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I have posted some of this before and my garagehammer group continues to revamp, so back to share more ideas for discussion:
Here are the basic build rules:
500 points:
1 HQ max 150 pts
Only models with infantry keyword (except tau who can cheat and take suits, but only the battle suit ones)
Any unit may be purchased at half its minimum models.
5 command points each
Max of 35 models (this is new, and so the number is tentative. We had one force at 42 last game and it was unbalancing (in his defense this was the tau player and we had told him no suits, we have since decided some suits would not break the game)

Rule clarification/simplifications
• Cover: Only models within 1” of and being fired at through a doorway receive cover bonus.
• Door rules: A model within 1” of a door at either the beginning or end of the movement phase may open it by forfeiting their shooting phase. Roll a d6: 1-the door is rusted or warped shut. 2-6 it opens normally and then sticks in the open position. Once open, doors cannot be shut.
• Exploring rooms: Rooms contain random rewards and hazards. A unit that ends its move WITHIN a room, may search it and draw a card. No player may search the same room two turns in a row.
• Advancing: Advancing now adds 2d6” instead of 1d6”/ Furthermore, a unit that makes its entire move out of LOS of any enemy units, adds 12” to their move when advancing instead of rolling the dice.
Set-up: Players start with one or two entrances determined randomly. All models are placed on the board within 6” of the entrance. If you can’t fit, they move on in the movement phase.
Turns: We’ll use the draw a chit to determine first player for EACH phase of the game, that player chooses next player. The phases are Movement, Psychic, Shooting, Charge, Fight.
Game Length: If we have four players, Each player will get to go first at least once.

Victory Points:
Each army has different reasons for entering the space hulk (chosen randomly from cards), Beyond that, we will make 3 random rolls on the following chart to determine the victory point conditions for this game.
1. Deny the enemy: For every 5 wounds rounded down caused to any enemy gain 1 VP. (this is so multi-wound models don’t cost anyone VP’s or give an unfair advantage)
2. The long game: Earn a VP for every 5 wounds rounded down you have remaining on the board at the end of the game. (or have escaped from the board).
3. Hold ground: Gain a VP for each quarter of the board you control using the objective control rules.
4. Explore: Gain a Victory Point for each room you search. No room can be searched by a player on consecutive turns.
5. Dominate: The player who controls the most rooms on the board gains a d3 VP’s at the end of each battle round.
6. Snoop, Poop, and get out: Gain a VP for each of your UNITs that exits the board by a different access point than they entered.

Special Space Hulk Stratagems available to all (Each of these may only be used one time during the game)

1 CP Prepare for Boarders! This must be played during your charge phase. Choose a unit: until your next charge phase, when firing OVERWATCH, this unit hits on its normal BS. In addition, this unit CANNOT charge, and any enemy in CC with it receives +1 to hit (this represents bracing to fire and thus an easy target slow to react).
1 CP We’re going in, Cover us! Play this stratagem during ANY movement phase. Choose a unit. It may move its movement characteristic, but may not charge this turn.
1 CP Hit the deck! Play this stratagem during your movement phase. Choose a unit; it gains the benefit of cover, but loses the ability to charge.
1CP The warp is strong in this one! Play this during the psychic phase. Either; add +1 to manifest a psychic power OR roll a single d6 and deny a psychic power on a 4+.
1CP Rules are for morons! Play this during the shooting phase. Choose a unit. That unit may have TWO models throw a grenade instead of one.

Specific Victory conditions (each player draws a card before deployment)

My cunning trap has worked perfectly: Your wily warlord has planned the hulk as a trap in an attempt to eliminate or at least whittle down rival forces. You may decide each turn of the game when you shall act. The turn goes as per the rules, but at the end of any player’s turn, before that player chooses the next to act, you may declare it is your turn (you still only receive one turn per round of course). You gain a VP for every ten wounds done to enemy models. (Note this is in addition to the 1VP per five wounds possible as a normal VP condition.)

