BSG Achievements

I don't visit BGG very much anymore, but there is an outstanding thread there now that combines our love of BSG with the addictiveness of the XBox achievement system. I belatedly want the "Who's Flying This Thing?" achievement, for getting everyone to evacuate Galactica for fear you will reveal with the Brig power, then early-jumping three times to zero the population.

For the SABG Band

Rumor has it this is the only game you guys play now... besides Rock Band. So, thought you might enjoy.

By your command -- Tinkering with Pegasus

Now that the gang has many games of the BSG expansion, is there consensus on the cylon leaders? We all (basically) agree they don't work, but they are intriguing. One idea I've had is to make two decks for the "Sympathetic Cylon" and "Hostile Cylon." A "Pro" and "Con" deck. The "Pro" deck would by like the standard victory conditions from the 4/6 or 5 deck, but balanced out. These should be things that are all under the leader's (somewhat) control. The "Con" deck would be pretty hard to achieve, but would require the leader switching sides (to the cylon side in 4/6, in the human side in 5), but would give the side he's abandoned some strong leverage to compensate for having an odd number. To take the "Con 5" example ... "You win with the humans if Galactica has 4 or 5 damage." Sure, the cylon player is 1 v 4, but at some point Galactica is going to become ripe for the pickings. Making these two decks (instead of one) means that just because you know a leader's "Pro" condition, you can't automatically guess his "Con." This would take a lot of work. But right now I don't have a better idea, other than playing with five.

Where's the Toaster, the Silent Treatment, and Monday

Thanks to Jeff, Amy and Ian for hosting. In particular, Ian helped us figure out the differences between monkeys and giraffes, and knows the answer to "Where's the toaster?" Some thanks go to Papa Johns, who managed to get our pizza their quickly despite (because of?) having no phone service. Next time we know "Bacon + Mushroom FTW."

As for games played -- well, I played a game of BSG (as Cavil), a few games of Roll Through the Ages, and the St. Petersburg expansion. I taught Snow Tails, and saw that Warhammer Invasion (and many other games of BSG) hit the table. We also saw the Chicken Hat. Don't know what happened later.

As for Monday, I'll be at Dragon's Lair at the normal time, with my new games (Roll through the ages, Uruk, Snow Tails, Masters of Venice) as well as any old games I feel like inflicting on people.

By your command

Last night had about 7 gamers, two cylons, and a sleeper or two. (Pretty much the typical distribution). Dennis, Michael, Steve and I started with a bizarre little game of BSG which began like a Bill Cosby Routine. ("The Cylons have won the toss, so they get to kick first. Humanity, you sit here while all the cylons in the world pop up on the board.") Galactica was almost wiped out before the first jump, we'd lost all the raptors. Ye Gods.

As is so often the case, a terrible first jump means that the role of the cylons went to the care-bear understudies for the next few jumps. In fact, by the time we jumped to distance 8 I thought humanity had it nearly locked up ... but hitting 5 non-jump events in the first six cards (leading with a fleet) did us in. There are interesting strategy implications in not scouting that I'm still thinking about...

There were lots of other BSG games played (4, I think), but also a game of Ave Caesar, Glory to Rome, and several games of Wabash Cannonball...

Saturday Roll Call

I started off with Jon and Scott and the federally mandated game of Race. I'm pretty sure that Scott and my combined score beat Jon. Almost positive, in fact. After that Steve and Chris showed up for our US RDA of cylons. Humanity was looking good, so I figured I'd get dealt a cylon in the middle. Which, of course, happened. And (loyal president) Baltar quickly eliminated Boomer as a cylon, which meant I was practically forced to reveal. Anyway, Chris and I had back-to-back turns. Adama had been shot (good times) and boomer was brigged so we got a round or two of running roughshod on skill checks (including incoming nukes). Then the fleet showed up and we put on some boarders. Mainly for giggles. On the down side, humanity got the bonus point of distance which saved them a full jump. Still, wee managed to force the fleet to make a risky jump for the win, and they failed. It came down to a straight 50/50 shot, but both Chris and I had a decent chance to win on our turn, and almost any skill check would have been great.

