Battlestar Galactica strategy game

[Tables]

Welcome... to the new Battlestar Galactica strategy game. This game is being hosted by myself and Balcerzak.

This is a game for 10 players based on the Battlestar Galactica TV series and in particular, the Battlestar Galactica: Board Game. Knowledge of either is necessary OR beneficial for the game, although it would naturally help set the theme and the like.

[spoiler=Important preface]This is not a mafia game. While there are very distinct similarities in it being a game primarily about traitors, the objectives and abilities of both sides is very different to mafia. For example, rooting out Cylons is not humanities main goal, and in fact they can win the game even if they don't find a single Cylon by the end. On the other hand, if the Cylons stay completely undercover the whole time, chances are they'll lose horribly. Both the humans and Cylons would be well advised to remember this.

Players should also be advised that this game will contain a fair degree of randomness. I could choose to botch it so I feel the game is fair, but I won't. It's designed to have randomness, and randomness it shall have. This does not mean you will be randomly elimiated from the game or that you will have no chance at victory. Essentially, there's enough small, random things that over the course of the game it should mostly balance out. I know what I'm doing (arguably).

So, before we go any further... SUDDENLY PLOT

[spoiler=SUDDENLY PLOT]The Cylons were created by Man.

They rebelled.

They evolved.

They Look and Feel Human.

Some are programmed to think they are Human.

There are many copies.

And they have a plan.

[spoiler=A brief overview]

Humanity has been bought to it's knees by the Cylons. Escaping as just a small band of civilians on the almost defunct Battlestar Galactica, they must pool their resources to survive. But there are Cylons, who look just like humans, among them...

The game is played over a series of months. Each month players gain skills of various types (represented as a numerical value) which can be used to try and pass crises. Passing crises often results in no effect (hey, they're crises, you avert them, you don't win from them) while failing them has bad effects, often lowering the population or morale of the fleet. If either of these (population or morale) reaches zero, the humans lose and the Cylons win. On the other hand, if humanity can survive and escape for just 12 months, then humanity will win.

[spoiler=More specific explanation]Each month lasts 3 days and has three simultaneous events:

1) Players may vote to brig or execute someone (execution can only be done after brutal force is authourised - see below). This occurs via plurality vote for brigging, majority vote for execution in the format ##brig: Tables or ##Execute: Balcerzak. A vote for executing someone will also count as a vote to brig them, in the case that a majority vote is not reached. The effects of these are noted below

2) Players may also vote to release someone from the brig, in the format ##Release: Balcerzak or similar. This occurs via a majority decision (hence max 1 person released per month)

3) Players secretly play skills into the crises (also referred to as 'skill checks' or 'checks' because that's what they're* called in the board game, and dammit, I'm too lazy to make sure I always use the right terminology). Any number can be played. Each skill check will have 1-2 skill types count positively and 1-2 negatively (the crisis will be explained later) At the end of the day various effects occur:

1) The skill check is totalled and the crisis effect occurs

2) Each character gets one action, and 24 hours to decide what to do. These can be character specific actions, OR drawing two skills, OR revealing as a Cylon.

*Actually in the board game skill checks aren't always crises, and crises aren't always skil checks, but... it's close enough that when you think of one you often think of the other

Then the next day starts.

The game starts with two randomly chosen Cylons and two randomly chosen sleeper agents - the sleeper agents are told they are human at the start of the game. This means any player could think they are human, but find out they're Cylons later in the game (around half way through). I will stress now, if you are told you are human at the start there's a 75% chance you are human and only a 25% chance you're a Cylon. So it is almost certainly not in your best interest to play suboptimally on the hope you're a sleeper Cylon.

The humans win if they survive one year (12 months, derp). The Cylons win if they can reduce population or morale to zero by the end of the game.

The game starts with 5 Population and 5 Morale.

