I'm actually getting MORE excited as they put out the previews. I am somewhat of a tinkerer though, and the one thing that I may consider making house rules for is the way that starfighters can only participate in space battles. After seeing The Force Awakens , X-wings and Tie Fighters are pretty cool in ground battles. I think I would give an option to assign the starfighters to either the space or ground arena, and I would force this choice at the start of every combat round. I'm not sure, but I might also think about an orbital bombardment option for capital ships too, but only if there are no opposing space units.

I am saying this without having seen all the cards or fully understanding the game yet, however.

This idea while cool, introduces a lot of problems.

An x-wing would be (without modification) equal to a stormtrooper on the ground, or in otherwords, WAY weaker than a snowspeeder. You'd have to modify it's attack die, it's hp pool, it's hp type, and then you'd have to consider it's cost. Is it easier/cheaper to produce X-wings over Snowspeeders? The balance issues this introduces could be pretty impressive.

Beyond all that. Rewatch that scene of the movie and you'll notice a few things. Most of the x-wings and Tie fighters are fighting only against each other, not ground targets. Only Poe is really accurate enough to be effective against ground targets.

I think I agree with kmanweiss, but I agree with MarthWMaster, too. I need Luke and Vader to feel qualitatively different in this game, as they are Force users. Icons and numbers are not sufficient. I would have liked to see more depth to the missions, that is, more story-content, much as there was in Freedom in the Galaxy. In that game, you really feel as if your heroes are going on an adventurous story in which they might encounter any number of events or obstacles in trying to complete their mission. I'm sure this would have added time and rules weight to Rebellion , but I think it would have been worth it. As I said in another posting, this game is feeling a bit shallow to me, even though I appreciate the good elements such as kmanweiss was pointing out. I may feel differently when it comes to actually playing it, though.

It's a shame this is Rebellion in name only and not an actual board game version of the PC game.

I too was hoping for a slightly more narrative-driven game, but I'm sure I'll love what they made when I finally get the chance to play it. The one thing I would have liked to see is more thought put into the multiplayer execution. Even though I was in the 1v1 camp regarding the development of the LCG, I've long felt that the setting deserves a cooperative game with a quasi- Pandemic feel to it.

While I love Freedom in the Galaxy, we do not need another Freedom in the Galaxy; I only have time for one 20-hour monster game in my life.

-Will

It's a shame this is Rebellion in name only and not an actual board game version of the PC game.

Research didnt make it, the rebel win condition is different, Production has been streamlined, and there isnt anywhere near as many unit/ship types, but things have to go when making a boardgame and none of these are "core gameplay concepts".

So yeah, I disagree that there is nothing in common with the PC game.

It's a shame this is Rebellion in name only and not an actual board game version of the PC game.

That would be a near impossibility to mimic in boardgame form.

It is definitely close enough for me. I can just feel the spirit of the game in this.

This game could be perfect for me, my younger brother, and all my Star Wars nerd friends. I think this game may be able to bring both hardcore and casual gamers together.

I keep shoving dollars into my laptop, but now my computer is slower and I still don't have Rebellion.

The more I think about, the more I realize how deeply strategic the missions can be.

For example, the rebel player plays Luke on a mission (Seek Yoda). The imperial player sees this and decides he is going to hold Boba Fett back to try and shut down Luke. But the rebel player knows that Luke's 2 intel may not be enough for such a critical mission so he plays Leia on a Sabatoge mission.

Then, in the command phase, the rebel player plays leia to Dagobah and although the sabatoge token is near worthless, when Luke attempts his mission, he will have 4 dice available. That is of course, assuming that the imperial player doesnt see through it and sends Fett vs Leia and the Emperor vs Luke.

So, to me I think the missions will not be be boring at all.

I've never considered keeping game notes on a board game before, but honestly, this could be pretty cool. Between the missions, the hidden info elements, the bluffing, etc, you could end up with some interesting playthroughs. Turning Leia to the darkside on turn 2. Obi going for training with Yoda. Fett leading the desperate defense of a planet under siege by the rebels and pulling off a victory due to pulling just the right cards. Han taking out a star destroyer by himself.

Each game will be like rewriting the original trilogy. Each game is a 'what if' scenario.

This last article reignited my excitement.

I've never considered keeping game notes on a board game before, but honestly, this could be pretty cool. Between the missions, the hidden info elements, the bluffing, etc, you could end up with some interesting playthroughs. Turning Leia to the darkside on turn 2. Obi going for training with Yoda. Fett leading the desperate defense of a planet under siege by the rebels and pulling off a victory due to pulling just the right cards. Han taking out a star destroyer by himself.

Each game will be like rewriting the original trilogy. Each game is a 'what if' scenario.

The guys from SU&SD said when they got to play the game during worlds they had a FFG employee doing just that, writing down what happened through their play through.

Interesting game, but I'll wait a bit first for the reviews to come in. The moment they start to announce hundreds of small box expansions for the game (seems to be their marketing strategy for all their new games), I'll skip this game altogether.

