Firestorm Strike Force: Fighter Combat in the FSA Universe!

[Ruckdog]

Just posted on the SG blog!

http://www.spartangames.co.uk/firestorm-strike-force-arrives

Firestorm: Strike Force

Last year (2016) when the planning for the Firestorm Galaxy Expansion took place, the idea of a fighter combat addition to the Firestorm Galaxy was proposed. At the time, it was decided that we would develop the game along the following guidelines:

• Fast and Furious game play
  Out-of-the-box solution – with no painting required
  Pre-coloured models coded to each Firestorm Core Race
  A Game Zone needed to be supplied – 24” x 24” minimum
  The Game Zone MUST be modular
  No dice
  No tape measures
  Deck Building capability
  Ease of future expansion
  Affordable entry point into the Firestorm Galaxy

And that is just what we have created with Firestorm: Strike Force. An exciting game which delivers on ALL of the design goals above.

The Rules

Intuitive and easy to master, the Firestorm: Strike Force rules are card-driven and allow for huge levels of variation and expansion. Starting with their Basic Deck, gamers then build their Custom Deck by choosing from three initial categories: Advanced, Mission and Faction. However, beyond these initial categories others, such as Strike Commander, Campaign, etc. will be introduced. This will open up a world of opportunity for gamers!

Welp, looks like the Spartan tradition of game ADD continues 

On the good side, this looks pretty neat!

[Fracas]

Substantial comments be spartan Neil in the forum thread
http://community.spartangames.co.uk/index.php?/topic/21284-so-uh-fighter-combat/

[Ruckdog]

Thanks for the tip!

Here is the quote:

Hi All,

Let's see if I can comment on some of these questions:

Scale: yes to smaller than Planetfall. As to using them as proxies in FA, you could I am sure, but as part of the new 3.0 work for FA we have created brand new 3D fighters and bombers which look much better than our flat tokens. You will see them in our Kickstarter.

New races becoming Core Races: With the newly created narrative the Saurians and Pathogen will take a greater role in the game. Overall though we are using 3,0 as a vehicle to better integrate a number of our alliance races into the centre space of the game.

Why a board game: good question and has a longer answer than I will ask you to read here, but we have a Q&A going up Monday which goes into much more detail. We get asked a lot for products which generate aa simple entry into our game worlds. After GenCon 2 years ago we created Taskforce and Fleet Action to try and assist in generating a simpler entry point to FA and DW. As to whether they worked, they proved popular in some areas, but were perhaps not the most perfect gateway into our worlds. A board game is a simple entry point and once built places limited demand on a company's resources, much less than a full blown game.

Are we targeting X-Wing: made me smile, and a clear no. Last time I looked X-Wing wasn't a board game. FFG has done a wonderful job with that game. Firestorm: Strike Force is a new type of game for us which adds a new dimension of fun to the FA Galaxy in the nature of a board game, hence being played on game tiles.

FA Kickstarter: there is some overlap with the new board game and the Kickstarter, but our work on the FA Expansion has been underway for sometime now. Just to be clear, the Expansion revolves around my 3.0 rulebook. This is my vision for where I am taking the galaxy and FA game and delivers on improvements I want for the game. So 3.0 is a key part of the game's advancement and has generated a whole batch of things: new core nation models, new races, a massive revamp of narrative, delivery through new books, terrain, and so on.

But at the heart of the changes is 3.0. The way we have changed SRS means new products are needed. New use of flight stands, which can be retro fitted to players models if they want. New narrative delivers new factions which ignite a whole new series of campaigns and further ignites the narrative. Part of this will see an effort to develop narrative based on your gaming experiences - we want to have your experiences develop aspects of the narrative - we think we know how and we really hope with your help we can pull it off. But we've never dine it before and we may well fail with it, but I really think it is worth a go.

Spreading ourselves too thin: always an issue and we are looking at how to resolve this. If you look at Dystopian Wars we have moved that game on leaps and bounds this year. New rules, new core models, new stats and a roll out plan that is embracing our allied nations. We are delivering on our research and are hugely happy with our work this year to get on top of the game and its player base. Legions has a great set of models, but we've not matched the models with a great set of rules - that has got away from me and I am still working on figuring out how to fix it.

Firestorm Armada and Planetfall need work, we all know that. Right now it is frustrating for folk, and I apologise for that, but we are close to detailing how the galaxy and game system will develop. As I mentioned earlier, we have built a new rulebook, lots of focus on narrative (masses of effort placed on this bit) and 3.0 has spurred us to look at the whole game system and all existing models and all new models moving forward.

Going to stop now, I have a Scout Hut to go and clean (it being Sunday and my wife thinking I don't have enough to do..) but I am coming back later to continue my answers.

All the best,

Neil

[Fracas]

This bit is interesting

"New races becoming Core Races: With the newly created narrative the Saurians and Pathogen will take a greater role in the game. Overall though we are using 3,0 as a vehicle to better integrate a number of our alliance races into the centre space of the game"

[Charbe86]

It looks interesting, but I'll want to see more details about the card mechanics before I invest any money in it.  Deck mechanics alway make me think pay-to-win, hopefully spartan stick to their track record on that front.

[Dakkar]

Arg ... it really does feel like system ADD again for Spartan. But hey, at least they didn't Kickstarter this one!

My patience is VERY thin now though (Sorry, Captain America...)

How long has it been since the last Planetfall Release? And weren't we supposed to have seen some 3.0 rules or more news by now?

I'd probably auction ALL my excess faction bits for FSA, DW, and HALO at the upcoming LGS auction...IF I thought anyone would buy them. :-( But still, my desire to do multiple factions for anything Spartan these days is gone...

[McKInstry]

I'm just not sure Spartan gets "it". This new game may be a great game with neat components but it has been announced on the heels of an FSA kickstarter initial push while many if not most hardcore DW fans are still waiting on Kickstarters and new preorder stuff and Planetfall and Legions fans have been feeling very abandoned and Halo/Halo Ground folks are if not abandoned, feeling a creeping silence.

Spartan is better lately at some communications but even their hardcore fans get irked at the constant ADHD behavior.