Battlestar Galactica: The Boardgame

Sepiche · Post by **Sepiche** » Thu Mar 20, 2008 5:12 pm

Looks like another possible good game from Fantasy Flight. Sounds like it's going to be a re-themed version of Shadows Over Camelot.

Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game will be a semi-cooperative game, in which players work together to solve problems confronting the fleet, ranging from mechanical to political issues, all the while remaining vigilant for Cylon attacks. However, suspicion clouds the ship and its crew, as one or more players may indeed be a Cylon!

Quitch · Post by **Quitch** » Thu Mar 20, 2008 7:11 pm

Sounds pretty awesome

Time to hit Board Game Geek.

Chaosraven · Post by **Chaosraven** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 1:11 am

arise...

Ok, so we played with the Pegasus Expansion tonight.

Humans didn't even make it past 2 Jumps. Holy crap.

Neat stuff - Cylon Leader with Hidden Agenda, new Characters (with of course new abilities), the Pegasus(!!), and Treachery.

silverjon · Post by **silverjon** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 1:27 am

Oh hey, I played this at my brother's place last weekend (no expansions tho). It was a blast. The Cylons were astounded by how long it took to wipe out the humans. They should have blasted us into oblivion something like 2 jumps earlier, but they kept missing.

Defiant · Post by **Defiant** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 2:05 am

I love BSG, one of my favorite boardgames. Havent played the expansion yet, though.

Quitch · Post by **Quitch** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 7:42 am

New cards and characters are great, but I'm not a fan of the cylon leader mechanic.

freelunch · Post by **freelunch** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 9:31 am

given the love this game is getting I'm keen to play it, but I figure I'll get more out of it once I see a bit of the TV series (have the DVDs, haven't gotten to it yet)

Quitch · Post by **Quitch** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 11:18 am

Oh I think it plays very well without any knowledge of the show, my parents stopped watching the show after two episodes but they love the traitor aspect of the game.

Incidentally, how much fun you have with this game is directly proportional to the amount of interaction going on amongst your group.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 12:16 pm

Hey that sounds cool. Wait is it single player? Otherwise Im going to need a friend. Do they have a store for those?

silverjon · Post by **silverjon** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 12:54 pm

freelunch wrote:given the love this game is getting I'm keen to play it, but I figure I'll get more out of it once I see a bit of the TV series (have the DVDs, haven't gotten to it yet)

Nah, I've never seen the show and the family assured me it wouldn't be a big deal. Some of the character special abilities make plot-connected sense and stuff, I guess, but I enjoyed the game just fine without all that. Everything I needed to know was in the game.

Quitch wrote:Incidentally, how much fun you have with this game is directly proportional to the amount of interaction going on amongst your group.

I'll agree with this. Good cooperative play (and an aura of mystery), good drama, really fun.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 1:29 pm

BSG board game website

Zarathud · Post by **Zarathud** » Sun Sep 13, 2009 12:34 am

I love that Fantasy Flight finally included Base Star minis in the Pegasus expansion.

I'm a bit skeptical about the Cylon leader mechanic -- it seems like it would take some fun out of the game. As in players saying "the only good Toaster is a dead toaster" and then killing even the most helpful Cylon Leader.

Chaosraven · Post by **Chaosraven** » Sun Sep 13, 2009 2:31 am

Yeah, funny enough, Remus and I as the cylons won, but our Cylon Leader lost due to his Agenda.

I'm thinking I'll pick up the expansion for my set.

Jow · Post by **Jow** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 12:40 am

What Raven failed to mention is that our Cylon #1 received BOTH "you are a Cylon" cards in the deck during the initial deal, revealed himself early, and subsequently gave Raven (our Admiral) his facedown "you are a cylon" card. During that one turn cycle, two of the three remaining human players were brigged and our President lost his presidency to the now traitorous admiral. The following cycle, the fleet managed to jump the same turn as FOUR centurions boarded. From then on it was all but over. We never even made it to the first sleeper phase.

