georgekatkins wrote:


Yes, it is a bit disturbing to a player, and I have known folks who ended up surrendering or offering a draw because they thought they had to take one of the options...

I replied in the game, but it's good for beginners to see this too. That's the boarding parties window. It's a separate phase that's only used if any ships are fouled or grappled, OR if someone unchecked the "Skip TBP phase" checkbox (I think that's what it's called). If you have no ships that can perform ANY boarding party actions, you just see that window because it needs a response from everyone, even though it would be nice if it skipped it for those who can't do anything.

If you had any ships that could be involved in melee or transfers of crew, you see a more detailed window. You might want to read up on that section of the rules and the Newbie's Guide since OBPs, TBPs, DBPs, etc can be confusing and all do different things. Captured ships are worth double their normal point value, so it can really influence a game.

One thing I always point out to newcomers is that you do NOT have to be grappled/fouled to transfer crew between friendly ships. You just have to be adjacent and uncheck that "Skip TBP" checkbox during movement. It shows transfers and melee results in the log for that turn. In our other game, Formidable transferred to Terrible last turn (13, or 12 maybe?)

Also, melee comes after normal firing, but you have to specify boarding parties BEFORE firing, so if you commit all your crew to boarding parties, you can't fire.

If something comes up in either of those games and you have a question, let us know. I'm not going to lie to a new player about the rules just to win a game.