Space Empires: 4X

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Space Empires: 4X
Game data
author Jim Krohn
graphic Rodger B. MacGowan , Mark Simonitch
publishing company GMT Games
Publishing year 2011
Art 4X strategy game
Teammates 2 to 4, with extension 5
Duration 180 minutes
Age from 12 years

Space Empires: 4X is a board game by the US game designer Jim Krohn. The game was published in 2011 by GMT Games . In the game, each player takes on a faction in a galaxy that he has to explore and tries to develop his technologies, build new spaceships and destroy his fellow players. The game belongs to the group of 4X games .

Theme and equipment

In the game, each player takes over a faction within a galaxy. Starting from the home planet, the players have to spread out with their spaceships in the galaxy and explore space. In doing so, they continue to expand their sphere of influence, develop their skills and manufacture new and stronger spaceships for this purpose. The raw materials required for this are captured from colonized planets or can be found when exploring space. By acting successfully, the players inevitably encounter either neutral opponents or fellow players who have to be fought and defeated. The player whose home planet was not destroyed in the end wins the game. The game is one of the so-called 4X games (English explore, expand, exploit, exterminate, in German scouting, expanding, exploiting, wiping out).

In addition to the game instructions, the game material consists of:

  • a game board measuring 55 × 73 cm
  • a total of 792 counters in four player colors
  • a 16-page rule book
  • a scenario book
  • a block of production tables
  • two black 10 sided throws
  • two orange 10-sided throws

Style of play

The game board depicts a galaxy with a honeycomb pattern. The starting areas of each player are printed in color for the standard scenario, but depend on the selected scenario and are described in the scenario book. Each player begins in a defined area and chooses a space for his home planet on which his starting spaceships will be placed. On all other hexes on the board there are counters that determine which properties the respective field has and what can be discovered on it. Spaceships are represented by counters on which attack, defense, hit and damage points can be seen. If there are spaceships from different players on the same space at the end of a movement round, fights are fought, which are decided with ten-sided dice. The dice must be thrown at the hit points of a spaceship. Attack and defense points of the spaceships as well as the developed skills of the players also influence the hit probability. A battle ends as soon as all of a player's units have been destroyed or fled.

Each game round consists of three movement rounds and an economic round. In each movement round, each player can move his spaceships in order of play, the range depends on the level of development of movement technology. With the spaceships, players must explore the galaxy with their spaceships. In doing so, they can either find new resources that have to be brought to their own planet by freighters, or discover foreign planets that can be populated with colonization ships. There are also planets that are guarded by neutral units and must first be conquered. After the three movement rounds there is always an economic round, in which the players calculate their raw materials in the form of construction points, have to pay maintenance costs for existing units and can either build new units or research new technologies. A variety of combat ships are available to the players in terms of spaceships, there are also spaceships, bases, colony ships, merchant ships, freighters, decoys, mine ships and mines. The game has a modular structure so that the players can decide before the game which parts they want to use or which not. Finally, players can place bids for the order of play for the next rounds.

What is special about the game is that the other players do not know what each player spends his construction points on. Spaceships and their number are turned around until shortly before the fight and are invisible to the other players. Each player secretly enters the researched technologies on a production table, on which all costs spent on spaceships and new technologies are recorded.

development

Development of the game began in 1990 when Jim Krohn and friends wanted to create a space 4X board game. The first ideas were developed and prototypes designed, but the playing time of six to seven next was far too long. In a first draft one could give names to individual spaceships and write them on the counters. At the end of the 2000s, GMT Games found a publisher that wanted to produce the game until it was released in 2011.

Extensions

With Close Entcounters from 2012 and Space Empires: Replicators from 2018, two expansions have already been released that add numerous additional options to the game. In addition, there is now the option of using the replicators to select a very different playable faction and, with certain scenarios, to be able to play the game with five people.

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