Four straight eight-hour days has done much for this project. The rules and three of the five scenarios are in the book (with one round of editing by me and checking by the staff to go). Two scenarios, the WYN OB, and the WYN SIT remain, but the staff has these 90% done and I will only need one round of editing and checking to wrap them up. There is a snowball's chance of the early access version out for Christmas.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Saturday, October 18, 2025 - 11:59 pm: Edit

Contents
115 introduction
209 moving through the wyn radiation barrier
332 combat around the barrier and disabled ships\
506 expanded to cover maps that show the off-maps for Lyrans and Kzintis
554, 555, 556 various WYN rules
634 scenario from TacOps totally rewritten
LDR rebellion scenario
Lyran civil war (one of many)
Romulan Civil War
Wyn war of return
wyn order of battle
wyn SIT

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, October 20, 2025 - 04:31 pm: Edit

THE OFF MAP MAPS are indeed in the product.

No, the ISC are not going to try to enter the cluster in this product, although it might be fun to add that as an option to the whirlpool scenario.

(634.42) ISC INTRUSION: There are historical references to the ISC attempting to force their way into the Cluster in Y1??. This could be done using an ISC fleet consisting of: @@@ STAFF TO WRITE OB.

By Stewart Frazier (Frazikar3) on Monday, October 20, 2025 - 06:26 pm: Edit

Wouldn't one of the Echo Forces (625.E411) plus PS0905 be used ??

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, October 20, 2025 - 08:18 pm: Edit

They should refer to that.

By Chuck Strong (Raider) on Monday, October 20, 2025 - 09:16 pm: Edit

The ISC are abstracted in the WoR. They take the cordons and the Kzinti/WYN avoid going in.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, October 20, 2025 - 10:48 pm: Edit

I actually added a "symbolic" ISC rule AS AN OPTION where an ISC fleet moves one hex closer to the capital every turn. The Usurper and Crown Prince can either...

1. Go destroy them

2. One of them finds a way to win before the ISC arrive at the Kzinti capital.

3. Face arrest and imprisonment if the ISC gets to the capital and ends the scenario.

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Wednesday, February 03, 2021 - 11:46 am: Edit

In the case of the Lyrans, would there be room for an historical scenario (or scenarios) dealing with the clashes surrounding the transition from the Dark Star County to the Democratic Dark Star County, and/or from the DDSC to the Lyran Democratic Republic? That might provide a useful tie-in to some of the LDR material over in Minor Empires. THERE IS ONE

Also, I somewhat recall there being an historical scenario covering that Lyran civil war which immediately preceded the Four Powers War. Perhaps such a scenario could be set up to link directly into the start of the 4PW scenario in the 2016 update to Fighter Operations, in that whatever losses inflicted would immediately carry over from one scenario to the next? I BELIEVE THAT IS IN "UNEASY LIES"

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, February 05, 2021 - 03:35 am: Edit

NOTE FOR RULEBOOK: WHAT ELSE YOU CAN DO WITH THE COUNTERS

1. Use them as extra ships for the empires involved.

2. Use them as #1 but use them for a force that is limited to serving in a particular area, such as Romulan forces on the Federation front or Lyran forces on the Hydran front.

3. Use them with an "elite ships" rule with some benefit for being "elite ships".

4. The puppet enclave rules
http://www.starfleetgames.com/discus/messages/37/25219.html?1408816397

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, February 05, 2021 - 03:49 am: Edit

Designer's notes, evolution of the countersheet.
-----
First version included all of the wyn cluster bound ships that could not be used in war of return but did not include Kzinti rebel ships actually used in war of return. The Kzintis were added by moving the cluster bound ships and the invasion of the cluster scenario to TacOps. That scenario was developed too quickly and I had to totally rewrite it in CIVIL WARS. Later, we eliminated the generic counters from the rebels and Lyrans in order to create enough Kzinti counters to handle revolts before the 4PW.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Tuesday, October 21, 2025 - 07:13 am: Edit

WAR OF RETURN has been processed and sent to staff.

I lack:
Revised Romulan Civil War
WYN Order of Battle
WYN SIT

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Tuesday, October 21, 2025 - 08:38 am: Edit

As per the historical data in Module C3, the ISC incursion historically took place in April Y187.

While it is noted as being a failure in and of itself, it did lead to a number of subsequent developments.

For one: it added at least one ISC ship type to the WYN collection, as per the SSD in Captain's Log #37. I'm not entirely sure if that ship has an F&E counter anywhere just yet. (Actually, there are other "late" WYN imports in that volume, to include a few WYN-Seltorian hulls, that might be worth a look somewhere someday.)

In terms of its impact on the War of Return: the incursion led both to many of the WYN-Orion ships which had exited the Cluster on his behalf to return home; this, in turn, encouraged him to accept the Crown Prince's offer of a duel to settle things once and for all.

And, to look ever so slightly ahead: those WYN-Orion ships need to be home (and back on the "in-cluster" Order of Battle) by the time a certain future product is being formally written up - as they are set to arrive home mere days before the one "spectacular" attempt by the Andromedans to invade the WYN Cluster...

