This is an official Traveller product and uses a variant of the Full Thrust rules with ships converted from High Guard. This adds Book 2 style vector movement to High Guard. And if you've ever tried to play High Guard ship combat with multiple cruisers on each side ... without using a computer ... you'll know what a pain it can be. In High Guard each battery has to roll 2d6 to hit, and again to penetrate each appropriate defense, and finally again for damage. But in Power Projection this has all been converted into a single d6 roll per battery. (So, for example, to resolve 8 laser batteries just pick up and roll 8 1d6s.)
Power Projection closely follows High Guard with 2 exceptions (brought in to improve game play): First, sand clouds (from sandcasters) can be deployed at a point away from the launching ship instead of being centered on the launching ship ... and they drift (creating a sort of terrain feature to otherwise empty space). Second, spinal mounts can only fire every other turn (require a charging turn) ... adding a tactical concern over when best to fire.
The game is best scaled for cruisers (Azhanti, Gionetti, etc) with rules to make dreadnaughts playable too. PP:Escort features smaller ships (Crysanthemums, Fer-de-Lances, etc) ... someone described them as flying egg crates with bazookas!
BITS developed Power Projection over a number of years by playtesting at Gencon UK. The past couple of years has seen regular demos played at Gencon UK (run by me), and Dragonmeet (although for this year's Dragonmeet a return to ACQ is planned instead). The standard demo used at conventions is for 2 Crysanthemums and 2 Fer-de-Lances against an equivalent Zhodani squadron. New players usually play this scenario in 2-3 hours.
The game comes with a number of pieces that will need cutting out (it helps if you get them laminated too) and you will need a bucket of d6, a tape measure and a moderately large area to play on (we use a black sheet over a couple of tressal tables). The minis (sold separately) really add to the game.
(See here.)
