Leaving Earth 7, Outer Planets 2

Tags

• leaving-earth
• outer-planets
• suborbital-flight
• landing
• life-support

It's been a whole week since I've played Leaving Earth. Much better than the nine month stretch previously. The last game ended a bit early, did not make it all the way to 1986. I do not expect this one to go the full distance either. I have to do a few more chores today, and need to do a bit of work stuff, and I'm pretty well exhausted from the work week and insomnia.

I'm going to do a Normal level game with the Outer Planets expansion added in:

1. Easy: Working Probe/Capsule in Earth Orbit.
2. Easy: Man to Space and Back.
3. Easy: Man to Earth Orbit and Back.
4. Easy: Reveal Moon Location.
5. Medium: Working Probe/Capsule on Ceres.
6. OP: Reveal Europa Location.
7. OP: Reveal Ganymede Location.
8. OP: Reveal Titan Location.
9. OP: Reveal Io Location.

1956

I'm going to start this game with Saturn's because it's solo, there is no really early pressure, and I want to be able to get a crap ton of stuff into orbit early on. So, the Saturn Advancement and 1 Saturn Rocket.

1957

Another Saturn and Ion Thrusters Advancement.

1958

Buy another Saturn and an Ion Thruster.

1959

Probe x 2, Galileo x 2, Supplies x 1.

Boost the 2 Probes and the Supplies into Earth Orbit with Saturn. Outcome is Success.

Score: 2, for Working Probe in Earth Orbit.

Note that Suborbital Flight can only be explored by sending a manned Mission there (page 30 of Leaving Earth rule book).

1960

Purchase Surveying Advancement.

Boost a Galileo with Saturn, test Success.

Purchase Eagle and 1 x Supplies.

1961

Assemble Saturn with Ion Thruster, Supplies and Eagle. Test: Success.

[Note: Eagle requires Landing Advancement before purchase. Also, once the Eagle Capsule is in space, if the Life Support Advancement has been purchased, it induces a Outcome draw at the end of every year. This is actually very cool, as it does not need to be manned to draw outcomes, and a Failure on Life Support does not destroy the capsule.]

Purchase Saturn and Rendezvous Advancement.

1962

Purchase Ion Thruster, boost thruster to Earth Orbit with Galileo.

Purchase Juno Advancement, Juno x 5.

Next turn will be full Rendezvous testing.

1963

Full Rendezvous testing between Probes and Ion Thruster spacecraft. First is success, 2d is Success, third is Success.

This leaves me with $5 left over. Fire some Junos:

1. Success.
2. Minor Failure, pay this off.

I'm in the game in a big way at this point. Next move is to fire the Ions off to do some surveys. Will need to think about this.

1964

Let's go to Saturn. We need to get to Venus in 1968, with a Galileo, which should not be too difficult with a single Ion Thruster.

The difficulty is 5, it takes 2 years normally, with payload 2. Ion Thruster has mass 1. So, 5 * (2 + 1) = 15 > 2 years * 5 thrust, so we'll set it up for 3 years and launch it next year. Then we'll see what happens.

However, I can test fire the Ion Thrusters. After some perusal of the rules, it's ok to declare a manuever of one year, then abort the the manuever. This makes sense physically, sort of. Nobody is going to shoot off an expensive rocket to, say, Mars just for a test.

Let's test fire the first Ion Thruster: This was success.

Second Ion Thruster: success, and bought that off.

Astronaut for remaining $5, Jim Lovell.

1965

Fire Ion Thruster for taking off to Venus: but this is a mistake, I can't make the trip to Venus from Earth Orbit in one manuever, it needs to be 2 manuevers: 1 to Inner Planet Transfer, the second to Venus Flyby. I'm going to pretend that I did the two year trip to IPT and that this turn removes a time token. This will put the game back in harmony, with the risk of losing the Ion Thruster on the IPT to Venus Fly By. Except I can do another test in Earth Orbit to clear the last Outcome: Success. Ion Thrusters are now ready for business.

Purchase Saturn and Atlas Advancement.

1966

Time token comes off. Manuever into Venus Fly By, add two time tokens.

Solar Radiation hazard, 2 time token roll. No effect for Galileo.

Purchase another Saturn and two Atlas.

1967

Time token from Venus Fly By.

Purchase a load of stuff: Eagle, Explorer x 2, Ion, Atlas x 2.

Two Saturns boost 4 Atlas, 2 Explorer, 1 Ion and 1 Juno into Orbit. That's a load of stuff. I need to test landing at some point, will need it for man to Earth and back and for Ceres.

This uses up all my money for this year, so I'm reading ahead on Landing. It looks like the cheapest way to test landing is with 4 Junos launched into Suborbital flight.

1968

Time token from Venus Fly By. Manuever into Jupiter Fly By and add two time tokens.

Purchase Landing Advancement. Fire Junos to Suborbital, test three times, all Success, test Landing, Success and buy that one off.

Buy 4 Junos.

1969

Time token from Jupiter Fly By.

