Day 62: OH GOD!! THEY'RE EVERYWH-

With a basestar right ahead, Admiral Adama, President Baltar, and the crew of Galactica (Chief Tyrol and pilots Apollo and Helo) had no time to waste. Yet things started poorly -- the crew failed to overcome their first crisis (a hangar accident), costing them some men and precious Raptors. Meanwhile a second basestar appeared, and soon four heavy raiders stuffed with Cylon boarding parties were steaming towards the hangar bay. The basestars opened fire and damaged Galactica's jump control, leaving the ship dead in space. Challenge after challenge was left unconquered, and morale dipped dangerously low. Only Apollo's deadeye shooting (knocking out two of the heavy raiders) and Chief Tyrol's quick repair of jump control kept humanity's slim hopes alive.

The Cylons soon caught up with two basestars, but a precious nuclear warhead from Admiral Adama dispatched one, and the other failed to add more damage before the next jump. At this point things seemed to improve. Crises were dispatched at a solid pace (though one cost the crew its only remaining nuke), the remaining boarders were dispatched, and Galactica was repaired. Despite all resources being at 50%, the third jump put Galactica 75% of the way home, and optimism was growing.

Which is, of course, when the bottom falls out. First a basestar ambushed while green pilots were on a trainee mission. Apollo flew out to protect them, and started mowing down Cylon raiders at a dizzying pace (he would end up dropping 14 in four turns). Meanwhile Baltar's new screening device discovered that Chief Tyrol was a Cylon. But the next player (Apollo) was unavailable to throw Tyrol in the brig, and the next player after that was...Tyrol. He revealed himself, shot Baltar, and called in a massive assault of ten more ships. And before the crew could rally to defend came the worst cut of all -- Admiral Adama revealed himself as a Cylon, threw the bleeding Baltar in the brig, and took personal control of the invading fleet. In two minutes the humans ran out of raptors; in five they ran out of humans.

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Holy cow, this game is fantastic. A bit long, but that will come down with experience. The slow creeping dread punctuated by total panic when the basestars arrive is just fantastic.

It turned out that Brian (Tyrol) and I (Adama) were both Cylons from the beginning, so the humans were hard-pressed. I steered Galactica's jumps as poorly as possible and wasted both nukes, while once Brian stopped fixing things, the humans were in trouble. I think human victories will rely heavily on more scouting (to find better Crisis and Destination cards), more Quorum cards, and quicker detection of the Cylons (since they are generally stronger while hidden, where they can screw up Crises more efficiently). Can't wait to play again.