The first expansion for Into The Unknown (ITU), is on the way finally. I have a great respect for this deep and well constructed game, but feel I may never get a chance to play it properly.
Gt my heart racing when I first saw it, but things have gone a little soft over time.
Unlike Captains Chair, a game designed to be played the same way 1v1 or solo, it is a game that may need two well versed players in both Trek, especially the Dominion War and the game mechanics to really shine.
The roll out is interesting and I feel a little odd.
The Enterprise makes sense as does the Defiant, although needing to buy the expansion just to complete the core cast is a little crap. No Riker and others on the Enterprise, especially one with the Hathaway included seems like a cash grab.
The Dominion make a decent opponent, but why not start with a less specific Klingon or Romulan adversary?
The expansion is equally vexing.
Another Defiant class?
Why not a Romulan Scout or Science ship to go with the Romulan included or even a K’Tinga or K’Vort for the Klingons instead of the B’Rel BOP (which they are offering separately)?
The next expansion is not on my must get list on any level. Cardassians and more Klingons. No thanks, I am done. Romulans maybe, but not more Klingons.
The separate ships are also strangely annoying.
A second Enterprise that does not match the other ships that could have been an Akira, an Excelsior, or maybe a Nebula, then a Bird of Prey with a cloaked version when more than one ship can cloak? With another B’Rel BOP coming in the next expansion I wonder if more variety could have been better?
Collectors pieces, not useful additions, with no other useful game additions included apart from the ship panel.
What would I have liked to have seen?
First up I would have made the ships smaller.
Why? Because the Borg, DS9, D’Deridex and some others ships will be prohibitively large, possibly never made because of it. This may have meant making some of the little ships slightly bigger, or not.
They are also lovely to look at, but after so much effort was applied to scale them correctly with each other, they are comically oversized on the play table. The game is good enough to stand on its merits with just some attention paid to avoiding the Attack Wing “scale all over the place” thing.
Star Wars X-Wing and Armada both made small compromises and got aways with it, they just avoided clangers like the Delta Flyer at 15% the size of the Scimitar or Borg Sphere or the TOS Enterprise about right to the TNG one, then other ships wildly off.
Personally, I would have loved them to do themed sets that could be integrated or not, as the player chooses or singles like Attack Wing with missions included. This would allow players like me to just cover periods of interest (TOS, TOM, Voyager).
I would pay for a core game and twice what they are asking for single ships if there was more value included in each and that way, I could build up faction specific sets and only repeat ships if I actually wanted to.
The future of this game will be interesting. It is an itch-scratcher, a dream come true for some, but I am not expecting it to end well.
Captains Chair is another I am loosing patience with.
Shran, but no Archer, Kirk, Khan and Pike, but no TOS Klingoons or Romulans, nothing Voyager or Borg mentioned at all, two Discovery captains, but both Federation, two Lower Decks captains and nothing Dominion yet. Way to milk it Wizkids, running out of care factor here, no matter how good the game is, this “scatter gun” coverage is tedious.
Really need a set with some TOS enemies, a Voyager blip and some Borg. Ideally some series specific sets like Xindi war, Voyager, TOS and TNG maybe.