Battlestar Galactica:RS Wargaming

This is the Commander. Moments ago, this ship received word of a Cylon attack against our homeworlds is under way. We do not know the size or the disposition or the strength of the enemy forces, but all indications point to a massive assault against Colonial defenses. Admiral Nagala has taken personal command of the Fleet aboard the battlestar Atlantia following the complete destruction of Picon Fleet Headquarters in the first wave of the attacks. How, why doesn't really matter now. What does matter is that as of this moment, we are at war. You've trained for this. You're ready for this. Stand to your duties, trust your fellow shipmates, and we'll get through this.

I am big fan of Battlestar Galactica series - either Reimagined,Original or stand alone pilot Blood and Chrome,  and least but not last Diaspora:Shattered Armistance pc game.   Full thrust IMHO is well suited for BSG gaming althought maybe Colonial Battlefleet will be suit better but i dont like Hexes anyway  first decision was easy first or second Cylon war. While first war will be easy on backstory as war rages on. The second in truth is easy too, only thing which is problem is CPN backdoors that Cylons used prior to attack on Colonies. Easily this could be say that Battlestar/s are returning from training maneovers and new system will be installed after return, like in Diaspora.

I looked into Studio Bergstrom miniatures line which features stylised non-BSG miniatures , new and old Battlestars, Basestars, vipers, raiders, Raptors and so on. There are others vendors that sells non-BSG minis namely Ravenstar miniatures,B3 Designs and Novastar. these vendors also make starbases, and civilian ships along with non-canon Cylon and Colonial Fleet ships.

Jump complete. Reading debris in low orbit and multiple nuclear explosions on surface. Virgon is gone, the Fleet is gone..... Incoming DRADIS contact!Single Cylon Raider!

So where to start, If you want to start Full thrust BSG you will need capital ships - i would suggest two Battlestars, and three or four Basestars for this reason i will choose two Battleships (they looks like Columbia class)for economical reason i would start with smaller complement of Vipers four of Vipers and one or two raptor flights to count as torpedo bombers . for Cylons choice was similiar Two Heavy cruisers and two smaller Deuce light crusiers, fighter escort will be 4 wings total with respawn - when wave is destroyed Cylon player can launch another.

Galactica has seen a lot of history, gone through a lot of battles. This will be her last. She will not fail us if we do not fail her. If we succeed in our mission, Galactica will bring us home. If we don't... it doesn't matter anyway. 

to the storyline we will be following two Battlestars conducting patrol along the Red Line BSG Athena and her sister ship BSG Rhea has been sended to emergency beacon set up by Armistice station, upon discovery that Armistice station is destroyed, and receving reports of massive assault againts Colonies they racing to rescue, unlike Galactica or Pegasus their Commanders decide to make a stand.

Since we aquired place to play Full thrust in local board games store with tables to play, we possible can aquire some new players, i am wishfull thinking we can make campaing called Fall of Colonies

Hecate my alien race to Full Thrust

As great Freespace  i always wanted to create similiar race into spaceship gaming, not even BFG allow it

something similiar - i dont want space "bugs" who only feeds but something more sinister  like Shivans.

While my Mystery fleet ships or on the way i decided to create some form of background of race, since i was always RPG player/gamemaster i just love this side of hobby - creating your own background.




It begun with name Hecate - Greek goddess of witchcraft among other things, apart from that it sound menacing so who are Hecate? Know your enemy and that stuff? Well basicly humanity dont know much about Hecate and their motives. Few months ago Hecate ships appear in Ross 128 system and destroyed human instalation along with military protection detail, and then disappear. Similiar attacks happened along border worlds in whole human space but without any pattern or it seems.

Face of Enemy

Since then Human diplomats and Inteligence services tried to contact Hecate, but without any success.
Durning battle of Beta Aquille humans was able to beat off Hecate, and also recover one smaller Hecate ship and thus founding dying bodies of  their enemy. Quickly they assume that Hecate evolved in water or in low/zero gravity which gave them they main advantage, they have far more better space coordination than humans allowing them using their ships in space to its limits.
Hecate ships are faster and more maneovrable than human counterparts, thanks to different propulsion system. Weapons of Hecate starships are similiar to humans although they are using different technology in terms of power and destruction potential are similiar


After Battle of Beta Aquille the Hecate dissappear and never to return, or it seems. Humans joked about how they crushed aliens with single stroke. But truth was different, Hecate were lurking shadows and prepearing for invasion. the first who faced the invasion was Admiral of 7th fleet with his ships for first time humanity faced Hecate Light Carriers and Dreadnought, and within matters of minutes 7th Fleet fallen ill prepeared to meet this kind of threat.

