This week we will look at Starcraft: The Board Game
from Fantasy Flight Games (FFG). Normally I’m wary of franchise games where one company licenses a non-game brand from another company. If you haven’t heard of Starcraft from Blizzard you should probably go back to 1998 and play it. Suffice it to say, the original is a science fiction real time strategy (RTS) computer game. It is very popular and along with Warcraft helped define and shape the genre. The highly anticipated sequel is coming very soonTM.
Luckily, you don’t need to know anything about the computer game to enjoy the board game. Certainly having a familiarity with the factions and their various units makes it easier to remember what different units do. On the other hand, having preconceptions might hamper your strategy on the first few plays. Converting a game from real time into a turn based game necessarily requires some changes to mechanics. Fortunately FFG has experience with science fiction strategy board games with Twilight Imperium, which is a fantastic game if you have four to eight hours to play it. They are similar games and if you are trying to choose between the two I would say the primary advantage of Starcraft is that it can be played in two to four hours instead. I must warn you, both require a fairly large sized table.
Unlike the computer game, where each session resolves a single battle on a single planet, the board game takes a grander scale with armies conquering territories on different planets. At the beginning of the game each player takes turns placing two planets in the galaxy. Between two and six players may play, so a game may include between four and twelve planets. Each planet has a few territories and each territory will have either a type of resource or a victory point value (Editor’s note: Conquest Points are the official designation.) Most of the fighting will be over these victory points. At the end of each turn if you control a territory with victory points you earn the points. This is important to note, because unlike some other war games, you don’t need to have conquered more than half the map to win. It also means you can get a sizable lead, and then edge your way to victory holding just one or two territories. The advantage of this system is it keeps the game from running on too long, and it encourages players to start fighting very early in the game. The biggest mistake most new players make is waiting too long to start the offense.
Once the worlds are set up, each faction begins with a few starting units on a single planet. Players can build more units where they have bases and more bases where they have units. Only a limited number of units are available at first, so a player may also purchase upgrades for their bases. It should be noted that resources spending is marked by worker tokens. You place a worker on a resource card to mark that you have spent it that turn. Resources are refreshed each turn, but you can only spend as many resources as you have tokens. One thing that often confuses new players is the difference between units and tokens. You are only allowed to create a certain number of units per turn (based on upgrades) but tokens are not limited in that way. The easy way to remember is that units are always represented by plastic figures and they do all the fighting.
Each turn has two main phases: placing orders and resolving orders. Players take turns placing orders on different planets. They get placed in a stack, where the first order in is the last order out. This makes the timing of placement very important. If you put your four orders on different planets and nobody else places orders on those planets, you can resolve them in any order because they are the top of the stack. If you want to surprise attack someone, you want to be the last person to place an order on a planet, so you can mobilize there first. The three types of orders you can do are mobilize, build, and research. It should be noted that research can be done on any planet, whether or not you have units there. It allows you to buy technology cards and draw event cards. So since orders are placed face down and it can be placed anywhere, you can use it to fake out your opponents and make them think you are moving where you are not. After all the orders are placed, you take turns resolving them. If none of yours are available, or only a limited number are because other people have stacked orders on top, you may be forced to pass or perform an order you didn’t intend to at that time. So careful order placement is important to the strategy of the game.
There are three factions in Starcraft. Up to two players may play each faction. Terrans are easily the most familiar to new players as they are the humans. When mankind grows up and leaves Earth, they conquer alien planets using marines in powered armor. As you may know, I am a fan of the Warhammer 40k universe. So it’s hard for me not to think of Terrans as Space Marines. To be fair however, both games are heavily influenced by the classic novel Starship Troopers. The biggest advantage that Terrans have is their bases are mobile. This is particularly important when they purchase the upgrade that keeps enemies from attacking bases from other planets. Then enemies have to spend a turn landing troops on other nearby territories before they can assault the base, instead of dropping troops directly from space.
The second faction is the Zerg. Zerg are completely alien creatures. Unlike anything that has ever been seen before. Their biggest advantage is they have a lot of cheap units that swarm across the galaxy. Their basic unit is the Zergling, which are weak on defense but usually do more damage than they take, suiciding to take out larger units with them. While they can’t quite do the super fast rush attack they are known for in the computer game, if you don’t start your offense early you aren’t doing yourself any favors.
Last is the Protoss, probably the most unique creation in the Starcraft universe. They are also aliens, but these are at least more humanoid. They have more advanced technology than the Terrans, using energy weapons and force fields. They would seem to have the advantage except that they tend to have more expensive units. On the other hand, in the games I’ve played they’ve always done very well but many other factors affected that. I haven’t actually played them myself, so my only advice is for their opponents: Don’t let them build up, hit them hard before they get to the top upgrades.
Overall, this is a quality game. It comes with a large number of nice plastic figures. My only complaint is the flying units are too easy to snap off their bases. I already have three or four that need repair. If you are looking for a lengthy war game, something more complicated than Risk and only slightly more than Axis and Allies, then this is definitely a winner. It encourages early conflict and keeps the game interesting up until the end. There isn’t a long finishing them off phase, keeping the game relatively short for the genre. My only regret is that my table is just a little small.
Apathy Rating: 4/5