In terms of expansions, this will be more of a tradional model along the lines of TI3 or Civilization, as in 1 or 2 expansions only.

Interesting game, but I'll wait a bit first for the reviews to come in. The moment they start to announce hundreds of small box expansions for the game (seems to be their marketing strategy for all their new games), I'll skip this game altogether.

More power to you, but some things to keep in mind.

This isn't really a competitive miniatures game like Armada, X-Wing, or even Imperial Assault. Those are the types of titles that get tons of expansions.

They also code their expandable games differently from their non-expandable games. This one is coded as a non-expandable.

There isn't really any good way to expand this game. Adding planets/boards would mess with the round timer as it would throw off the balance of how long it took to discover the rebels, etc. The balance of units doesn't really leave any room for additional units between any of the other units.

Other than purely trivial stuff (miniatures for the leaders, or additional leaders) that really wouldn't have anything to do with the game, I can't see many ways for them to expand the game.

I think it's more likely that we'll see 1 or 2 different versions over time. As in maybe a version that is tweaked for Ep 7-9, and maybe a prequel trilogy version also. They would be separate games though with their own sculpts, different rules, leaders, missions, win conditions, etc.

FFG could very well prove me wrong, but typically they plan well ahead on this stuff, and so far there is no indication they plan to expand this at all.

I do wish they'd announce the extra dice set though and get it over with already.

Interesting game, but I'll wait a bit first for the reviews to come in. The moment they start to announce hundreds of small box expansions for the game (seems to be their marketing strategy for all their new games), I'll skip this game altogether.

This is a not a Miniatures Game or RPG-lite, so that will not be the expansion strategy for this, if there is an expansion at all.

-Will

As I recall it was mentioned in one of the preview articles that there is a cap at 5 dice rolled, so extra dice makes litle sense (unless I've totaly made that rule up ofcource).

As I recall it was mentioned in one of the preview articles that there is a cap at 5 dice rolled, so extra dice makes litle sense (unless I've totaly made that rule up ofcource).

I suppose there is a point at which you have so many armies on the battlefield that they're basically just getting in each other's way. Even if space is infinite, the area relevant to a particular battle is going to be much smaller, usually.

As I recall it was mentioned in one of the preview articles that there is a cap at 5 dice rolled, so extra dice makes litle sense (unless I've totaly made that rule up ofcource).

I can't seem to find anything, but I tend to overlook small details like this. If someone could find where that idea came from (other than potentially Smuggler's brain), that would be great.

It would be very interesting in gameplay. One of the battles shown as an example would take like 8 dice of one color for one faction, and it wouldn't be hard to gather more than that together, but the game tops out at 5 each of the red and black dice.

Limiting max dice thrown is a significant advantage to the smaller army (which will be the rebels more often than not). A 10 dice assault against 2 enemy units is pretty much a guaranteed 1 round kill. But limit the dice to 5 per round and those 2 units might survive the first wave, and that means they can kill more units in defense than if the enemy could throw everything at them at once.

In addition, with the retreat mechanic, this makes it more likely that something survives to retreat.

It also makes it MUCH more likely that an X-wing could survive a first round assault to make the attack run on the Death Star.

A 5 dice cap to combat would be a significantly important rule if it existed.

As I recall it was mentioned in one of the preview articles that there is a cap at 5 dice rolled, so extra dice makes litle sense (unless I've totaly made that rule up ofcource).

I can't seem to find anything, but I tend to overlook small details like this. If someone could find where that idea came from (other than potentially Smuggler's brain), that would be great.

I can't find it either. That leavs two possibilities, either I heard it in one of the videos I've seen (Dice Tower and the twitch thingy that I can not bring my self to ever watch again) or my brain just made it up all on its own...

So take it with as much salt as you can get your hands on

RE: The dice cap - we know that people over at BGG have played/reviewed/demo'ed the game. So I'm asking around there.

see - https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1513986/dice-capped-5

This game reminds me a lot of War of the Rings and I recall when I first hear about War of the Rings and even when I read the rules I felt that "yeah this game is decided by the dice". I was wrong of course and I think the same is the case here.

Rebellion is built on what amounts to the current version of modern board game design which is effectively exclusion driven mechanics. This basically means that as a player at any point in the game, you can do anything you want, but each action you take, excludes other actions. In the case of Rebellion you can for example use a leader to run a mission, oppose a mission or make a tactical move on the board. You can do any of those, but which ever you do, excludes the possibility of the other two options.

I believe the core of that type of design comes from role selection and worker placement mechanics.

In any case I love it. I predict right now that this is going to be in the top 10 on board game geek inside of a year and it will be on "best game of the year" on everyone's list in 2016.

This may simply be a symptom of my introduction to modern games occurring through the Star Wars TCG, but I actually like the importance of dice in this game, as well as in X-Wing . Since we don't have access to a mystical energy field, the most critical moments in the story of our playthroughs can only be decided by pure chance. If you trust Obi-Wan, luck doesn't exist in the galaxy far, far away, but it does in ours.