Is my gaming group the only ones who are really dissapointed that there are no additional cylon leaders in this expansion. Xena, Dorral the Dummy and the Doctor. They appear as npc's but why not make at least one of them a leader? Hard to imagine FF just got lazy about it, think they are trying to get away from the whole cylon leader aspect introduced in Pegasus?

I imagine they didn't do it so they wouldn't have to include agendas, treachery cards, etc. etc. etc.

It'd be fine if you already owned pegasus, but a lot of people don't, and including something without it being playable out of the box is pretty lame.

We were dissapointed as well. I know the agendas so well that they have become sort of stale.

While, SInis' reasoning is probably correct, I don't think it would hurt to have at the very least just included one leader. If you can't use one character sheet and one piece of cardboard, I don't really see it as a big loss. I would have loved to see more leaders!

Brenzie said:

Well, it's also a bit of a lousy move from a business standpoint. Retreading old material is almost never good for sales unless it's a) a vast improvement over the previous incarnation (and, I do mean vast), b) not really a retread, in that it provides a lot of additional material that has the same format as the previous product, or c) also not really a retread, because it's an add-on onto that previous material, and is simply used with the older material, rather than more of the same.

Things that are like a: Windows 7 replacing Windows Vista. Not because Windows 7 is spectacular, but because Vista is awful.

Things that are not like a: The Star Wars prequels vs. The Original Trilogy. You can copy all sorts of elements from the original trilogy, like hiding in asteroids, planets with inclement weather, bounty hunters with distinctive helmets and reputations, dying mentors and the like, but if it's worse or even on par, it's just going to leave you feeling empty.

Things that are like b: Playing a sequel of a video game like Assassin's Creed. Assassin's Creed 2, and Assassin's Creed Brotherhood are arguably more of the same, but they're only the same mechanically, and they provide a wealth of new material to have fun with (rather than re-hashing any of the history or material from the first game). Note that if you've played Assassin's Creed and it's sequels, you'll see how it applies to 'a' too.

Things that are not like b: Playing through the same computer or console RPG again. It doesn't really matter that your character might differ in terms of their goodness or evilness, that they were different clothes, or even that they made different decisions. The material isn't appreciably different, and it leaves you feeling like things might from the 'things that are not like a' category. This isn't really a lousy business move, because the consumer isn't actually buying anything new, but you can imagine that people would not pay twice to play through the same computer/console RPG.

Things that are like c: Some game expansions. Most relevant, things like the Pegasus or Exodus expansion. The stuff seems like more of the same at first brush (i.e. there are skill cards, crises, and characters) but it's so wildly different that it's hardly treading the same ground. The Pegasus ship changes the way the game goes, and the New Caprica phase is not merely a second set of locations to play with, but a whole new set of goals, with their own quirks and mechanical interactions.

Things that are not like c: Other game expansions. Look to something you might have played in the past, and think about an expansion that was released for it that wasn't good, or bad, but boring. Think specifically of awful Magic: The Gathering expansions, where you just got more of the same. Or goofy downloadable content for some console games which 'expand character options', but don't actually provide more gameplay features, material or anything that you'd want to spend more than a couple of minutes on (prime candidates for this are things you can obtain to change the mere appearance of your character before plowing through the same old content).

...And that's what I think of it. Unless they were going to a) release a ton of cylon leaders (like the remaining 9 who are cylons, even the final five), b) provide new options for Cylon leaders to make their gameplay more interesting (like producing a lot of new objectives), or other special Cylon Leader-specific mechanics, or c) create a different character type, that might resemble a cylon leader at first brush, but is actually something completely different (like, some sort of cylon-leaderish character that represents one of the final five that is on the face of it, a human but has special rules and/or goals), it wouldn't have really been a selling point on the product. It would be like saying "Here's our new awesome expansion with these three major themes that are really cool, innovative and different from existing game mechanics, and a heap of cylon leaders."

Now, this isn't to say that they couldn't have put them in, but when developing the aspects of the expansion, they probably didn't want to do more of the same, or anything even resembling more of the same. It's probably better to strike out on something completely new, and create all sorts of new stuff. If anything, to avoid any confusion that the expansion might contain 'more of the same', and be indistinguishable from something that is less than exciting.

I agree with Sinis that cylon leaders don't really fit with Exodus. Instead of functioning as an expansion of the base game, they would be an expansion of an expansion. But I also agree with Brenzie that if FFG wanted to do such a thing, a cylon leader would be the place to do it, as 3 is a little thin. But my group almost always plays with 5 players and we don't allow cylon leaders in such games (we've found that 1 hostlie leader + 1 cylon is strictly inferior to 2 cylons). So with respect to those groups who've run the 3 cylon leaders into the ground by now, my group rarely gets them out anyway, and we're thrilled to death with Exodus just as is.

From a business standpoint, you are totally correct Sinis! I understand. I just wish more existed.

Our group is usually size seven, which means the leaders get played very often. We know the agendas so well that we can usually tell what the leader is trying to accomplish.

It would be incredible, if FFG released a small set with only cylon leaders and new agendas, that way it would be playable with the base game as well as the other expansions too.

On a slightly off-topic note, Brother Cavil's OPG "Primacy" is HUGE when the fleet board is in play. If he's on the cylons side, the humans really have to keep heavies off of the board at all costs!