[Path-Shaper]

I'd say yes. Great to have new players. Its months long commitment though as long as you know

Tattersail

This post has been edited by Path-Shaper: 16 May 2020 - 07:51 AM

[D'rek]

ansible, on 16 May 2020 - 02:33 AM, said:

Am I lucky enough to catch the start of a game? I haven't seen a thread for game 5 signups but it does seem like the games are usually full.

Yup. The 4C game is winding down and there'll probably be a game 5 signup (or two) in the next couple weeks.

[Blend]

Alright, can someone please point me to what exactly were those official changes? I know it's in the chat thread somewhere, but I can't find it. I want to update the Reference thread and my GMing materials accordingly!

[Imperial Historian]

It's under player resources

https://www.fantasyf...fourth-edition/

[Blend]

Imperial Historian, on 29 May 2020 - 07:34 PM, said:

It's under player resources

https://www.fantasyf...fourth-edition/

Thanks!

[Galactic Council]

Did we ever fall anywhere definite with the modification of the Warfare strategy?

[D'rek]

Galactic Council, on 29 May 2020 - 07:51 PM, said:

Did we ever fall anywhere definite with the modification of the Warfare strategy?

General consensus that the high alert token should not be tied to a particular ship. Copy the primary text word-for-word from TI3 expansions and it should be fine.

[Galactic Council]

So should we create that new Strategy Card? If so, where in the order do you think we should put it?

[Galactic Council]

Alright, so here are proposed changes to Warfare

Primary: Choose one of your ships. For the remainder of the Action Phase, this ship grants +1 movement and +1 on all combat rolls to your other ships in the same system.
Secondary: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool to move up to 2 ships from unactivated systems to systems that are empty or which you control.


Proposed updates:

Primary: Place the High Alert token in a system. Your units present with the token receive +1 to combat rolls, and your ships gain +1 movement. When moving, they may move the token with them.
Secondary: Spend 1 tokent from your strategy pool to move up to to two of your ships from unactivated systems into adjacent systems that contain no enemy ships. This does not activate the destination system(s). Cargo may be picked up during this movement.

[Galactic Council]

Potential 10th Strategy card:

Relocation

Primary
Move 1 space dock or 1 PDS from a planet you control in a system you control to another planet you control in a system you control.

Secondary
Spend one strategic token. Remove 1 of your ships from the board, receive trade goods equal to its production value. No more than 4 trade goods at a time can be received this way.

[Galactic Council]

Am looking at TI3 strategies, and other things, and thinking we could create an 11th strategy card as well, I think then our 9 player games will see a bit more variety... So what do folks think of following as card # 11:

Armistice

Primary: Players taking a hostile action against you must exhaust or lose control of a planet. This ability is lost if you perform a hostile action.

Secondary: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool and 2 influence to claim an empty non-home system non-Mecatol Rex planet in or adjacent to a system containing friendly planets or units.

This post has been edited by Galactic Council: 30 May 2020 - 06:13 PM

[Galactic Council]

We would also need to discuss where in card order those 2 additional strategies would fit.

I'd think Armistice would become the new # 3 right after Diplomacy, while Relocation would come after Construction - so 5 if we don't take Armistice, 6 if we do.

[Imperial Historian]

Mods to warfare seem good.

The secondary of armistice seems strong early but weak later on depending on the definition of empty. Primary is the opposite which makes things interesting. Possibly this is too defensive, I think the game has been suffering from lack of combat, are they any primaries in ti3 which boost combat/make it more attractive? Perhaps a resource boost if you win a combat?

Most strategy cards let you do something, or a weaker version as the secondary, these both seem to do different things for primary and secondary abilities. Not necessarily a bad thing but different to the others. I can see people valuing the secondaries more than the primaries which could lead to them not being picked.

[Imperial Historian]

I like the idea of another card whoch controls the objectives. Objectives wouldn't be drawn until this card is played.

