Star. Wars. Rebellion. F. F. G. O. M. G.

I think "hipster" is actually a descriptor used to describe someone who ascribes to the philosophy that if something is embraced with enthusiasm by the woefully ignorant masses then it must be garbage while on the other hand when the average joe rejects something it can't be because it is actually terrible but rather the average Joe, not possessing the cultured insight of the well healed hipster, is just too stupid to "get it".

It's somewhere between your description and Barnes's. Trust me, I was a barista.

I live in LA which by no means makes me an expert on hipsters, but the hipster culture is thriving here. I like hipsters overall, I don't think they go around judging common Joe as much as Repoman thinks. I see them staying in their lane and not giving a crap about what common Joe is doing.
Hipsters have helped gentrify crappy neighborhoods.
Help the spread of more quality coffee outlets that are not Starbucks.
Bring cutting edge foods like Korean tacos into the world, and hamburgers with Ketchup Leather and Bacon Jam.
Craft Beer.
Mixology bars.
Artisanal anything really.
I am not 100% sure but I think hipsters are down with board gaming.

Hipster dudes usually have tattoos, piercings, hair short on the sides long on top, facial hair styled uniquely (wax?), plaid shirt with top button buttoned, skinny jeans (suspenders?). I don't know what hipster women look like except they can be seen with hipster dudes.

There is a big backlash against hipster culture, and I am not sure what they did to deserve it. People seemed threatened by it for some reason. But are hipster truly as snobbish as is attributed to them?

interesting to see the SUSD review, im not too fussed by the combat or story critiques. I agree that War of the Ring has its story elements over sold. However because of the geography it does have variety. The direction of the Shadows attack can radically change the feel of the game. Whilst it does use an event deck its not that dependent on it for narrative. I think this game will sink or swim on how dependent is on its card decks to drive narrative and surprise down the stretch. Also the geography, will the game feel different if the hidden base is on Hoth or Alderan, or will they just be place names?

I will likely end up playing this a lot, as one of my main opponents loves starwars and is totally pumped for this. So i really hope it has some strategic or even narrative substance that persists over time.

I made the mistake, after reading the LtP rules, of telling my wife that it read like a 2p TI3. I've had to do damage control all day about that.

My review copy from MM is on the way, but I dread going through the LtP manual and then flipping through the rule book all game.

I put one of my friends on notice to read the rules before he comes over...when I do that he usually shows up with a highlighted/underlined printout. So I'm hoping we can suss it out together.

Michael Barnes wrote: My review copy from MM is on the way, but I dread going through the LtP manual and then flipping through the rule book all game.

I went back a page and couldn't identify LtP, so I went to Miniatures Market and looked at new releases but couldn't find it there either. Then I searched the forums and belatedly discovered it is a reference to Learn to Play.

Michael Barnes wrote: My review copy from MM is on the way, but I dread going through the LtP manual and then flipping through the rule book all game.

I put one of my friends on notice to read the rules before he comes over...when I do that he usually shows up with a highlighted/underlined printout. So I'm hoping we can suss it out together.

I know at least one early review slagged the rules, and I'm on record as not being a fan of the Learn to Play/Rules Reference approach for non-minis games, and it's certainly true that things can seem to make sense when they don't in practice, but I got through the Learn to Play book for SW:R fairly quickly and easily. The combat section is a little snarly, but so is the combat, from what I can tell. At least on only a read-through, my only real beef was that they decided, for whatever reason, that the full use of Tactic [sic] cards was too complicated for a first-time game, so they have both a first-game-only and an "advanced" setup version of how to handle those cards. I can see why someone thought "one layer too far," but . . . really? (The front-of-the-manual setup also doesn't warn you that the Tactic deck setup is different than the "advanced" version, although the manual does note this for other things.) On the other hand, I did appreciate the fixed setup and the admonition not to place the Rebel Base adjoining Imperial space as good first-game allowances.

There are definitely games where I ask people to read the rules in advance if at all possible--TI3, middle- and heavyweight GMT games--but I feel like, with one more pass through the rules, I could teach this on the spot, at least well enough for a first time. It'd probably even be shorter than my infamous Age of Conan lecture.

