Space Alert - The Galactic Threat

What is the Galactic Threat?

Space Alert - The Galactic Threat (SAGT) is a game, which is stacked on top of the cooperative board game Space Alert (SA). In SA you are a one to five person crew, which has been put in charge of a spaceship of the duckling-class. The mission: Hyperjump into an uncartographed sector and survive against various threats until your boardcomputer has finished scanning. After that the ship jumps back. One of such rounds takes about 20 - 30 minutes game time. So you usually play several rounds in one game evening.

Although the boardgame SA is quite challenging, with a well co-operating crew and a captain who knows how to direct it, you can perform well. However, some players - as myself - might be bothered by a lack of purpose of these cartographing missions. You play missions or a series of missions, but there is nowhere "to go".

This is where this homepage - The Galactic Threat - comes into play. It adds purpose to the missions you fly and sets them in a much larger context. This is done by the following features:

A map of neighbouring galaxies, containing different habitated solar systems, planets and space stations, you can travel between.

Trade with the habitants of these locations and earn your spacebucks. See the colonies grow using the material YOU brought to them.

Spend the earned money to upgrade your ship or repair the damage your ship has taken from the last fligts.

Explore new areas of space to find more habitable areas. Maybe the next solar system will be named after you!

Defend the colonies against the alien threats, either as civilian or...

... enroll into the army, benefitting from their special support. But prepare to be loaded with responsibilities also!

One (of the many) special thing about SAGT is: All decissions made in SAGT are made from human players like you and me. There is no AI, only rules you need to play along. Which Colony offers and needs which kind of ressources? --> It's determined by a human player.
The same holds for questions like: Where will you be ordered next, when fighting in the Army? Where and how strong will the alien threat strike next? What are they after? Which trade routes are especially dangerous these days? All of these are player's decissions.

You might say: Wait a minute! Where is no way to implement this stuff into the board-game Space Alert. This is true and this is the reason we need this homepage. If you look around, you see a lot of information, concerned with different kind of announcements and also subforums, which are about the meta-game SAGT and how to improve it. Also you might notice several subforums closed for most users. This is where the magic happens ;)

But let's slow down. To understand how SAGT is organized, it's easiest to present the different in-game organizations it consists of:

The council: The council consists of experienced players, who volunteered to keep things running. A lot of moderation, administration and organisation needs to be done in SAGT and the council members take care of that. Also they decide on who claims the chairs of leading the other organisations.

Space Command: You can think of the members of Space Command and the Guilds (see next section) as the decission makers opposing the alien threats. Space Command takes the role of the army: They defend solar systems and spacestations and push the aliens back into their territory. It's they you call, if there is trouble rising. Each ship (played by you and your other crew-members) can enroll into the army and fight the aliens at the front. You will get special support for that, however you also have to do your duty: Orders which lead you to dangerous places and might mean the end to you, your crew and your ship. The activities of Space Command is led by their admirals and their Commander in Chief. They lay out their strategy and order military ships to the places they are needed.

The Guilds: The players being member of the guilds are responsible for building and repairing infrastructures. They can't order ships like the Space Command, but stimulate players activities by setting selling and buying prices. Space Command and Guilds work close together, building an alliance against the alien threat. The Guilds are led by Guild Leaders and their Head-Merchant.

The Scouts: Scouts are a bit tricky and for explaining them we need the terms "In-Game" and "Out-of-Game". Out-of-Game always refers to the real world, your hand touching the mouse and your eyes seeing your computer screen is all Out-of-Game. In-Game is the world you imagine yourself in, when playing a game. If you play a PC-shooter for example, the shotgun your game-figure carries is an In-Game entity, as well as your game-figure lives In-Game. This clarified it's much easier to explain the duality of Scouts: In-Game they are a network consisting of spying satellites, informants and, well, scouts. They collect information about the alien activities and relay it to Space Command as well as broadcast it as news. Hence as In-Game characters they are on the side of humanity, helping to defend against the Galactic Thead. However: Out-of-Game they oppose the other players! They make the moves for the aliens and decide on their measures, like attacks, movements or reinforcing their armies. The Scouts leader is the so-called Ranger.

The Academy: In-Game the Academy is where you learn to fly space-ships and do all those fancy manouvers. Also you learn how to use the space-bucks payment system, how to load and unload your freight and what to do to repair your ship. Also if you enroll into the Army they will explain everything you need to be successfull on the field. Out-of-Game this means, that members of the Academy will guide you through your first steps on SAGT. They will explain the new rules, which are added to the board game Space Alert and show you how to do things like trading and upgrading your ship. They will explain the communication protocols, which are crucial to experience SAGT smoothly. Members of these volunteers are called scholars with one of them being the Headmaster of the Academy.

Research Lab: The Research Lab consists of players dedicated to improve SAGT. They constantly think about, what can be done to make SAGT more awesome, easier to access and overall handsome. They have an open ear for wishes, opinions, proposals and feedback in general. They condense these feedback into actions, which are then applied to the next iteration of SAGT. Members of the Research Lab are called Researchers and their Dean.

The Army: The army consists of ships, which volunteered in the struggle against the aliens. The captains as well as their crew are part of the army.

Civilians: All ships not being in the army are called civilian ships. The universe is a free infinite Space and as civilian ship you can go, wherever you want, leaving the colonies far behing your back. But watch out: It's dangerous out there!

To make things more clear I made this diagram for you:

What to do next?

Hopefully I was able to make you interested in using SAGT to add more depth to your Space Alert rounds. If so you probably have a lot of questions about how exactly stuff works in SAGT. You can inform yourself by following these links, covering different main topics in SAGT. Check them out or just wander around, to find out if SAGT is something you want to do:

Code of Ethics

How SAGT works

How to join SAGT

How the organisations of SAGT work

See you - In Space!