I am a new Starcraft player so im sure we are playing some rules awkward. But Is it just me or does it seem like the game always ends to eraly. It feels like once stage III comes then its basically pointless. The Factions special victorys are indeed to easy to accomplish. Do other people feel this way too? Has anybody ever just played without special victory and without victory points, and just played to be the last man standing? It seems more logical that way. Any feedback would be greatly apprreciative.

Yeah, you're pretty much right. However, two things remedy the situation a bit:

• Once the players have more experience, and know to look out for others about to achieve their special victory conditions, victory point victories are a bit more common.
• Get Brood War! The expansion adds leadership cards, one of which is chosen at the start of the game - and only 1 out of 3 options that every faction can choose there has a special victory condition. This means that usually, roughly a third of the players has a special victory condition only, so it's even easier to keep them in check.

Once in one of my first games, a player even won without him realizing it himself - we had to point it out to him, "hey, you won"

Ok, so with this said, would it be better to just not play with the factions special victory conditions? Maybe just win by conquest points or total iniahlation. How long would it take by the way to play with 4 people and only win by iniahlating everyone?

The problem I see, too. I would recommend trying the variant in the BW-rulebook, every player three planets and to 25 VP. Haven't tried it yet, though.

Well, Special Victory or even Normal Vistory are not obligatory. So, if you wish, play as long as you eliminate all other players. It is a matter of players' choice. See also some game modes suggested in BW instruction.

I found Event cards' deck too thin in original SC:BG, but with expansion it is definitely better suited to 4 players or less.

One change I've wanted to try, but have not, is: don't end the game at the end of the round in which the first Stage III event card appears. Play one more round after that first Stage III card shows up.

TK

If you want to play the Core game the way it is intended to be played, just keep in mind that the 15 VP victory is NOT your primary objective. IT takes a whole lot of luck and brillians (depends who you're playing against) to achieve this goal. consider that reachings stage 3 usualy happens by turn 5 - meaning you'd have had to held 3 VPs worth of locations for each turn on average - and that's including turn 1! (not an easy feat).

The Sepcial Victory conditions realy are the means by which players should aim to win, whilst the "primary" victory condition is pretty much there as a side option in case anyone see it as a possibility and focuses all of his units on just holding these key locations instead of fighting enemy bases.