So my group playtested this game before it came out. We were intrigued, generally liked some things about the game (the co-op nature .. the secret cylons, the crisis check mechanics, etc., but disliked some things about the game. After the last playtest we weren't 100% sure it was a game for us .. we felt it has some balance issues.

After it was released and hearing generally good reviews about it .. it felt like some of the balance issues were tweaked, so we thought we'd pick it up and give it a try.

So I wanted to give our second impressions of the game and get feedback on if others encounter the same issues we had with the game or if we are just tainted from playtesting the game before it was in its final form. It also could be our group dynamic and how we play the game as well.

To start it WAS a close game much closer than some we had in playtests. The humans were at 1 moral, 1 fuel and 1 pop at th end of the game after they made that final jump.

The secrecy was awesome .. I was Helo and became a cylon after sleeper agent phase .. it's always more fun to play the unrevealed cylon.

The President (a pretty apparent human) had suspicion of Adama as a cylon and threw him in the brig, Boomer was in the brig via her negative ability after Sleeper agent phase. I revealed myself and with my card able to throw the President in the Brig. I was pretty sure Starbuck was a fellow cylon.

So we had all three humans in the brig .. with Starbuck (now the Admiral) an unrevealed cylon ..

And the problem we had .... is we COULD NOT take advantage of that situation really. On my next turn I revealed the Super Crisis that added two cylons on board the ship (and damaged the ship) With one revealed cylon and three people in the brig only one crisis card was coming up .. so even though they weren't moving up the jump track .. neither were heavy raider activations or cylon attack cards. Eventually they got out of the brig .. and with one out . .they were quickly able to get the others out. Starbuck easily got thrown in the brig and she revealed herself. They simply got enough jump crisis cards to move up the track .. FTL'ed when as soon as they could and got to 8 distance. So it was at a point where they just needed a few jumps to get to the -3 spot and FTL out .. so it came down to luck of the crisis card draw .. if they got jump symbols there was nothing we could do before it was even our turn again. We couldn't really fail most of the crisises because they all had mitt full of cards from being in the brig and we can only draw two and contribute one .. so there was always a crisis or two per turn we couldn't even ATTEMPT to make fail. We watched them draw jump card after jump card and despite them being so close to death we felt there was nothing we could actively do to stop them or slow them down.

So some of the issues we had which I wonder if anyone else encounters:

1 - Boomer and Roslin's abilities to manipulate the crisis deck are good .. too good (no matter if you are cylon or human). If people KNOW this game and want to win .. those two characters should be picked every game .. hands down. They were human and their ability to find the cylon attack cards and ditch them to the bottom of the deck wrecked the Cylon chances. We had TWO cylon attack card come up all game .. (and it came up round 1) .. so after their first jump the board was empty until the last round .. where it was too late to make a difference. After the game the players playing those characters said they took at least three (combined) attack cards and ditched them under (that is signifcant considering there are only 10 in the deck).

2 - The game just gets boring after the cylon's are known. The Cylons have very little to do to effect the game. They can draw crisis cards or activate ships (if there are any) or attempt to damage galactica .. the problem is they really aren't a factor in crisis checks due to their draw limit and only contributing one card. The game got boring for the humans as well as they spent a few rounds in the brig! They had nothing to do but try and break themselves out. During this time no crisis cards were being drawn .. so no action on the board either.

3 - Not enough action on the board ... we still feel (as we did in playtest) that cylon attack cards don't come up enough. 3 or 4 of the actions on Galactica are meant strictly to deal with Cylon ships in space .. if there are no ships ... really not much to do on the board except draw cards or throw someone in brig or play quorum cards. It takes several turns usually for cylon ships to start to threaten the civilian ships ... in those turns .. crisis jump cards are drawn .. then the humans just jump to clear the board . .never really having to "deal" with the cylon ship threats. This game (and most of the playtest games) we didn't really have pilots getting into vipers (unless they were just bored and had nothing else to do), the pilot cards are never.

4 - Helo's negative ability to not start the game until the 2nd turn is just dumb. Who would WANT to sit out the first turn? I only took him because I couldn't join the game right away. I suspect he would never be taken more often than not.

We generally like the game .. especially the initial phases where the cylons are unrevealed .. it just sometimes has periods that we call "crusin' through space" .. where there are no ships on the board .. the cylons are suspected, but maybe not known, and no one wants to take any real big moves that determines their status one way or another. So people are just drawing cards .. voting on crisises ..

But eventually the humans were frustrated for being in the brig and not really doing anything .. the cylons were frustrated because there was nothing we could do to stop them really once they got to 8 distance .. if they drew three jump cards .. they win .. or only hope was to rely on the luck of the crisis deck draw (or the luck of a 50/50 damage chance on Galactica Then a 1-of-8 shot that MAY take out the FTL spot or do a fuel damage) ...

