The title pretty much says it. I remember getting the base game and playing it with a few friends. We enjoyed the quests, the combat, the exploration mechanics, the character abilities, the items, the map, the artwork, player health trackers, etc. the list goes on and on as far as things we liked goes... I mean really, this game is a lot of fun to play and it’s still fun to play the 25th go round.

But like everyone else who I saw on these and other forums; the whole experience fell short when the game came to its abrupt and seemingly unnatural conclusion which managed to discount the entire experience for us. The more we played the game the more we felt the exact same way. And I honestly can’t remember reading a single review of the game that failed to mention exactly what I’m talking about, so I don’t feel I need to beat that dead horse to a community that knows exactly what I’m getting at.

So I guess I’m just trying to voice my aggravation to find that the one problem that seemingly every person had with this game hasn’t been addressed. Sure they added the co-op rules for the new scenario but that’s not really fixing the issue at hand for me.

The other reason I wanted to voice my aggravation... which is really the main reason. Is that FFG usually addresses the concerns of their player base and fixes them(albeit at their own leisure at times). But fantasy flight games continually makes quality games. I don’t have enough fingers on two hands to count how many of their card/tabletop/board games I own and enjoy. And I have found that for the most part, any issues with their games are usually addressed and fixed when the community overwhelmingly supports them and voices their concerns... so why haven’t they shot the elephant in the room on this one and fixed what everyone has an issue with? Am I alone in my frustrations?

I feel the same way. I would not say I am upset, but the game ending condition seems really weird. I just played a 2 player game with someone who had never played it before. Towards the end, I had three cards that gave me points for the shields being ahead. I knew my opponent had a least one. My opponent was happily enjoying the narrative for the shields and put in all the work to advance the shields. I just ran around the board trying to achieve the bonus of my 4th Card. He did so much more than I did as far as the narrative of the scenario goes, but I won by not really doing anything... It seems really weird. When he achieved a reward for doing something crazy and advanced the shields two spaces, and I won. It was kind of awkward when I declared victory as a result of his good game play.

I think next time we play, we will forget the agenda points and just keep playing until we get through all the cards. In other words play for the sake of the story.

On 12/20/2018 at 2:02 AM, Nanich said:

I think next time we play, we will forget the agenda points and just keep playing until we get through all the cards. In other words play for the sake of the story.

As far as I'm concerned this is how it should be played.

The Fallout games have always been about the story and exploring the wasteland.

The victory system feels like it's tacked on just for those who need an ending trigger. I know people that aren't happy unless there's a defined "End of Game" trigger.

I keep thinking about how to do it, change the way the game ends, and I've got one idea: as soon as one faction hits the bottom, using excess moves to push back the other faction, the game can keep going; running out the agenda deck won't move the factions and no story card can move them. Once the faction struggle ends, anyone can declare victory when they've got the points for it.

Alternatively, for extending the game: whenever a staged card that progresses the faction markers would be trashed, it's set next to the agenda deck; when that deck runs out, if there are any cards next to it, then those cards are removed but the faction markers are not moved.

Since I haven't heard anything for some kind of organized play for the game, I think every player group will make some kind of solution that fits their interest with it and that'll be fine.

Having owned the game myself pretty much since release, I've yet to actually lose a game. Tied wins, yes, but it's almost impossible to lose in a 4-player game by the simple virtue of having 4 agenda cards.

I've found that 2-3 player games are a lot closer, and solo play has pretty much always gone to the second-to-last card in the scenario at the least. The increase in agenda points required really makes a difference. Still, just bumping the point total up (say, to 13 in a 4-player game) doesn't solve the overall huge variance of one player getting 3-4 of a faction card and wining by default. I think the easiest solution is to play the game to the conclusion of the scenario (or make one up where thee is no definitive conclusion*), backtracking a faction when the other would win, and then everyone reveals their agendas once the campaign ends.

It'd be a much tighter race, since players can properly get a sense of what their opponent's objectives are.

I found a different end-game condition online and the last few times I have played, I used that format. Since this isn't a game where I am playing in tournaments with multiple other people, I can pretty much play with whatever rule changes I feel improve the game.

I remember making a comment pre release of the expansion saying they’d have to be pretty ignorant if they didn’t make changes, at that stage thinking it’d be a given that they’d at least offer a mod of the win conditions at the least. I am honestly surprised they didn’t.

I still like the idea of the game but because I enjoy playing it, not winning it, which is definitely a shame.