Chaosraven · Post by **Chaosraven** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 12:52 am

If you recall, I continued to aid the humans for two more turns, destroying Cylon ships and giving extra orders to the pilot.
Offered the presidency by Crisis made my move clear.
The THIRD turn I made it pretty obvious where my intentions lay, given the glorious opportunity as one player was brigged, allowing me to brig the other with my recently acquired Presidential powers and begin the decline of the ship.

Executing myself then was the only play

Jow · Post by **Jow** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 1:25 am

You sure? It seems like you grabbed the Presidency almost right away, but it's certainly possible a couple of turns slipped by in-between.

Regardless, you put the marquee around your head when you stole the Presidency on your first turn after Steve revealed and knocked our morale down to 5.

However, yer right - Mike didn't get brigged until play went around one more time. Steve revealed, converted you, and then two turns later you stole the Presidency. Next go-round you brigged Mike and that's when everything really fell apart.

I was thinking about it afterward - your little execution thing was more unexpected and psychological than it was game-shattering. Sure it saved you the extra turn you would have needed to reveal yourself officially, but for me it was more of a "Ah, we finally have you... wait, no we don't" kind of thing.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 10:19 am

Chaosraven wrote:If you recall, I continued to aid the humans for two more turns, destroying Cylon ships and giving extra orders to the pilot.
Offered the presidency by Crisis made my move clear.
The THIRD turn I made it pretty obvious where my intentions lay, given the glorious opportunity as one player was brigged, allowing me to brig the other with my recently acquired Presidential powers and begin the decline of the ship.

Executing myself then was the only play

You stole the President title the turn you were given the card and went off on some stupid rant, like you weren't absolved of being human by the president when you were scanned. That is what made it obvious you were a cylon IMO. But there was nothing that could be done.

I like the game concept. I don't like the execution. I don't mind that they make the game very difficult for the humans. I don't like that they make it almost impossible. It takes a perfect storm or bad play by the cylons for the humans to win. Looking at the board, it looked like the humans effort might have been made easier, except 1)

Cylons collect as many super crisises as the want when they resurrect now? That's completely broken.
The Cylon infiltrator and Cylon leader help they cylons on a grand scale and way outweigh the extra jump set up you can take.

The next time we play there really should to be a coordination of characters on set up. It's the only way I think they human would have a fighting shot.

If we play again and we do not elect to coordinate characters then I will go back to my old strategy of trying to become a cylon by design. That's literally the only reason why I've won more games than I have lost.

Quitch · Post by **Quitch** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 12:59 pm

LordMortis wrote: Cylons collect as many super crisises as the want when they resurrect now? That's completely broken.

It's really not, you spend a precious action doing nothing but picking up a card in a game where you won't get more than six or seven actions in a game. Not to mention you can't even collect this way until your third action (as a cylon leader)

LordMortis wrote:I like the game concept. I don't like the execution. I don't mind that they make the game very difficult for the humans. I don't like that they make it almost impossible

From reading BGG it seems humans are easier to win as than cylons, it's just that the humans are tricker to play so people find them more difficult at first.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 1:23 pm

Quitch wrote:It's really not, you spend a precious action doing nothing but picking up a card in a game where you won't get more than six or seven actions in a game. Not to mention you can't even collect this way until your third action (as a cylon leader)

How do you figure only six or seven actions? We've only played Pegasus once, so it may be more abbreviated and may have dropped that Cylon's Attack cards to prepare to jump card ratio considerably but all of our games typically went about two rounds per jump unless you could get someone thrown in the brig, then its three to five rounds per jump. If an average jump was two spots then you'd still be looking at least 10 actions.

From reading BGG it seems humans are easier to win as than cylons, it's just that the humans are tricker to play so people find them more difficult at first.

Humans are trickier. You have to learn when to coordinating letting an action just fail and learn when to jump and sacrifice population. Conceptually I like a lot about the game.

I'd like to see what is going on that would make BGG think it is easier to play the humans. I've only played the game maybe 7 or 8 times and we might be locked down in our thinking. I'm not seeing it but it's possible.

