Oh man was this game great! It took my group so long to get together for a game because we heard the thing would take ~7 hours to play; but we finally got 4 people together and played TWO games over the course of eight hours. I won the first, and was thoroughly humbled in the second. Every hour of this game was worth it, and the guy who bought the game decided that after the two games, TI paid for itself.

Anyways, it's a great game, and I can't wait to play Runewars later this week/next week.

in 2 hours...

you played 2 games...

Pardon my sceptisism, but I think you might have done something wrong. I won't deny, that a 4 player game can be done in 4-5 hours maybe less if you are an experienced group - but 1 hour for one game? How?

Do you play with Age of Empire and Imperial II?

...Idless

Glad you enjoyed it!

However, I must also agree that playing a game in an hour is impossible - can you give us a brief rundown of how the game went, in case we can notice what went wrong rules-wise?

Sorry... I meant eight hours. Hah!

*Breathes sigh of relief*

Glad you enjoyed playing. :-) That said, even that is pretty quick, and you're bound to have made mistakes, so do re-read the rulebook before your next game. It'll make much more sense now.

I too am new to the game. I keeps seeing Imperial II mentioned. Is this an optional rule... from an expansion? Please clarify. Playing with the Imperial strategy that comes with the base game seems to always cause the same thing to happen in the strategy phase. Current speaker picks imperial to get the free victory points and the person to his left always picks initiative so he can ****** up imperial the next time around. The first game my group played (3 player) resulted in the game ending before any real conflict between races had really had a chance to develop due mostly to the points handed out by the imperial strategy. A political card on the very first turn that handed out 2 points to everybody didn't help that much either.

I'm guessing this wouldn't be as much of an issue with more players as the points from imperial would be spread out between more players. For the three of us (all first time players) it really made the game feel like a big letdown.

It is part of the expansion, but was also offered by FFG online as a variant, before SE came out.

You can find the rules for it here: http://new.fantasyflightgames.com/ffg_content/Twilight%20Imperium%203/ti3variant.pdf

Note that this variant requires you to play with the "Age of Empire" option from the rulebook (which makes you draw all the objectives from the objective deck before the start of the game - they are all available to be claimed).

First games don't really count because EVERYONE is learning the game on the fly. The are still fun to participate in though as you learn. Re-reading and re-reading the TI3 rules and going through the FAQ 2.2.1 PDF will reveal a lot of missed meanings about the game play and it is there that you will find more depth in the game, requiring more thinking on one's part on exactly how they'll reach their goal of winning.

Once everyone knows the TI3 rules inside and out and knows all the answers to the ambiguous rules, players have to be on their toes to survive because of the so many ways to interact in the game and with each other.

We played a second game and it was really fun. We had four players this time. At the end of the game, two of us were tied at nine points and the guy that won jumped past us from eight to ten points using the imperial strategy card. After the game, I took the time to re-read the rule book and noticed that had I known a single word in the rulebook I would have won the game in the status phase prior to the end of the game. I saw that I could have completed my secret objective and a public objective in the same status phase (I was the only one who could have been effected by this rule as I was the only one to complete my secret objective). I had mistakenly thought that I was eligible for only one or the other. It just goes to show how the smallest detail in the rules can sway the course of a game (ok that was kind of a big detail). In any case, I really need to encourage the rest of the people in my game group to read the full instructions. Up until this time, I have been the only one to read them fully and explain the game to everybody else. I haven't tried to withhold any information from them, but I'm sure my explanation wasn't nearly as complete as the 43 page rule book.

I made the mistake a couple of turns of accomplishing more than one Objective Card and claiming points for them at one time rather than claiming just one of them each turn. I still lost though, playing the green guy that could have all the Action Cards (that were not shuffled!) so I had lots of the same card.

Hi, guys I am new to the game and did a search and nothing came up. Also I have read the manual and the changes to it that are posted at this site. My question when buying Tec-using the secondary abilitily of the stra card (8 resources)- does buying the tec with the eight resources cause the planet to become Exhaused? If you read page 24 upper right hand corner(second paragraph) it seems to indicate that the planet is Not exhaused(TI3 rule book).

Ive read and read and I am not sure. Thanks in advance.

razorbacjac said:

Yes, you have to exhaust the planets you use to pay the 8 resources for the tech you buy. You ALWAYS have to exhaust the planets you use when spending resources or influence on something (unless you have a racial ability or a special card that says otherwise, although I can't think of any such exception off the top of my head.)

The paragraph you mention at the top of page 24 is specifically in reference to tech specialties. These are the little red, green and blue icons you sometimes see beside certain planets. (There is only one planet with a yellow tech spec and it's from the expansion) What that paragraph is saying is that in order to gain the benefit of that tech spec, the planet must be unexhausted when you pay for the tech. You do not need to exhaust that specific planet as part of the cost to gain the discount from the tech spec (although you can ), but you do need to exhaust at least 8 resources worth of planets (less whatever discounts your tech specs provide, of course). Also, if you have a tech spec on a planet that is already exhausted, you do not gain its discount on this purchase.

Although, do note that voting on a political card is not the same as spending influence - you do not exhaust the planets you have untapped when voting on an agenda.

Steve-O, Thanks for your reply it answered all my questions. When playing the game (new to it) its hard to tell if its played correctly sometimes. Again thank you.