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I am going to start this off by saying that I do not like "collectible" games and I am not a fan of pre-painted minatures. However, I have been trying to get any following at my local gaming store for a Starship combat game, and there seemed to be no interest. This game, however, generated a lot of interest so I bought the starter set, and fough some games and here are my thoughts:

The System:

The game itself is incredible easy to learn and took us about two minutes to learn. The game takes place on a pre-printed map of squares. Light side and dark side set up 3 squares. Essentially all ships are given a class of 1 through 4. Depending on what class they where dictated how fast they could move. All ships come with a stat card that give the abilities and ststistics for the ship, so all the information you need is right in front of you (similar to Warmachine).

Class 1 is the Super Ships, the only two class one ships are the Mon Calamary Vessel and Super Star Destroyer included in the starter box, as a Class 1 ship you can only move one square at a time and your turning is retricted, you can move then turn or turn then move.

Class 2 ships are your main line capital ships (Star Distroyers, Mon Cals), they have the same move restrictions as size 1 but can move 2 sqaures a turn (see a pattern yet?)

Class 3 are your corvette size ships (Millienium Falcon, Imperial Shutlle), they can move 3 and are less restricted on movement.

Class 4 are your fighters (X-Wing, TIE Fighter), they can move 4, interesting thing about them is that they can only engage models in an adjacent square, and if they are adjacent with another class 4 ship, the two ships are "locked" in combat.

Firing Weapons is the easiest thing in the world. There is no range or line of sight in this game. All you systems can fire at seperate models if you choose as well. All weapons are given an attack modifier and all ships have defence ratings. So you roll a D20 add the attack modifier and compare it with the defence number. If you equal or beat that number you add damage. Each Weapon also has a damage amount, and this amoung is placed on your card. Now each ship has two hull values (except size 4), once you take a number of damage points euqual to your first hull value, you flip your card over. On the back of your card is you ship with reduced stats (which are now the stats of the ship) and a second hull number. Once you take damage enough to kill that number, your ship is distroyed. For example, the Mon Cal Fires on the Super Star Distroyer that has an 18 front Defence, they roll15 then add +4 equals a successfull hit, the weapon gives 4 damage, so the Star Distroyer is reduced from 10 hull to 6.

Now the interesting thing about this system is that damage is applied at the end of the turn. So initiative is less critical in this game. You will commonly have a fighter die to shooting, but still kill things when it come to your turn to shoot.

 The turn sequence is simple, both side roll for initiative with the looser moving first, then the winner moves then fires, then the loser fires, with damage applied at the very end.

Overall I give the Game System a 4 out of 5. Just because it is simple doesn't mean that tactics and list construction won't be crucial, and I do see a meta-game to this system.

The Miniatures:

It seems, at least from my perspective that each class is in a loose scale to others in the same class. Class 4 (fighters) I would say are roughly the size of a 40K Infantry man, whereas the Class 1(Super ships) are smaller than a Land Speeder. This does give the game a wierd perspective, but nothing overtly distracting, especially considering the actual size of the ships if they where to make them "to scale". The minatures are decent sculpts and painted to the same quality as other Pre-painted games.

I would give them a 2 out of 5. They are nothing to write home about but better than what you would find in a board game or similar.

 

Overall I give the game a 4 out of 5. If is an easy, fun game that works best is you have a decent "core" group of gamers that you can set up trading to get the ships you want. Immediately in our group we place the restriction that you could only field ships of the same era, and we are noticing that the factions play a little different under those restrictions, essentially give the players an option of 4 races to play, other than the basic rules that says you can mix and match different ships, having wierd situations like General Grievous leading Imperial Star Distroyer. 

This sounds good. If the local store's got 'em they may be worth a look see...

I want to stress this is only after the preliminary games I played, there are more advanced rules, like commands (which effect every ship in the same class) and point defence systems (essentially capital ships get a free shot at every fighter in an adjacent square) which I haven't used yet.

This game is very similar to Warmachine. In that the tactics of the game comes to combination of units and the special rules they imploy.

I'll give it a try, thanks for the review.

the game is nothing like warmachine. Only similarity is that you have your stats on cards, but then again so does every WotC miniatures games.

