Behold, the Holy Grail of Board Games

Maj.Striker

Maj.Striker

Swabbie
Banned
Twilight Imperium 3rd Edition!!!!

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/ti3.html

Okay, so if you are into board games at all then you're going to love this. Twilight Imperium is essentially Master of the Orion in a board game format and it is a blast! You've got everything you could hope for, galactic fleets, race advantages, technology research, colonization, ground forces, planetary defense shields, galactic councils etc. This game is just incredible! The rules are quite complex which means you'll probably have to play it at least twice just to get familar with it but after that...look out! No two games will be the same, a random tile system creates a unique universe each time and the ability to be one of 10 separate races is another unique randomizer. This is an instant classic. Although there's not much time left...this would be a killer game for the crew to play at Dragoncon. :)

I'm fortunate that I have a small group of friend in my town that love good strategy games and we play often, unfortunately a game like Twilight Imperium is probably too complex to convince your casual friends to become involved. But if you can, then you're bound to have a blast. Easily, this was the best game purchase I've ever made. Loaf, I know you'd really love this game...combat is similar to Axis & Allies but the strategy component to it is simply marvellous. Anyway, just thought I'd point it out to anyone who might be interested.
 
I bought mine at a local game store for $80 but I'm sure that's on the high end. You can find it on ebay and certain on line sites for (with shipping included) $65 to $70. Its just an amazing game...the galactic councils are tremendous fun! With 5 to six players it's a blast. Like I said...it's a little complex so it might take a bit to get the hang of it but after that...you won't want to stop! :)
 
I just don't get boardgames beyond the level of hungry hungry hippo's, I've always palyed my strategy games on the videogame format (masters of Orion 2 was a funky game)
 
I have had my eyes on Ti3 as soon as it was released. I just really wished I had a gaming group where I had a chance of playing it. However this game is just too complex and long (6 hours?) and needs many players (best with 6 I think) as well.

I'd really love to get it, but as is it looks it would only collect dust :-(((
 
lol, well I don't know much about it but I believe that it's possible somehow to play by email. I've not tried it and it would seem like a lot of work but that might be enjoyable. As for the playing time..no, its definitely not 6-8 hours. We played the game twice in about 5 hours. I could see where somehow someone could really try to prolong it that long but the truth is it'd be just delaying the inevitable. The game can easily be played in 2 hours (and since it's based on victory points you can make it even shorter by changing the number of victory points you need to win; instead of 10 go to 8 etc.).

The people I play with our pretty much all my family, I have two younger cousins that really enjoy board games and my older brother who is a cunningly flexible opponent and I have my best friend who likes playing them with us. We typically get together on Saturdays and play one or two of the following games:

Risk 2210
Axis & Allies Revised
Game of Thrones
Attack!
Napoleon in Europe (great game!)
Age of Imperialism
Civilization (not very fun...only played this a couple of times)
Twilight Imperium 3rd edition (I suspect we will be playing this one for the forseeable future)
Bloodfeud in New York

All of those are pretty great games but right now TI beats them all hands down. CFF, I don't know where you live but if you check you might find some gamer groups near you that like to play. (no comments on the types of people you might find yourself playing against :) ).
 
Maj.Striker said:
All of those are pretty great games but right now TI beats them all hands down. CFF, I don't know where you live but if you check you might find some gamer groups near you that like to play. (no comments on the types of people you might find yourself playing against :) ).
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Currently I prefer boardgaming to computer gaming. So I try/tried to find enough players already for other games I have. Which worked ok, I guess. But I am pretty sure this game wouldn't appeal to them even if almost every game so far was appreciated. There is really only one game I am disallowed to bring along: Shogun/Samurai Swords. Thats the MB Gamemaster series, so its pretty much in Line with Axis and Allies and Fortress America. Reason: too long.

Warcraft was taken considerably well (not a hit tho). Puerto Rico is liked very well. (I'd consider TI3 as kinda a fusion of those 2)
 
Ah, yeah Shogun/Samurai Swords is an excellent game. My brother recently purchased a copy off of ebay for a paltry $23 and it is awesome as well. Yeah, that is a bit of a longer game though. I would say TI could be played much shorter than Shogun. Like I mentioned with TI you can change the victory conditions to make it shorter. Still, I can understand what you're saying...its dependent on the other players. I think you're right about TI being a mix between Warcraft and Puerto Rico...though I've not played those two I've read a lot about them and Christian Peterson TI's designer said he borrowed a lot of gameplay mechanics from them.
 
Maj.Striker said:
I would say TI could be played much shorter than Shogun. Like I mentioned with TI you can change the victory conditions to make it shorter.
Click to expand...

Such is a dangerous way however. You have to loose certain strategies (some parts of the tech tree for example) that way which might actually disbalance the game (due to some race properties being more useful in early or in late game).
 
Yeah, I was just about to post an update to correct my previous statement. This saturday we played a 5 and a half hour game and still we didn't have a clear winner. The good thing was...it felt like we had only been playing for about 20 or 30 minutes!!! The game is that good, plus there was a lot of backstabbing going on. See, the game could be a lot quicker if we actually tried to win victory points. But our group of gamers are pretty aggressive and we'd rather wage war then worry about most of the victory objectives. :) Alliances are formed and then all out warfare rages...followed with some bitter betrayals. :) God, I love this game!
 
any board games with betrayal and backstabbing is a game I aprove off.
Pitty I would never get enough people together to play that.
 
Hmm, maybe we could work out a way to play be email. That would be fun. Of course, that would mean each of us would have to buy a copy of the game (I've got mine!) Hmm, or if someone was really good at web coding...they could make an online version of the game. It would take me forever since I'm not good at coding...
 
To Play by Email a Board Game is to defeat the purpuse of the whole thing, better play an online game already. In my experience, it's really rare to have a complete play of anything more complex than War (Risk).
 
There are some boardgames where people argue that PBEM is actually the better way to play them. Diplomacy comes to mind...
 
Diplomacy is an excellent example. Also although you lose that great up close personal feeling of a boardgame when you take it to PBEM (play be email) sometimes PBEM is the only truely viable way to play a complete game. Although my group often plays on Saturdays...we don't have 10-16 hours to play a full fledged Axis & Allies Revised game. The only way we can play some games completely would be via a PBEM. Diplomacy is a great example in such that it truly inspires backstabbing every single turn...that can be pretty tough to do in person with people...lie and be lied to consistently in the strategy phase.
 
Talking about massive boardgames/boardgaming - anyone planning to go to the Essen gaming fair in October?
 
I wish...:( What games do they highlight there?

BTW, I bought another copy of Twilight Imperium 3...just for posterity sake. :) A great place to get board games in the US (they may ship internationally) is www.cardhaus.com. Good selection and good prices.
 
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