EM-4 Space Fighters for Tacship

I found the box of plastic 'Universal Spacecraft' from EM-4 in the loft the other day and have been working out how I can use them for Tacship. These are the old Silent Death models but are very well sculpted and cleanly moulded, with some really funky designs. I've grouped them into pairs of fighters and fighter bombers, based on similarity of design, size and shape so that I can use formations of them together in strike, interception and escort scenarios, for example. I particularly like the models demarcated by the green and red rectangles (above), with the latter as very good alien style craft. I'll see if I can find the time to get some of them prepared and painted over the weekend.

Tacship Cover

One thing missing from my downloaded copy of Tacship is a front cover, so without further a-do (whatever an a-do is?), I've adapted a cover that I designed for a set of naval rules to a space fighter format. I can't remember where the picture came from but it's rather good and captures the spirit of the rules really well. Anyway, I've now printed out the rules and put them in a handy folder ready to try out a game, once I've sorted out the EM-4 plastic space craft that I have successfully located up in the loft.

Talking of Tacship

I've found a revised record sheet for Tacship on Boardgamegeek, which is a cleaner and neater version of the one featured in the online SSFFW version of the rules. I might have a go at twiddling around with this a bit further to add a bit more customisation and some colour. I've also been considering ways in which I could organise the EM-4 plastic fighters into different factions, which is quite easy as some of them share similar design features, and how I can add some more spacecraft to build further units.

I do like the look of the Brigade Models 6mm Folgore multi-role fighter, which would scale well with the old Silent Death models, even if the rest of the Squadron Commander range doesn't really appeal that much. Anyway, I have more than enough to play around with just using the EM-4 plastic ships, so it's all systems go for a Tacship project this summer. I'll see if I can dig out the boxes of plastic space fighters when I get home from the holidays in a couple of days time.

Tacship

Cool old school artwork!

My trawl through the dusty, cobwebbed corners of my hard drive in search of simple, 'beer and pretzels' games continues! This time I unearthed a copy of Jon Tuffley's simple tactical level space fighter miniatures rules, Tacship, as published in Ragnarok Issue 3, now long out of print but available for free via the SSFFW website.

Here's a handy link:

http://www.sfsfw.org/a/03/tacship.php

How these ended up pasted into a WORD document on my hard drive is anyone's guess. I can't remember when I added them to my sci-fi collection but I must have done at some point. Anyway, they are what look to be a very straightforward but fun set of rules, with a definite emphasis on fast play and a lack of complicated book keeping, fancy turn sequences or complex mechanisms.

In fact they appear to be the perfect 'tea and a wad', space dogfighting rules with plenty of scope for designing and arming your own fighter space craft including all the whistles and bells, from pulse lasers to missiles and mines. There would be nothing to stop you adding additional type of ordnance if you wanted to or even tweaking your space fighter with extra technological add-ons, as the rules are simple enough to be adapted and extended should you wish to do so.

Groovy 70's retro typeface!

I really like the look of these rules, which have a neat thrust and velocity based movement system and can be played with hexes or without, adding another layer of flexibility. I'm thinking of using them with the old Silent Death plastic space fighters that you can now buy from EM-4 for peanuts, so this could be a very cheap and cheerful project indeed.

I'm pretty sure that I've already got a couple of boxes of these in the loft somewhere...just have to find out exactly where???