[spoiler=Crises & Skills]Crises form the bulk of discussion and strategy for the players, as they are how the humans will win or lose. The idea is this: At the start of each month a crisis is revealed. It will have a pass effect, a fail effect, between 1 and 3 'positive' skills and between 0 and 2 'negative' skills. Each player has a hand of skills distributed according to certain parameters. For example, you may have a Politics-5, Politics-3 and Leadership-4 card in your hand. The crisis will also have a difficulty ranging from about 12 to 34. Each player, during the month, may choose any number of skills from their hand and reply to their role PM stating what they want to play. At the end of the month, all of the skills played will be shuffled (to hide who played them) and them counted. As you might expect, all of the positive skills are added, and all of the negative skills are subtracted. If the total score exceeds the crisis difficulty, the check passes and the pass effect happens. Otherwise, it fails and the fail effect happens. Let's look at an example crisis.

Unidentified Ship

Pass: No Effect

Fail: -1 Population

Difficulty: 22

Skills: Leadership, Tactics

So the humans have to reach 22 points of skills to avoid losing 1 population. Any Leadership and Tactics skills are positive, any Politics skills are negative. So going back to our hand example, let's suppose we're human. We want to pass the check, so we play our Leadership-4 skill into the crisis. We do this in our role PM, NOT in the thread. At the end of the month, everyone else is told you played '1 skill' with no details about what skill it was, but in the shuffled list of skills, you see a Leadership-4 skill in there. Actually, you see three Leadership-4's in there - which is good, since you managed to reach 27 and pass the check! As you passed, the pass effect happens which in this case is nothing (there are a number of crises that do good things if you pass).

Skills: Skills are distributed in varying values depending on character and skill rating. There are 5 Skill types: Leadership, Tactics and Politics are the standard 3, and may well be all that's seen during the entire game. Two others are special ones: Piloting is used by one character, so we'll come back to that later. Treachery are always negative and are only given out in certain circumstances, such as some failed skill checks.

Each player starts the game with 3 skills, determined by their skill ratings. Each player is also limited to 10 skills in hand - if you go over, you have to discard down to 10 (this is most significant with the character William Adama)

When you draw a skill (such as at the start of the game and at other times) the following process is used: I look up your skill rating in a specific skill and roll a random number from 0-99. I then check what strength skill this random number corresponds to, and generate a skill with that strength. For example: You have a Tactics rating of 4 and need a tactics skill. I roll a random number and it's a 48. It just so happens that 48 corresponds to a TAC-3 card, so I send you a TAC-3. Essentially all you need to know is the following: Higher skill ratings don't guarantee higher skills, but they make it more likely.

[spoiler=Brig & Execution]The brig is essentiall military prison. When a player gets thrown into the brig, all of their skills strengths are halved, and while a player is in the brig, they can only play at most one skill into a skill check, and all skill cards drawn have their value halved. If released from the brig, all of their skills are doubled in value, minus 1 (so 1->1, 2->3, 3->5).

Execution: After the Brutal Force Authourisation (BFA) event, humans may vote to execute someone. This always requires a majority decision. If it goes through, that person voted for is then removed from the game. If they are human then 1 morale is lost. If they are a Cylons then 1 morale is gained. Humans should be warned that executing a human player can easily be an event that costs them the game. On the other hand, executing a Cylon gives them a powerful advantage. Essentially, Execution is similar to lynching, but has a larger effect on the game.

Being executed happens at the end of the month (as does brigging). As such the person still gets to use their character abilities and play skills into the crisis. (Note: Revealing as a Cylon happens AFTER execution. This means that Cylons cannot avoid being eliminated from the game by revealing when they're getting killed).

[spoiler=Cylons]Cylons are what you might think of as the 'mafia' in the game. However, they are not a strict relation to their mafia brethren. In a sense, the roles of the mafia and town are reversed in this game: Normally, the mafia just have to stay calm and blend in, while the town searches for them. If they do, they should win eventually. Here, it's the opposite. The Cylons must play an active game - not necessarily from the start, but certainly they must not simply blend in - since it is the humans who will win by staying calm and waiting the game out.

