Speculations about playing with other forces (I)

At first, it seemed that the most obvious expansion for Super Space Knights was just adding new types of companies and, naturally, the next step was using other military forces of the Dominion as playing characters. Depends on the specifics of your Dominion but it doesn't seem too hard to create rules for militia, giga-mechas or clone troopers.

If you think a bit further, it takes no effort to conclude that even changing sides completely and use alien forces or renegade space knights could be an interesting option.

(Image generated by AI)

As I started tinkering with the system I realised quickly that it was not as simple as adding a few more booklets with different skills and moves: the system is designed around the idea of a force of elite warriors fighting for the Dominion and it the moment you change that concept, the whole ruleset trembles because all pieces are put in a way that support that very core concept. The Space Master objectives and principles are written  as a founding baseline and everything else rests on top of that. Let's have a look:

For other loyal forces there are little changes here. Mentions to "Companies" could be easily changed to "Armies" or similar. The player moves, on the other side, are quite specific for Space Knights and not all would work the same or at all with different armies. Let's have a look which ones would need changes:

• Always War
• Flexible Tactics
• Unbreakable Brotherhood: this implies that the companies in the Order share a bond that might be absent in other forces. 
• In the Name of Humankind:  again, the Space Knights are supposed to be among the best and that gives them a certain level of authority that a poorly equipped militia might not have. 
• The Code of Space Knights: this move is very Space Knight specific and wouldn't work with other types of armies. 
• Movement and Manoeuvre
• Order's Rites: seems obvious that if you are not part of an Order, its rites mean little for you.
• Mission Move: it would need some expansion regarding the authority levels of different armies. 
• Space Chronicles 
• The Path of Damnation: the whole Damnation mechanic is built about the concept of the Space Knights being superior to the rest of humanity and, at the same time, trying to stay as its servants and not become its masters. Other forces might have similar problems with getting corrupted but would probably do it in a different way.
• Brother Against Brother: Space Knights have a bond among them that might be absent in other forces.
• Final Hour
• From Here to Eternity

(AI generated image)

So, to summarize: if I want to add an expansion of new armies for Super Space Knights (even the name of the game might need a change) I will need to fiddle a bit with objectives and principles and a lot with the basic moves. 

In the next part of this series of posts we will talk about playing with the bad guys.