Escape! You have realized the Space Hulk is going to explode, crash, enter the warp, whatever. You must escape as fast as possible. Unfortunately, the escape system is damaged and unreliable. Only by scattering to all edges can you guarantee the best chance to escape. Deploy your forces within 6” of the center of the board. Units escape by reaching the edges. You gain VP’s for each model that escapes off the edge, the amount determined by how many different edges you escape off.
• 1 edge: ¼ a VP per model.
• 2 Edges: ½ a VP per model
• 3 Edges: 1 VP per model
• 4 edges: 2 Vp’s per model

Capture the Hulk: You need the hulk for survival! You must capture it at all costs, and desperation drives your forces beyond mortal abilities. Your entire army gains a 5+ roll to negate all wounds. If, at the end of the game you retain more wounds on the board then your opponents total, you gain 1d6+2 VP’s.

Destruction of the Hulk: Your forces are here to destroy the space hulk, as it hides some secret you want erased. To destroy the space hulk, you must plant charges in as many rooms as you can. Your opponents choose the structurally weak points of the space hulk by taking turns placing markers, until 6 markers have been set. Each marker must be 7” from any other and the edges of the board. You gain 1 VP for each charge you set on a marker.

Assassination: It’s personal or just business, whatever. Certain enemy models MUST die. Your forces are here to assassinate them! Choose a character from each of your opponent’s forces. They lose their normal character targeting protection against your CHARACTERs only. For each one you kill, gain a d3 VP’s.

Rescue mission: Somehow one of yours was left behind in an earlier foray. Remove a model from one of your units and place it against the edge of the space hulk no closer than 30” to any of your units. The model is badly wounded, and may only move 1d6”. All of its rolls except saves are made at -2. In addition, this model has become adept at using the detritus in the space hulk as a protection. If it did not fire or charge on your previous turn, it gains +2 to its armor save, and all shooting is at -2 against it. Charges also suffer a -1d6 to their distance (rolled AFTER the charge is declared).
If the model rejoins your forces, gain d6 VP’s.

We have placed a bunch of points of interest around the Hulk. These can be searched and a card drawn from our made up card deck. The list of possible cards below:

Security camera access
You have found the codes for the ship’s security cameras. Knowing the enemy’s location is an advantage. Hold this card. Use it once to allows a unit to either: Fire Overwatch at normal BS OR Deny an enemy unit overwatch against one of your chargers. If you still hold this card at the end of the game, gain 1 VP.

Medical Bay
You have found a medical kit. Once during the game you may either: Heal one model of d3 wounds OR return one lost model to a unit with 1 wound

Warp field
You have unleashed an unstable warp field. The unit has been infused by chaos and gains a 5+ roll to ignore any wound. If the unit does not include the Chaos keyword, and survives the battle, they must be destroyed! You lose d3 VP’s.

Warp field
You have unleashed an unstable warp field. The unit has been infused by chaos, its muscles morphing to incredible size. It gains either: +1 Strength OR +1 Toughness. If the unit does not include the Chaos keyword, and survives the battle, they must be destroyed! You lose d3 VP’s.

Touched by the Cosmos
One member of the unit has been touched by the very Cosmos itself. They now see, hear, and understand what few can. They are a Psycher. They gain the power to deny one psychic power a turn, and may cast following power:
Foreordained: Warp Charge 6, range 18” one friendly unit. The unit may reroll one failed armor save, each phase until your next psychic phase. SPACE HULK

Extra Ammo
The unit has found a bag of clips, extra battery packs, whatever. Keep this card. Use it once to allows a single model in a unit to fire its weapon a second time in a the shooting phase or during Overwatch. If you have not used this card at the end of the game, gain 1VP.

Hull Breach
You have uncovered a hull breach by accident. Roll 2d6+1. Subtract the distance in inches (rounded down) PLUS the strength of every model nearby. If result is positive, that model has been sucked from the hulk and is removed from the game. No VP’s awarded to anyone.