I like our Roslin fix (and we need to make the Ambush super-crisis fix standard as well ... it only backs up the jump track one space).

After that we had newcomers Karl & Kathy, and Travis. After a caloric interlude, we split into Vinci and Through the Ages. [Actually, we started on Starcraft before Jon put on his Derek Lowe face and muttered something about "a lot of rules."] I must say that the 3rd editions "boards" (instead of card setup) are nice, although they still aren't clear about happiness. Anyway, after getting off to a slow start I Pillaged Karl and razed his two Cathedrals to the ground to make sure he didn't run away with it (and to show what is best in life). Then me and Captain Cook circumnavigated our way to a huge score.

The Vinci people will have to enlighten us on their day.

Anyway, thanks to all who attended. I still need to play Starcraft. Perhaps I'll read the rules again myself.

Public Service Announcement from SABG

#11: Your name is Michael or Dennis.

Brian, Dennis, and I started Monday gaming with a quick game of Glory to Rome in which Dennis picked up two early Legionnaire clients only to see Brian and me throw up Walls to block them. I was able to build a large vault and, using a building that let my Legionnaires take from opponents' clients directly into my vault, stock it with the dead corpses of Dennis' once loyal clients and earn a victory. Fun game that feels like a Race for the Galaxy rollercoaster careening wildly off the rails.

As we finished, Ted, Scott, and Jon showed up and we scratched our heads trying to figure out what game plays well with six. Since Michael wasn't around to help us answer that question, we brainstormed and came up with an answer he would have probably liked--Battlestar Galactica. Dennis took Helo, Scott took Roslyn, Brian grabbed Apollo, Jon took Adama, I played Baltar, and Ted in his first game (another SABGer introduced! The assimilation continues...) took Chief Tyrol. As luck would have it, no cylons were dealt out on the first deal, and the Good Ship Galactica sailed throughout the void with nary an interruption. Ted understandably asked more than once, "Is the game supposed to be this easy? I thought it was supposed to be hard."

Jon steered us to a planet that knocked fuel down into the red with the jump into the sleeper phase, turning me from a Cylon sympathizer into a brigged human sympathizer. With little hope of getting out of the brig (I still had two unrevealed loyalty cards), I used Baltar's once-a-game detector power from the brig to check Dennis' cards (I thought he was a Cylon from the get-go, but I was wrong; he's just a suspicious guy) and discovered that he was, indeed, a frakkin' toaster. As Brian pointed out, "Of course you're going to say he's a Cylon, no matter what he is!" So, even though Dennis was quickly arrested, I didn't earn anyone's trust with my discovery and stayed in the brig for most of the game. After Scott, Brian, and Jon all passed on opportunities to hose the humans after the sleeper phase, suspicion settled on Ted, who was likewise summarily arrested. Dennis revealed shortly thereafter, but Ted, unsure of who to trust, kept his identity secret until Galactica was well on its way to Kobol. Several Cylon base stars came out near the end, but the humans had gathered a full head of steam and could not be stopped, nuking one base star and waving at the other as we sailed on to our destination with a comfortable 5-5-5-5 human victory.

Asking a new player to play a Cylon on their first play of this game is a pretty tall order, especially when the entire game is one of "I don't trust you...or you...or you" and you just don't have a feel for what the right thing is to do in a given situation. Hopefully we haven't scared Ted off too much from BSG--it gets better when you've got a game or two under your belt and you know what to expect.

Still, it's an easy game when you know how to Spot The Cylon. Look for the guy named Michael. If he's not around, it's Dennis. We don't need no stinkin' spinner.

