Beyond the Reach: Introduction
I’ve been working on a game for a little while now, one I’d like to share with you now. I’d like to get your help in development, take any ideas you and I have, throw out the awful ones, and make a really, really great game.
Here we go:
Our own solar system was conquered and explored nearly one hundred years ago. Rather than unite us, as all the old stories have told, we turned on one another, each desperately seeking to overthrow those who we saw as enemies of our own purpose. In the vast breadth of black space, our warships seek out one another, hoping the destruction of each enemy ship brings our own faction that much closer to victory.
Beyond the Reach will be a multiplayer tabletop war game/board game/roleplaying game where two massive warships battle each other with one goal: The complete destruction of the enemy.
While most wargames feature one person controlling many troops, this game features many people controlling a single ship. Each player controls and manages one section of the ship, allocating energy, shifting the shields, firing weapons, and giving orders.
There would be five roles on each ship:
Captain
Engineer
Science
Helmsman
Weapons
The ideal game would be five on either side. Yes, I understand most people would have a hard time gathering ten people, so roles could be combined if you could only play with a couple of people.
The players would each have a display in front of them to represent the part of the ship they manage. After each side discusses that turn’s plan, both Captains act, giving orders. They would have a series of orders they could give to give a boost to any other player for that round, from “FIRE EVERYTHING!” to “EVASIVE MANEUVERS!”
From there, the Engineers would act, taking the power from their engines and allocating it out to the other players. They would have a couple of abilities such as “I’M GIVING HER ALL SHE’S GOT!” which would allow for a round of extra energy in exchange for some engine damage. The Engineer would also be in charge of managing damage control teams throughout the ship.
The Science officer would be able to spend some energy to analyze the enemy’s ship, choosing a particular thing to scan, such as how their engines are doing, the number of lifeforms (useful for seeing how many crewmembers on the ship have died), and would also spend energy allocating shields. They would have some abilities, but I don’t know what yet.
Helmsman would drive the ship. They would have abilities to damage the engines to pull sharper turns, things like that.
Weapons would fire the weapons, getting special abilities in certain situations, choosing where to spend the energy on their weapons.
All crewmembers would need to work in conjunction for the ship to function properly. It’d be a combination of wargame meets RPG. Both warring ships would act simultaneous as far as the steps go. Both captains act, both engineers act, etc.
Those are my initial ideas. I’ll begin laying out more rules I have in place in the coming days. Any tips? Suggestions? Thoughts? Let me know!
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I think as a board game you might have some competition: http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/123096/space-cadets