First, I need to go over some rules... (note: I originally wrote this for another forum, feel free to skip rules stuff.)
Victory Conditions:
Humans - Reach Kobol. This is done by making one final jump after accumulating a Destination score of 8 or more (Every time you jump you will earn a Destination Card with a score of 1, 2, or 3).
Cylons - End humanity. This is done by destroying Galactica, dropping one of the fleets stats (Fuel, Food, Morale, Population) to 0, or getting a raiding party far enough into Galactica's innards.
Skill Checks
The main avenue for Cylon subterfuge is by sabotaging skill checks. This is because all players contribute skill cards anonymously. To make things easier, the skill types are color coded:
Politics: yellow. Leadership: green. Tactics: purple. Piloting: red. Engineering: blue.
A skill check will involve from 1 to 4 colors, and a number. A skill check always includes 2 cards from the Destinty Deck (which consists of random skill cards), and then each player may add as many cards as they like. After the skill cards are revealed, you ADD all of the numbers from the correctly colored skill cards, and then SUBTRACT all of the numbers from the non-matching skill cards. If you meet or beat the skill check number, the check is a pass. This usually does nothing but avoid negative results, but can sometimes yield positive results.
Quick Reference - Player Turn
1. Receive Skills - Draw Skill Cards based on your character's stats.
2. Movement. - Move to any location. Discard 1 Skill Card if moving between ships (Galactica and Colonial One).
3. Action - Take one action. You can take an action listed on your current location, an action on a skill card in your hand, or an action on your character sheet.
4. Crisis - Draw and resolve a Crisis Card. This is when bad things happen.
5. Activate Cylon Ships - Based on an icon on the drawn Crisis Card, the Cylon Ships on the board will activate in different ways.
6. Prepare for Jump - If the Crisis Card has the Prepare for Jump icon, move the Prepare for Jump marker forward one space.
The Players
I'm going to list the character sheets of the characters we used in this game to give you an idea of how the rules of the game really convey the spirit of the show, right down to the characters skills, personalities, and flaws. The titles of Admiral and President start out based on the show, but can change hands during the game. The Admiral controls the nukes. The President can draw from the Quorum Deck. Often times Crisis Cards will call for the Admiral or President to make a decision, instead of the active player.
Lee "Apollo" Adama (Me)
Karl "Helo" Agathon (Admiral)
"Chief" Galen Tyrol
Laura Roslin (President)
Kara "Starbuck" Thrace
Setup
We're playing a 5 player game. We chose our characters and I put together the appropriate Loyalty Deck. With 5 players the Loyalty Deck consists of 2 "You Are a Cylon" cards and 8 "You Are Not a Cylon" cards. You add cards if Baltar or Boomer are playing, because they receive an additional Loyalty Card. I deal out the initial 5 Loyalty Cards and we got started! I take a gander at my Loyalty Card: I am "Not a Cylon".
Early Game
Things started out fairly well. The game always starts with a Basestar and two Raiders, and since I was Apollo and got to start in a Viper, I headed straight for them. My one move got me close enough, so I played a piloting skill card that gives me 4 attacks. Attacks are based on rolling a d8, and Raiders are chumps that go down on a 3+. I start firing and kill one. Miss. Kill the second. Just me and the Basestar now. I need an 8 to hit it, but, why not? Fire! 8! Right in the exhaust vent! I draw a damage token and it looks like I took out its weapons. Sweet. I draw a fairly tame crisis hard and hand the turn over to Helo.
Helo, like any good Admiral, heads straight to Weapons Control and fires Galactica's main weapons at the Basestar. Bam! Hit! Helo draws a damage token and it's a crit! The two damage token, on top of the damage token from my turn, is enough to put the Basestar out of commission. And just like that the Cylons are wiped out. Starbuck, who was eager to get in a Viper, frowns at that. But we move on.
Space becomes eerily quiet as the Cylons leave us alone turn after turn. There is a chance that a Cylon Swarm will show up in the Crisis Deck, but so far it's mostly water/food shortages. Our first jump goes off without a hitch. Helo, as the Admiral, looks at the top 2 cards of the destination deck, ponders, and throws down a whopping 3. Woo!
We're drawing as many skill cards as we can in an attempt to pass skill checks, but it doesn't seem to help. There is definitely at least one Cylon among us. Accusations run rampant as we become paranoid at the lack of any Cylon fleet. What are they waiting for?
We manage to make another jump, despite failing every other skill check, without any Cylon fleets showing up. Helo looks at the top 2 destinations, frowns, throws down a 1. Not optimal, but still enough to get us halfway! This initiates the second round of Loyalty Cards...
