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Hello Commanders!

Assault Fleet Centauri has been out for just over a year now in early access in some form, and I wanted to give you an update on the game.

I'm still working diligently on refining the game, making new ships, new officer abilities, and refining the rules. In fact barely a day goes by where I'm not thinking about AFC, Section 5, or the Solar Cold War setting. I've been picking away at them all pretty diligently, but I'm only one person and this project is huge.

I thought, since it's been a year without a game update I should tell you what I've been working on.
Basically, the games been going through a full rework. I'm fundamentally changing the basic mechanics of the game, but I'm doing it in service of the spirit of the game.

Why the change?

There are two reasons why I needed to change the game. 

First of all  the mechanics are much more of a convoluted mess than I originally thought. Back in October I showed the game to a friend of mine at PAX Aus. They're a very insightful game dev and have a knack for getting to the heart of what a game is, and what does and doesn't work in a design. Up until this point I'd only showed the game to RPG players, not anyone in the industry. 

Something that became immediately apparent was that every action you could do in the game worked completely differently in a way that was just confusing to a new player.  More specifically, there were too many different ways to roll dice. Another factor in the confusion was that some mechanics were ultra granular and felt like moves in board game, while other mechanics were very loose, narrativist, and open to interpretation...and not in a fun way.

So the incongruity of the mechanics alone demanded a revision, but so did the game feel they created. 

When I originally started making this game I wanted to create a tactical rpg where success was based on the choices you made. What Version 1 of AFC turned out to be however was a board game where choosing the right move was all that mattered. I don't want a tactical game of sci-fi chess. As a player I want to be engaging with the game world as closely as possible to the way my character would be. I don't wanna be thinking about action economies and granular rules, I want it to be a narrative simulation. I want the tactical puzzle to be about considering the in universe circumstances, not board game manuvering...I'll save that for board game night

So something also needed to change in the design philosophy of mechanics. The game as it stood wasn't about making choices, it was about system mastery...and that's not what I wanted it to be.

What's Changed?

I don't want to list every little bit of rules difference, both because that'd be tedious but also because it wouldn't be useful. I'm pretty set on the major change, but still working out the details. The basics of the game, what I consider the core experience, remains unchanged. Each player still commands their own warship. Those ships are still made up of Hull Points, Weapon Systems, and Ship Abilities.  Your player character is still your ships commander and has Skills and Officer abilities. Your ship is still represented in the play space by a playing card. And as ever, a key part of your success is managing your resources.

What's changed is that the game, where ever possible, focuses more on narrative positioning than numbers stats. It now uses a decision matrix to determine the effective ness of your action, but you still roll dice. Graduating up or down dice sizes as the odds stack up for or against you. Instead of Crew abilities each ship has a number of Sub-Commanders, NPC Officers that help you lead your crew in actions. I've also done away with combat phases. Instead each officer on your ship gets to take an action. I've redesigned the Ship sheets to be more legible, coherent, and to better describe the in world capabilities of your vessel. The Officer sheets are more streamlined, and setup so you can print them on the back of your ship sheet.

There's a lot more changes that I've been making to the game but the big one is that I've moved it even further away from what other tactical rpgs are doing. This now feels even less like D&D and Starfinder, and much more like someone fused Blades in the Dark with war collage strategic simulations.

What does that mean going forward?

This Dev Log is just a declaration of intention. Its update on what I've been working on. The new version of the game is nowhere near ready for public viewing but I did want to leave you all in the dark about what I've been doing for the last 12 months. 

Right now, nothing changes for you or the game. I feel that the new mechanics are pretty big departure from what I originally released, and I don't want to steal that version of the game away from you. When version 2 of AFC  is eventually ready for the public, I'll archive version 1 but leave it available as a zip file for you all to access through the downloads. 

I hope you're as excited for version 2 as I am, thanks for reading, and Fair Winds.