Enderain Ruleset

[Bloggard]

not much posted about this for a while.

rulebook is reasonably priced now, so thinking about it - wondered if there are any more recent impressions, longer-term experiences, to be shared here ?

Good solo-play, and 'exploration' (searching / discovery etc) are key required elements for me, ideally.

* oh - and does it cover science / space fantasy stuff - I'd be using SW legion figures, so covering light-sabers and 'force' type doings would be good too ?

[Bloggard]

hmm, that's a 'no' then.

I think users Ithoriel and PeteW  were enthusiastic at one point ... ?

[Darkson71]

Never heard of it, which is strange, as a brief look at the website shows it would be the sort of game that would interest me and a few others I game with.
No entry on BoardGameGeek either.

The FB group seems dead as well - few posts, and most of them don't have any comments.

[Bloggard]

no entry on BGG - I hadn't realised that. Surprising.

The afore-mentioned LAF members were pretty positive about it 2-3 yrs ago ... hopefully they'll see this thread and have the time to chime in (and I appreciate that can be the issue) ...

[zemjw]

I'd forgotten about that one. One of the threads was https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=138693.0, so worth a look if anyone's curious.

In the end I didn't buy it. I can't quite remember why now, although I have a vague memory they didn't accept paypal. However, it might also have been because I have way too many rulesets I don't play, and actually managed to stop myself buying another one

[Bloggard]

yes Zemjw, I've mentioned those posts - I think all 2-3 yrs old, and pretty much early impressions.

was hoping for update/s.

I do get the feeling the Rules aren't really being supported / further developed now - at least there doesn't seem to have been any further formal content released.

I guess with the A5 ruleset available now, the obvious answer is 'buy it and make your own mind up!' ...

[ithoriel]

I loved Enderain (and still do) but alas those I played with did not. They were dyed in the wool 15mm WW2 Historical gamers and weird figures, odd dice and no Osprey books to use for research saw my attempts to broaden their horizons limited to two games of Enderain and one of Mars:Code Aurora (which I also really like) before we returned to 15mm Chain Of Command.

I then turned to 5 Parsecs From Home solo gaming to scratch both my sci-fi itch and my TTRPG one.

Then I went on to pills that caused me to develop gout, which I have been slowly and painfully learning to manage through diet, and gaming became something I did online using Board Game Arena to play virtual board games on those occasions when I had enough working fingers to cope.

I think the Enderain NPC activation works really well and also makes it quite suitable for solo play. I found Combat quick and easy but then I've been wargaming for around 60 years so YMMV. The "use what you have" approach to figures appealed as I had a sizeable number of 20mm figures that would be suitable (and a large number more in the "Lead Mountain Range"). The Initiative Deck gives the game a lot of replayability IMHO. With 4 players our games ran for just under 90 minutes each, fewer players should give a slightly quicker game.

[Bloggard]

Oh gosh, Ithoriel, very sorry to hear of  your health issues. Hope things are improving and you're transitioning back to miniatures gaming?

Thanks for finding the time to post your further impressions.
It's pretty clear then, that you find 5 parsecs better for solo / campaign play.

My problem is that I want to have a space fantasy (i.e. 'not-star wars' as I'll be using Legion figures) vibe and that seems at best an after-thought with the available rulesets - I guess Stargrave is closest.

And I'll add that I did try and buy Enderain today, and got some sort of Paypal error on the website - which hasn't been updated for some time I now realise.
Generally don't have any trouble (God help me) buying stuff online - although did run into another such situation where it appeared I needed to use the Shopify app - so, some evidence that the ruleset isn't actually for sale, at least for me.
Find it odd it was never made available as a PDF.

[Hobgoblin]

My problem is that I want to have a space fantasy (i.e. not-star wars as I'll be using Legion figures) vibe and that seems at best an after-thought with the available rulesets - I guess Stargrave is closest.

Do you know Rogue Planet? It's a brilliant game and a dedicated 'space fantasy' ruleset. It's by Brent Spivey, who also did The Battlefield, Mayhem and Havoc (three great games - the last, earliest one almost ruined by a lack of decent text editing). I've linked to it on Amazon, where you can get it in print for the extortionate sum of £6.43, but there's also a PDF for less than four quid on Wargames Vault. I'd recommend getting the print book - just easier. There was, at one point, a lavishly illustrated special version floating around; I bought the PDF, but it doesn't seem to be on Wargames Vault now.

Anyway, it's a massively flexible ruleset, but it's set up for Star Wars-sy stuff - heroes riding monsters, laser swords, psionic levitation of enemies, foes being sent hurtling into terrain, etc., etc. The rules are really interesting and innovative - perhaps very slightly hindered by the author's preference for initialisms for stats (so 'shooting' might be RAT or something), but that doesn't matter once you've played it for a few rounds.

[Hobgoblin]

Oh, wait - you get the PDF of the Derelict Planet edition with the standard PDF. So you could get the normal rules in print plus the two PDFs for about a tenner.

There's an in-depth review here.

[Bloggard]

hi HG, yes, I bought it on your recommendation some while ago ... and it's been beetling away in the back of my mind while pondering this subject ...

I do remember I had trouble getting 'into' it ... and wasn't encouraged when a basic rule (being prone or something like that) wasn't clear to me - I emailed the author, and he made a vague answer with a question mark - apparently unsure himself!
[** upon reflection, not at all sure that this 'issue' pertained to the RP rules- prob. another set; possibly 'chaos in carpathia' or suchlike ... ]

But will have another look. Thanks for the nudge.

I should add that it has to have a fairly robust solo-play option as only company is  my other half and she aint' gonna play ... 

I've been looking long and hard at the Battlesystems stuff - particularly 'first born', all the more so as I've picked up a load of their terrain (for the third time!).
That's got a lot of the elements I'm looking for (focus on searching / exploration etc, designed for solo etc) and I love the components, 70s Mastermind 'look' et al ...

But ... it doesn't seem very space-fantasy-ish ..., no not-light sabers, 'force' type 'magic' etc.
Wondered if you could shoe-horn stuff in from their Fantasy Maladum (stoopid name) variant - of course you can ... but would it be worth the bother ... 

[Bloggard]

* I've got the 'Derelict Planet Edition' PDF

[Hobgoblin]

Ah, good!

You might find this blog (by a forum contributor) useful. He found that Rogue Planet worked very well solo

[Bloggard]

ah, excellent, thanks.

had a quick look - in it's standard game, RP doesn't have measured movement - is that right?
that might have put me off - I'm an old fart, and things don't feel right without measuring (and tbh, grid movement - again where core space scores).

although, if that's the case I suppose it wouldn't be that difficult to bodge it in ...

[Hobgoblin]

Yes, that's right - so you do need lots of terrain. I love the measureless movement (it works very well with sci-fi terrain, I think: lots of pipes and barriers and so on), but I think Berman mentions on that blog that he ports in measured movement for most of his 40K-ish games.

You could very easily port in Song of Blades-style measuring sticks for moves and solve the problem at a stroke.