The "Cadet Training Handbook" is an introductory manual to the boardgame Star Fleet Battles, currently published by Amarillo Design Bureau. The Handbook was published in 1996, and it is the third edition of an introductory product for SFB. It is suprisingly much of the same material as previous editions, but with better layout and more colorful components. The Handbook is 64 pages, of which 19 are charts and Ship System Displays (SSDs). In addition, there are two color hexmaps stapled to the center, with cut out counters on the short edges of each hexmap.

The book is intended to teach the basics of SFB and it is ideally positioned as a teaching aid for an experienced player to introduce a newcomer to this quite formidable system. It introduces a few rules, then a scenario to try them out. The first few scenarios are all one-player, but later scenarios require two players, as robotic opponents are quite hard to write good rules for and there- fore are easy to beat. The pace is actually quite leisurely in the first half of the Handbook, although the second half is more rapid as it has to introduce a lot more rules.

Complete novices can take this rulebook and, by themselves, can learn the basic rules of SFB, enough to play with an experienced player and not leave out too many of the main SFB rules. I learned the Commander's Edition SFB rules when I was 13 so the CTH should be digestible by anyone. I've been going through it to refamiliarize myself with the SFB system, and the only mistake I've spotted is neglecting to mention the damage of a drone should be doubled when the full-size ships are introduced.

The Handbook includes 20 ships, 10 regular cruisers and 10 half-sized cadet cruisers. Surprisingly, Lyran, Hydran, and ISC cruisers are included, each of which adds some specific rules for those ships. In my opinion, there are enough rules and variety to just use the Handbook as a standalone game, without ever delving into the full SFB system. It's comparable to the first edition of SFB, which came in a pocket-game format, or other pocket-game spaceship games. There are lots of places where it can be expanded, but it is self-contained and quite complete by itself.

One thing it is not, and that is a 64-page advertisement for Star Fleet Battles. I remember reading the third edition Basic D&D rules. This was before the Expert D&D rules, I think, because there were constant references to "advanced rules can be found in the AD&D Player's Handbook". I can see why TSR did it, as the Basic rules only went to 3rd level, but it still made the book read badly and be not very useful as a standalone game.

There is currently a discussion on Usenet, the subject of which is how to make a version of SFB that is simpler and more accessible to regular people. Some suggestions are to make it more "German", i.e. colorful 3-d pieces, wooden board, simple rules, more family-oriented. Other suggestions are to have a totally different design that is card based, or uses chits/tokens, or several other things. People point to Silent Death, the old FASA Star Trek Tactical Combat System, Full Thrust, and a couple of other games.

It's a laudable goal, to increase sales and reach a larger market. But it's sort of a "so what" to me. The gaming industry is not a place where one goes to get rich. People do this because they love their design and they love creating these games. SFB has enough of an audience to be self-sustaining, at least for the next decade, short of financial mismanagement. I don't think ADB has the skill and expertise to do a simple family SFB game, and it probably shouldn't devote scarce capital in such an endeavor.

Anyway, the Cadet Training Handbook is an easy to learn, complete game that is a subset of Star Fleet Battles. It's designed to teach newcomers the basic rules of SFB gradually, yet covers enough rules to be a self-sustained game. It's an excellent way to introduce new players to ADB's Star Fleet Universe, which is 25 years old and going strong.