Welcome to issue seven of 'The Cardboard Cartographer,' here on 'The science of selling yourself short.'
In this issue we are going to be doing something a little different.
Yet another new feature.
Some foreshadowing;
Here at The Cardboard Cartographer we accept that any review needs to be based on real life experience of playing the game being reviewed.
Due to life happening most of the reviews posted here will feature games that are good few months old at least. Not only does this allow for games to be played alongside real life issues, but it also allows for more research to be done on the games and their accompanying material.
This issue throws those rules out of the window.
This issue features a product that is a couple of weeks old at best (at time of posting). It is new enough for a fair amount of people to have not even noticed it was out at all.
This is not a review.
This is the un-boxing of 'Firefly: Pirates and Bounty Hunters;' an expansion for the Firefly board game.
To have something this up to date is a fairly exciting prospect here for
'The Cardboard Cartographer,' and is certainly something we'll try to
do more of in the future.
I digress!
Google Fu.
For those of you who have yet to encounter 'Firefly: the board game,' or indeed the television show it is based upon, I suggest you Google it.
Failing that you can read issue one of 'The Cardboard Cartographer.' It was our very first review!
Check it out - Firefly Review
Caught up? Good.
On to the contents.
This picture contains everything in the new expansion.
as you can see there are new ships, cards, tokens and missions.
Before we continue I would like to point out that there are some new rules. These will not be covered in this issue, but will be explained in a future issue where we review the expansion. So stay tuned!
In the mean time we'll get acquainted with the new stuff; starting with the new ships.
This ship is the SS Walden. The ship is the salvage vessel from the episode 'Out of gas.'
as you can see it has a huge amount of storage space, something which *spoiler* will be invaluable in some of the new missions!
The other new ship is the Interceptor.
This is the bounty hunter; Jubal Early's ship from the episode 'Objects in Space.'
This ship has minimal storage space, crew compartments and upgrade space.
The plus side? It re-roll failed boarding tests.
In addition it is super fast!
Almost the exact opposite of the SS Walden.
While we're on the subject of speed, it should be noted that both the new ships have unique drive cores.
The SS Walden has a small range, but does not suffer heavy load penalties (another new feature), while the interceptor is outrageously fast, and requires no fuel.
New ships mean new captains.
Meet Jubal Early and Sash.
Again, their card text features modifiers based on the new rules.
We'll have to wait and see how effective they prove to be
Speaking of new rules, pretty much everything from here on in concentrates heavily on them.
The new missions for example;
'Jailbreak,' 'The choices we make' and 'Another man's treasure,' are missions specifically for the expansion. 'Choices,' and 'Treasure' are PvP based. Nice.
There is extra loot to be had. Five new cards for each trading post
The biggest addition to these cards is the new class of crew; The Lawman.
A Lawman is an alliance operative. They work for free but will not participate in illegal activity.
Each contact also has five new cards.
These are mad up entirely of jobs that involve piracy and bounties.
Oh wait, what?
Yes, an entirely new card type called 'Bounty.'
While the specifics of this new card will not be known until we've played the game, it is safe to assume that you can obtain or abduct certain people and trade them in for cash.
I picked out a few that caught my eye.
I almost lost it at Two Fry's 'unlicensed haberdashery.'
Finally we come to the new tokens.
As well as some extra tokens for already existing items such as parts, fuel, warrants and so on, there are some new ones.
Seven to be exact.
These seven have numbers printed on one side; these are destinations, whilst the other side are Havens.
So there you have it!
First impression.This is the first 'first impression,' written at the time of my first impression.
I pretty much summed everything up in issue one. Pieces wise nothing has changed.
The tweaked game mechanics are where this will get really interesting. I love the concept of player verse player and I also live the new ships.
I am also curious to see how piracy, boarding, stand off's and bounty's work
I don't know about you guys, but I am looking forward to playing this expansion.
In issue one I stated that I thought the game could do with some player verses player interaction to lend some urgency to play, and here it might well be.
That is all for this issue.
