"...this combination of nerd bloodthirst and recreational math must be celebrated." I don't know where, I don't know when, but inevitably I will find a use for this beautiful phrasing. I thank you for introducing it to the world.
Thanks for the memories. Spent many hours playing SFB - had the laminated sheets and everything. Great thing was the solo scenarios in case I couldn't rope my friends into it!
I always find it interesting how poorly heavily stats and rules based boardgames transition to computers. You'd think they'd work well, what with the electronic superbrain handling all the calculations, but it turns out that when you let the computer do those bits then your own brain loses track of how it all actually works, and all the nooks and crannies of the ruleset, and the ability to house-rule around things.
Computer moderation starts to feel arbitrary and capricious, because all the gears aren't right there in front of you so you see how it's working. Random chances start to feel biased. It's a weird psychological effect.
It's funny because, due to my age, my initiation to the hobby happened during the transition to narrative systems e.g. WoD, LARP, etc. However, when I see many of the modern, diceless masterless playerless indie games with their conceptual skills that can be used in every conflict and throws that calculate how cool you are while doing The Thing™️, and tables that want to skip even the minimal effort to create the concept of your character, I can't help but hear my inner grognard grumble "bring back THAC0, you cowards".
In high school my gaming group a couple of SFB campaigns. We would have one big map that represented the galaxy (or something) and we would start with a home planet and then send out ships to make colonies and when we ran into each other we would break out the combat map and do ship-to-ship battles.
We had some HUGE battles sometimes. It was great fun. I think the first campaign went until someone finally attacked another player's homeworld and was surprised to find out they had abandoned building ships and instead just filled the board with mines. The battle was one turn, but it took us all night to allocate the damage because the mines blew up the smaller ships, then the explosion of those finished off the medium ships and the explosions of those finished off the really big battle ships. That evening is burned into my memory. :D
Looking at the ship health and the tables and so on, I am extremely reminded of Battletech. Another board game for those of us who want to spreadsheet someone to death!
I first heard of Star Fleet Battles through a video game: Star Trek Starfleet Command. The game is pretty heavily based on SFB, and although it does simplify a lot of the crunchy parts, it's still a decent adaptation.
The first game doesn't have some of the exotic stuff like ISC, and I think they had to change Kzinti to Lyrans, due to copyright issues.
However, the CD for the first game had PDFs for a starter version of SFB, so I printed that out on my dinghy inkjet printer and tried to play it on my own. It was OK, but I was bummed out because I couldn't get any of my friends interested in it.
I still have it in the back of my mind, and I've seen a few games pop up in recent years that have the same concept.
All in all, it was awesome to read about Jeff's experience with the game :)
I played this game like crazy in the 1980s and early 90s!
I had everything! All the expansions! Even X-ships! All organized in a humungous binder. I remember playing fleet actions with a dozen people running various ships in teams and tournament duels. We used the plastic sleeves, but switched from grease pencils to erasable markers because the fine tips made energy allocation easier to write.
We tried every variant. Hidden cloaks, plotted movement, and the monster scenarios. We played a lot of tournament duels. I once entered and won a tournament with the ISC cruiser. No one knew how to fight it!
During one too many moves, I put the whole box into the recycling thinking I would never play again. I regret it. It is the most complex board game I ever played and I would play it again given the chance. Recreational spreadsheets and all!
What a blast of nostalgia! You might not like hearing this, but my uncle had this game. I was always desperate to play it. I don't think I ever learned how beyond rules I made up from guessing at the boxes on the ship diagrams (the ship diagrams were the only part that held my interest) and maybe an attempt or two he might have made to give me a vague idea how it was supposed to work. For some reason, I had a lot of those ship layout pages. I'm not sure if he gave me copies, if I borrowed the game, or if he just outright gave them to me! They awakened the giant ship-or-robot customization itch despite not being for that purpose.
I had always dismissed Starfleet Battles for providing awkward, since-retconned information. However, with hundreds of pages of rules, I may have to enrich myself...
SFB is the reason I'm the only editor at my technical publishing company who came in on day 1 knowing what errata were and how they worked.
"...this combination of nerd bloodthirst and recreational math must be celebrated." I don't know where, I don't know when, but inevitably I will find a use for this beautiful phrasing. I thank you for introducing it to the world.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/sfbcadet/?ref=share&mibextid=NSMWBT
There is a Facebook group
Great game, still have some components. Trying to get friends to play very difficult.
My friends were JUST talking about how to put together an SFB match the next time we get together... are the space mind control lasers on?
