Hello, distant friends.

I noticed the announcement for Exodus' imminent release a bit late, but am just as excited as everyone here (it just comes as a huge disappointment not to have Romo Lampkin as a playable character, I confess).
Otherwise, this is really good news, the options added by this expansion seem fantastic.
To celebrate this, I'd like to share with you this little project I've been thinking of for quite a while now.
At some point, we wondered how we could refine the best boardgame ever without taking the risk of unbalancing it. So we started with cosmetic alterations, and after basing & painting the models, I built several colonial ships to make our space battles even more spectacular.

The Mk7 Viper & Blackbird shown here were old projects I recently updated, they were made soon after the release of the Pegasus expansion, but we never dared to use unofficial rules for them.

This little exercise allowed me to identify several ships by name and function, while I previously had no idea what they were. Funny to realize some designs were kept unchanged from the original 78 series (Astral Queen, Colonial Movers, ...)

-the Gemenon Liner :

-the Colonial Mover :

-the Olympic Carrier :

-the Mining Ship :

The biggest challenge would be a scratch-built Pegasus, I guess, but I think I'll just pass on that one.
Also, I met huge problems with the Daru-Mazu (one of the Tylium ships), so don't expect to see one here ... ever !

Right now, we only use them in conjunction with the colonial ships tokens, but I came with an idea to further integrate them in the game.
It would be about creating unique locations aboard colonial ships, which would only be accessible when said ships are on the board. The advantages granted by these short-lived locations would be significant, so the idea of fighting frantic battles to defend (or destroy) these colonial ships brings a smile to my face (especially if there are players onboard).
Does that sound to you as a silly idea ?

I'll soon post new ships as soon as they're done.
Again, a bit late but Merry Xmass everyone

I don't know anything about new locations, but one thing I'm thinking is how much better it would be if, for example, the Tom Zarek ally were to appear on the Astral Queen instead of Colonial One. In fact, one could even turn the ships into allies themselves, with, for example, a benevolent or antagonistic effect of visiting Cloud Nine or the Olympic Carrier.

Don't know how I'm the first to say this, but it needs saying:

That is some highly frakking impressive stuff. Thanks for showing it off!

I could definitely see giving the Astral Queen and Cloud Nine their own board spaces ala Colonial One. I'll work on some ideas, but does anyone else wish to suggest anything? Having a greater roll for the rest of the human fleet could add a sharp new dynamic.

Thanks for your first reactions, friends.

Talking about the Astral Queen, I just completed my model :

I've always wanted to sculpt this prisoner barge, since I love its rich background and odd aspect (like a macaroon-tipped spaceship), but prefered to begin with easier designs before starting this one. Gathering reliable documentation on these usually is a bit hairy, but battlestarwiki had a rather accurate pic of the AQ. Too bad I didn't have a bottom view, I missed some interesting structures there. These invariably dark screen captures sometimes have their use ...

At this point, I'm not too sure about reasonable effects for these ships in the game. Astral Queen could be a starting location for Zarek, but it would imply a specific set up when this character's in play.

Subochre, your idea is very good indeed. A whole ship could be given a Trauma Token, in this case for reflecting the prisoners' mood, resulting in :

-a) the convicts gladly help you. Recruit additional manpower for ice-extraction, thus adding 1 food resource (a bit broken, don't you think ?)

-b) they laugh at you, put you in a cell, you stupidly lose this action and can't contribute more than 1 skill card for the next vote.

(I must admit I'm a bit scared by this new system. Following Tyrol's example, it sounds like lots of oportunities to lose your precious activation, and the Gods know you can't afford that too often). But this brings a lot of technical questions. How do we limit this ? Is this a "once per game" action ? What if the AQ is escorted back to the civilan ships stack, then returns in play later ? Is the option still available if it has already been resolved once ? Can you be taken hostage if you're playing Tom Zarek while taking this action ? Will some well-rewarded actions require several turns of presence aboard a specific ship to be completed (with fierce batlles raging all around in space) ? ...

Zorajit, I'm sure having boards for AQ & C9 would prove great, but in this case, I don't think civilian ships would deserve more than one location. I'm afraid it would give them too much importance, and remember their presence is ephemeral.
Cloud Nine could be an interesting realisation, although I'm not quite sure what it does actually look like. I can see the obvious dome-shaped structure, but can't figure what the parts kept in the dark are. I don't want to repeat the Daru-Mazu tragedy !!

For such a large structure, would it take more than one cylon raider to destroy it completely, or should we keep the 1 raider/1 ship destruction pattern ?

Sorry for extrapolating so much at this point ...

These are very cool. I definitely think, having gone to all that trouble, you should associate specific effects with each ship. Will need some balancing given that some of the uncertainty associated with civilian ships will be eliminated, but worth doing for flavour, I'd have thought.

I finished these two ships recently, in fact just in time to use them for our first game with the Exodus expansion (had some issues getting my copy).

