Hi guys! I've been thinking of this concept for a tabletop game for a long time
The theme is a war between space fleets for some reason (its not important) and the game is played entirely without a board, on a table or floor. The idea is that you get to choose what kind of ships you include in your fleets (big or small) and the choices you make affect your strategy and the outcome of the battle. Also, every ship has empty slots on them (big ships have more than small ships) in which you can place different kinds of add-ons: weapons, upgrades or shields. Bigger ships move slower but also have higher armor so its harder to destroy them. So basicly there are unlimited amount of options in how you build up your fleet.
During every turn players can move every ship for a distance depending on the size of the ship (the bigger the slower) and fire their weapons, but weapons can only shoot in the direction they are facing and what makes it even more interesting is that you can only change the direction of your weapons after you fire them so you must predict where the enemy will be when you get to the firing range. Also turning ships costs much movement points so its not very effective to turn your ship to aim the weapons. Whenever you shoot a ship you roll a dice to determine wether you did any damage or not. The number you have to roll is determined byt he armor of the target ship and the damage of the weapon you are firing.
Here are some of the add-on ideas I've thought about so far:
Light Cannon - Can fire twice but has very low damage so its not very effective versus high armor ships
Heavy Cannon - Fires once but has high damage. More effective against high armor ships than light cannon but not so good when fighting swarms of smaller ships.
Long-range Cannon - Has very long range and moderate damage but fires only once and cannot fire if the target is too close. Ideal for shooting targets from a safe distance.
Shield Generator - Creates a shield circle around the ship. Ships inside cannot be damaged from outside of the shield and vice versa.
Speed Booser - Increases the distance the carrier ship can move each turn
Personal Shield - Increases the armor of the carrier ship
Self-Detonator - Destroys the carrier ship and nearby ships when activated
EMP - Disables one add-on in the target ship for the next turn.
Also when the ships collide they cause damage. Bigger ships naturally deal more damage to the ship they collide to than smaller ships.
I think that there should be either 3 or 4 types of ships that both sides can choose and 1 for both side thats special to them. For the "human" side i thought the special ship would be "Battle Fortress" A square shaped ship with very high armor but very slow speed. For the "alien" side I was thinking about "Crusher" a ship that is extremely effective in crashing with other ships.
The game would either end when all the enemys ships are destroyed or the enemys mothership is destroyed. Also there could possibly be "missions" where the players get pre-organised fleets and must complete an objective to win.
I'd like to hear your opinions and ideas about this and also let me know if there is a similar game already. If its not too similar it might give me some inspiration. Thanks in advance!
