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I'm thinking of grabbing the Battle for Valhalla starter set as it looks value rich, and as people know I had been looking for a "different" kind of miniature game versus my usual 30mm skirmish or mass-battles thing.

All the talk of Battlefleet Gothic and Star Wars: Armada has me thinking a space-combat game might be perfect, and while I love X-wing Miniatures, I think I want something closer to a complete table-top experience.

So what is Firestorm Armada in a nut-shell? Can someone speak to things it does particularly well, or badly? What are its stand-out features?

Better still, are there any particularly great reviews you can point me toward?

Thanks guys!

From a rules perspective, FSA is clean and simple. The game revolves around a simple dice mechanic (successes on a 4+, and 6s count for double and grant a re-roll) that is fairly universal in its application; weapons, shields, and boarding all roll the same. Special rules also are fairly simple and intuitive. Complex mechanics are often accompanied with an example or two and illustrations explaining it further.

There are issues that need to be clarified; its certainly not perfect but Spartan does FAQs more often than GW.

The fleets are distinct and flavourful. The factions are also fairly well balanced, both internally and externally.

The alternating activation mechanic helps keep both players actively involved and adds another layer to list building strategy and general play tactics.

The models are quite excellent now after the do over. Nice resin with very little flash and issues.

Overall, I like it a lot. Its clean, simple, offers good depth and very cool miniatures. Spartan is also a good company that make use of a dedicated beta team to go over and help balance the rules.

Plus, its fairly cheap to get a fleet. Two Patrol fleet boxes gets you a tournament ready fleet for ~$100. Plus the fleet lists are free.

Well, I spent the better part of a few hours reading reviews, and watching some bat-reps, combined with looking over resources here, and it looks like precisely the weight of game I was looking for. It looks significantly more "table-top war-game" heavy than X-wing, but doesn't require obscene volume of book-keeping, nor worrying about Newtonian physics. :-p

I just grabbed a Battle for Valhalla off of Ebay as the price/value was just too good. Is this a good start? I don't think I want to play either faction long-term, but it seemed like a great entry point. Is the 500pt game included enough to really give a good sense of the game? I know from experience that many games don't "feel" like what they really are at the "starter" level.

Yes, BfV is a great place to start. Excellent value, cool unique sculpts, and a sweet station.

And yes, the fleet you get does give you a great handle on how the game plays in normal ranges (commonly 800-1200). You basically just double the squadron activations and you're there.

So, for future reference... are there good "starters" for other factions?

I know, only from casual reading that the models are largely split into "before" and "after" reboot. Problem is, sites like Miniatures Market make no such distinction.

What of the newer product is available to other factions?

All of the six main factions have been completely redone. Each faction has a patrol fleet box that comes with a battleship, cruiser squadron, and frigate squadron. Easily the best way to start with a given faction. From there, buy other boxes for the other ships; cruiser boxes, destroyer boxes, gunship boxes, so on.

Terrific, and thank you. What a great advocate for this game you have been.

Now I just have to hope I can find a local community. We're about an hour North of New York City, and this part of NY is hardcore Warmahordes/40k country... finding almost anything else being played proves tricky.

Have two fleets; one Kurak and one Zenian. Paint them all pretty like and run demo games for people. Push the game if you really enjoy it. That's the best way to do it. Nothing gets gamers more excited than pretty minis.

Oh, and good terrain. You can get some star mats for cheap, and making asteroids and planets is pretty simple too. Really wow people.

Any good recommendations on 6x4 star-mats on the cheap? I could use one for X-wing as well.

I'm definitely planning on pushing this game on my X-wing/Attack Wing players if I like it. There IS a strong community for both locally, and a good many of those folks cross-over into Warmahordes, etc... and thus aren't afraid to paint models, and do some hardcore table-top play.

As for making asteroids... my hobby skill beyond being a decent painter is nil... so i'll glue cool looking rocks to bases. :-p

Firestorm's a pretty good game now with the V2 edition. It made major improvements to the game engine, and Spartan continues to sell great models at such a cheap price point.

It's very much a traditional tabletop wargame though, as opposed to more modern offerings like X-Wing. This is a matter of taste of course, as both appeal in their different ways.

My favorite though is that it does have rules for orbitting objects. Having a table full of moving terrain is /very/ fun, when you have to avoid stray asteroids and keep formation to attack the enemy

Out of curiosity, I saw a few reviews mention that there are "upgrades" you can give to ships/squadrons. Not having the book yet, can someone elaborate on this?

Is it essentially 40k's system, where a profile will have a bunch of options that say, add 5+ to the cost of the unit, etc?

I looked at the model stats on some fan-sites and didn't see anything resembling upgrade options.

As an example, a Reaper Frigate squadron can take an upgrade called 'Pack Hunters'. The cost is +5pts per ship in the squadron. Unlike 40k, you have to buy the upgrade for all the ships in the squadron; so I couldn't buy Pack Hunters for 3/5 of the frigates, its all or nothing.

This can be a little confusing with mixed squadrons, like carriers with cruiser accompaniment. If you buy an extra shield for the carrier, and your cruiser have the same option, you have to buy the shield for all of them.

Got it. Thanks.

Ok, so one last big, quality of life question...

As a disabled gamer, one thing which helps me out immensely is a digital rule-book. It makes it much, much easier than flipping through a chunky hard-cover when learning a new game.

Is there any way, legitimate or otherwise to get a .pdf of the V2.0 rules? I say this only because, I HAVE ordered Battle for Valhalla, so I do have a hardbound rulebook on the way, but I know it'll be highly impractical for me. If anyone could PM me on the matter, it would be amazing. I know it sounds silly, but this really is a hurdle I have to over-come with a lot of games.

In the past, Spartan has released their core rules as a digital download for free some time into the lifespan of the game.

I can't remember if we got official confirmation of this happening for V2.0, but if history repeats itself, it should come eventually.

Otherwise, the internet is a big place...

Firestorm armada is absolutely amazing, and there is a good online community over at Spartan. Blacksails has done a good job representing the game.

Currently there is no PDF of the rulebook, but there was a PDF written by geek Ken that summarized a lot of the important information. Only mistake I saw was BattleLog Points for destroying a cruiser squadron. Otherwise, the rulebook itself is quite thin and not as cumbersome as many other games, but no PDF as yet, not even the less than legal kind.

Welcome to the Firestoem Armada Community, you've picked a fantastic game, easy to learn, clean, living balanced and free fleet stats, just can't say enough good about the game so far.