Tow

A ship with 2 engines or more can tow another ship, including enemy ships. Towing occurs in order of ship ID#.

Tow Conflicts

When two or more ships are towing the same ship, the ship with the lower ID# will tow first. Lower ID# ships will also win a tow conflict when two ships are trying to tow each other (though the higher ID# ship can still break tow). Low ID# ships are valuable to have because of this advantage in towing.

Breaking Tow

To avoid being towed by an enemy ship, you can try breaking tow. To break tow, four conditions have to be met (the "4 fingers"):

• Your ship must have 25 kt of fuel or more.
• The ship must have 2 engines or more.
• The ship must set a "long waypoint", which is the square of your warp speed (e.g. warp 9 = 81 ly). For non-gravitonic ships, it means the farther than you could travel in one turn at your selected warp speed. (For gravitonic ships at warp 9, it is enough to travel more than 81 ly).
• You must have a warp speed at least equal to the ship trying to tow you.

The type of engine never matters for breaking tow. For ships with gravitonic engines, speed is measured by how many lightyears you travel in a single turn rather than warp number. So for example, at warp 7, a gravitonic ship will travel 98 lightyears, so this is faster than a normal ship at warp 9. This also means that you cannot break tow against a gravitonic ship with a warp speed that is high enough.

Examples of Tow Conflict

• If 2 ships tow each other, normally the one with lower ID# will win. But if the higher ID# ship sets a long waypoint to break the tow, it will avoid being towed itself, but also still tow the lower ID# ship. The lower ID# ship will be towed unless it sets a long waypoint and breaks tow as well.

Notes on towing

An attempt to establish a Tow Lock doesn't require fuel. This means:

• A foreign ship could transfer fuel to your ship and successfully Tow despite starting the Turn without fuel.
• An alchemy ship (such as the Aries) could start the turn with no fuel, lock tow, perform alchemy, and then tow a ship successfully.

Command Ships

Command ships move earlier in Host order, and can avoid being towed by moving away.

External Links

Planets Magazine Tow

PlanetsPedia Tow

Donovans Tow

See Also

Ship Movement
Ship Intercept