Remnants of Crew
You have found remnants of the crew of the space hulk. Roll a d6:
• 1: The corpse has a virilant disease. Your unit suffers a d3-1 Mortal Wounds.
• 2-3: Indentification papers tell something about what happened; Gain 1 VP
• 4-5: An officer with a log telling of the spacehulks last days; Gain d3 VP’s
• 6: The body is famous (a leader, wanted man, hero, etc) Who holds a relic. Pick one from your codex and give it to a character.

Remnants of Crew
You have found remnants of the crew of the space hulk. Roll a d6:
• 1: The corpse has a virilant disease. Your unit suffers a d3-1 Mortal Wounds.
• 2-3: Indentification papers tell something about what happened; Gain 1 VP
• 4-5: An officer with a log telling of the spacehulks last days; Gain d3 VP’s
• 6: The body is famous (a leader, wanted man, hero, etc) Who holds a relic. Pick one from your codex and give it to a character.

Warp Rift
The unit is sucked into a warp rift, appearing in a location exactly 3d6” from current chosen by the owning player. They cannot end this move closer than 9” to an enemy (Yes, this limits choices (if somehow this means they cannot warp at all, lengthen the distance until they can)). They may act as normal, but suffer -1 to all to hit rolls due to disorientation. SPACE HULK

Data Trove
The unit has found a valuable data trove. You gain d3 VP’s. SPACE HULK

Nav Console
You have found one of the back-ups for the nav console. The information is invaluable. Gain d3 VP’s.


Noxious Gas
The room suddenly fills with noxious gas. Each unit with a model within 2d6” suffers a d6-2 Mortal Wounds. These wounds do not count for any player for VP conditions. SPACE HULK

Weapons Locker
You have found a discarded weapon or one stored for anti-boarding purposes. You may add one special weapon or one melee weapon to the unit from your codex’s list.

edwardmyst wrote:
Only models with infantry keyword (except tau who can cheat and take suits, but only the battle suit ones)

Crisis suits and Stealthsuits have the Infantry keyword already, no need to write them an exception.

Any unit may be purchased at half its minimum models.

Round up or round down? Are you expecting to allow single-model units of Crisis suits or Custodians?

Max of 35 models (this is new, and so the number is tentative. We had one force at 42 last game and it was unbalancing (in his defense this was the tau player and we had told him no suits, we have since decided some suits would not break the game)

Do you have any Guard players? Filling 500pts with a cap of 35 models and no vehicles is going to be pretty hard for them if they're not all Stormtroopers/don't want to take Ogryn.

Rule clarification/simplifications
• Cover: Only models within 1” of and being fired at through a doorway receive cover bonus.

No cover within rooms? How are you setting up tables?

• Door rules: A model within 1” of a door at either the beginning or end of the movement phase may open it by forfeiting their shooting phase. Roll a d6: 1-the door is rusted or warped shut. 2-6 it opens normally and then sticks in the open position. Once open, doors cannot be shut.

Skeptical of this one. If the door is entirely unopenable you could end up cutting someone off from the objective and making them automatically lose by just rolling one 1. It also raises the question of why a dude with a meltagun can do significant damage to a Titan but can't wreck this puny door. Might suggest a simplified version of the Zone Mortalis rules by assuming everyone's got lascutters and allowing them to either destroy the door (in which case it can't be closed) or open it normally (in which case it can be closed).

• Advancing: Advancing now adds 2d6” instead of 1d6”/ Furthermore, a unit that makes its entire move out of LOS of any enemy units, adds 12” to their move when advancing instead of rolling the dice.

It's a possible fix for the cut-off-from-the-battle problem, certainly. It feels to me like allowing people to destroy doors has a similar effect and allows more freedom of table design with fewer rules.

Turns: We’ll use the draw a chit to determine first player for EACH phase of the game, that player chooses next player. The phases are Movement, Psychic, Shooting, Charge, Fight.

