I have my own ideas, but I am really interested to see what you guys have to add.

Just list everything, think of this as more of a brainstorm session.

Well in Portland we are doing an esscalation campaign from doing 180 points to 300 with a massive battle at the end representing the Mon Cal entering the fray

I have my own ideas, but I am really interested to see what you guys have to add.

Just list everything, think of this as more of a brainstorm session.

If you check out my post above this one https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/177246-our-epic-star-wars-campaign/

You can see my thoughts. Although, I admit, my ideas are totally over the top

Lol nice timing! I'll give it a read.

I will do a 2-3 page post sometime tomorrow (or the day after) but try to see what you guys also have to say about it.

I'd love to see a mechanic that tracks the progress of your fleet, so if you lose a ship in a battle then it's gone for good. At a certain point (after each battle, after a number of battles - not sure exactly) you get a certain amount of points to put towards building new ships/squadrons/upgrades.

I had an idea for a all sector war between four to six planets each with certain buffs and a total fleet point pool of 2000 to attack and defend your planets split between 2 players each. You could have 2 players attack a planet and one player need to hold them off til the other can jump in with reinforcements. Though need to flesh it out a bit more.

I've been trying to get together a campaign as well, although I didn't include the rpg (but the three other ffg product lines) because of the lack of interest of it in my area. I've mainly been looking at how other campaign systems have handled different possible aspects in order to draw inspiration. So far, three things are necessary for success: ease of use, lots of player interactivity, and enjoyment.

I've been trying to get together a campaign as well, although I didn't include the rpg (but the three other ffg product lines) because of the lack of interest of it in my area. I've mainly been looking at how other campaign systems have handled different possible aspects in order to draw inspiration. So far, three things are necessary for success: ease of use, lots of player interactivity, and enjoyment.

Ease of use for me is ease on the players, I don't mind doing a lot of grunt work behind the scenes. Interactivity and enjoyment are massive though. Actions need to have consequences and people need to feel progress. One thing about a lot of campaigns is that they reward people who win and punish those that lose a lot, which can lead to someone at the bottom of the table not only be a worse player, but also having huge disadvantages.

it's tricky to balence that, which is why i'm running a narrative campaign, and not a competitive one.

You could just emulate Star Wars: Rebellion, the best SW Strategy game around.

You'd need a GM. Rebels have a hidden base on one of a few dozen outer rim systems, and the base on Yavin (that the Empire knows about). Imps have the core worlds, and influence on the others. Deploy fleets, with the Imps starting with a massive advantage. Rebel raids damage imperial production or steal plans and kidnap key people. Imperials need to locate and destroy the Rebel base, which can be evacuated/moved.

Game is over if someone takes Coruscant (always going to be well defended), destroys the Rebel base AND stops the evacuation, or blows up the DS2 under construction (or kills Palpy somehow)

You could just emulate Star Wars: Rebellion, the best SW Strategy game around.

Rebellion was the single biggest inspiration for the big campaign system i wrote. I loved that game.

I've been trying to get together a campaign as well, although I didn't include the rpg (but the three other ffg product lines) because of the lack of interest of it in my area. I've mainly been looking at how other campaign systems have handled different possible aspects in order to draw inspiration. So far, three things are necessary for success: ease of use, lots of player interactivity, and enjoyment.

Ease of use for me is ease on the players, I don't mind doing a lot of grunt work behind the scenes. Interactivity and enjoyment are massive though. Actions need to have consequences and people need to feel progress. One thing about a lot of campaigns is that they reward people who win and punish those that lose a lot, which can lead to someone at the bottom of the table not only be a worse player, but also having huge disadvantages.

it's tricky to balence that, which is why i'm running a narrative campaign, and not a competitive one.

Absolutely on the ease of use being an ease on the players but I'd also include an ease on the ones running the campaign too. I see interactively playing more on giving more choices and the ability to affect the 'board' beyond the basic games they play. Maybe similar to something like the old Mighty Empires?

I'm leaning towards either doing during the Rebellion or just after episode 6. I like the idea of having the Imperial players being on the same 'team' but also being able to nibble away at their teammates' territories and systems in an effort to see more Imperial versus Imperial battles rather than the usual Imps versus Rebs.

I kind of want something that just focuses on Armada, and abstracts everything outside of it. Rules to create and maintain fleets, rules for unique cards enforced across a faction, Supply limits and friendly ports, special rules to cover friendly bases being attacked or defended...

Seeing the other campaign ideas I feel overwhelmed by the complexity. I wouldn't want to play or be responsible for much beyond just controlling my fleet.

One of our players in Portland is basing our league campaign off of a modified Flames of War style.

I would love to try some of these ideas here though.

