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Renegade Legion is a series of science fiction games that were designed by Sam Lewis, produced by FASA, and published from 1987 to 1995. The line was then licensed to Nightshift games, a spin-off of the garage company Crunchy Frog Enterprises by Paul Arden Lidberg, which published one scenario book, a gaming aid, and three issues of a fanzine-quality periodical before reverting the license.

Set in the 69th Century, the series allowed gamers to play out the battles between the 'Terran Overlord Government (TOG)', a corrupt galactic empire, and the 'Commonwealth', an alliance of humans and aliens. The focus of the plot, like with many strategy games, is to present a long term conflict to enable as many individual situations and environments as possible. Most of Renegade Legion deals with large, military battles to be played on hexagonal grid mapsheets in a turn-based rules system.

The Games

Write your own reviews (unknown) The Window Reviewed by Aaron Sturgill. 162 Laurier Ave. East, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. World of Barador Player Guide PDF Reviewed by david sinclair World of Barador Referee Guide PDF Reviewed by David Sinclair. Renegade Legion: Legionnaire Reviewed by Todd Cross. This wiki covers FASA's Renegade Legion Universe; its history, technology, games and rules. Renegade Legion is a series of science fiction games that were designed by Sam Lewis, produced by FASA, and published from 1989 to 1993. Retro Review: Renegade Legion – Legionnaire Posted by Alamar in Reviews, RPG on April 28, 2014 Back in the late 80s and early 90s, the game company FASA was pretty famous for Battletech, a game about giant robots in war.

Each of the boxed boardgames in the Renegade Legion series used a template-based mechanic to determine weapon damage. When a unit was hit by a weapon, an additional die roll was used to determine the hit location; a geometric template was placed on the ship diagram at that location, and the armor boxes beneath that template were marked as destroyed. Each weapon had a unique template; more- or less-powerful weapons would use larger or smaller versions of a standard template. The intent was to add depth to the game system beyond simply counting up damage points (as in FASA's BattleTech), as weapon type and hit location would now be important to game resolution.

Another key aspect of the Renegade Legion series was interoperability. All of the games in the system included rules for simultaneous play with the other games, for example using the starfighters from Interceptor as support for the action in a game of Centurion.

Renegade Legion games first shipped with die-cut cardboard boxes as the playing pieces; each side of the box depicted the unit from the appropriate angle (front, back, side, top, or bottom.) The second edition of Centurion replaced these with plastic miniatures.

Interceptor was the first game of the Renegade Legion series, and was based on single- or two-crewmember starfighter combat. A second Edition of the game was announced but not published. Interceptor used a complex diagram of ship systems to track internal damage; this feature proved difficult for players to use and was not carried into the other games of the series.

Centurion, the second in the Renegade Legion series, covered ground combat. The primary units were high-speed antigravity tanks; the game also included ground vehicles, artillery, and infantry.

Leviathan covered capital ship combat. The starfighters from Interceptor were represented not as individual units, but as whole squadrons launched from massive starships. While Leviathan used the same template-based damage resolution mechanic as the other games, the templates were much less complex.

Prefect was a more traditional wargame with large fold-out maps and hundreds of small cardboard counters, that shifted the action from the tactical level to the operational and involved the invasion of an entire star system. The player of Prefect was a high-level commander in either the TOG or Commonwealth forces and controlled thousands of ships, tanks and soldiers fighting over multiple worlds and millions of miles of space.

Circus Imperium was the fifth of the Renegade Legion board games published by FASA, but unlike the others in the series, this tongue-in-cheek game of chariot racing was played strictly for laughs. The game involved anti-grav chariots being pulled by carnivorous beasts, with the object of the game to defeat the other racers, usually by knocking them out of the race or getting them eaten by the monsters. Outcomes of player actions were often random and unpredictable, and players could get points for eliciting laughs or the loudest cheers from other gamers.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Renegade Legion is a series of science fictiongames that were designed by Sam Lewis, produced by FASA, and published from 1987 to 1995. Theline was then licensed to Nightshift games, a spin-off of thegarage company Crunchy Frog Enterprises by Paul Arden Lidberg,which published one scenario book, a gaming aid, and three issuesof a fanzine-qualityperiodical before reverting the license.

Set in the 69th Century, the series allowed gamers to play outthe battles between the 'Terran Overlord Government (TOG)', acorrupt galactic empire, and the 'Commonwealth', an alliance ofhumans and aliens. The focus of the plot, like with many strategygames, is to present a long term conflict to enable as manyindividual situations and environments as possible. Most ofRenegade Legion deals with large, military battles to be played onhexagonal grid mapsheets in a turn-based rules system.