You want to draw straws five times a turn? Seems to me like that might take a while. Maybe consider adopting alternating activations in the manner of Kill-Team (players take it in turns to move/charge, then psychic, shooting, and fight phases alternate activations the same way Fight does in the normal game, but models can stand still to "ready" and shoot first the same way charging models go first).

Special Space Hulk Stratagems available to all (Each of these may only be used one time during the game)[/b]

1 CP Prepare for Boarders! This must be played during your charge phase. Choose a unit: until your next charge phase, when firing OVERWATCH, this unit hits on its normal BS. In addition, this unit CANNOT charge, and any enemy in CC with it receives +1 to hit (this represents bracing to fire and thus an easy target slow to react).
1 CP We’re going in, Cover us! Play this stratagem during ANY movement phase. Choose a unit. It may move its movement characteristic, but may not charge this turn.
1 CP Hit the deck! Play this stratagem during your movement phase. Choose a unit; it gains the benefit of cover, but loses the ability to charge.
1CP The warp is strong in this one! Play this during the psychic phase. Either; add +1 to manifest a psychic power OR roll a single d6 and deny a psychic power on a 4+.
1CP Rules are for morons! Play this during the shooting phase. Choose a unit. That unit may have TWO models throw a grenade instead of one.

Not sure about the once/game restriction; I don't know that any of these are that overpowering, especially considering the fact that some of them are either things Guard can just do (move-again is an Order).

We have placed a bunch of points of interest around the Hulk. These can be searched and a card drawn from our made up card deck. The list of possible cards below:

Security camera access
You have found the codes for the ship’s security cameras. Knowing the enemy’s location is an advantage. Hold this card. Use it once to allows a unit to either: Fire Overwatch at normal BS OR Deny an enemy unit overwatch against one of your chargers. If you still hold this card at the end of the game, gain 1 VP.

Medical Bay
You have found a medical kit. Once during the game you may either: Heal one model of d3 wounds OR return one lost model to a unit with 1 wound

Warp field
You have unleashed an unstable warp field. The unit has been infused by chaos and gains a 5+ roll to ignore any wound. If the unit does not include the Chaos keyword, and survives the battle, they must be destroyed! You lose d3 VP’s.

Warp field
You have unleashed an unstable warp field. The unit has been infused by chaos, its muscles morphing to incredible size. It gains either: +1 Strength OR +1 Toughness. If the unit does not include the Chaos keyword, and survives the battle, they must be destroyed! You lose d3 VP’s.

Touched by the Cosmos
One member of the unit has been touched by the very Cosmos itself. They now see, hear, and understand what few can. They are a Psycher. They gain the power to deny one psychic power a turn, and may cast following power:
Foreordained: Warp Charge 6, range 18” one friendly unit. The unit may reroll one failed armor save, each phase until your next psychic phase. SPACE HULK

Extra Ammo
The unit has found a bag of clips, extra battery packs, whatever. Keep this card. Use it once to allows a single model in a unit to fire its weapon a second time in a the shooting phase or during Overwatch. If you have not used this card at the end of the game, gain 1VP.

Hull Breach
You have uncovered a hull breach by accident. Roll 2d6+1. Subtract the distance in inches (rounded down) PLUS the strength of every model nearby. If result is positive, that model has been sucked from the hulk and is removed from the game. No VP’s awarded to anyone.

Remnants of Crew
You have found remnants of the crew of the space hulk. Roll a d6:
• 1: The corpse has a virilant disease. Your unit suffers a d3-1 Mortal Wounds.
• 2-3: Indentification papers tell something about what happened; Gain 1 VP
• 4-5: An officer with a log telling of the spacehulks last days; Gain d3 VP’s
• 6: The body is famous (a leader, wanted man, hero, etc) Who holds a relic. Pick one from your codex and give it to a character.

