Hello friends

From what I can read on the forums, the option of playing with the "New Caprica" destination didn't garner much love.

Now, I can't say this was very different here : we did a couple of unsatisfactory tests, and simply reverted to Kobol objective.

Come to think of it, one of the reasons why I'm not too fond of NC add-on it is that it simply happens too late in the game : it sort of breaks the rythm and slows down the events, while most players at this point (after several hours sitting around the table) are eager for a quick conclusion.

I was rewatching this awesome show, start of the New Caprica arc-story (beginning of S3), and thus was willing to have a new try at it … when an odd idea occured to me.

Do you think the interest for NC would shift if, instead of making it the ending of the session, we made this board the beginning situation ?

Now, it certainly creates some problems (Cylons can't act too overtly, as they would reveal themselves far too early in the game), but has anyone already considered this possibility ?

Thanks for your feedback about this idea

Hi there,

well honestly I thought about the exact same thing. But I don't see how this could work out. This variant demands that there are revealed cylons around. Otherwise much of it is useless. And even more critical: If the admiral is a hidden cylon or a hidden cylon makes himself the admiral the chance for human victory is minimal to nonexistent since he then is able to order the jump while most players are still on New Caprica and the entire civilian fleet still on the ground.

So you'd have to do a lot of house ruling to get it to work…

Hello Kaermo

You're right, this idea would require lots of adjustments …

Indeed, active Cylons are needed in this setup to hinder the human actions, send them to detention, etc …

Two possible answers to this problem :

#1 : we could make use of the NPC characters of the exodus expansion. Each location receives one of them with a trauma token, and some of them (depending on the number of players : one for 3/4 players, two for 5/6 pl) are revealed in sequence. If they turn to be in good mood, nothing happens. If this is a red Token, the Cylon effect is triggered. The NPC is replaced by another character, and receives a new token for future activations.

#2 : or we could have centurions (represented by the boarding party track tokens) lurking on the board, randomly moving to locations with a D4 roll and activating the Cylon effects.

An optional rule could be to pass skill checks adding 3 destiny cards instead of 2 while on New Caprica, to make hidden Cylons' actions less blatant.

As for the Admiral problem, it sure can't work as it is, as players wouldn't appreciate the cruel joke of a sudden death at the beginning of the game.

No, I'd prefer the game to revert itself spontaneously to the BSG board when a certain number of turns has passed.

I guess, the game would then go on starting with a travelling distance of 2, but it would be neat if the human players received some reward if they performed especially well on New Caprica (1 or 2 ressource points). Or, if we remain in the game logic of making life harsh to humans, they simply avoid substantial population loss (remember the defense lawyer during Baltar's trial, and her speech about " How do we measure loss ? ")

What do you think, friends ?

What if:

1. Shorten the time NC comes into play by dropping the Distance needed. Have the board come into play in the Sleeper Phase, or drop the Sleeper Phase entirely and have come in after 5 or 6 units of distance. Reasoning : NC is the endgame, so why should it be a pit stop? This might also help the Cylons prepare better, rather than trying to prevent the humans from getting to NC, then trying to stop them from leaving NC. Also, if you drop the Sleeper Phase, this makes the sleeper agent part of the base game's "story arc", which I think mirror's the show.
2. Make a larger game of it by playing to Kobol first, getting a small boost to Resources, and then trying for New Caprica. Reasoning : I'm just brainstorming, so I haven't thought of anything past this, but the idea sounded cool.

We only played with NC once. It was hard as hell, but it was a three-player game and I don't know if that was a factor. I ended up the Cylon, but I really didn't have to do anything; the boards did my work for me.

So bouncing ideas off your idea to play NC first… none of these are thought out, or taking other ideas into consideration by the way, just brainstorming.

1) What if Cylons were only Cylon Leaders? I'm not too familiar with all the Agendas, but this would remove the constricting feeling of being an unrevealed Cyon. Maybe only use Sympathetic Agendas, since they're supposed to be "living with" humans?

2) What if the Admiral either plays without the option to Jump? Or what if s/he's dealing with the threat in space while everyone else is working down on NC? Or what if the Admiral has no power until they're in space?

3) Suppose the unprepared civilian ships impose some detriment other than the usual resource loss? Something like once you're in space, you can play with prepared civilian ships face up?

Hello Brandon

Thanks for your feedback & thoughts about this idea.

We came to the same conclusions about Civilian Ships loss value, and role for the Admiral in ending the NC sequence.

I don't know if having only Cylon leaders in the game would work, though …

About making a larger game … the people I usually play with complain about BSGTBG already being overlong, so I prefer not to augment its duration.

I liked the idea of the Resistance being chased by Centurions on the board, while trying to free Civilian Ships, so here is my first draft of the NC beginning sequence so far :

SETUP :
-Install the New Caprica Board, with the 12 civilian ships tokens on the Locked Civilian Ships location
-Players characters start on Resistance HQ. Each except first player receive 3 Skill cards.
[ Keep in mind this major distinction between the two different types of Centurions tokens we will use : Occupation Force Tokens (referred from now on as OFT) and Boarding Party Track Tokens (BPTT) ]
-Depending on the number of players, place a number of BPTT on the Occupation Authority location :
3 to 4 players = 2 Centurions / 5 to 6 = 3 Centurions.

RULES :
-No player can move to any location other than the New Caprica Location before the end of turn 3 .
-These BPTT activate between players turns, starting right after the first player. When all have played, they must wait for the next turn to activate. When they do, they move to a random location (D4) then activate its Cylon Action. If a player is on said location, the BPTT always attack him instead. BPTT don't have a crisis card step. They can be executed as if they were characters. When a BPTT is executed, he will skip its next activation ( otherwise, destruction of a BPTT is really pointless ). If a player reveals himself a Cylon at this point, one BPTT is removed.
-For each skill check done on New Caprica, add 3 destiny cards instead of 2 to the Skill cards ( this is done to give hidden Cylon players some latitude during the skill checks )
-When drawing New Caprica Crisis cards, ignore the Evacuation Icon.
-When a Civilian ship in the locked Civilian ships stack is destroyed, ignore the loss of ressources indicated on its back. Instead, keep track of how many ships have been destroyed on New Caprica.
-maximum firepower cards can be used to reroll an attack OFT die roll

ALTERED LOCATIONS :
-Resistance HQ : will need a Cylon action
-Occupation Authority : OK as it is.
-Breeder's canyon : Human action = prepare evasion. Allow one player in detention to draw two skill cards. These may come from outside his skill set.
- Shipyard : Human action : prepare action only ( since evacuation automatically happens at the end of turn 3 ). On 4+, send a ship from locked to prepared civillian ship location. Cylon action : place a Cylon Raider in front of the galactica on the main board ( not too sure about this one , but I found the idea of interacting with the main board interesting at this step ).

ENDING OF NEW CAPRICA :
-When turn 3 ends, all players' characters are placed on their starting location on the main board.
At this point, if 8 or more ships have been evacuated , gain +2 moral.
Then place a 2 travel distance under the destination, and follow the instructions of the Kobol objective card.


Tested this with 5 players (but we didn't go on past this step). Took around 1 hour to resolve these 3 turns, 9 ships were saved. Players complained that they spent a lot of time in jail -XD-
Unsurprisingly, friend Yohann (who always plays Baltar) turned out to be a Cylon ! Massive losses of ressources at the beginning of the game, especially moral ( hence the reward if enough ships are saved ).

Tell me what you think, friends (especially if you have better ideas for replacement actions on the locations).

Surprised that no one has pointed out how well the NC board works as a coaster…