QSpaceHulk V1.4
Space Hulk is about the battles between heavy armoured Marine Squads and a deadly alien race, called the Genestealers. Aboard gigantic abandonned drifting spacecrafts, called space hulks, squads of space marines fight those deadly Aliens to protect colony worlds from invasion. While the Marines are protected in enhanced Dreadnought armour, called the Terminator, wielding modern firepower weaponry, there enemys move fast like giant insects and are furious foes in close combat.
Every side will use its special powers to win this deadly conflict.
SpaceHulk is a turn by turn game between the Genestealers and the Marines.
Each unit begins the turns with an amount
of APs (Action Points). Those APs are spend to move around, turn, fire, open
doors,etc... Genestealers and Blips have 6 APs. Marines have only 4 APs. When
a creature (marine or genestealer) is selected, the previous selected
creature lost the APs it has not used for this turn. As an exception, the
Marine player also have command points (see below) which deplete only at the
end of the marines turn and can be used as the APs.
As you see in the table Genestealers are far more maneuverable than the bulky marines in there Terminator Dreadnought Armors. The Genestealers should keep this in mind when planning his attacks.
This table shows the exact AP costs for each side and action. Also you see the Interface Symbols to perform the actions.
| Space Marine | Genestealer | Blip | |
| Move Forward | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Move Backward | 2 | 2 | 1 |
| Strafe | - | 1 | 1 |
| Turn 90 | 1 | 0 | - |
| Turn 180 | 2 | 1 | - |
| Shoot with bolter | 1 | - | - |
| Overwatch | 2 | - | - |
| Unjam | 2 | - | - |
| Forward & Shoot | 1 | - | - |
| Turn 90 & Shoot | 1 | - | - |
| Backward & Shoot | 2 | - | - |
| Turn 180 & Shoot | 2 | - | - |
| Fire with flamethrower | 2 | - | - |
| Reload flamethrower | 4 | - | - |
| Attack (in short range) | 1 | 1 | - |
| Open/Close door | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Example:
A Genestealer has 6 APs. Down the floor it
sees a Marine.Only 5 squares away. The Creature lurches forward and spends 5
APs to run toward the marine. The last AP he spend to Attack the Marine with
its Claws.
Command Points:
At the start of his turn the Marine Player gets 1-6 Command Points. These CPd can be considered as additional APs usable anytime with any marine, even if the marine has been deselected and thus lost its own APs.
Firing:
The Marines normally carry Storm Bolters which fire explosive shells which detonate after impact. A fine weapon to fight creatures like the Genestealers at a safe distance. Note that if you have moved or turned you may fire for free! This counts as a move & fire action (see the AP table). When a Marine fires its Storm Bolter at a target, two dices are thrown. If one of them or both show a 6 the target is removed (destroyed). If the Marine shoots again at the same target, also a 5 on one (or both) of the dices would destroy the target. This "precise Fire Bonus" is only applied for each following shoot just after the first one, at the same target and during the same turn. To get this Bonus, the Marine must stand still and keep on firing. He may not move nor fire at another target, etc.
Example:
A marine turns around a corner and sees a
Genestealer. The marine has 2 APs left so he starts to fire. He throws a 1
and a 2. Not good enaugh and now he got only 1 AP left. Desperatly he keeps
on firing and throws now a 4 and another 4....missed again. Now the player
spends one of the Command point for the marine to shoot one last time. He
throws 1 and 5. 5 is enough to hit and he kills the Stealer.
Overwatch:
A marine with a
stormbolter gun can prepare himself to fire at anything that moves in front
of him during the following Genestealers Turn. He spends 2 APs and so puts
himself into Overwatch. If anything enters or moves in his view during the
following Genestealers Turn, he fires for free at it, but only if it is
within a 12 square range. He wont get any bonuses for enduring fire at the
same target. If he rolls a double his bolter jams, leaving him helpless and
unable to fire during the rest of the genestealer turn.
Weapons only jam in overwatch mode and not
during normal fire!
If a marine in Overwatch gets in close combat
he lost overwatch automaticly.
