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Just for a comparison:
the pressurized space of the International Space Station is: 837 m3 (29,600 cu ft)
the habitable space is 350 m³ (12360 cu ft)
crew 6 persons.
As that include the space used by the station equipment, the habitable area created by this spells isn't so little.
That said there is a easy solution: Bring with you a 10 level witch with the icy tomb hex. She will provide instant cryogenesis for the crew members in exchange for a few hp of damage.
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What's bubble time?
I thought that was fairly self-evident. It's time... within a bubble.
Hence, "bubble time".
To be more clear, by RAW, there's nothing I could see at my brief glance at the time to indicate that you couldn't go into the Magnificent Mansion (which is actually pretty swank), but by RAI I'm guessing* you're supposed to actually stay in the actual bubble.
Also, the space is positively huge for Halflings and Gnomes. :)
(That's a joke.)
Let's break it down, shall we?
Star Walker (Su)
You can transform your power to enable you to travel great distances. As a standard action, you can expend two uses of mythic power to surround yourself with a bubble of air enclosed by a thin iridescent layer of force. While this bubble offers no protection from attacks, you can propel yourself through the air at great speed . As long as you concentrate, you gain a fly speed of 240 feet per round. If you cease concentrating, the bubble stops and then sinks 30 feet per round until it reaches the ground and collapses; you can expend one use of mythic power before the bubble collapses to regain control.In the void of outer space, the bubble's speed is much faster. Although exact travel times vary, a trip within a single solar system takes 3d20 hours, while a trip beyond takes 3d20 days (or more, at the GM's discretion). Ceasing concentration while in the void of outer space has no effect on the bubble-it continues traveling in the previously stated direction at the same speed until an outside force slows it down. The air in the sphere is constantly refreshed and kept at a constant temperature, protecting occupants from the void of space, but not necessarily the harsh climates of other planets or planes.
All well and good there I use this and I can fly between solar systems with an average time of 3d20+ days (My characters immortal and doesn't need to eat, sleep, breath or drink so as long as I bring along plenty of reading material I'm fine till I reach my destination where I better have protective spells ready before entering a planet). However then we get to the enhanced ability . . .
By expending two additional uses of mythic power, you can increase the size of the bubble to a 10-foot-radius sphere and you can bring along up to 11 Medium creatures within the bubble. Other creatures can enter or exit the bubble freely.
Star Walker (Su)
You can transform your power to enable you to travel great distances. As a standard action, you can expend two uses of mythic power to surround yourself with a bubble of air enclosed by a thin iridescent layer of force.
Okay, although this is just fluff and basic gist, let's look at what we have. It's purpose is to surround you with "a bubble of air enclosed by a thin iridescent layer of force" for the purpose of "traveling great distances". Got it.
While this bubble offers no protection from attacks, you can propel yourself through the air at great speed . As long as you concentrate, you gain a fly speed of 240 feet per round. If you cease concentrating, the bubble stops and then sinks 30 feet per round until it reaches the ground and collapses; you can expend one use of mythic power before the bubble collapses to regain control.
Okay, so this bubble offers no protection from attacks. Attacks are specific attempts to harm you. Same thing with invisibility. If it can break invisibility (by being considered an attack), this bubble doesn't protect from it.
In the void of outer space, the bubble's speed is much faster. Although exact travel times vary, a trip within a single solar system takes 3d20 hours, while a trip beyond takes 3d20 days (or more, at the GM's discretion). Ceasing concentration while in the void of outer space has no effect on the bubble-it continues traveling in the previously stated direction at the same speed until an outside force slows it down. The air in the sphere is constantly refreshed and kept at a constant temperature, protecting occupants from the void of space, but not necessarily the harsh climates of other planets or planes.
It specifies, in this context, that it doesn't protect against planets or planes. This is rule text, not fluff text. Thus, we can surmise, that stars, not being planets, are not part of this statement. If you find me a sentence that notes, "Stars are treated as planets for all purposes" that isn't related to a specific instance (i.e. the spell you cited) then we'll have to rethink this. But in this case, this is a specific noted exception (planets and planes) to a general rule (the air pressure and temperature is kept constant in the Void of space).
In any event, the bubble travels, until you're no longer in the void of outer space - i.e., until you hit an atmosphere. Then the bubble begins behaving according to the local conditions of the atmosphere.
In any event, it's worth noting, this is really friggin' fast. Like, mind-blowingly fast. It's interesting to note that the text mostly presumes that you're not going to encounter anything that would impede your trip - thus they're not addressed. This makes sense - space is stupendously vast, and the likelihood of running into another traveler is so remote as to be mind-boggling and effectively only pure GM fiat would cause such an unlikely event to take place. (Do bear in mind: stories that require large numbers of people to utilize space travel in a confined zone are pretty explicitly GM fiat).