After fall of 7th Fleet the humanity , lost almost every border colony forcing whole fleets to retreat to core worlds and earth itself. Will humanity be able to turn the tide and defeat Hecates are will they succumb to total destruction of human race?

Hecate Fleet (Courtesy of  http://starbase-spartan.blogspot.cz)

Capital ships space combat

While various players prefer historical or modern battlefields, there those - and iam sure that there are lot of us who love the epic battle scenes where space capital ships firing and destroying itself in deadly gauntlets.

you see it in various movies and shows - Star trek, Star wars, Battlestar Galactica, Firefly,Stargate series, Babylon 5, Battleship Yamato  and many others. same goes for books - Warhammer 40.000, Honor series, Battlestar Prometeus,Crimson worlds or even classics like Enders game. Even Pc games starting from EVE: Online, Homeworld series, Nexus to even less known games like Flotila or  Stellar Impact

There are lots of gaming rules for space combat, Firestorm:Armada, StarArmada, Task Force Zeta, Battle Fleet Gothic  to A  Sky full of Ships. but ruleset that far most popular around world is old Venerable Full Thrust which comes through various reedition and remastering by players, and with cooperation there is 3rd Edition of FT on way.

so apart from famous ranges (Babylon 5, Star Trek TOS and other official ranges) we will look on other ranges what they have to offer to casual new player.
Brigade games created ships for their own universe called Iron Cow now featured in game Stararmada X: Brigade. their range contains 10 different nations , two of them are aliens. personally i dont much like design of the ships they lacked deepth of GZG models but now the new range called british came out i changed my mind these new ships are more than good (and germans or american rep. aren´t bad either

Ground zero Games, IMHO the best and largest ranges on market up today. Created specially for Tuffleyverse which is featured in Full thrust,Dirtside II and Stargrunt II games. the Full thrust range contains 16 different nations, four of them are alien - two of biological origin, one your typical warlike aliens and lastly hightech crusties ships which were long labeled as mysterious fleet. also the models are some of the best on market , and Jon from GZG is good bloke and always there to help you out, the postage is little higher but you get your stuff here in europe really fast - in matter of days. (cca up to three days)

Zandris IV one of the smallest vendors in space gaming wargaming currently offering 3 different ranges , two oftem resambles ships from famous space combat game, there was fourth alien race but it is discontinued and offered only two ships but they were closest to the Shivans from Freespace series i have found yet. i personaly own ships from them,  and they were flawless, quick delivery worth money.





Antenocitis workshop got FATC Hiigarian fleet  that means if you join not-Vaygr forces from Z4 and these Hiigarians you can wargaming battles from HW2, the miniatures are really nice somewhat big but really nice, however you can buy them only in deal packs which is shame also the price tag isnt much player friendly.

Ravenstar miniatures got some archaic style of buying, pics of things showed on blog and you must order via
mail, pretty strange but otherwise great service. lots of non-BSG ships from Battlestars( of various size and classes) through Basestars to civilian fleet, essential for every BSG fan. he also selling his Cold navy range which are greatly designed.  they also selling some 1" scale non-BSG fighters for those who are intersted in dogfighting




Studio Bergstrom had some nicest ranges based on movie or pc series. like Ravenstar they also produce 1" Scale fighters, and few original ranges like Hive or ORC, ever want to field Rodger Young cruiser? here is your chance.

B-3 Designs is old sculptor of B5 ships for Call to Arms: Babylon 5, he got his range of his own for B5 and BSG while it is not big there are many original designs even with backstory excelent. also got range for fleetscale ST fighters and range of B5 1" scale fighters still itching to get some Star Furies and Nials for Tacship/BSG Mass combat and do some dogfighting.

Agents of Gaming aren´t sculptors, they are selling old aging ranges from fallen games like Babylon 5 Wars or GROPOS. for B5 gaming you got everything here.


there is big Star ranger comunnity where not only players gather but also sculptors and vendors lots of various talk, battlereports, advices inspiration and so on. Mechworld.de is another page where some players gather but mostly Full thrust ones, MW created Full thrust Lite rulebook. and lastly there is The Miniature Page which have they own Space combat board

so still interested in epic space battles? lets gets some ships and start fighting!