In one of our games we had an early accusation for Boomer being Cylon, so we put her in the Brig. The player didnt complain or anything so we were sure he (she) is a cylon. He was just stuck in the Brig and I think she was more dangerous then when she would revealed. She just lunched a scout every round to see what nice Crises Card she can get, if it was too easy, she buried it and if she rolled poorly we lost a raptor. This didnt seem fair. But more to come. If she burried the Crisis Card, she could use her Scouting ability to look at an other. This was creepy, so basicly if she wanted she could bury 2 Crisis Cards each round. Then she was just waiting when she could strike with her once per game ability on something important and then she revealed herself.

Should not there be a way to force a cylon to reveal himself. It looked even odd when she could lunch scouts from brig. I think she did more damage this way then when she would reveal. Or should not there be a limited option on Actions while in Brig?

If you could force someone to reveal it would break the game, and I mean break it, because what would happen when you forced a human player to reveal? They couldn't do it right? So then you could just 'force' everyone to reveal, and out all the Cylons right from the get go.

While having Boomer in this situation may be annoying, it's generally suboptimal play for various reasons. First, it allows the humans to cooperate (more) safely. Second, she can't use her Cylon reveal ability. Third, she can't surprise everyone when they're counting on her. Fourth, using the Caprica location still seems better. Sure, she can scout easy cards away, but there could be another easy one after. With Caprica she can pick between two cards, and actually play one. When she's in the brig, she doesn't draw Crisis Cards! (I almost forgot that, but it's huge).

An unrevealed but obvious Cylon in the brig can be a pain....but as pointed out it eventually ceases to be a benefit to the Cylons. The skill for the Cylon is to decide when to stop being a pain on Galactica and become a royal pain in Cylon locations. That depends on the cards they have in hand and the situation on Galactica.

If they keep trying to rig the crisis card deck that way, then simply make sure to scout on the turn after theirs. Especially if they left it on top. You can probably executive order someone else to do it if the next player doesn't draw tactic cards.

Of course what the cylon player should do is convince people they aren't the cylon, even if they don't get out, players will probably start to question who is the cylon unless you do something like play bad skill cards into a face up skill check

I agree with most of the above comments. It can be frustrating, but it's also a very specific scenario that won't come up every game. Think of it this way, at least she has to waste tactics cards to launch scout and as someone else said, the next player can either launch scout or executive order someone to launch scout right after her to stop the next crisis card from coming up. Also, if she does put both cards on the bottom, there's no guarantee that the top card will be bad, and even if it is, it still has the potential to have a jump icon on it (as opposed to when she uses the caprica location to waste two crisis cards and the jump token is ignored).

As the cylon in the brig the main thing I would do is try and barter my loyalty offer to help in a way that only I could or that would be most beneficial

sometimes doing so can actually helping in that scenerio can throw suspicion on to a human.

I always try and make it appear that im trying to help the humans win and point suspicion back at those who are making accusations.

Before Sleeper I always try and point out that its entirely possible that there are no cylons. I can often do lots of damage by helping the humans distrust each other.

I wouldn't go with a forced reveal as it makes no logical sense and it's problematic. BUT... I'm not opposed to the idea of rules for throwing a character out of an airlock. That IS thematic and you'd never do it unless you were absolutely sure because if a human got thrown out... that'd be a disaster.

Trump said:

I think that would be a great addition to the game. You would need rules to guarantee it only happens to cylons though. Maybe a Quorum card that gives the President the power to throw an unrevealed cylon whose cylon loyalty card has been seen by the president out the airlock thus forcing them to reveal.

It would be ridiculous if a human got thrown out and I think it would ruin the game to either have the player stop playing, switch sides or draw a new character (Which seem to be the first alternatives to a human getting executed that I can think of)

So this would be my format for doing this:

1) The President MUST confirm beyond any doubt that the player is a cylon (the cylon player confessing doesn't count. The president must KNOW that the loyalty card is that of a cylon). This can be done either through quorum cards or certain crisis cards.

2) The suspected cylon MUST be in the brig.

3) The President must then draw a specific quorum card; title relates to the airlock. This card should include a clause: Maybe there would be a dice roll involved (1-4 -1 morale 5-8 no penalty) and then that player is forced to reveal and follows the steps of a cylon revealing from the brig.

