ISS Vanguard

What is ISS Vanguard

ISS Vanguard is a co-operative campaign Game. It brings players into epic Sci-Fi adventure, as they play as 4 sections (security, recon, science, engineering) onboard the first human ship with the potential to reach outer space. The campaign introduces a unique story full of hard player choices, twists and branching storylines. The game comes with over 100 different Crew members, each with unique characteristics.

A game session takes you through a Ship Management phase - in which you choose your destination for your ship then research technologies, produce equipment, recruit crewmembers and resolve situations - and then a Planetary Exploration phase. During Planetary Exploration, players complete a daring landing procedure with your Lander, explore the planet for information or resources, fighting back a barrage of threats as well as a running timer of supplies depletion before you have to run back to the Lander to lift off back to ISS Vanguard. What follows is the remainder of the Ship Management phase, when players unload discoveries and resources from the Lander, heal or memorialize crewmembers, take apart the game board and record changes to the planet you've just explored, preserving its status for future games.

The Ship Management phase allows players to make strategic decisions as to their resources and a way forward in the unknown galaxy chasing the mystery encoded in human's DNA. The Planetary Exploration draws the focus to the tactical, as players decide on cards, dice, crewmembers and equipment to bring to fulfill dice checks on the planet's Places of Interest. The players also decide which of the variety of specialized Landers they want to use and how to outfit their Lander for the perilous descent into the chosen planet's atmosphere (or lack thereof). Throughout the game, the narrative system relies on a web of structured and linked Mission Logs, often snippets of journal entries or dialogue, to provide gameplay choices and storyline information as well as keep track of progress throughout the universe.

The goal is to survive your missions and complete the campaign.

Game details

Players

1–4

Age

+13

Duration

120 min

Difficulty

Heavy

Type

Board game

Year

2022

Mechanics

Cooperative Game · Dice Rolling · Open Drafting

Categories

Adventure · Exploration · Miniatures

Designer

Krzysztof Piskorski · Marcin Świerkot · Paweł Samborski

Publisher

Awaken Realms · Delta Vision Publishing · MeepleBR · Pegasus Spiele