White Knuckles
November 25, 2008
Strange that a boardgame would illicit such a response, but the recently released Battlestar Galactica Boardgame did just that on Sunday night. Mind, you, we didn’t finish the game (we’re still figuring out the rules), but from what Phil, Jess, Mel and I experienced, I can’t wait to play again!
Much like the series it’s based on, the BSG boardgame highlights the human survivors’ tense conflict with both external (Cylon fleets, lack of resources) and internal (Cylon agents, political strife) threats. To overcome crises, which come at the players constantly, they must work together to overcome deadly challenges. I say together, but the real fun comes from the fact that one player may be a Cylon agent secretly working against the human players. Even if there are no agents in play at the start of the game (which happened to us), there will be a sleeper agent activated when the humans find the path to Kobol. This is the only way the humans can win, whereas the Cylons can achieve victory by destroying Galactica, killing all of it’s crew via boarding party or reducing one of 4 resources to zero.
Unlike many other Fantasy Flight Games products, this game is not too heavy on the components, but what you get are simple, attractive and effective. The board itself is well laid out, and for once I had room for everything on my dining room table! My favourite mechanic has to be the crisis stage of each turn. Each crisis card includes up to 3 different “effects”: the initial crisis (skill check or plain old Cylon attack), Cylon activation and Jump prep. Each of these is resolved in turn, and the rules for which are elegant and simple.
Our white knuckle moment came when and unfortunate series of crisis cards lead to the fleet almost being completely overwhelmed by Cylon raiders. Jess, playing Boomer, managed to get to the bridge and make a lucky FTL jump roll, clearing the board of enemies an giving us a brief respite. That lasted all of Phil’s turn, as we were once again completely surrounded by Cylon ships.
We’re not very competent humans, but at least this time none of was a traitor.
Written by kingmob | Filed under: Boardgames |