I just picked this game up and played my own copy for the first time after trying it out at a friends house when he was in town and after our first game a few situations came up that I didn't know how to deal with

first off early on in the game the admiral had to deal with martial law and decided to become the president... the question was if he'd have to give up admiral to do so or if he could be both

not wanting to bog down the game trying to figure it out for any longer we decided that it'd be passed to the next in line, since a decent answer now was better than a perfect answer the next day but for future reference I figured I'd ask

secondly, one of the civilian ships was destroyed and when we flipped it to reveal what was lost there was no resource icon... do some civilian ships just have nothing in them?

the third issue was how long william adama gets to hold on to the cards he gains with his once per game ability if he uses it on a crisis card. If I understand it right the crisis resolution is the final thing done in a turn, and each player has to discard back down to 10 at the end of each players turn. The question is if the discarding of the cards is just before the player turn switches or just after... would he get to use his ability to pick up all the cards then immediately have to discard back down to 10, or would he be able to use them over the next players turn before dropping them out?

thanks all I appreciate any help I can get on all of this

1. I'm pretty sure the presidency goes to the admiral and the player keeps both titles. It doesn't say anywhere in the rules to pass down the admiral title, and it fits with the idea of "martial law".

2. That's correct. There are civilian ships (2 of them IIRC) that have no resource loss.

3. That's a very good question. I believe you only collect cards that were involved in the crisis (and not cards that were played on the skill check like IC, DE, or any cards that render the check reckless). The way my group plays, we have him discard down to 10 immediately since it is at the end of a turn. This can be very troublesome if treachery cards were thrown into the check... especially if any cylons are holding sabotage cards when he tries to get rid of them.

He would discard the cards immediately if he has more than 10 in his hand at the end of the current turn. Since he has to pick them up instead of discarding them from the Crisis it technically is happening during the final part of Crisis resolution. His OPG is usually best used when he has a hand of good cards and there is a must-pass crisis that he can basically dump the entire thing into.

OK - what about such situation:

one player has both admiral and president titles. then because of crissis card ( can't remember the title, and left the game in work ) president have to choose: give up his title to admiral or lose something. He's already an admiral and president so can't really give up title to himself, but then again can't find anything against it in rules or errata.

In my group we usually play that in such situations, when one of the options can't be applied, you simply have to choose the other.

For example: a card instruct to discard 5 cards or lose one resource, but you have none, you can't choose to do it.

Woodclaw said:

The rulebook on page 30 (under Choice Crises, in the Card Clarifications section) states that you can choose an option which requires you to discard more than you've got.

A bizarre place for the rule to be found, but there it is.

Sinis said:

True, but at the same time the FAQ stated that Laura Roslin can't activate a location if she has no cards to discard. The two rules seem to clash a little to me so we decided to revise one of the two.

Woodclaw said:

It's true that the seem to clash in spirit. The rulebook refers only to choices on crises, whereas Roslin's draw back is not a crisis.

I think the logic behind being able to choose for crises is that a crisis just appears and bites you, whereas you chose Roslin at the beginning of the game, knowing that you wouldn't be able to activate locations without a hefty cost. Also, a lot less hinges on Roslin's activating of locations. So, if the players pick up a food or water shortage with not enough cards in hand, not only did they not see it coming, but it's a pretty raw deal, but if Roslin can't use weapons control or or the armory, she'll just have to choose another option (like Executive Order, Consolidate Power, or some presidenty action).

The rules are very clear about discarding (and it has come up on these baord several times): Even if you do not have enough cards in hand to discard due to a crisis card, you can still pick that option. And discard as many as you can, even if that amount is 0. The only time you cannot choose an option you can not meet is if the card itself says so. At present, the only card that makes that claim is Build Cylon Detector if you have 0 nukes, you cannot choose the discard a nuke token option. Roslyn's weakness is a cost that requires her to discard the cards to activate a location, so it is completely different.

If a card says "give the presidency to the admiral" and the admiral already has the presidency, the players got lucky. Nothing prevents a character from having both titles this can happen to Lee often, since he is the first non military/politcal character in the line of both successions. If a card says the current player and the president discards cards, and the current player is the president, that Food Sortage just caused the current player to discard 5 cards (or lose 2 food). If both the president and the admiral have to discard X cards, and one player has both titles, that player has to discard X cards twice (it can be brutal to be the Admiral/President).

JerusalemJones said:

I don't think there is a disagreement about how the rules are. I think there is a disagreement between Woodclaw and the rules about how it should be. I don't agree with Woodclaw, but if his playgroup all agrees, who are we to say 'boo', eh?

Sinis said:

I know that the text is very clear, but using the RAW we met situations where discarding was convenient a little tto often. For example: Food Shortage instruct to reduce Food by 1 or the President and the current player have to discard a total of 5 card (I don't remember which one have to discard 2 or 3). Applying the rules if one of them as zero cards it became extremly convenient for the humans to call a discard and passing the crisis with a discount. Worst yet, if the current player and the President are one and the same (quite possible) and he/she has less than 5 cards.

Woodclaw said:

Well, I think that costs are balanced with that in mind. In particular, if a crisis were to make the players lose one or two food, its difficulty would be such that it would not need 5 cards. So, I think that it's somewhat intended that the players will have to discard fewer than five cards. Additionally, the player drawing the crisis will very typically have the three cards to discard, as they just collected them at the beginning of that turn (the exceptions being in the sick bay).

Also, I think of it as part of the sliding difficulty of the game. If the players are so short on cards, then perhaps they deserve to toss fewer to food/water crises in the same way the sympathizer is intended to work; if the players are having an easy time, there's another cylon player, if not, another human.

I also believe it creates more incentive for using your cards rather than holding on to them... especially if you are the president and/or admiral. If you don't use your cards, you run the risk of having losing them in a crisis... so you might as well use them while you have them.

I'll admit that it is convenient to discard cards that you don't have. And it appears to have been intentional as well. In the base game (without Pegasus) the game is weighted in favor of the cylons; if the players were obligated to have the cards to discard then the water and food sortages would food more quickly. Thematically, think of it as the Preisdent and current player giving up some of their other powers (cards) to ration the food for the survivors.

If you don't like it, you don't have to play that way. But that is how the rule is designed and meant to be played. And it can be one of the few times where the game breaks in favor of the humans who need all the breaks they can get.

I see your point. Currently we aren't playing much, but next time we'll make some "efficiency test".