GBP (£)
EUR (€)
Step into the world of International Rescue as you race around the globe performing rescues, averting disasters and of course thwarting the schemes of the villainous Hood. Honestly there couldn’t be a better product to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the absolute gem of my childhood that is Thunderbirds. This whole game is packed full of so many iconic moments and wonderful touches of nostalgia that you can’t help reliving the series as well as being a part of it.
In this game you take the role of either one of the five Tracy brothers or the always glamorous Lady Penelope Crighton-Ward in your mission to answer calls for help from around the world. It’s worth mentioning here that this choice in no way limits the which of the Thunderbird machines you can operate. The Lady Penelope Character can operate Thunderbird 1 as much as she can FAB 1 for example. Of course each character has its own strengths and abilities that will aid with various rescues.
Components List
As the Setup for Thunderbirds Co-operative Board Game references a lot of different components, I will break them down here before we move onto the Setup Proper.
6 Character Cards with corresponding Character peg representing the 5 Tracy Brothers and Lady Penelope. Each Character Card has a unique ability and a bonus that can be applied to rescues that match their speciality. For example Scott Tracy has a Bonus for Air Rescues, Gordon Tracy for Sea Rescues etc.
47 Disaster Cards representing the various rescues you will be faced with during Thunderbirds Cooperative Board Game. These Disasters range in difficulty represented by a number in the top left corner. Each Disaster will also have a location, a rescue type (Land, Sea, Air or Space), bonus conditions that assist with completing the rescue and rewards shown in the bottom left corner.
12 Event Cards and 20 Scheme Cards that represent either The Hood’s plans or various effects that add new challenges for the Players to overcome.
18 F.A.B Cards that provide various benefits, advantages and resources to the Player that draws one. This cards can be played at any time and on any Players turn.
4 Reference Cards that describe key rules, actions that can be taken, Turn Sequence etc. Basically a condensed version of the core game mechanics.
30 Bonus tokens of 5 different types. Green Technology Tokens that can be spent to construct 1 Pod Vehicle. Yellow Determination Tokens that can be spent to allow a Player to take an extra action. Pink Intelligence Tokens that allow a Player to re-roll 1 dice. Orange Teamwork Tokens that can be spent to add +2 to any dice roll. And Blue Logistics Tokens that can be spent to allow a Player to draw one F.A.B Card.
10 Pod Vehicle Tokens representing the various additional machines that can be purchased using Technology Tokens. Having these vehicles present in a required location can often mean the difference between failure and success in a rescue.
- 1 Player Token
- 2 Dice
- 6 Thunderbird Machine Models
Setup
Like with most new games, setup can seem a little daunting so I’m hoping that I can help break this down a little bit. As Thunderbirds Co-operative Board Game is a card based game, most of the Setup will revolve around creating decks from which you will either draw or reveal cards as the game goes on. As I’ve mostly been playing deck based games from the amazing Renegade Games recently, I was expecting one of those steps to include creating a character deck as well. With this game though characters rely simply on a list of actions they can perform rather than cards to play.
I’ll come to that later though.
Before we get into the Setup proper, I will just take a moment to describe the Game board. The majority of the board is a stylised world map broken down into various zones representing the major continents of the world; Europe, Asia, Atlantic Ocean, Africa and the South Pacific. Along with zones representing Outer Space (Geosynchronous Orbit, Asteroid Belt, The Sun, Venus, Mercury, The Moon, Mars), along with separate areas of the Disaster and Hood tracks that will be explained during Gameplay. Going back to the World Map, the South Pacific contains Tracy Island from where most characters will begin the game.
The Hood Track
First you will begin by creating The Hood Track. Having located the Scheme Cards and Event Cards, sort them into five piles according to the card backs, ie one pile of Event Cards, one pile of Scheme 1 Cards, one pile of Scheme 2 Cards, one pile of Scheme 3 Cards and one pile of Scheme 4 cards. Then shuffle all of these piles individually. DON’T do what I did and shuffle them into one pile. If you are playing this game for the first time, you will only want to use the Event Cards and Scheme Piles 1, 2 and 3. Then following The Hood Track Spaces at the top of the board place from left to right 2 Event Cards from the top of the Event Pile, the top card of Scheme 1, the top card of the Event Pile, the top card of Scheme 2, the top card of the Event Pile and finally the top card of Scheme 3. Place the remaining Event and Scheme Cards back in the box without looking at them, turn over the Scheme 1 Card on The Hood Track then place The Hood Figure at the start of The Hood Track.
