Imperial Assault as pseudo-RPG

Olgar Shiverstone · Aug 2, 2015

How does Imperial Assault work as a pseudo-RPG? It looks like a minis-based board game along the lines of ToEE or Wrath of Ashardalon, but I know it has a "campaign" mode.

I haven't played Descent, which it is based on, so I don't have a point of comparison. But the idea of a more casual, easy to pick up RPG-lite game is appealing.

What's your experience, if you've played?

Crothian · Aug 3, 2015

It's a board game. I guess you can add in role playing but I think it would take a little work for it to feel like it fits. The campaigns don't seem that long and are based on how the missions go. There is not much if any real customization of the character at the start. You can gain XP and have some options but it is not a lot.

Redthistle · Aug 5, 2015

I think that taking a look at both the board game and the RPG from Fantasy Flight game to see if they would complement each other. Use the RPG for the interpersonal role-playing, and the board game to resolve the space battles. They might feed off each other in a useful fashion.

aramis erak · Aug 12, 2015

Redthistle said:
I think that taking a look at both the board game and the RPG from Fantasy Flight game to see if they would complement each other. Use the RPG for the interpersonal role-playing, and the board game to resolve the space battles. They might feed off each other in a useful fashion.

They're too mechanically different to interlock - and that appears intentional. It's the antithetical approach from that of Battletech and WEG.

Crothian · Aug 12, 2015

Redthistle said:
I think that taking a look at both the board game and the RPG from Fantasy Flight game to see if they would complement each other. Use the RPG for the interpersonal role-playing, and the board game to resolve the space battles. They might feed off each other in a useful fashion.

Aside from the two being incompatible why would you need to use the RPG to role play? If you want to get into character and role play during a board game then go ahead and do it. Role playing in a board game is no different then role playing in an RPG.

Olgar Shiverstone · Aug 17, 2015

So I picked it up but haven't played yet -- having fun painting the miniatures.

I think it works as RPG-lite if you like gridded tabletop combat. You need to flesh out the campaign scenario, but could handle all of that with roleplay sessions that don't need a particular rules set, then play out missions/battles using the board game.

I don't have Edge of the Empire or the other RPG releases so I don't know how I'd go about making new characters and translating them into IA stats, though.

innerdude · Aug 18, 2015

Had my first experience with Imperial Assault last week.

Two things:

While it was fun, and I'd certainly play it again, I honestly don't see why it's getting such massive love on BoardGameGeek. It was a fairly run-of-the-mill minis combat game, with a few RPG advancement elements tacked on, nicely packaged in a Star Wars "sheen." It wasn't anything revolutionary. Brutal honesty, as a pure combat engine, anything I've ever run in Savage Worlds had better, more dynamic action than Imperial Assault did.
In no way would Imperial Assault be anywhere close to being a viable basis for an RPG---unless you're willing to make up literally every out-of-combat mechanic on the fly. If the purpose was to introduce some people who had never played RPGs before to some basic concepts, Imperial Assault wouldn't be a bad "gateway drug"....... but in all seriousness, I could set up something at least, if not more interesting using a set of Savage Worlds pre-gens and a basic combat scenario. To make it simple, you could use the basic Savage Worlds combat rules, and treat any other die roll as a standard ability check.

Wednesday Boy · Aug 27, 2015

I played it for the first time last weekend and enjoyed it. The missions we played had objectives that had to be met within X rounds, so each turn we were constantly pushing forward at a very fast pace. The pacing works well for a board game but would be very rushed for a roleplaying game where you want time and the opportunity to interact with other characters, explore your surroundings, strategize, etc. If you wrote your own scenarios that relaxed or removed the urgent pacing, I think you could use it as a really simple roleplaying game (in the same way that you can inject roleplaying into the Hero Quest board game).