The Game


Babylon 5 was an incredible science fiction TV series that first aired in the late 90s. It had 5 successful seasons, several TV movies and a spin off series, Crusade. The series centered around the ambassadors of 4 major galactic powers, the "space UN" headquarters (space station: Babylon 5), and the men and women who ran this diverse city in space.

The CCG allows 3-7 players to recreate and retell their own possible Babylon 5 saga by allowing each person to either take on the role of one of the major political powers (either via their ambassador to B5 or their home faction) and attempt to dominate the other factions using diplomacy, intrigue, military, or access to fearful and deadly ancient powers. With several expansions, the CCG really is one of the best (if not the best) war/intrigue games ever made.

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Back in the Saddle... or Meddling with Others


On a side note: shouldn't either "with" and "others" be capitalized, or neither?  There's not a proper noun "Others" involved here... okay, sorry, moving on.  I've tried to manipulate, cajole, and guide our little club into a new Babylon 5 CCG direction, and (with two of the return players chomping at the bit to go) we've finally assembled a new lunch crew.  I strongly encourage you, if starting a new persistent game, to find a place where the game can be left alone, declare who's playing what at the onset, and then go from there.

We started this first game playing just starter decks (I looked them up and built them as sold).  I think we're far enough in that we'll just stop the game (no one wins) and let everyone break out their custom built decks.  It looks like our new group with be me and another student running Narn, our 2 Minbari players from last year (yay!), a returning player now taking up the Earth/PsiCorps mantle, a non-aligned new player (I think he'll be quite good, already deck building in his free time), and another new Centauri player (Chaotic Neutral, but that works well with either Refa or Londo, so all good).



Here's our table at the start, but many of us are in the teens (yes I know we're using the wrong Refa and Neroon) and the mechanics are well taught.  I'm really thinking about going out and buying some plywood to make a bigger table this year... just so we can have 6 of us going with room to play.

If I have any concern, its the lack of aggression.  Yes, so a Narn player would always say, but its more than just throwing fleets out there.  They need to be willing to hurt each other a bit, work with each other a bit, get the game going.  Right now all the players are kinda just building on their own.  We need fleets striking, intrigue developing, diplomacy negotiating, etc.  Hopefully those with the lower influence this game decide to get things going in a big way next game.