Bureaucracy

Primary

Special if any TG are placed on this card, at the start of this action reveal one additional objective for each TG

Then:

Draw the top 2 cards from the objective deck, reveal one. You may choose to place the remaining card back on the top or bottom of the deck. You can immediately score the revealed objective

Secondary Spend 1 CT to score the last revealed objective.

I also like the idea of a strategy card which encourages combat

Raiding

Primary You may immediately activate a system as normal. If you win a combat in the activated system you may immediately gain TG equal to the value of the destroyed units to a maximum value of 5 TG

Secondary

Spend a strategic token. If you have not passed you may immediately activate a system. If you win a combat in the activated system you may immediately gain TG equal to the value of the destroyed units to a maximum value of 3 TG

[D'rek]

Galactic Council, on 30 May 2020 - 06:01 PM, said:

Proposed updates:

Primary: Place the High Alert token in a system. Your units present with the token receive +1 to combat rolls, and your ships gain +1 movement. When moving, they may move the token with them.
Secondary: Spend 1 tokent from your strategy pool to move up to to two of your ships from unactivated systems into adjacent systems that contain no enemy ships. This does not activate the destination system(s). Cargo may be picked up during this movement.

Primary: Place the High Alert token in a system which contains your ships. Your ships in this system receive +1 to combat rolls and +1 movement. When a ship moves out of this system, the high alert token may move with that ship. Remove the high alert token at the start of the status phase.

Secondary: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool to move up to to two of your ships from unactivated systems into adjacent systems that contain no enemy ships. This does not activate the destination system(s). Infantry may be transported during this movement, but cannot land on planets.

[Galactic Council]

D, on 31 May 2020 - 04:18 AM, said:

Galactic Council, on 30 May 2020 - 06:01 PM, said:

Proposed updates:

Primary: Place the High Alert token in a system. Your units present with the token receive +1 to combat rolls, and your ships gain +1 movement. When moving, they may move the token with them.
Secondary: Spend 1 tokent from your strategy pool to move up to to two of your ships from unactivated systems into adjacent systems that contain no enemy ships. This does not activate the destination system(s). Cargo may be picked up during this movement.

Primary: Place the High Alert token in a system which contains your ships. Your ships in this system receive +1 to combat rolls and +1 movement. When a ship moves out of this system, the high alert token may move with that ship. Remove the high alert token at the start of the status phase.

Secondary: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool to move up to to two of your ships from unactivated systems into adjacent systems that contain no enemy ships. This does not activate the destination system(s). Infantry may be transported during this movement, but cannot land on planets.

Thanks Lady!!

Thoughts on additional strategies?

[D'rek]

Galactic Council, on 31 May 2020 - 03:18 PM, said:

D, on 31 May 2020 - 04:18 AM, said:

Galactic Council, on 30 May 2020 - 06:01 PM, said:

Proposed updates:

Primary: Place the High Alert token in a system. Your units present with the token receive +1 to combat rolls, and your ships gain +1 movement. When moving, they may move the token with them.
Secondary: Spend 1 tokent from your strategy pool to move up to to two of your ships from unactivated systems into adjacent systems that contain no enemy ships. This does not activate the destination system(s). Cargo may be picked up during this movement.

Primary: Place the High Alert token in a system which contains your ships. Your ships in this system receive +1 to combat rolls and +1 movement. When a ship moves out of this system, the high alert token may move with that ship. Remove the high alert token at the start of the status phase.

Secondary: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool to move up to to two of your ships from unactivated systems into adjacent systems that contain no enemy ships. This does not activate the destination system(s). Infantry may be transported during this movement, but cannot land on planets.

Thanks Lady!!

Thoughts on additional strategies?

That is taking longer to think about... but so far:

Galactic Council, on 30 May 2020 - 06:11 PM, said:

Am looking at TI3 strategies, and other things, and thinking we could create an 11th strategy card as well, I think then our 9 player games will see a bit more variety... So what do folks think of following as card # 11:

Armistice

Primary: Players taking a hostile action against you must exhaust or lose control of a planet. This ability is lost if you perform a hostile action.

