"GZG - Full Thrust Light, FREE!" Topic

I've just posted this as a news item, but it may take a couple of days to work its way through the queue – so I hope no-one minds me posting it here directly….

We are pleased to announce that, in between doing new starships and stuff, we've at last managed to get put together something that we've been intending to do for ages – an all-new, all "OFFICIAL" self-contained intro to the FULL THRUST rules, which we're giving away FREE in both pdf and printed versions! FULL THRUST LIGHT is just two A4 pages of rules, plus 2 ready-prepared record sheets of (different) generic ship designs ideal for use with our FT INTRO PACK 2-fleet deals.
FT LIGHT is basically the simplest core rules of the game brought up to the current standard (what we've been calling "FT2.5"); there are a couple of little tweaks that veteran players will spot, but no major changes. It has been written as an ideal introduction to the system for new players, and we hope it will be especially useful for getting younger players into the game.
The pdf version is already up on the "downloads" page of the store site (www.gzg.com), and is completely free of charge, so rush over there now and get a copy! We're also having a load of sets printed up as hardcopies, to give away at shows and with mailorders for FT ships – we'll have them at Salute this weekend (April 19th), free for the asking to anyone who buys any FT ships from us.

Enjoy! :-)

Jon (GZG)

Is this the precursor to a full revised version coming along any time soon, Jon? Awesome idea, btw – hope loads of people pick it up :)

Have you got time between now and Salute to knock up 'Lite' versions of Dirtside and Stargrunt for idiots like me? ;-p

Yes and no, Bob – it's an interim thing until FT 3rd Ed. gets done, which IS actually getting closer at last – but the main idea is to have a cohesive intro to the basic system, which has been lacking since the FB1/2 rules modified so much of what was in the core of FT2.

Jon (GZG)

We need official stats on the all the old and new available FT ships. :P :)

I hear Dean at StarRanger is working on stats for all the new ships for the old fleets.

Go to star-ranger.com/Home.htm

Robert

Yup, stats for all the new minis soon, but if Jon keeps releasing more new minis, I'll never get done.

Then let's hope you never get done, right?

Hmmm. Multiple drives.

"Hmmm. Multiple drives."

Yes, that's pretty much the only significant rule change from FT2.5 – something we plan to introduce in FT3, so we put it in here. It really doesn't change very much (except there is now a chance that you CAN lose all drives to a bad threshold if you're unlucky), in fact it simplifies the threshold rules because we now don't need a special rule for drive hits.

Jon (GZG)

How bad would THAT suck, right? To lose both drives from a single check?

Excellent, Jon! I'm looking forward to FT3.

This is cool, but also hilarious.

Who reads Full Thrust, and says "gee, if only it weren't so complicated…"

-Kle.

It's not that it's complicated; it's that the rules are spread over 4 books, some parts replace others, and yet other parts may or may not be compatible with the later material.

"It's not that it's complicated; it's that the rules are spread over 4 books, some parts replace others, and yet other parts may or may not be compatible with the later material."

Precisely. FT Light is the first step towards getting FT back to easier-to-use coherency again, by giving people a basic intro that conforms to FT2.5 and will stay current for FT3.

Jon (GZG)

This reeks of Awesome.

Oh, at last a glimmer of FT3!

How bad would THAT suck, right? To lose both drives from a single check?

OTOH, now that it's two seperate systems, you can assign twice as many damage control teams to them when they're all the way down, which should increase your chances of getting at least some thrust back on line. And it'll always be better to spread your crews around so there's a chance of getting a full repair.

Silver lining of sorts, anyway.

All the example ships have exactly two drives – will FT3 allow for ones with 1 or 3+ drives?

"All the example ships have exactly two drives – will FT3 allow for ones with 1 or 3+ drives?"

Yes. The sample ships in FT Light just happened to work out best with 2 each, but you'll be able to put your eggs in as many or few baskets as you like, provided each drive has an integer thrust value. A thrust-4 ship will be able to have a single 4, two 2s, four 1s or even (probably*) a 2 and two 1s.

[* I say "probably" because we'll have to make sure this doesn't do anything odd to the costings, but it makes PSB sense – one main drive and two secondary boosters….)

Jon (GZG)

Thanks. What does "PSB" mean?

I should say I like the idea that you can lose all thrust in a single threshold check – the old two-step system feels artificial to me.

PSB = Pseudo-Scientific Bull

Personally, I'd hope that the 'official' FT3 SSDs reflect the ship miniatures themselves; the new NSL ships, for instance, seem to have multiple sizes of drive tubes (like the Super Star Destroyer), while the FSE ones tend to go for evenly-sized tubes.

I was thinking you could even be a little more devious with the UNSC ships; those thruster pieces are common across a lot of ships; you could say that one big square one, for instance, is X MASS, and keep it the same across all the ships. Same goes for the cargo pods. This probably means that that the UNSC large SDN would be faster than the smaller SDN, though. You might end up with wasted mass, if the multiples don't work out properly.

"PSB = Pseudo-Scientific Bull****"

Exactly. A term to describe anything that sounds kind of plausible as long as you don't think about it too hard….

;-)

Awesome news Jon! No wonder I got the urge recently to dust off my fleets and start playing with them again. Great timing.

-MM