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The Game
Space Fleet - The Boxed Game
Space Fleet is a spaceship combat game set in the fictional Warhammer 40,000 universe. It was released by Games Workshop in 1991 and was pulled off the shelves after a relatively short period of time. It came in a rectangular box, similar to a few other entry-level games of the time, such as "Space Marines," "Kerrunch," and "Dungeon Masters."
The box contains six square space game boards, two plastic Imperial battleships, two plastic Eldar battleships, a wide array of counters and cardboard sheets, and a few six-sided dice.
The rules are very simple and fit on a sheet of paper. The core mechanic revolves around a so-called "Helm Computer." This is a piece of cardboard with maneuvers printed on it. Both players move their spaceships by placing counters on the Helm Computer in secret. Then the spaceships move accordingly, so nobody knows how the opponent will move their ships. Additionally, you can freely place shield tokens around your ship to deflect damage.
Firing is simulated by throwing the dice into the box lid. On the underside, there is a 3x3 grid printed with 5 "hit" squares and 4 "miss" squares. Most of the time, it’s not the number on the dice that counts, but where the dice land on the grid. The number of spots on the dice comes into play for some special weapons, like torpedoes.
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Space Fleet the boxed game. |
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White Dwarf Extensions
The simplistic basic rules of Space Fleet received several additions in five issues of the White Dwarf hobby magazine. These issues are:
- White Dwarf No. 139 (July 1991)
- White Dwarf No. 140 (August 1991)
- White Dwarf No. 141 (September 1991)
- White Dwarf No. 146 (February 1992)
- White Dwarf No. 147 (March 1992)
However, these rules could hardly be described as an "extension" due to the sheer amount of new rules and material introduced. It seems more like there was a nearly fully developed main game that got reduced to a simpler boxed game version. In fact, no rule of the boxed game is left untouched, making the original rule slip of paper unnecessary.
There are 17 pages of background text and artwork alone, which lay the groundwork for a future spaceship setting in the Warhammer 40,000 universe. The additions include 14 new Imperial ships, 10 Tyranid ships, and one new Eldar ship. New Helm Computers, Data Cards for all 25 new ships (including the two old ones), new counters, eight pages of scenarios, and a painting guide are also provided. Altogether, the new content amounts to over 90 pages.
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The History
It is obvious that this game was meant to be more than a simple boxed game, but something happened that halted its development. The extended rules contain hints of more
content that never appeared. For example, the text about the Emperor Capital Ship mentions that it can carry fighters, with rules for them to be provided soon. Similarly,
the Galaxy Troop ship has rules for landing operations that were never published. So, what happened?
There is no written history (to my knowledge) that describes the design process of Space Fleet, but some details are mentioned in interviews with Games Workshop game
designers from that time. Thus, one can speculate:
It’s said that sometime towards the end of the 1980s or at the start of the 1990s, Richard Halliwell, famous for Space Hulk, designed a spaceship battle tabletop game
named "Battlefleet Gothic," a name he is credited with. This information comes from a teaser in White Dwarf magazine no. 119, published in November 1989. The artworks
for the game were contributed by Tony Hough, Martin McKenna, Terry Oakes, and Jes Goodwin. Jes Goodwin's Battlefleet Gothic / Space Fleet artworks were highly influential;
as late as 2022, Games Workshop released a Navy Breacher Kill Team based on his sketches.
This game was reportedly complex and allegedly used protractors for ship movement. The development was halted, and aside from the name and the artworks later used in
Space Fleet, nothing else is known about it. It may have been influenced by the age of sail wargames of that time, of which there were many. Richard Halliwell designed
a few games that used a game board, so perhaps the grid movement was his idea, but one can only guess.
In the late 1980s to at least 1990, there was another attempt to create a spaceship wargame or to develop Halliwell's game further, this time by Jervis Johnson and
Andy Jones. This game eventually became Space Fleet. At some point during development, the name was presumably changed from Battlefleet Gothic to Spacefleet Gothic
and then to Space Fleet for unknown reasons. Space Fleet also bears some similarities to age of sail tabletop games in how the Imperial fleet has to maneuver to
effectively use the broadsides. Jervis Johnson mentioned at some point, World War I aerial games where an influence for this game too.
This game was also playtested by Andy Chambers, who didn't like it much due to the game board and the movement on a grid. He later became the lead designer of the
Battlefleet Gothic game, released in 1999. Space Fleet itself was presumably halted in its development for unknown reasons. There was a lot of material, though,
including interesting background stories about space travel and battles in the Warhammer 40,000 universe, great artworks, and molds for two plastic spaceships.
Additionally, Citadel Miniatures made new pewter spaceships and reused some pre-Warhammer 40,000 ones from earlier Citadel Miniatures spaceship ranges.
Creating plastic molds was a significant financial burden at the time, and a lot of work was put into this project. To avoid wasting this effort, Games Workshop
released a simplified boxed game version featuring the plastic spaceships. The remaining material was released in five issues of White Dwarf, albeit in a somewhat
disorganized manner. Understanding the rules spread over 90 pages across five issues required dedication, which not everyone was willing to give. The game was
presumably not a great success and was very short-lived. However, the artworks, background stories, and the concept of a Warhammer 40,000 space battle game had a
huge impact on the following decades.
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