By expending two additional uses of mythic power, you can increase the size of the bubble to a 10-foot-radius sphere and you can bring along up to 11 Medium creatures within the bubble. Other creatures can enter or exit the bubble freely.
Fairly straight forward on the most basic aspect. It creates a 10-ft radius sphere (that is, 20-ft diameter) and can hold up to (but not necessitating the presence of) 11 Medium creatures. Cool.
One question I have, is if "other creatures" includes the 11, or excludes the 11 (and yourself). It can be read either way, really.
So, let's answer your questions as best as I can, in order.
1) Protects you from the void of deep space including the freezing cold (air is at a constant temperature and regularly refreshed) temperatures there but from the freezing cold temperature once you enter a planetry atmosphere.
Yes, this is exactly what happens.
If this is problematic with you, try thinking of it this way: as the personal power of the Mythic character running into the personal space (and thus the personal "power") of the planet. The planet, being the greater essence, "wins" the contest of personalities. By entering its atmosphere, you are entering a contract to be submissive to its will. You don't have to be aware of this contract to become party to it. Asmodeus was around to help make the universe, after all, and that's the sort of thing he thrives on.
2) Similarly it generates a limiltless supply of air in space but once you hit that planet you'll be choking on toxic gas.
Yes. See above for one idea of why that might work.
3) What about something like our moon do you pass a certain point and suddenly not get protected from the vacumn of deep space because your in planetry orbit?
Nope. Not unless you hit atmosphere, in which case you descend (toward that surface) at a rate of 30 ft per round until you reach the ground, at which point, it collapses.
4) It pretty much states with the air thing you need to breathe but it doesn't make any mention of eating, drinking or biological wastes. Sure there are ways around that (ring of sustenance) but why give you the ability to take people on a 90 day trip to another star system and not address these concerns? If it only generates air in deep space why not have a sustenance field, or all your passengers undergo a stasis effect unless they pass a DCX will save or you deliberately wake them? Its one sentence and they've addressed one need but not the rest. Do you know how much food and water you'd need to drag along just to feed yourself on that 90+ day trip (You don't know beforehand how long it'll take and its not like you can stop off at "Bobs Gas and Go" halfway between Sol and Golarion)? Again yes there are ways around it but my POINT is that it addresses one concern breathing and not other equally important ones eating, drinking, exercise, boredom (there are plenty of creatures in various modules who have gone insane from prolonged periods of confined spaces).
These are all neat ideas, but, frankly, it's irrelevant to the ability. Those other things aren't actually necessary. You can take some rations with you, eat them, eliminate the waste, and keep going. It's gross, but that's entirely viable, thus it doesn't matter to this ability at all.
5) How freely do they enter when you take off flying do they just float and have a personal fly speed within the bubbles confines or do you need to tie them to you with a rope so they don't get left behind?
Uh, the fact that it states that you can bring them along within the bubble seems to make that clear - they are in the bubble in the same manner you are.
Given that it makes no mention of gravity, at all, we're left with the baseline - that is, there is gravity when you're within a planet's bounds, but it ceases once you're in the void. Thus, they stand (or sit) until you exit the atmosphere/heavy gravitational pull, at which point they begin floating.
Given that it states you can take them with you, and that there is no mention of gravity, flotation, and the like, the bubble must be non-permeable to the people riding it (unless they're attacking - their attacks go through the bubble harmlessly). As to why this is so, the actual answer comes down to, "it's magic - that's the way it functions", which isn't terribly satisfying, but is the same answer we'd have to come to if we were looking at more basic abilities like fireball which also stop making sense at a certain granularity as well.
6) They can enter and exit freely, can I? Does the bubble collapse if I pop out to check an interesting moon or collapse.
It specifically notes that "other creatures" can, but does not have the same wording for you. Thus, from my reading, the intent is pretty clear that you cannot.
7) Is it one bubble and if I create another any existing one dissolves.
<super-minor typo corrected for my OCD and those red squiggly lines>
This is nowhere in the text. There would be little purpose in doing so, however, because that would mean that you've ceased concentrating on the first or the second; thus you'd descend at a rate of 30 ft (since you can't leave the bubble) and then the bubble you're not concentrating on pops, but the one you are concentrating on functions normally... at least it seems that way. It's possible that the new bubble "overrides" the old, as it does indicate that a bubble can be affected ("an outside force slows it down" is the exact wording).
Thus, I'd say the GM is right to interpret it either way.
In any event, for most cases, doing so would not be advantageous - it's basically just throwing away mythic power. Only if the GM would allow the new bubble to overcome the old, and only in specific circumstances, would this be a useful trait. Otherwise it's irrelevant.
8) If I stop in the middle of deep space does the bubble remain or does it collapse as I've reached my "destination"?
Uh, this is pretty explicitly addressed within the text itself. It continues forward until it hits an atmosphere, at which point it behaves like it does in any atmosphere - it matches the local conditions, drops at 30 feet per round until it gets to ground, then dissolves.
