Fantasy Star Wars CCG 2.0

So.. we are Decipher and are charged with streamlining the Star Wars CCG rules. Which rules do you propose to be among the first to be modified/thrown out?

 

Wow, good question.

I think that much of the game is found outside of the cards themselves (ie Undercover rules, MPG rules) and that should be kept to a minimum, if possible. Try to keep explanations on the cards themselves. I think the rules could be clarified and explain special "rules" cards in a small glossary section, or perhaps create game aids like the Nav Chart. GT can obviously be tightly focused and standardized.

 

I would ditch the cumulative rule. It just creates too many headaches.

 

Deployment restrictions on the card themselves.

 

I don't know. The thing about SW:CCG that makes it complex isn't the rules so much as it is the cards themselves. For example I think the timing rules are complicated, but that's because the cards themselves have no keywords to indicate timing. Bib is right that the cumulative rule is confusing, but if you take that rule away without fixing many of the cards, you'd have a lot of abusive cards ... A half-dozen Palace Raiders in Patrol Speeders come to mind!

Here's a couple of ideas, though:

- Weapons. We old timers know that conceptually everyone is armed with a weapon of some sort ... X-Wings are not head-butting TIE fighters in space ... Wicket is not thumb-wrestling a Biker Scout Trooper on Endor. But if you have no weapon card (or permanent weapon) you can't "shoot" anyone. Why not have all "warriors" have a built-in blaster? Draw destiny, target "hit" if destiny > defense value? Would create a little more excitement in battles, with everyone shooting at everyone else.... Weapon cards like the original Blaster could be used by non-warriors, or a warrior may still carry a Blaster Rifle to get that +1 to destiny, so there would still be some use for weapons cards.

- Unpiloted space ships. Why not just assume that every ship has a permanent pilot (ability = 1) which may be replaced with a pilot character? That would encourage me to use those ships more often. Likewise with vehicles....

- Deck building rules. Rules that said you must have X characters, Y starships, Z locations, etc. etc. This would help new players tremendously, and force decks to have more balance.

Those are just off the top of my head. If I think of others, I'll post them here....

 

change deck size. There are too many cards able to be deployed on table. Look an an open tourny deck using Local uprising (V). Too many card on table and not enough in deck. I feel that really hurts deck building and what you feel could be useful in the deck. Change the deck size. Do whatever. Don't count starting cards. Change the rules so that losing force is not losing cards and instead something else. Start with "force points" and you lose them instead of cards from the deck. 30 force points? 20? 60? I don't know. Something needs changed to fix this problem.

Seriously, i feel that something needs changed in the game. It's too overwhelming anymore. If i was a new player, and i had a choice between CCG and TCG, i would go TCG. why? not because it's the only one sold, but because the rules are simpler. There are a lot of outside rules that bog down the game. And the limited decksize, the amount of starting cards, and limited movement is seriously hindering the game...IMHO.

I always thought that movement is so limited in the game. You have to play Docking bays to move around? Sure there are nabrun and elis, but they are very limited anymore. and you have to draw the card to move them. i think an effect that allows characters to move, sort of a nabrun effect, would be nice. But then again, that's more of a (V) card idea.

 

i noticed someone mentioned something about unpiloted ships.....

What about a rule that says every ship has a perm pilot ability = 1 unless otherwise stated. And any ship with perm pilot can have the perm pilot suspended by adding a pilot if no other room is avaible. That would make a generic X-wing, Y-wing, and Tie Fighter pretty good in a deck not centered around them.

 

>>What about a rule that says every ship has a perm pilot ability = 1 unless otherwise stated. And any ship with perm pilot can have the perm pilot suspended by adding a pilot if no other room is avaible.

Ummm, yeah, I like that idea. Why didn't I think of that? Why does that sound familiar to me?


>>Eek, no. That would be limiting to deck type possibilities. You wouldn't be able to make a characterless-deck, for example, with those building requirements.

"Eek?" What are you, a mouse?

I'm thinking I don't want anyone to make character-less decks -- or more likely, starship-less or weapon-less decks!

But let me explain a little bit. I'm not suggesting there be a fixed number of each card in your deck, like you have in YJ. I'm thinking of something more like this:
"You must have at least 5 and no more than 15 of each of the following major card types: Character, Starship, Vehicle, Weapon (!!), Effect, Interrupt, Location." At a minimum, that only dictates 35 cards in your 60 card deck, that doesn't seem unreasonable to me.

Also, "You may have no more than 6 [or some other number X] of any one card or persona in your deck". (Why "card or persona"? So that you can't have 6 Qui-Gon, 6 Master Qui-Gon and 6 Qui-Gon w/Lightsaber!)

With these two rules, new players would have some guidelines at least as to how to build their deck. And, it would force some diversity in your deck. If people have to use weapons and vehicles in their decks, they'll try to find a way to make them useful.

(Shrug) FWIW, anyway....

 

Maybe another rule change would let you deploy all your locations at the start of the game, like the way ST:CCG deployed all of their missions at the start of the game....

(Shrug) Just another random thought....

 

Maybe they could make a rule where your all of your starting cards don't count towards your deck limit.