A Flamethrower cant be used to set up an Overwatch.
Example:
A marine looks down a long hallway. Knowing
that Stealers are coming soon, he puts himself in Overwatch Mode. In the
following Stealers turn an Alien appears in the Hallway and he gets his first
shoot off. The dice shows 4 and 5. So the Genestealer evades the shoots
continuing toward the marine. The marine rolls again and comes up with 5 and
5. A double!. His Bolter jams and the Genestealer can go now for an easy
kill.
Clear Jam:
If a marine luckily survives the consequences of a Weapons Jam, he can try to clean his weapon in the following round for 2 APs.
Fire Flamethrower:
Flamethrowers can be used to slow down Genestealer Attacks or to secure Areas. A marine which carries a flamethrower may shoot at any visible square but not farther than 12 cases. Fire cost 2 APs but you can continue to fire on any visible adjacent cases for free (flame are considered transparent during the fire). At the end of the fire, flames are too big and nobody can see through them nor enter in a flamed case. For each flamed case, a flame counter is put on the case. The flamer marine can fire twice at the same place, and the case gets two flames. If a genestealer is on a flamed case, the player rolls 1 dice and the genestealer is killed on a throw of 2-6. At the end of the marine turn, one counter is removed in each case. At the end of the genestealer turn, if a creature is still in a flamed case (because the first flame didn't kill it), another roll is done and the genestealer is killed for a throw of 2-6. Usually the flamer marine gets 12 ammunitions per charger. It can reload its flamethrower for 4 APs any time.
Close Assault:
Marines should avoid close assault with Genestealers. If it happens dices are thrown to determine who survives the struggle. One dice is thrown for the Marine and three(!) for the Genestealer. The Genestealer picks the highest number and compares it with the marine dice. The winner kills the loser. Tie means both survive this round. Marine Sergants add +1 to there roll and can also force the genestealer player to reroll one dice. The second dice is taken even if it's better than the first one.
Example:
A Sergant is attacked by a Stealer. Dices
are thrown. The Sergant throws a 5 and adds +1 and ends up with a 6. The
Stealer throws 2,2 and 6. Means its a Tie. But the Sergant forces the
Genestealer to reroll the 6. He comes up with a 2 and the Sergant kills off
the Genestealer.
If the Sergant would have been a normal
Marine, who wouldn have the +1 Bonus and the chance to force a reroll, he
would have been killed by the Stealer.
At the beginning of the Turn you will be prompted to choose Entrance Zones for the Reinforcements you get this turn.
Blips:
Blips are
lifesigns picked up by the space marines' scanners. It could be a bunch of
Genestealers or a just single one roaming through the Hulk. The exact number
is only known to the Genestealer player himself. A blip can "contain" from 0
to 6 genestealers. A blip with 0 genestealer is a false alarm.
The Genestealer turn starts with getting
reinforcements in form of Blips. Every Blip must be put on an entry zone from
where the Blips will enter the Map.
When a marine spots a Blip or it moves in his view it is converted in the
number of genestealer it stands for. They are placed around the square the
Blip was, as he was spotted. The Genestealer Player can also convert a Blip
voluntarilly instead of moving it but it has to be done before it is moved.
If the conversion is unvoluntary, placement is done by marine player,
otherwise, it is done by the genestealer player. Note that if there is not
enough space to place all the genestealer, the unplaced ones are lost. (But
they are not considered as killed ... rather as never existed).
Example:
A Marine spots a Blip. The Blip was
moving down a Hallway and stood for a group of 6 Genestealers. Now the Marine
player has to convert the Blip. He places one Genestealer in the Square the
Blip occupied. Now he places one Genestealer on front of that Square and
another one behind it. The Corridor is too small to set the 3 other
Genestealers around the Blips position and so they can not be placed at
all.
In your first
games of Space Hulk, the marine player usually will lose big time. The
Genestealer will over run him and tear his team apart before he can achieve
any of his Goals. This will change when the marine player earned some
experience and can start giving the genestealers a hard time.
