Hi all I'm wholly new to TI. I've thought of getting in to the game for a long time, and just last night I spoke to 2 friends who would be willing to set aside a whole day to try out TI3 if I felt like picking it up after I get back from GenCon.

So with this well-timed announcement, I'm pretty excited. However, can anyone tell me about a) the races in the core TI3 and b) the other races (it looks like there were 17 in the old game after some brief forum searching). I'm debating on if I'll want to jump in on this, or take my LGS's 3rd Ed copy off their hands so they're not stuck with an expensive and outdated game. While I'm sure the streamlining experience would be good, I don't know if I need however many bonus races, and that's the most important part of any expac rules for me anyway.

Thanks!

The expansion races tend to have special abilities that change more of the game rules compared to the core races (like the Embers of Muaat starting with a gimpy War Sun, the Clan of Saar with its mobile space docks and the Borg-like Nekro Virus which has to assimilate new technologies instead of researching them).

18 minutes ago, profparm said:

Hi all I'm wholly new to TI. I've thought of getting in to the game for a long time, and just last night I spoke to 2 friends who would be willing to set aside a whole day to try out TI3 if I felt like picking it up after I get back from GenCon.

So with this well-timed announcement, I'm pretty excited. However, can anyone tell me about a) the races in the core TI3 and b) the other races (it looks like there were 17 in the old game after some brief forum searching). I'm debating on if I'll want to jump in on this, or take my LGS's 3rd Ed copy off their hands so they're not stuck with an expensive and outdated game. While I'm sure the streamlining experience would be good, I don't know if I need however many bonus races, and that's the most important part of any expac rules for me anyway.

Thanks!

Or heck, you could just buy my old stuff and then I can offset the cost of getting the shiny new edition when it comes out

To answer your question though, the bonus races are definitely cool and fun, but they're not strictly needed. The main benefit of the expansions comes from the new tech they added, the racial flagships, the unique racial techs, and then the variant strategy cards. The strategy cards are a core part of the game and the ones in the expansions were far better than the ones in the core game. Most people that loved 3rd edition loved the expansion strategy cards much more.

EDIT: The expansions also offered modified objective sets, which are worth noting since they're how you score points. Those tend to make the game more combat oriented and less turtle-y. The rest of the things they add are nice little additions, but none of them are super important (i.e. space mins, shock troops, artifacts)

You dont get the expansions for the races, you get them for the alternate rule mechanics. Groups tend to have sets of rules, its "Their way of playing the game".

I've played in one group for years that always uses pretty much everything that can be applied, there's token leaders and councilors and wormhole systems flagships and tanks ETC. We even made up a handful of rules ourselves, sometimes to spice up a single game, for example only placing planets next to Mecatol rex to make a heavily populated middle.

I can honestly say I´ve never played and unmodified game of TI3 and I never intend to.

The expansions brought a lot more balance to TI3.

4th Edition seams to contain all the races form 3rd and it's expansions. Her is the rundown of all of them.

The Barony of Letnev: Arrogant militarists. have the best homeworld in the game.

The Clan of Saar: Space-gypsies. Can move there space-docks with there fleets.

The Emirates of Hacan: Space-merchant-cats. Masters of trade.

The Federation of Sol: Humans. Jack of all traits with a military slant.

The Mentak Coalition: Space-Australia. Used to be a prison planet for political decedents from all races. Also pirates.

The Naalu Collective: Telepathic space-sneks. always to fist and have better fighters.

The Nekro Virus: murderess robots. Can assimilate technology from the opponent.

The Sardakk N’orr: insect warrior race. gud at fighting.

The Universities of Jol-Nar: fish-nerds. gud a science, bad a fighting.

The Winnu: Used to be accountants of the old empire. Jack of all traits with a economic slant.

The Xxcha Kingdom: peace-loving space turtles. Masters of politics and diplomacy

The Yssaril Tribes: Gollum looking masters of espionage.

The Brotherhood of Yin: Religions zealot clones. Can convert enemies and blow themselves up

The Embers of Muaat: Race of fire-elements. They have a death-star.

The Ghosts of Creuss: mysteries energy-based race. can travel everywhere though wormholes

The L1z1x Mindnet: Last decedents of the old Lazax empire. They are basically the Borg now

The Arborec: Sentient plants. They can grow entire spaceships from themselves.

I don't know, I don't think the humans are a jack of all trades. They can get ground forces very easy and that is about it. If I were to say Jack of All Trades the L1Z1X is that. Then the Winnu make a better Jack as well.

I was playing at my LGS once and when someone asked how the humans had gotten so many ground troops, someone exclaimed, loud enough to be heard by the entire store "that's what humans do, make babies!"

8 hours ago, Forgottenlore said:

I was playing at my LGS once and when someone asked how the humans had gotten so many ground troops, someone exclaimed, loud enough to be heard by the entire store "that's what humans do, make babies!"

Back in the day, there was a Twilight Imperium wiki site that had a forum that rivaled any community that ever existed for the game here. I distinctly remember one of the threads was "Describe each of the TI3 races in 5 words or less." My favorite one for Sol was: "Are you pregnant again, soldier?"

As much as I love TI3 (it's my favorite game), I would wait for TI4 at this point. It's shinier and it will get support and expansions from FFG, while TI3 is most likely done (as in no more new stuff). If you really want to try it, I would try to find somebody who can invite you for a game, or borrow it to you, so you can try with your friends.

As others have said, I would discourage you from buying TI3 now, if you're new to it. TI3 base game had some pretty significant flaws and imbalances that have been later fixed by expansions, and TI4 seems to be taking the best from the complete TI3, so there's really no point in buying TI3 base now imo. The added races in expansions were great, but it's definitely not the most important thing the expansions brought to TI3.