BSG At the risk of repeating myself---What screwed me over, suspicions-wise, was that Investigative Committee that came in shortly after I joined the game. It was a check which Yellow cards counted against. I had really and truly nothing in my hand but Yellow cards at the time. Even before IC was played, I was at the time thinking I should lay low and play nothing (or only spike the deck with one card). With the IC, it was play the Yellow cards and definitely be suspected, or play nothing and only possibly be suspected (which is why I was so frustrated that I did indeed earn the suspicion--by doing the lay-low/helpful thing).
Hindsight being 20/20, I should have played every card in my hand and then revealed on my next turn. The lesson I learned: if you're a Cylon and you're at risk of being suspected, you may as well reveal sooner rather than later. I could have done a lot more once in the Cylon locations.
I was hesitant to because I had some cool abilities (not powerful, but neat and useful) and I wanted to play with the Quorum. I think what's hard for Cylon players to realize that every thing you lose in your human abilities you gain a lot of good abilities as a Cylon.
On Characters Zarek seems to be a good all-around character. In the series, he's actually my least favorite character, go figure. But he's good for being human or Cylon and as Billytea says, makes a strong President... if played competently *whistles*.
The other two characters I've played in face to face games are Roslin and Starbuck, both of whom I've enjoyed and would play again.
Roslin: Her weakness can be a big drawback but you can work with it if you think ahead. She gets Yellow cards, so one trick is early on is to build up your deck by playing Consolidate Power--lose one card for two. The other thing is to go ahead and spend a few cards early game to activate the President's Office a few times (as if she's in the game, she's at least starting as president). Once Roslin gets a good Quorum hand going she can play those as her actions with no need to spend cards out of her hand for awhile, and Quorum abilities tend to be powerful. Even if she spends one card her first turn, she'll end up with three Quorum cards and can use those for her next several cards before needing to activate a location again.
The real trouble with Roslin is that she's crap for taking to Galactica and helping over there, because it essentially costs her two cards instead of one---she's better off playing an XO to get someone on Galactica to do what she wants for her (which is actually pretty in character). On the other hand, if Roslin is a Cylon, running around and activating locations is a good way for her to spend down her hand while appearing to be helpful--and then she'll legitimately have no or few cards to put into crises. But that's still probably the weakest thing you can do with her either way.
Her Religious Visions do have the side effect that if she really does have to choose between a rock and a hard place, yes, she can unfairly build up suspicion quickly. But I think that's a fair tradeoff as, if she is the Cylon, she can really screw the fleet over and quickly. If you're the human, just do your best that on the next crisis, draw the nicest one and use the Quorum to restore resources (many of the Quorum cards do that). The best thing otherwise is to play Roslin--be diplomatic as possible and deflect suspicion from yourself. If Roslin is the Cylon and people are suspecting her, then she should reveal. If her abilities have become drawbacks there's no reason to hold onto them.
Starbuck: Starbuck is tremendous fun to play in piloting with her extra actions (and she's hella fun to roleplay), and she has a fairly flexible hand. She can help in a lot of situations. She can be easily brigged, but if she happens to be the only pilot in the game, then the other players have to be really careful before they decide to brig her because they could shoot themselves in the foot without having Starbuck to defend (continued...)