Cylons don't know who their partner(s) are at the start of the game - although they learn secretly eventually. They must rely on themselves to elevate their position and cause damage until that point. They may, if the feel it is needed, reveal as a Cylon. Doing so will cause heavy damage (such as flat reducing population, or making people draw treachery skills) but can only be done once, and not if they're in the brig (they can still reveal as a Cylon, but they don't get any special effects).

After revealing, they cannot vote or be voted for in brigging, execution or releasing from the brig, don't count towards the player total for votes, are immune to the negative effects of Crisis that affect players (but are also not affected by the positive effects) and cannot be targetted by, or use their own, character abilities. They do, however skill get to play one skill towards crisis and draw 1 skill per turn from the set Politics, Leadership, Tactics rating-4, Treachery rating-2. When a Cylon reveals they discard down to three skills.

[spoiler=Actions]This is more or less the equivalent of the night phase. Every player may perform one action secretly - there are three possible actions a player can make - draw 2 skills (every player can do this), reveal as a Cylon (if you are a Cylon, of course) or take a character specific action. In the morning these are announced (note: What type of skills you drew, but not their strength, will be revealed. So don't go saying 'yeah I'm taking two tactics' when you're actually drawing two politics (note: This is an extreme and impossible example as no character can draw two of the same skill anyway).

[spoiler=Special events] 5 special events happen during the game at specific times. At the end of...

Month 3: Revelations (Both initial Cylons find out who their partner is)

Month 4: Sleeper Phase (the two sleeper Cylons will find out that they aren't human)

Month 6: Revelations 2 (All Cylons find out who the other Cylons are)

Month 7: Brutal Force Authourisation (Players may now be executed)

Month 12: Earth is found (Humans win!)

[spoiler=An example turn]We have a game with 4 players in it:

Saul Tigh (Tactics rating-5, Leadership rating-4)

Gaius Baltar (Politics rating-4, Leadership rating-3)

Callandra "Cally" Tyrol (Tactics rating-4, Politics rating-3, Leadership rating-3)

Leoben Conoy (Tactics rating-4, Politics rating-3)

The crisis comes up and is:

Unidentified Ship

Pass: No Effect

Fail: -1 Population

Difficulty: 10*

Skills: Leadership, Tactics

*It's actually difficulty 22 in the real game, I've lowered it for example purposes since there's less players

Now let's say this is each player's hands:

Saul Tigh - TAC-3, TAC-5, LEA-4

Gaius Baltar - POL-5, POL-2, LEA-4

Callandra "Cally" Tyrol - TAC-3, POL-5, LEA-2

Leoben Conoy TAC-4, TAC-1, POL-3

So Saul happens to be online as soon as the crisis is posted. He checks his hand as declares 'I can play a lot into this crisis' (he's not allowed to be too specific - sorry, that's a rule I should have explained. Just take it at face value as 'don't be too specific' for now). In a PM, he tells me he's playing the TAC-5 and LEA-4 into the check. He decides to keep the TAC-3.

Baltar comes online a little later, checks his hand as says 'I'll leave it to you other guys then. In a PM, he confirms he's passing and playing no skills.

Cally is next online - she's secretly a Cylon. She looks at her hand and declares 'I'll help cover things as well then'. In her PM, she plays the POL-5 and LEA-2 (note the LEA-2 is positive but small compared to the POL-5 - this could be a play to try and draw suspicion off of her)

Finally Leoben comes on, is antisocial and doesn't tell anyone what he's doing, but confirms via PM he's playing a TAC-4 and TAC-1.

During the day nobody votes to brig anyone, and since nobody is in the brig, nobody votes to release anyone either.