Disaster Track And Disaster Deck
To start with, separate out the 8 ‘Hood Advances’ Cards from the Disaster Deck and set them aside. Shuffle the yellow backed Disaster Deck, draw three cards from it and place them at slots 1, 2 and 3 on The Disaster Track. Then separate the remaining cards into 4 face-down piles of 9 cards each, shuffle 2 ‘Hood Advances’ Cards into each pile and then stack them to form the Disaster Deck. Again it’s important not to shuffle these piles together.
Thunderbird Machines And Pod Vehicles
Thunderbirds 1, 2 and 4 will always start on the South Pacific Zone, just as Thunderbird 5 will always be placed on the Geo-stationary Orbit Zone. If one player has selected John as his or her character, Thunderbird 3 will also begin the game on the Geo-stationary Orbit Zone. Otherwise she begins the game on the South Pacific Zone. FAB 1 will always begin the game in Europe.
Next take all ten pod vehicle tokens and place them blueprint side up on the Brains’ Notebook area on Tracy Island. Then flip The Mole over and move to Tracy Island to show it has already been constructed. Other pod vehicles can be constructed using the green Technology Tokens.
Character Pegs
Take all the Character Pegs and place them in the corresponding Thunderbird Machine; John into Thunderbird 5, Gordon into Thunderbird 4, Alan into Thunderbird 3, Virgil into Thunderbird 2, Scott into Thunderbird 1 and Lady Penelope into FAB 1. All character pegs will be used even if no player has selected a particular character. Non Player Characters can still provide Bonuses to Rescues.
F.A.B Cards, Bonus Tokens, Character Cards And Dice
To complete the Setup, shuffle the F.A.B Cards and place them in the space on the bottom right corner of the Board, sort the 5 Bonus Tokens by type and place them on the game-board below Tracy Island, shuffle the character cards and deal one to each player, then finally give the dice to the player who most recently watched the Thunderbirds TV show. They will be the starting player.
If you prefer to choose your favourite character instead of dealing one randomly, you may of course do so as well. It’s not strictly in the rules but sometimes rules are meant to be broken, right?
Objective
The objective of Thunderbirds Co-operative Board Game is fairly simple. On paper anyway. As a team you must complete the various Disasters occurring around the world while working to defeat the Schemes of The Hood. The game is won once the final scheme is defeated. The game will be lost if either The Hood reaches one of the Skull and Crossbones steps on the Hood Track before the connected Scheme is defeated or if any Disaster Card reaches the end of the Disaster Track.
Turn Sequence
Each Player’s Turn can be broken down into three steps. Action Phase, Disaster Phase, and End of Turn. I will break down those phases below.
Action Phase
The action phase is when your character can act through performing Actions and Operations. Actions are complex tasks requiring greater effort to complete and Operations are relatively simple tasks. To represent this varying level of difficulty a Player may perform any number of Operations per turn but will be limited to only performing 3 Actions. Actions and Operations can be performed in any order. Once you have completed your last action, this phase ends and you may not perform any more operations.
The List of Actions a Player may perform are;
- Move - A Player may move any Thunderbird Machine his or her Character currently occupies up to it’s top speed, i.e up to the number of zones it may move
- Rescue - A Player may attempt to complete a Disaster Card
- Plan - A Player may take an F.A.B Card and advance The Hood one space on The Hood Track.
- Scan - A Player may move a Disaster Card back one space on The Disaster Track. This Action may only be used if the Player is currently aboard Thunderbird 5.
- Unless otherwise stated, these actions are not limited to being performed once per turn. Unused Actions cannot be banked for future turns. If they are not used, they will be lost.
- Players may perform any number of the Operations listed below during the Action Phase. Unless otherwise stated Operations may not be performed during an Action itself.
- Transfer Characters - Transfer character pegs from one Thunderbird Machine to another as long as the Machines are in the same Zone
- Load and Unload - Thunderbird 4, FAB 1 or any 2 Pod vehicles may be Loaded into or Unloaded from Thunderbird 2 as long as they all occupy the same Zone
- Defeat Schemes - Defeat Scheme Cards on The Hood Track
- Use Bonus Tokens - Bonus Tokens may be spent to pay for their effects then returned to The Supply.