Mid-Game
I deal the Loyalty Cards out, carefully, one by one. Once they're out, I look at my new card. Still "Not a Cylon". I glance around the table. If there weren't 2 Cylons before, there are now. It's possible that one player received both Cylon cards, and in that case there is a Cylon location that lets a revealed Cylon hand one of their unrevealed Loyalty Cards to another player (dirty).
Accusations again run wild. We know someone is sabotaging the skill checks. Alas, we make yet another jump! Helo throws down another 1. Oh well. Some of us are gloating that this is going to be an easy ride for the humans. This game is easy!
The Chief is starting looking worried.. He doesn't say much in the turns leading up to his.. Why so drab there, Chief? Lo and behold, Tyrol attacks President Roslin and sends her to sickbay, and then offs himself before we have a chance to throw him in the brig. Off he goes to Cylon land. He draws his Super Crisis card and attempts to slow us down with Cylon fleet attacks.
The Cylons have a location that lets them look at the top two cards of the crisis deck and choose one, effectively letting them dig for Cylon Swarm cards (they bring the ships). With no Cylon ships in play, his Super Crisis is useless (many of them rely on at least one Basestar in play), so he goes digging.
Cylon Tyrol doesn't hand off his unrevealed loyalty card, so we continue to bicker. We're still not making skill checks, missing the mark ever so slightly each time. Helo thinks it's Starbuck. Starbuck thinks it's Helo or me. Roslin thinks it's Starbuck or Helo. I honestly have no idea. We press on.
Late Game
A few jumps later, no sign of Cylons, despite Tyrols best efforts. Our destination total is 7. None of our stats have dropped into the red. Is this it? Is the final Cylon going to let us get away with this?
The next few turns don't go well. We fail skill check after skill check and all of our stats drop into the red. Morale is low. Cries of "WHO IS IT?! THEY WOULD'VE REVEALED THEMSELVES BY NOW!" ring throughout the room. Tyrol taunts us and laughs. Helo initiates a jump. He throws down another 1. 8 total. One more jump...
Helo draws his crisis card. Cylon Swarm. Basestar jumps in, launches Raiders and Heavy Raiders. Tyrol grins, he's up next. Tyrol drops the Super Crisis and activates every Cylon ship on the board, in addition to launching more Raiders and disabling our communications. We lose a few civilian ships and our population plummets. The Basestar fires on Galactica and takes out Weapons Control. Great.
Laughing maniacally, Tyrol draws two crisis cards, and throws down another Cylon Swarm. Another Basestar jumps in. More Raiders. More Heavy Raiders. Oh, Gods. The Heavy Raiders activate and move closer.
End Game
Roslin's up. She uses Executive Order on Starbuck, giving Starbuck a move and an action during Roslin's turn. Starbuck jumps in her Viper and takes off, heading for the nearest toaster and opens fire. She takes out about half of the Raiders in a quadrant, she will draw fire from the civilian ships.
Roslin draws her crisis. Prison Riot. We fail the check miserably and Roslin has to had the Presidency to another player. She decides that Starbuck's recent Cylon slaying is reason enough to trust her, and names Starbuck President of the Colonies. Speaking of Starbuck, her turn is next.
Starbuck, President Thrace, continues shooting the crap out of everything. Her crisis activates the Raiders, who proceed to destroy the "redshirt" Vipers around her. They almost take her down, but she has an Evasive Maneuvers, causing them to reroll the attack, and subtract 2 from it. Thrace lives! Her crisis doesn't go as well, and both Basestars open fire. Galactica loses Command and the Research Lab. 3 more total damge and Galactica is history.
I'm up. Naturally, I make for the nearest Viper and take off in the opposite direction "around" the ship as Starbuck. I pull similar shenanigans and take down a swathe of Raiders and live to tell the tale. Despite our best efforts, most of our stats are down to 2 or 3. We're still a few ticks away from the final jump.
I draw my crisis card. It states that the Admiral must choose to sacrifice a nuke or to lower our Morale by 1. Our Morale is at 2. "The nuke!" we chant, "The nuke!"
Helo looks at us.
Looks down.
And turns the Morale down to 1.
There was screaming, yelling, standing up, pointing, cries of agony and defeat. Why, Helo?! Admiral! /Vader NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
We couldn't believe it. Helo! This whole time?! Our beloved Admiral... who had been choosing our destinations...... and it was his turn...........
Admiral Agathon casually sauntered over to the FTL Control. Our Jump Prep marker was at -1, meaning we risked losing 1 population if we jumped. Our Population was at 1.
There was a 50% chance that we would lose the population and lose before we would make the final jump and win. Helo reminded us that he could reroll once per turn, making it a 75% chance.
Regardless, he chose to jump, rolled the die, and ended the human race.
A+ Would play again.
Last edited on 2008-08-23 19:09:38 CST (Total Number of Edits: 1)
Posted Sat Aug 23, 2008 1:11 pm
