I've just recently picked this game up (last week) on a whim at our local game summit (the store offered 50$ off the price which helped)

And since myself my wife and two of our friends have just fallen in love with the indepth aspects of the game, we went out and bought the expansion almost right away, and are enjoying the new strategy cards even more than the old ones (Having to always choose Imperial got old really fast)

One thing I was wondering is are there other games out there have have as much re-play ability? Where the game map is random, there are so many races that each play is different? (We always assign races randomly so the same races aren't always chosen, to date a different race and player has one every time and no one race seems to be overly strong)

I looked at some of the other FFG games but they seem to have static boards which to me limits the re-play ability....

FFG has a number of games with modular boards which I would say have at least as much replayability as TI3. Descent if you're into fantasy, Doom if you prefer to keep the sci-fi going. Also, Runebound is a fantastic game with an amazing amount of replayability. Don't let the static map fool you on that one, there are a boatload of small, cheap card expansions that can change the game in surprisingly drastic ways. There are also bigger expansions that add new boards too.

If you're looking for other galactic conquest games with replayable factors, there's an old classic called JUMP (Justified Use of Military Power) if you can find it. It's pretty old now and has probably been out of print for a while, but it's a lot of fun. I liked the system they used for generating planet info, making it randomized but remarkably consistent. I also liked that all units were tracked on a score sheet. The lack of plastic bits was a bit sad, but the ability to make literally as many of any unit type as you wanted was pretty cool.

FFG's "Starcraft: The Board Game" is also another that has quite a bit of replayability. The board is modular for that one, and because of the way the game plays, it is rare that you will ever acquire your full arsenal of figures in a single game - which means you have to focus on a direction for your army and go for that.

I've heard many good things about Decent except one player is basically the Game Master... which basically is alot like D&D which takes a special person to be the GM... as I don't personally enjoy that role.

I was definitely looking at Starcraft it looked pretty good and along the same lines which makes things very interesting for us (My wife and I), as we've just discovered some of the type of games..(Non monopoly type) and have found a hidden love we had no idea we had.

Descent does require one of the players to be the "Overlord", but the role is a bit different than D&D; the Overlord may be privy to some secrets in the dungeon, but generally he doesn't have to keep track of a bunch of stuff on paper or anything. Beyond that, though, the Overlord is really just another player, a player who is ACTIVELY trying to destroy the heroes and win. Unlike a Dungeon master in D&D, the Overlord player isn't just trying to make it a fun story, or be the referee; he's the evil Overlord trying to conquer the world and slay the heroes.

It does take different playstyles to be the Overlord vs the Heroes, but both are still trying to thwart each other, they just have different means of doing so.

Starcraft is probably the closes you are going to get, though it lacks the politics and intrigue of twilight it makes up for it with an amazing combat and tech system.

sigmazero13 said:

It is true that the Overlord is not quite the same thing as a DM in an RPG, but that has ups and downs. On the up side, you don't have to spend time outside the game coming up with story points or NPCs, or tracking things on papaer, as you said. On the down side, I've found that the other players in my group are a great deal more hostile towards me as an OL in Descent than as a DM in an RPG. In an RPG we're all working together to tell a story, but in Descent it's them versus me. I'm not saying my friends are malicious or anything, but the attitude is definitely more PvP when we play Descent, which is not something I always enjoy.

Also, perhaps of greater concern for the OP, it is true that the person who owns Descent does usually end up being the OL. Theoretically anyone can take that role, but there does seem to be an unspoken attitude of "it's your game dude." So that might be a detractor. That said, the game does have a lot of replayability, and if your group is willing to rotate who the OL is from game to game, you could still have fun with it.

Puerto Rico...
Its sort of similar...
Its what the stratagy card system in twilight was based off of...so thats similar
For replay value I would say that it has alot:P Its a lot simpler than twilight and theres a lot less that you can do but the game is always so different...one stratagy is never "the best"
Twilight IS the best game ever! but puerto rico is very good I also do love descent, and its definetly worth a play but I found it very easy and got boring quickly unless you play RTL

It is true that the Overlord is not quite the same thing as a DM in an RPG' date=' but that has ups and downs. On the up side, you don't have to spend time outside the game coming up with story points or NPCs, or tracking things on papaer, as you said.[/quote']

Addendum: the Overlord has a hard time winning at Descent using the rules as printed; it's not a fair fight at all. Conversely, Doom has the exact opposite problem - the Invader usually crushes the Marines. I prefer Doom because, if one player's going to have to play by him/herself, at least s/he should have a better chance of winning. Descent feels too much like picking on one person just because.