1) If I flyby a star does it count as a planet and negate whatever protections being in deep space apparently grants the bubble.
Nope. No atmosphere.
2) If it doesn't am I protected against the massive outpouring of radiation and light, just the heat or not even that (It says the air is at a constant temperature nothing about the critter just hit by a solar flare).
<super-minor typo corrected for my OCD and those red squiggly lines>
If it's an attack, it's not blocked by the bubble.
If it's not an attack, ... meh? It specifies that other creatures can enter/exit at will, and it specifies that the interior is kept at a constant temperature and air pressure.
Getting hit by a solar flare means you're doing it wrong, and thus a GM must interpret why you did this so poorly - or the GM put you in that situation in the first place.
3) Related to that what about light and dark? Can I start into the heart of a star without being instantly blinded, do I get darkvision in the vast voids where there's no light as its being sucked into a massive black hole?
You don't go instantly blind by staring into the heart of a star. Go outside and try it right now. See? Not blind. (Just don't do that for long, because then you will go blind by retina damage.) Of course you don't get darkvision. You have to provide that on your own. That only makes sense. The likelihood of being in an area where no starlight can reach you is small, and you'll only be there for a short time anyway - 3d20 days is not very long to travel across (or between!) galaxies.
And, "Getting," [stuck in a black hole], "means you're doing it wrong, and thus a GM must interpret why you did this so poorly - or the GM put you in that situation in the first place."
4) What if I hit a micrometeorite while travelling between stars as the bubble offers no protection against that.
<super-minor typo corrected for my OCD and those red squiggly lines>
Ahem:
"If it's an attack, it's not blocked by the bubble.
If it's not an attack, ... meh? It specifies that other creatures can enter/exit at will, and it specifies that the interior is kept at a constant temperature and air pressure."
And
"Getting hit by," [a micrometeor], "means you're doing it wrong, and thus a GM must interpret why you did this so poorly - or the GM put you in that situation in the first place."
5) On a personal note I'd prefer a bit less random magic travel speed where you can go to pluto in 3 hours but a trip to the moon can take 90 from the same starting point on earth.
Nice preference; I understand it, however it doesn't cover the deepest of deep space. The randomness is just a manner of handling all those situations combined.
6) A bit of clarification about GM discretion would be nice as in when do they start taking on extra day's? A trip across the spiral arm, galaxy to another galaxy?
... that's pretty explicitly the GM discretion thing going on. Thus "or more, at the GM's discretion". In other words, if you travel farther than something the GM considers reasonable (which you should clarify with the GM before hand) you're pretty explicitly traveling at the speed of Plot. If the GM wants to randomize it more (to make it more fair or something, I guess) an off-the-cuff house-rule is to add a 3d20 to the travel time per "extreme distance" beyond the first.
Clearly 3d20 is meant for intra-galactic but extra-solar travel. Thus, I'd suggest (if you want to add more time), adding an extra 3d20 (or even an extra 6d20, if you feel it's better) for any galaxy other than your own.
In any event, it seems to me that this is basically supposed to be a kind of "Peter Pan" ability - "Second star to the right and straight on 'til morning!" indeed.
Hope that helps!
* PLEASE NOTE: I am guessing. That is, I believe the intent is such, but I can't know the intent is such. I'm not claiming psychic revelation here, just comparative analysis - i.e. looking at the Shantak I posted about earlier.
I really don't see what the issue is with food and water. One reasonably competent 6th level cleric can keep half a dozen people fed and watered indefinitely; for a mythic mage powerful enough to travel between solar systems at supra-light speeds, arranging for these sorts of necessities would be utterly trivial.
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A whole part of being able to fly around the stars is stopping off to examine that blue green giant and if its going to flare its not going to care if your in the path of it hence the question same with flying through an asteroid belt on route to a distant destination in the solar system your going far too fast to try and steer around it if a small rock's in your way.
The first spacecraft to traverse the asteroid belt was Pioneer 10, which entered the region on July 16, 1972. At the time there was some concern that the debris in the belt would pose a hazard to the spacecraft, but it has since been safely traversed by 11 Earth-based craft without incident. Pioneer 11, Voyagers 1 and 2 and Ulysses passed through the belt without imaging any asteroids. Galileo imaged the asteroid 951 Gaspra in 1991 and 243 Ida in 1993, NEAR imaged 253 Mathilde in 1997, Cassini imaged 2685 Masursky in 2000, Stardust imaged 5535 Annefrank in 2002, New Horizons imaged 132524 APL in 2006, Rosetta imaged 2867 Šteins in 2008, and Dawn orbited Vesta between July 2011 and September 2012.[80] Due to the low density of materials within the belt, the odds of a probe running into an asteroid are now estimated at less than one in a billion.[81]
Chance of a random encounter with a small asteroid are really slim. Essentially they became relevant only if your GM want them to be relevant.
