How to Play - Star Wars Armada

Card Overiew

Hull Value [Yellow] – How much damage your ship can take after shields are gone

Anti Squadron Value [Blue] – This is how many dice you get to fire at each squadron in your firing arcs

Defensive Markers [Dark Green] – These are different abilities you can do to help prevent damage from enemy fire.You get two uses out of them but if you use them both in the same turn you lose them, if just used once they regenerate.

Movement & Speed [Orange] – The numbers running along the bottom are the speed that you can go, the numbers in the squares are how many times you can adjust your turn at that speed.

Command, Squadron and Engineering [Red]

Command – This is how many command dials your ship has and how many command tokens it can hold at any one time.

Squadron – Is how many squadrons you can activate using a squadron command.

Engineering – This is used to show how skilled your crew are at repairing the ship

Shield and Shots Overview [Purple] – The diagram shows the shield values for each hull zone of your ship, plus shows how many shots each hull zone has along with what colour of dice to use.

Upgrades [Light Green] – At the bottom of the card is the upgrade bar which shows you which upgrades you can buy for your ship when it comes to building a fleet.

Points Value [Pink] – This is how much the ship costs in the fleet building mechanics.

Dice Colours

Black – Used for close combat, has the ability to roll a crit/hit

Blue – Medium range, has the ability to get Accuracy shots which cancel out defensive tokens

Red – Long range, has the ability to roll double hits and Accuracy shots.

Orders

Navigate

At the start of the game you can set your ships movement, this then can only be changed by using a navigation command or token. The command lets you change your yaw which is how many clicks you have on the movement tool by one and the token lets you change your speed.

Squadron

Most squadrons can only move or attack, not both which makes things very difficult when it comes to lining up an attack. Using a command will let you use the full squadron value of a ship e.g Victory Class Destroyer has 3 which means it can move and shoot 3 squadrons.

This happens straight away and before you even get to the squadron phase. Giving you the ability to conduct a pre emptive strike against your opponents squadrons. Using a token lets use activate one squadron so its useful to have in an emergency. This can be combined to activate more squadrons, squadron value 3 + 1 from your token lets you move and shoot 4 squadrons.

Repair

A repair command lets you use your ships full engineering value to carry out repair commands on your ship. Tasks such as 1pt – move shield from one hull zone to another 2pts – recover 1 shield

3pts – remove one damage card from your ship. So for example if your ship has an engineering value of 4 you could recover 2 shields by spending the 2pts twice. The token of this command lets you use half your engineering value so its handy to hold one in reserve to top up your shields.

A command and token can also be combined, for example you have an engineering value of 4 plus a token which takes you to 6. You could remove damage from yourself and regain one shield all at once.

Concentrate Fire

This is used to concentrate your ships efforts into damaging enemy ships. A command lets you add an extra dice of any colour available to you to add your attack pool. The token for this lets your re roll one of your dice. Once again you can combine these effects.

Defensive Tokens

These are used to help reduce damage inflicted upon you. You can use one of each type of defensive token unless the enemy has rolled an accuracy when shooting as this lets him choose what defensive token you cannot use.

Redirect – This lets you shift damage from one hull zone of your ship to another. Handy when you have plenty of ships on one flank and none of the other side, allowing you to bolster one side.

Evade – At longe range this can be use to cancel out a hit, medium range you can choose a dice for the enemy to reroll and close range it has no effect, pretty much you are too close to evade the shot.

Brace – This is used to halve the amount of damage coming in

Scatter – This lets you cancel all enemy attack dice, this is usually found on squadron heroes in manoeuvrable ships like the Tie Inteceptor.

Damage

Damage can be inflicted in two different ways, face down and face up.
Face down cards are basic damage that when they add up to your hull value will destroy your ship.
Face up cards inflict extra effect against your ship such as restriction of command, movement and firepower whilst also counting against your hull value.
Your ship cannot suffer crits whilst its shields are still up so its a good idea to keep them topped up.

Movement

The way that ships move in this game is pretty unique and i think it does a good job of showing how big these ships are and how difficult some of them must be to maneuver. Most of the bigger ships go a lot slower and cant turn nearly as tight as the faster smaller ships as you expect then again they usually trade protection and firepower to do so.

Speed Dial

This is used to show your current speed and can be adjusted using a navigate command or token.

Turning Examples
The red lines represent where the ships would end up at the end of their moves.
The Gladiator Class Destroyer has a top speed of 3, can turn 1 on all stages apart from at speed 1 when it can turn twice.

Here the destroyer is going at speed three and decides to make use of the single pivots it gets to make at each step of its movement, finishing in line with the 3 which is his speed.

Here however the destroyer is going at speed 1 and can turn a lot tighter at the sacrifice of not going as far and needing another navigate command to get back up to speed.

Squadrons

As stated before it is pretty difficult to get your squadrons in the right place when you are only able to attack or move, especially when you can only attack when you are within range one [picture at the bottom will give you an idea of how short that is]. Especially when it comes to attacking enemy ships, you usually have to use your ships like mines and sit them in the path of enemy ships and shoot as they come towards you. This is why squadron commands are a very poweful thing, allowing you to take the initiative, shoot and move[in any order] before enemy squadrons have even done anything.

Movement Value [Red] - This is how far the squadron can move, a picture at the bottom of this section shows the distance.

Hull Value [Yellow] - This shows how many hits the squadron can take, shown in the picture below on the ships base.

Anti-Squadron Attacks [Green] - This is how many attacks the squadron gets against other squadrons.

Anti-Ship Attacks [Pink] - The amount of attacks you get against ships.

Special Rules [Purple] - Almost all squadrons have a few different rules that either give them more attacks, increase range or reduce incoming damage.

Points Value [Orange] - How many points the squadron costs for fleet building.

The squadrons health and activation status [The red/blue tab that is swapped from side to side to show if it has been used] is shown on the base.

This picture shows how far the squadrons can move in relation to ships.

Conclusion
So far i am really enjoying this game with its tight but deep game mechanics with plenty of room with variety through its fleet building system. I cant wait to make up some synergized lists with ships and squadrons complimenting each other.