We know, that to travel to another star systems, we need to use FTL for traveling. But if you need to travel to another planet in the same star system, what type of travel should be used? Is it worth using fuel costing engines like warp drive (because it uses "exotic matter", a lot of it)?
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3$\begingroup$ Can you spend some more words in defining your context? Worth has to be measured with respect to a context: a horse was a valid transportation few centuries ago, nowadays and in certain countries no more. $\endgroup$– L.Dutch ♦Commented Jul 25, 2018 at 9:28
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1$\begingroup$ "We know, that to travel to another star systems, we need to use FTL for traveling." Not necessarily. Even that depends on context; for example, a very long-lived species able to achieve a velocity that is a very large fraction of c living in a densely populated part of the galaxy might not care about travel time to nearby star systems, while if you change any of those assumptions, travel time may become a very relevant consideration. $\endgroup$– userCommented Jul 25, 2018 at 9:30
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3$\begingroup$ @Egidajus Commenting clarifications only works slightly, you really need to edit the question for clarity if you want good answers that take new data into account. $\endgroup$– AshCommented Jul 25, 2018 at 10:44
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1$\begingroup$ You question boils down to "what fictional propulsion system should I use compared to the fictional FTL drives but I'm providing no details to compare them". That's asking WB to write your story and do your basic research for you. $\endgroup$– StephenG - Help UkraineCommented Jul 25, 2018 at 12:14
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1$\begingroup$ You hitchhike. Don't forget to bring your towel. $\endgroup$– The Square-Cube LawCommented Jul 25, 2018 at 13:17
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2 Answers
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An energy efficient method would be to use solar sailing or to convert solar energy to one of the different electro propulsion engines. All technologies are either used or existant, but not efficient enough yet and depend on the so far most reliable resource you can "obtain" in a solar system, which is a sun. Those methods also have the potencial to reach high velocity over a relatively small amount of time.
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1$\begingroup$ Welcome to Worldbuilding, Instinct, and nice answer! If you have a moment, please take the tour and visit the help center to learn more about the site. You may also find Worldbuilding Meta and The Sandbox (both of which require 5 rep to post on) useful. Here is a meta post on the culture and style of Worldbuilding.SE, just to help you understand our scope and methods, and how we do things here. Have fun! $\endgroup$ Commented Jul 25, 2018 at 11:25
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Is (comparatively) short-range teleportation like the transporters in Star Trek an option? Perhaps there could be wormhole-like gates similar to those in Stargate.
If we’re looking for “super fast” instead of instantaneous, I am imagining something along the lines of a railgun or maglev launcher that propels vehicles based on a trajectory calculated to put them in some sort of deceleration field or other object that uses magnetics to influence trajectory or momentum in the orbit of the destination planet. I imagine the lack of friction makes maintaining momentum easy to the point of not burning fuel once sufficiently launched.
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1$\begingroup$ Railguns or mass drivers do not make good space transportation systems. The accelerations would kill humans and the maximum velocity attained only about 4 km/s. Other forms of propulsion would be better. Say, ion or plasma drives. If they possess FTL, then there should be better forms of sublight propulsion. $\endgroup$ Commented Jul 25, 2018 at 12:35