So the month ends and I announce the following:

Saul: 2 skills

Baltar: Pass

Cally: 2 skills

Leoben: 2 skills

And the following shuffled list:

TAC-1

POL-5

TAC-4

LEA-4

LEA-2

TAC-5

The tactics total 10, the Leadership total 6 and the Politics total 5. Since LEA/TAC are positive, the result is 10+6-5=11, which is a pass as it's above 10. So the crisis is averted, and we move on to the action step. People have the following hands:

Saul Tigh - TAC-3

Gaius Baltar - POL-5, POL-2, LEA-4

Callandra "Cally" Tyrol - TAC-3

Leoben Conoy - POL-3

Everyone except Leoben decides to draw skills for their action. Saul, Baltar and Leoben have only two possible skills, so they draw both (e.g. Saul's Tactics rating 5 gives him a TAC-6, his Leadership Rating 4 gives him a LEA-2, etc.). Cally has a choice of two skills from 3 - she decides to draw tactics (rating 4) and Leadership (rating 3). Leoben uses his special ability which lets him draw 1 skill now (he chooses Tactics) and 1 skill after seeing the crisis

At the start of the month I announce the actions:

Saul: Draw Tactics, Leadership

Baltar: Draw Politics, Leadership

Cally: Draw Tactics, Leadership

Leoben: Use Glimpse the face of God, draw Tactics

And remind everyone what the resources currently are, and the next crisis appears.

I hope this makes things a little clearer.

[spoiler=Secrecy Rules]In order to protect Cylons ability to lie, certain secrecy rules on what you can post are needed. You can essentially think of this as being equivalent to the 'don't quote or screenshot your role PM' rules in mafia games, but a little more stringent.

You are allowed to make general, qualitative claims about things only you know. You may not make quantitative claims. In essence, this just means: In case of doubt, give a vague description rather than a number.

Rather than trying to word this nicely and make it crystal clear through description (which is probably impossible) I'll just give examples:

Very good: "I have some fairly good cards for this crisis I'm going to play in."

Good: "I have mostly good cards for this crisis but a few low ones, I'll play them all anyway."

Bad: "Some of my Tactics are good for this check - one's low though. My Leadership are all low. I'm playing them all."

Instant modkill: "I have a TAC-5, TAC-4 and TAC-1 I'm playing, and also two LEA-2's. I'm going to play them all."

Note also that sometimes, qualiatitve description can give away numerical values, so be careful about that too. For example claiming the one skill you're playing in "Extremely low" is pretty much the same as claiming it's a 1 strength skill. In case of doubt, be more vague.

Note: The total number of skills in your hand is public information (as it can easily be tracked) but the number of each TYPE is NOT. Again, this is to protect Cylons ability to lie and be deceptive. Also the following things may be publicly posted:

Number of skills you intend to play (but not their individual or total value - ideally, give a vague description - a (very) high/low amount considering the number of cards, for example)

Action you intend to take (but you must PM me the action you DO take - there are fringe cases where even a human may want to lie)

Votes for brigging and release.

[spoiler=Player characters]Each player will, at the start of the game, choose a character from the Battlestar Galactica series to play as. This character will determine the skills they can draw, a special ability they have (which is either an action or an immediate ability that can be posted straight into the thread that you're using it). Note also that character skill ratings are not the exact strength of card you draw, but rather an indicator of how strong cards you draw will be on average. I'm going no more precise than saying that a character's skill rating *0.75 is the average strength it draws.

Helena Cain

Guts & Initiative: immediate - during each skill check you may add three skills at random with Skill Ratings Tactics rating-5, Leadership rating-5, Politics rating-3. You do not get to see the added skills.