If you have any questions about 'The Cardboard Cartographer', this or past issues, and/or anything else, feel free to drop me a line.
Also, if you fancy leaving some feedback you can do that too.
Comment bellow, or hit me up on Twitter @DarKHaZZl3 - Use the hash tag #TCC.
I'd love to hear from you, especially if you've managed to play Pirates and Bounty Hunters yet!
Thanks for reading
-DH-
Welcome to the former home The Cardboard Cartographer.
The Cardboard Cartographer has moved.
The reasons for this decision can be found here in this post
Because of this, when a review for a game that was once hosted here is covered on The Cardboard Cartographer it is removed from this site.
But have no fear!
If you wish to read the new and improved review you can follow the link bellow!
Love Letter Review.
Welcome to my new feature; 'The Cardboard Cartographer.'
The Cardboard Cartographer will be an blog series focused around table top reviews.
I'll be mapping out my encounters with the world of war games, miniatures games, board game, card games and others of like.
Having
played quite a few board games in my time I thought I could easily start with
something from my past experience. However, I thought I'd save those for later
(when I have nothing to write about :P).
So today I'll be talking about a relatively new game (new in terms of board games anyway).
FIREFLY - The [Board] Game.
For those of you who are not aware of FireFly's existence I'll fill you in.
FireFly
was a TV series first aired in 2002 written by Joss Whedon (Known for Buffy,
Angel and the Avengers to name a few). It was cancelled after one season, which
by and large was the biggest travesty committed by Fox entertainment. Ever.
(Except for their news services... really? They try to call that trash news?).
Firefly is what can only be described
as a Space Cowboy/Western Drama.
Set in the year 2157, it follows the story of crew of Serenity; A Firefly class
spaceship and their various encounters and adventures in a generally
unforgiving Galaxy.
For more information WATCH THE DAMN
SHOW!! It is one of the best TV shows I have ever seen.
If you don't have time/ have severe
taste issue, you can read more about it on Wikipedia
The Firefly board game is set in this setting.
Whilst prior knowledge of the TV series makes the whole game more engaging, it
is far from necessary. The theme has only a marginal bearing on how the game is
played, and therefore prior knowledge of the show will not grant one player any
noticeable advantage.
So, back to the game.
Firefly was published in 2013 by Gale
Force Nine LLC in conjunction with Battlefront Miniatures ltd, and designed by
Aaron Dill, John Kovaleski and Sean Sweigart. For more of this general
information, check it out on Board Game Geek - http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/138161/firefly-the-game
The game is for 1 - 5 players and takes
around 90mins according to the box. The reality is at least 3 hours. The game
is competitive in nature, and while it is possible to interfere with other
players, it is not a large part of the game (even if you try really hard to
make it that way).
The object of the game is to be the
first to complete the Goals on the Story card; of which details vary.
To do this players must take turns traversing the Galaxy ( the Game board), in
search of jobs; both legal and illegal, to make money to fund their escapades,
thus making life easier in the long run, hire more crew to make lighter work of
jobs, and buy equipment and ship upgrades.
Ahh. Board games always sound so
simple. But as always there are obstacles in the players way. These vary from
the Alliance; the big bad government trying to stamp out any illegal activity
within their 'safe' sections of space , The Reavers; the cannibalistic, homicidal
and generally horrible folk, trying to... well... eat you, and all manner of
scum and mechanical problems in-between.
Overview done.
Review.
First Impressions.
First thing you notice when you get
this game is that is pretty big!
While this doesn't put me off playing a board game (far from it in fact!), it
does make the logistics of playing it problematic.
This only gets worse the
further you get in the game.
There are 11 decks of cards (Your
standard trading/ playing card size) and each deck requires its own discard pile.
Very
shortly that will result in 22 piles of cards.
These cards make up your
missions, crew and equipment. These; as well as your ship, need to be stored in
your playing area.
Needless to say, it gets quite crowded.
Space issues aside the production
quality is very nice.
