"Starcraft Boardgame....6 hours of my life I just lost" Topic

So some of the guys at the game store got the new Starcraft. They had heard it was similar to Twilight Imperium. For 80 bucks you get a huge game box stuffed with counters, cards, and minis. Must of what you expect from FFG.

I must say this is a disapointing game. Much of the tactics have to do with card draw and how one places order tokens. These order tokens denote if you are going to attack, build, or research new technologies. These tokens are placed in various areas thus you have to pre-think your turn. While this is a nice mechanic it allows for major abbuse by players. If you are the one who is last placing your counters you can "trap" other players moves by putting your orders over thiers then going through your own stack cashing them to be skipped every turn. Thus I had to wait atleast an hour every round to take a turn as everyone was able to take multiple turns because I had my counters "trapped."

While this is a viable mechanic anything that forces a player to be unable to play for that extended period of time bogs a game down and makes it unfun, while I am sure we might have been playing things wrong, I am going to pass on future games. I urge you to do the same. D- at best

That's a game I've been thinking of getting and have read quite a few reviews and posting about it on Boardgame Geek. I've seen discussion of the strategy of blocking but not anything that sounded like your experience. Waiting an hour would be a pretty big red flag in my book that there might be something wrong in the way the group is interpreting the rules. Since you had so much free time, did you read the rules yourself to double check?

I bought the game. I must echo beowulfdahunter's comments. It is slow and fiddley. As they tried to duplicate the feel of the video game, you are left manually doing things taken care of for you by the AI in the original.

Booooorrring.

However, I highly recommend the components to run a sci-fi campaign. The excellent printing and exhaustive quantity allow you to use the pieces for any rule combination you can think of to run a campaign background.

I don't regret my purchase, but I won't be playing "Starcraft: the Boardgame" with it.

Guiscard

How were the minis? I picked up the WOW boardgame and the heroes, ogres and murlocs are pretty nice.

FFG has a really good track record overall, from their games I have played (we are Arkham Horror addicts, here). But not every game can be a winner, alas. This one sounds flawed (although it might be a problem with some misinterpreting of the rules, or just extra slow because it was the first game).

My brother tried "Fury of Dracula" and didn't care for it – as I recall, he didn't like the combat system at all.

Minis are excellent.

3 of each type in 2 colors ( 2 factions for each race, 3 races) and well produced.

Not surprised.

I find the whole idea of making a boardgame out of a cimouter game to be perverse. Almost as perverse as making a board game out of a computer game made from a pen-and-paper RPG (Descent)…

-Kle.

"cimouter" really ought to be "computer".

-Kle.

The board game isn't the same as the computer game. It deals with things at a galaxy level, not at the individual battle level like the computer game.

But that said, that's certainly an odd opinion. Why would it matter where the original idea first appeared? People make board (and mini) games from all kinds of inspiring sources.

Sure like th exciting Planet of the Apes board game or Star Wars Monopoly games. Does anyone actually plays these games or do people buy them for others when they have no other idea what to get someone for Christmas/birthdays?

At least Chutes and Ladders and Candyland are fun.

I'm not sure I understand your point. There are poor games made from original ideas too.

I think you might find that some people like the various versions of Risk that have been licensed so even that can't be considered all bad.

A friend owns this and I've played it once when he brought it around to mine. Several of us were involved in the game, and I have to confess now, I'm not an avid PC gamer, so Starcraft was unfamiliar territory to me. And that was problem number 1 – I'd say a working knowledge of what Starcraft (PC) was about would have helped here, to put the rules and game play into context on what I had to do.

Game production was good – usual FFG standard, and game set-up was OK – there was potential tho for any one player to be set at a disadvantage from the outset, with devious manipulation by the others.