Tactics rating-6, Leadership rating-5

Laura Roslin

President: You have three one-shot abilities: action - Presidential Pardon (move someone out of the brig); immediate - Investigative Committee (Who played which skills into the crisis is made public at the days end, must be called within the first 36 hours of a crisis); action - Probation (play on any other player, then once after you may: immediate - call in their probation to see what skills they play)

Politics rating-5, Leadership rating-3

Gaius Baltar

Cylon Detector: Action - once before and once after the sleeper phase, may find out one player's loyalty

Politics rating-4, Leadership rating-3

Samuel T. Anders

Pyramid Player: action - discard any number of skills, then draw the same number from your skill set (that is any number of Tactics rating-6 and Leadership rating-4 skills)

Tactics rating-6, Leadership rating-4

Tom Zarek

Friends in low places: Immediate - your vote for brigging/release (not execution) counts twice, and your vote wins draws

Politics rating-5, Tactics rating-4, Leadership rating-3

Felix Gaeta

Mutiny: immediate - once during the game, choose any player and send them to the brig - they cannot play skills into this crisis (if they attempt to do so or have already sent them in, they'll be given the skills back)

Tactics rating-5, Politics rating-4

Louanne "Kat" Katrine

Hotshot Pilot: other - One of your skill draws is the Piloting skill. When this is played into a crisis, you may convert it into any other skill type immediately (Politics, Leadership, Tactics or Treachery)

Tactics rating-5, Piloting rating-4

Callandra "Cally" Tyrol

Discharge of a Firearm: immediate - once during the game if you are not in the brig, you may execute another player. Then you are moved to the brig.

Tactics rating-4, Politics rating-3, Leadership rating-3

Leoben Conoy

Glimpse the face of God: action - draw one skill. After you see the next crisis, you may draw any skill (with a skill rating 4)

Tactics rating-4, Politics rating-3

Ellen Tigh

Politically Adroit: action - choose another player, give them a skill you have, then draw three skills (you may draw from one of your skill ratings twice)

Politics rating-6, Leadership rating-4

Player list:

Human:

Ceadeus as Helena Cain (2 TAC, 1 LEA)

Kevin as Laura Roslin (2 POL, 1 LEA)

Excellen Browning as Gaius Baltar (2 POL, 1 LEA)

Wen Yang as Samuel T. Anders (2 TAC, 1 LEA)

JBCWK as Felix Gaeta (2 TAC, 1 POL)

BK-201 as Tom Zarek (1 POL, 1 LEA, 1 TAC)

Queen as Kat (2 TAC, 1 PIL)

Eclipse as Cally (1 POL, 1 LEA, 1 TAC)

WeaponsOfMassConstruction as Leoben Conoy (2 TAC, 1 POL)

Radiant Dragon as Ellen Tigh (2 POL, 1 LEA)

Revealed Cylon:

Executed:

(Human also includes and hidden Cylons for obvious reasons)

Population: 1

Morale: 4

It is currently month 1.

Edited June 16, 2011 by I Eat Tables

[eclipse]

I'll give this a shot because I feel the urge to get my rear handed to me.

[Haze]

In.

[riariadne]

/points to autosignup list*

*...you know, the one in my first post in the new mafia HQ thread nobody pays attention to? yeah, that one.

Edited May 9, 2011 by Queen

[Radiant Dragon]

/points to autosignup list*

*...you know, the one in Lightning's first post in the new mafia HQ thread nobody pays attention to? yeah, that one.

[BK-201]

Autosignup is dumb. I'm signing up btw.

[Zkirsche]

I'll join.

[Tables]

Autosignup is dumb when we're talking about a game that's of a style you've never played before.

Also a few small things I thought I should add: If you ever see the term 'skill card' you'll probably instinctively know I'm talking about skills and not give it a second thought. But just in case feel free to slap me over it, as I've tried to remember that, well, you don't have cards in this game.

More importantly: Bal and I are thinking about the starting resource values. We're probably going to put them around 5. I think that should be a good number to give both sides a chance, and since it's the first time we're playing this game (yes... it could well be played again. Same game in theory, but everything shuffled so it's like a whole new game :D).

At the start of the game, you'll get 3 skills. If you choose a character with 3 skills listed, you get one of each, if you choose one with 2 skills, you get the higher valued one twice (or in case of a tie whichever is listed first). Whenever a character draws a skill and has a skill set of more skills than they can draw, they choose which ones to draw.

