The Boardgame ...

In Six Easy Steps

Man created sentient robots called cylons, who rebelled and destroyed human civilization. We are the last survivors of the human race, trying to reach the lost colony of Earth.
1. This is the board. a. This is Galactica, this is Colonial One, and these spaces are locations on each ship where we can do stuff. The area around Galactica is also divided into spaces, for vipers, cylons, and civilian ships. Civilian ships are always there, but we dont actually put them on the board unless theyre in danger. b. These are our resources, this is the jump track, and this is the boarding track. We win by making a series of FTL jumps, which Ill explain in a minute. The main idea is just to survive. We lose in any of three different ways: i. We lose if any one resource drops to zero. ii. We lose if a cylon reaches the end of the boarding track. iii. We lose if six locations on Galactica are damaged. 2. On your turn you draw cards according to your character sheet; they are unfortunately color-based. Ill explain what the cards do in a minute. Then you get to move: a. You can move to any location on the same ship. b. If you discard a card, you can move to any location on another ship. c. If youre in a viper you can move to an adjacent space, or discard a card to move to any location on a ship. 3. After you move you get one action. Each location has an action you can do, several cards have actions, and some characters have actions. If youre in a viper, you can spend your action to shoot or move. 4. After your action, you draw a crisis card. This is the engine that makes the game run. a. Some crisis cards add more cylons to the board. b. Some crisis cards include a skill check with a target number. One by one, face down, we add any number of cards we want into a central pile, plus two random cards, and then we flip them over and count themwe ignore the abilities, all we care about is the number. If the card numbers add up to beat the target number, we pass. If the we get less than the target number, we lose and bad stuff happens. i. Heres the trick: each skill check also includes a set of colors. Cards that match those colors work toward our target number, but cards of other colors work against it. ii. Some of the location actions require skill checks as well. c. After you resolve the crisis, you look for two things: cylon activations, and the jump icon. i. This icon tells you which cylons to activate, and there are specific rules for what they do. ii. This icon tells you to advance the jump track one space. When it gets to the end we jump automatically, but when its on these spaces we can force an early jump at the risk of losing population, because some ships get lost or left behind. iii. When we jump, the first thing we do is clear the board of all ships, and return all pilots to the hangar. Then the admiral draws two location cards and chooses one of them. This builds up distance, and when our distance reaches 8 that means our next jump wins the game. Most of the cards are 1 or 2 distance, but there are some 3s.

5. Okay, now heres the kicker to the whole thing. They cylons have developed new androids so perfect that they look human, which means any of could secretly be one. At the beginning of the game were each dealt a loyalty card, and when our jump distance gets to four were each dealt one more loyalty card. So you might know youre a cylon from the beginning, or you might think youre human and turn out to be a sleeper agent. a. If youre a cylon you try to secretly work against us to destroy the fleet. Cylons lose if the humans make their final jump, but they win if the humans lose: i. Any resource is reduced to zero. ii. A cylon boarding party makes it to the end of the boarding track. iii. Six locations on Galactica are damaged at once. b. Part of the fun of the game is trying to figure out who the cylons are. Cylons can work against the humans in a number of ways: i. They can make and encourage bad decisions. You have to be careful not to make people suspicious. ii. They can sabotage skill checks. Remember that off-color cards count against the target number. If we flip over the cards and see a bunch of off-color cards in there, well know theres at least one cylon aboard. Thats why we add two random cards to the pile, because it makes it harder to tell if theres a cylon or not. iii. If youre a cylon, youre loyalty card has a special action you can use to really hurt the humans, but you have to reveal yourself in order to use it. For example, on your turn you can use your action to reveal your loyalty card and blow up a section of the ship. From that point on you actually leave the ship and use these cylon locations instead. Revealed cylons can do a lot of damage, but its often a lot more effective to stay hidden and attack from within. 6. Now its time to choose characters. Each character has two good abilities and one bad ability, and most of the good abilities are equally useful as both a human and a cylon. There are military leaders, political leaders, and viper pilots, plus one support guy, and we need to take a more or less equal spread of each. 7. We have an admiral and a president, who get special powers of their own. These characters start with the titles, but they can change over the course of the game. 8. Now we set up the board, with each of us in our starting location and a handful of cylons and civilian ships around us in space. 9. Now Im going to give everyone their loyalty card. You are required to read them for at least twenty seconds, without looking away, even if youre not a cylon, because that way it wont be obvious who is. Ready, set, go. 10. Each player, except the first, draws three cards, based on the colors of your characters skills. Ill go first to show you how a turn works. Now I draw my full five cards and take my turn.