Remnants of Crew
You have found remnants of the crew of the space hulk. Roll a d6:
• 1: The corpse has a virilant disease. Your unit suffers a d3-1 Mortal Wounds.
• 2-3: Indentification papers tell something about what happened; Gain 1 VP
• 4-5: An officer with a log telling of the spacehulks last days; Gain d3 VP’s
• 6: The body is famous (a leader, wanted man, hero, etc) Who holds a relic. Pick one from your codex and give it to a character.

Warp Rift
The unit is sucked into a warp rift, appearing in a location exactly 3d6” from current chosen by the owning player. They cannot end this move closer than 9” to an enemy (Yes, this limits choices (if somehow this means they cannot warp at all, lengthen the distance until they can)). They may act as normal, but suffer -1 to all to hit rolls due to disorientation. SPACE HULK

Data Trove
The unit has found a valuable data trove. You gain d3 VP’s. SPACE HULK

Nav Console
You have found one of the back-ups for the nav console. The information is invaluable. Gain d3 VP’s.


Noxious Gas
The room suddenly fills with noxious gas. Each unit with a model within 2d6” suffers a d6-2 Mortal Wounds. These wounds do not count for any player for VP conditions. SPACE HULK

Weapons Locker
You have found a discarded weapon or one stored for anti-boarding purposes. You may add one special weapon or one melee weapon to the unit from your codex’s list.

I like these, generally. Skeptical of Weapons Locker; it's a very Space Marine-centric view to assume that every unit has a "special weapon" it could grab (there are units in the game (ex. Aspect Warriors) that don't have upgrade weapons, and units (ex. Custodians) that can only use a different weapon if they drop the one they've got), and it might just result in nonsense (a Tyranid found a bio-weapon in a locker and integrated it into its physiology?).

You might also look at incorporating ideas from Cities of Death (expansion in Chapter Approved 2018) or old-school Zone Mortalis (rules were printed in Badab War for 6e and in Heresy for 7e) to better represent tight/enclosed spaces.

@Anomander Rake
Thanks for some ideas, input! Discussing this stuff with different view points, play styles whatever really helps me out. I feed off of shared imagination/discussion.
The rules are pretty tentative, and my group is really good at adjusting on the fly. We are really trying to add more tactical maneuvering and planning into the game on the board, rather than buy super efficient damage unit, place and win.
To some of your specifics:

I do not play Tau, and the guy who does, plays them rarely (for some reason in space hulk he doesn't want to bring his primaris) so didn't realize the keyword was there. Apparently he didn't either the first game we played...we are all discussing what units seem to fit and wont be unbalancing, something involving a lot of opinion. (edit: are you sure crisis suits have the infantry keyword? My friend just checked his codex, and says no...stealthsuits, yes)
Points should seem to be that way, but this is GW and they absolutely do NOT work as a balancing factor at this level. (A smash captain or equivalent is ridiculous against squads of 5 or so guys scattered about (My primaris psycher turned out to be absolutely devastating (the ogrynn bodyguard didn't hurt), and Our custodes player has chosen not to bring them for balance reasons. Fortunately, we have a group that will work these things out.)

On model count, I forgot to retype it in, but our rule is half the unit size rounded up. We are trying to increase the number of different units a player has command of, so splitting forces etc becomes more tactically possible. Now again we might make an exception for the tau suits. I don't know there cost, etc, so need some research there. I continue to lobby for rough riders...

As to the max model number...
That is a newer tentative rule we would stretch for certain players. I am the guard player in my group and have had no problem reaching 500 points without hitting the 35 limit with 3 separate builds (One is a 6 bullgrynn build, one vets or command squads with lots of special weapons (the half squad rule means I can buy 3 special weapons per 5 man vet squad) and one using elite characters. I do completely see it with standard 4 point models. We are encouraging elite style forces (not the category, but the adjective)). We had an issue with the 40+ armies taking longer than we as players wanted to for their turns. We have also debated lowering the point total here. Remember, these are free for all style games with usually 4-5 players.