-----

Actually, it appears that both the Klingons and the Lyrans had been launching a series of "aggressive" probes into the Cluster in the last months of Y186. (Presumably this was before Cordon Echo made it as far as this area of space.)

These actions spurred the "post-Usurper" WYNs to more formally reintegrate the Orion Cluster Cartel into their midst: thrrough hiring more Orion Pirate mrcenaries; through the rresumption of building "true" Orion hulls at their shipyard, and in welcoming the Cluster Cartel Crimelord back to the governing council in Y187.

As it happens, this was part of the reason why the ISC launched their intervention into the Cluster. The War of Return business was bad enough; active complicity in space piracy no doubt put the WYN government further beyond the bounds of what the Concordium considered to be acceptable behaviour.

So, I'd be curious to ask: is there a component of the WYN data to go in Civil Wars which covers these "political" changes - to perhaps include a "parallel" OOB for any Cluster Cartel forces stationed inside the Cluster at certain points in time?

And also: at a step down from full-scale incursions, to what extent might the revised rules from TacOps be usable for the kind of smaller-scale intrusions into the Cluster as historically carried out by the Klingons and Lyrans in Y186?

If so, perhaps one could add a Victory Point bonus for any intruding ships which make it back out again in such raids after a certain number of battle rounds, in terms of how much sensor data they'd be able to gather once their systems "clear up" post-crossing. Perhaps with some sort of VP bonus for scout ships which do this?

By Ryan Opel (Ryan) on Tuesday, October 21, 2025 - 06:08 pm: Edit

Gary,

Uneasy Lies the Head is included in the book.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 11:41 am: Edit

From Lar: I and some other players i know have just blended in the CWar counters to their sets and use them as normal ships. Its a cool idea to use them as expedition units, homeless or some other way. This at a glance separation gives folks a visual aid to easily ID the units. If we had all the kestrals they could be separated from reg Rom colors so you can see where your kestral parts are going.

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 03:24 pm: Edit

SVC I have a staff workshop scheduled for tomorrow evening 4:30 pacific on MS Teams to discuss accumulated edits on WoR. We will also be looking at the Rom Civil War update. Chuck is no-comms this week so the section Chuck suggested we remove still need his approval and will hold that scenario resubmission a few more days.

We can get updates from Ryan on OB and SIT if he has not provided one by then.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 04:00 pm: Edit

Send Chuck an Email. I don't want to lose "a few more days". He's been answering my emails all day.

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 06:52 pm: Edit

I will drop Chuck a line right now.
Please If you have sent along any files or draft updates can you include Ryan and I. (Maybe you haven't sent anything yet.) We are co-running point on tomorrow’s meeting in Chucks absence.

I did see the email on my lunch break at work about the counters. I have a growing list of edits for the WoR but dint want the staff to send you duplicate reports on it so we will consolidate what we have found and send it tomorrow night after the meeting.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 06:56 pm: Edit

My understanding was the WoR was post-staff and ready for me. Anyway, I sent it to you before and will handle your reports. The next round for pages 21 and later (including WoR) will be your last chance. The current WoR you have is the chance before your last chance. I might comment that including ZULU is going to delay the schedule I had assumed we were on. It will take 3 weeks from Monday to get those counters.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 06:57 pm: Edit

I managed an eight-hour day today and am even down here an hour beyond quitting time because I wanted to get the staff 20 pages of rulebook to review.

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 07:57 pm: Edit

Yeah sorry for the confusion...lots of pages and edits flying back and forth. WoR was the only one not post-staff ready. We did playtest it and found some glaring issues. Chuck did his best to hand it over for your first review but we found several things that need clean up in that copy. Its in process now and we will get it to you very soon.

The RomCW was post staff ready (twice actually) but the VC were way off last year and needed both a rewrite and retest...that did happen recently so everything we have will have been tested. Loyalty checks was the main tipping point and needed a final staff review/discussion.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 10:04 pm: Edit

It took me a bit to adjust to the new reality.

I thought we'd wrap up this product by Tuesday or Wednesday (i.e., by now) but when we added ZULU I was focused on getting that done by Friday and didn't think about the fact that it will take 3 weeks (or more) to get the counters so we won't be releasing this any time soon.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, October 23, 2025 - 01:42 am: Edit

That does give the staff more time to do things at a measured pace, but I don't want to be here in June waiting for the Order of Battle.

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Thursday, October 23, 2025 - 11:53 am: Edit

I don't want to be here in June waiting for the Order of Battle
1000%

By Sean Schoonmaker (Schoon) on Thursday, October 23, 2025 - 01:38 pm: Edit

Drooling over the "Off the Map" maps!

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, October 23, 2025 - 04:42 pm: Edit

Does the usrper have a repair ship or frd?

should he?

FEDS:
Historically, the WYN cannot build FRDs (campaign only) but have a few PRDs.
They do have one repair ship.
All of these units are on the single sided CW sheet.