Hi, just got this game as a birthday present last week. Wife and I have played twice. First game took 8 HOURS! I really wish FF had included an insert that gave a single page outline of the steps to each phase.

Warning this is a long post. I have a question about the classification of the deathstar as a unit, then a more general question of "If and what are we doing wrong" because of the length of our first game and second one (4.5 hrs), and how difficult we are both finding to make any progress within the first 4 turns.

Anyway, my main question concerns the death star, and if it is considered a unit. Specifically, my wife was playing empire. She moved the death star to a planet i had loyalty in, with 2 ground units at the time. There were no space units. When phase 3 came, we didn't know if i was allowed to build units using the planet's resources or deploy planets from my build queue, since I know the rules say you can't build or deploy units from and to a loyal planet that your opponent has one of their units in. (come to think of it, does this only apply if they have at least 1 ground unit? We were assuming it meant space or ground.)

This issue came up again when I played a rebel card that I can't remember the specific name of, but it was like hidden fleet except only ships could be moved from the reb base to a space with no units.

Like i said, death star was her only figure on my planet. I used this card to get my ships out of my base and onto the system, so that I could initiate combat with the deathstar and play my plan the attack card to take it down. (We did make sure she rolled her red dice first against the ships.) Was I allowed to do this? If not, what cards if any do allow you to transfer into a system with the deathstar in it?

Finally, If the deathstar isn't considered a "unit" for the purposes of these cards, are there any other pieces from your military that aren't either? For instance, the ion cannon/shields?

Also, we are finding that our games are going very very slow - we cut it down to 4.5 hours the second time, but by that time my wife just conceded when I blew up the deathstar because she needed to raid. I was a lot more cognizent about trying to thin my mission deck early the second time around, but I am finding it really difficult to achieve any missions in the game - in fact that last game, I only completed 2 missions in the last turn only (one worth 2 points during phase 3 and the other 1 point during a combat). It seems the ability to speed up the game falls on the rebel player most since he has direct influence over the rebel marker moving to meet the empire's marker, whereas the empire is going to necessarily take some time to narrow down where your base is going to be. I found I couldn't ever complete the 1 point missions - control all systems in a region or blow up a destroyer because my leaders were busy doing missions, not moving troops. Wife would just send vader or palp to counter my diplomacy missions, and it felt that my tool kit was very limited in gaining diplomacy beyond that. To be honest, I felt like the missions that gave you 2 points were way easier to fulfill, in particular the 1 point mission to control a region feels like I am chasing my tail.

On the empire end, my wife constantly felt overwhelmed with all the ground she needed to cover to find me - and she seems to be very very good at suspecting where I'm hiding - both times we've played she was one planet off from my location, but still struggles to get to the location quick enough when she needs to answer my bigger plays (like taking mon calamari with the intel mission that let me also fill my build queue - she had spent her leaders on moving units around calamari's twin planet on the other side of the board and removing my sabotage on corellia). In particular, she is frustrated with deciding between her missions or if she should just inch across the board. I noticed that most turns she was attempting to capture my leaders (She did wind up getting one of them, then next turn converted that unit to her leader pool with lure to the darkside), get through her project deck, and she was opposing my diplomacy attempts on the big planets, so was she spread to thin? Was she doing too many missions and should have always focused on moving her units atleast a couple of times a turn? She felt like she was chasing her tail trying to keep me from producing starships on one side of the board while amassing her army on the other to take down the region she suspected (correctly) that my base was on.

My suspicion is that the first game rules are to blame - for this second game we still used the first game rules, including not using the action cards text. I recently flipped through those cards and it seems like they present more opportunities for mobility and thinning out the mission/project decks, but do they make any really meaningful impact on the game length? Feels like I'll never get to even see the 3 point rebel missions.

Sorry for the long post, I just wanted to give proper context to how we are approaching the game and where we are struggling to understand what to do. While the production values of this game are incredible, the rule books and first game setup feel like they needed to be done better - first game setups should never lead to 8 hour games! We are still leaving this game with mixed emotions - the game has very high production values, and I can feel in my bones that it's going to be very rewarding and and a blast once I have the rules down - but when we get into a 30 minute back and forth, double rulebook fliping, google fest over random mechanics and interactions the game starts to feel frustrating and futile.

