RftG

Round 12 begins. Here's everyone's choices:

omnis: Phase IV (x2) - Consume (double VPs)
Connie Neil: Phase II - Develop
Ryan: Phase IV (x2) - Consume (double VPs)
Laga: Phase II - Develop

We start with Phase II (Develop).

omnis plays Colony Ship for 2 discards. He can discard this in a later Phase III to play a non-military, non-Alien world at no (other) cost.

Connie plays Free Trade Association for 4 discards. This is at -2 cost, for choosing the phase and for Investment Credits. She then draws 1 card from Public Works. This 6-cost development lets her produce on a Blue windfall world in Phase V, and she can consume up to 3 Blue goods on it for 1 VP and 1 card each. Its value at game end is 2 VPs per Blue production world plus 1 VP per Blue windfall world, plus 2 VPs for a couple of specific cards. Its current value is 4 VPs.

Ryan plays Improved Logistics for 3 discards. This card lets him play two worlds when Phase III is selected instead of one.

Laga plays Imperium Lords (Evil Empire!) for 3 discards (-1 for choosing the phase, -2 for Galactic Federation). This card has a Phase V power. She draws 1 card per military world in her layout. At present that would mean 5 cards. Its value at game end is 2 VPs per Imperium card plus 1 VP per other military world. Its current value is 9 VPs. it also increases the value of Galactic Federation by 2 VPs.

Imperium Lords is the twelfth card in Laga's layout. The game will end this round.

RftG

Phase IV is the last phase.

omnis chose this phase, and opted for double points. He has 3 goods. He consumes 1 on Propserous World and 2 on Old Earth for 3 VPs; doubled, he clears 6 VPs.

At round start, Connie had just one power to consume goods (on Public Works), and was looking at a 1 VP haul. But Free Trade Association lets her consume the two Blue goods for 2 VPs and 2 cards. Galactic Bazaar lets her discard 1 card from her hand for 1 more VP. Total haul is 4 VPs and 2 cards.

Ryan also chose this phase, for double points. He consumes two goods on Mining League, one good on Mining Conglomerate and one good on New Earth. Total is 5 VPs and 1 card, becomes 10 VPs and 1 card.

Laga has just the one Consume power, on Rebel Colony. She consumes 1 good for 1 VP.

And that concludes this game. Unfortunately, it's now midnight here. I'll need to wrap up the points in the morning.

RftG

Ok, let's get into the wrapup. Just before I do, the number of VP chips remaining in the pool are now -2. That ends the game too.

As usual, I'll break out the points into the different categories.

Consumption VPs
omnis: 9
Connie Neil: 9
Ryan: 29
Laga: 3

Ryan ran away with this category. He was fortunate to build a produce-and-consume engine quite early, and was able to consume for double points three times. At the other end, Laga was running a military strategy, which typically is poorly placed for consumption.

Layout Value
omnis: 9
Connie Neil: 12
Ryan: 12
Laga: 18

On the other hand, military strategies tend to lead to better layout values. High-defence military worlds are also typically high-value worlds. Her two Rebel worlds alone were worth 10 VPs.

6-Cost Developments
omnis: 12
Connie Neil: 10
Ryan: 8
Laga: 25

But Laga managed more than just a straight military play. She got Galactic Federation down relatively early, and used it to play two killer 6-cost developments. GF itself ended worth 9 VPs. So was Imperium Lords, while Galactic Imperium was worth 7.

The other players managed a good boost here too. omnis got 6 points apiece for Terraforming Guild and Galactic Survey: SETI, while Connie scored 6 for Galactic Renaissance and 4 for Free Trade Association. Ryan's 8 VPs came only from Mining League; however, this card also accounted for the bulk of his consumption.

Goals
omnis: 3
Connie Neil: 3
Ryan: 6
Laga: 8

Laga never quite made it to 6 strength and the "Greatest Military" tile. She could have done - she had Lost Alien Warship in her hand for a while, which adds +2 strength - but even with the 5 VPs from the goal, the 6-cost developments were better plays. But she did claim the "Most developments" tile. The "First" goals were fairly evenly spread.

So, Laga was the comfortable leader in three of the four point categories; but Ryan was the runaway leader in consumption. Who ended in front will it be Evil Empire or Chocolate Empire?

