Post by Gilvan Blight on May 2, 2007 15:26:31 GMT -5
Quickly: amazing amount of new stuff, I can't see playing without it now that I have used it.
After our last game, I have now tried most of what the expansion has to offer so feel I can give a fair review.
[glow=red,2,300]Summary:[/glow]
This is the first expansion for Twilight Imperium Third Edition and either adds to the game significantly or totally changes how it is played. Lets see if I can remember all of the bits in this one.
You get two new sets of miniatures, tech decks, etc allowing you to play with up to 8 players now. You also get a ton of new space systems in order to make a board to accommodate 8 players or add more size or variety to your existing 3-6 player games. There are a ton of new cards that can be added to your existing decks including new Action cards, new Political Cards and new Secret Objectives. All of these add more warlike actions to the game, with more player vs player conflict. There are 6 new technologies for each player. There are a set of race specific technologies that can be bought and are unique to each race. There are new "distant suns" counters for use with that variant rule. There are 4 new races including home systems for them (including one with no home system and movable space docks). There are +3 fighter and ground troop tokens to use with the original tokens and save space. There are re-printed cards featuring revised rules from the latest errata. There are rules for and counters for Shock Troopers and Space Mines. There are rules for a quick start up, in which the first three turns are simulated giving players the areas around their stating planets to start with. There are a set of variant objective cards that replace the originals and make the game all about conquering and battle. There are a set of variant Strategy Cards, replacing the original that let you move a lot quicker, vote more often and increase the amount of pvp conflict. There is a variety Imperial Strategy card, that reduces the Impact of the 'killer strategy' from the original game. There are rules for playing with an Ancient artifact somewhere in space and objectives to go with it. There are a set of fighters and ground forces that can be placed as the defenders of Mecatol Rex to make the system less 'open' to invasion. There is probable something I missed as well.
The new systems are some rather interesting new system types. There is the ION storm which makes it so that Fighters can't fire in combat, and it slows movement. There are systems with 3 planets. There are the 'refresh' systems. These, when owned by a player let them generate something during the refresh phase. There are two that generate trade goods, one that generates Shock Troops and one that Generates fighters. The trade goods ones are unique as you don't have to land on them, just have a ship in the system to get them. There is also the Warp point nexus a planet off the board that provides good influence.
The Shock Troopers hit on a 6+ instead of 8+ and capture opposing pds and spacedocks when they win a landing. You get Shock Troops whenever one of your troops rolls a 10 and survives or if you control the Military Training Planet.
The new Strategy Cards, new Objective Cards and the Artifact objectives totally change the style of game TI is. The original game using the original cards, even with the additions of the new techs, races etc from Shattered Frontier plays more like Catan then Risk. You spend a lot of time trying to take neutral planets and achieve objectives like having the most techs, tech of every colour, planets with a total influence of 10 or more, etc. With the expansion your objectives become things like, invade 3 planets this turn, wipe out three opposition ships, take out an opponents space dock. The strategy cards give you a lot more movement options and more command counters allowing people the time and movement to get into conflict (one of the main 'problems' with the original game is that it takes forever for players to even get into a position to bump heads).
[glow=red,2,300]The Good[/glow]
The amount of stuff you get in this heavy box is amazing. In typical Fantasy Flight and Twilight Imperium fashion there are a ton of counters, cards, chits and blips. The new minis come pre-cut! That was great as I had to spend 2 hours getting the original clipped from their sprues. The new systems are all interesting and add even more variety to a game that was already insanely varied. The new objectives definitely change the feel of the game. We had a ton more conflict in our last game then ever before. The new techs are great, especially the addition of the race specific techs. The replacement cards for errata are awesome. I hate having to have a bunch of photocopies of stuff from online with my game to play, and this let me toss out all I had printed for the original.