Assemble Juno and Probe in Earth Orbit. Will run a survey test here: Major Failure, buy this off for $5.

Another Landing test with Junos, launch…Success. Landing test is Success. Purchase 4 more Junos and do this again: Junos are successful, and last Landing is Successful.

Purchase Atlas and Juno.

1970

Remove time token from Jupiter Fly By, now able to survey something.

Test Atlas on Earth: Success.

Purchase Atlas and Ion.

Survey Io: nothing to see there.

Score: 6.

Automatic manuever to Saturn Fly By, reveals Jupiter with beta letter and one die per astronaut roll of 1 is incapacitated, two time tokens on Saturn Fly By.

The Jupiter Mission is Man On/Orbiting Jupiter or one of its moons at start of year for 25 points.

1971

One time token from Saturn Fly By.

Test Atlas: Success. One more of these to test.

Fire the Ceres Mission off from Earth Orbit, which is a maneuver to IPT.

Purchase Saturn rocket.

1972

Take time token from Saturn Fly By.

Survey Titan, reveal alpha Separate and Discard Explorer Payload on Titan, 22 points.

Score 12.

Reveal Saturn location which is a beta, draw Man to Saturn Fly By and Back for 35 points! Dang! No way I'm going to win this one. I need to play the base game a bit more. Put 5 time tokens on spacecraft and move to Uranus Fly By.

Send a probe to Lunar Fly By for last Atlas test. This is inefficient, but I have the Atlas in Earth Orbit already, and if it works it will save me a little time and money. Major Failure!!! It had to happen at some point. Buy it off with $5.

Purchase Life Support Advancement, Aldrin, Atlas and Juno.

1973

Time token off of Uranus Fly By.

Ceres landing, now that the Atlas has been tested, the landing is a success.

Score: 20.

I may put it up here for the week. I've been trying to plan a mission to Jupiter Orbit and it's a bitch. It's the supplies which are the killer.

Aerobraking though I think I've got figured out: send 3 Junos to Mars Fly by with an Ion Thruster and test it there. Make sure to have enough cash on hand to clear the failures, it could take all $25. Timing on this is important as Life Support needs to be tested as well.

I don't really know what to do here, I need more technology like Soyuz or Proton. I'm running out of years.

Purchase Proton Advancement for $10, and one Proton.

Need another Saturn to make a big lift.

Mean time, Man to Space and Back, manuever to Suborbital and reveal, landing with the Eagle capsule. Suborbital is 1 die per astronaut, 1 is incapacitated. Roll 4, Jim Lovell is back on Earth.

Score: 22.

1974

Time token from Uranus Fly By.

Purchase Saturn, 3 Junos, Probe, make a big lift.

Payload: 4 Juno, Aldrin, Probe, Ion, Proton, Atlas.

Ion Thruster and 4 Juno to Mars Fly By to test Aerobraking.

Juno and Probe to Lunar Fly By, Survey and reveal nothing on the moon.

Score: 26.

Drawing random outcome on Life Support: Minor Failure, it's going to have to do I don't know what…need to hit the forums for this one.

Testing Life Support apparently works like this: at the end of the year, an outcome is drawn, which means only one test per year per capsule may be conducted. Note that Life Support failures do not imply damage.

Another thing to note is that only the Aldrin Capsule requires Life Support. The other capsule may use Life Support if used to carry astronauts more than one year. However, once the Life Support Advancement is purchased, these capsules will be subject to drawing outcomes.

This is enough for today. I'll pick this back up in a couple of weeks, after I get back from a company retreat next weekend. (Not happy I have to go on this, it was too hard to refuse, I tried.)

1975

I successfully escaped the company retreat! This will cost me I'm sure at work later, but I judged the downside risk of attending to be too great. I just don't have the emotional energy for these sorts of things at the moment.

Time tokens, remove from Jupiter and Uranus bound.

Apparently I have 3 Juno going to Mars to test Aerobraking. They will be there in 1977.

Put the Titan mission in thrust to Inner Planet Transfer, need to be at Venus in 1980. Put 4 time tokens on it to arrive at IPT in 1979, then 1 year to Venus, 1 year to Jupiter, and 2 years to Saturn. Good stuff.

Purchase Re-entry. Test Life Support, minor failure and buy that off. Purchase Aerobrake.

1976

Remove time tokens from Titan, Mars and Uranus missions.

Test Proton, success. Purchase Eagle Capsule and supplies.

End of turns.

Test Life Support: Success.

1977

Remove time tokens from Mars, Uranus and IPT craft. The Uranus mission takes first turn, reveals nothing on Uranus, lost after this because no manuever to Neptune.

Three Junos in Mars Fly By, let's fire them for Aerobraking:

1. Success.
2. Success.
3. Success.

Ion thruster aerobrakes into Mars Orbit for return to Earth Orbit.

End of turn.

Test life support: Success. Lose $5. Bummer.

