Nomadic Raiders of the Lost Ark

Molten gobs of hot metal dripped from laser cutting breaking a square hole in the derelicts hull. The large slab dropped onto the metal grating, creating a metallic echo that filled the long corridor.

A slender bronzed leg breaches the craft's interior followed by two probing eyes that scanned the entrance. "All clear, Captain Edwards!" Called the robotic voice, waving over a sturdy bald man.

 His shadow engulfing the robot as he peered into the ship, the small Imp perched on his left shoulder cackling as it rubs its hands together. "Keehehe, what we lookin' for did time?  Continuum secrets? We got a big score last time we sold them to the L'Orani." Captain Lloyd Edward chuckled, "That's the trouble with you, Burt, you only see credits. No foresight."

The ship's interior creaked as it settled into the jungle floor, vines had started to claim the corridors, crawling and reaching to engulf every inch. "Just like they had said..." Edward moved as if he had worked aboard the hulk for years, rounding corners like he had a map deep in his mind from ages ago. His grav-boots clinging to the ceiling, jumping over some obstructing growth.

Vast control consoles expanded around him. A dark red light from the Captain's bionic eye danced around the room, stopping on a panel that was badly damaged from the battle above so many years ago. Wrenching it off, reveals an intricate network of wires and circuit boards. With practiced hands, Edward start to rearrange the wires, connecting a small power supply and removing the old burnt out one. Edward swiftly moved to a lit up console and with a few keystrokes sent a distress beacon to the Coven Empire. The encryption was old, and if his source was right, it would summon who he was looking for.

Outside the craft, the Astral Pathfinders were in place, securing the area for when trouble inevitably came. "Alright gents, let's get paid!"

This is my first time playing through Star Breach, so I only have 101 uc on each side, normally it's 120 uc.

After the test game I noticed a few mistakes when I had created my list. I gave the Mech a Hellcannon, which is from the Terror Cult, one of the factions that Nomadic Raiders can't take weapons from, but the Plasma Cannon is similar with only a 24 inch range instead of 30. I was also paying for weapons that were given to the soldiers in their profile, ie. Flym's secondary weapon is a Plasma cutlass which is normally 1 uc, but all the preset weapons are added to the total cost of the unit. I was also trying to fit the weapons to the model, which is why CLINT-66 has two Bolt Magnums.

Nomadic Raiders have two special abilities, Thick as Thieves, the 1st Mate gets to use all the Captain's skills for free as long as he is 12" and line of sight of the Captain and the other is anyone with an Initiative of 4 or more gets to take weapons from any faction (excluding a few factions like The Hive as well as Terror Cult).

The Astral Pathfinders

From left to right, back to front.

Mercenary Surgeon - Tory "The Kid" Williams
Primary Weapon: Subcompact Boltgun
Relics: 2x Opiate Packs
Skills: Field Medicine
Psychic Abilities: Mend and Push
Total: 12uc

Alpha - Captain Edward Lloyd
Primary Weapon: Subcompact Boltgun
Secondary Weapon: Plasma Cutlass
Frag/Smoke Grenades
Relic: Token of Resistance (+1 Initiative)
Skills: Ruthless Nature 1, Natural Leader 1, Deadeye
Total: 3uc for extra skill

Scrap Mech - Wrecking Ball
Primary Weapon: Plasma Cannon
Secondary Weapon: Crushing Claw
Total: 18 uc

1st Mate - Flym
Primary Weapon: Starfire Rifle (L'Orani Empire or Eldar)
Secondary Weapon: Plasma Cutlass
Smoke Grenade
Relic: Jet Wings
Skills: See Captain
Total: Free

Merchant Marine - CLINT-66
Primary Weapon: Bolt Magnum (Continuum Syndicate)
Secondary Weapon: Bolt Magnum
Krak Grenade
Relic:  Telescoping Optics ( treat all ranged attacks as close range)
Total: 24uc

Mercenary Engineer - Jaery Harper
Primary Weapon: Subcompact Boltgun
Secondary Weapon: Electrified Knife (Coven Empire)
Frag Grenade
Skills: Field Medicine
Total: 18uc

Merchant Marine - Xanthus Stern
Primary Weapon: Bolt Rifle (Scoped) (Continuum Syndicate)
Secondary Weapon: Bolt Magnum
Krak Grenade
Relic: Stolen Legionary Armor (+1 Armour)
Total: 24uc

Total: 99uc

The Coven Empire, let's just face it, it's the Tau. Get EMP Barrage disable enemy fighter's ranged weapons in the first turn on a 4-6 (I might've forgot about this one, not that ranged attacks are very effective at long range anyways). They also have Death before Dishonour, adding +1 to Initiative if they kill someone in combat (once per soldier per game.) and they don't lose Initiative during combat even after losing a round of it.

