Just wondering how important you guys are finding Initiative? I almost always try to take planets quickly and efficiently, thus I find myself always striking on the Initiative unless I have no other choice or need to deny a planet to the enemy.

Is this pretty much what you would expect from "proper" play?

Initiative is less important with Ranged units, but is pretty important otherwise. One thing I like is that Warlord presence changes initiative, preventing players from mapping out initiative for the rest of the game.

Initiative is less important with Ranged units, but is pretty important otherwise. One thing I like is that Warlord presence changes initiative, preventing players from mapping out initiative for the rest of the game.

True, however if you're taking planets on your initiative and bring your Warlord+crew to the 1st planet every time you go to take it you're sitting pretty 80% of the time since you will maintain initiative and have some buddies if your opponent doesn't spot your tempo/plan and stop you. O.o

The fault I see is that for more astute/experienced players it is easy to spot said tempo and plan accordingly, however, usually it's like trying to stop a sledgehammer with a trash can lid. :/

Still undefeated though, so I'm not complaining too much.

Initiative is less important with Ranged units, but is pretty important otherwise. One thing I like is that Warlord presence changes initiative, preventing players from mapping out initiative for the rest of the game.

True, however if you're taking planets on your initiative and bring your Warlord+crew to the 1st planet every time you go to take it you're sitting pretty 80% of the time since you will maintain initiative and have some buddies if your opponent doesn't spot your tempo/plan and stop you. O.o

The fault I see is that for more astute/experienced players it is easy to spot said tempo and plan accordingly, however, usually it's like trying to stop a sledgehammer with a trash can lid. :/

Still undefeated though, so I'm not complaining too much.

What if, instead of a trash can lid, they just used a sniper rifle? I have a couple decks focused on killing the warlord in one ranged shot. You just deploy the ranged units at planets where your opponent will have initiative (and/or important planets) and attach things like Ion Rifle and Stealth Cadre. If their warlord goes there, they die, if not, it's much more difficult to win the planet. This is especially true with the "always go first planet" snowball strategy (I also pack Doom to deal with this )

I have yet to start a game with the initiative and I am 3 for 3 on games won so far.

Initiative in combat is great. Initiative when deploying less so. I think it balances out.

I've found initiative to be very powerful. When playing other skilled players it's often come down to who has initiative to win the game, but this is with a friend who's played 30-40 games with me.

I will say one thing. I wish initiative was not random. It would have been a lot better to allow players to bid on initiative, maybe by secret bidding up to their starting value in resources, whoever wins the bid has to pay their end and gets the advantage on4 of 7 planets.

I think the biggest thing with Initiative is Combat phase. As Zebadiah said, being able to have the Initiative in a battle by having your Warlord there is great to balance the game and avoid the classic "Your turn/My turn" problem. Having the Initiative in a battle can make you win if you find the best order to use your cards.

At Deployment, I don't think Initiative is that important. Unless you are a very skilled psycologist and your partner someone very easy to manipulate, I think the most important advantage in Initiative is subterfuge when being the last one, literally, showing your cards, and this can be achieved by deploying Support cards or Accesories.

I've found initiative to be very powerful. When playing other skilled players it's often come down to who has initiative to win the game, but this is with a friend who's played 30-40 games with me.

I will say one thing. I wish initiative was not random. It would have been a lot better to allow players to bid on initiative, maybe by secret bidding up to their starting value in resources, whoever wins the bid has to pay their end and gets the advantage on4 of 7 planets.

I agree with you for the most part. It plays a huge part in special when just starting with the core set, I feel afterwards it balances more out because the decks are more balanced out as before.

I do think that in a best of 3 game format the initiative should be decided by the loser after the first and/or second game.