Starships (GOBS)

[rflowings]

Ahoy! I have two fleets of scratchbuilt starships (modelled on BioWare's Mass Effect games) and Howard Shirley's Generic Outlandishly Big Spacefleets rules to fight with. Does anybody fancy a game? I can bring it all in on Monday if so.

It looks to be a robust beer-and-pizza ruleset with a fairly simple damage mechanic and lots of explosions. Pure space opera, physics be damned.

If you're interested, check out the rules here.

The scenario: Sink The Fist.

The Earth Systems Alliance thought that a few false-flag commerce raids outside Council Space to generate a bit more revenue would be easy. They were wrong.

It turns out the Turian Imperial Fleet have been monitoring them all along. Every Alliance vessel engaged in privateering is now logged in the central server of the Turian Dreadnought Palaven's Fist. And the Fist is due to report back to Imperial command any day now.

It's up to the Alliance Navy's 3rd scouting flotilla and their allies from the Asari Republic to take out the Turian flagship before it can leave its current anchorage at the backwater world of Shanxi. Failure could mean humanity's expulsion from the galactic council - and jeopardise interstellar peace for good. The future hangs in the balance. The future... of space.

[dan]

Sounds good to me. Commander Shepherd to the rescue?

[rflowings]

...well, I guess that depends whose side you're on.

I'll bring the ships. See you tonight!

[Timf]

Unfortunately, I have a rugby club committee meeting tonight, so won't be able to join in.

[rflowings]

Never mind Tim, we'll see how the rules go tonight and I'll brew up a 3+ player mission if you want to take a crack at it in future.

[rflowings]

So! Forces were (fairly) well balanced and the game played (fairly) well. The Fist escaped (not without a few battlescars), thanks to a solid defensive game by Dan and the Earth Systems Alliance has some serious explaining to do back on the Citadel.

Final thoughts: an escape scenario for a slow, lumbering capital ship wasn't the best scenario design, so mea culpa. We got lots of bangs and broadsides but as Katie pointed out manoeuvre was not terribly dynamic. I would like to take another punt at the rules in a couple of weeks if there is interest - many thanks to everyone for their comments this evening!

[dan]

None the less I thought it was jolly good fun.
I also felt of the 2 other space fleet combat systems I've played and enjoyed (Full Thrust and Battle Fleet Gothic) it did feel more similar to BFG.

Thankyou again for the game. :-)

[dan]

And I did destroy the future and create a paradox by destroying the pre Shepherd, pre Mass Effect, SSV Normandy.

[Timf]

Dammit Dan, how many times do we have to tell you not to play with causality at the club!

[dan]

Ooops my bad. ;-)

[dan]

Exciting battle action footage!

[rflowings]

Ah, marvellous! Would you mind if I pinched a couple of those pics for my blog?

As to the Normandy... well that just gives me a good reason to build the SR-2! I'm already concocting the next scenario, hopefully I will have refined book-keeping a bit into the bargain.

[dan]

Sure feel free. :-)

Ah cool.