[glow=red,2,300]The Bad[/glow]Twilight Imperium has never claimed that it was a balanced game. There are some races that are just better then others in certain situations and this expansion magnifies that. The race specific techs make this even more clear with some definitely seeming way better then others. They game is meant to be like this as the weaker races are supposed to use diplomacy and alliances to get past their weaknesses and winning with a weak race is a huge accomplishment in overcoming adversity. A lot of people won't like this though. They want nice equal sides. Especially when you change it to a more warlike game with player in more conflict this rift between races seems to grow even bigger. Online there are some scenarios for setting up balanced games that are worth checking out if you feel this way. I don't count that though as they weren't included in the box (though they should have been). More options means more game time. TI was already a long game, adding in all the new rules makes it even longer. Our game the other night lasted over 8 hours. Not everyone has that time (heck we really didn't either).
[glow=red,2,300]The Ugly[/glow] It's a lot to change at once, and it's very hard to decide what to change and what not to. If you toss in all the new rules, or even most of them, there is a really good chance most if not all the players will forget some of them. This was true in our game of the building Colonies and Factories (forgot that in the summary). We totally forgot we could do it. Even worse can be trying to decide what to use and what not to use. It's amazing to own a boardgame with this many 'mods', the problem is knowing which to use, and which combine well with others. I would say 80% of this expansion are mods for the original game and thus optional. There is very little that can be just added to your game 'out of the box' without changing the game significantly and requiring a pretty steep learning curve.
[glow=red,2,300]Overall: [/glow]
The only reason I would tell someone that owns TI not to pick this up would be if they couldn't afford it. It's not cheap, at all, costing about 2/3 as much as the original game which I have seen retail for over $100 (not here in Windsor thankfully). If you can afford it though it's great. There are so many optional rules that you are bound to find a few you like. Even if you don't the new systems, new techs, new action cards and new political cards would probably be worth it. If you want to play with 7 or 8 players this one is a must. Expect to have a learning curve if you try to toss all the rules in at once. Adding them one at a time is great, but at 8 hours a session it's going to take a long time before you use them all. The Quickly at the top of this review says it well, I can't see playing without it now that I have it.
After our last game, I have now tried most of what the expansion has to offer so feel I can give a fair review.
[glow=red,2,300]Summary:[/glow]
This is the first expansion for Twilight Imperium Third Edition and either adds to the game significantly or totally changes how it is played. Lets see if I can remember all of the bits in this one.
You get two new sets of miniatures, tech decks, etc allowing you to play with up to 8 players now. You also get a ton of new space systems in order to make a board to accommodate 8 players or add more size or variety to your existing 3-6 player games. There are a ton of new cards that can be added to your existing decks including new Action cards, new Political Cards and new Secret Objectives. All of these add more warlike actions to the game, with more player vs player conflict. There are 6 new technologies for each player. There are a set of race specific technologies that can be bought and are unique to each race. There are new "distant suns" counters for use with that variant rule. There are 4 new races including home systems for them (including one with no home system and movable space docks). There are +3 fighter and ground troop tokens to use with the original tokens and save space. There are re-printed cards featuring revised rules from the latest errata. There are rules for and counters for Shock Troopers and Space Mines. There are rules for a quick start up, in which the first three turns are simulated giving players the areas around their stating planets to start with. There are a set of variant objective cards that replace the originals and make the game all about conquering and battle. There are a set of variant Strategy Cards, replacing the original that let you move a lot quicker, vote more often and increase the amount of pvp conflict. There is a variety Imperial Strategy card, that reduces the Impact of the 'killer strategy' from the original game. There are rules for playing with an Ancient artifact somewhere in space and objectives to go with it. There are a set of fighters and ground forces that can be placed as the defenders of Mecatol Rex to make the system less 'open' to invasion. There is probable something I missed as well.