Jeff showed up toward the end, and we split 5-2, with Dennis and Scott going off to play Up Front, and the rest of us breaking out Ted's copy of Princes of Florence. Most of us started off leaving Jeff in the dust on the VP track with our early works. However, several bonus cards helped him start scoring exponentially, and at the end he managed to finish not-last, beating me by a few points as I overbid on several items and had to drop VPs to get enough gold to play my last work. Ted finished third, and Jon edged out Brian for the win with his "build lots of parks" strategy.

Scott, Jeff, and Ted departed, and Brian, Dennis, Jon and I finished with several rounds of Race for the Galaxy.

Good to see the turnout we had. Mondays have really picked up again the last month or two.

The REAL Cylon Detector

It looks like a mere finger spinner.

Looks are deceiving.

I have seen Dennis unleash the might of this futuristic technology at the beginning of two Battlestar Galactica games. "To choose who goes first," he says. But clearly, it's no simple trinket but a technological marvel that always points to magnetic northEVIL.

Both times, he has brought it out and set it to work BEFORE the loyalty cards are dealt out, giving each of us our roles.

Saturday's Battlestar Galactica game: the finger spins and stops at Steve.
The cards are then dealt. Result? Steve is a Cylon.

Monday's Battlestar Galactica game: the finger spins and stops at Michael.
The cards are then dealt. Result? Michael is a Cylon (oh, and the Pope is Catholic).

DETECTION RATE: 100%

I recommend everyone to carry at least one of these things. You never know when you may have a Cylon in your midst. (Well, if Michael's around, you KNOW, but besides that...)

Monday night saw our attempt at a 7 player game (Scott, Dennis, Michael(cylon), Sean (playing his first game and, of course, being a Cylon), Jon, me and Brian) and it seems to work well. The dials increased by one also seems to be a good break point, as both times I've seen it played with dials at start position +1 at the beginning, it has been a narrow human victory (although I agree with Michael that Monday's game was not quite as close as the dials would indicate). I think I'm ready for some variant goodness.

Tiffany brought her friend Raquel to the group and played Tikal with her. Unfortunately, our BG game ran fairly long, and we didn't get to play games with Raquel or get to talk to her much. Hopefully, she makes a return appearance and we can find some fun stuff for her to play with the group.

Sean brought Wasabi! and taught Tiff and me how to play. Cute game with good production, easy rules and some player interaction in a short period of time. Short games always seem to go over pretty well in our group.

(On BGG, they say that you can pass without playing ingredients and instead discard as many recipes as you want as a legal move. This prevents the logjam of having recipes you can't legally complete, which just didn't seem to make much sense.)

Brian, Michael and Dennis Raced around the Galaxy several times, and Jon, Scott, Sean, and Brian got in a game of Dominion as well.

Dennis and I picked up our new WoW mini deluxe starter kits, and Tiff found a Harry Potter book. Just trying to keep DL in business.

In other news, I'm putting in my game order tomorrow night (shopping around for the best deal). Here's what I've got so far:
Me: Dominion and Neuroshima Hex
Michael the Cylon: Dominion
Jeff: possibly Race, possibly some other things
Tiff: possibly some games

Send me Geekmail or email or whatever before about 10pm tomorrow night and I'll add you in.

Humanity's current death toll

Yesterday, at Casa de Chris, we played BSG and other games. Our first BSG game had Steve, Travis, his lovely wife Kate, Michael, Jon and myself (I think). Honestly, I don't remember much about that game except that a) I took Zarek (the only time we've played with him) and b) Michael convinced everyone he was a cylon in the first round, and c) everyone was right. The cylons won.

After a break for life-giving hamburgers, we split into two games. At my table, I was President Baltar (and a cylon off the deal) in a four player game with Kate, Chris and Jon. We had the most amazing destiny deck I've ever seen ... during the first few jumps there were never even two bad cards in a skill check. (I had decided to wait for an opportunity that never came). The sleeper phase made Kate a sympathizer (what with the 'friendly' destiny deck, everything was blue). Boomer was in the brig and it was my turn so I ordered the remaining human (Helo?) into the brig. And so President Admiral Cylon-in-Chief Baltar led humanity on a merry quest. Then they died.