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At Tacticslion
Excellent sum up.
A whole part of being able to fly around the stars is stopping off to examine that blue green giant and if its going to flare its not going to care if your in the path of it hence the question same with flying through an asteroid belt on route to a distant destination in the solar system your going far too fast to try and steer around it if a small rock's in your way.
The whole part of "being able to fly around the stars" is to move from one planet to another planet. That's the point of this ability.
This is either similar a slower, more flavorful Planetary Teleport spell, OR it's a method of going to a new place, without providing the protections for that place.
The fact is, it's just any teleport ability - you can go somewhere stupidly hazardous to your health. This ability just lets you get there successfully.
In terms of "solar flare" or "asteroid belt" concerns, I can see those - but ultimately, if they're an attack, they pass through; if they're considered part of the void, they don't. Whether or not they do is up to the GM.
As I said, I agree that this ability is odd - really odd. But it fits with PF's general themes of space travel being really hard and bizarre (in a way that inter-planetary teleport does not).
But this ability is so stupidly fast, it's not comprehensible to have such encounters. There isn't really a way of doing so.
Let me explain. The speed of light allows you to reach Pluto on (on an average) 5.3 hours.
Although exact travel times vary, a trip within a single solar system takes 3d20 hours, ...
So, using this ability, you can (though you won't necessarily) travel faster than light. Think about that for a moment. You're going - substantially - beyond the speed limit of the universe (sometimes). You're nearly doubling light speed! And once you get to,
... while a trip beyond <the solar system> takes 3d20 days (or more, at the GM's discretion).
"c" means nothing to you. As in, it holds no meaning whatsoever.
Alpha Centauri, our nearest neighboring solar system, is 4.3 light years away. A Light Year is the distance that light travels in a vacuum over the course of one year. Being four-point-three light years away means that it would take us more than four years traveling at the speed of light.
You can accomplish that journey in three days. Three. Days.
Instead of traveling for (more than) 1,461 days (well, really 1570.575), you're traveling for three. You're traveling over 487 times the speed of light. FOUR HUNDRED EIGHTY SEVEN TIMES the speed of light.
The speed of light is the physical speed limit of the universe. We're talking the hard line limit. You can't go faster than that, to all of our current understanding. It simply can't. And you're multiplying that by nearly five hundred times. That's your speed.
You don't have time to care about solar flares, micro-meteors, or anything else.
I mean, even if it's the maximum time frame, sixty days, you're still going more than 25 times the speed of light.
And the strangest part is, that's relative to Golarion time just as much as it is to your own. It's not the weird "'I only traveled for four years!' 'But you've been gone for centuries!'" effect that you'd run into if you actually did light-speed traveling. If you travel for 3d20 days, and then another 3d20, you're gone for... 6d20 days (with the sum of the latter equaling the sum of the former every time).
And the thing of it is, that's the shortest trip you could take. The shortest. Anywhere else in the galaxy? Still 3d20 days. Your speed will so exceed the speed of light, that it doesn't matter.
The thing is, Liam, you're not traveling like the rest of the universe. You're going so fast that the rest of the universe might as well be in a time-stop. It is literally impossible to travel as fast as you are. Not as impossible as holding bat guano, muttering some words, and having a sudden energy increase (with no expansion of energy) impossible - this ability is more impossible than that.
The kinds of encounters you are describing figures that you're going at a speed where such ideas are reasonable. They are not. You cease to be a physical part of the universe while traveling this speed, otherwise you're going to have infinite mass and everyone is consumed in an all-encompassing ball of you.
Effectively, this ability has three tiers:
1) [atmosphere]: I can fly, I can fly, I can fly!
2) [solar system]: Hahah, forget you, relativity and light speed in general!
3) [beyond]: HYPER SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE! (aka, "They've gone to plaid!
Thus, I'd suggest treating it more like Star Wars hyperspace. Once you hit hyperspace, you're out - you're golden and good to go. No one and nothing can reach you until you hit your destination or a planet somewhere along the way. Otherwise, there is no reality with which we can relate, and things like micrometeors and solar flares didn't kill us - being riddled with the rest of the universe did (and, incidentally, the rest of the universe died while riddling us with itself).
At Tacticslion
Excellent sum up.
Thank you! Also, nice quote. :D
The only thing ODD about the ability is why the super intelligent archmage never bothered to cast temporal stasis on his companions.
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Why do I feel like this would be a really great idea for incredibly powerful mages to start "pushing" starships around? It's an incredibly inefficient use of power, but space farers may want some ways around the void.
For example, if we bring up Simulacrum, a wizard can sell copies of themselves to serve as engines and open up a new age of exploration.
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Simulacrum abuse IN SPAAAAAACCCEEE!!!