Secondary: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool and 2 influence to claim an empty non-home system non-Mecatol Rex planet in or adjacent to a system containing friendly planets or units.

I don't like Armistice. The primary is copying/similar to some race's special abilities, and overall it's the same general idea as Diplomacy - make everyone else not want/able to attack you. Only it blanket applies everywhere so there's no opportunity for players to try and play around it, either. And the secondary is just the Xxcha ability, more or less, plus late-game I don't think the secondary will be ever used.

Imperial Historian, on 31 May 2020 - 01:45 AM, said:

I like the idea of another card whoch controls the objectives. Objectives wouldn't be drawn until this card is played.

Bureaucracy

Primary

Special if any TG are placed on this card, at the start of this action reveal one additional objective for each TG

Then:

Draw the top 2 cards from the objective deck, reveal one. You may choose to place the remaining card back on the top or bottom of the deck. You can immediately score the revealed objective

Secondary Spend 1 CT to score the last revealed objective.

I also like the idea of a strategy card which encourages combat

Raiding

Primary You may immediately activate a system as normal. If you win a combat in the activated system you may immediately gain TG equal to the value of the destroyed units to a maximum value of 5 TG

Secondary

Spend a strategic token. If you have not passed you may immediately activate a system. If you win a combat in the activated system you may immediately gain TG equal to the value of the destroyed units to a maximum value of 3 TG

Controlling the objectives is interesting, I suppose, but getting to choose which objective will appear out of a small number doesn't seem like much to gain for the price of not doing any other strategy card. I think this would immediately become the least-desired stratey card and feel like you get "stuck" with it. Secondary is just a weaker version of the Imperial primary, and for most of the game it's not that hard to take the Imperial card if you want to.

Raiding feels like it will make timing very messy. You get a free tactical action between the strategy and action phase? Kinda stepping on the Naalu go first ability, and how do end-of-strategy-phase/start-of-action-phase effects fit into it. Then for the secondary, imagine every player using the secondary - with how we resolve secondaries at the start of a player's turn it basically becomes an action phase round where everyone temporarily has fleet logistics. Just feels kinda weird to me.

Not that I necessarily have any better suggestions.

One train of thought I've been having is that in TI3 there was a Production strategy card, which let you build units in a system without activating it/even if it was already activated. The primary gave you a few bonus resources when doing so, while the secondary cost a strategy token and limited you to 3 units.

In TI4 they sort of shifted the secondary effect to Warfare (what we call Logistics) and dropped the primary, while giving Warfare/Logistics primary the "remove a CT" effect. But I don't really like the pairing of "remove a CT" with "build in homeworld". Sure, removing a CT lets you build twice in a system or build and move out of it, but it can (and is) used a lot of other ways that make the secondary effect feel like a completely different ability, rather than the usual "weaker version of primary" feel of secondaries. Plus you can get into annoying situations where you're using Warfare/Logistics to pull a CT off the board in order to attack someone, but doing so takes a whole turn and lets the person you're about to attack build defenses in the meantime.

Our Warfare kinda has that, too - you spend your turn just putting down the high alert token as prep, but this also lets someone move a ship into your path to block the thing you want to do with it.

Putting this altogether, I guess I'd be proposing something like this:

WARFARE STRATEGY CARD (6)
Primary: Place the High Alert token in a system which contains your ships. Your ships in this system receive +1 to combat rolls and +1 movement. When a ship moves out of this system, the high alert token may move with that ship. Remove the high alert token at the start of the status phase.

(there is no secondary)

PRODUCTION STRATEGY CARD (8)
Primary ability: Choose a system {it does not have to be unactivated}. You may immediately use the PRODUCTION ability of each of your units in that system, receiving 2 additional resources to spend. {this does not activate the system}

Secondary ability: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool to use the PRODUCTION ability of 1 of your space docks in your home system.