Problem number 2 now – as the rules were read out on what could be done, like the tech / abilities acquistion and the choices in your operations, and the order in which you had to do things, and the risks (like the blocking mentioned above), and spending resources… and I have to say, it wasn't sinking in. With the first turn underway, what had looked to be a simple board layout with plenty of space for exploitation before hostilities commenced, proved not to be the case, as one player landed exactly in the spot I was looking to move into – and frankly, the snookering with your order counters languishing at the bottom of other player's stacks was a touch boring. Luckily, I had some 28mm WWII German infantry from Artizan to clean up and prep for priming, and so that kept me occupied – but the game, and my interest in it, was effecively over from the end of Turn 1….

Would I attempt to play it again? No – there was nothing that really grabbed me at all about it, despite my fondness for sci-fi strategy conqer/resource games – I'd much rather sit down to Twilight Imperium. The only aspect I had any liking for was something to do with the resources – I say 'something' as now I can't recall what that was! That might sum it up for some others here I guess…

Not long after, we had a session with the WoW boardgame as well, and that was just as awful for me, generating absolutely no interest to see it thru. So I began to consider that the retro-evolution of PC games 'back' to boardgames was a bad thing, almost heretical – until I played the Doom boardgame! Now that changed my mind – and if you have money to spend on Starcraft, and you miss other games that had you fending off monsters as you tromped thru rooms and corridors, forget Starcraft and buy Doom….. definitely a lot more enjoyable.

FFGs original games are always disappointing. The games they license are usually very good, however.

But that said, that's certainly an odd opinion. Why would it matter where the original idea first appeared? People make board (and mini) games from all kinds of inspiring sources.

It was a mediocre computer game, without much depth or innovation. Computer games often get by by being "flashy", with pretty graphics and such, at the expense of gameplay. boardgames can't usually get away with that. If all the components are dull, and it's still a good game, then the gameplay must be pretty good, eh?

Conversely, the strength of computer games comes from the ability for solo play, and the way they can do very time-consuming things quickly.

For me, computer games and boardgames are completely different things, for different purposes. I think that making one into the other isn't the best of ideas. Of course, there have been boardgames that were nigh-unplayable that have been made into better computer games, but IMO that's because they were made for the wrong format to begin with.

I also find "sports" video games, where you take the place of an individual athlete to be absurd. Popular, though.

It's similar to the way I find text and instant -messaging to be bizarre and clumsy.

Anyway, I figure people should play whatever they like – doesn't matter what I think. All the above is just my opinion.
-Kle.

[q]It was a mediocre computer game, without much depth or innovation. Computer games often get by by being "flashy", with pretty graphics and such, at the expense of gameplay. boardgames can't usually get away with that. If all the components are dull, and it's still a good game, then the gameplay must be pretty good, eh[/q]

I would hardly call Starcraft mediocre or an exercise in style over substancey. People are still playing it competitively 10 years after release.

It's popularity made "Starcraft:the boardgame" one of the most anticipated games of the year. So I guess most people don't have a problem with an idea crossing over from computer to non-digital.

The merits of PC-to-Boardgame ancestry aside, it would appear we have at least two posters who said the game was dull and uninteresting to play. Any game that allows a player to sit for an hour before their next turn sounds broken to me.

But … what I would like to know are there any folks out there who have played and like this game?

The reason I ask is because once a year I get together with a bunch of my friends for along-weekend of gaming, and this is one of the games that somebody picked up recently. If this were just a weekly gaming session, I'd be willing to give it a shot even with the negative press.

But for a once a year shindig? I don't want to waste 6 hours of my time giving this game a shot now that I know what some players have experienced.

Try Nexus Ops instead. A lot of folks referred to it as "Starcraft the boardgame" before there was a Starcraft boardgame.
Lots of fun, pretty easy to learn, decent replayability.

I hesitated buying it several times due to the cover art and the rather garish pieces, but I am glad I finally caved in and bought it. Enough that I am still considering a second set for larger games.

SeattleGamer,

I'd recommend browsing here for a bit more insight:

boardgamegeek.com/game/22827

If you scroll down to the Board Game Forum table, you can see a tab for Reviews – and some of the more general comments may be helpful too. There's even a thread that someone's started comparing 'Starcraft' with 'Nexus Ops'.

