Battlestar Galactica: The Flamethrower!

About a week ago, I purchased the Battlestar Galactica board game. It's based on the recent television series about a rag-tag fleet of space ships, all that's left of humanity after a surprise attack by "cylons," and their search for a new place to call home. And the twist is that cylons are a formerly robotic race that the humans created, who then (predictably) rebelled. After a lengthy exile, they returned, this time with the ability to appear human, and executed a plan that nearly destroyed their creators.

The first season of the show, and the game that is based upon it, follows the flagship of the fleet (the titular Battlestar Galactica) as it deals with the hardships of space, attacks from pursuing cylons, and worst of all, the cylon saboteurs in their midsts that they can't root out because they appear human in almost every way.

That last point is what makes this game stand out, for me. As the game begins, each of the players is secretly given a loyalty card that tells them if they are a cylon are not. The humans win if they can get the fleet all the way to Kobol, a legendary planet, a new home. The cylons win if the humans fail.

So, while trying to avoid revealing themselves, the cylon players try to wreak as much havoc as possible. There are all kinds of ways to do this. As problems come up on the Galactica and the rest of the fleet, the players have to work together, playing cards from their hands, but any player can secretly add cards that don't help, or possibly make things worse. Sometimes a player is forced to choose between two terrible options; a human will try to pick the one that harms the fleet the least, but there is no guarantee that they aren't a cylon choosing the one that they think the harm the fleet the most. Many of the character abilities work in secret, giving a player a great way to help everyone, or a great way to hurt everyone with no one the wiser. Almost every decision in the game could be interpreted as a human or cylon decision...

And half way to Kobol, things are made even worse: The cylons have placed a number of "sleeper agents" throughout the fleet. There are people who are working for the cylons and don't even know it! At the halfway point of the journey, they suddenly realize who they are and what they need to do. Each player is dealt a second loyalty card, and this one can change a "non-cylon" into a "cylon," along with that player's win condition, without warning.

So, there is a lot of paranoia. You can't trust anyone, and even if you had a chance to look at their cards and know for sure (and there are a few ways to do this), they still can't trust you. The entire game runs on this. Yes, there are mechanics for dealing with problems, making FTL jumps, flying fighters around in space, making political powerplays, and seeking out a new home, but all of it is surrounding the simple core of the game: The players can't trust one another. And from what I've seen in actual play reports, there are a lot of accusations thrown around.

It sounds like a whole lot of fun. And it looks like we'll probably be playing it this coming Sunday, so I'll make sure to give a rundown of how it went.