Some possible "fixes" to the problems we encountered:

1 - Just randomize characters. A game without Boomer and Roslin could be more exciting without that control of the crisis deck.

2 - Not sure what to do here .. obviously the point is to stay unrevealed as long as possible .. I just wish there were at least some way for a revealed cylon to have more effect on the game. Maybe give the cylons the ability to manipulate the crisis deck as an option rather than just drawing two and resolving one? Resolving a crisis as a cylon isn't really that great unless you get an attack card since ships don't activate. Maybe it would be better if cylons could draw 3 crisis cards .. resolve none of them, but put one on top, one on bottom and discard the third? That way they could control what crisis comes up next for the humans (depending on sitting order) .. they could make sure they don't get a jump card .. they could make sure they get a fail option that would effect a resource they are already low in.

3 - We feel that if a lone basestar and a few civilian ships showed up every time the jump track hit the third spot (the one before the -3) if one already wasn't on the board .. that would make the game much more exciting. You'd actually have raider activations happen, the humans would have to decide whether to take that early jump or not with the threat of a basestar on them.

4 - I know it's thematically correct, but does helo need to sit out the first turn? His abilities aren't that great to warrant him sitting out for a turn.

Definitely agame we aren't giving up on ... . we may just try and randomize characters (still maintaining a balance of character types) to eliminate the Boomer/Roslin issue and see if people getting a cylon card BEFORE the sleeper phase spices things up too.

Why would anyone want to play as Helo? Because he's AWESOME! Both in the game and his character on the show! Yeah he sits out 1 turn, but after that he basically has no negative, and aside from that his re-roll abiliy and Moral Compass abilities are game saving! This dude is a good guy for FTL jumping before auto because he has two chances at making a good roll, same with if Centurions board the ship, just send Helo to the Armory. Or just have him Launch the Scouts most of the time so as many Raptors don't blow up. Team any of that up with the one skill card that adds 2 to the roll (which is clarified to still add 2 after Helo re-rolls it) and you stand a great chance to pass any die roll check.

Also, he's high up on the Admiral Title succession, he's a pilot if you need him to be, has a good mix of skill cards, etc.

Yeah, Helo is amazing and he is one of the first characters chosen a lot.

Helo's abillities *are* that good. It just takes a while to realize it. Whether its a free evasive maneuvers, another shot at a centurion, or especially FTL control, he really tilts luck in his favor.

Roslin and Boomer may be good, but they have significant drawbacks. Roslin starts off as the president, and makes the quorum card engine much harder to pull off due to the discard. I much prefer Baltar to Roslin.

Boomer doesn't have leadership OR politics. EO's are how to win the game IMO, and starbuck can do just as well as boomer if she uses her extra actions to scout. Lee is also excellent with his amazing skill draw (you can take leadership and tactics for a millitary leader type role, or politics for a politician).

I think that mainly you have to play more. The strategy *seems* clear at first, but its more complicated than that. Try playing the 1-player variant, I think it shows how the game is still involved when there are no unrevealed cylons

Around my table we have a tradition of randomly dealing such things out and it works out pretty well. We did it here and made for a better game.

Mattr0polis said:

I see your points .. I just never needed to use the reroll ability (when I was human) and I never found a good crisis card to use the Moral Compass on .. even though I see it's potential.

I just think that sitting out a turn is a harsh penalty compared to the relative strength of his abilities. I think other characters have equally strong abilities (Boomer's to automatically pass a crisis is just as strong as helo's) without having to sit out a turn.

F50 said:

Also good points. We definitely saw Boomer struggling at certain crisises because of her skill set.

As for Launch the Scouts .. we didn't really use that the first game yet .. we were used to the way it was playtest so didn't really read it's new version close enough until mid game! (in parts of the playtest Launch The Scouts card let you risk a raptor to look through the top few cards of the DESTINATION deck and put a card on top of your choice.). It is MUCH better now and we'll probably use it more. I can see now how that gives the crisis deck manipulation ability to other characters if they so choose.

Roslin's negative IS much more balancing than it was during playtest (Hand size limit of 6) for sure, but our player still used her doing quorum cards. The free crisis deck manipulation is still worth it no matter what her penalty is. At least in our group . .if we picked characters she WOULD be picked every time.

We definitely need to play more (and WANT to .. don't get me wrong) .. the replayability is there for sure (though having more characters would be a great expansion!). We definitely feel the balance is there and random character picks will shake things up a bit .. still not sure on the lack of cylon ships though (if deck manipulation throws them to the bottom or just luck of the draw and not many come up at all). The cylon ship threat is what made the game really exciting for us when we initially played and trying to balance taking actions with fending them off with actions to play Quorum cards, repairing the ship, trhowing people in the brig, and trying to figure out who the cylons are, etc.)

