Sky Empire game development status!
As I mentioned in the last newsletter, I’m reaching a point where everything just seems to take so much time!
At least the physical version is almost complete, and I’ve started uploading the new files to TTS! I hope some of you are ready for wave 2 playtesting! I’ll update the “call-to-arms” on BGG, and I hope to bring in a flow of new playtesters to join the ranks on Discord. Feel free to invite friends, family, and others to both the Discord and the newsletter!
Today I am also celebrating a year-long journey with making Sky Empire!
It has been exacly one year since I started making this game! A lot has changed, but also it feels weird that the game is so close to the starting product, still! Just notice the two development tracks on the character board and the council cards to the left – still the same, just rebalanced a lot 
But enough about that—it’s time for a battle!
Battlereport #1: Alabastus VS Daphne
– And what better way to kick things off than by pitting the two strongest military forces against each other?
Alabastus (me) with his powerful abilities versus the Sentinels, and Daphne (my wife) with her impressive PvP skills! This promises to be quite the battle!
(This is my first time doing a battle report, so I mostly focused on my own actions and didn’t capture much of my wife’s moves. Apologies for that!)
During the map-building phase, I managed to place a volcano island right next to my home island (on the way to the center). I’m also pleased with my setup, with double Magnorium and double Galvornite on each side of the home island. My plan is to attack the Sentinel building, establish a mine there in round one, and then expand outward on both sides. With some luck during the exploration phase or by looting the Sentinel building, I might manage to get all three mines set up in round one! My wife claimed the first-player advantage, but that’s generally fine since this is a two-player game.
Right from the start, my plan is disrupted as the event card spawns the Sentinel airship Rumah on the volcano tile just outside my home island! So much for my three-mine plan and the middle yellow crystal! I’m not willing to take on both the building and Rumah! My wife chooses Production and Dynamism as the council cards, securing the maximum bonus, and I select Economic and Development for an alternate strategy. With her choice of Dynamism, I can pretty much say goodbye to the middle yellow crystal.
For developments, I pick Construction I and Versatile I (2 Galvornite for buildings and salvage to find a yellow crystal mission from exploration). The two Galvornite are spent on the first mine, and with Economic, I buy 2 Galvornite and 3 Hydrofluxium. This sets me up for an early bazaar and gas farm next round if I can manage 2 Magnorium production or upgrade to Construction II development.
For my final move, I send my airship to the 2-Magnorium rock island and find old equipment in the exploration phase! (This allows me to construct a building with 2 fewer resources.) This gives me a free mine, and that mine produces in the very same turn — 2 Magnorium! We’re back on track!
The event phase reveals gas clouds exploding, lowering all shields on airships. Fortunately, this isn’t a concern at the moment. However, the event also triggers gas farms to produce at the end of this turn, which aligns perfectly with my plans for a gas farm on a 2-Hydrofluxium tile!
My wife chooses Development and Production again, while I take the top council cards with a lot of juicy bonuses, including Ambition and Governance. I acquire a good amount of initiative tokens and action cards, as well as first-player advantage.
As expected, my wife secures the yellow crystal in the middle, but I get a yellow crystal mission from my salvage development during exploration. It requires me to gain 3 ancient and/or Sentinel developments. Not the easiest, but achievable! I stock up on initiative tokens and action cards and manage to place my third mine. I may relocate it to the volcano island if I eventually take it down, but we’ll see how it goes.
state of the board after round 2
Filled with confidence and holding the first player badge, I head into Round 3. But my confidence quickly wanes as the event spawns the Sentinel destroyer Cytqua on the very same volcano island as Rumah, right in the middle of my territory! Maybe placing that volcano island next to my home wasn’t the smartest move after all!
I choose Production to take advantage of the bazaar and Development (since Alabastus’s green crystal is 5 airships, which often means a lot of developments). My wife chooses Governance since she’s out of tokens, and Economic.
This round, I manage to consolidate my territory and get a versatile corvette and an action card destroyer! Just one more airship needed for the green crystal!
Things just keep getting crazier with these events! Egnever spawns (Sentinel behemoth), and as you might guess, it’s on the volcano island right next to my home! The spawn dice really aren’t in my favor… or maybe they are?
Earlier, I picked up the ancient development Foresight, which lets me peek at the next event. It reveals that all Sentinel airships will move in the next event phase! Time to set up defenses!
For council card picks, I choose Production and Governance, while my wife chooses Development and Ambition. Goodbye, first player token!
I no longer need more developments, so I decide to maximize the resources from my territory, using Production and activation to gather materials for my final airship and to construct buildings toward the blue crystal.
Egnever is set to move to tile #23, and as a Behemoth-sized airship, taking it down will earn me a red crystal! Fortunately, Ripper is on this tile, so I manage to set up an Aetherforge and a turret. I think this will be enough to take it down!
Rumah will move to the portal tile where I have a single mine, then despawn. I decide to leave it be.
Cytqua will move to my tile with the bazaar, so I position my destroyer Golden Falcon there and add an air turret. This should do the trick!
Through buying and selling, I manage to gather just enough resources to rebuild Cytqua using Magnorium and Galvornite instead of action cards and exploration tokens! (I plan to pick up the Sentinel development “Insight” that allows me to do that, as a reward for taking it down.)
Everything is set up for a big move in Round 5!
Round 5:
The evil scheme is set in motion, and for the first time, I aim to finish the game in Round 5. This hasn’t been achieved in any of the 70-something playtests!
The plan dawns on my wife as the event card is flipped, instructing us to move the Sentinel airships. Egnever and Cytqua are taken down without much trouble, awarding me the red crystal and my third Sentinel/ancient development, which secures my yellow crystal as well!
For council cards, my wife picks Economic and Production, while I choose Dynamism and Ambition to keep all options open in case something goes wrong.
With little chance to stop me, as Daphne lacks larger airships, I place the 12th building for the blue crystal and build Cytqua as my fifth airship, securing the green crystal! I also claim the yellow crystal from my crystal mission.
Finally, I gather all available forces on the volcano island that I could only dream about reaching three hours earlier, take down the Sentinel building without trouble, and claim a monolith to secure victory!
Final attack on the Sentinel building that has been annoying me for 3 hours!
This game didn’t turn out to be the PvP battle I expected. In a 2-player game, the bases are quite far from each other, but I think that’s a good thing as it generally allows time to prepare if you notice aggression toward your territory. In a 4-player game, it’s much more cutthroat!
Daphne also struggled with her slice and wasn’t able to get any larger airships out to delay my progress.
In the end, having the Sentinel spawn close by was a huge advantage for Alabastus, helping me secure the red, green, and yellow crystals!
Even though we mostly played within our own territories, I found the game very fun and engaging. The race element was always present, pushing us to optimize actions toward the crystals.
The early Round 2 bazaar gave me a significant advantage, allowing me to maximize profit and versatility from my slice!
I’m going to Essen Spiel 2025 pt.3!
On that note, let’s have a look at how the airship build are coming along!
That was the 6th newsletter from Greymarsh Games!
The next newsletter will cover the production budget and delve into the final pricing for the product, and also have a 4-player battle report!
Peace out!
/Preben, Greymarsh Games