Now, I hear there are plenty of houserules and variants which will make Descent much more balanced, and I have never played the expansions (I believe there are expansions?) so I can't comment on what the game is like with them.

without the expansions the game is VERY unbalanced... you need the first couple expansions for it to balance out... they make a HUGE difference... the first game its easy to beat the overlord and then in the next expantion I think it is they add some things the overlord can do and it makes it unfair in favor of the overlord and then the next one balanced it out nicely and then return to arms is what really makes descent amazing
(I might be wrong on which expansions make who overpowered, I know that the first 2 change it like I mentioned. we bought all the expansions very close together and awhile ago so my memory is a bit fuzzy)

Korhal_IV said:

I've heard people say the game is unbalanced in favour of the heroes, and I've heard other people say its unbalanced in favour of the OL. Everybody seems to be coming up with house rules to balance out their perceived biases. In my experience the game is reasonably balanced in general, as long as you stick to the rules as written (regardless of their lack of logic or "realism") and as long as the OL is prepared to be a right bastard. A lot of people approach Descent like some sort of RPG and introduce house rules to make things more "logical" and those rules invariably end up tilting the balance one way or the other.

Now, it's true that each new expansion has shifted the balance one way or the other with its new components (AoD made things a lot easier for the OL, and ToI with its Feat cards seems to give the heroes a boost) but I find that once everyone gets used to the new abilities presented, the balance returns. For example, there are a few treachery cards from earlier expansions I've always left aside because I thought they were too cruel, now that the heroes have Feats I'm reconsidering that position. Game balance in Descent is a house of cards that can easily be toppled, but it is there as long as you're careful. The fact that the game seems plagued with unclear wordings and unexpected FAQ rulings doesn't help matters either.

I also found that people approached the role of OL as if you are the DM in DnD ... and I dont know about anyone else but the peopel who would DM our games or when I would we would help out the "heroes" by taking away a few monsters or giving them extra items or experience so that they could beat the dungeon but in Descent as the OL you really need to be in it for yourself only and play as mean as you can!

TrentL said:

Just because the map is fixed doesn't mean a game lacks replay-value... think of the amount of games that chess afficionados get out of 64 black and white squares!

There are lots of "German" games out there. Puerto Rico has already been mentioned. Carcassonne and all its variants is another. There's Settlers of Catan.

FFG's Game of Thrones seems to come out different every time I've played it, and Cosmic Encounter is a chaotically variable blast from the past.

They're not all space empire games and they don't all have variable game boards, but they're all eminently replayable.

Well Trentl, thanks to the home page of FFG, now you know what's left for you to do : wait for Runewars

TrentL said:

We use a lil bit of houserule for space exploration which adds nice variation even though its sometimes very unfair to player or two but more realistic than especially placing the planets and suchs. I'll list it with numbers, its easier that way

1. All system hexes (except for race, wormhole and MR) are turned upside down (the red side) and shuffled.

2. MR is placed to be the center of the galaxy.

3. Then all systems are placed around MR in rings as normal, but without looking the systems and without knowing anything about them.

4. Home systems are placed, again, face down, shuffled.

5. Players choose where they want to sit and turn their homesystem around to see what they play.

6. Proceed as normal.

Now in game, player has exact same rules for playing as normal, but they don't know what systems are around them and they have to explore them. I'll again list what player does because its a lil bit easier to understand vs me trying to write nice text to descripe whats going on.

1. Player makes normal action by taking command counter and placing it on a hex he wants to activate.

2. Player chooses units he wants to send to explore the system. He picks transport (think colony ship) and ground force (think colonists.. with guns). Now he has chosen what goes to the unexplored system.

3. Player turns the system around (explored now on). For example there's one one planet there, now you place distant suns (if I remember right the name, don't have the game here atm) token on the planet without looking at it (of course).

4. Player may now use the system as normal, for example land the troop on the planet to attempt to conquer it.

Some rules we have in addition:

- If you fly to supernova or asteroid field or anything else you can't pass, the ship is available back at the system where it left from on the next round.

- Ships with more speed than 1 can't pass uncharted worlds to explore something further away.

- This rule might be in the game before too, I don't remember exactly, but if player fails to conquer planet but manages to destroy the distant suns counter (ground forces, fighters, radiation, what not), a new one is picked randomly (and is hidden as normal before new units are landed)

We really wanted the game to be even more like Master of Orion, hence after first two games we made rules for the exploration of unknown and we use it at every game todays. It works wonders and makes the game much less predictable And do we love the game, do we... so awesome.