TL:DR- Similar to eating a peanut butter cup… There’s no wrong way to play Space Aces.

First some background:

Space Aces is rooted in my love all things campy sci-fi. It is built to be played with both small and large groups, rules-lite enough to be easy to follow, and flowy enough that the action keeps moving. And since it fits in your wallet, it is also designed to be played anywhere.

The game retains the simple joy of critical hits and critical misses that a d20 Action die brings, while also adding in the narrative flavor and mixed results with a d6 Complication die role. Now, it’s not the GM punishing players, it’s the dice that incur the plot twist, the setback, the baddies, etc. Generally, this leads to less complaining / whining at the table.

Space Aces was also a reductionist challenge to see how much "game" could be fit on a single business card. In many cases, doing so required boiling down complex systems and ideas to a single word. By necessity the system is open-ended enough that it encourages interpretation. Various modules have been made that can augment the core game loop in various ways.

The generator tables are crafted with the philosophy of providing an minimalist and evocative "hard edge" for players and GMs to crystallize their ideas on, and nothing more. The fun of Space Aces is often in interpreting the results together.

Dice Rolling & Heat Core Mechanics:

Two dice are rolled every single time: A d20 Action die, and a d6 Complication die.

d20 Action Dice: We all know how a d20 works. 20 is critical success. 1 is critical fail. Rolling with Advantage means rolling it twice and taking higher result. Rolling with Disadvantage means rolling twice and taking lower result. Nothing revolutionary.

In Space Aces, the GM almost never rolls. The PCs roll when acting on the world or reacting to the world.

Setting the Difficulty: Setting the Difficulty Check in a situation is a little more tricky. The principle is: Fictional framing determines everything. A character's fictional positioning, approach, previous actions, Skills, and Style adjectives all come into play when determining the Difficulty of any action. There’s a handy chart on the front with words associated with a number to help determine difficulty. Ask yourself 'how hard would this be for an average person to do?' then modify according to the circumstances. I like to stick to simple Difficulty of 5, 10, 15, and 20. When in doubt, set Difficulty to 10 and see what happens.

Often it helps to communicate the stakes and consequences before each roll so everybody is clear on what's going to happen on a standard hit or miss. The Complication die will modify this with an additional benefit or cost.

Determine the Stakes: If something is risky, ask your players what they are risking? If something is dangerous, ask what could go wrong? If something is uncertain, ask them what happens if they fail? This short conversation will help adjudicating the rolls afterwards, and set expectations. ('Adjudicating' is a great word, btw) Consider the Heat Level too when deciding the Stakes, as the heat goes up I like to raise the Stakes!

d6 Complication Dice: Make every roll matter. Every missed roll should come with a consequence. This asks a lot from the GM, but it is essential for keeping the action moving. The Space Aces system is designed to help this along with the Complication roll. This d6 allows for major/mixed successes and major/mixed failures. It even allows for a super critical success, or a super critical failure! This helps the GM decide how to adjudicate rolls, and helps in determining future Difficulty of actions as well. If a cost is not obvious, the GM may roll on the Cost / Benefit chart to help determine what happens.

The Snag: Typically a “The Snag” is dropped by the GM at an opportune moment during the mission to make the story more fun and surprising. In solo play, it’s hard to surprise yourself with a twist. So, an optional rule is as follows: If a Cost is rolled and the d20 result is under the current heat level, the “The Snag” triggers or triggers at the next opportune moment. It is a ticking time bomber in your mission... sometimes literally.

Heat: Every Cost that is rolled turns up the Heat Level for the whole the party by 1. The higher the Heat, generally the bigger the Cost. Roll a Cost with Heat of 1? You might stub your toe. Roll the same Cost with Heat of 20? You might lose that toe...  Generally, the only way to reset Heat Level is to take a Long Rest.

Up to you, but every 5 Heat points that are accrued I like to throw in an interesting event of some kind. Also, generally there's only one The Snag per session... but as with all of this... these are guidelines that can easily be broken.

Stats & Gumption:

Rather than representing skills, Stats represent approaches. How you approach a problem determines which stat modifier you use for the roll. There is room for interpretation and argument, of course.

It doesn't hurt much to let the players use their strongest attributes if they can make a convincing argument why their approach matches the Stat. However, if they roll a Cost, don’t be afraid to put that Stat at a disadvantage the next time they want to use it.

• Moxie: Moxie represents tackling a problem head on.
• Smarts: Smarts represents approaching a situation brains first.
• Wiggles: Wiggles represents coming at a challenge from an angle.