Game got boring once all the cylons are revealed? That's when our games get the most intense! On Sunday we played a six player game and for the last half hour the human players had literally given up, they figured they had no chance to win, yet suddenlt the Crisis Cards kept going in their favor. They had three resources (fuel, morale and food) at 1, were surrounded by the cylons, and just had two centurions board Galactica, but managed to draw 3 jump icons in a row, and set up their vipers so that the cylons couldn't destory civilian ships if the two of us cylons (who went back to back) activated the raiders, not could we auto-win by moving the Centurions/heavy radiers twice. So we were forced to use the Caprica location, and out of four cards to choose from none provided us with the win we needed, and the humans jumped. Nick asked me why we didn't use the Human Fleet location, and I said the odds were not good enough to damage FTL, and Chief was a human -- repair and jump.

Helo is perhaps my favorite character. He doesn't miss his first turn, he just can't move or act, so he gets skill cards and a Crisis card. If the fleet is being hosed by cylons, he is no help at all. His moral compass can change the game -- once when I was a cylon I used it to drop Morale to 0 to win the game.

Roslyn and Boomer are just as good for cylon players. Boomer can always ditch jump icons (though she does have to ditch cylon attack cards if she doens't want to reveal herself). Roslyn is the same; as long as it is not an obvious cylon crisis she can play the card that hoses the fleet, but not too much. Both of their weaknesses are some of the worst in the game, so they balance out.

Sure, there are games where the cylons rarely attack. And times where they attack so much before the first jump that the civilian ships are down to 3 and population is at 1. Are you a revealed cylon but no one else is? Ditch your Super Crisis (and hope to draw the fleet attack card) and pass your unrevealed loyalty card to another player (preferably the player who acts before you). Starbuck was the other cylon? Why didn't she reveal herself before she got sent to the Brig and use her ability? I always think it is stupid for a player not to reveal themselves when everyone knows they are a cylon and they will get sent to the Brig. Once your secret is out, why try and pretend otherwise?

In the 5-1/2 years I have owned a game store I have NEVER seen a new game played as often and consistenly as this one. One night we had 16 people playing 3 different games. This last weekend we had a Gaming Weekend and played 8 games of BSG -- the only other games played were one game of Dominion and one of Game of Thrones LCG (outside of normal OP events). I'm worried we might not play the new Arkham League scenarios because of the popularity of BSG.

There is nothing wrong if your group doesn't enjoy the game, but I just don't see your complaints.

It is a different game .. which does make it refreshing. I have another game group I want to show it to that I know will like it for sure.

I wouldn't call my points "complaints" as more of frustrations which more plays with the new balanced cards/rules may flush them out. I admit we may have been a bit biased from the way we "knew" the game from playtest.

Could just be our play style (every group dynamic is different) ... we like co-op games like Descent and Arkham Horror and Runebound and was expecting an epic "fight the board" game like Arkhum horror where your backs are always against the wall knowing there are a now few players out there looking to screw you over! Without a consistent cylon fleet threat the game just dragged a bit .. draw cards ... do something ... draw a crisis card .. vote .. rinse-lather-repeat. We'd just get frustrated when it was our action phase with really nothing to do that seemed to matter in the grand scheme of things. The drawing and resolving of crisis cards are all that matter when there is no cylon ships on the board and the lack of them takes out a huge section of the game (for us). Imagine a game of Arkhum horror with no monsters on the board? But even there you can still go to a shop buy items, hope to draw better items, etc. A bit more interactive during "down" time.

And why didn't Starbuck reveal herself when everyone knew she was a cylon? She wanted to stay unrevealed as long as possible to have a better negative impact on the crisis cards. She was also the Admiral .. so she wanted to retain it to influence the next jump.

That was a very exciting point in the game when the only person not in the brig was a cylon who also was Admiral.

This game is definitely NOT a shelver like Tanhauser was for us after just a few plays.

Last_Crusader said:

Yes, having the Presidency or Admiralcy will affect when you reveal, but knowing that you will lose when the Admiral title when (not if) the humans throw you in the Brig isn't always the best reason to stay unrevealed.

As the thread evolved, I saw more of where you are coming from (there were a few more posts betwen when I started my initial post and it actually got posted lol). And I'm sure your play-test experience has semi-tainted you...so far. And the fact that you want to play more, and introduce the game to others shows that you aren't just writing off the game.

Every game of BSG is different, and when the fleet has down time the human players tend to be more confident, and make minor mistakes ("we have plenty of food, so we can afford to lose it instead of skill card."). When my wife has to make a choice, she always picks the one that affects resources the least, especially at the start of the game. We've had too many games end where the humans lost because of poor resource management.

Enjoy!

Last_Crusader said:

But Boomer's negative of getting sent to the Brig automatically is arguably worse, as you might not get out in one turn.