ThePlotline

The setting's backstory begins with human expansion through thestars, colonizing many planets, and coming into contact with manydifferent alien races. After a massive plague decimates or evencompletely depopulates the human race from many worlds of the Orionarm of the Milky Way galaxy, which includes Earth/Terra Firma, analien race known as the KessRith attack. The KessRith conquers mostof the human race and enslaves them. However, the KessRith fail toconquer the Commonwealth region which is a multi-racial nation frommany planets, but primarily humans who descended from Britain anddid not suffer from the plague.

A rebellion starts on Earth itself. It is led by a man whocalled himself Trajan and who used the ancient Roman Empire toinspire and gather support. The rebellion succeeds in driving offthe KessRith. With the help of a newly discovered interstellarcommunication technology that only humans possess this forcespreads over the course of hundreds of years. They retake most ofthe human colony worlds, forming the human race into a Republicruled by the Senate and lead by the Pro Consul. However, theRepublic becomes increasingly militant, and develops into a castesystem to identify their population. Citizens are members of thenation who can vote after service to the state, or by purchasingthe title. The second class is Plebeians who cannot vote or ownland/business. Plebians may only work for others and rent propertyto live in. The last caste are slaves who have no rights and aretypically conquered aliens and prisoners. Being a slave is notalways a lifetime affair. Convicted prisoners may be sentenced toslavery for a number of years, and then regain Plebian or Citizenstatus later on in life. In addition the population increasinglyenjoy blood sports. These are unintended consequences Trajan hadnot wanted to emulate when he led his people in revolt using theancient Roman culture as a role model.

Thirty years after the formation of the Republic the humans ofthe smaller and separate Commonwealth nation negotiate a separatepeace treaty with the diminishing KessRith empire. The humans ofthe Republic react to this as treason and must face the full forceof the KessRith alone. Under the strain the Republic must enactstricter laws, become even more militant, and raising the positionof Pro Consul into Caesar, dictator for life. After defeating themajority of the KessRith, conquering approximately 80% of the MilkyWay galaxy, the TOG switches to attacks on the Commonwealth.Conflict changes to human battling against human. In addition, thePatria Protestus law is put into effect through politicalmaneuvering, blackmail, and assassination to deal with women of thecitizen class who typically voted against the state. This reducedthe rights of women to property of their husbands or fathers,removing their right to vote, and limiting their military rank tolow level officers only.

200 years after the Republic is formed it suffers from a coup.It involved a small nuclear device planted under the Senate flooras the Pro Consul gave a speech. This results in a split within theRepublic. One of the Senators who helped plan the attack arrangesfor his son, a suspected war crimes criminal to be named as the newCeaser. The new Ceaser forms a fourth class of citizen, theOverlords. They are created to control the masses and are 2nd onlyto the Ceaser, and wield as much sweeping power as a Ceaser. Afterreaching the breaking point, a noble frontline legion commander hashad enough. He implores his people to follow him, invokes the noblememory of the original Pro Consul, Trajan, and breaks away from theTOG by traveling directly through the dangerous center of KessRithspace to reach the Commonwealth. They take with them Senators thathad been on a fact finding tour at the front, and correctly suspectthe real motives and nature of the assassination or their fellowSenators and Pro Consul. Also a large contingent of women flee theoppression of TOG, many of who then form the all female 'Minerva'military units in the Legion. The 'Renegade Legion' of the titlewas the name given to this defecting TOG military unit that joinsthe Commonwealth forces, and now represents 40% of theCommonwealth's fighting force. Their symbol is the TOG trianglearound the planet Earth, but covered with a hastily painted 'R'made from four straight passes with a red paintbrush to state thattheir Renegade status as a badge of defiance.

During a panel at RedCon95, FASA President Sam Lewis stated thatthe Renegade Legion series of games were originallydesigned for use with the Star Wars license. Since the license wasawarded to WestEnd Games, FASA chose to use the systems with their ownsetting.

The Renegade Legion series was made up of five boardgames, a role-playing game, a war game, two computergames, with another board game and computer game announced butnever published. With the exception of one of the board games andthe two computer games, the Renegade Legion series wascompatible on all levels.

Boardgames

Interceptor was the first game of the RenegadeLegion series, and covered ship-to-ship starfighter combat.Playing pieces were boxes that showed the fighter ships from front,back, sides and top. Lead miniatures of the most popular ships fromthe game were produced by CinC Soft Metal Casting. Asecond Edition of the game was announced, but never saw publishing.Interceptor is famed for its method for determininginternal damage: every vessel has a flow chart diagram thatleads to the damaged systems, thus making it difficult to use aswell as adding the flavor of having a complex system where it isdifficult to anticipate what will crash. This feature waspersiflaged in Renegade Nuns on Wheels, a book for theMacho Women with Gunssatirical RPG by Blacksburg TacticalResearch Center (BTRC); it was dropped in the proposed 2ndEdition of Interceptor.