I would personally switch your ratings for miniatures and gameplay. The miniatures are absolutely great (except the super star destroyer, which is way off in the angles and especially the back end). The paintjobs are very nice, far superior to the star wars micro machines. All of the ships have a decent wash applied and colors are fairly accurate. Many of the larger ships have an aztec pattern as well, which enhances the look and in general the paintjobs are a step above what you would see for most pre-painted games. Most ships are pretty accurate in terms of the models (except the super star destroyer) although they don't scale with other ships of the same class, the Slave I is bigger than the millenium falcon for instance and the falcon is almost as big as the rebel assault frigate, even though both are size 3 and the frigate should be far larger. Fighters are roughly the same size as the star wars micro machines, aand they scale better to each other than the other ships. As Mahu said, it gives the ships an odd appearance, but there's absolutely no way to avoid this, star wars ships vary too greatly in size to be truly scaled.

As far as gameplay goes, the game is way too simple. It's simpler even than the regular star wars miniatures, but you don't have the walls and cover to change things up, and not nearly as many special rules to break the monotony. Movement matters very little except for fighters, and combat boils down to army selection and who rolls D20s better. Fighters dominate the game, they can only take a single hit but they deal out as much firepower as a size 3 ship for a fraction of the points and can only shoot and be shot at from an adjacent square. After a few games we found that capitol ships were only being taken to launch fighters which can't start on the table, but deploy from capitol ships based on their fighter launch vaue. I don't especially have a problem with how much damage fighters do, star wars has always put an emphasis on fighters being fragile but powerfull (especially the video games), it's just a little wierd to see it in play.

I wasn't terribly impressed with the stats for the rares in the game, many of the uncommons are more useful, which is not entirely a bad thing. Once again the exception is fighters, unique fighters are quite better (better attack and defense values) for about double the cost of a normal fighter and some even give bonuses to surrounding fighters.

Overall, the game is MUCH too simple for it's own good. I wasn't expecting starfleet battles or anything, but it really does seem designed for children to play. Good for children, bad for gamers.

Sounds like the regular starwars mini game, which I thought was CRAP.

If you noticed, I stated how it was like Warmachine. In that you have all your stats on cards and tactics come into play when you compose your lists to see which units works with others. I didn't say it was an exact replica.



I did say loose scale with others of the same class not exact. The examples you provide is why they are loosely scaled with each other.

I gave the ratings on what I felt appropriate. The minatures I place in context of all minature games and their respective minatures. Though the Star Wars Minatures are good, they are no Games Workshop Wraithlord, or Privateer Press Protectorate Avatar. Some of the smaller ships sufer from soft plastic warp and the paint jobs, though better than some things I have seen are adequate. I do admit that for a pre-painted game, they are impressive.



I didn't notice that in our test games. All the games I played, most fighters got tied up with opposing fighters to really contribute. The difference between the Dark Side and Dark Side is apperent though. Light side fields a lot of quality fighters, most of those fighters carry anti-capital ship weapons and can out gun Dark Side Fighters. However Dark Side has access to unlimited fighters and can easily swarm the enemy. As the game goes on you will see Dark Side force feild more and more unlimited fighters to tie up the light side fighter so that they can concentrate their superior capital ships on the ligt sides capital ships. So you can see the games tactics are not overtly simple, even though the game is.



I actually like that about this game. I hate that collectible games are about the rares or uniques you have to speend hundreds on boosters to find or buy overpriced on ebay. This game looks like it will be more balanced. For example, I have both the TIE Fighter and TIE Fighter Ace. Sure the TIE fighter Ace has better attack and defence values, but TIE fighters are Infinite and constantly recycle, so niether is better than the other. This game does enchourage players to feild balanced fleets. You want capital ships to stop your opponent from launching fighters, and you want fighters to take out opposing fighter and hopfully capital ships.



Yes, it is simple and it looks to appeal to a lower common denomiator, but does that stop you from playing Monoploy? or Risk? or any of the hundred other board games (which is what I view this game). On the face of it Chess has simple rules, but the tactics behind it aren't that simple. While this game is no chess, if you have two players who kknow what they are doing, the outcome will be far from simple.

If anyone would like to check out the rules heres a link

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=starwars/article/SBrulebook

Looks like a "fun" game isnt that why we all play these things after all?