Thanks for the memories. Spent many hours playing SFB - had the laminated sheets and everything. Great thing was the solo scenarios in case I couldn't rope my friends into it!
How in the hell did I miss that Avernum 4 Kickstarter!?!? Rectified.
I always find it interesting how poorly heavily stats and rules based boardgames transition to computers. You'd think they'd work well, what with the electronic superbrain handling all the calculations, but it turns out that when you let the computer do those bits then your own brain loses track of how it all actually works, and all the nooks and crannies of the ruleset, and the ability to house-rule around things.
Computer moderation starts to feel arbitrary and capricious, because all the gears aren't right there in front of you so you see how it's working. Random chances start to feel biased. It's a weird psychological effect.
Starfleet Command 1 and 2 are loosely based on the game.
And more than 20 years ago I found some very basic computer game based on SFB, never been able to find it again.
Something changed fundamentally when RPGs stopped being dominated by math nerds and started becoming a haven for theater nerds.
I could go on at GREAT length about the generational differences in D&D players.
It's funny because, due to my age, my initiation to the hobby happened during the transition to narrative systems e.g. WoD, LARP, etc. However, when I see many of the modern, diceless masterless playerless indie games with their conceptual skills that can be used in every conflict and throws that calculate how cool you are while doing The Thing™️, and tables that want to skip even the minimal effort to create the concept of your character, I can't help but hear my inner grognard grumble "bring back THAC0, you cowards".
In high school my gaming group a couple of SFB campaigns. We would have one big map that represented the galaxy (or something) and we would start with a home planet and then send out ships to make colonies and when we ran into each other we would break out the combat map and do ship-to-ship battles.
We had some HUGE battles sometimes. It was great fun. I think the first campaign went until someone finally attacked another player's homeworld and was surprised to find out they had abandoned building ships and instead just filled the board with mines. The battle was one turn, but it took us all night to allocate the damage because the mines blew up the smaller ships, then the explosion of those finished off the medium ships and the explosions of those finished off the really big battle ships. That evening is burned into my memory. :D
Looking at the ship health and the tables and so on, I am extremely reminded of Battletech. Another board game for those of us who want to spreadsheet someone to death!
I played a lot of Battletech too. Star Fleet Battles was wayyy crunchier.
Agreed (and, to illustrate, the most fun way to play Battletech is outdoors at a park with tape measures).
I first heard of Star Fleet Battles through a video game: Star Trek Starfleet Command. The game is pretty heavily based on SFB, and although it does simplify a lot of the crunchy parts, it's still a decent adaptation.
The first game doesn't have some of the exotic stuff like ISC, and I think they had to change Kzinti to Lyrans, due to copyright issues.
However, the CD for the first game had PDFs for a starter version of SFB, so I printed that out on my dinghy inkjet printer and tried to play it on my own. It was OK, but I was bummed out because I couldn't get any of my friends interested in it.
I still have it in the back of my mind, and I've seen a few games pop up in recent years that have the same concept.
All in all, it was awesome to read about Jeff's experience with the game :)
I played this game like crazy in the 1980s and early 90s!
I had everything! All the expansions! Even X-ships! All organized in a humungous binder. I remember playing fleet actions with a dozen people running various ships in teams and tournament duels. We used the plastic sleeves, but switched from grease pencils to erasable markers because the fine tips made energy allocation easier to write.
We tried every variant. Hidden cloaks, plotted movement, and the monster scenarios. We played a lot of tournament duels. I once entered and won a tournament with the ISC cruiser. No one knew how to fight it!
During one too many moves, I put the whole box into the recycling thinking I would never play again. I regret it. It is the most complex board game I ever played and I would play it again given the chance. Recreational spreadsheets and all!
What a blast of nostalgia! You might not like hearing this, but my uncle had this game. I was always desperate to play it. I don't think I ever learned how beyond rules I made up from guessing at the boxes on the ship diagrams (the ship diagrams were the only part that held my interest) and maybe an attempt or two he might have made to give me a vague idea how it was supposed to work. For some reason, I had a lot of those ship layout pages. I'm not sure if he gave me copies, if I borrowed the game, or if he just outright gave them to me! They awakened the giant ship-or-robot customization itch despite not being for that purpose.
I had always dismissed Starfleet Battles for providing awkward, since-retconned information. However, with hundreds of pages of rules, I may have to enrich myself...
"Gaming today doesn't use enough grease pencils." Couldn't agree more. Never heard of it but looks like something I would obsess over.