-the Demetrius :

-the Zephyr :

Coincidentally, it somehow answers roger-e's request for civilian ships miniatures (unless you already saw my previous post). Since their role in the game is currently limited and they all have very distinct shapes, I don't think it would be very profitable for FFG to produce them for the game, though. Maybe in a future "BSGTBG monster-game edition", including the content of all the expansions published ... ? : )

Demetrius was pretty straightforward to build, with a correct documentation.
Zephyr was more challenging to conceive, attaching the main body to the ring section proved tricky.
Right now, I don't intend to build more (after all, you don't often need more than 8 civilian ships simultaneously on the board). I'll certainly create rules for them in the future, that is when we will be familiar enough with all the novelties brought by Exodus ...

Wow, Xur! I'm feeling quite disappointed in myself now, after looking at those stupendous models of yours. And they're all like 3/4" long? Have you ever been approached to perform heart surgery?

On the gaming front, yes, absolutely make them locations with ship-specific functions. I would suggest making them each have the following: "Action: risk the resources on 1 random civilian ship in order to xxxxxxxxxxxxx on a roll of # or higher." where the gains would be to add a resource, look at a deck, view a loyalty card, etc., and the # rolled would depend on the action attempted.

Thank you, Keithustus.

>And they're all like 3/4" long?

Varies a lot, depending on the ship's class. From 1,5" for the Gemenon Liner to nearly 4" for the Colonial Mover (mainly built using plastic chopsticks).

>Have you ever been approached to perform heart surgery?

Unfortunately, other skills were required for the job : ) ... Nope, former sculptor for french company Rackham Miniatures.

>I would suggest making them each have the following: "Action: risk the resources on 1 random civilian ship in order to xxxxxxxxxxxxx on a roll of # or higher."

Mmhhh ... never thought of risking the resources of the ship involved. Certainly interesting, but on the other hand I would hate to see a Cylon player winning the game so easily on resources, just by activating a location and botching a dice roll.

Brigged!

/10char

Also that's why it would be important for any resources lost to be drawn from a random ship, so that a Cylon couldn't "resource shop" for the civilian ship with the resources (s)he wanted to drop. Also, add the following as part of the action text:

"Once the roll is resolved, return this civilian ship back to supply." so that it couldn't be used multiple times, whether for good or evil.

Wow, those are **** impressive!

Good stuff. Keep them coming!

Hi!,

These models are amazing!, where did you bought them?.

Thanks

Read the first post, he built them himself.

For such a large structure, would it take more than one cylon raider to destroy it completely, or should we keep the 1 raider/1 ship destruction pattern ?

Do you remember how the Olympic Carrier blew up from just a few viper salvoes in 33? Civilian Colonial ships are made of cardboard and wet tissue paper (or perhaps ship weaponry is pretty good at its job in the setting, but I like my explanation better).

XUR said:

Let's face it: a civilian ship doesn't need to be destroyed completely to let it fall behind. If the dome were punctured on the Cloud Nine, that would probably create somewhat hazardous living conditions to any humans without appropriate gear, i.e. a space suit. And if a viper can blow up the Olympic Carrier, why shouldn't a raider be able to puncture the dome of the Cloud Nine?

> Cifer, it is true that the Olympic Carrier was blown to smithereens very easily (how could we forget "33" , one of the most memorable episodes of the whole show ?) , but there is a big size difference between this ship and Cloud 9, which is litteraly a space-city in itself.

>ronsen, you have a point with your puncturing theory (which would make hands down C9 the most vulnerable ship of the entire fleet), but BattlestarWiki tells us "the ship was extensively damaged during the (original) Cylon attack" ... Maybe we're missing something. Why indeed bother building such a hulking thing, if a meteoric impact would be enough to obliterate it ?

We ran many games since my last posts, and I must say this is getting better and better !! The thing is, Exodus brought its share of neat stuff, but BSGTBG has become complex enough for new players, and I didn't dare to further confuse them by adding home-made rules. So far, we only used these colonial ships for aesthetic concerns. Works a treat

My own Battlestar galactica civilian ships!, but XUR are better!

Take care!

Hey Atlantis !

It's been a long time since I last came here.

Congrats for your ships, they look quite cool.

You even managed to build that damned Daru-Mozu !! -XD-

Of course, people will ask you " why spending so much time on these, while this has no concrete impact on the game ? "

(but we, of all people, know the answer )

I too bought the Revell plastic kit of the BSG.

Now there's one thing I really crave for : having Moebius/revell doing modern basestars, so I can have a couple of them at the correct scale.

Can you imagine how thrilling that would be ?

^^

Hey Atlantis !

It's been a long time since I last came here.

Congrats for your ships, they look quite cool.

You even managed to build that damned Daru-Mozu !! -XD-

Of course, people will ask you " why spending so much time on these, while this has no concrete impact on the game ? "

(but we, of all people, know the answer )

I too bought the Revell plastic kit of the BSG.

Now there's one thing I really crave for : having Moebius/revell doing modern basestars, so I can have a couple of them at the correct scale.

Can you imagine how thrilling that would be ?

^^

Great!, you paint the model so good!, I know some people that sells the new basestars, I think that the biggest one is one of 24cm