Game Review: Sky Team by Scorpion Masque

Sky Team published by Scorpion Masque, designed by Luc Remond, and art by Eric Hibbeler and Adrien Rives

Winner of the 2024 Spiel des Jahres (the German board game of the year award), Sky Team is a two-player co-operative game where players land a plane as pilot and co-pilot. 

A central board represents the plane's controls and each player has a set of four dice (blue for pilot; orange for co-pilot) which they roll behind a screen. 

Control Panel

Before they roll the dice each round, they can discuss what strategy they will use for that round. After the roll, players are not allowed to talk. They place their dice one at a time, alternating between pilot and co-pilot. In the first round, the pilot places the first die. In each subsequent round, they swap who places first.

Players have seven different spots they can place dice representing seven different actions. Two actions are mandatory:

• Axis--Each player must place one die. Once the second die is placed, the plane's axis tilts toward the higher die, moving the number of space of the difference between the two dice. So a 4 and a 2 result in the plane tilting two spaces on the central axis control. If the plane tilts too far, it crashes and the players lose.
• Engines--Each player must place one die. Once the second die is placed, the die numbers are added together to get the speed. Just below the central axis control is the speed gauge with two markers (blue and orange). If the total speed is below the blue marker, the plane does not move forward. If the speed is in between the blue and orange markers, the plane moves one space forward on the airport track. If the speed is greater than the orange marker, the plane moves two spaces forward.

Axis & Engines (sounds like another game)

The other actions are not mandatory but are necessary to land the plane safely:

• Radio--The airport track has planes on it and the crew needs to radio the airport to remove those planes. In each round, the pilot has one radio space, the co-pilot two (at the top of the control panel). If the planes are not cleared before the airplane advances, the plane crashes into the other plane and the players lose.
• Landing gear--Only the pilot can deploy the landing gear, i.e. all three wheels (on the left side of the control panel). As each is deployed (they can go in any order) the blue marker on the speed gauge moves one space. The pilot has to activate all three before they reach the airport or the plane crashes and the players lose.
• Brakes--Only the pilot can deploy the brakes. The dice are played sequentially (2, 4, 6) to move the red brake gauge forward, though the dice can be played in separate rounds. In the final round, the speed has to be less than the brake amount or the plane crashes and the players lose.
• Flaps--Only the co-pilot can deploy the flaps (on the right side of the control panel). The die are played sequentially from the top to the bottom of the flaps area. Each time a flap is deployed, the orange marker on the speed gauge moves one space. If all the flaps are not deployed when the plane reaches the airport, the plane crashes and the players lose.
• Concentration--Either player can add a die with any face value here to brew a cup of coffee. The cups can be spent to change the face value of a die up or down one number per cup used. 

Brakes and coffee

After all the dice are placed, the altitude track moves down one and the players retrieve their dice from the controls and can start talking again. They slide under the two slots at the top of the control panel. As you can see below, sometimes the team will have to fly two spaces toward the airport in order to arrive when the plane reaches the ground. The black cube icons on the airport track indicate adding extra airplanes using a black die.

First flight

Once the altitude track and the airport track are on the same space, the last round is triggered. The plane needs to have a level axis, the speed value has to be less than the brake value, the flaps and landing gear have to be completely deployed, and no other airplanes can be on the airport track. If all those are true, the players win!

A successful landing!

We found the very first mission, landing in Atlanta, to be fairly easy. The game comes with several different airport tracks, all of which are two-sided. A harder approach is on the back! The game also adds in other complications, like controlling fuel usage, having an intern to train, dealing with headwinds and tailwinds, and other challenges. A second rule book details the additional rules and the airports have symbols at the top indicating which add-ons to use. One possible add-on is a bonus power (or two) that give some help (like an extra die or cup of coffee) in landing the plane, so not all the add-ons are challenges...just most of them. In the photo above, the synchronization card is a bonus power and the fuel track on the left is an extra challenge.

My wife and I enjoy the game immensely. We got it for Christmas and played it once or twice every day for a couple of weeks. Most of the airports take more than one go to have a successful landing. Part of the challenge is the luck of the roll, but the variety of spots to place the dice helps to mitigate the randomness. On an easy airport, the players get two re-roll tokens to use during a round. The hard airports only provide one. Re-rolling after getting four of the same number on the dice might be necessary. Since the players are not allowed to talk, the player choosing to reroll does so on their own though the other player can also reroll their dice. Each player can choose how many dice to reroll. Any placed die cannot be rerolled.

Making a successful landing is very satisfying. The game plays very quickly (under twenty minutes) so we have had times where we just tried again right away, especially if we crashed early. That happens with bad dice rolls or bad dice placement, often a combination of both. But resetting the game is easy and replaying is rewarding. We can see why it won the award.

Highly recommended--easy to get to the table, quick to play, and cooperative!