Pocket Universe: Boardgame concept.

1) this is a 'hex tile' game. Random assortment of tiles, face down at start.
2) Theme: each player has a tramp ship that is attempting to exploit the cached resources of an ancient civilization that sequestered itself inside the pocket universe. The different players may be from civilizations with radically different technology and psychology--the wormholes open into wholly different galaxies, or at least the other side of the galaxy. Sometimes a player will want to trade with the newly contacted civilizations; sometimes he will want to close the Pocket off to prevent invasion, and other times he may be bent upon awakening the ancient builders of the Pocket.
Each player begins at a wormhole hex around the perimeter of the pocket universe with his ship.
3) Goal: varies by player card recieved; each player has a large VP bonus for completing the goal.

Mechanic: each wormhole has a demand for one of the (three) types of ancient technology stashed: culture, philosophy, weaponry, and biodiversity. The demand value indicates how many VP the given type of technology may be traded for at that wormhole.

SHIPS: each ship has three stats: cargo, endurance, and resources. Endurance is how long the ship can voyage away from its home wormhole before it returns ('rubber band' mechanic). A ship can have a number of cards in hand equal to its Endurance stat. When it has no more cards, it returns to a wormhole of its choice.

Cargo is how much technology the ship can carry, either as digital storage or AI scientists anaylyzing with all their computing might...or as an actual cargo hold.

Resources are used to buy upgrades for the character's ship.

DECKS: There are two decks in the game: the Explorer deck (used for movement), and the Ancient deck (used for scouring the Pocket for usable stuff.) A player draws from the explorer deck up to his endurance

MOVE:
An explorer card can be played either as its event, or as movement for the ship. JUMP X(hyperspace your ship to a system up to X). PROBE (peek at a face-down hex, and choose to flip it or look at one of the challenge stacks in the ancient deck and rearrange them.

CHALLENGE STACKS:
Each system, once flipped face-up, is assigned a CHALLENGE STACK number from 1-8. Each challenge stack contains 3 cards from the ancient deck. (only

ENDING THE GAME
In the