OR

Instead, the 'Airlock' quorum card could have a section that states: If the suspected player is actually a human and not a cylon, move the suspect to sickbay,-2 morale and the president must surrender the title of president to the next highest player in the chain of command. That player may not be given the president's title for the rest of the game.

That might be a neat alternative to my other suggestion. I say move the suspect to sickbay since that seems to be the destination of choice for potentially killed crew (the same thing happens when a location you're in is damaged or your viper is damaged/destroyed).

As much as I dislike the idea of forcing players to reveal, I think that like someone else said, it doesn't make sense for someone like boomer to be able to launch scout from a prison cell. Plus this format would be cool and realistic thematically.

iceberg84 said:

It already still makes sense thematically. It could be that some other random dudes still trust Boomer/are loyal to her, and are willing to carry out her orders, even while she's brigged. Same with if someone plays Executive Order from the brig.

I still don't think this is even a problem at all. As others have already stated, the things she can do from the brig are bad, but not much worse than what a couple of the other characters could do, and the things she could do at the Cylon Locations are much worse.

Mattr0polis said:

I agree that it is better for her to reveal in theory, and it IS a very specific circumstance, but now I really like this idea of throwing someone out the airlock. "Authorization of Brutal Force" could easily be used for this purpose. I think it would be great actually. You could try it on a human and get screwed for the wrongful accusation.

If you go airlocking characters then you have the possibility of removing players from the game, which really ruins some peoples' fun. I feel one of the strengths of BSG is that no players are elminated.

As for the President being able to airlock a Cylon who's card he's seen, it again relies on the verification of what was previously secret information. That's going to have weird repercussion, mostly along the lines of: if you're not doing this action, then you were obviously lying.

timonkey said:

That's why I suggested sending them to sickbay instead of removing them from the game since that seems to be the status quo for characters whose vipers are destroyed or damaged and characters in locatons that get damaged. I agree there should NEVER be a situation where a player gets eliminated. Sidenote: I think that's what makes BSG my new favorite board game since it keeps everyone involved so the game never dies out because people don't want to play anymore.

I think it COULD have weird repercussions, but it's up to the President to lead the charge to throw a cylon out the airlock. If you're a cylon president, you could try throwing a human out the airlock (again, sending them to sickbay ultimately) to try and cause a resource drop. When it turns out you're wrong, you can shrug your shoulders "Gee pa, he shur LOOKED like a toaster ta me!"

I think if the pres is discreet, he can choose whichever option he/she wants based on loyalty without revealing anything to other players.

If the game were to develop a mechanic that would allow for the "airlocking" of an unrevealed cylon, there should stil be a negative to it. The cylon player should either get to automatically use their "when revealed" ability, or else an automatic loss to Morale, perhaps -2 since all the player characters are important figures from the show. ("The Admiral was a cylon? We are truly doomed now!"). Besides, as is often the case, when a player realizes that someone knows beyond any doubt they are a cylon, their best course of action is to reveal themselves.

Also, once the Cylon player has failed enough Launch Scount cards and destroyed all the available Raptors, they lose the option to play LS cards anymore. And for Boomer this is such a stupid idea anyway -- if the LS card shows a particualrily nasty Crisis card, Boomer's Special Ability is then wasted.

JerusalemJones said:

I agree, there should be always be a negative side for every positive in this game to maintain balance. In this case I'd say automatic -1 morale when the airlock is flushed (since even if it's a cylon, it certainly doesn't help morale to show that humanity is offering no quarter to the enemy so what can be expected in return?). The -2 for flushing a cylon out the airlock may be too much I think. I would say -2 only if you try it on a human.

I also believe it is best to reveal yourself as a cylon when you know you can't convince people to let you out of the brig, but sometimes it might be a better strategy to stay in there because it keeps the humans distracted and frustrated waiting for you to reveal. I think it adds an interesting (and BSG-appropriate) element to allow a specific scenario in which the president can order a good ol' fashioned airlockin'.

As for the thoughts about Boomer, it CAN be a waste if the LS shows a bad crisis card, but the chance to discard two jump tokens is pretty enticing. Also, the idea is to guarantee a bad card since there aren't a plethora of bad ones in the deck (it's only a waste in the specific situation where you draw a bad card for the humans, I think more often than not, you'll find a card worth putting at the bottom so you can search the deck again).