I am currently working over an idea for an Armada campaign. One thing I've noticed in a lot of these suggestions and in prior threads regarding the subject is that many people see the fleet battles as conflicts in a grand strategy game. That the events of a particular battle drive the economies of a large game. While this is an interesting perspective to take, I propose that pulling back from that idea and instead focusing on story-telling and forced objective selection would make for the best campaign. Big strategy games are just going to get too complex, and when each "conflict" takes 2 hours to complete a large strategy game just becomes too unwieldy for gamers with lives -- so it will never gain any traction. And what we really want when we think Armada strategy is that our games have additional meaning, as they are driving a larger act. With storytelling and objective selection becoming the focal point of a campaign, each game your group does play contributes towards a very real, very imminent victory for one side or the other. Compact, meaningful strategy that puts the focus on the game we're building the campaign around.

I would issue two handbooks, one for each faction. In it would be a number of scenarios, mini campaigns consisting of a number of interconnected battles, with success and failure of these battles effecting the fleet points and objectives of later battles. Each handbook would have a description of the scenario, a bit of fluff, and a choice for the player to make prior for the first battle. The choice is one of three options for each player, each represented by a combat dice - Black, Red, Blue. Each choice represents a decision on how to approach the upcoming battle -- charge in guns blazing, setup a defensive perimeter, etc. When both players have secretly chosen their die, they reveal them and roll. The die faces of each player will be compared on a table specific to and printed on the ongoing scenario in order to determine the objective and any specific rules for the battle. Thematically these objective results would be accompanied by flavor text printed next to each die result. The Rebel frigates successfully get the jump on the hasty, lone Victory. Players would select their choice, and thus their die, and the interaction of the two choices -- coupled with the luck of their rolls -- determines how the upcoming battle will both be setup and played out.

As an example, perhaps if the Imperial player rolls a crit and the Rebel player rolls a blank the objective becomes Most Wanted and the Imperials get an additional 50 pts. Flavor text describes how the updated patrols you ordered when you chose your dice prior to the battle stumbled upon the furtive Rebel fleet. And you can afford to stage these sort of pitched battles, which would normally be unfair because one player is technically handicapped, by balancing out the injustice to any one player over the length of the campaign. This adds an interesting dynamic in which players get the opportunity to either play as an underdog or confidently charge ahead with superior numbers -- these are fun, thematic occurances that won't happen in regular competitive play.

Anyway, this is all just stuff I'm kicking around in my head at the moment. I need to get more people to play before I can sink a ton of energy into a complete ruleset, lest it never be used.

Well in Portland we are doing an esscalation campaign from doing 180 points to 300 with a massive battle at the end representing the Mon Cal entering the fray

Which store? When?

More on topic, what I would want in a campaign:

Asymmetric battles, where good positioning on the strategic level gives you a solid advantage at the tactical level... without the weaker player wondering why they're even playing!

Persistent ships, either through unlocked upgrades; a fixed, deplete-able army list; and/or the ability to withdraw ships in the middle of an engagement and some purpose to doing so.

An objective other than "Kill the other guy utterly," be it "Hold system x for x turns" or "control x number of systems" or something to reflect than Armada is an objectives based game beyond plain-ol' annihilation.

I've always thought a relatively simple split path linear campaign is a good idea. They tend to be a good balance between fun, interesting games with twists and narrative hooks beyond the game itself and a relatively simple campaign system.

An example of how one would work is this:

First game is the scout elements of the imperial force uncovering a hidden rebel base (rebels have advantage so you'd play superior positions combined with maybe minefield), rebel objective is to destroy all imperial ships, imperial objective is to get word back to command (survive).

Then the next game basically leads on from what happens, and you can make it up as you go (before each battle) or plan out a complete map of possibilities.

For example if the rebels DID wipe out all the imperials, somehow, they can now lead a strike mission deep into imperial space and have a strike at taking out a vital imperial asset.

If the Imperials won by absolutely trashing the rebels somehow even with the disadvantage of scenario then the next mission could be the rebels fighting a full retreat as the empire brings it's might to bear on the uncovered and crippled rebel operation.

I think another completely essential ingredient of a campaign like this is narrative elements and custom elements. Not only should missions tie into each other but each player should, you know, name all their ships and stuff. When they take battle damage or do something awesome in a game make sure to note it down and have a system of promotions and damage to give it minor buffs or debuffs as the campaign progresses. The CR-90A "Forerunner" slipped behind the enemy "Dominator" and delivered the killing blow, but suffered much damage in return [it could have a buff to attacking ships from behind but lose the ability to go speed 4 until it gets a serious chance to repair].

Have a custom admiral for each player, they may copy an ability already on an admiral card to make one up (that's not too imbalanced) the important thing is that they have their own name.

I also think a really fun campaign would be one where a rebel or imperial player has to "run the gauntlet", fighting a series of battles that tie in together loosely but where the protagonist fleet retains all losses and damage between each mission and only has limited opportunity to replenish squadrons, damage and ships.

Hope this inspires