Hyperspeed travel is one way for craft to make a quick exit from the battlefield. The ship builds up power to its jump drives, and when this build up is complete, the ship exits normal space and travels at FTL to reappear several light years away.
While it is used to travel into enemy terrority, the chances of actually jumping into a battle are so remote that they will be considered here only briefly.
Ships travelling into a battle this way will only appear if the scenario states this to be the case. Space being so vast, the chances of a ship entering into a battle accidently are remote. While ships do make trips into enemy territory all the time, they usually enter sublight space a bit away from a potential battle zone to have a chance to get ready for the upcoming battle.
If a scenario states that ships may appear during the battle, it will either list a turn for the ships to appear, or else a die roll may be required (such as a on a 1-2 the ships will appear. Entry points for the ship will be declared in the scenario write up.
Ships will appear at the end of the movement phase and they will not be able to move that turn. They may otherwise function normally.
Using hyperspeed to get out of a battle is another story though. Ships may (and frequently do) enter hyperspeed to leave a battle zone. This may be because the battle is lost, the objective is won and the ships need to leave, or many other reasons.
Hyperspeed engines need to be charged up, requiring valuable energy that is normally used for movement and weapons. As such, a ship charging up has three modes of charging available to it - Slow charge, Quick charge or Hot charging.
A ship must declare that it is charging engines during the initiative phase. This energy build up is public knowledge to any ship on the board, but the rate of build up is not. So an opposing player will detect what ships are charging up their hyperspeed engines, just not what rate of charging the ship is using.
A ship slow charging spends three complete turns charging it is hyperspeed engines. During these three turns, the ships movement and weapons systems are treated as if they had recieved light damage. Base this light damage on the current state of the ship, not the original. Thus if the ship originally had 4 secondary batteries but currently had 3 due to battle damage, then the 3 value would be used for the light damage, making the current value 2.
This damage is not actual battle damage at all and the systems are not really damaged, they are reduced to simulate the energy going into the hyperspeed drives.
On the fourth turn the ship enters hyperspeed during it is movement and leaves the map.
At any time, the ship may stop the build up of energy. On the next turn the ship returns to normal levels of efficency. However if it wishes to enter hyperspeed it must start the energy build up from the beginning again.
A ship quick charging its engines is using an awful lot of energy and has even less power available for it is weapons and movement. As such, treat the ship as if it was Slow charging, but the ship takes the equivalent of Heavy Damage. On the third turn, the ship may enter hyperspeed during its movement.
Hot charging requires a ship to expend all of its energy to the hyperspeed engines. This means that for one complete turn the ship may not move or fire any weapons. On the next turn, the ship may enter hyperspeed.
Charging does not effect the use of missiles or its launching and recovery of fighters. In addition, while the ships abilities may be reduced due to the rate of charging, how it uses these reduced abilities is not limited in any way.
Once the charge has been built up, the ship usually enters hyperspeed. Sometimes it may not want to go straight away though. In this case, the ship may hold their charge. A charge may be held indefinitely, but each turn the ship holds the charge (which must be noted in the initiative phase) it is treated as if it is Slow Charging for that turn. Once declared to be holding, the ship cannot jump that turn in the movement phase. Enemy sensors will not reveal that the ship is holding a charge, but will note that the ship is building its charge.
Small craft (fighters and shuttles) can also enter hyperspeed. It requires one turn for the small craft to bring their engines power (the ship is under no restrictions for this turn, but the energy build up is visible to enemy sensors) and on the second turn the ship may enter hyperspeed when it should move.