 

I like what bib said.....

Too bad they couldn't do locations like LotR and ST:CCG. The locations are limited to X (say X = 10-15 for deck like hidden base that require a large number of locations) number and are a seperate deck outside the 60 cards. You can deploy one location per turn. Could free up some deck space.

Cards like IAO, that pull sites would then pull from your location deck.

I would also make a rule that no more than X force may be generated per turn by each player. It could cap force generation so it doesn't become outragous.

I guess deck space would be the major thing i would improve upon...regardless of how it is achieved.

 

Another random thought, but a little more radical this time: Eliminate attrition. Attrition confuses practically everybody who starts to learn this game.

Battle destiny would simply add to your power. You would still be able to forfeit cards at the site to satisfy battle damage; in fact, to offset this rule change, maybe you make another rule change so that you MUST forfeit cards from the site first ... and "immune to attrition < X" would become "immune to battle damage < X" ....

 

hmmm.... i like that idea.

 

I don't agree with dumping attrition. I mean, if it was that difficult would the CCG have as many players as it does? Of course it was hard for a lot of players at the beginning because there wasn't the internet or a TD we could ask.

One of the first things I would do to help make actions more understandable is to create a keyword system similar to LOTR. The LOTR keywords do so much to simplify what can be done more than once and what can't.

 

I just taught 2 people how to play the CCG last night, and they didn't have any problem understanding the whole Battle Destiny/Attrition thing. In fact, there wasn't much that was tough for them to understand.


If I was going to change ANYTHING about the game, it would be deployment restrictions. I hate having to wait for a Dagobah location to deploy my Yoda! It's the one thing I wouldn't mind to lose.

 

Well, Red, if we use that logic we wouldn't change anything, now would we?

I just think that attrition is an unnecessarily complicated rule. Drawing battle destiny and adding it to power is one thing; using it to determine attrition is something else. You always have four numbers to keep track of: your total power and attrition, and your opponent's.

....

While I'm here, I'll suggest this, too: remove the restriction of having docking bays to move from one planet's sites to another's. Why not have a virtual Elis/Nabrun rule? Anytime during your move phase, if you want to move from one exterior site to another, hire "Nabrunelis" (draw destiny), and pay that much force. Bingo, you're there.

Too simple? How about this: if you use "Nabrunelis" to move, place your characters & vehicles face-down in a stack on your side of the table (not at any site). They are not present anywhere while they are face-down. During your next deploy phase, you must redeploy all of the cards in that stack (for free) to another exterior site. So it takes time for Nabrunelis to complete the transport. That rule may not be any simpler than the docking bay transit rule, but it allows for freer movement, and keeps the original Nabrun & Elis cards viable for play.

 

Okay, well now that it's obvious there are changes we'd all like to see, it's time to call the board meeting to order.

We will go through each phase of the game. If there's an issue you'd like to bring up, feel free. Changes that the majority agree upon will be noted.

At the end I will compile all the "changes" into one document and we'll see what we all came up with. Should be interesting.

So, first phase is the most exciting: the "Activate" phase Thoughts?

I do not see any reason to change the phase. You activate Force based on your Force icons in play. Pretty cut and dry.

 

Whoa, whoa, hold on there, Red! You skipped some of the most important steps in the game already: the "Set Up" phase!

I propose to keep the first two steps of the Set Up phase intact: (1) deploying Starting Effects and (2) revealing/deploying a starting location or objective.

The third step of the Set Up phase would be a new step where each player deploys up to 5 locations from their deck, one location at a time, alternating between players starting with Dark Side. If a player does not have a location to deploy he may "pass", but once he passes he may not deploy another location during the Set Up phase.

These locations are deployed from the player's Reserve Deck, so they still count toward the 60 card limit. A player may have more locations in his deck, and may deploy any five locations from his deck during this step of the Set Up phase (assuming deployment restrictions). In essence, a player may now have up to SIX starting locations instead of one.

The last step of the Set Up phase -- playing and resolving Starting Interrupts -- would remain unchanged.

I think the impact of this rule change would be obvious: more force generation at the start of the game, making game play quicker; eliminates (or at least lessens) the chance of losing a key location needed for your deck (Hidden Base system, Death Star II sector, etc.); makes certain decks more viable (the aforementioned Death Star II for example)....

Sorry, I just ran out of time, I'll pick this up later....

 

But in your example, Light Side would have the same opportunity.

Let's say Light Side is playing Lightsaber Combat. With 19 Force, Light Side could deploy Qui-Gon Jedi Master with his saber, Obi-Wan Jedi Knight and his saber, and Jedi Luke and his saber! Now which player did you say was at a disadvantage?

 

Six is too much, but the mechanic has its potential (I'm in favor of anything that gets 0's out of my deck ).

I would say this: you either start an objective or up to three non-battleground locations. This prevents a massive amount of Force to start and further prevents anyone from dropping a big main or beefed up ship at a bg for early, unopposed drains.

It also prevents the Death Stars or Jedi training from getting set up too fast. They're fast enough as is.

 

I think what he was saying that you need a few turns to build up your hand at the same time you build up your force.