The Captain Is Dead: Episode 2 – Adrift
The Captain Is Dead: Episode 2 – Adrift Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
24 Yellow Alerts 25 Orange Alerts 8 Red Alerts 1 Reference Card 10 Damage Tokens 2 Battle Plans 12 Veteran Abilities
Setup
Setup in Episode 2 follows the same setup as Episode 1 with the following exceptions:
Use the new Alerts deck provided by Episode 2. Place the Episode 1 Alerts deck back in the box as it will not be needed.
Shuffle the 2 new Episode 2 Battle Plans into the Episode 1 Battle Plans deck.
Shuffle the Veteran Ability cards and randomly distribute one to each player. They should read this card before choosing their role.
Place a hostile alien pawn in every location, including the hallways. You should have 12 pawns and 12 locations on the ship.
Place the damage tokens near the game board. You'll need them soon.
Once you're set up, you still resolve 5 alerts, and then begin the game as normal.
Objective
You have escaped the hostile alien ship that killed the captain, for now. However, they have chased you into an asteroid field. The asteroid field has protected you from the aliens, but a rogue asteroid has knocked your Jump Core offline and left your ship to drift in space. Will you try to get the Jump Core back online, or simply try to drift through the asteroid field?
In addition, the aliens are held at bay by the asteroid field, but still hunting you. The remaining stowaways on board are sabotaging your ship, and the mothership is sending probes into the asteroid field to hunt you down.
Episodes
For the sake of clarity, The Captain is Dead shall be referred to as Episode 1 and this expansion shall be referred to as Episode 2.
Playing The Game
Play the game as described in the Episode 1 manual. It is important to note that you need version 1.5 of the Episode 1 manual or higher so that you have the most up-to-date rules. If you have an older version, go to www.thecaptainisdead.com and download the latest version of the rules.
Winning And Losing The Game
In Episode 1 you can only win by getting the Jump Core back online. In Episode 2 you can win that way as well, but you can also win by making it all the way to the end of the Alerts deck, effectively drifting through the asteroid field.
In Episode 2 you can still lose if the ship is destroyed or overrun by aliens, but there is also a new way to lose. If 2 Alien Probe cards (from the Alerts deck) are ever in play (attached to the ship) at the same time, the players are captured and lose.
The Bad Stuff
The Alerts deck in Episode 2 is designed to be a bit more frantic than Episode 1. There are new threats, and new ways of taking damage that are beyond just knocking systems offline. Many of the anomalies have effects that will throw you off your game as well.
What all this means is that you will have to develop new strategies to win in Episode 2 beyond those you developed for Episode 1.
Because there is a new way to win the game, by going all the way through the Alerts deck, you might think that's the easier path. It's not. It's just as difficult, and perhaps more so. But, it can be your backup plan in case you aren't getting what you need to repair the Jump Core.
More importantly, you have much greater control over the Alerts deck than ever before. The reason is that you can shoot down nearly everything in the deck with a torpedo. Probes and asteroids can both be shot down while they are visible in the alert queue while the External Scanners are online.
If you shoot down the asteroid or probe that will be resolved at the end of your turn, then you won't need to resolve an Alert at the end of your turn. However, it is often just as beneficial to shoot down the second Alert, even though you'd still have to resolve the first Alert. This is because you should get rid of the Alert that is most devastating, not necessarily the one that is closest to the ship.
By keeping the Torpedo Tube and External Scanners online, and keeping a couple Torpedoes manufactured, you can easily keep the most damaging Alerts at bay, which will make the game much more manageable.
Dodging Asteroids
Dodging an asteroid is a new form of overriding an alert in Episode 1. (Printed as "Episode 1" in the source manual; this is likely meant to read Episode 2, since dodging is new in this expansion. Kept as printed.) The big difference is that the ship's ability to dodge an asteroid directly correlates to the current level of the Jump Core.
For example, if you started the game at Veteran, but have made 1 repair then your current Jump Core level would be Normal. A Normal Jump Core level means you would have to spend 4 Command to dodge the incoming asteroid.
Any alert, ship system, battle plan, or ability that affects overriding alerts also affects dodging. Therefore, the Diplomat may use her override ability for dodging.
A reference card is provided so you need not memorize the following chart.
Dodge chart: your ability to dodge an asteroid correlates directly to the status of the Jump Core (the Command cost is shown as Command icons):
| Current Level | Dodge? |
|---|---|
| Novice (or above) | 3 Command |
| Normal | 4 Command |
| Veteran | 5 Command |
| Expert | 6 Command |
| Hardcore | 7 Command |
| Insane | IMPOSSIBLE |
Damage Tokens
Damage tokens are used to indicate small amounts of damage to a ship system. When a system has 3 damage tokens remove the damage tokens and flip the system to it's Offline side. (Source spelling "it's" kept as printed; it means "its".)
Damage tokens cannot be repaired unless someone has the Maintenance Veteran Ability.
Do not add damage tokens to any system that cannot go offline, such as The Captain's Journal.
Alien Saboteurs
The remaining hostile aliens on-board the ship have changed their mission from taking control of the ship to sabotaging it to allow their brethren to catch up.
At the start of any turn in which a hostile alien is present, add a damage token to any system that already has a damage token.
Veteran Abilities
Veteran Abilities are new in Episode 2. They further extend the special abilities of the base 18 roles making old characters feel fresh once again.
We think it is important that you read and understand your Veteran card before choosing your role. Your Veteran Ability may be better suited toward one role than another, and this may make you want to choose a role that you otherwise might have avoided in the past.
Though it's possible to use Veteran Abilities with Episode 1, they will throw off the game balance, so this is not recommended. We recommend you use the abilities only with Episode 2.