This is a Warspawn game. If your not familiar with what that means let me explain. The warpspwn web pages contain hundreds of sets of rules for games. Generally speaking you only have the rules, card distributions and board descriptions. Thats is, they tell all about the game but dont present you with a finished product.

Malta Convoy is a little differn't to that. As well as the rules someone has also made and posted a play mat/sheet. It was this additional item that made me pay attention to this game.

The rules are straight forwardly written and I didn't have any questions arrising out of reading them.

The only component as such is the play mat/sheet.

The can simply download the mat/sheet and print it out. Keep the rules themselves on your computer screen while you play the first few rounds and after that you wont need anything but the mat/sheet.

The game itself is a simple dice rolling mechanic with a few fairly meaningless choices. Dont let that put you off. Considering that it's only meant to be a 20 miniute diversion, it succeeds at that very well.

The theme is based around the famous Malta Relief convoy sent to Malta in August 1942.

The game length is fairly fixed around 20ish turns. Each turn follows the order shown below.

Roll to see if there is a contact with the enemy.
Roll to see type of contact.
Roll to see size of attacking force.
Roll to intercept the attackers.
Roll to see how many hits are made.
Roll to see whats been hit.
Roll to see what damage is done.

As you can see there is a lot of dice rolling. Each roll is associated with a small table and these often have variable effects that keep things a little more interesting.

As well as these straight forward turns you have have to keep in mind that at half way through the trip any and all aircraft carriers will leave your fleet.

You also have four options that you can put into effect at any point during the game. They all last just a few turns and change the odds somewhat. For instance you can put out a "Screen" which gives a couple of extra chances to intercept, but enemies that pass the screen have an increased chance of doing damage.

All in all, this IS a dice rolling game, but if you find the theme at all appealing, then printing out a sheet or two to take on a long journey, or pass a few minutes on a rainy Sunday is well worth the effort.