Easiest cylon victory has been with heavy raiders. When the humans have to start wasting their precious actions hunting down cylons on board they are in trouble. If you can get two or three cylons on board the game is generally done.

The human defense is to have leaders hold on to the give two actions and roll +2 cards but then these cards are aren't used to avoid crises. It's win win for the cylons.

Jow · Post by **Jow** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 2:46 pm

I asked over on BGG about the repeated Resurrection Ship actions and they said what Quitch did - that it's legal but that giving up so many actions to load up on Super Crisis cards can be deadly.

From what I've read over on BGG, most experienced players are experiencing win/loss ratios of about 50:50. I can see it happening but in general I think the human groups I've been a part of need to be more coordinated on levels that we're just not getting yet cus we're relative newbs. Coordinating character types is a must and I think we did a decent job of that the other night. I also think the humans in general need to be a lot more critical and quicker on the draw in terms of voicing suspicion or even brigging people they even remotely suspect of something.

Something I've grown fond of doing as a human is every so often suggesting actions to players that are only beneficial to the humans, especially to players I'm beginning to suspect are Cylons. A good Cylon will play along with this but can only keep it up for so long without helping the humans TOO much. I caught a friend of mine in one of my first games this way because, instead of doing what I suggested, he countered with the idea of doing something else which was a much more neutral action. I suspected him the rest of the game but blew it when I had the chance to brig him using a Quorum card but didn't until it was too late.

I think you're onto something with the bit about choosing which skill checks to pursue and which to just abandon. The biggest human problem I've seen is just running out of cards, mostly because of nickel and dime shit. Once we get a little more situational awareness, especially in terms of keeping an eye on what sorts of cards all the humans can draw each game, I think we'll get better at prioritizing card usage.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 2:54 pm

Jow wrote:From what I've read over on BGG, most experienced players are experiencing win/loss ratios of about 50:50. I can see it happening but in general I think the human groups I've been a part of need to be more coordinated on levels that we're just not getting yet cus we're relative newbs. Coordinating character types is a must and I think we did a decent job of that the other night. I also think the humans in general need to be a lot more critical and quicker on the draw in terms of voicing suspicion or even brigging people they even remotely suspect of something.

Actually, now that you mention it, organizational and institutionalized brigging of humans may help them out immensely and was the precise thing I'd never thought of that could change the pace of the game. That would slow down the game allowing players to not draw crisis cards and build hands.

Something I've grown fond of doing as a human is every so often suggesting actions to players that are only beneficial to the humans, especially to players I'm beginning to suspect are Cylons. A good Cylon will play along with this but can only keep it up for so long without helping the humans TOO much. I caught a friend of mine in one of my first games this way because, instead of doing what I suggested, he countered with the idea of doing something else which was a much more neutral action. I suspected him the rest of the game but blew it when I had the chance to brig him using a Quorum card but didn't until it was too late.

At least one cylon should expose them self almost immediately IMO. The strength of being on the resurrection ship is generally better than subterfuge.

I think you're onto something with the bit about choosing which skill checks to pursue and which to just abandon. The biggest human problem I've seen is just running out of cards, mostly because of nickel and dime shit. Once we get a little more situational awareness, especially in terms of keeping an eye on what sorts of cards all the humans can draw each game, I think we'll get better at prioritizing card usage.

That is probably a subtle art in the game we have come nowhere near mastering. I'm still up for playing again, but after the last game, I still think Baltar is the best opening choice for character. Play as hard as you can for the humans but try to be a cylon.

Jow · Post by **Jow** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 3:07 pm

LordMortis wrote:At least one cylon should expose them self almost immediately IMO. The strength of being on the resurrection ship is generally better than subterfuge.

I'm not sure I agree with that. You don't have the Cylon actions when you're still human, granted, but I don't think you can overrate the abilities to sow dissension among the humans and play unlimited numbers of skill cards into checks. I still think the most powerful and insidious Cylon is the one you haven't identified.