Centurion, the second in the Renegade Legionseries, covered ground combat between companies of individual(anti-)grav Tanks, with support from conventional vehicles and'bounce' infantry (soldiers with anti-gravity propulsion backpacks)platoons. The spacefighters from Interceptor could also beused as air support. Like Interceptor, the first editionof Centurion used boxes that showed all sides of thevehicles for playing pieces. As with Interceptor, leadminiatures were produced by CinC. The 2nd edition of the gamereplaced these with detailed plastic miniatures of the tanks.

Both Interceptor and Centurion used a uniquegame mechanic to determine combat damage. Players used differentgeometrically shaped templates to simulate different weaponeffects, allowing for differentiation between weapons beyond simplenumbers; an armor-piercing weapon might do less total damage butpenetrate more deeply into the armor than a high-explosive warhead.Depending on where shots landed and how the templates overlapped, avehicle could sometimes be taken out with a single volley, andother times absorb large amounts of damage and continuefighting.

Leviathan covered capital ship combat in deep space,and each player could command a fleet of a dozen ships or more. TheInterceptor spacefighters were represented not asindividual units, but as whole squadrons launched from massivestarships. Again, as with the other board games in the series,Leviathan 's playing pieces were 3-D boxes which showedthe starships from front, back, top and profile.

Prefect was a more traditional wargame with large fold-outmaps and hundreds of small cardboard counters, that shifted theaction from the tactical level to the operational and involved theinvasion of an entire star system. The player of Prefectwas a high-level commander in either the TOG or Commonwealth forcesand controlled thousands of ships, tanks and soldiers fighting overmultiple worlds and millions of miles of space. Prefectalso provided a setting (and conversion rules) for integrating theother titles in the series into an ongoing campaign game.

Circus Imperium was the fifth of the RenegadeLegion board games published by FASA, but unlike the others inthe series, this tongue-in-cheek game of chariot racing was played strictly for laughs.The game involved anti-grav chariots being pulled by carnivorousbeasts, with the object of the game to defeat the other racers,usually by knocking them out of the race or getting them eaten bythe monsters. Outcomes of player actions were often random andunpredictable, and players could get points for eliciting laughs orthe loudest cheers from other gamers. Ral Partha produced aseries of lead figures for the game, including chariots, senatorsand imperial guards. Older catalogs have had these figures presentas items available to order but in the exchange ofBattleTech figures the Identifiers have changed. Therewere 3 variants under the old Ral Partha banner dependent oncountry of purchase.

Technology

Gravvehicles

One of the most common technologies of the setting areanti-gravity devices that allow vehicles and other machines to fly.The largest vehicles are corvette class starships used as scouts,couriers, and landing craft. The main unit of the armies ofRenegade Legion are grav tanks, grav APC's for transportinginfantry, and Bounce Infantry that use grav belts to enable them tojump long distances even while fully loaded. Gravity control iseven used for nuclear devices, as a gravity device known as a Hellbomb increases the local gravity to such an extent in a nearlyinstantaneous timeframe that the material drawn into it will reachfusion state, and explode. Other applications are Thor satellitesthat hover above an atmosphere and can drop large guided spikes ofsolid metal as a form of artillery support.

Because of the use of Grav vehicles, roads are not nearly asimportant to armies of the Renegade legion settings. Rivers oftenbecome major routes of travel as they are clear of obstructions.Tank battles can also occur far out at sea, as grav tanks fly abovethe surface of the ocean, popping up from the troughs of largewaves and exchanging fire with the enemy forces.

The visual art style of Renegade legion most often depicts gravvehicles as having a box shaped hull with two downward slopingprong bow section with upturned tips. Frequently a large cannon isfitted into the hull between the bow prongs, as well as a turretwith secondary weapons.

Lasers

Another common weapon, but best known in the Renegade Legionsetting for being a source of misery. The crystals used to make thelasers are mined on various planets, but is toxic and mining themis used as a form of punishment for slaves.

T-space

Faster than light travel is possible in Renegade legion byspaceships that enter Tachyon-space, also known as T-space. T-Spacetravel requires a ship to accelerate under computer control along aprecise flight path before activating the T-space drive. Onceinside T-space the ship cannot turn in any direction as T-spacedoes not follow the normal laws of physics. In addition theenergies involved will build up within the solid matter of the shipand crews, requiring no more than a month of travel in T-spacebefore becoming dangerous. An equal amount of time must be spent inthe real space to dispate the energy, known as Shimmer Heat, sonamed for the visual shimmering effect crews can see when enteringand leaving T-space. The ships of the Leviathan board game featurelarge fins on their hulls, and these are used to dissipate ShimmerHeat.

P-Comm

Renegade Legion Pdf

The faster than light communication related to T-space travel.The range is limited, but it is possible to communicate with nearbystar systems. The devices are small enough to fit onto smallspaceships. However, the P-comm cannot be used while actuallytraveling in T-space.

