Here’s how the strategy layer works in Menace, the turn-based squad combat RPG from the Battle Brothers devs

“A tactically rich turn-based game with some meaty role-playing elements”, was how Staff Sergeant James Archer characterised his Menace hands-on, back in September. The only thing missing from his account of the game was the bread needed to make that rich, meaty concoction a tasty, nourishing sandwich.

And by bread, I of course mean the strategic layer – the parts between the turn-based battles where you pick your next mission, improve your squads, deal with pop-up story events, appraise your standing with each NPC faction, and equip your strike cruiser with auxiliary systems. Developers Overhype have now shared a few details of how it all works. Mmmmm, such malty, yeasty strategicalness.

Honestly, it all sounds pretty straightforward next to the difficulties of avoiding injury on the surface. Between missions, you’ll return to a starmap of the Wayback solar system, on which you can see planets and the factions that own them, together with any requests for aid. There’s a reputation management element – leave a faction request hanging and they might sour on you.

Faction distress calls aside, the starmap is where you’ll spend the game’s main resources. Promotion points are for levelling up squads, OCI components (that’s “Operational Capability Improvements” – you’re impressing nobody with this wanton jargon, Overhype) are for embiggening your ship, the Impetus, while authority points are for keeping a lid on your crew’s morale and mood.

Your crew are described as “motley”, which here means “a massive liability”. You might have to intervene in a bar fight, or deal with the problem of a moonshine distillery, or resolve an accident in the hangarbay. It sounds like the usual strategy–RPG rhythm of having to decide between fixing a problem now, or letting it slide to save resources and getting into hot water later.

As for ship upgrades, these have both active and passive benefits during missions. You can equip the Impetus with facilities that let you call in a dropship strafing run or a bunker-buster missile. Other enhancements restore unit health during missions, but the must-have is probably the one that gives you sharper intelligence on enemies and their position during briefings. Menace definitely feels like a game where reconnaissance trumps firepower.

Last but not least, there’s the armory screen, where you can choose from various weapons, armour, accessories and vehicles, and dole out promotions. Each squad leader has a unique perk tree, though some of the individual perks are shared between characters, and each squad leader starts with a trademark personal trait. Everybody is their own special snowflake. At least till they get stepped on by the mechs.

And that’s it for the strategy stuff. Forthcoming in a future blogpost: details of the black market, where you can barter for gear, squad leaders and pilots, and of operations, which are a series of connected missions.

I was vaguely hoping for a transformative gimmick of some kind, but it sounds like the strategy aspect of Menace is rather by the numbers. Still, that’s the thing about bread, isn’t it? If it’s too exciting, the filling loses its potency. A sandwich in which the bread is the star component is no sandwich at all but a breadstick you’ve accidentally dropped in the stew – and whoops, now Lance Corporal Vicarus has clobbered you with a ladle because he’s absolutely blotto after sampling the hooch they’ve been brewing behind the main reactor. Captain to the messhall, please! Menace is out later next year.