RftG

The closing summary:

omnis
Victory Points: 9
Layout Value: 9
6-Cost Developments: 12
Goals: 3
Total: 33

Connie Neil
Victory Points: 9
Layout Value: 12
6-Cost Developments: 10
Goals: 3
Total: 34

Ryan
Victory Points: 29
Layout Value: 12
6-Cost Developments: 8
Goals: 6
Total: 55

Laga
Victory Points: 3
Layout Value: 18
6-Cost Developments: 25
Goals: 8
Total: 54

VP Pool: -2

There was just 1 point in it, but at the end, the game's newest player held on.

Ryan wins!

At the other end too, just 1 point separated third and fourth place. Connie just held on to pip omnis.

Connie just held on to pip omnis.

I live to pip

from leader to loser. Such are the fortunes of war.

Congratulations Ryan! Good job!

Good game to Laga & Connie as well.

Of course, we couldn't do this without the tireless work of our awesome GM. Thanks BillyTea for be our game runner.

Well played Ryan, well played.

I am proud of myself for coming so close but Ryan very much deserves the chocolate crown.

thanks again for running the show, billytea!

Ryan thanks you all. He is dropping hints that with Easter just a fw days away, that "chocolate crown" is an idea worthy of actualisation. Congratulations too to Laga, whose score of 54 is higher than any score in any previous game.

With that in mind, my comments are fairly brief this time around.

• Ryan ran a textbook produce-and-consume strategy. Note that he didn't actually consume for points until round 8. (Of course, from then on he chose nothing but produce and consume.) It takes a bit of time to set up a consume engine.

• However, he would not have won if he hadn't been able to play odd developments and worlds while he was doing his consume thing. Primarily that's about card flow. His P&C engine also generated a few cards per cycle - three on Produce, one on Consume. Card is a very useful add-on to a P&C strategy.

• I must also note that he got lucky. He got good Brown cards (and related developments) early on, which worked nicely with his starting world. you can improve your odds of finding good stuff with good card flow, but ultimately it's still luck of the draw.

• Moving to Laga, she ran a good military strategy, but note that she also did very well with her developments. Her 6-cost developments added 25 VPs to her score, the highest total for that category by any player yet. There are 6-cost developments that work very well with military strategies.

And that's all I have to say about the game, really. I have more to say about next game, namely: would people like to include cards from the second expansion, Rebel vs Imperium? YOu can see all the cards from this expansion here: [link] Among other things, there are three new starting worlds and six new 6-cost developments. Including them mostly keeps the game the same, but there are some things to consider.

1. The new cards are more varied, which is generally a good thing. Some of the powers are a bit different from previous powers. For instance, Hidden Fortress is a 5-defence military world. It adds 1 to your military strength for each military world in your layout. HF is your fourth military world? your strength just went up by 4. (I will of course provide explanations where necessary.)

3. Aside from the variety angle, there's also some power creep. It's balanced - the more powerful (and/or valuable) cards are also more expensive. For instance, there is now an 8-defence military world (Alien Monolith) and even a 9-defence military world (Rebel Stronghold). There are more expensive/valuable/useful non-military worlds too. So, power creep. That's likely to see rising scores.

4. Rules are mostly unchanged, but there are two exceptions. First, there's a new Explore power. Usually, when you Explore, if you pick up two cards you both like, you can only keep one. However, if you have the new Explore power in your layout, you can keep both, by throwing out a card from your hand instead. Basically, when you do Explore discards, you can substitute cards from your hand to keep more of the cards you just drew. (This might be a bit tricky to visualise, but it's easier to pick up during play.)

There's also a change to how starting worlds work. At present, at the start of the game, you get a random starting world, over which you have no choice. The second expansion brings the total number of starting worlds up to 12, and changes the rules. Now, at game start, everyone gets dealt two worlds, and can choose the one they like best. I like this rule change, as it gives players more control over their starting position.

Summary: the new cards will increase variety and options, and hopefully make it easier to find something to do that feels worthwhile. In particular, you'll get a choice of starting world, instead of being stuck with what you're dealt. But it may also increase the need to brain. Everyone seems to be handling the goals pretty well, so I think you can probably cope with the cards getting a bit more complicated. How do you all feel? Specifically:

1. Who wants to be in the next game?

2. Would you like to add in the cards from the second expansion, or play again with the same cards as last game?

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Sure, I'm up for braining with new cards.