*** Welcome to piglix ***

Federation Commander

Part of the article series on
Star Fleet Universe
Games
Star Fleet Battles
Federation Commander
Federation and Empire
Prime Directive (role-playing game)
Star Fleet Battle Force
Star Trek: Starfleet Command
Star Trek: Starfleet Command II: Empires at War
Star Trek: Starfleet Command: Orion Pirates
Captain's Log

Federation Commander is a tactical starship combat board wargame system, produced and developed by Amarillo Design Bureau Inc. (ADB) It is designed to represent combat between vessels of various factions in the Star Fleet Universe, such as the United Federation of Planets and the Klingon Empire. The Star Fleet Universe is based upon a licence to use properties in the fictional Star Trek universe as it stood in 1979. Thus it includes the original series and the animated series as well as fan contributions but diverges from then and does not include anything from the movies or any subsequent television series. Much of the combat in Federation Commander is said to take place around the time of the fictional "General War", a large scale conflict in the Milky Way that involved prolonged conflict between a multitude of star-faring cultures.

Federation Commander is largely based on Star Fleet Battles (SFB), and carries over many of its basic rules and game dynamics. It was designed to be a game which would be similar to Star Fleet Battles, but which would provide more ease of learning and playability. It provides a balance between tactical nuance and ease of playability, in order to provide a game which is more accessible for newer gamers, or those with limited time constraints.

Some Star Fleet Battles rules were omitted from the game, in order to make gameplay more streamlined, and to eliminate some processes which some players found overly complex. Another motive was to make game rules and dynamics more understandable for new players.

Combat takes place as two or more players each control one or more starships represented by counters that move across a hexagonally gridded map that may include astronomical features such as stars, planets and asteroids. Players captain their ships by allocating energy to movement and a few specialised systems at the start of each turn. The turn is divided into eight sub-steps called impulses in which movement takes place and additional energy is used to activate weapons, reinforce shields and use other shipboard systems such as transporters. Depending on the capabilities of a ship it is given a particular points value. This value is used to balance game play ensuring that one side does not have an overwhelming advantage over another and can be used to calculate victory points to determine a winner by totalling the value of destroyed or disabled vessels. Scenarios exist that allow variation in the specific winning condition, such as rescuing crew from a crippled ship, gaining sensor information from a planet, escorting a freighter or surviving for a specified number of turns in the face of unbeatable odds.


...
Wikipedia

...