter Flyby

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

Route A3: Mars Needs Sails!

Route B1: The Flora Family

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

Route B2: The Mercury-Venus Slingshot

Route B3: To Greece Via Earth

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

Route B4: The Martian Way

Route B5: "The King"

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.

Route C: C is for Ceres

Peet's Guide to Sailing the Solar System.