I am in agreeance that right now its too simple. with no line of sight and no range for weapons, it turns into exactly what kalamadea said, movement is non-important except for fighters and its a process of rolling d20's and moving fighters. I'm in the hope that a future expansion or side rules will give us some kind of space terrain (asteroids or planets) to break it up a bit as it will get real monotonous fast with just sitting there rolling dice. I really like the game, the mini's are good. I feel that I'm going to tire of it very very quickly though

I noticed though that there is an impedus to move Capital Ships Forward, especially on the Dark Side, if you field enough Class 2 ships with fighter launch bays, then field a large amount of rescycle ships, you want your launch bays as far forward as possible to continually reinforce the figher combat in the middle. Also Class 3 ships can get out manuvered quickly if not properly supported. So to say movement doesn't play a part in the game is flawed. I do agree though, I wish capital ships would be encoraged to get closer, though I don't know how "realistic" that would be.

The game is fresh, But I agree that over time I will tire of it. the beauty of it is that you can pack it up and bring it out once in a while for quick gamer fix if you don't have the time for something more involved. While it doesn't replace the cool factor of the CCG game...it still is cool, because it's Star Wars.

 

Capt K

I have some of the SW CCG that's not by WOTC...*cant' remember who it's by* I'll go check...one moment.


It's by decipher. got a crapload of cards thinking some SW geek friends of mine would play...and no game. They stayed with MTG till reciently I realized they don't play that anymore.

I also played SWCCG, Infantryman. It's a hell of a game. In fact, just yesterday, I broke out my old decks just to take a look at everything. Great game.

The game looks like a simple and fun game to play. The models look cool. The draw of this game is that it is star wars. If you want a more complex rules set try The latest B5 game from mongoose. That game rocks.

As for me... I am a star wars geek so I can see myself buying a seperatist fleet for me and a republic fleet for my 8 YO.

ender502

I'll say it was a good try, and its in the area that Lucas would shoot for. A game that gets his product into houses and has more of a "board game" feel than a "tabletop game" feel. It'll probably turn into a minature gamers "beer and pretzel" game.

I would still go for a SW fleet system that is more inline with BFG or B5 with some really good mini support.

Posted By Infantryman on 11/28/2006 8:51 PM
I have some of the SW CCG that's not by WOTC...*cant' remember who it's by* I'll go check...one moment.


It's by decipher. got a crapload of cards thinking some SW geek friends of mine would play...and no game. They stayed with MTG till reciently I realized they don't play that anymore.

That's a shame that your friends weren't into it.  I started playing the Star Wars CCG back when the first set was launched and even though I bought Magic cards, MTG is just plain inferior to SWCCG in terms of rules, cards, game balance (well up until the last few sets of SW that were rushed so they could get them out the door and into players' hands before their rights were given up to WotC).  Damn that game was good. (yeah I know I lament its death on here every few months, but it was that good)

As far as this game goes the scale thing really bothers me.  But then again I'm an engineer, so I dislike it when anything is out of scale   In terms of the apparently simplistic gameplay, just as others have pointed out, I imagine the system will gain more tactical depth and complexity (whether for good or bad) as more sets are released.

Posted By DarkTemplars on 11/29/2006 7:54 AM
I would still go for a SW fleet system that is more inline with BFG or B5 with some really good mini support.

Oh me too- I'd LOVE to see GW, Rackham, PP, or someone of repute that would do a game like this with the SW imagery AND a proper sense of scale. 

We'd have to sacrifice something and here's what I'd be willing to sacrifice:
-the larger scale ships like super start destroyers- basically anything that would be too large to produce in scale with properly scaled medium and fighter ships.
-All non-fighter or really small battleship models are not present but for very rare cases (like we see in the regular star wars minis game- one super huge model that's properly scaled but hard to come by- the AT-AT).  This isn't really that big of a deal.  I'd rather some nice sized and super detailed fighters and bounty hunter sized ships at the cost of losing the corvette sized ships.
-pre-paintedness.  I'd rather accurate models that require assembly and won't get bent around and look stupid as a result.  The cost here?  Financial.

