Wayfarer Protocol is a colony sim on a single starship. You get a cramped hull, a reactor that barely keeps up, and a crew who will suffocate if you look away too long. Everything past that, you build.

[h2]Build the ship[/h2]

Floor and hull go down one tile at a time. Reactors, oxygen recyclers, hydroponics, bunks. Turrets and thrusters bolt onto the outside. Every system pulls power and throws off heat, and a reactor that falls behind will brown out exactly the half of the ship you needed running.

[h2]Keep the crew alive[/h2]

Your crew get hungry, tired and scared, and each of them carries traits that cut both ways. The hard worker is fifteen percent quicker at everything. The coward fights at less than half strength and would rather hide. The voidborn sleeps less and eats more. Morale sinks when the ship falls apart around them.

When something goes wrong, somebody drops what they are doing and deals with it. Fires. Hull breaches. If the breach is on the outside, they put on a suit and go out on a tether to patch it.

[h2]Then you jump[/h2]

Every sector deals a new hand. An asteroid field worth stripping, a trader worth hailing, a distress call that might be a trap. Pirates who will cut through the hull to get at the cargo, and who send people across to take the ship room by room. Boarders die in vacuum, so an airlock is a weapon, as long as your own crew are somewhere else.

[h2]Fight their ship, not a health bar[/h2]

Drop the shields, then pick apart the engines, the guns, the life support. Missiles go around shields entirely. A railgun charges for a few seconds and then guts one component in a single strike.

[h2]Deeper[/h2]

A dreadnought guards sector 10, and it does not take bribes. Killing it is the first thing that counts as winning. It is also not the end. Another one waits at 20, and at 30, each drawn from heavier stock than the last.

Lose the whole crew and it ends there instead.