I was itching for a game to play, something new to ease my fidgety ennui, so I thought I'd finally try Star Breach, by Elijah M. Kelogg! (I'm assuming the "M" stands for "Multigrain".)
This is an attractive book with glossy pages and nice illustrations and photos of minis. It's something I could probably convince a friend to play if I had friends. I mean, friends nearby that I could hang out with.
Anyway, here's what I did.
|
|
Something desert-y. Hopefully with out billions of demons. |
|
|
The Legion of Mankind Agent M as the (Alpha) Sergeant up top A couple Corporals and some Privates |
|
|
Nomadic Raiders Captain Vorann as the (Alpha) Captain (duh) Also the 1st Mate and Merchant Marines |
|
|
Each dude gets a die in the bag Blue for Nomads and Black for Legion |
Who goes when is based on drawing a die out of the bag. If it's your color, you assign that die to one of your figures, with the number denoting the action (1:Down, 2:Mend, 3:Cover Fire, 4:Fire, 5:Advance, 6:Run/Assault). Despite all those options, not much happend in the first turn. In the Orders Phase everybody Runs (6) forward, trying to stay in cover. The two Alphas just Advance (5) in order to keep their options open in the Special Actions Phase, but there aren't any opportunities to do anything.
|
|
Double-timing it! |
 |
| Charge!! |
I gather all of the dice, put them back into the back, shake it up, and draw again. I draw a black die. The Legion goes first. A Private Advances (5) and fires, rolling 4 + 1(1/2 range) + 3(Initiative) = 8. Not great. (The Legion aren't penalized for moving and shooting.) The Raider Merchant Marine rolls to Dodge, getting 2(!) + 1(partial cover) + 4(Initiative) = 7. That's a hit! The base damage is the difference in dice rolls, so just 1 + 3(rifle damage) - 5 (relic armor) = 0. The Merchant Marine is hit, but his armor absorbs the blow to no effect! Whew.
|
|
Wait, the Private clearly rolled a "5". Shush, you! |
On the Merchant Marine's turn, he shoots (4) back, barely hitting, but the Privates don't have great armor. The Merchant Marine's submachine gun gets two shots, so I had to roll to hit and defend twice. That gets to be a bit much when trying to solo the game.
|
|
Yaar! Blood for the Blood... Booty, I guess? |
The other Merchant Marine shoots (4) him, too, bringing him to 7 of 8 Hit Points. I'm not a huge fan of tracking HP at this scale, but maybe it wouldn't be so bad in a head-to-head game.
|
|
(Just a flesh wound) |
A bunch of guys missed, though the Pirate's First Mate took some damage, and the Merchant Marine with a flamethrower toasted a guy. The flamethrower was able to attack three enemies at once, with two attacks each. There were a lot (12!) of 2d6 + math rolls for that one engagement. Yeesh.
|
| Burninate them! |
The two Alphas use their Special Actions to Focus Fire at each other, but miss.
I cleaned things up and drew again!
Flamethrower guy goes again and injures the Legion Sergeant and the nearby Private. Both are forced to take a Down(1) order in response, wasting their turns!
|
|
"Down"(1) provides a +2 bonus versus further shots at least |
A couple more Legion troopsgo down, and the Legion Sergeant's Hit Points are slowly being whittled away.
|
|
The Raiders are feeling OP I did ignore the errata, but still |
Flamethower guy burns another one (after rolling 2D6 another 12 times)! The Legion Corporal goes down, too. Other than that, it's a lot of misses and armor pings.
|
|
I suppose I could have had some of the Legion "Mend"(2) to heal up, but then this game would have taken for-ev-er! |
Two more Legion troops go down. It's not looking good for the the Legion of Mankind! The Sergeant does manage to use his Special Action to do 2 damage to one of the Merchant Marines, though.
(Special Actions are extra actions that heroic types like Alphas and Specialists can take. I don't have any Specialist, just my leader "Alphas". Special Actions include taking an extra, aimed shot, healing, charging into melee, and taking an overwatch position.)
|
| Man, I'm rolling soooo many dice |
One of the Merchant Marines tries to cut the Sergeant up with his plasma cutlass. The Sergeant fires at him as he charges, but misses. The Sergeant wins the fight, though, and even if he doesn't injure the Merchant Marine, he does take the opportunity to step back out of the line of fire!
|
| No fair! I called "no assaultsies"! |
Flamethrower guy demonstrates his awful cheese once again! Again, I'm not sure the flamethrower is actually legal for this crew, but they have one now, so nyah!
|
|
"Fwoomp!" "Aaaagh! Ze goggles! Zey do nossink!" |
It's now a target-poor environment, and only a couple of Raiders manage to take shots at the lone Sergeant, but none hit.
|
|
I mean, I know that I wasn't playing smart, but the Legion really took a beating here |
And that's it! Normally you'd add up points for fallen soldiers, but since this was a clearly one-sided fight, I don't think a recount is going to make a difference.
So, this was a solid set of rules, I think. It feels on par with games like Infinity or Kill Team. Unfortunately for me, that doesn't translate to solo-friendly. There weren't too many special abilities, but there were a few. I didn't take any of it, but a lot of the special gear ("relics") were one-use only, which would be a pain to track for all of these guys. And of course the individual HP felt like extra work. I don't want to sound too negative. I bet this game is fun head-to-head, but I've only got one head to work with.
Ĝis la revido!
Jason "Ludanto" Smith C;E
Great batrep as always! I always loved your miniatures - now that they are properly based they look even better!
ReplyDeleteThanks! Admittedly, I don't play sci-fi on green fields very often. Definitely needed to update these guys to the wasteland bases. I still have like 12 left that need the same treatment, though.
Delete