Halo: Flashpoint is a PVP Skirmish experienced featuring Microsoft’s familiar Spartans

Halo: Flashpoint, from Mantic Games, brings the fast paced action of the Halo video game universe to the tabletop. Two players will match wits and face off across a variety of scenarios using authentic characters and weapons from the series in this miniature mashup

Play begins with players selecting their fire team of four characters and agreeing on one of several familiar scenarios. You might play a straight up slayer or maybe opt for capture the flag. Once teams and scenario are locked in, Halo: Flashpoint‘s play area is set up with variable 3D terrain, respawn points and the all important weapon drops. Finally the battlefield is scattered with useful item tokens.

Halo: Flashpoint takes place in a series of rounds, players will take turns activating one of their warriors until both players have activated each of their combatants once. At the end of the round items and weapon drops will be replenished. When activating a model players can perform two different short actions such as advance and shoot or a single long action like sprint. The success of some actions is determined by a roll of the eight sided dice. To determine if you successfully blasted an enemy you will roll three dice aiming to roll equal to or higher than your squad members ranged stat.

There are several possible modifiers to the number of dice such as firing from higher ground or from a crouched position. Rolling an eight is considered a head shot and will allow you to roll an additional die. To defend themselves your enemy will roll against their survival stat, each time they roll equal to or higher is counted as a success. If the attacker rolls more successes than the defender hits are landed, otherwise the attack is shaken off.

At the start of each round each player also rolls their command dice. These allow for game changing special actions and abilities and can only be spent once per round. They might allow you to activate an additional model in the same turn or add a die to a test roll among others. Each fireteam faction also has its own special order which is activated with the command dice. The Spartan special order snap shot allows for a quick shot against models advancing into the same cube.

The battle area is fully 3D so characters can be offered cover by the terrain, scale walls to gain height advantages or even be knocked off and fall. Clever positioning of your units to outmanoeuvre and surprise your opponent is key. Leave them out in the open and they become much more vulnerable, but you may have to risk it to get your hands on that sweet sniper rifle. The movement system is simple and intuitive in Halo: Flashpoint, no need for rulers. Models simply move their speed in cubes on a flat plane or climbing.

As expected there is a good variety of classic weapons from the franchise the gravity hammer and energy sword are both present and correct. The items do a great job of keeping things varied and surprising. A particular favourite of mine was the frag grenade, which targets all characters in a cube and throws them back in random directions-great fun!

Each character is also unique with their own starting weapon and keyword abilities. For example the scout keyword ability of the Spartan Zvezda allows a free advance action before the battle begins while Spartan MK VII’s tactician allows you to add additional command dice and re roll them. Mixing and matching character types to create your ideal fireteam is part of the fun.

All in all Halo: Flashpoint offers an accessible, fast paced and exciting experience for fans of the Xbox franchise and newcomers to the hobby. There’s plenty of variety and challenge for tabletop veterans too with the ever variable terrain and 3D movement. I really enjoyed trying to secure the best positions to occupy and work out the best paths to advance along.

The combat system is fast, intuitive and rewards aggression to keep things moving- for example advancing into an enemy fighter’s cube grants you a close combat attack on them. Of course there are infinite respawns so death is only ever a temporary setback and allows both players to stay fully involved. It would be great to see the game expanded in future to accommodate more than two players.

The standard Recon Edition offers a pair of identical Spartan fireteams, however there are numerous expansions available offering different factions and more terrain options. A deluxe Spartan addition is also available offering a greater selection of Spartan characters as well as the alien Banished Elite for your battles.

Halo: Flashpoint is available now from various online stores, including Amazon.

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