• The Class 1 (ie. Super Star Destroyer) ships feel huge and ponderous, moving only 1 square a turn. While their front shields are high, their side and rear are very vulnerable, and must therefore be protected from fighters and other smaller vessels. Typically this will form the center of your fleet, launching fighters and projecting power with its weapons anywhere on the table.
• Class 2 ships (ie. Rebel Frigate) feel like mini-class 1 (only move 2 squares per turn) as they only move 2 but still project firepower across the table and some also launch fighters.
• Class 3 ships (i.e. Millennium Falcon) offer speed, sometimes great anti-fighter, command help, and support for different vessels. Their speed allows them to get behind the big ships and attack weaker flanks and rear. The problem is they are large enough to be vulnerable to the guns of the larger class ships at range. Meaning they are easy targets.
• Fighters (class 4 ships) are very fast, and in many ways are the center of the battle. The scariest moments for my Super Star Destroyer where when proton torpedo equipped X-wings made it to the flanks and did massive damage. Fighters have two special rules that make them powerful: They can’t be attacked by anything not adjacent to them and if a fighter moves adjacent to another fighter it must stop movement. That is, fighters can’t just zip by other fighters.    So although larger class ships can attack anywhere on the table, fighters are safe from this unless the attacker is adjacent. The figthter’s high speed means that you choose who it will attack and be attacked by.
• Maneuver is key. In many ways the game feels like a bit of a chess match. Your fighters must screen against enemy fighters, since you cap ships can’t fire at them until they are so close they’ll launch their payload.   While the Class 1 ships can project anywhere on the table, some of their weapons have limited firing arcs. The most powerful weapons are fired from the broadside, which have the best chance to hit, but turning to fire these would expose your weaker side shields.   While class 2 and 3 ships can also fire at large ships anywhere on the table, you really want to get behind the enemy to have a good chance of damaging. In one turn I had maneuvered my Class 3’s behind the enemy Class 1, with my Class 1 directly ahead. My opponent turned is Class 1, which then gave him a double broadside against my Class 3’s and my Class 1, resulting in heavy losses for me. This did expose his weaker side shields, and my counter attack was heavy.
• Support is essential. Many ships have special rules that lend bonus to adjacent ships, usually fighters. Grouping fighters with supporting Class 3 ships or hero’s (such as Lord Vader’s Tie fighter) makes a small group of deadly craft. The down side is that you can not spread out your fighters to protect your cap ships from enemy craft. 
• Protect your Queen your Class 1 ship feels much like the queen in chess, powerful, but you can’t afford to loose her. An early loss means you most definitely will not get all your fighters in the air, but play too conservatively and you won’t be able to take full advantage of your double broadside. 
• Command is an interesting twist. Some ships generate ‘command tokens’ that allow you to issue special orders to one class of ship for one turn. Things like more powerful shields, faster speeds, increased fire power, etc. These tokens can only be used once per game, but it’s an interesting way to represent the influence of command vessels such as imperial shuttles, etc. Leveraging these orders at the right time can turn the tide of a battle, but hold on to them too long and the ships with command ability may die, with their orders unused.
• Control the grid as mentioned before, fighters that enter a square adjacent to an enemy fighter must stop. Also, some larger ships have tractor beams, which require smaller ships to stop when they enter adjacent spaces.  This means much of the game is positioning your ships to control the grid so the enemy can not slip past your front lines and attack your rear. There are, of course, exceptions to this rule to make things interesting. For example, Interceptors fighters (e.g. tie interceptors, and a-wings) can slip by non-interceptors, and ships with cloaking devices (e.g. Sith transport) can slip by tractor beams. This mix means that you have to leave some ships guarding the rear, even if you have a good front line screen.
• More is more fun this game is much more fun with lots of vessels. The starter box just isn’t enough. According to the rules, battles should be 300 points, and while a Class 1 ship is around 150 points, fighters are 5-10 points each and Class 2 and 3 ships run between 20-50 points. After splitting our starter box and getting one booster each, my friend and I had about 250 points to field. To give you an idea of my fleet size at 250 points: 1 Super Star Destroyer, 1 Interdictor (Class 2), 1 Imperial Shuttle (Class 3), 1 Darth Vader Tie Fighter, 1 Tie Fighter, 1 Tie Fighter Ace, 1 Droid Fighter, 2 Genosian Fighters. This proved to be a much more exciting fleet than the starter box, and is still 50 points short of the recommended fleet size. 