Coven Sergeant (Alpha) - Wik'tun
Primary Weapon: Pulse Jezail
Secondary Weapon: Electrified Knife
Plasma/EMP Grenade
Relic: Armored Bracing (+1 move and +1 Armour), Com-link (increase ability range by 4")
Skills: Inspiring Presence 1, Natural Leader 2
Total: 6uc

Coven Battle Priest - Sap'fleb
Primary Weapon: Electrified Battle Staff
Relic: Hover Engine, Life Pack
Psychic: School of Order
Total: 17uc

Coven Stealth Suits - Qes'leon
Primary Weapon: Incinerator
Secondary Weapon: Electrified Knife
Skills: Stealth 1
Total: 17uc

Coven Hover Drone- WX-649
Primary Weapon: Pulse Carbine
Relic: Shield Generator
Total: 8uc

Coven Veteran Trooper - Aeki'yo (with gadget)
Primary Weapon: Pulse Rifle
Secondary Weapon: Electrified Knife
Relic: Accuracy Lock
Total: 17uc

Coven Veteran Trooper - Dyl'lon
Primary Weapon: Pulse Carbine
Plasma Grenade
Relic: Accuracy Lock
Total: 19uc

Coven Trooper - Res'tor (without helmet)
Primary Weapon: Pulse Carbine
Secondary Weapon: Electrified Knife
Plasma Grenade
Total: 14uc

Total: 98

In Star Breach, soldiers have several options for actions;
Down for cover if they haven't moved, or are forced to when hit with a Covering Fire.
Mend roll a d6 to heal 1:1 of health.
Cover Fire suffer a -2 penalty to hit but pick a spot that's visible and hit everyone that's 2" of it.
Fire straight forward.
Advance Move full movement then fire at a -1 Initiative (besides mechs)
Run (Assault) Double movement, if assault declare target, enemy target can take a Fire Order if they haven't activated and shoot at -2 Initiative

Coven's starting position

Nomadic Raider's starting position

In Star Breach all the members of the warband are represented by a dice, so both sides had 7 dice, 14 dice tossed into an opaque bag and shuffled. The Coven Empire went first, advancing towards cover as it took potshots at the Nomadic Raiders.

Coven Vet with Accuracy Lock advancing, hoping to get a short off.

The veteran suffered a -1 for advancing but +1 for the Accuracy Lock so those would cancel. His target got a +1 for cover, rolling 2d6 each, and compared the dice, the difference would hit the armour of the model if the attacker got high enough on their 2d6. But Aeki'yo got a 7 plus his Initiative of 5 to get a 12. CLINT-66 used a down action as he didn't have an action yet, pulling out his dice to give him a +2 to his Initiative but giving up his turn.

Coven rushing for cover, covering the battlefield with inaccurate fire.

Flym gets a lucky shot at  Res'tor after he advanced to the ruins

The Kid tries to finish off Res'tor, but misses.

Captain Edward Lloyd has Natural Leader 1, letting him choose another soldier to take their turn after his own.

Hover Drone moves forward, giving those 6" from it a +1 to Initiative

End of turn 1

After all the dice are used on both sides, there is a Special Action Phase. Up to three Soldiers, Alpha or Specialists, can take another mini turn to Focus Fire, which removes downed and cover bonuses, Mend to roll a d6 to recover 1:1 ratio of health, Assault run only their movement to get into combat or Ambush to be given a downed token till they want to pop out and shoot when their target pops into view. I think one focus fire did connect but didn't punch through the armor.

This mission was mostly just to try out the game, so I didn't have any objective besides to play and kill each other.Star Breach has a lot more math to it, but once you know the modifiers, it gets a bit quicker. I was playing a Solo game, Slow Death Games did publish Solo rules, but I just wanted to jump in.

Second turn, the Coven went first, the Battle Priest used Mend on Res'tor, healing him up back to full health.

Aeki'yo spies an out of cover frog.

CLINT-66 got shot and went down, I think it was from Dyl'lon

Wrecking Ball used his Hellcannon, an AOE gun that is at -1 Initiative, targeting three Coven but missed all THREE! Upon reviewing mech rules, I was giving the Mech a -1 Initiative for Advancing, but mechs don't suffer Advancing penilties.

