Interstellar Travel

"So let me get this straight, you saw The Red Dreamer Slip-Drive from Assalon II, in the middle of system, after only a few seconds of calibration? And all that to outrun the local Cannae patrol? That ship must be lightyears in the doldrums, and its entire crew dead. And you're telling me this as if I'm supposed to be impressed? Do you know hot many hot-shot smugglers have tried the same thing?"

"Oh no, the Red Dreamer's crew survived,  in fact they've returned to Assalon, with a new paint-coat and ID Plate of course."

"Bullshit, Captain Nisk would have contacted me by now"

"He is contacting you. I'm his second-in-command, he's waiting for you aboard The Blue 'Seer"

Faster Than Light Itself
The FTL drives are what connects the most backwater agricultural colony to the mightiest capital world, and one would never be able to survive without the other. Freed from the nightmare of sub-light tomb ships, ferrying frozen colonists a thousand years into the void, the modern peoples of Rasalum rely on FTL travel to sustain their interstellar way of life.

There are three known types of FTL drives in the modern age,

Punch-Drive

The Punch Drive is the name of the crudest but most reliable form of FTL travel. By taking the ship to the liminal point between real-space and sub-space, the drive ploughs at previously unattainable speed through the stars. Less prone to deviation and the buffeting effects of gravity wells than slip-drives, a good punch-drive is able to decelerate further into a solar system and requires less absolute precision than other drives.

Punch drives are the most common form of FTL drive, used by everything from courier and cargo-haulers to dreadnoughts. An older model might be slower, but it will get the job done, while newer models have greater speeds and precision. There is even talk of some punch drives that can jump from outside a Lagrange Point, but if these exist they are kept a state secret.

Slip-Drive

A more elegant, if more complicated drive, the slip-drive transforms the ship into a diving cormorant, submersing it in subspace temporarily and attaining great speed as a result. The ship emerges at its destination much faster than a Punch-Drive, but is at greater risk of distortions by gravity wells and other phenomenon. As a result, most slip-drives are used from Lagrange Points at the edge of the solar system, which can leave the ships vulnerable as they slow-boat to their destination within. Slip-drives also require longer calibration times within Lagrange Points, as the possibility of miscalculation, and winding up lightyears from the nearest stellar body, is much higher.

Hole-Drive

To most, the Hole-Drive is a rumour or a legend. Tearing space-time to bring its ship almost immediately from origin to destination, the Hole-Drive would revolutionize FTL travel, but there are many reasons such technology has never left the conceptual labs of blacksite research installations, or the musings of over-eager astrophysicist students. In backwater bars across the galaxy there is talk of those who use Hole-drives, and those who experiment with the technology, becoming stranded in the lightless void known as the In-Between

Lagrange Points
Calibrating the exact route to a solar system via sub-space is an enormous feat of mathematics and conceptual physics on its own. To do this with the FTL drives available to most ships, which are at the mercy of distortions caused by gravity wells, exo-planets, and other phenomenon, is approaching a miracle. To assist in this daunting task, the vast majority of jumps are made from within Lagrange points - points of space within a solar system where there is relativistic stability, usually between two orbital bodies, and minimal effort needed to keep a spacecraft within a Liossajous Curve, steady enough to calibrate an interstellar route.

Many Lagrange points are not useful for FTL travel, either cluttered with Trojan bodies that have accrued there over the deep time of the universe, or too far within a solar system to allow easy calibration out of said system. Along major trade routes and arteries of interstellar commerce, crucial Lagrange Points are guarded at all costs.

Scopes
A Scope installation sits at the heart of a lagrange point. Essentially a giant computer, it assists nearby ships in their calculations when jumping to different stars. Systems with Scopes allow ships to jump further, and sometimes faster, than they would otherwise, replacing the laborious star-hopping to cross the great expanse with a few highly calculated jumps.

Intra-solar Travel
Although the speeds ships travel between stars may seem immense, all ships are hampered by the fact their FTL systems begin to dangerously malfunction in the proximity of a suitably sized gravity well, such as a Star. Thus, while a passenger can reasonably expect to travel between stars within a few hours, the act of leaving a planetary or orbital port and arriving at another takes considerably longer, as the ship must rely on much slower propulsion speeds while within the origin and destination solar systems.