I admit my personal experience is negative (and unlikely to be challnged or changed any time soon) so the comments in BGG may help decide on whether you fit this in to your game weekend.

And this link is handy too:

link

It's a long review but well worth the read – I can even say it almost made me change my mind – almost….

A link at the top of the review is an even better bonus:

link

You should be able to find the game's rulebook here, to read and learn beforehand….

Hope that helps :o)

Thanks for the links. I've read enough to know this game is a pass for my group. There are strong recommendations to learn the game from someone else who knows how to play (and none of us have played it so it will be new to all), and that it takes several games to get a good feel for how the rules work together (and we will have one play).

In the past, when we've introduced new, big games to the group, it was after the person who bought it got a chance to play it a couple of times with a smaller group, learn the rules, get the FAQ, download any charts or summary sheets that might be out on BGG, etc. So the larger group had a core number of people who had played it at least once, maybe twice.

Not this time. So we'll pass.

Seattle Gamer,

That sounds like a sensible decision – if no-one in the group can take on the lead in teaching the others, then you would be better off playing something else. And in my opinion, this game actually needs a couple of players who can instruct….

I'm lucky in having a hardcore of complete frothers who enjoy sitting down to a large helping of Twilight Imperium, also by FFG, and that is always an enjoyable game…

This is a little late but I'll post my impressions of the game anyway for the sake of those TMPers who find this thread in the future.

I LIKED the way orders were stacked on one another. It had interesting tactical applications. Having to wait an hour before you get your turn to move sounds a little extreme to me, it didn't get nowhere near as bad as that when we played. I think that after a while, you learn how to place your orders in a smart way that gives you more control of your actions in the Execution phase.

I also liked the modular game board, this is the first strategic boardgame I've played with a modular board and it makes for a refreshing change.

What I didn't like was that the rules were 45 pages and didn't feel very intuitive. I rather got the impression that the game's designers, against their better judgement, added lots of unnecessary rules simply to placate the PC game fans (who, I imagine, enjoy seeing as many elements as possible from the PC game reinterpreted into board game rules). 45 pages of rules, 25 different unit types and over 300 cards is a bit rich, IMHO.

I've never played the PC game, and as a result, parts of the boardgame seemed a bit esoteric to me. Particularly all the many unit types and technologies. The game can also end pretty quickly (in number of turns played), so it's hard to get an opportunity to build and use all those different units. Particularly the elite units that you can't get until you've bought lots of upgrades to your bases.

My group probably WILL keep playing Starcraft the Boardgame. Now that we've invested time in actually learning the rules and have gotten some idea of basic strategies and tactics, I think future gaming sessions will run more fluidly.

By the way, the rule we kept forgetting about the most was that units with only ground-based attacks couldn't harm flying units. It was quite a severe mistake that completely messed up one game for us! Just saying that as a heads up to other beginner players.

I think we are getting too old :-)

I picked his up on ebay recently, and my (9 year old) daughter loved her Zergs as she stomped all over my poor marines. Yes, the rulebook is a bit confusing in places, with some quite steep learning curves (not helped by the multitude of little rules and specific sequences) but we managed to work through it last night and got the main mechanisms sorted.

I get the impression that it will take one or two games to get the real hang of it. Then vengance will be mine (even if it is on the bottom of an ultralisks feet)

Geoff,

I think you may be right! Good to see this blast from the past reprised. I can honestly say that in the last three and a half years, I still haven't played this game again. But great to know your daughter loves it! Best of luck in your revenge crusade :o)

IMHO, Fantasy Flight Games would produce better games (those based on video-games) if they did NOT try and replicate the video game as a board game, and instead use the theme/setting of the video game as the basis for a board game style game. Doom, Descent, StarCraft, etc…(?) could have been approached in a different fashion mechanically and been produced as superior games. I am sure that people would still buy them, and as a bonus (for us) enjoy them more.