Hey there

I just got my copy of Brood War today. I'm very happy with it overall (except for the fact I got 4 green lurkers and only 2) and I'm reading through the rules but I have a couple of questions.

1. Can you only get an event card for discarding a special order token now and not a normal one?

2. Sacrifice, the wording says this ability "is triggered whether or not the opponent has sufficient strength to destroy it'. So does this mean even if an opponent can kill a unit that has the sacrifice ability, that the ability is still triggered? This seems unusual because in the original boardgame (and the video game) if you kill a sacrificing unit before it gets to you it doesn't auto kill your unit.

That's all I have so far. I might have a couple more questions later

Thanks in advance.

Sebly said:

Sacrifice has only one effect. The unit with the ability will be dead if it can attack the enemy. Thats it. There is no kill the enemy part in that ability. That is a unit with sacrifice STILL has to kill the enemy normally with its attack value! And yes, it can even do so if killed that turn.

1) Rules for discarding standard orders are exactly the same. You must execute the order somehow or draw one event card instead. Only using special orders is a bit more complicated, but as a result - better than in classic game (you may use now special order in 1st round if you build an appropriate module before revealing it).

2) Yes, it can kill the enemy unit with its combat card values (but still needs the ability to attack that type of unit). Note that sarifice won't trigger always. I haven't seen the altered combat deck, but I suppose that cards for units with "Sacrifice" may offer some text abilities, which require to keep front line unit alive (like Collaterral Damage).

According to the rule book: Sacrifice always trigerred when your unit is able to attack one of the opposing units. But is it also triggered when you use a combat card which doesnt match the unit icon (Scourge or Infested Terran)?

Carnate said:

Yes.

Now, the sacrifice 'ability' is always with those 2 units no matter the cards that they use. In fact there is no text on the BW cards for the Scourge and Infested Terran. They just have major values for those 2 units on those cards, and minor values for any other units.

Here is the Updated sacrifice ability from the latest FAQ (2009-Jan-02):

Sacrifice Ability
In order to clarify, the Sacrifice ability should read as follows:
A front-line unit with this ability (listed on its Faction Sheet)
is automatically destroyed during the Resolve Skirmishes
step of a battle regardless of whether or not the opponent
has sufficient strength to destroy it. This ability is ignored
if the unit with the sacrifice ability is unable to attack both
the opposing front line unit and supporting units (due to its
attack capability). This is also ignored if the opposing unit
has cloaking and a friendly detector is not present.

Ah I see. I didn't even notice that the scourge cards now have attack values. I just assumed they would auto kill the enemy unit if they survived like in the base game.

I wonder how well this will go down with my mates, we're having our first Brood War game tomorrow. We're also introducing a 5th person into the game who's never played so that should be interesting...

The new scourge mechanic is far better. It is much more obvious what is going on and you don't get any strange exploits like scourge being insanely good base defense units.