After a bit of Rocking and Dominion, Jon decided to improve on the classic and set up a game of '500 card pick up' He's probably still sorting Dominion cards as he reads this. We also played a few games of Race. On the other game, Michael was yet again an unconvincing cylon. He should just wear that as a sign. "Unconvincing Cylon."

Jon Chris and I did a three player game where I revealed as Apollo by leaving the scene of a space battle and shooting someone (I think). Having every raider, basestar, and almost every raider and civilian ship on the field is fun. Jon and Chris managed to divert 10 of the raiders on a wild goose chase, which gave them enough time to jump. Then they drew 3 consecutive ship cards. That, combined with the two boarders they already had, was enough.

After a touch of football, we played another game of ... BSG. I was finally loyal, but Mr. Unconvincing Cylon was 3-for-3. We decided to give the humans extra resources, and they jumped into the sleeper phase with one barely in the read, and the others solidly safe. As President Roslin I had a good hand of Cylon-hate, so I think humanity may have won. But I had to go feed Muffit, so I don't know. I guess that makes the final game a cliff-hanger.

Thanks again to Chris for Hosting.

WE MADE IT--almost

The good news is that Galactica made several amazing against-the-odds FTL jumps to make it to Kobol.

The bad news is that they forgot to bring humanity with them.

Midway through the game, two cylons [Michael as Boomer and Tiffany as Admiral Adama] had been revealed (after both having been arrested by President Roslin [strong work, Jon] and thrown in the brig). The humans seemed to be holding their own when a basestar jumped in next to Galactica and raiders shot out and began targeting civilian ships. The new admiral, Starbuck [Dennis] began strafing the raiders while Baltar [me], sensing the growing threat, left the lab and got on the horn to command the other vipers from Galactica. Meanwhile, Chief Tyrol [Scott] was kept busy in the hangar repairing the vipers as they returned with their battle damage. Starbuck called in a nuclear strike on the basestar while evading raider fire. Although the basestar survived, its ability to both launch new raiders and fire at Galactica was wiped out.

Suddenly, a bright flash of light erupted, and Colonial One was gone, wiped out by a Cylon bomb. Almost immediately, another basestar jumped in and the stars were thick with raiders (and vulnerable civilian ships). Feverishly, Starbuck wiped out one squadron and flew to defend another group of four civilian ships. He called in his second tactical nuclear attack and the new basestar vanished in a ball of fire. The moment of peace was short lived, however, as a third basestar jumped in in front of Galactica! The humans were now out of nukes and the remaining civilian ships were starting to fall. The FTL drive, which had been agonizingly slow to charge, finally came online and Baltar triggered the jump to save the remaining civilian ships from almost certain destruction.

However, Galactica did not travel as far as they needed to, leaving themselves two agonizingly difficult jumps from Kobol. The cylons began to throw crisis after crisis at the humans and the resources began to bleed away. One more jump, and the humans were one final FTL drive charge from home. But population had dwindled to one. Galactica and the fleet sacrificed all of their other resources to spare the last vestiges of humanity as the Cylons launched Incoming Nukes at the ship. Finally, down to (if I remember correctly) 1 fuel, 2 food, 1 morale, and 1 population, and with all of the humans' skills exhausted, we realized that one more crisis would certainly stop Galactica just short of its goal. We needed to jump NOW.

I drew one last tactics card, trying to draw a +2 to a die roll for the final jump chance. No luck. Finally, Scott moved to FTL control and triggered the jump. A success, and we would be home. A failure, and we would leave the fleet behind (-3 population) and humanity would end. We needed a 7 or 8. The die roll came.

Six.


WOW! This was incredibly close! Every roll for the humans seemed to be one short, but we still had a chance on that last roll to win the game. If Scott rolls a 7 or 8, we win. If I draw the +2 card and Scott rolls the same 6, we win. But no. The anguished cries as the die settled on the six were a testament to how much fun we all seemed to have. This game seems to be getting better with every play. And I think we got all the rules right.

