Fleet War : Beta Test – Version 2 The Axe Cometh

After building the ships, using wood instead of printed sheets on foam, and rewriting the rules, adding phases, creating the new Ship Control Sheets, rebuilding the playing surface, building an asteroid – after doing all of this work, we got three turns into the test and had to call it quits.

The problem? Still too complicated. Too much measuring, too much calculating. Less is more. And more is…well, more is currently too much. So what’s the answer? Simplify.

So we’ll be trying a revised way to do manage movement using fuel costs. Also will be using a simplified version for hit and targeting. Hope this works. If not, I’ll have to get out the axe again and cut away more of the complication from the game.

Game board v2

The New Fleet – “Black Sky Navy”

Here’s the updated fleet. I like the newest ships so much I think I’m going to have to redo the old ones eventually. Funny thing is, the two very distinct designs helped me come up with a background story.

Also, you may notice that I’m testing out the name “Black Sky Navy”. I feel this captures the naval and aerial aspects of capital ships fighting in space. Now, I’ve got to build the new gameboard. With luck and a lot of Gorilla Glue it might just work.

FleetWar – from this, to this…

It’s been too long since my last post, but I’ve made a lot of progress with the game. Since it’s no longer about a fleet battle, I’ve changed the name from FleetWar to…something else (still to be decided).

Anyway, I’ve finished building the first set of models for the ships. Take a look:

Two ships from FleetWar

The work of Les Ismore

I had a chance to test out the FleetWar game a couple of times in the last few weeks and as a result I have a new imaginary friend. His name is Les Ismore. No, he’s not a 6-foot rabbit, but he’s just as real.
Les introduced me to the concept of accomplishing more by doing less. What I mean by this is that in trying to accomplish too much with FleetWar, I failed at it all. By pulling out, removing some aspects of the game, I’m able to make if far more successful. Therefore, Les Ismore, is my friend.
What this means for the game is that it’s no longer about a fleet battle. Instead, the player will manage a single battleship or cruiser. They will have to balance their energy usage (or action points), between movement, weapons and shields. Essentially the strategy will lie in how well the player manages their limited resources and where they position themselves on the board, and not on how well they align their many ships on the board. While I still like the idea of playing Admiral (or Ender) and the idea of moving your ships just so, and thereby increasing the effectiveness of your attacks, it just worked out to be too much for the board. The movement phase took hours. The weapons phase was too long and the missile phase often was forgotted. Never once did I ever get to use the repair phase or the missile defense systems. But by pulling back, removing some aspects of the game, I think that the game will be stronger. You see, less is more.

As a result, I’m building new ships out of wood that will hopefully give a greater realism to the game. I plan on putting them on ball joints that will pivot and allow for more movement on the stand. So keep your eyes open for more (or less) posts on this to see the finished product.

Ships of FleetWar

Choosing to create the ships for FleetWar myself wasn’t that difficult once I realized I’ve been doodling ships since I first saw Star Wars ( the real ones, not the fake, impostor movies a.k.a. Episodes I-III).  And so, it wasn’t that difficult to bring them from concept to life.  And that is the purpose of ideas, after all, isn’t it?  To bring life to them, moving them from the aethereal to the corporeal in some way. 

These are the simple renderings, kept simple so that they can be inserted into the ship sheets. 

Battleship

Cruiser

Destroyer

Corvette

Bomber

Fighter

FleetWar Full-D

Last Friday night I was able to test out a Space-Fleet-Combat game I built with a bunch of guys.  Inspired by Spock’s quote, ““He’s intelligent, but not experienced. His pattern indicates two dimensional thinking” I wanted to build a board game that is truly 3-dimensional, playing on a board that is more than just horizontal.  It makes no sense to me to play a space game on 2-dimensions.  It’s just so…Kahn.  And he blew himself up at the end of the movie!

The game went well – for the most part.  After about 5 hours that included setup, explanation of the rules, and actual game play, we only got to start turn three.  Here’s a look at the early development of the game board.