Design: the Falcons, a Legend

Proposed, October 2026. Change by pull request.

The Falcon went into the game as a rare pirate: a dice roll on ordinary pirate encounters, deadly and nameless. Played, she turned out to be a hazard rather than a Legend. She was met too often in lawless space (two or three times an hour in an anarchy), she ended your run in one pass, and she was gone with nothing to remember her by.

A Legend should be rare, named, and personal: someone you hear about before you meet, who remembers you afterwards, and whose story is tied to the galaxy's. This design makes the Falcons that.

It builds on exploration (Legends, the Ninefold trail), the companies (Wexley-Yorozu, clause 214, the Carriers' Mutual), law and travel (the beacon, rescue), the radio and the combat rating. The homage rules in CONTRIBUTING apply throughout.

Principles

• Rare and findable, not random. One Falcon at a time in a galaxy, on her own circuit. You hear where she is before you meet her, and you can go looking, or stay away.
• She takes; she doesn't kill. A Falcon leaves you disabled and drifting, lighter by a cargo, never dead. Losing to her is a story, not a reload.
• She remembers you. Every meeting is kept. She knows your ship, what she took, whether you hurt her, and which side you took on the Ninefold.
• People, not stats (the story rule): each captain has a name, a reason, and a feeling: glad, sad, mad or bad.
• Deterministic from seed and clock. Where each Falcon is comes from the galaxy's seed and the time, the same for every commander, with no server cost. What she thinks of you lives in your commander.
• Modern rules only. Classic never meets her.
• The homage stays ours. The nod is in the name Solo, the shipyard, and a rogue with a code who'd rather out-fly you than kill you. Names, story and ship are original. Nothing from the films: no quoted lines, no smuggling-run in so many parsecs, nothing that copies an on-screen design.

The story

Solo & Sons was a shipyard of five: Iver Solo and his four sons, building fast hulls on contract in the lawless systems. Iver flew with the Carriers' Mutual when it was young. He's the reason for the Mutual's empty chair at every meeting: he answered a call nobody else would, and didn't come back. The Mutual still sets his place.

When the Ninefold colony failed, Wexley-Yorozu chose recovery under clause 214 over relief: 4,000,000 Cr against 31,000,000. Sam Dray's tug Hold Fast answered the call he was told not to, and took 41 people off before the recovery crews arrived. He took them to the Solo yard. The Science Division's report says Dray should be found. It doesn't know where he went.

The sons have hidden the forty-one ever since, and fed them, and kept Wexley-Yorozu from finding the yard. They do it with the ships they built for themselves: the Falcons. (A Falcon is she, as ships are; her captain is a Solo son.)

A commander who flies the Falcons' galaxies in order meets the whole family, and pieces together the yard's story from each.

The Mutual's code. The sons let Carriers' Mutual haulers go. A commander carrying only Mutual cargo is hailed, recognised and waved off ("Give the treasurer our love"). Rob a Mutual hauler yourself and that courtesy ends.

Meeting a Falcon

• One Falcon a galaxy at a time, working a circuit of four to six anarchies and feudal worlds from the seed. She moves on every six hours (real time, from the clock), so every commander hears the same news.
• Word of her: at stations within 15 light years, bar talk ("a Falcon's been seen working Riedquat"); with a comms array, the radio picks up haulers warning each other. On the chart, her current system is marked once you've heard of her.
• Meeting her happens only in her current system: a chance on each arrival (about one in three), higher if you carry Wexley-Yorozu or Hexon cargo, and never more than once a visit. In practice that's a few meetings a week for someone who goes looking, and very rarely for someone who doesn't.
• Her approach: she runs dark, a cold white unknown on the scanner, until the hull read inside 2 km ("Hull read · FALCON"). Then she hails, in her own voice, before she fires. Pay her price (the cargo she wants) and she takes it and goes. Refuse, run, or shoot, and it's a fight.
• The random Falcon roll on pirate encounters (FALCON_CHANCE) goes. Pirates are pirates; the Falcons are the Falcons.
• She comes for the pirate-killers (Mark, October 2026). When the packs in a region have lost about six ships to one commander (the same tally that makes them wary, pacing and pirateLost in main.ts), word reaches her. First the warning beats: in the saloon, someone's asking about a Cobra that's been thinning the packs; on the radio, haulers saying she's changed course. Then, within a visit or two, she comes looking for that commander, outside her circuit, once. Beat her and the region's pirates stay wary for longer; lose and they're back to full strength. Your success is what calls her.