Can't wait for Monday night. Sleep or no sleep, I want to play again.

it's an interesting debate about exactly what the best tactic is for an unrevealed Cylon. Do you blatantly spike the skill check right before your turn and then reveal so that you can't be thrown in the brig? I've seen Brian do this, and it seems to make sense. Do you try to stay hidden and throw a few bad cards in to make skill checks more difficult? In my experience so far, this hasn't panned out--as soon as a Cylon does this, they get found out pretty quickly because the humans can trace back who could have thrown in the errant colors by who DRAWS those colors, and it's even harder if some of the people who draw those colors decide not to throw in on that check (so that they're automically eliminated from suspicion). From my recollection, this is how we discovered Tiffany's treachery. It's awful difficult to surreptitiously spike a check and stay undiscovered. It would only make sense to do this if the reveal power for the Cylon is so unhelpful (because you have to assume you're going to be discovered, brigged, and lose the reveal power) that causing the skill check to fail is worth the risk. Michael made an interesting choice that I hadn't seen before. His power was to automatically determine the result of a skill check before it was resolved. We had an early skill check which was very helpful (I think it advanced the jump track twice, and the failure cost morale, or deployed a basestar, or something), and Michael outright said, "No, we fail that." Still pleading that he wasn't a Cylon, he was instantly brigged, but he remarked later that he thought trading his reveal power for the skill check automatically failing was a reasonable tradeoff. Interesting.

We also got in a game of Dominion (better in person than I was expecting after having played it online--the shuffling didn't bother me much) with a highly interactive deck, a quick fun game of Thebes (which came down to the last play for all of us [Scott, Tiff and me]), some Ca$h 'n Gun$ (being able to move around like a ninja didn't help Michael at all, as he was dead before turn 5) and four games of Race, which Michael seems to be consistently excellent at.

A few songs of Rock Band thrown in (with an agonzing 98% fail of "Gonna Hitch a Ride" just as the crowd began to applaud), some pizza and breakfast tacos (Mr. Black tried again for a taco, but Tiff is on to him) and it was all in all a really good day. Thanks to Dennis, Scott, Michael, Jon, and Tiffany for dropping by.

P.S. DennisOops--MICHAEL, I still have your Stage II. I'll get it to you either Monday or next weekend if you're around for gaming.

Post Turkey Crushing of Humanity

If there's gaming, there must by our good, dear friend.
Anyway, I happened to be a Cylon twice. I may have missed some details but I wrote two session reports for BGG. The highlight of the day was definitely getting caught by Michael Baltar and then, if not exactly convincing the crew, casting enough doubt to keep me out of the brig and force several actions (and plenty of cards) to be wasted on the debate. May have very well won that game if I had a partner-in-genocide.

Besides destroying humanity, we also played a quick game of "We didn't playtest this at all." I've now spent more time typing about the game (these two sentences) then playing the game, so I'm done. We also played a hand of 6 Nimmt! I'm sure the rest of you played other stuff (either during or after BSG) so I'm awaiting edification on that part.

I'm thankful ...

That we haven't yet invented the race that will annihilate us. I speak, of course, of the Turducken. As far as I know, we've only got those in safely dead form. But as the Biologists work in their labs towards breeding a living turducken, and I fear for humanity. Tomorrow. Today I help protect humanity from wild turkeys by eating as many of them as I can find. Hopefully Tiffany, Jeff and Amy aren't playing God by mixing such tasty and dangerous DNA.

Tomorrow there will likely be morethreats to humanity. I've written my thoughts in numerous places, but I'm still eager to play again. But if I can't make tomorrow, interested parties may wish to look at some slight (and not so slight) balancing variants.I also think they make the game more interesting. (Of course, with new players probably best to play a few more straight games, but I'd be interested to hear what others think about these).

Enjoy humanity while you still can! Happy T-Day!