MarkyMark and I got our second game of BSG-Starship Battles in over the weekend. This time we tried using specific pilots. The game uses some really interesting mechanics when it comes to using pilots (both named an unnamed), and it’s worth going over those mechanics before I tell you how the game went.
In BSG-Starship Battles, you can fly your starfighters with specific pilot cards (named pilots), pilot tokens (unnamed pilots at a specific skill level), or neither (considered to be average pilots). The starter set includes pilot cards for one named Colonial pilot—Lee “Apollo” Adama—and two named Cylon pilots—AI Level 4 and AI Level 5. The named pilots have positive “to hit” modifiers, as you would expect (Apollo’s modifier is +2). There are also pilot tokens included for both factions; in ascending order, they are Nugget, Rookie, Average, Expert, and Ace. The pilot tokens also have “to hit” modifiers commensurate with each pilots’ skill level, from -1 for Nuggets to +2 for Aces.
Additionally, both the named and unnamed pilots can be equipped with “talents” and “flaws”. We haven’t yet played with the flaws; we only tried using the talents in this game. There are four types of talents: Firing, Maneuver, Activity, and Other. Interestingly, the named pilots can only be assigned the specific talents listed on their pilot cards; for example, of the seven Maneuver talents (Resolute Pilot, Evasion, Sharp Reflexes, Daredevil, Nimble Pilot, Dodging, and Exceptional Pilot), Apollo can only be equipped with Daredevil and Sharp Reflexes. Unnamed pilots (pilot tokens) can take a number of talents commensurate with their skill level—Nuggets can take only one talent (of any type), and Aces can take up to five (of any type). Use of named and unnamed pilots, and the number of assigned talents for the unnamed pilots, are either specified by the scenario being played or agreed upon by the opposing players--there are no point values for pilots (named or unnamed) or talents.
Now, there are limitations, and this is where things get interesting. Pilots can only use one talent of each type once per turn (so if a pilot has two Firing talents equipped, only one of the two can be used in each turn). The same talent cannot be used twice in a turn, unless another equipped talent allows you to do so. If the pilot is wounded or severely wounded (critical effects), they can only use a max of two or one talents per turn (respectively), no matter how many are equipped. To make things even MORE interesting, most talents have a finite number of uses; this is listed on the talent card. Each time the talent is used, a token is placed on that talent’s card; when the maximum number of uses is reached, that talent can no longer be used in the game. There are a few talents that have an unlimited number of uses.
In this game, my opponent flew Apollo and an average Colonial pilot against my Level 5 AI and an average Raider pilot (or...AI, I guess?). As you can see from the picture below, my unnamed Raider got waxed pretty early in the game.
A note on the image above: we didn't realize that certain damage tokens only apply to collisions (i.e collisions with asteroids, planetoids, etc). The token with the 12 damage points is one of those collision tokens. However, we didn't know that at the time, so that Raider died pretty quickly!
The next several turns looked something like the picture below (although I took this picture once the Level 5 AI killed the unnamed Colonial pilot):
As I was chasing the Viper, which was oriented almost 180 degrees away from its direction of flight, Apollo was pacing my Raider at close range, firing into it on pretty much every turn. Good tactic on Mark's part, and Apollo was able to eventually close the deal and eliminate the Level 5 AI.
I pulled four "0" damage tokens IN A ROW out of the token bag, much to Mark's frustration. For the last 5 turns of the game the Level 5 AI Raider was hanging on by a wire and a transistor--14 damage points!
Playing with the talents was pretty interesting, and I like that most of them have a limited number of uses. In addition to having to choose which talent to use, this forces more tactical decision-making during the game, and adds a lot of depth.
I also really like the unnamed pilot tokens. With a little planning and coordination, I could see using those cards in a "career progression" campaign, where you start off as a Nugget and progress up the ranks based on surviving engagements and scoring kills. Someone needs to write up a version of the "Heroes of the Aturi Cluster" cooperative X-Wing campaign that can be used in BSG-SB!
We also had our first chance to use the "Tailing" rule in this game; one of my Raiders got in close enough to tail one of the Vipers. However, in this case it didn't help too much because the Viper was rotated away from its direction of travel, limiting my opponent's maneuver choices, but it was still neat to see it in action!
Next time I'll see if we can start incorporating the pilot flaws and elevation changes.
And this game still looks DANG COOL on the table top.
Thanks for reading!