[WeaponsofMassConstruction]

Singe up.

[Guest Wen Yang]

Why not?

Sign me up.

[Excellen Browning]

I'll sign up

[Jaybee]

I might miss 3 days (16th to 18th) of June, but I'll still steal that 10th spot

[Tables]

OKAY!

Firstly, the character list has been updated and formatted. This is good, since it's the final list and time to pick characters! Each person in turn gets to pick a character, or if they're not next in turn order leave a message as to their preferences (if you want you can do it via PM, but since nobody knows their loyalty or anything yet I don't much see the need. Option is there though).

The randomised order of character picking (from top to bottom) is:

Ceadeus

Kevin

Excellen Browning

Wen Yang

JBCWK

BK-201

Queen

Eclipse

WeaponsOfMassConstruction

Radiant Dragon

People towards the bottom have the more restricted but more interesting picks: I'll advise now that Leadership is the most commonly positive skill but every skill is necessary, and since you're more likely to be a human than a Cylon, making sure you have a good skill distribution may be useful.

Finally something else that I forgot to mention (I'll put all these little things together eventually, really): You have a hand limit of 10 skills. This is a 'soft' limit in that you're allowed to exceed it, but you must then discard down to 10 skills immediately.

No, you do not find out what team you're on until you've picked a character. Actually until everyone has picked a character. Bear that in mind with your choices.

Finally, good luck, and if anyone still has any questions about things, make sure to ask (if you think you'll look stupid, just send me a PM. Chances are you won't).

[Haze]

First!

Helena Cain.

[Zkirsche]

Laura Roslin please.

Kill some cylons, LIKE A BAUSS!

[Excellen Browning]

I'll be taking Gaius Frakkin' Baltar

[Tables]

I'll be taking Gaius Frakkin' Baltar

Edit: ##Wen Yang to choose a character next.

Also a good question has been asked and I'll clarify: Whenever you see me say {Skill} Rating-X, what it means is that a skill with strength based on X will be generated. So for example, a Tactics Rating-3 could give you a TAC-1 or a TAC-4 depending on your luck, but would average at a strength of 2.25 (so TAC-1's you would expect to be rare, TAC-2's slightly more common, TAC-3's more common still, and TAC-4's probably a little less common than TAC-2's, and TAC-5's may or may not be possible from it (it's a secret!).

I will however tell you that Skills are no weaker than 1 and no stronger than 6. I'll also reveal that strength 2 and 3 cards can be generated from any skill rating (with varying chances)

Edited May 10, 2011 by I Eat Tables

[Excellen Browning]

way2stillbeconfusing

Question: How are skills going to be used? I'm currently assuming you have a base set of skills, and draw skill cards that add to a certain skill when played so your character can pass a certain skill check?

[Tables]

Sorry, I didn't want to give ALL the details away. Basically just remember that a higher skill rating means you get better skills on average.

The way skills work is that you have a hand of them - at first, three, which may increase or decrease as the game goes on. Each month is a crisis - the same one for everyone - which requires people to play skills in to complete it. A lot of the discussion will be about what people intend to play in (or not, as the case may be). If you play skills into a skill check, you don't get them back. However, at the end of each month you can take an action which may be drawing 2 more skills. So you have a continuous flow of skills from me (randomly) to your hand, to skill checks.

Let me illustrate this a little better with an example.