The new systems are some rather interesting new system types. There is the ION storm which makes it so that Fighters can't fire in combat, and it slows movement. There are systems with 3 planets. There are the 'refresh' systems. These, when owned by a player let them generate something during the refresh phase. There are two that generate trade goods, one that generates Shock Troops and one that Generates fighters. The trade goods ones are unique as you don't have to land on them, just have a ship in the system to get them. There is also the Warp point nexus a planet off the board that provides good influence.
The Shock Troopers hit on a 6+ instead of 8+ and capture opposing pds and spacedocks when they win a landing. You get Shock Troops whenever one of your troops rolls a 10 and survives or if you control the Military Training Planet.
The new Strategy Cards, new Objective Cards and the Artifact objectives totally change the style of game TI is. The original game using the original cards, even with the additions of the new techs, races etc from Shattered Frontier plays more like Catan then Risk. You spend a lot of time trying to take neutral planets and achieve objectives like having the most techs, tech of every colour, planets with a total influence of 10 or more, etc. With the expansion your objectives become things like, invade 3 planets this turn, wipe out three opposition ships, take out an opponents space dock. The strategy cards give you a lot more movement options and more command counters allowing people the time and movement to get into conflict (one of the main 'problems' with the original game is that it takes forever for players to even get into a position to bump heads).
[glow=red,2,300]The Good[/glow]
The amount of stuff you get in this heavy box is amazing. In typical Fantasy Flight and Twilight Imperium fashion there are a ton of counters, cards, chits and blips. The new minis come pre-cut! That was great as I had to spend 2 hours getting the original clipped from their sprues. The new systems are all interesting and add even more variety to a game that was already insanely varied. The new objectives definitely change the feel of the game. We had a ton more conflict in our last game then ever before. The new techs are great, especially the addition of the race specific techs. The replacement cards for errata are awesome. I hate having to have a bunch of photocopies of stuff from online with my game to play, and this let me toss out all I had printed for the original.
[glow=red,2,300]The Bad[/glow]Twilight Imperium has never claimed that it was a balanced game. There are some races that are just better then others in certain situations and this expansion magnifies that. The race specific techs make this even more clear with some definitely seeming way better then others. They game is meant to be like this as the weaker races are supposed to use diplomacy and alliances to get past their weaknesses and winning with a weak race is a huge accomplishment in overcoming adversity. A lot of people won't like this though. They want nice equal sides. Especially when you change it to a more warlike game with player in more conflict this rift between races seems to grow even bigger. Online there are some scenarios for setting up balanced games that are worth checking out if you feel this way. I don't count that though as they weren't included in the box (though they should have been). More options means more game time. TI was already a long game, adding in all the new rules makes it even longer. Our game the other night lasted over 8 hours. Not everyone has that time (heck we really didn't either).
[glow=red,2,300]The Ugly[/glow] It's a lot to change at once, and it's very hard to decide what to change and what not to. If you toss in all the new rules, or even most of them, there is a really good chance most if not all the players will forget some of them. This was true in our game of the building Colonies and Factories (forgot that in the summary). We totally forgot we could do it. Even worse can be trying to decide what to use and what not to use. It's amazing to own a boardgame with this many 'mods', the problem is knowing which to use, and which combine well with others. I would say 80% of this expansion are mods for the original game and thus optional. There is very little that can be just added to your game 'out of the box' without changing the game significantly and requiring a pretty steep learning curve.
[glow=red,2,300]Overall: [/glow]
The only reason I would tell someone that owns TI not to pick this up would be if they couldn't afford it. It's not cheap, at all, costing about 2/3 as much as the original game which I have seen retail for over $100 (not here in Windsor thankfully). If you can afford it though it's great. There are so many optional rules that you are bound to find a few you like. Even if you don't the new systems, new techs, new action cards and new political cards would probably be worth it. If you want to play with 7 or 8 players this one is a must. Expect to have a learning curve if you try to toss all the rules in at once. Adding them one at a time is great, but at 8 hours a session it's going to take a long time before you use them all. The Quickly at the top of this review says it well, I can't see playing without it now that I have it.