1978

Remove time token from Ion in Mars Orbit, add 3 to get to Earth Orbit. Remove token from IPT.

The Jupiter mission is scrubbed, forgot to purchase two more Ion Thrusters and enough lift to get them into orbit. I can get to Outer Planets Transfer in 2 years, so I'll do a lift in 1980 and hopefully have enough mojo to get there. I need to buy a lot of rocketry between now and then.

Purchase Saturn and Ion.

End of turn: Life Support Outcome: Major Failure. Ok, that's good, I only have 2 outcomes here, so this won't be too hard to purchase away. It effectively reduces my spend to $20 though, at a time when I need to buy stuff.

1979

Remove time token from Ion to Earth Orbit. Remove time token from IPT, add time token to get to Venus Fly By.

Purchase Saturn and Ion.

End of turn: Life Support Major Failure.

1980

At Venus Fly By, time token to Jupiter Fly By.

Purchase Saturn and boost one to Earth Orbit.

Cannot do the Jupiter mission this year. If I can boost in 1982, I can do the mission. If not, it's scrubbed.

End of turn, Life Support Outcome: Success and buy that off.

1981

Time token from Earth Orbit. Time token from Jupiter Fly By, add two time tokens and manuever to Saturn Fly By.

Purchase Saturn and supplies, launch to Earth Orbit.

Here's the stack blasting for Outer Planets Transfer:

• Saturn: 20
• Proton: 6
• Ion x 2: 2
• Atlas x 2: 8
• Aldrin: 3
• Supplies: 3
• Total: 42

Difficulty 6.

Thrust required: 252

Thrust available 200 + 10 + 70 = 280.

Fire the Saturn (success), Ions (success) and the Proton: Success. Lucky.

End of turn.

Life support:

• Eagle: Major Failure, purchase.
• Aldrin: success.

Spend 1 supply.

This was a bit sketchy, Protons are not fully tested. But it worked.

End-of-year: success, no astronaut perishes.

1982

I need to get turn order figured out. From the back of the Outer Planets manual:

1. Complete start-of-year missions such as Space Station. None.
2. Everyone's money resets to $25.
3. Players take turns.
4. Damaged components on Earth repaired for free.
5. Check Astronaut health in space.
6. Remove time token from each craft with token.
7. End-of-year hazards occur.

Turns

• Burn Atlas and Ion x 2 to get from Outer Planets Transfer to Jupiter Fly By:

  • Total mass: 15
  • Difficulty: 4
  • Thrust: 27 + 20 = 47.
  • Required: 60.

  Looks like I miscalculated that one, this mission is over. Missing the launch window for the Venus Fly By sucked. Will need to try this mission again some time.

• Man to Earth Orbit and back: Purchase a Saturn, an Eagle and Gherman Titov.

Score: 30.

Remove time token from Saturn Fly By.

The game is technically over, as I will not be able to score enough points on the Titan mission to win. Let's play that out anyway.

1982

No start of year missions, collect $25.

Turns

Single turn to complete all the manuever into Titan Orbit.

• Saturn Orbit: Can't do it with Ion Thrusters, there is no time token. I would have needed to tote an Atlas out with me. Not sure if I could have done that. Surprised I messed this one up.

AAR

Final score: 30 - 4 = 26, with 89 left on the table. Not real great!

Learned a bunch of good stuff this game, especially about testing.

• Life support: Get the Advancement early, then any capsule which can carry passengers is going to automatically test for Life Support at the end of every year, even if the capsule isn't manned. This means is a really cheap way to get a look at the outcome cards, choosing to buy off only the failures are they occur. With even two capsule in, say, Earth Orbit, a few years before they're necessary, end of year outcomes will provide a pretty good look at the outcome draws.

• Landing: test with 4 Junos, 3 to boost to Suborbital, the fourth to test the landing.

• Junos can be tested by just cycling through the deck looking for failures. They are so cheap it hardly matters, and buying off successes on Junos is relatively expensive.

• Proton Advancement requires Soyuz Advancement, so I made a mistake when I purchased the Proton. As it turns out, it won't have really hurt the game any, everything I did could have been done with Soyuz, just in a slightly different order.

• By the rules, Life Support is tested after all turns are complete. This means one cannot purchase, and to buy off outcomes for Life Support, that money must be saved, and potentially lost. That sucks. This makes the solo game a lot harder.

• I've been removing time tokens at the beginning of the turns instead of at the end of the turns. I need to play a careful hard game of the Base rules.

Turn order template

1. Complete start-of-year missions such as Space Station.
2. Everyone's money resets to $25.
3. Players take turns.
4. Damaged components on Earth repaired for free.
5. Check Astronaut health in space.
6. Remove time token from each craft with token.
7. End-of-year hazards occur.

Set up

Here's a large image of the setup:

It's a pretty cool map. Would be excellent to have a potential KPO expansion, but we'll see how that happens.

Mission to Titan via Venus Fly By slingshot

Tags

• leaving-earth
• outer-planets
• suborbital-flight
• landing
• life-support