Flym throws a smoke Grenade

 Smoke Grenades last for the turn they are thrown and the next turn, giving both sides some good cover to get into position. The smoke is 6" x 4", my prop was a bit bigger lengthwise.

My name is....KKKIIIID

Tory "The Kid" was hoping to walk through the smoke, firing his handcannon into the xenos like a bad ass, but didn't quite turn out that way.

Dyl'lon firing at CLINT-66

I believe this is turn 3, the Coven take shelter against the planet's growth, also protected by the Drone.

Jaery uses Covering Fire to target the two Veterans and the Drone, hitting Dyl'lon

Battle Priest tried to Dismantle to disable enemy guns, but fails and suffers a wound 

Qes'leon tags Wrecking Ball, but his armor is too high for the Incinerator to damage him

Res'tor taking some heavy fire from Wrecking Ball's Hellcannon

On the other side of the battle, Edward tosses a grenade into the bundle of Coven

Rereading the rules, it looks like I should have only gave Edward a -1 to the grenade, instead of -2 (one for AOE and one for being a grenade) at least that's how I read it now.

The Captain inspires CLINT-66 to go right after, taking out the Shield Drone.

Tory takes out Res'tor

This was the first kill of the game, but now that most of the soldiers weren't taking -1 for advancing it helped speed up the game. It also helped that Res'tor was out of cover from one angle.

 Sep'fleb charges into "The Kid"

Sep'fleb glows with unnatural light, a deep green glow surrounding the Coven Priest. "Tory!" The Captain screams as he sees the Coven Electrified Battle Staff swing downwards across his crew mate's chest, knocking him off his feet. Sep'fleb turns his gaze to Edward, but Edward was already moving to do battle with the Priest.

During the Special Phase, Jaery takes a shot at Sep'fleb 

Captain Edward draws his Plasma Cutlass, parrying Sep'fleb's horizontal strike with his staff. The Priest recovers quickly launching another strike, but the Captain saw it coming, dodging around it and slashing at Sep'fleb's back leveling the Coven Priest. Edward picks up a small artifact that was wrapped around the priest's left arm. "We leave now! CLINT gather "The Kid" and move out. We got our prize." Just as the Coven was downed, portal opens before Captain Edward and an agent of the Continuum Syndicate steps through (that's the faction that used time manipulation, it's forbidden tech). "Well done Captain, your crew will be handsomely rewarded for the retrieval of this artifact, with it, we can stop the Coven from ruling the galaxy before it happens." In a blind of an eye, the agent, and the Astral Pathfinders disappeared with him.

It took most of the night to get through a game, but I am glad I did. I think next time I will try out the solo rules, hopefully it will make it a bit less hectic to run on my own. Star Breach seems to really offer a lot to people that want to kitbash their crews, making up some sweet looking xenos creatures for a unique look. But it also has enough factions that are basically analogues to 40k factions that it wouldn't be hard to use your kill teams.

From my play through, here are a few tips to remember for next time.

- Remember your special abilities, some are used on the first turn and never again.

- Mechs can fire their primary weapon twice or each secondary and primary, each at different targets. They also don't suffer from the penalty of advancing.

- Make good use of the Skill and Relics.

My thoughts on it as a skirmish game

Pros

The initiative system is really unique and isn't the tired back and forth. Also skills to interrupt picking out dice.

Less dice to see if you kill a model, one 2d6 roll for attacker and defender, compare result, if attacker's is higher, compare to armour value, if it's over, it does damage.

Free rules for a basic PDF, Slow Death Games has no intention of selling updates, but you can support them by picking up the Deluxe PDF.

Cons

Predetermined weapon load outs, I was going to go with The Path and make Flym basically a Jedi and give him psychic powers but he didn't fit as the Alpha  based on the model. But if you kitbash or just aren't as picky with WYSWYG then it's not much of a concern.

I'll continue to play games of Star Breach and report back, I backed the softcover rulebook and the custom dice, which does help during gameplay but regular d6 would work just as well. There are rules inside the book for multiplayer and tournaments and the community also has made summary cards for each faction.

I picked up Star Breach because my brother wasn't that into Kill Team, he found that there were too many dice rolls to see if someone was killed or just maimed. Hopefully he will enjoy Star Breach more.... and finish off his necron kill team.


Coming Soon!

Getting close to finishing up some Sisters of Battle,Cannoness, Repentia squad, Arco-Flagellants, Seraphim, about 2( or one group of 10) Battle Sisters Squad, and a Penitent Engine are on the desk. I should be able to get them done before #new40k lands.

Then maybe some Necromunda?