BoLS logo Tabletop, RPGs & Pop Culture
Advertisement

40K Breaking: Speed Freeks – Roolz You Needz To Know

4 Minute Read
Oct 15 2018
Hot story icon

With Speed Freeks on the way and Orktober really getting into gear, it’s time to dive in to speed freeks. Today we have a look at the rules.

We know that Speed Freeks is a game of Mad-Mek fueled, high-orktane racing that will pit the “best” vehicles the Orks can come up with against one another in a head to head race/fight to the death. Which is all that any good Ork should ever want–but what we don’t know is how exactly the game will play. We’d previously seen X-Wing style maneuvering lines it looked like. Well today we have a much better idea of how the game works, thanks to a rules preview from GW.

via Warhammer Community

First you’ll pick a Rukk–four are included in the box. These are the scenarios you’ll be facing, and will set out objectives which can include crossing the finish line first or blowing up the most stuff. Proper Orky objectives. As seen here in the Demolition Derby scenario, Da Grand Smash:

Advertisement

Basically a standard scenario, with everyone setting up in corners and trying to kill everyone. Once you’ve got your Rukk, it’s time to grab a Speedmob, which is basically your band of boyz. You’ll get datacards for each of the vehicles, and their design is proving to line up with the things they can do. The shockjump dragsta, for instance, does tellyport around the battlefield if you get it right.

And we know how those movement templates work now as well. You create a “trail of gubbinz” which you generate by rolling a number of dice–you’ll allocate them between speedin’, shootin’ and kunnin’, and from your pool figure out what you can do each turn.

Speedin’ Phase: First of all, you assign at least one dice from your dashboard’s Speedin’ pool to each of your vehicles. The more Speed Freeks dice you allocated to a vehicle, the faster it is likely to move (and less likely it is to stall) when you roll to determine how many gubbinz you can place end to end to create a Trail.

If a vehicle’s Trail leads it into another object, it will ram it – in the case of a vehicle – or simply crash if it hits something like a scrap pile. You can perform flashy manoeuvres like driftin’ to skid around corners or other vehicles, and can also make use of speshul or even snazzy gubbinz to careen across the battlefield at breakneck speed. These manoeuvres come with risks, however, and can force your vehicle to spin out at the end of its move if you fail the subsequent drivin’ test – you have been warned!

ANd of course things like the Megatrakk Scrapjet’s big drill can increase the damage you do when ramming. Once you’ve sped around the battlefield, you can shoot–and I love that there’s a chance to destroy things in every phase of the game.

Shootin’ Phase: When activating a vehicle in the Shootin’ phase, the number of shots you can make in each direction varies according to its datasheet. In the case of the Kustom Boosta-blasta, this can range from its turret-mounted rivet kannon, which can fire in every direction, to its massive burna exhausts that unleash a wall of flame to its left and right:

And much like 40K, after shooting comes Fighting. And all the while you’ll be dealing out damage until your enemy gets destroyed.

All in all this looks like a fun resource management/vehicle combat game, which you don’t often see comboed together. But leave it to the Orks.

What do you think of this roolz preview? Are you ready for Speed Freeks?

Avatar
Author: J.R. Zambrano
Advertisement
  • D&D: Fear Reveals The Truth - An Eberron Adventure From Its Creator