12 turns. 1-6 players. A winning player can do so as soon as at the end of his turn he or his Alliance have colonized sufficient discovered (initially upside-down) planets, dead but mineable, friendly or, less easily, unfriendly.
A player's turn consists of adding a starship for each new planet he acquired in his previous turn, and then moving his starships to visit other planets, attack enemy starships or bases, or beat back Dead Zones if the Death Star has been activated and not yet destroyed. He can also move his base to another live planet.
The Alliance starts on Jord/Earth, but no more than the 2 highest scoring players in it can get credit for winning the game if the Alliance does, so others may emigrate to other planets to set up their base there and become independent and/or piratical Vikings.
Negotiations and alliances can become as cut-throat as in classic Diplomacy. After the 7th of 12 turns the Alliance can *start* a war with a competitor/Viking, if the latter hasn't already started a war with *it*.
Planets to be found and diplomatically (or militarily) colonized (for game-winning credit) are even out in the outer reaches, but then so is the Death Star which is a threat to everyone if awakened and usually requires everyone to set aside their competitions and even wars to defeat!
Bases - Earth being the first and central - 6 starships, 5 friendly planets, 5 unfriendly planets, 4 dead but mine-able planets, 5 asteroid markers, empty space markers, and the Death Star on a 37 hexagon space field.
-description from designer
Negotiation, Pirates, Print & Play, Science Fiction, Space Exploration, Wargame · Cooperative Game, Dice Rolling, Force Commitment, Grid Movement, Hexagon Grid, Hot Potato, Pieces as Map, Push Your Luck, Sudden Death Ending
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