Cover: I just bought furniture and consoles and stuff for the space hulk board I have, so we will have to revamp the cover rules when its here. We simplified for our own reasons. My entire group absolutely HATES the true LOS rules. They are miserable in the game because neither the models, nor the terrain is built to a uniform scale and so it gets silly (for example, in reality for true LOS, a tree should have a canopy covering 6-10 square inches at space marine scale (that would be 30-40 feet, like my fruitless mulberries out back)...none ever do. And a hill should cover half the 4x6 board.) We use the older and more uniform historically rule of area terrain. So created an equivalent for space hulk. Rooms with furniture will probably get a similar rule. Not perfect, but we like it.

Doors:
The door rule is again a super simplified thing. In the first game we just let a model open or close a door. Which worked until one player tried to hold doors shut so another couldn't open them. Which sounds reasonable, except, how does a unit know there is a unit on the other side of a door in the middle of all the explosions etc. (we rolled off on the door by the way). It got lame, massively restricting, and in reality ruined what should have been this great last ditch effort all but that player wanted to see happen.
We will add in the ability to open a shut door (or eliminate the rule and doors are just open etc) it is a trade off for faster vs realistic I guess. Units should be able to melt a door, blow it open, etc. Thanks for reminding us!

The advance move:
We want the forces to spread out a lot more than they did the first time we played this. And the nature of the table set up meant there were a lot of empty corridors and space (particularly when we had an odd number of players...one was too far from all but one other opponent, and at one end of the board, two players just fought each other because there wasn't enough movement to get to far objectives. We are refining the layout of the boards (modular terrain walls etc from Death-ray designs) and adding more rooms I built the last few weeks.

I also failed to copy paste the correct rule for drawing chits. (I pasted from an older suggestion by mistake) It is once per battle round. So the player who draws first, goes first in each phase (with one possible exception involving the VP system) and the order follows the same as picked in that movement phase. In addition, no player can go first twice until all have gone first once. So when a players chit is drawn and he goes first in a round, his chit is NOT replaced in the bag.
I also like the alternating activations. We are taking that suggestion and using it. Appreciate that!

The stratagem ideas is also a work in progress. you may be right about not unbalancing (the only one I worry about is the Overwatch. My guard has a ton of plasma, primaris can, etc. We don't want to make charging a suicide mission)
Which also reminds me, I want to add one for CC guys to swing at models falling back (I am a real proponent of the enemy models should get an OVERWATCH equivalent when models use the fall back rule)
As to the move again, read it carefully. it can be used in ANY movement phase, including an opponent's to react to his move. So a bit more powerful than the guards order. Not sure this needs to be limited either, but we'll see.

Again you are absolutely right on the one special card you pointed out. I need to rework that so it can benefit anyone who finds it (maybe rewrite it to just add a special weapon from your codex list?)

Some of the others are new and somewhat random, others have been changed. The first two time we played, the noxious gas was written as everyone in a room, and went off in the giant central hold. Like 15 models died to it (four of five players, all had multiple units about). Which was funny, but completely decided the game (the player NOT in the room basically won right there)
The vacuum one needed a rewrite too. In its first iteration, it was pick a spot, and so became assassinate a character. Now it's basically where the card is found (the piece of terrain searched)

I do not (nor any of our group) own ANY of the GW skirmish level rules. Clearly by this post we find them not worth the cost, although that doesn't mean they do not have some good ideas. We definitely sum up the word Garagehammer as a group and mentality (which is NOT knocking tournament players in any way, but clearly for us theme and the idea of small unit fights at squad leader level drive us: We tend to have painted (or work in progress) armies, aim for but do not insist on WYSIWYG, and avoid named characters. Three of us regularly go to our local FLGS tournaments, where we do fair and generally end up 4th to 10th behind the same exact three players and lists in a field of 12-20. We of course, bring TAC style mono codex lists...and get what we deserve.