The
Starship Troopers Game
Here's where
you're
going to find something very interesting connected with the
Grandmaster.
It's the
Starship
Troopers Game, dating back from 1976.
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This is not a book cover. It's the Starship Troopers Game issued in 1976. |
I learned that many people found them difficult to read, that's why I have added this transcript:
This game is based on the
military axiom
that final victory depends on the willingness of brave men to
stand and
fight and hold - or die trying - despite all fancy technology,
all superweapons.
In the long run the infantry is always the "Queen of Battles".
Unlike most wargames, STARSHIP
TROOPERS
is laid many years in the future. Some planets unknown today
are the war
theaters for this game.
The playing units of the Terran
Federation,
the Mobile Infantry, are an elite corps akin to the US Marine
Corps or
US Army paratroopers. The M. I. humans wear powered jumpsuits
that enable
them to leap over obstructions such as buildings. They are
armed with advanced
weapons that give each infantryman firepower roughly
equivalent to a platoon
today. Brought to the battlesite by spaceships, M. I. 's are
ejected into
space above the battle area in capsules. The capsules enter
the atmosphere,
the M. I. 's emerge and parachute down to form up to do
battle. Casualties
are always suffered --- but M. I. 's do not leave
injured comrades
behind when their ship sends down a space boat to make a
pickup.
M. I. 's are versatile. They can
make
a quick strike, do enormous danger in a few minutes, and
return to their
starship. Or stay down for full battle - conquer or die.
The enemies are nonhuman aliens.
One
sort are the Arachnids (something like giant spiders) who live
a communal
life and have a social structure resembling an ant or bee
colony. They
have at least the following castes: Queens, Brains, Warriors,
and Workers.
Only the Warrior class fights, but Warriors are directed in
their tactics
by one or more Brains. Arachnids are underground creatures,
burrowing tunnels
in which they live and work. It is therefore necessary to go
down and destroy
(or capture) the Brains and Queens as well as the Warrior
caste.
Skinnies are a humanoid race that
fights
the Terran Federation early in the war. At a later phase they
are allied
with the humans to fight the Arachnids.
I hope that this game will prove
stimulating
to game players. Let your imagination range as widely as
possible; there
are no precedents for such battles.
Robert A. Heinlein
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