Outside the Znutar Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Optional Pieces
• Outside the Znutar
  • Entering and Leaving the Ship
  • Airlock Control
  • Movement Outside the Znutar
  • New Units
  • Ship's Boats
  • Attacks From the Boats
  • Outside the Boats
  • Combat Inside the Boats
  • Rules Changes

Optional Pieces

These optional pieces are used only for the "Outside the Znutar" rules:

• 14 Optional Pieces – three Boats (the Scout, the Cockboat, and the Saucer), two Cargo Movers, eight Jet Suits, and the Ook Soot.

Outside the Znutar

These optional rules allow crewmen and Green Things to leave the Znutar and fight on the ship's skin, and even in space. This allows more silliness after you've played the basic game. An earlier version of these rules appeared in Dragon magazine.

Note: These rules help both sides, but they help the crew more than they do the Green Things. You may want to allow the monsters an extra Adult in the setup, if they have trouble winning otherwise.

Entering and Leaving the Ship

Crew and monsters may exit and enter the ship in the following places:

• The Main Cargo Hold;
• The three Boat Bays;
• The two Sensors;
• The launch tubes in Probe Control;
• The engine tubes in the Engine Room.

Any number of crew and monsters may pass through these portals in a turn. Entering or leaving the ship takes the whole turn. The crewman or monster must start adjacent to the airlock; passing through the airlock is the only movement allowed that turn.

The Green Things don't need to breathe; they can stay in space for a long time, and, in the time-scale of the game, can grow and reproduce normally.

Crewmen do need to breathe. They solve this problem by putting on the small Universal StickyFoot Suits that are stored in each exit area. This is the reason it takes a whole turn for a crewman to enter or leave the ship. (Note that these suits do not protect crew inside the ship from Gas Grenades.) No counter is required for the suits, because they have no effect other than protecting the crewman from space.

Airlock Control

The Znutar is equipped with the newest and best in automatic airlocks. Unfortunately, they are so very automatic that they work for the Green Things, too! Thus, monsters can enter and exit the ship, just like crewmen.

There are two ways that the crew can keep monsters from using the airlocks:

First, if there is a crewman inside the ship, next to the airlock, he can manually override the lock control, and nothing outside can enter. He can only do this if he is not fighting that turn. So, if there are enough Green Things in an area to attack all the crewmen there, more Green Things can enter from outside on that same turn.

Second, if either the Captain or First Officer is on the bridge or auxiliary bridge, he can open or close any one lock at the beginning of any monster turn.

However, any lock that is closed during the monster turn must stay closed during the following crew turn, and cannot be re-opened until the beginning of another monster turn!

The Green Things can not use the airlock controls to keep crewmen from entering or leaving the ship.

Movement Outside the Znutar

There are two distinct ways to move while outside the ship: either floating in space, or walking along the skin of the ship.

Jet suits, cargo movers, and the ship's boats can float in space. Green Things cannot attack them while they are in space. There are four space "areas" – the Bow Area, Top Area, Stern Area, and Underside. A unit may move from any area to an adjacent one on the movement phase of its turn. A unit in space can attack any Green Thing on the skin adjacent to that area. Green Things on the skin cannot attack units in space.

Green Things and pressure-suited crew members move by walking along the skin. Each portion of the skin outside a room of the Znutar is a separate "skin area." (Exception: Each of the Fuel Pods has two Skin Areas – one on either side of the space-area dividing line.) Movement on the skin is handled just like movement in the ship.

New Units

CARGO MOVERS Number Available: 2 Where Found: Main Cargo Hold

These heavy-duty devices assist the crew in cargo handling. Any crew member or the Robot (but not the Mascot) may enter or leave a cargo mover during the Grab Weapons phase of a turn. There is room for only one "person" inside. Put the pilot's counter underneath the Cargo Mover counter.

The cargo mover has grav pods which let it move from one area to one adjacent area per turn. It is too large to enter any areas of the ship except the cargo hold and the boat bays, and these must be entered from outside the Znutar. While outside the ship, a cargo mover is considered to be in space, out of reach of any Green Things walking on the skin of the Znutar. The large claws of the cargo mover are too clumsy to handle any weapon other than a can of Rocket Fuel (if someone gets one to where the cargo mover can reach it). The claws can reach through a hatch to grab something on the other side, but not to attack. If the claws grab a Green Thing through a hatch or inside the ship, they do 3 dice hand-to-hand damage. If the cargo mover is in space, the claws can grab one Green Thing (any size) per turn and throw it off into space, where it will eventually die.

A cargo mover may be attacked by Green Things only if it is inside, in the cargo hold or a boat bay. If a cargo mover is destroyed, any hits over 40 are applied to its occupant. Cargo movers may be attacked while empty.

JET SUITS Number Available: 8 Setup 2 each in Boat Bays and Cargo.

These handy suits let crew members perform sustained spacewalks without being tethered. Any crew member or the Robot (but not the Mascot) may enter or leave a jet suit during the Grab Weapons phase of a turn. Put the occupant's counter underneath the Jet Suit counter.

If a crew member is carrying a weapon when he dons a Jet Suit, he must drop it. It will take another Grab Weapons phase to pick it up again with the suit's claws. The manipulative arms of a jet suit allow its occupant to carry and use any weapon.

Six small thrusters let the suit move from one area to any adjacent area, inside or outside the ship, once per turn. When out in space, a jet suit is considered to be beyond the reach of any Green Things. Thus, outside the ship, a jet suit can attack Green Things without any danger of a counterattack. Inside or outside the ship, a Jet Suit has a 1-die hand-to-hand attack with its manipulative arms. This replaces the occupant's normal hand-to-hand attack.

Inside the ship, jet suits can be attacked. If a jet suit is destroyed, any hits over 20 are applied to its occupant. Jet suits may be attacked while empty.