I think the rules are pretty good. I was up playing the game after reading the Learning to Play rules. Then I went back and read the references to make sure I wasn't screwing up anything. I don't love the combat system but I think I like the combat system system better than many of the recent FFG games including Forbidden Stars. The best part so far seem to be the be the mission, counter mission, project, objective connection or basically trying to figure out whether it's more important to try to follow through with your own plans or whether it's more important to try to block the other players mission. Cool stuff happens like Han runs a hit and run mission that Darth Vader comes to stop but in reality the Rebels really wanted to sabotages another location with Luke because that was one of there objectives. However, the Imperials have Boba Fett ready to capture Luke and they're holding the Carbonite card to through Luke into.

The rules are fine. We had one question in our play, but it was with a specific card. (Imperial Probe mission----do you round up or down for the troops in the rebel base)

The game is really, really good. Very simple rules framework bolting together a giant pile of chrome. And it all works. I think I'd go ahead and jump to the advanced rules, however, but go ahead and use the basic first-time setup. You really need those Action cards.

I like what I'm seeing/hearing about them not playing the straight DOAM part of the game too hard.

Played for about two hours (not including an hour of setting up, rules, chit chat) before my friend had to take off, but some early notes:

- It's not as complicated as you might think, the rulebook is fine- early reports were...misguided.
- it does feel long, I'm think 120 at a rock bottom minimum with two veteran players.
- It is as much a worker placement game as it is a DOAM, but the workers have unique skill sets and interact with certain missions/actions.
- War of the Ring comparisons are kind of dumb- that game feels really old fashioned compared to Rebellion.
- Blowing up Kashykk was pretty fun (I was Imperial).
- Blows Forbidden Stars out of the water.
- Undoubtedly the best thing Corey K has done since BSG and definitely a top tier FFG title.
- It is exactly the game you wanted it to be.

Hoping to get my friend over again Tuesday, wives willing. He was pretty psyched about it too:

Crap. I was hoping this was going to be another Horus Heresy.

I hate all of you so much for making me want this.

Played for the first time and I agree with Barnes' initial assessments. I wouldn't go so far as to say WotR is that much more "old fashioned". Both games capture the theme VERY well.

Our game took about 5 hours excluding assembly ( yah - no fucking dials, an FFG first for a big box game ! ) . But chalk that up to first time rules look up and learning the mechanics. It also went 10-11 turns, which is on the long side from what I've read - I had drained all but the last 3 Probe cards. The game ended with a successful Rebel Death Star strike. Had he failed, I would have won on the next impulse as I had zeroed in on the Rebel Base. I think 120 minutes will be out outlier, most games will probably go a bit longer, then once experience sets in I think both sides will be able to stretch the game out when necessary .

The game has depth that doesn't appear right away. For instance, I should have had more TIE fighters w/ the Death Star, as I wasn't able to wipe out his fighters with only 2 TIEs and some capital ships after the first round.

Two thumbs up.

Be interesting see how long the nerd ragers on BGG who got all butthurt over the Asmodeee pricing thing can hold out before they bow to the lure of the Dark side and get this. Its gonna be huge.

First game tonight with my daughter as the Rebels. I found the base in turn 7, but was beaten down, then moved in a bigger force the next turn but couldn't quite finish her off... she had one ship with one health left... and then she managed to finish another objective to meet the turn marker at #9 for the win. But wow, was it close. I had recently captured Chewie but barely failed at my attempt to carbonite him, which would have pushed back her rep by 1. So many fun little moments throughout.

In retrospect, I think we both focused too much on our missions, without using the leaders enough to activate systems to move things around. And because of that, I could have been spread out more to be in a better position to wipe out her base. I had two Death Stars in play, but they were ineffective without getting the laser project soon enough and without having moved them earlier in positions where they could better access worlds to blow up.

I thought it was very straightforward, as far as the rules, and flowed well. I think our total time playing was about 3.5 hours.

If I have a quibble, it's that it seems fun to get those new leaders and action cards for the first four turns, but then that stops, which felt like a bit of a bummer. And that also ramps up the potential AP and time per turn, as you pretty quickly have 8 leaders and 10 missions to consider what to do with. I'd have liked to see that spread out a bit more, so you might get a new leader later in the game who you may only have briefly, but who could help save the day.