Items in a crewmember’s inventory can be used by them at any time, unless the item card itself indicates otherwise. You cannot use items in the inventory of another member of the crew. IMPORTANT—For one or more crewmembers to take any of the following actions, at least one other crewmember must be taking the SHOOT action (if in Ranged Combat) or the fight action (if in Close Combat).

You may take one item from the inventory of one other crewmember. That crewmember may still perform one action this round, so long as the action does not involve use of the item being taken. Away from the purely mechanical improvements, the arc of the story you will experience has also seen some refinement. In Dark Castle you just dealt a bunch of chapter cards at random and worked your way through them. This meant you could easily come a cropper early on in a difficult encounter before you had a chance to gear up properly. In Dark Sector the chapter cards have been split up into Act 1, 2, and 3. Act 1 encounters are relatively easy, hurting you less, and allowing you to gear up before you get into the real challenges in Acts 2 and 3. There is a great feeling of progression as you work your way towards the boss, and the chapter cards just feel a bit more interesting than in the previous game. You play as crew members of the Equinox, each represented by a unique crew card and matching die. Each crew member has a rating in three traits: Might, Cunning, and Wisdom. Those traits will be present on the crew members die, at a frequency relative to the rating. For example, a character with high Might, will have a die will more Might symbols, than Cunning or Wisdom.After all players have fully resolved their chosen action, the round ends. If there are chapter dice remaining beneath the chapter card, the enemy has not yet been defeated and a new round of combat begins with each player declaring the action their crewmember will take.

As these i mmersive chapter cards are revealed one by one, players must make decisions about what to do, before using a combination of tactical dice combat and the timely play of item cards to complete them. Your current hp is shown on the medical record by a dot or ‘point’. These points always go on the intersection of two lines. Whenever you lose or gain HP you must immediately adjust your medical record by plotting a new point on it. The new point always goes one vertical line to the right of your current one, and then moves up or down by as many horizontal lines as the number of HP you are gaining or losing. Plot your new point, then join it up to your previous one. Although it is definitely part of the B-movie sci fi madness that is the Dark Sector there is a definite tonal shift. Although in saying that the art of the new cards is beautiful and a refreshing difference from the previous artworks. I think it comes down completely to personal preference whether you enjoy the theme or not but even if you do not care for the time travel shenanigans there are still several encounters that stay on theme and can be mixed in straight out of the box.With Escape the Dark castle the main choices given to the players were about who goes into the next room first, as they are likely to get wounded, and about taking turns resting in combat. In Dark Sector you feel like you have much more control over your destiny. In doing this the game feels less arbitrary than its predecessor, the wins more meaningful, the losses more understandable. You may immediately use the newly acquired item, unless it is an item which normally requires an action to use (such as a ranged weapon). This new cybernetic implant allows the crewmember using it to take the ACTIVATE DRONE action and perform the Basic function of any drone without turning it to its Drone Recharging side afterwards. As soon as you get to your first combat in Dark Sector you will realise that you have a lot more agency in this game than you did in Dark Castle. The introduction of ranged weapons means that most of the time when you get in a fight you can choose to get right into melee or fire off some shots before rushing in. The actions available to members of the crew during Ranged Combat are SHOOT and FLANK, along with all Standard Combat Actions • Shoot