That is probably a subtle art in the game we have come nowhere near mastering. I'm still up for playing again, but after the last game, I still think Baltar is the best opening choice for character. Play as hard as you can for the humans but try to be a cylon.

Eh. After a while I suspect playing Baltar is going to get you suspected and scrutinized right from the beginning, leaving you less room to operate.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 3:24 pm

Jow wrote: Eh. After a while I suspect playing Baltar is going to get you suspected and scrutinized right from the beginning, leaving you less room to operate.

I am rarely not scrutinized and even attacked at the beginning. Three games in a row, someone made an honest mistake whose results pointed directly at me being a cylon when I wasn't... And three games in a row I became a cylon on the second draw... And three games in a row they cylons won...

Only once has it been really close where the humans had the game right up until the last moment. Where we came to the raiders taking over the ship on the turn the humans could have gambled to make their final jump... Now that was a fun game and nail biter right up to the end.

Quitch · Post by **Quitch** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 4:44 pm

Being an unrevealed cylon is far more powerful than being revealed. You can take titles. You can cast suspicion on other players. You can play 0 - all your cards into skill checks.

The fear of what a cylon might do is much stronger than what they can do, especially when revealed where their options are incredibly limited.

This is why we dumped the cylon leaders quite quickly, the joy of weeding out cylons is far more interesting than the "which side is he on?" "no one cares, brig him" agenda stuff.

hentzau · Post by **hentzau** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 5:26 pm

This thread really has me jonesing to play BSG again. I only played it one time, but fell in love with it then. But I've never picked it up, because of the number of people you really need to have to make it play well.

I really need to introduce my buddy Stuart to this game, but my buddy Tommy wouldn't get into it, I don't think. He wasn't a fan of BSG. And my wife and daughter wouldn't be able to keep track of the rules and strategy to enjoy it either. (Not being disparaging, just a fact.)

Ah well. OctoCon is only a month away...

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Tue Sep 15, 2009 4:06 pm

give me a holler sometime and i'll drag my copy over (or you and stewart can come to my den of inequity). as for tom, you don't really need to be a fan of the show to enjoy this game. you just need to be a fan of lying to your friends and stabbing them in the back when they aren't looking.

Turtle · Post by **Turtle** » Tue Sep 15, 2009 5:23 pm

I like the new agenda cards for the Cylon Leader and the new Sympathizer, it adds more chance to the game beyond one player simpy going to the other side based on what the dials are at, plus you can never be quite sure of what the agenda is.

However, it ended up hurting the human team in our game as their sympathizer wasn't so sympathetic.

The new infiltration mechanic is quite nice as it allows you to take some more risk, but also help or hinder the humans even more when needed. More importantly, it adds back in more interaction between cylon players and humans.

Jow · Post by **Jow** » Sun Sep 20, 2009 12:13 pm

Played again last night. Despite the odds against it happening, this makes the second game in a row the original Cylon ended up with BOTH cylon cards (#1 in the first phase, #2 after sleeper). Lot more intrigue this game - we had the second Cylon brigged but at the last second I canned the Admiral's quarter action with an off-color card because one of the remaining players did something (allowed me to lose the presidency when he could have stopped it from happening) which caused me to doubt his status. Baaaah.

Awesome game.

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Thu Oct 21, 2010 4:05 pm

ARISE!

new expansion announced.

You can choose to add any combination of the three new options included in Exodus. Crave more white-knuckle space dog-fighting? Incorporate the Cylon Fleet option. The Conflicted Loyalties option introduces new Loyalty Cards that will test even the most trustworthy allegiances. Finally, relive the emotional turmoil of the hit television series with the Ionian Nebula, which pits players against the various conflicting personalities aboard Galactica.

The Cylon Fleet option keeps the pressure intense by introducing the Cylon Fleet game board. This board makes sure that every Crisis Card drawn will result in some sort of enemy ship activity. Once the Cylon Pursuit Track reaches the end, the Cylon ships will transfer over to the main game board, surrounding Galactica. There’s little time for rest between assaults, so get out there and protect those civvies, fighter jockeys!