Last_Crusader said:

A few people I've played with would agrea with you on this. It all depends on your personal preferenses. But then again it is what you make of it. How is the options in Arkham horror you mentioned significantly different from what's avalible in BSG when no cylons are on the board? Buy items, hope to draw better items... Sounds to me like draw skill cards (reseach lab and the pressroom or what it is called on colonial one) and hope to get better ones. One could allso launch and position Vipers as a preacoution for comeing cylon attacks. And ofcours if you have the cards, launch scout as has been mentioned earlyer... (and come to think of it, any one regardles of skill set can get that card. Politics cards are avalibe to draw from colonial one, and consolidate power lets you draw from outside your skill set.)

Admitedly I've never played Arkham so I could be way of on that.

<cracks knuckles> Let's begin...

Last_Crusader said:

How many times did you playtest the game? I daresay there was a LOT of balance issue whining when the game came out... all by people who had only played once or twice. It takes time for the humans to learn how to win.

Last_Crusader said:

One crisis card from the unrevealed Cylon? So... every Crisis had three humans who could only play a single card against a Cylon who could user her entire hand plus another Cylon who chips in a card and you couldn't take advantage of that? Starbuck must have drawn some amazingly tranquil Crisis cards since every one of them should be failing.

Last_Crusader said:

So you could play a game with mostly political leaders? That doesn't sound good. Those characters aren't as game-breaking as you think. And if one of them becomes a Cylon...

Last_Crusader said:

Boring? The Cylons shouldn't be revealed until they're going for the killing blow, so that's pretty exciting. And playing a crisis card IS good for the Cylons, despite not using the bottom symbols. Do the math. The humans draw a hand of cards per Crisis card. Every time a Cylon throws another Crisis in there, they're depleting the human hands. And the Cylons are drawing two and picking one... something you claim is game-breaking with Roslin or Boomer.

I wouldn't want to see anything changed to make revealed Cylons more interesting. Compared to Shadows Over Camelot, the traitor here has a lot to do. Still... the game should encourage staying hidden, not offer great options which make everyone want to reveal as soon as possible.

And the brig is boring. No surprise there. The obvious answer is to get out. Your situation in this game doesn't happen all that often. It's usually paranoid humans tossing everyone in the brig.

Last_Crusader said:

No, you don't have constant fighting... and thank the gods for that! I think you're only expressing your group's bias here in that the game is all about fighting Cylons. That's not true of the TV show or the game. You don't want or need that constant pressure. This game isn't about trying to get to the end without a Cylon fleet showing up and destroying you. It's a game of attrition.

Last_Crusader said:

What??? I remember reading his ability, shrugging, and thinking "So what?" Who the heck cares if you miss out on an action? That's a lot better than being saddled with some weakness you have to drag with you throughout the game.

In summary, you appear to be trying to beef up the Cylons which is pretty funny when you look at all of the other impressions here and on BGG since most people would claim that the Cylons already have the advantage (as they should). I really think that most of what you're saying is simply a result of your group's playstyle and not indicative of gameplay in general. If your group wants to do all sorts of things to alter gameplay and increase your enjoyment, then go ahead. I don't think you're going to find a lot of sympathy from the gaming world at large though. This is a tightly balanced game and few experienced players would be willing to accomodate any house rules here.

Trump said:

We playtested the game over a month .. the game was a lot different during its test ... (which I admit may bias us a bit as we remember how it was better or worse in some cases).

For us the game at first was hard for the humans to win (which we preferred I guess as it presented a big challenge on replays) .. then it was too easy for the humans to win (to the point the cylons were never winning). Things like the resource starting points started much higher then they are now, there were less cylon attack cards in the deck, etc.

So I am not really complaining about balance issues. I think the game is quite balanced now (on which side can win) .. I was just wondering if anyone else ran into the same frustrations we did ... the boring spots .. the lack of a feeling of control over the game by a revealed cylon, etc. The impression I am getting (and the conclusion we came at the end of our session) ...

We need to definitely give the game a few more tries with the final rules. I think the game is there (it's nice to see playtest suggestions make it into the final product .. the game definitely needed balancing to give cylons more of a chance to win and they have that now!)

We were happy with the closeness of the game .. with the exciting moments (getting all the humans in the brig ... the humans breaking someone out so they can throw Starbuck in the brig ...)

If you are short on Cylon ships the easy choice is to pick two crisis cards and resolve one, the icons at the bottom don't matter but you can help target the weakest resource (and a skill check is going to fail with all of them in the brig). If the other "unrevealed" cylon has nothing better to do, they can reveal or perhaps play a scout card to try to get rid of "useful" crisis cards. The faster you get through the deck the more likely you are to come across Cylon attack cards aswell.

Also remember Roslins power does not work in the brig as she does not draw a crisis card. Boomers does but you can always "scout" away the card she puts on top.