Very Large CommunicationRelays

Another faster than light communication system that only the TOGpossess. The arrays are large space stations and can transmit andreceive over far greater distances than the P-comm devices, evenacross the entire Milky Way galaxy. This allowed the Republic/TOGgovernment to make use of smaller forces for maximum effect thantheir enemies using only P-comm system. However, they are quitelarge and must operate by line of sight to other known relaystations and cannot be fitted into starships.

Shields

Most military vehicles, ships, and fighters are equipped withshields. They deflect incoming attacks, though their protection isbased on their flicker rate. Shields cannot run continuously, soinstead they cycle on and off many times a second. A fixedpercentage of attacks are rendered harmless due to their flickerrates, and higher quality shields have a better ratio of on-cyclesto off-cycles when compared to low quality shields. However,shields have limitations beyond this. In grav tank battles the maingun/Gauss cannon shots are not affected by shields, as well as Thorsatellite attacks and nuclear detonations. Lasers, missiles, andinfantry weapons are potentially stopped by shields.

Othergames

Role-playingGame

Legionnaire was the name of the role-playinggame set in the Renegade Legion universe. Whiledesigned primarily as a stand-alone game, it could be integratedinto the board games in the series, with stat conversions andguidelines for players who wished to do so.

ComputerGame

In addition to the board games and the role-playing game, twocomputer games set in this universe where published by Strategic Simulations, Inc.Renegade Legion: Interceptor was a straight translation ofthe turned-based board game of the same name, and allowed twoplayers to fight each other with a squadron of starfighters. TheInterceptor computer game also contained a ship creationgenerator, providing players the ability to produce customships.

The second game was called Renegade: the Battle for Jacob'sStar. This game deviated from the Interceptor gamesystem by becoming a space dogfighting simulator, very similar toWing Commander. It wasreleased around the same time as Wing Commander III: Heart ofthe Tiger. However, its graphics were originally designed inVGA and hastily converted tohigher-resolution Super VGA, and were decidedly inferior toWing Commander III's (which were designed for SVGA fromthe beginning), and compared to the marketing blitz forWCIII (similar in nature to a movie marketing campaign),it was very poorly advertised. Renegade, therefore, alongwith a number of other relatively hastily-programmed spacesimulators marketed at the time hoping to catch WingCommander's coattails, performed very poorly in the market.Part of its failure in the market can also be attributed to theperilous finances of SSI at the time, and the company was absorbedby MindScape later in the year.

Gamesdevelopment

Nightshift games had given Don Gallagher the task of evolvingthe background as well as revising Interceptor into thelong-announced 2nd Edition and creating the announcedPhalanx board game.

In his proposal for the background, TOG collapsed and anew human ./. Kess Rith-conflict ensued. In Fan circles, this wasreceived with mixed emotions, and many fans continue to play in theold storyline.

Interceptor, 2nd Edition abolished the flowchart-like internal damage system, in effect making it to'Centurion in Space'. The completed rules have been released freelyonto the internet, and have a certain following, but never existedas a published work in book format.

Phalanx was to be the game of individual combat, likeBattletroops in Battletech or DMZ in Shadowrun. Luc Nadonand Dallen Masters did a playtest version that differed heavilyfrom the Battletroops rules, in effect makingPhalanx a tabletop game. No more than a HTML-edplaytest version exists. There is talk on the fanbase to merge theexisting Phalanx and Sam Lewis'Battletroops into a Centurion-compatible game;the realisation status of this is unknown.

Novels andmodules

FASA published a number of titles in support of theirRenegade Legion games. Interceptor,Centurion and Leviathan each had a number ofmodules that provided interlinking scenarios for gamers, and eachhad one technical sourcebook that provided additional ship andvehicle designs. In addition, FASA published ShannedamCounty, a sourcebook which profiled dozen of planets and starsystems where adventures and battles could be set.

There were several paperback novels that used the RenegadeLegion setting: Renegade's Honor by WilliamH. Keith, Jr.; and Damned If We Do …, FrostDeath, and Monsoon, all by Peter L. Rice.

Notes

Renegade Legion Legionnaire

Renegade Legion's Leviathan module was used asthe base for FASA's Battletech new aerospace rules known at thetime as BattleSpace.Much of Leviathan's movement & damage system rules were used tomake it. The Leviathan rules have continued to be used,updated and revised for Battletech's newer aerospace ruleset,Aerotech 2.

In 2006 Catalyst Game Labs revised andenhanced the Aerotech2 rules. They were split up between Total Warfareand Techmanual. Rules for large naval ships andspacestations are included in the 2008 rulebook, StrategicOperations.

Externallinks

• Renegade Legion:Interceptor at BoardGameGeek