Edit - 2 more questions concerning loyalty and subjugation:

Had a forehad slap moment when I realized why I might be struggling with the loyalty int he region mission - If I have loyalty on a planet, but the empire has subjugated it, does it still count for that mission?? I've been assuming no. second, in that situation would the empire still be building the one troop he gets from a subjugated planet, or does he need to remove my loyalty tokens completely first?

Thanks!

From page 14 of the RR:

"All plastic miniatures in the game are units. The capabilities and

names of each unit are shown on the faction sheets.

Here is a list of all units included in

Star Wars: Rebellion

Imperial Units:

24 TIE Fighters, 8 Assault Carriers,

8 Star Destroyers, 2 Super Star Destroyers,

2 Death Stars, 1 Death Star Under Construction,

30 Stormtroopers, 10 AT-STs, 4 AT-ATs.

Rebel Units:

8 X-wings, 12 Y-wings, 4 Corellian Corvettes,

4 Rebel Transports, 3 Mon Cala Cruisers, 21 Rebel Troopers,

6 Airspeeders, 3 Shield Generators, 3 Ion Cannons."


And yes. A subjagated system is still loyal to the rebellion if it has rebel loyalty. From page 13 of the RR:


" SUBJUGATION

A system with a subjugation marker is an Imperial system.

A subjugation marker in a system does not define the

system’s loyalty. Its loyalty is either neutral or Rebel

(if a Rebel loyalty marker is in the system).

…

If a subjugated system contains a Rebel loyalty marker, the

marker stays in the system beneath the subjugation marker.

a Rebel loyalty marker is placed beneath the subjugation

marker.

If the Rebel player loses loyalty in a subjugated system, his

loyalty marker is removed from beneath the subjugation

marker. The system is now neutral."

yes, without this rule games would go ridiculously long as you wouldn't be able to accomplish most objectives. This is the cause of your ridiculously long games.

I suggest reading through the RR completely before your next game. it will only take you about a half hour and will probably cut hours from your game from the rules you found you did wrong.



As for strategy. The early objectives are designed to be really hard to complete. The later objectives are supposed to be easier and more rewarding. using infiltration to get to those better tier Objectives is a powerful way to get objectives that you can more easily score.

The rebels should Build Alliance every turn. If you're having trouble with the empire sending palpatine to counter just send Leia and Mon Mothma or perform the mission in systems where you have units to gain the +2 dice bonus. Gaining loyalty is indeed the primary way in which you will score objectives. Though there are plenty of objectives that require other activities like Cut Supply Lines or any of the combat based objectives. Remember if Palpatine is wasting his action trying to stop Mon Mothma he's not doing something more useful.

That said your games are certainly going abnormally long. most games end around turn 7 for either side and go 3-4 hours. Though that's with people who know the game well enough to plan their turns rather quickly.

On the empire side of things the empire should almost always use 60% of their leaders for fleet movements. usually more around 90% of their moves should be fleet movements. Missions are valuable and powerful. But only do them if they are good and can be helpful. Early Rule by Fear and R&D can be powerful for gaining an early production lead. But remember, the empire should always be looking at every system on the map and thinking "What's the quickest I can get there? Where is the furthest possible location from where I am." You want to position yourself so no system is more than two turns away.

By limiting it to two turns then in any given turn, if you figure out where the base is through interrogation or handy probe card draw (remember you draw 2 probe cards a turn at least) you can move adjacent to the system, and then next turn, when the rebels actually do Rapid mobilization (most rebel players don't have somebody on Rapid mobilization until they think they're vulnerable) you are able to jump on the rebel base. Remember Rapid Mobilization doesn't activate until the end of the turn. so if you're two turns away from any system you can theoretically hit the rebel base before it can move unless the rebellion has a ridiculous ability to predict your movements.

I suggest using the action cards even for your first game. They make the game more balanced and it feels more complicated to ignore them than to use them for the first games as you still draw them for recruiting. The preset unit setup is fine as far as I know.