Posted By RussWakelin on 11/29/2006 1:46 PM

• 1 Super Star Destroyer, 1 Interdictor (Class 2), 1 Imperial Shuttle (Class 3), 1 Darth Vader Tie Fighter, 1 Tie Fighter, 1 Tie Fighter Ace, 1 Droid Fighter, 2 Genosian Fighters.
  

They mixed the old and new trilogies?  Dear God.  WHY!?

If I do pick some of these up, well, some of the pieces probably won't end up in my fleet(s).

Posted By bigchris1313 on 11/29/2006 2:23 PM

They mixed the old and new trilogies?  Dear God.  WHY!?

Greater diversity means you have to buy more packs to get what you want. That is the way with "collectible" games.... This is WOTC.

ender502

Of course, they're banking on the idea that an empty investment in genosian fighters won't turn me off to the game entirely.

Between the utterly ridiculous price, and the lack of thought process behind the contents, I'll pass and keep a few of my choicer comments to myself. The whole concept of these types of games from WOTC have me thorougly disgusted with thier namebrand. As far as im concerned, anything with the name on it starts with two strikes against it.

- I don't know if it is the whole overall try to make me buy twenty boxes for a decent army routine, with less then a handful of miniatures in each box, or the whole " Oh, its Star Wars, so it has to be good".

- These prepainted games are , as of this moment the death of the hobby aspect of the game. If I want to play a Star Wars space battle, why then are we forced to play it with micro machine rejects? For the sake of the price, is the arrogence of this company so great as to just throw out minis with paint on them and we as a consumer are supposed to just say, hey thanks? They couldn't even agree on a standard scale for the game.

Thanks for the good review of the game, but I'll pass.

- Nuts to WOTC. DOOOM!!!

Posted By Grot 6 on 11/29/2006 4:18 PM
The whole concept of these types of games from WOTC have me thorougly disgusted with thier namebrand. As far as im concerned, anything with the name on it starts with two strikes against it.

Woah! Well at least you're honest. Try approaching the game from a neutral standpoint though. You haven't given the game itself a fair chance.

- I don't know if it is the whole overall try to make me buy twenty boxes for a decent army routine, with less then a handful of miniatures in each box, or the whole " Oh, its Star Wars, so it has to be good".

And this is different from every other wargame how? If you want to play a one-box game, pick up RISK or Chess.

- These prepainted games are , as of this moment the death of the hobby aspect of the game. If I want to play a Star Wars space battle, why then are we forced to play it with micro machine rejects?

While I don't like pre-paints, I fail to see how they damage the hobby aspect of a game. Either you buy pre-paints and use them as is, you buy them strip them and fix them up to your liking, or you don't buy them at all and use other models in their place. There is no 'Forced to buy them' event here. Heck, the rules are online so you don't have to buy ANY of their product in order to try out the game. In my experience, pre-paints will not prevent people from enjoying the hobby aspect of a game. Either they gravitate toward this type of game because of its lack of hobby aspect, or they create their own hobby aspect in spite of the game.

If a game has no hobby aspect, so be it. Not every game needs one nor should every game have one. Pre-paints are in this way fundamentally different from the types of games we usually discuss on Dakka; they don't require a hobby aspect. This is because they are in a different class than 40k, Warmachine, etc... The fact that a game uses miniatures does not necessarily mean that it needs or should have a hobby aspect.

For the sake of the price, is the arrogence of this company so great as to just throw out minis with paint on them and we as a consumer are supposed to just say, hey thanks? They couldn't even agree on a standard scale for the game.

I'd love to see a realistically scaled game just as much as anyone else (actually probably more than most), but this is a problem that occurs with some miniatures games, especially those in an imaginary environment. It's hard to create a realistic scale when to do so would mean that your largest ships would occupy the entire table while your smallest ships would be represented with dust motes.

You are of course entitled to your opinion of WOTC and their games. No one is quesitoning that. But in my opinion it is far more arrogant to pre-judge and sentence a game simply because of who made it without giving it a chance (when applied to people, this is called racism).

The reviews was good, the rules sound fun. If you don't like WOTC then don't buy the game. Fine that's your right and it's what people should do if they don't like the company in question. But don't condem the game itself until you give it a fair chance.

