Also I cannot believe Dee lived!
'Time Bomb'
Gaming 1: You are likely to be eaten by a grue
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Right? That's amazing! Ultimately futile, but amazing.
I think I need to pay a LOT more attention to the pursuit track next game, it can have a huge effect and there are some subtleties about it I know I don't have down.
Yeah, I start to lose track of all the tracks, including Tobias'!
The "how long until the centurion destroys Galactica" (good lord, a noun goes here but I am completely blanking on what it is! Stupid brain) notation helped me, but it's just a lot to keep in mind.
BTW, you were very smooth getting Six's negative goals accomplished without arousing suspicion in the previous game. It's hella fun having contradictory goals like that.
I decided, as Leoben, that I wouldn't lie and that worked out really well for me. Which I find hilarious, so I thought I'd share.
BSG
Congratulations to the Cylons for their victory. I would especially like to mention Apollo's reveal, where he brought Galactica to one token away from destruction, and Leoben to a state of mild panic; and Baltar's focus on Tobias Vaughn's eyebrows, advancing him for two turns in a row to claim the victory. Commiserations to the humans. It was fun watching Adama collect all the titles like baseball cards. Piece of trivia: if Cally had shot the CAGmident IN THE FACE, and he came back as a pilot, then each human player would have had a title (Admiral Dee, President Cally and CAG Deadama). Special mention to Dee too for surviving. It seems that the moment Morale hit 3, you couldn't so much as look at the crisis deck without Morale threatening to fall further. There are a lot of Morale crises in the deck, but it's still less than half.
You were quite unlucky with jump icons too. After you reached the Sleeper Phase, your first eleven crisis cards had only three jump icons between them. Coupled with half the players being Cylons and not drawing jump icons, and a couple of uses of the Basestar Bridge to mess with things, it took you 24 turns to reach your next jump. (Over the course of which, you lost 2 Food, 2 Fuel and 5 Morale.)
Some notes about this game.
1. No one was executed for the entire game, despite the presence of both Cally and Dee on the crew. That just ain't right.
2. On BGG, Cylon leaders with "The Illusion of Hope" agenda have a 100% success rate, over 6 games. It's extremely difficult for the humans to win against it; the game essentially becomes 3 v 3. Indeed, this game was remarkable that Leoben at one point actually felt the need to help you out. (Spending a total of three of his turns to infiltrate Galactica, fix your FTL, and then disappear again.)
That said, I think the humans made things needlessly difficult for themselves with two decisions in particular, and both of them are motivated by the same problem.
The obvious one first. You had Tobias sitting two steps away from destroying you for a whole cycle. That's way too close with revealed Cylons able to advance him at will. In a choice between going after him or trying to jump, there's really just one question: would not jumping immediately have killed you? There were only three civvies on the board, and you had 10 Population. (Note that even if Dee's crisis hadn't activated the Centurion, you'd still have had just one shot on Cally's turn, without an SP, before Apollo could end the game.)
The other fateful decision was way back on turn 2.1, when Cally destroyed a wounded basestar. The pursuit track started ticking forward the very same turn. When the fleet next jumped, you had one turn's breathing space before the Cylon fleet caught you again. If you hadn't destroyed that basestar, you would've had four turns at least. INstead, you were back under siege almost immediately, and over that jump cycle, Pegasus/Galactica got hit nine times.
In both cases, I think there's a tendency to get too focused on the ships out in space. They're not always that bad. The CFB and the pursuit track mean that clear skies can actually be more dangerous (as they were here). In fact, having a basestar with a damaged hangar is close to ideal. It won't spit out any more ships, occasionally you might have to fix something; and meanwhile it keeps the pursuit track stuck firmly in Park. The only way you could be safer is if it had Damaged Weapons as well.
Ultimately though, I very much enjoyed running this game, it was pretty exciting. And after all, that's what's important.
I would especially like to mention Apollo's reveal, where he brought Galactica to one token away from destruction, and Leoben to a state of mild panic
Man, I was really really hoping to be able to finish it off then! All those repair cards!
bsg
Also I cannot believe Dee lived!Seriously! I was waiting for the email saying "your CO's to be Starbuck are now activated"
BSG
I, too, am amazed that Dee lived.
The other fateful decision was way back on turn 2.1, when Cally destroyed a wounded basestar. The pursuit track started ticking forward the very same turn.
Ugh, yeah, I fucking hate that pursuit track, and I'm pretty sure I immediately regretted having destroyed the basestar even though I thought it was a good idea. Although didn't I play Major Victory on it and get us some Morale? Without which Dee would have died eventually?
It almost seem like you should leave one of each ship on the board at all times to keep the Pursuit track at bay.
BSG
yes, I'm still confused by the pursuit track. But I like it because it feels more authentic.
BSG
I moved to launch heavy raiders because Leobon needed Caprica to himself.
Before my turn I was going to do something else, then I went back to check and see where everyone was and realized all I had to do was sit tight and and activate the heavy again.
The only real thing I wish I'd done different was Reveal right after the sleeper phase.