A Jet Suit cannot fit inside a Cargo Mover.

Inside the ship, the occupant of a Jet Suit may ignore Gas Grenade attacks.

OOK SOOT Number Available: 1 Setup: Damage Control Central

Engineer Officer Smodum made this special soot for the Mascot after it came aboard, since it couldn't use the crew's suits. The Ook can put it on or take it off during any Grab Weapons phase. Switch counters to show whether the Ook is wearing the soot or not; use the soot counter, upside-down, to show the empty ook soot. The monsters may not attack the soot while it is empty.

When the Ook is in its soot, gas grenades don't affect it. Its constitution value is doubled, but its movement is slowed to 3.

Ship's Boats

Separate counters are provided for each of the ship's boats. These can leave the ship and enter the space areas around the Znutar. Use the counters only if the crew enter a boat to leave the ship. The boats can only move from the boat bay to space, or from one space area to an adjacent one, each turn. Each boat may only re-enter its own bay.

Any crew member can operate any boat. The Robot and Mascot cannot operate a boat. Neither can the Green Things.

The Scout has life support for two crew, the Saucer four, and the Cockboat can carry any number (they sit very close together). The Robot and Mascot do not count against the capacity of the Scout or Saucer. Neither do Green Things, if they get in.

Neither Jet Suits nor Cargo Movers will fit in the boats.

Neither weapons nor Green Things can harm the boats or anyone inside them.

Attacks From the Boats

Crew in the Scout and Saucer can open the boat's lid (if they're wearing their pressure suits) and use weapons on Green Things on the ship's surface adjacent to that space area. Crew in the Cockboat can't attack monsters except with rocket blast (see below).

Any crewman on the skin of a boat can use weapons as though he were wearing a Jet Suit.

Rocket Blast: This rule only applies to the Scout and the Cockboat (the Saucer has grav drive). Usually, while maneuvering close to the ship, the boats use tiny thrusters. However, they can use the full force of their rocket blasts as a weapon, with the same effect as Rocket Fuel. The blast from the Scout has the same effect as one can of Fuel; the blast from the Cockboat counts as two cans. The blast affects all creatures on the ship's skin in that space area, or all creatures in the hold or bay in question, or all creatures on the skin of the other boat (if one boat used its rocket blast on the other).

There is a catch: The boat which uses its rocket blast will zoom off the board, and may not return until the third turn after the blast. It returns on the crew movement phase, and may appear in any space area.

Outside the Boats

Both Green Things and crew (in their sticky-foot pressure suits) may be on the outside of a boat. Green Things may only get on the outside of a boat while it is in a boat bay, and can't leave until the boat returns. When a boat leaves the boat bay, any Adult or Baby Green Thing that was in the boat bay can choose whether to be on the boat, leaving with it, or to stay in the boat bay. Eggs and Fragments automatically stay in the boat bay.

Likewise, crewmen in the boat bay can choose to ride out of the bay on the outside of a boat.

Crewmen on the skin of a boat may enter the boat on their movement phase, if there's room. Likewise, crewmen inside a boat may go to the skin of the boat. Opening the hatch of any boat will be fatal to any crewman inside who didn't stop to put on his pressure suit!

Abandon Ship! If there are Green Things on the outside of a boat when the crew abandons ship, the crew has to kill those Green Things before they can enter the Epilogue!

Jumping: Crewmen can jump from the exterior of the ship to the exterior of a boat, or vice versa, or from one boat to another, regardless of which space area the boats are in. This takes their whole movement phase. Roll a die for each crewman that jumps. If he's jumping to a boat, he misses on a 1, 2, or 3. If he's jumping to the ship, he only misses on a 1. (The Robot never misses.) If a crewman misses, he's lost forever unless one of the boats leaves the board to pick him up. The boat, and everyone in it, misses that turn and returns on the next turn with the crewman clinging to its skin. Each boat can rescue only one person per turn.

Combat Inside the Boats

The only way for Green Things to get inside a boat (unless the crew does something stupid like holding a door open or carrying an egg inside, which they won't do in the game) is for a Green Thing to be on the outside of a ship's boat in space, and for no crew to be left inside the boat. Obviously, for the last crewman to leave the boat, the door had to be open, so the Green Thing could then get in. This will never happen if the crew is careful.

If it does happen, then the crew might try to retake the boat. Consider the inside of the boat to be one area, and conduct combat normally.

Rules Changes

Setup

Green Things can set up outside the ship, provided they follow the usual guidelines for initial setup. Since the crew can't come outside immediately, this may be a good move.

Weapons

Fire Extinguishers and Gas Grenades will not work outside the ship. All other weapons work normally. Rocket Fuel which explodes outside the ship affects all creatures in the same space area, except for those inside the ship's boats.

Any unit in a space area has a line of sight (LOS) to any unit in that space area, or on a skin area of the same space area. It also has LOS to units in adjacent space areas, but not to the skin areas of adjacent space areas. This will only come into play if Green Things get into a space area by clinging to the outside of a ship's boat.

Any creature on a skin area has a LOS to any other skin area in the same space area, or to any creature in an adjacent skin area (even if it's in a different space area).

Outside airlocks and boat bays have double doors for safety, so no LOS can ever be traced through one.

Green Things Growth

Green Things outside the ship never have to grow. If the Green Things player wants to grow the ones inside, but not the ones outside, he can.

Victory Conditions

The game is not over until one side controls the whole ship. If the crew controls the interior and the Green Things control the exterior, the crew must open the airlocks, either to flee in the ship's boats or to fight. To go home in a ship (or a boat) with Green Things clinging outside would be a bad idea.

Playing "Outside the Znutar": Make sure you have plenty of Zgwortz on hand when you try these rules.