Alliances are put to the test in the Conflicted Loyalties option, where the new Final Five Loyalty Cards up the stakes and introduce penalties for revealing your fellow humans’ Loyalty Card. In addition, new Personal Goal Loyalty Cards present players with an incriminating task to undertake. If they don’t fulfill their goal, then they will cause Galactica to lose a resource at the end of the game. Will you raise suspicion by completing the damaging task, or will you lay low and hope your failures won’t condemn the rest of your crew?

Finally, with the Ionian Nebula option, familiar faces populate the fleet as allies, and can be encountered by visiting locations on Galactica. But beware! The Cylons can influence these non-player characters, compelling them to produce negative effects when encountered. Manage humanity’s conflicting personalities carefully... or infighting will leave you vulnerable!

get your credit cards ready, boys.

Turtle · Post by **Turtle** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 10:56 am

Should be fun, Humans get the new MK7 Viper in the cylon fleet variant (travels 2 spaces for each move, and is only damaged on a 5-7, instead of 4-7), along with the new CAG role (similar to president and admiral, but has abilities that activate vipers on the board). But, at the same time, if you jump away from cylon ships, they all get moved back to the cylon fleet board, just waiting to come back at you should the new Pursuit track fill back up. Oh and civilian ships stay on the board as well.

The new conflicted loyalties will be quite fun, providing a bit more grey area actions from players that should enable good cylon players to hide in.

Jow · Post by **Jow** » Tue Nov 23, 2010 11:10 pm

wow, i really didn't expect another expansion honestly.

Zarathud · Post by **Zarathud** » Wed Nov 24, 2010 12:42 pm

That "human objective" is going to be interesting and make it a little harder to ferret out the Cylons. It's a nice counterpart to the Cylon leader mechanic, too. I thought the fighter pilots were underused since it's often easier to just guarantee that you can quickly jump away with Pegasus instead of hanging around for combat. I like this in concept.

Quitch · Post by **Quitch** » Wed Nov 24, 2010 6:17 pm

Jow wrote:wow, i really didn't expect another expansion honestly.

I wouldn't be surprised if there is a third, but I bet it depends heavily on sales.

El Guapo · Post by **El Guapo** » Wed Nov 24, 2010 8:54 pm

How is the "human objective" supposed to work?

Zarathud · Post by **Zarathud** » Wed Nov 24, 2010 9:22 pm

El Guapo wrote:How is the "human objective" supposed to work?

hepcat explained above that the humans will have to do something incriminating to avoid an end-game penalty.

Alliances are put to the test in the Conflicted Loyalties option, where the new Final Five Loyalty Cards up the stakes and introduce penalties for revealing your fellow humans’ Loyalty Card. In addition, new Personal Goal Loyalty Cards present players with an incriminating task to undertake. If they don’t fulfill their goal, then they will cause Galactica to lose a resource at the end of the game. Will you raise suspicion by completing the damaging task, or will you lay low and hope your failures won’t condemn the rest of your crew?

DD* · Post by DD* » Tue Nov 30, 2010 1:27 pm

Any board game types here in the Detroit MI area? I've never played, but wouldn't mind giving it a try.

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Tue Nov 30, 2010 1:57 pm

DD* wrote:Any board game types here in the Detroit MI area? I've never played, but wouldn't mind giving it a try.

Aren't LordMortis, Remus and ChaosRaven in that area?

DD* · Post by DD* » Tue Nov 30, 2010 7:09 pm

I know that LordMortis is on the other side of town, and I think Bob is in this neck of the woods as well. Not sure about the rest.

Chaosraven · Post by **Chaosraven** » Tue Nov 30, 2010 8:24 pm

Chaosraven: dearborn, LordMortis: ten minutes west, Remus West: ten more minutes west, Redrun: five more minutes west.

Chaosraven · Post by **Chaosraven** » Tue Nov 30, 2010 8:27 pm

Oh and kenetickid is staying with chaosraven for the immediate future