The cards are straight forward, clear and visually appealing.
The game pieces are made of good card stock and the resources are plentiful.
The in game currency is probably my favourite form of currency ever!
The board is pretty. Who says board games are dull!
The only issue I have is that the ships themselves are a bit flimsy. However,
they are considerably more intricate than your standard player marker, so I guess
that is the price you pay.
As previously stated, this game is very
heavily themed.
While this doesn't really effect game play in any meaningful
way, it is far more enjoyable being a fan of the franchise and sci-fi. Seeing cast
from the show pop up adds a bit of awe to proceedings.
To the important part - Game play.
As with many big box games it is very
easy to be put off but the rule book.
Yes, it is quite page worthy, and yes, it does really all need to be read in
order to play the game efficiently.
In spite of its relatively large and
badly organised rule book the game is fairly straight forward.
A player can take 2 of a possible 4 actions
per turn. These actions are (in no particular order);
Fly,
Buy,
Deal,
Work.
You can only take an action once per
turn.
Put simply, you can either move, buy equipment/fuel/parts/crew, Deal (get a
job/ interact with job giving folk) or work (do something required by your job).
Players take it turns doing these things
until someone wins.
While that sounds repetitive, the game
throws enough spanners into the works to keep this interesting.
For example; travelling short distances
is much safer than travelling long distances... regardless of where you are.
If
you are doing illegal business you might need to avoid the Alliance, which
requires you risking Reaver territory.
Completing jobs isn't straight forward either; each job has a requirement in terms
of skill, and more often than not, requires a player to complete numerous skill
checks or suffer the consequences (failing the mission, losing crew members or
being issued a warrant for your arrest!).
If you are interested in learning more
about the game you can download the rules here - http://www.flamesofwar.com/Portals/0/Documents/Events/FireflyRulebook.pdf
Personal opinion.
Now, I wouldn't be me if I didn't pick it apart a little, so...
The game is relatively easy to be
introduced to, and the mission based mechanic ensures that experienced players
will not have a major upper hand over newer players. This is, and its low down
time between player turns makes it a nice game for new players to jump into
(assuming someone knows the rules).
The only issue that arises in the
experienced vs new area is knowing where certain crew members/equipment resides
in the market.
Knowing which 'shop' provides you with the 'good' characters does give a slight
advantage to the experienced player.
However, this is offset by the random
nature of the market and the need to continually earn money to fuel such endeavours.
Another point I should note is that I often find that games with no player
vs player mechanics to be quite...dull.
Co-operative games seem to lack a sense of urgency; a sense of jeopardy.
Firefly is in-between the two.
While playing the game you exist in
between co-op and competitive; you are not working together directly, but
you're not directly involved in each other fortunes; except of course, by
winning the game first.
In this sense the game has managed to
hold on to a sense of jeopardy; the missions can be quite dangerous depending
on your crew and equipment, and the risks are ever present.
However, because
you have no player vs player interference on a meaningful scale, you can easily
amass the resources required to make most skill checks an automatic pass.
Player vs player mechanics grants a
game a killer edge; gaining the upper hand or a way to sabotage your opponents
plans to claw back time/ advance further.
Firefly lacks this.
So unless your opponents are rushing around
trying to complete the GOAL first; in which case they'll likely fail, you can
take your time. The sense of urgency, and therefore jeopardy, is lost.
This I feel is my biggest gripe with
the game. For something so intricate, it is quite casual. This can make games
drag on. What is meant to take 90 mins can take between 3-5 hours.
So, overall I enjoyed the game, and I'd recommend it to fans of the franchise,
and to board game players looking for something a little different. However I
feel that the game could do with a little more incentive to get players to take
risks sooner to get into the 'lead,' as opposed to players taking their time
and tanking resources.
So there you have it. Firefly down
If you've played Firefly, what do you think? What do you feel are the best/
worst aspects of the game.
Feel free to drop me a comment, or tweet me @DarKHaZZl3.
Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for more reviews from The Cardboard Cartographer!
-DH-
