Treacherous Terrain and Rogue Elements in Rogue Planet

Echidna (Top-Left), Sky Urchins (Top-Right),
Witches Cauldrons (Bottom-left) and
 Banksia (Bottom-Right)

One of the great things about Rogue Planet is the Treacherous Terrain mechanism.  In a nutshell, Treacherous Terrain allows a player to employ normally 'neutral' elements of the battlefield to attack their enemy.  It certainly makes one think twice when taking cover!  If you're imagining Venus Fly Traps, Strangling Vines etc, you're on the right track.


In our games set in Libuscha's Banksia Plains, we've made use of a lot of Treacherous Terrain and Rogue Elements (think Non-Player Combatants/NPCs) as of late.  They're both great narrative devices that also can act as a catalyst for play.  For example, when playing a Strike game (goal: kill your opponent's leader) we often found ourselves hunkering down, playing defensively (yes, even my pre-teen kids saw the sense in keeping the target out of LoS!).  By using the Treacherous Terrain mechanism, suddenly cover can become dangerous... this really forces one's hand.

Currently, we have the following terrain-like items on high rotation (note the hyperlinks to the detailed write-ups of each):

• Banksia: are hudge predatory tree-like molluscs that slowly, relentlessly hunt their prey.
• Witches Cauldrons: emit clouds of psychotropic steam that causes paranoia, disorientation and hallucinations.
• Sky Urchins: reign down from the skies of Libuscha impaling the unwary.
• Echidna: man-sized masses of spines that will charge at the drop of a hat.
• Bombstools: mobile fungoids filled with flint, poison and spoors that explode with horrific effect.
• Anemones: squat creeping armoured polyps whos whorls of tentacles harpoon and inject their victims with complex neurotoxin-like venoms.
• Hydra: the Anemone cousin who's evolved larger tentacles.
• You might like to check out this Halloween nightmare post as well ;-)

Anemone (top) and Bombstools (bottom-right)