• Pockets: Pockets is dual usage. It represents how well your character is equipped. Need that crucial piece of gear? Roll +Pockets vs Difficulty to see if you have it. Your main Skill will often dictate how likely it is that you have an item on you. Perhaps no roll is even required to check. A swashbuckler undoubtedly has a basic sword, but almost definitely not rocket launcher. Set the Difficulty roll accordingly. Pockets can also can be used to limit the amount of notable or large items your character can carry. But don't get too bogged down in the minutia of inventory / supply management... nobody likes that guy.

• Friends: Friends is dual usage. Need to find just the right contact in a new destination? Roll +Friends vs Difficulty to see if you know a guy. Trying to charm your way out of a tight spot? Roll +Friends vs Difficulty to see how charming you are.

• Gumption: Gumption is not necessarily health. I'll say it again: Gumption is not necessarily health. Gumption is your will to stay in the mix. As with super heroes and Saturday morning cartoons, main characters can shrug off almost any amount of damage, but if you break their will to fight… that’s another story. This allows for non-lethal encounters to also carry risk. A failed task, bad news, or a well timed insult can lower your Gumption, and if your Gumption ever reaches 0 you are Taken Out like yesterday’s baguettes!

The fact that Gumption is not health means that Gumption can be regained in a number of ways. An encouraging pep talk, a well timed hug and compliment, a your favorite tasty Cool Ranch flavored snack... all could conceivably restore a character's Gumption.

Grit:

Our plucky heroes have Grit, up to 5 of it actually. They learn from their failures and eventually fail enough that they can grit their teeth and turn the tables on an otherwise failed action.

Note: there is room for abuse of this mechanic. It's up to the GM and their players to decide how much abuse of this will be allowed. If your player wants to do something that would be impossible in the fiction, decide if you will allow it or not. Since I personally hate to say "no", perhaps doing something otherwise impossible will also come with a consequence or Cost...

Combat (henceforth known as "Scuffles"):

Combat Scuffles are very dangerous for PCs. Combat Scuffles are not fair for PCs. PCs should think outside of the box when tackling dangerous encounters because jumping straight into the fray will probably result in them being Taken Out real quick. In general, most of the Enemy and PC standard attacks will cause -1 Gumption Harm. Big bad guys may hit the PCs for 2 or 3 or more Gumption. Rolled Costs and Benefits can modify that number up or down if appropriate.

Setting the Difficulty to hit an enemy or dodge an enemy's hit changes based on the fiction, there are no set rules. A general principle though could be:

• Small baddies have a Difficulty of 5 to hit them and to dodge their attacks.
• Medium baddies have a Difficulty of 10 to hit them and to dodge their attacks.
• Big baddies have a Difficulty of 15 to hit them and to dodge their attacks.

Difficulty should be modified depending on the fictional framing. If a player misses a hit on a big baddy, but rolls a Benefit... perhaps it puts them in a better position for next time so the Difficulty drops to 10 for the next attack. Do what seems appropriate at the time.

Scuffle Initiative:

There's plenty of ways to handle Initiative. It's not specified in game because it doesn't really matter. Pick a method you like. Here's what we are noodling with:

1. Decide in fiction which side starts with High Ground and Player order.
2. If Player has High Ground, Opponent reacts to Player’s actions & attacks. If Opponent has High Ground, Player reacts to Opponent’s actions & attacks.
3. Player gains High Ground on a rolled Benefit. Player loses High Ground on a rolled Cost.
4. That's it. Players take turns acting or reacting depending on who has High Ground.

It's entirely possible to enter a fight and never lose the High Ground. It's also entirely possible to never gain the High Ground in a fight, keep reacting to the attacks, and have to eventually run away. But in either case, the players are always the ones rolling the dice, not the GM.

Aiding:

Players may be of the helpful variety and want to help each other out. While no rules officially exist for this (because there's only so much room...), at our table we often say that PCs can aid another by rolling against a narratively appropriate Difficulty. If successful the aided player gets to add +2 to their roll. However, everybody who aided will also face the consequences of a failure and/or cost.

In Conclusion

This writeup covers some of the basics, but that's it. As the game is minimalist, it encourages interpretation, hacking, and home brewing. When a new question comes up, decide together on how to handle it by asking this one simple question: What is most fun? If you can determine that, then there's no wrong way to play Space Aces.

Adventure Awaits!