Oh and I didn't see that last question. If a system is subjugated it doesn't matter if it is loyal to the rebels. It still produces the left most resource. Subjugation and loyalty are kinda completely separate mechanics. But don't feel bad for not getting it at first. It's a bit complicated.

Imperial systems are any system subjugated or imperial loyal
Any system not loyal to the empire with imperial ground units is subjugated.
Any system with rebel loyalty and not subjugated is a rebel system.
Subjugation has no effect on the loyalty of the system.

Or better yet just read the section on subjugation in the RR. It probably explains it better. Some people like to put subjugation markers next to the loyalty hex (covering the right most resource) so they don't conflate subjugation and loyalty and you can always see who a planet is loyal to even when subjugated.

For Tactics I recommend this:

It helped me a lot as it gives some input and you can take the stuff and fit it to your playstyle. For the length of a game I just can say, that it goes down really fast as soon as you get familiar with the rules and all the special advantages. After like 60-70 games played we are down to 2-3 hours per game! Shortest game was under 1 hour, cause I managed to find and destroy the rebel base in turn 3... ;-) very satiesfying! That said, I never would play without the actioncards, because of the surprising actions they give! And always remember its an assymetrical game, so as the empire sometimes you just have to ignore what the rebel scum is doing and just concentrate on your quest for the base (always keep in mind that you need powerful groundunits like the AT-AT). On the other hand when you play aginst the empire keep in mind that time plays for you and you just need to keep them away fom your base. So draw their attention on the other side of the galaxy.

8 hours ago, Bantha said:

For Tactics I recommend this:

It helped me a lot as it gives some input and you can take the stuff and fit it to your playstyle. For the length of a game I just can say, that it goes down really fast as soon as you get familiar with the rules and all the special advantages. After like 60-70 games played we are down to 2-3 hours per game! Shortest game was under 1 hour, cause I managed to find and destroy the rebel base in turn 3... ;-) very satiesfying! That said, I never would play without the actioncards, because of the surprising actions they give! And always remember its an assymetrical game, so as the empire sometimes you just have to ignore what the rebel scum is doing and just concentrate on your quest for the base (always keep in mind that you need powerful groundunits like the AT-AT). On the other hand when you play aginst the empire keep in mind that time plays for you and you just need to keep them away fom your base. So draw their attention on the other side of the galaxy.

With all due respect the statement "This game is won or lost mostly in the first two rounds" is only true for newer players

While it is theoretically possible for the stars to align and all the best things happen to your opponent and the good things happen to you this rarely ever happens and even when it does (in my experience) the side behind can always come back.

Trouble starts when one side has 3-4 bad turns in a row. Which usually just happens cause they're being outplayed.


All that said that thread has a lot of good advice. However remember every strategy has a counter strategy.

6 hours ago, davidumstattd said:

With all due respect the statement "This game is won or lost mostly in the first two rounds" is only true for newer players

While it is theoretically possible for the stars to align and all the best things happen to your opponent and the good things happen to you this rarely ever happens and even when it does (in my experience) the side behind can always come back.

Trouble starts when one side has 3-4 bad turns in a row. Which usually just happens cause they're being outplayed.


All that said that thread has a lot of good advice. However remember every strategy has a counter strategy.

You are a 100% right. You can always come back! In fact I had alot of games in which it looked like one side has a big advantage and an easy win after 5-6 rounds played but suddenly everything tourned upside down to the other side in the next 1-2 rounds! One of the reasons why I love this game so much! Never give up! There is always hope ;-)

I just thought the OP was asking for "newbie-advice" and when I started playing this helped me a lot! When you get experinced you develop these tactics (sorry dont know how to say what I mean in englisch ) And I would like to say tht also watching some videos on YT and reading Davidumstattd's commentary was very instructive!

But be aware, some ofthe videos a good and some not! Because of to many false played rules

On 4/7/2017 at 7:55 PM, Bantha said:

And I would like to say tht also watching some videos on YT and reading Davidumstattd's commentary was very instructive!

Glad somebody appreciates all the work I've done on all the Youtube playthrough videos writing down every rules mistake I can find. It wasn't easy and I'm sure there are tons of videos and mistakes I missed.