Retro Thrust

RETRO THRUST

Where did it all begin, Jon Tuffley the creator for Full Thrust posted this on the GZG-L mailing list 17 February 1997

Jon Tuffley

RETRO THRUST: The first ever incarnation of the rules that eventually developed into FULL THRUST!

A little bit of history: This is a rewriting (as near as I can remember - I don't have a surviving copy anywhere!) of the first "back of a postcard" rules for space battles that I designed in the mid-seventies, while still at school. They were never designed for publication, but many battles were happily won and lost on the dining-room table with vast fleet of the little starship models that Minifigs made around that time - they made just three ship sizes in each "fleet", hence the three classes used in the game; as I recall, they cost about 11p for the small ones ("destroyers"), about 20p for the "cruisers" and a massive 35p or so for the "battleship" - the fleets were built up though many small mail-orders of pocket money!

Somewhere in a deep drawer I still have some of these ships...

Over the years the rules got steadily refined, added to and rewritten until I arrived at the first published version of FULL THRUST in 1991. What is written here is a far cry from FT, but you will see the roots of many of the ideas - it still makes a great "beer & pretzels" game, so give it a try sometime!

SHIP CLASSES

There are three ship classes:

DESTROYERS (little ones)
CRUISERS (medium ones)
BATTLESHIPS (big ones)

All ships of the same class have the same specs (no racial variations).

MOVEMENT

Orders are written secretly in advance, just as in FT. The same 12 "courses" of the clockface are used to indicate direction (usually with a fixed plane of reference on the tabletop, so course 12 is always towards the same point and not relative to the ship).

Velocity does not have to be recorded, as ships can be ordered to move any distance up to a set maximum for each class (forget realism, think E.E.Doc Smith - can you say Bergenholms...?). Orders specify just course and speed for that turn.

Originally we allowed any course change in a turn, so ships could move in any direction they wished ( a real "inertia less drive"), but you could limit course changes to 3 points (90 degrees), or different limits per class if you prefer.

Maximum moves (speeds) are:

DESTROYERS 18"
CRUISERS 12"
BATTLESHIPS 6"

TURN SEQUENCE

Write orders
Move ships
Alternate fire by ship (as per FT)

COMBAT

There is only one type of weapon (beam): it has a range of 18", and rolls 1D6. Damage/hits are as per basic FT, ie:

1-3 : no hits
4-5 : 1 hit
6: 2 hits

Ships have FORE and AFT fire arcs, each 180 degrees.

DESTROYERS have ONE beam system, mounted FORWARD only - no rear armament
CRUISERS have one beam FORE and one AFT
BATTLESHIPS have TWO beams forward (which can fire at same or different targets) and one AFT

DAMAGE

DESTROYERS 2 hits
CRUISERS 4 hits
BATTLESHIPS 6 hits

When a ship has taken all its hits it is destroyed and removed. Ships may move and fire at full capability until destroyed (ie: no critical hits or thresholds).

SHIP STATS SUMMARY

DESTROYER: Max Speed 18"; Fore armament: 1 beam; Aft: none. 2 hits (damage points)
CRUISER: Max Speed 12"; Fore armament: 1 beam; Aft: 1 beam. 4 hits
BATTLESHIP: Max Speed 6"; Fore armament: 2 beams; Aft: 1 beam. 6 hits

So, there it is - the seed that grew into Full Thrust (or the bits that Dr.Frankenstein put together, depending on how you look at it....) Happy lasering!

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