Playtest: Shoot People In Space!

I recently had the chance to playtest the alpha (?) rules for a new minis-agnostic skirmish game that's SF-based.


Mission: Humans vs Skulkers. Both sides have to grab a valuable droid and make it off the table. The droid will move randomly each turn until picked up. There are 4 units a side: 2 characters and 2 squaddies each. A character (1 model) or a squad (3 models). Each is considered a unit in its own right. 


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All move towards the droid, mostly keeping to cover with the exception of the lone (foolhardy?) Skulker squad that's out in the open.

And they get punished for it in the Firefight phase as they break and run under fire, nearly moving off the table.

The 2 faction's leaders shoot it out. The Human hits the Skulker for 5 DAM, wiping out all its HP but a fortuitous roll on the Grim Fate table sees the Skulker fire back and this time the Human fails the Grim Fate roll and is removed from the table.

More shooting ensues and this time a human squad breaks under fire, running off the table.

Then the other Human character (who can't seem to hit the side of a barn) gets hit a second time, fails the Grim Fate roll and is removed from the table.

With only one squaddie left on the Human side (the other 2 in his squad perished in an earlier firefight but this guy is made of sterner stuff) they call it a day, leaving the field to an intact Skulker force. (The runaway Skulker squad managed to get back under Control at the end of the previous turn).


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Abysmal dice rolls on the Humans' part and pretty good to great rolls on the Skulkers' sealed the outcome of this game. Even with 2d6, there's not much you can do when you're rolling snake eyes or 3-5.


The game makes use of several tables. The tables are pretty interesting. When you shoot, depending on what you roll out of 2d6, certain things might happen. Not just hit or miss. 


For example, you could get a total miss, gun jammed, target may react in certain ways depending on d6 roll, or a possible hit that you have to check another table for to see if you actually hit. If you get hit, wounds will happen. Cover just makes it tougher to hit you. It doesn't mitigate wounds.


When a character's HP goes down to zero... it doesn't mean insta-death. You do get a chance to roll on another table for a 50-50 chance to either continue gamely fighting or you did get fatally hit and you get removed from the table. Squaddies just die.


The activation is also a bit different as you can do most of what you want during the Action Phase (move, shoot, special action etc.) as normal. You can also react to enemy movement by taking a shot at the moving unit (a bit like Infinity) but if you do, you can't do anything else in the Action Phase.


THEN comes the Firefight Phase where all eligible units (including those that fired in the Action Phase) can shoot.


It makes for a pretty deadly game.


The game is designed for PvP but the Threat table (that makes the outcome of taking a shot a bit uncertain), and the Grim Fate table (that outlines what happens to a character when said character loses all HP)... combine to make a pretty solo-able game without needing explicit solo rules.


The activation right now is alternating depending on which side has the most models and a Discord discussion is on-going about that one. 


There's some background fluff set in the game designer's own universe and it seems there will be some basic scenarios provided but you are encouraged to play the game as a mini campaign. A lot of that is only placeholder text at the moment so I'm waiting for the next update to drop within the next 48 hours.

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