LOGISTICS STRATEGY CARD (9) (imperial moved to 10 or 11)
Primary ability: Remove 1 of your command tokens from the game board; then, gain 1 command token.

Secondary: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool to move up to to two of your ships from unactivated systems into adjacent systems that contain no enemy ships. This does not activate the destination system(s). Infantry may be transported during this movement, but cannot land on planets.

[Galactic Council]

Another thought I had about potential strategy card things...

Something that would allow you to flip your commodities without having to trade with someone?

[Imperial Historian]

Quote

I don't like Armistice. The primary is copying/similar to some race's special abilities, and overall it's the same general idea as Diplomacy - make everyone else not want/able to attack you. Only it blanket applies everywhere so there's no opportunity for players to try and play around it, either. And the secondary is just the Xxcha ability, more or less, plus late-game I don't think the secondary will be ever used.

Agreed makes everything too defensive

Quote

Controlling the objectives is interesting, I suppose, but getting to choose which objective will appear out of a small number doesn't seem like much to gain for the price of not doing any other strategy card. I think this would immediately become the least-desired stratey card and feel like you get "stuck" with it. Secondary is just a weaker version of the Imperial primary, and for most of the game it's not that hard to take the Imperial card if you want to.

Maybe having more options for the primary? If you put the other PO on top of the deck you also have foreknowledge of future objectives, as I imagine it won't be used every turn, which I think is pretty powerful. I was going to give the primary a bonus CT but I thought that made it to powerful. Scoring an extra objective can really change the rythm of the game, and getting some choice is pretty powerful.

Quote

Raiding feels like it will make timing very messy. You get a free tactical action between the strategy and action phase? Kinda stepping on the Naalu go first ability, and how do end-of-strategy-phase/start-of-action-phase effects fit into it. Then for the secondary, imagine every player using the secondary - with how we resolve secondaries at the start of a player's turn it basically becomes an action phase round where everyone temporarily has fleet logistics. Just feels kinda weird to me.

No the tactical action occurs when you play the primary, doesn't interfere with the naalu, your strategy card acts as a tactical action but you gain a bonus to resources if you win. I wanted to add something which encouraged small scale skirmishes between players and make the game a bit more active. I imagine the secondary would trigger a round where lots of combat occurred. In my mind using the secondary acts as your action for the round not giving everyone fleet logistics. perhaps wording works better
Secondary

Spend a strategic token. Gain 1 tactical token, on the upcoming turn if you win a combat in the activated system you may immediately gain TG equal to the value of the destroyed units to a maximum value of 3 TG

Quote

WARFARE STRATEGY CARD (6)
Primary: Place the High Alert token in a system which contains your ships. Your ships in this system receive +1 to combat rolls and +1 movement. When a ship moves out of this system, the high alert token may move with that ship. Remove the high alert token at the start of the status phase.

(there is no secondary)

This feels weird, not having a secondary feels a lot worse... how about a secondary which gives one of the bonuses but not both.

Quote

PRODUCTION STRATEGY CARD (8)
Primary ability: Choose a system {it does not have to be unactivated}. You may immediately use the PRODUCTION ability of each of your units in that system, receiving 2 additional resources to spend. {this does not activate the system}

Secondary ability: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool to use the PRODUCTION ability of 1 of your space docks in your home system.


LOGISTICS STRATEGY CARD (9) (imperial moved to 10 or 11)
Primary ability: Remove 1 of your command tokens from the game board; then, gain 1 command token.

Secondary: Spend 1 token from your strategy pool to move up to to two of your ships from unactivated systems into adjacent systems that contain no enemy ships. This does not activate the destination system(s). Infantry may be transported during this movement, but cannot land on planets.

I like these

[twelve]

For secondary of warfare have it be pay 1 ct and gain either +1 movement or +1 attack plus all the other text that the primary has. Isn't that just a slightly worse primary. Probably wont be used too often but I've not been a fan of the move ships outside Tactical actions.