We have a game with 4 players in it:

Saul Tigh (Tactics rating-5, Leadership rating-4)

Gaius Baltar (Politics rating-4, Leadership rating-3)

Callandra "Cally" Tyrol (Tactics rating-4, Politics rating-3, Leadership rating-3)

Leoben Conoy (Tactics rating-4, Politics rating-3)

The crisis comes up and is:

Unidentified Ship

Pass: No Effect

Fail: -1 Population

Difficulty: 10*

Skills: Leadership, Tactics

*It's actually difficulty 22 in the real game, I've lowered it for example purposes since there's less players

Now let's say this is each player's hands:

Saul Tigh - TAC-3, TAC-5, LEA-4

Gaius Baltar - POL-5, POL-2, LEA-4

Callandra "Cally" Tyrol - TAC-3, POL-5, LEA-2

Leoben Conoy TAC-4, TAC-1, POL-3

So Saul happens to be online as soon as the crisis is posted. He checks his hand as declares 'I can play a lot into this crisis' (he's not allowed to be too specific - sorry, that's a rule I should have explained. Just take it at face value as 'don't be too specific' for now). In a PM, he tells me he's playing the TAC-5 and LEA-4 into the check. He decides to keep the TAC-3.

Baltar comes online a little later, checks his hand as says 'I'll leave it to you other guys then. In a PM, he confirms he's passing and playing no skills.

Cally is next online - she's secretly a Cylon. She looks at her hand and declares 'I'll help cover things as well then'. In her PM, she plays the POL-5 and LEA-2 (note the LEA-2 is positive but small compared to the POL-5 - this could be a play to try and draw suspicion off of her)

Finally Leoben comes on, is antisocial and doesn't tell anyone what he's doing, but confirms via PM he's playing a TAC-4 and TAC-1.

During the day nobody votes to brig anyone, and since nobody is in the brig, nobody votes to release anyone either.

So the month ends and I announce the following:

Saul: 2 skills

Baltar: Pass

Cally: 2 skills

Leoben: 2 skills

And the following shuffled list:

TAC-1

POL-5

TAC-4

LEA-4

LEA-2

TAC-5

The tactics total 10, the Leadership total 6 and the Politics total 5. Since LEA/TAC are positive, the result is 10+6-5=11, which is a pass as it's above 10. So the crisis is averted, and we move on to the action step. People have the following hands:

Saul Tigh - TAC-3

Gaius Baltar - POL-5, POL-2, LEA-4

Callandra "Cally" Tyrol - TAC-3

Leoben Conoy - POL-3

Everyone except Leoben decides to draw skills for their action. Saul, Baltar and Leoben have only two possible skills, so they draw both (e.g. Saul's Tactics rating 5 gives him a TAC-6, his Leadership Rating 4 gives him a LEA-2, etc.). Cally has a choice of two skills from 3 - she decides to draw tactics (rating 4) and Leadership (rating 3). Leoben uses his special ability which lets him draw 1 skill now (he chooses Tactics) and 1 skill after seeing the crisis

At the start of the month I announce the actions:

Saul: Draw Tactics, Leadership

Baltar: Draw Politics, Leadership

Cally: Draw Tactics, Leadership

Leoben: Use Glimpse the face of God, draw Tactics

And remind everyone what the resources currently are, and the next crisis appears.

I hope this makes things a little clearer.

[Excellen Browning]

Righto. Does this mean then that everyone has 2 actions at the end of the month? And how do character skill ratings come into play? And do they affect what kind of skills you can draw, or is that randomized?

Edited May 11, 2011 by Excellen Browning

[Balcerzak]

Righto. Does this mean then that everyone has 2 actions at the end of the month? And how do character skill ratings come into play? And do they affect what kind of skills you can draw, or is that randomized?

No, everyone has one action. The most common action is to "Draw two Skill cards". Character skill ratings affect the probability distribution drawn from when selecting randomly the result of the draw. Higher numbers have higher average pulls.

[Guest Wen Yang]

I'll take samuel please.

[Jaybee]

Felix looks nice.

[Tables]

##BK-201 to choose a character next

Also I'm going to bold what I'd consider the 'common' name characters are referred to in the show. You can call them what you want as long as the name makes sense, of course, but these are how I'm likely to refer to characters (this is mostly important in the case of William Adama and Lee "Apollo" Adama, and Saul Tigh and Ellen Tigh.

Edited May 11, 2011 by I Eat Tables

[BK-201]

I guess I'll take Zarek.