The fight, and losing it

• Her guns, for now. A beam laser on each talon vane, both firing at once on a little gimbal (8°): 55 damage a second between them, at up to 3.2 km. (Built 25 October 2026 as a stopgap; how she fights replaces it.) In test duels (a bot flying a Cobra at a Cobra's turn rate, five fights a laser) a military laser won 3 of 5, a beam 1 of 5, a pulse 1 of 5. Full beam lasers firing together (144 a second) took a Cobra in under two seconds whatever it carried: she only has to take you to a third of your hull, you have to take her to a fifth.
• She fights to disable. Her lasers go for your drives, her missiles (three, never two at you at once, as for every ship) to break your shields. She doesn't fire on a ship that's beaten.
• Beaten: when your hull is down to about a third, she stops. (Built early, 25 October 2026, with her beam lasers: at a third of your hull, by laser, missile or collision, she stops, takes her price (below), hails you and jumps out. The drifting, the beacon tow and the calling card in your Messages are still to come.) Your hyperdrive is knocked out and your speed limited: you're drifting, with life support on.
• She takes her price: company cargo she wants first, then the most valuable goods, up to her hold (10 t). A company contract taken by a Falcon fails without the usual standing loss: the companies know who she is. Your ship, equipment, credits and survey data are left alone.
• Her calling card arrives in your Messages: a line from her, and what she took.
• Then she leaves through witchspace, and you're alone.
• Getting home: fire the emergency beacon. In lawful space the police tow you in; elsewhere a Carriers' Mutual tug comes, for a fee you can always afford (never below the 100 Cr stake). Or, after a couple of minutes, your engineer jury-rigs the drive for slow flight to the nearest station. Never stranded, never destroyed.

How she fights: the ambusher

Mark, 25 October 2026: "The Falcons run dark, they are fast, and having two beam lasers that are fixed would mean they have to point their nose at you."

Everything about her says ambusher, not jouster: she's fast (340 to a Cobra's 280: you can't outrun her), she turns tighter (0.95 to 0.8), she runs dark (you don't know what she is until she's close), and her guns are fixed: she has to point her nose at you to fire.

• Her guns. Two fixed beam lasers, one at each vane tip, firing alternately (Mark's idea): left, right, left. A beam laser firing steadily overheats in about four seconds; two taking turns each fire half as often and take about twenty, so in practice she never stops. That's her edge: not more firepower than you, but firepower she can keep up while yours overheats. Fixed guns are hard to land, so she gets a beam laser's full 90 a second, with real heat, the same rules as yours.

• She comes from behind, out of the dark. Her approach uses running dark to get onto your tail before you've read her hull. Turning a Cobra round takes about four seconds: four seconds of her fire and none of yours.

• She won't joust. In a head-on pass her fixed beams would win every time (in the test duels, 90 a second won all twelve jousts in about 3.5 seconds, even against military lasers), so a head-on pass is the one fight she doesn't offer. Turn to face her and she breaks away, fast and dark again, and comes back round for your tail.

• Your chance is the break. As she breaks she's turning, her guns are off you, and she's crossing your sights. Turning into her and catching her as she breaks beats a bigger laser: a commander with military lasers who sits still is eaten from behind; one who flies well wins with a beam.

• A reason for a rear laser (Mark, 25 October 2026). In 1984 the rear laser was the one most commanders never bought. Against her it's the obvious answer: she spends the fight on your tail, and a rear laser points straight at her. It isn't free: it costs a mount and the money, you switch views mid-fight and lose sight of what's ahead, and it heats like any beam while hers alternate to stay cool. And she answers it:

  • she reads your ship as she comes in dark: carry a rear laser and she won't sit dead astern, but works the rear quarter, from below or off to one side, where a rear laser has to chase her too;
  • a better pilot answers it sooner: a rookie Falcon sits behind you and eats your rear laser; an ace has seen the mount before the first shot;
  • she learns it: beat her with a rear laser, and next time she comes from below (she learns how you beat her).

  It's what a commander who's met her before would fit. With a combat computer flying Tail guard while you work the rear laser, it's a kit; she reads that too (combat computer routines).

• Your heat decides when you commit. Hers barely builds; yours does. Hold a beam on her for four seconds and you're overheated just as she comes round.

• Pilot skill scales this (pilot skill): how quickly she gets behind you, how well she reads your turn, how soon she breaks when you face her, rising with your combat rating. The first pass at pilot skill, an ace who jinked out of your sights, made her no stronger in the duels: a ship can't sidestep, so a dodge means turning, and turning takes her guns off you. She wins by position, not by dodging.

• Tuning. The test bot has to fight her properly, turning to keep her in front rather than only jousting, with a human's reaction time and aim. Measure how often she takes your tail, how long fights last, and whether turning into her beats a bigger laser.

Beating her

• A Falcon can't be destroyed. At about a fifth of her hull she breaks off: she jettisons a can (gems, a fee for your trouble), hails you with something you'll remember, and jumps out with her ECM covering her.

  Built early, 25 October 2026, after Mark's beam lasers took her in a single pass: she breaks off at a fifth of her shields and hull, drops a can of gem-stones, hails you, and jumps out 2.5 seconds later, her ECM taking any missile fired at her. Driving her off pays her bounty, counts as a kill, and adds 2 to your standing with Wexley-Yorozu and Hexon. She's tougher too, as a Legend should be: 320 shields and 230 hull (a beam laser needs about five seconds on her, not two). The rising bounty, her brothers' word on the radio, and her coming back for you arrive with the rest of the redesign.

• Driving her off is worth it:

  • her bounty (2,000 Cr, rising by 500 each time she gets away from anyone in that galaxy, from the clock and seed), paid when you dock;
  • combat rating as a kill of a ship her worth, and a Legend's weight (see combat rating);
  • standing with Wexley-Yorozu and Hexon (+2), and a word from his brothers about you on the radio.

