Great. Congratulations to you and your girl. Hope you will create many young recruits for the Starmada.

Many thanks that you take time to write an answer to my post above. I think it would be necessary to improve and reorganize the rules of VBAM. The problem is that the rules as they are written now could be a problem for newbies to understand.

Some below points I think could be useful if I may post it here

-examples. There are examples in the game, but too few IMO. Some graphical pictures (eg. how jump lanes look like and movements on them are conducted) and charts (eg. a chart which details all intelmissions with short descriptions on one single page, or a scenario chart which lays out when each of the different scenario begins and when it ends)

-the main rules begins much too late. I have to read through 40 pages of different rules for this and for that (many of them which I am not sure if they are important at all), till I finally am able to begin the movement/combat chapter. It should be possible to begin with the main rules at the beginning of the book on page 3-5 and not somewhere on page 40. I dont want to read 3 hours through minor rules before I even know how to move a ship or how to combat.

-for newbies or for people which want to play a simpler version of VBAM you should make a basic version of it, with 10-20 pages to read. (maybe the complexity level of sovereign stars or a little bit higher but not much higher) There could then be a medium version with the more crunchy rules (different scenarios, ground bombardment) and an advanced version with intelmissions, raid rules, squadron rules etc. for the hardcore fans.

Maybe VBAM is simpler than this "starfire" game but its too complex for the occasional player like myself. In these days I dont have the time anymore to play games of this level (family etc.) so I prefer simpler games like Starmada, Illuminati or columbias block game series. (Eastfront etc.)
I would appreciate a simpler version of VBAM which seems quite good in its basics.

This may be, but I cannot remember that you give some hint which rules are absolutely necessary for the game to function and which can be replaced or taken out completely. So the basic idea of a "skeleton" or a module system is very good. But its difficult to learn which parts of the game belong to this skeleton and which parts are just add-ons. For a experienced player of VBAM this is no prob, but for new players it is.

-Combat and design rules for orbital stations and ground batteries would be fine.

-simple rules to conduct ground combat with the troops/marines invading a ground installation. Should be similar and easy like the boarding rules maybe. (eg. troops are calculated in "steps" to 25 etc.)

-rules for ship combat in the athmosphere of a planet. Different types of athmospheres would be nice to simulate the athmospheric conditions of exotic planets.

-rules for invasion landings of assault landers or drop troops and the planetary defence fire.

-much greater hulls than 20. (maybe 200 or even bigger for titanic ships like the star wars death star) Or maybe a hull size formula to construct such monster ships.

-Some premade scenarios with balanced forces also.

-more different scenario types

-Also a way to design ships without shields or screens at all. (just different thickness of armor and the material it is made of)  I know the game comes with an armor special equiment, but I would prefer a deeper system for armor. Eg. for game universes like the traveller universe.

-Gunship rules, sub light ships which are greater than fighters but smaller than hull size 1 ships. (maybe operating in squadrons of 2 or 3)

-new area weapons

What I dont need is:
-background material for a universe. (while basically interesting, this should be in a seperate source book, like the Boltian book for example)

No, your bubblefish is great. I really love you english native speakers when you try to use some german expressions. (maybe it is similar comical if we germans use english)

Games Workshop does the same thing in their warhammer fantasy books. For example once they named a cruel demon "zahnarzt" (which maybe sounds dangerous in english, but means "dentist" in german)

Today I tinkered around with some traveller ships converting to starmada. But it was not easy. The biggest problem is the size.

In traveller you have following ships
-30 ton fighters
-400 tons space defense boats
-200 tons armed freetraders
-800 tons mercenary troop transports

larger ships
-1000 tons escorts
-3000 tons destroyers
-6000 tons light cruisers
-12000 tons hvy cruisers
-50.000 tons battleships
-150.000 tons dreadnoughts

you get the problem? In Starmada, there is 100 SU to 1500 SU (times 15) In traveller you have ships from (not even counting the smaller ones) eg 1000 tons to 150.000 tons (times 150) Do anybody have an idea how to solve such a problem?

I agree. Bookeeping should not be more than in starmada. The only bookeeping should be task force mission assignment and maybe keeping track of supply points (but that is another story)

Thats why I think that planetary combat should be like fighter combat in starmada. Player A moves and fights then Player B.

A typical basic turn sequence could be

1. Both player assign simultaneously missions for their taskforces and write up the corresponding points on the playing area.

2. simulataneously movement to the designated area

3. mission resolving in alternate fashion, depending on the individual initiative value of a task force (how to calculate this is another story )
  -sensors phase (scanning other task forces to reveal them)
  -revealed task forces can do space battles: each player rows up his ship in lines and fires simulataneously (like A house divided or GDWs Imperium)
  -space/ground interface operations (moving spacecrafts or jump troopers to a planet while receiving planetary defense fire)
-other missions

4. players conduct ground movement and combat in alternate fashion, depending on the individual initiative value of the ground combat task force. This means  task force with highest initiative moves and combat first on the planet according to its movement points, then second highest etc. The planetary combat is similar to the space combat. This means lining up troops like "A house divided" etc..you get the picture. Different for long range missiles and artillery of course.

5. Logistic phase
-Task forces return to base to repair ships, reload ammo, burgers for the troops and "this strange green liquid for the drives" if necessary.
-command points (as arrigo suggested) are reassigned between the task forces - receiving a command point could represent the possibility to conduct advanced missions for the next turn not only the basic drill. (what these missions are, is another story ) They show that the headquarter is giving special attention to the task force for the next turn. Each headquarter could have a certain command value to distribute each turn depending on the quality of its 3C equipment and talent of its admiral.

Of course the venus would be ok, but its not the same. 1889 plays with the "colonizing" idea of the mars. This means also that the empires on earth dont have an equal alien foe in military and technological fields. Their biggest enemies are other nations on earth. People from other planets of the solar systems are just natives and there to exploit. So if there are high tech marsians which can kick the the earthlings butt the whole idea of a colonization space age dont work IMO.

So the focus in a roleplaying game should not be colonizing like in space 1889 (as much as I love the setting) It should be something different.

Did anybody ever read, roleplayed or boardgamed the Space 1889 series from GDW?
In this game there was an interesting martian culture along with descriptions of their (rather simple) airships.

The same feeling I have about this game. I liked the 2nd edition much more. Unfortunately I sold it shortly before 3rd ed. came out. I sold the 3rd ed. too. It was not that bad, but a little bit too boring to me. I have many other games I prefer (like Fortress America or Starmada )

Didnt you like the new TI3?

To Dan: It would be very "leiwond" to have a new, streamlined version of sovereign stars. I liked the newly designed sovereign hex-tiles you posted very much.

Yes. Your theory of points of inflections is true. In most games the possibilities to change the pace of a game is represented by the option to move and by die rolls. In Starmada there is a special point of inflection - the designing of ships and putting them into an arena/scenario against each other.