- Disaster Phase
Once a player has completed all his or her Actions, The Turn moves to The Disaster Phase. This phase always begins with the Current Player drawing the top card of The Disaster Deck. If the drawn card is revealed to be a Disaster, advance all cards on The Disaster Deck forward by one space and place this new card at the beginning of The Disaster Track. If at this stage any Disaster Card moves to the Skull and Crossbones Square the game ends in a loss. If the card drawn is a ‘The Hood Advances’ Card advance The Hood one space along The Hood track. Disaster Cards do not advance this turn.
End Of Turn
Simply pass the dice clockwise to the next player.
The Bigger Picture
It’s all too easy to get bogged down and just focus on the most urgent rescue. It was just that kind of thinking that lead to our first few loses. Chasing just one rescue at a time either led to us getting overwhelmed by the ones building up or losing outright to a scheme we hadn’t defeated in time. My top tip, don’t rush your first three or four games. Play it nice and slow. And keep taking a moment to see the whole board.
Plan Ahead
As mentioned above, if there was one thing that did us in on our first play throughs it was not thinking ahead to future rescues. Winning will almost always come down to two things; thinking ahead and teamwork. Thunderbirds Co-operative Board Game has cooperative in its title for a reason. If you aren’t working together and planning out how you can help other Players complete rescues they want to attempt each game will be a short one. Each Player turn should be a discussion of the best way to end your turn to support another Player. I realise that sounds a bit abstract. Let me lay out a scenario below.
Player 1 controlling Scott has moved him in Thunderbird 1 to Europe to defeat Trapped in the Sky which he completes thanks to bonuses from both Thunderbird 1 and Lady Penelope also being in Europe. This has used two of Scott’s three actions. Knowing that Player 3 will on her next turn send Virgil, Thunderbird 2 and FAB 1 to South America as required by Salt Bed Splashdown Scott’s player will use that last move to bring Thunderbird to South America so the criteria for completing that Rescue have been met.
Now, that’s a very simplified example of the theory. In practice this will often mean very exacting and strategic placement of both Thunderbird Machines and Pod Vehicles. As well as taking all opportunities to build Pod Vehicles that will be required for upcoming Rescues. Economy of moves is very important.
Token Tips
Don’t overlook the importance of bonus tokens especially as the game reaches the end stage. Not only will they be vital in completing schemes, the varied effects they can be played for will be just as useful. Keep an eye out for Disasters that offer wild card tokens as these can be a godsend. A good early choice for a wild card will be to take a yellow Determination Token. An extra Action is always a solid choice. Don’t overlook the Logistics Tokens either. They tend to be one we horde. Top tip. Don’t. F.A.B Cards are much more useful unless you are saving up Logistics tokens to beat a scheme.
Character Choice
As with most games, Character Choice can have a huge impact on Gameplay. While all games will have some characters that play better than others, here that difference can be very marked. While no team can guarantee victory, there are certain mixes that make a win extremely challenging, if not impossible. Drawing both John and Lady Penelope for example. A team of these two will struggle to deal with early rescues than one of say Alan and Virgil. The simple logistical problem of moving FAB 1 from Europe to Tracy Island will cost her first turn. Conversely John will have to either permanently sacrifice his bonus for being on Thunderbird 5 to assist with Rescues on Earth or keep spending moves to return to Thunderbird 5. Likewise a Team of Alan and Gordon while not as detrimental will prove challenging. Not that there is a perfect Team Up. While Scott and Virgil can be strong, they will struggle against space and sea rescues. In short, the fewer players you have the more challenging the game can be. Fortunately I’ve worked out a way to overcome that weakness.
House Rules
Unusually for me, I’m actually advocating that this game should be played with a variant of the Solo Rules if you are playing with only two Players. Normally I think a game should be played as designed with Players working within the limits of the game. Here though, playing a game with only two of International Rescue’s roster feels wrong and doesn’t for my mind give you the full Thunderbirds experience. Instead we play a version where each Player controls three characters like they would in Solo Mode. This offers a much more satisfying experience but by no means makes victory a certainty. I would certainly recommend this mode to new players. Once you have learned the game, you can follow the setup steps for more advanced games if you are seeking a challenge.
Final Thoughts
No matter what the future brings in the way of new games and further releases the compelling nostalgia of Thunderbirds Co-operative Board Game means it will always have a place in my gaming collection and on my gaming table.