• Not a living. (Mark, October 2026: "would a player with beam or military lasers find it easy to make money fighting Falcon pilots all day long?") Until the circuit is built she's still a random roll on pirate encounters, so for now a Falcon you drove off keeps away from you for a day (falconDrivenOff on the commander), and a meeting in that time pays no bounty. The circuit, the shared bounty and her learning you are the real answer.

• She comes back. A Falcon you drove off stays away from you for a few weeks, then returns wary, or wanting revenge, depending on who she is.

She remembers you

Your commander keeps a small record per captain: meetings, what she took, how often you drove her off, the last time you met. With the Ninefold choice already stored (explore.ninefold), that's enough for her to know you:

• First meeting: a warning and a price.

• Again: she knows your ship by its transponder, and says so.

• You've beaten her before: she's careful, or she comes for you specifically.

• She learns how you beat her (Mark, October 2026: "does she get better weapons or better flying the second time you meet?"). Each time you drive her off, she comes back with one answer to your last win, and her lines say so ("I've been practising, Commander"):

  • you beat her head-on: she won't joust again; she circles and comes in from behind or below;
  • you used missiles: a better ECM, or decoys;
  • you out-turned her: she refits for speed and fights from range, hit and run;
  • you out-ranged her: longer-range beams.

  One change a meeting, kept in her record of you, so after three or four she's a hard fight built for you, and beam lasers win the first meeting but only flying wins the fourth. Each brother starts from his own style too: Bram cold and precise, Kit showing off with close passes, Jory careful at range, Tobin dirty, with more missiles. Nothing new is needed but a few numbers in her record and how her AI picks its approach.

• You published the Ninefold report: Bram lets you keep half. You sold it to the Science Division: she takes everything, and tells you why.

• You delivered for the Mutual, answered distress calls, never robbed a hauler: they're warmer.

A Debt: the night the Falcon needs you

The turning point of a Falcon's story: the Legend who hunted you, caught, and you the only one who hears.

• When: only after you've met that captain at least three times, so he's someone to you by then. It can't come early, and it can't be bought.
• The call: with a working comms array, you pick up a Mayday on a Carriers' Mutual channel nobody has used since Iver Solo's day. It's the Falcon. Wexley-Yorozu has been hunting the yard, and the Co-operative Marshals have caught her: a Bastion has come through its rift, her drive is damaged, and Lancers are closing.
• Three ways it can go:
  1. Save her. Keep the Lancers off her for 60 to 90 seconds while her drive comes back, then she's gone into witchspace. Firing on the Marshals is a serious crime (a Marshals warrant), unless you do it running dark, unidentified: then they're chasing a ship with no name. Skill and the transponder, not a menu choice.
  2. Turn her in. Hold her for the Marshals: stay close and keep her from running until they board. Wexley-Yorozu pays very well (several times her bounty) and your standing with them and Hexon soars. Every Solo son in the eight galaxies learns your name, and none of them ever lets you go again.
  3. Fly away. She gets out alone, barely, and remembers that you didn't come.
• Saving her, for good:
  • She never attacks you again. Met in the lanes, her captain hails you by name, and warmly.
  • She protects you. Jumped by pirates anywhere on her circuit, there's a chance she drops out of witchspace, dark, and the hull read says FALCON · she's on your side. She fights for you and leaves without a word, at most once a day, so it stays a moment.
  • Never against the law. She won't fight police or Marshals for you, and won't help if you started it. She has a code, and your crimes aren't hers.
  • His brothers hear. Kit races you for fun instead of robbing you, Jory leaves your cargo alone, and even Tobin is civil, mostly.
  • The yard is open to you. You're trusted with where the forty-one are, which opens the yard trail, and whether you ever betray them is the last choice in her story.
• What it's built from: the Marshals and their rifts, running dark, the radio and the array, and the Falcon's memory of you. Nothing new but the story.

Where it leads (later)

• The yard. A trail across the Falcons' galaxies leads to the Solo yard and the forty-one, Sam Dray among them. Bring them something (Mira's yellow flowers, seed stock that works) and the Falcons spare you for good. Sell the yard's position to Wexley-Yorozu instead, and the Science Division comes in force, and every Falcon in the eight galaxies knows your name.
• Hunting her for the companies: Wexley-Yorozu and Hexon post special assignments to find her.
• In the shared galaxy: the chart records who drove her off last, a season at a time.
• Flying with them: a pirate career that starts with an introduction to a Solo son, and ends, for those the Solos come to trust, with a Falcon of your own (ships, classes and makers).

Building it in stages

Numbers (to balance)

Open questions

• Should a Falcon ever be destroyable, perhaps only at the end of the yard trail, by choice?
• Four captains for eight galaxies, or one each, with four more sons' stories to write (a community contribution)?
• What does a Falcon do to a commander who is themselves a pirate?
• In shared space, can two commanders fight one Falcon together?

Think something here should change? Say so on the ideas board, where others can vote it up, or email hello@witchspace.org.uk. If you code: this page is docs/design/legends-the-falcon.md on GitHub, open to pull requests.