The Basics
This analog game is played by 2-4 players using cards, dice and tokens. Each player has 20 crew tokens (10 Red, 5 Blue, 5 Gold), a ship token a supply toke, a System Deck, an Exploration Deck and a Reference Card. There is also a shared set of 6 dice, a Space Deck and Destiny Tokens. The goal of the game is to reach New Earth in the Orion Belt with the most Victory Points. Each resource in the game is worth Victory Points: 5 for each Red Crew, 10 for each Blue/Gold Crew, 5 for each System, 2 for each Destiny, 1 for each Supply. The game itself is a test of resource management and planning ahead and the general theme of the game is inspired by The Oregon Trail. Like the game's spiritual predecessor, The Orion Trail focuses more on punishing each players crew more so than rewarding them, with devastating events either happening to a specific player (Unstable Shields, Hull Breech, etc.) or larger cosmic events affecting all players (Black Hole, Xenodysentery, etc.).
Each turn players perform the following actions in order: repair a ship system (The Bridge, Sick Bay, etc), explore the ship for valuable items (Robot, Personal Shields, etc), assign crew to operate ship systems, consume supplies based on the number of crew, risk visiting a planet to resupply (or don't), populate the next planet on their Trail from the Space Deck. Players may also use a resource named Destiny, which is gained through experiencing negative events or dangerous planets, at several points during their turn to direct negative events happening them toward another players.
Each turn players perform the following actions in order: repair a ship system (The Bridge, Sick Bay, etc), explore the ship for valuable items (Robot, Personal Shields, etc), assign crew to operate ship systems, consume supplies based on the number of crew, risk visiting a planet to resupply (or don't), populate the next planet on their Trail from the Space Deck. Players may also use a resource named Destiny, which is gained through experiencing negative events or dangerous planets, at several points during their turn to direct negative events happening them toward another players.