Fistful of Spaceships...

aka Fistful of Photons, aka Fistful of Lead: Red 5, aka FfoL: Pew, pew, pew!

A strange series of events happened. Basement General Steve (he of all the Star Wars minis you see on the blog) stumbled upon a horde of X Wing miniatures at the 1/2 Book Store. What can you do with all those miniatures and a regular group of 6-8 players?
Well, as it happens, a few months back the Fistful of Everything playtest group in UK put together a game using Fistful of Lead and some really nice Star Wars model ships. They were kind enough to share their notes.

So, in a couple of days we put together a fleet action. A group of Rebel commanders were trying to run an Imperial blockade above the water planet Zindo (we had some generously donated space mats, but the playing area ended up being 6' x 8'). The Rebels had to clear the Imperial fighters away for the command ships, while the Imps had to take out at least half the fighter cover so their own capital ships could engage. The command ships really just functioned as clock moving across the table to show when the game was over.
What happens when you take an Old Western game and convert it to space ship dogfights?
A really cool game! I gotta say, it turned out remarkably well. Same mechanics, same special cards. Only a few adjustments.
For instance, one of your two actions is always a movement of some sort that can be combined with a small turn. More nimble ships get more turns. Or you can move twice to just haul ass.
Close Combat became Dogfighting. Still opposed roll with the winner decided the direction the loser is facing after. This led to some cool maneuvers that replicated tailing without any forced mechanics or pre-plotting.

Shields act like armor in the regular rules. The only exception was larger ships can't be put out of action by the usual wound roll. Instead, Out of Action became 2 wounds or damage.
Pilots who had more shock than remaining damage points on their ship were forced to "break off" (leave the table). They had a chance to come back after skipping a turn. This is similar to the Regroup mechanic we've been using for Big Battles.
TIE fighters, being unshielded, died in droves. But that why there are hordes of them.

A couple of turns in, the Imps are taking heavy losses

There are rules for missiles, ion cannons, proximity mines. But all essentially the same game.
The Rebels were able to clear most of the air space, but their losses were mounting when we called it.

30+ ships, 6 players all in about 2 hours. And best of all great fun!
I'm trying to figure out a way to get this out with all the other stuff I'm doing (still have a day job) and not infringe on any IP as well as make generic enough to use other genres.