Played a game of Stars & Lasers Monday night at mine with two friends, and I got them to play test an idea I had for another scenario for the game, it also gave me the chance to use a few of the Bio ships, and it was an interesting game and I think everyone had fun.
The scenario was that a dying Alien Bio ship had hidden itself in an asteroid belt, two warring factions find out about this and send out two small fleets to investigate and retrieve any information they can about these strange alien ships.
To make things harder or at least to cause a little tension, the alien ship managed to send out a message for help and there is a small alien fleet on it’s way and can arrive any turn ( all I had to do was roll a double at the end of the turn with an increasing number of dice!!! )
The winner would be the player who had the closest ship to the alien on the seventh turn of the game.
The aliens win if they can destroy the other fleets ( the scenario is meant for two players I just added the aliens to spice things up, and gave me a chance to use my new ships )
Fleets were as follows –
Human fleet x 2
- Fighter Carrier with 2 x stands of fighters and 2 x stands of fighter bombers
- Heavy Cruiser
- Light Cruiser
- Frigate
- Corvette x 2
Alien fleet
- Light Cruiser
- Frigate x 2
- Stand of fighter bombers x 1
Deployment saw both human fleets set up close to the centre of the table where the alien bio ship was positioned, this was going to get very nasty very quickly.
First turn and both fleets raced into centre of the table, one fleet launched massed missiles early on and after some frantic rolling for Point Defence Systems a couple of missiles still manged to find their targets, these made a bit of a mess of a light cruiser and a corvette.
( I have to state now that for most of the night one side did more damage to itself by ramming into other ships and asteroids than it’s enemy did from shooting!! )
Both sides put out lots of laser shots taking out shields across both fleets, but no other serious damage was done.
So at the end of turn one, I rolled my 2 x D6 and tried to get a double to bring on my small alien force… and no double for me, but still the end of the next turn I would get an extra dice so that should be fine ( I would get an extra dice each turn until a double was rolled )
Turn two saw a few failed rolls to reinstate shields which would cause a few points of damage to several ships later in the turn, there was also some manoeuvring for position around the alien ship, and lots of close range shooting… and also a couple of rams between enemy ships, these were unintentional.
End of turn two and I roll my three dice….. and again no double…. Ok next turn I get four dice that will make it simple to get a double.
Turn three and four and five see lots of shooting causing some critical hits, a couple of ships take engine damage causing a loss of speed, and one ship lost some of it’s targeting systems so was firing at a -1 for the rest of the game, one side had by this time lost three ships and was just lucky that it hadn’t lost the rest, and the other fleet was still bumping into things!!
So here I am at the end of turn five, I still haven’t managed to roll a double, I am now rolling six dice… and yes, a double!!!! Finally, I get to bring on the alien ships.
Turn six, I roll for table edge and get one of the long edges so I am real close to the dead alien ship in the middle of the table, both human forces have one or two ships close by the big alien ship so I know I have to go in with all lasers firing, this I do and actually manage to take out a corvette and put some more damage on an already heavily damaged light cruiser, I also get a critical hit on the fighter carrier, but I didn’t do massive damage which was a shame.
The alien ships take shots from close range from everything that is left on the table, but no real problems as they are hard little buggers.
Turn seven, the last turn, I don’t think there was much the little alien force can do this late in the game, but they gave it their best shot, they finished off the light cruiser with some very close shots, and put a few more hits onto the fighter carrier but they just could not do enough damage to stop it getting the victory by flying within millimetres of the alien ship ( it’s funny because he had crashed into almost everything else during the night!! )
That was a fun game ( to watch ) it would have been a bit different if I could have got the alien force on the table earlier than turn six, but still the scenario seemed to work well, mainly for two players but it does work for a third if they roll doubles better than I do.
For anyone interested in seeing what the rules are like, they are on sale here – http://www.wargamevault.com/product/210571/Stars–Lasers?src=latest_rule_sets