Here are the subtle things my gaming group did, that I feel greatly enhances the game:

1. Era System - we split the light side and dark side in two, so you can only field clone war ships or glacatic civil war ships not both. Time will tell how balanced each faction is, but I am noticing that it does make playstyles more diverse, for example, the majority of Dark Side Class 2 Fighter launchers are Clone War models, meaning a pure Glactic Civil War (Empire essentially) need to reliy more on its class 3 ships and streanght of its capital ships (I noticed Star Distroyers tend to have higher defence and armor than Seperatist ships of the same class).

2. Trade System - If you have a good groupd of people that play be the era system, you can easily build fleets quickly if you set up trading. Most of the time you will either get the ships you want or trade ships that are of a different era or side with people playing opposite forces.

3. Less restrictive sides - in the game only Light Side may challenge Dark Side, we set it up to where if Dark Side fights Dark Side or Light Side fights Light Side, you make it an initiative roll.

Try those things out and you will find a much wider appeal for the game.

Another fun game play is the "range 5 option" (house rule)
All ships have a 5 square range minus their class. Try it is a blast!

Posted By Grot 6 on 11/29/2006 4:18 PM
Between the utterly ridiculous price, and the lack of thought process behind the contents, I'll pass and keep a few of my choicer comments to myself. The whole concept of these types of games from WOTC have me thorougly disgusted with thier namebrand. As far as im concerned, anything with the name on it starts with two strikes against it.

- I don't know if it is the whole overall try to make me buy twenty boxes for a decent army routine, with less then a handful of miniatures in each box, or the whole " Oh, its Star Wars, so it has to be good".

- These prepainted games are , as of this moment the death of the hobby aspect of the game. If I want to play a Star Wars space battle, why then are we forced to play it with micro machine rejects? For the sake of the price, is the arrogence of this company so great as to just throw out minis with paint on them and we as a consumer are supposed to just say, hey thanks? They couldn't even agree on a standard scale for the game.

Thanks for the good review of the game, but I'll pass.

- Nuts to WOTC. DOOOM!!!

1.  Wow, you must be the only one that ever bought the 40K box and never added to it.  Any wargame requires buying more then just the starter.   You get 10 figures per $22 pack so they really aren't very expensive compared to other individual gaming miniatures.  There are already complete sets on sale for less than $300.00.  Spend another 50-60 for extra common and uncommon sets/singles and you have all you'll ever need to play.

2.  As far as I can tell the starter comes with the ONLY class 1 ships in the game and comes with basically a mix of every type of ship, so it sounds like they put a great deal of thought into the starter contents.

3.  Prepainted minis aren't the death of miniatures gaming any more than 1 piece figures are.  Some people have no interest in modeling and painting, some do.  As a matter of fact, I'll bet in the long run prepainted miniatures could help traditional wargames as it is an easy entry point for new players.  I can't count the number of people I've met that won't get into wargaming because of the daunting task of painting and assembling their miniatures.  I'm sure plenty of the younger players of the prepainted games will get into more traditional wargames as they get older due to the exposure.

4.  Silent Death isn't scaled, Bab 5 isn't scaled, Epic 40K isn't scaled, it really isn't that big of a deal when you look at other games.  Heck have you looked at the 40k transport vehicles and catachans, 40k is barely scaled.

Basically this entire argument seemed to me that your first statement about your dislike or WotC has clouded your ability to look objectivly.  I haven't played SSB yet, but I encourage you to try it out if you see a demo, it might be good.

On the other hand.... he is right... you can´t even start a trial game just with the starter.... which costs 40Euro vs the GW-starter which costs 50 Euro over here.
Tried the game several times.....

1. For a halfway decent trial game you need one starter and at least 3-4 boosters. And no, our dealer was not trying to make us pay through the nose.... he opened that much boxes to have a decent trial force for his shop.

2. Compared to other games of the same ilk it is more than simplistic.... in the end the higher dice wins. Tactics take a back-seat far in the back.

3. Bending on some big ships is abysmal and can´t be completely cured with hot water. Just have a look at every second TradeFed-Ship.

4. Which colorblind muskrat decided to have the cards in such neon-colors? There are so much fine color-schemes for Star Wars, but no.....

Full gallery is posted:

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=starwars/article/sbgallery

Hmm, they do look a bit warpy. Like the old Micro Machine rubber/plastic figures.

Maybe, but some people actually repaint them.

I got the starter and some tie fighters from the ebay, and decided to repaint the tie-fighters with a light grey and give them kill markings and other stuff (including names on the side).