Here some hints to help you with your first games:
Marines
- Shoot doors! Doors are a good hiding place for Genestealers. As they can operate them like humans they will try to hide behind them or use them as cover. Also they will try to close them to force the marines to spend valuable APs to open them.
- Set Overwatch. Find good spots to control long corridors with it. Secure a Overwatching marine with a secound one also in overwatch.
- Avoid corridors with many crossings. Genestealers can outrun your marines and attack from behind.
Genestealers
- Collect large groups of Genestealers to make big assaults at the marines. Sacrifice Genestealers to Overwatching marines to provoke a weapon jams. If it Jams go for it! Try to set you Opponent under pressure.
- Use you speed. Lurk at corners and wait for marines to come in range for a close assault.
The interface
of qspacehulk is almost self-explainatory. But there is some hidden useful
features.
Game modes
About the shoot and fire command
About the entry zones
Selection of creature
Smart right-click
End of game
Options and preferences
Heuristics
Spacehulk (2nd edition) is an almost fully turn-based game. There is only two conditions where
a player must take a decision during the turn of its opponent :
We're planning to have four different modes for the game : solo with AI, HotSeat (multiplayer on the same computer),
PBEM (asynchronous multiplayer by email), Network (synchronous or real-time multiplayer). Currently only HotSeat and PBEM are usable. The game mode must be chosen at the beginning of the game
and it can't be changed during the game.
When you used the shoot or the fire command,
you usually want to shoot or fire more than once (you want to shoot to one
or more targets until they die, or you want to flame a whole corridor).
So, in the interface, you just have to click the shoot or fire button once
and then click on the targets as you want. The APs are deleted at each click
as normal. To stop shooting or firing, you just have to click another
button command. If you want to select a creature, you must click on the
"stop" button first.
The entry zone are not real cases. They are just an unknown space near the
entry point. When creatures are in an entry zone, they can only enter the
board with the "enter" command, Blips can also revert. Entering the board does
not cost any AP but this is a movement. So blips can't be reverted just after
entering (remember that blips can only be reverted at the beginning of their
turn before any movement).
When you left-click on a square of the map, all the objects in the square are displayed on the "on view" panel. There is usually no more than one selectable creature per square. The button "Select" is available if one of the object of the square is selectable. In the Entry Zones, you can have more than one selectable creature. When you left-click one time, the "On view" panel displays the first creature of the zone. You can left-click more to cycle through the list of creatures, to select the one you want.
You can also select more easily a creature by right-clicking on a square. The first selectable creature of the zone will automatically be selected. In the Entry Zone, right-click will usually select the creature with the lowest id.
If you deselect a unit (by selecting another one) when this unit has not done any action, its APs will not be deleted.
If you right-click on a square, the game will try to find the most useful action
and execute it. If a unit is already selected and you click on an empty near square,
the action will be a movement, move or turn depending on positioning.
If there is a friendly unit on the square, the action
will be to select it (be careful because this will unselect the previous one and drop its remaining APs).
If there is an enemy unit on the square, the action will be a
shoot or an attack. If there is a closed door, the action will be to open the door.
Some actions cannot be done with the right-click, so you must rely on the button panel
on the left for them : you can't close a door with the right-click, because the default action
will be to move on the square. You can't turn 180 because the default action is to move backward.
You can't revert your blip by right-clicking either.
The winning conditions are only check at the end of each turn. Whenever you think you have won the game, you must click on next turn button to activate the check. If your condition is to spend some APs on a specific computer or something like that, you just have to keep a marine in the correct square and leave him with the correspondent APs.
Currently there is only few graphical options. When you click on the button "File->Save Preferences", this will save your
the graphical preferences with the values you currently have. These values are those taken by default at the beginning of the game.
To be able to play the game fully turn-based, qspacehulk provides two heuristics which can be used
in order to avoid the decision of the opponent player. These heuristics are :
At the beginning of the game, you can decide to use the heuristics or not. This decision can be changed during
the game to avoid cheating. For PBEM game, the heuristics are obligatory.