COLONIES !!!!!!!!!! YESSSSS :)

[FrankJones]

Though I'm puzzled that they haven't done Venus first. It makes the floater cards seem lonely. And have the cards with Venus effects been left out or what?

There are no Colonies project cards that have Venus effects.

[RoyalRook]

Stormcraft!!!!

[jaymc1130]

Oh, nifty. Guess it's time to migrate. Hi Frank! Been a while.

[FrankJones]

Oh, nifty. Guess it's time to migrate. Hi Frank! Been a while.

Jay !!!!!

I thought you were a ghost !

Why haven't you been playing more often here ??

Let's play some alpha colonies to help the developers find bugs

[jaymc1130]

Pls just speak for urself and don't generalize ur personal opinion over the Venus Expansion...

Speaking for myself is exactly what I was doing. In my opinion, Venus Next is not a good or interesting expansion.

Part of the point of my post though is that I don't see why Venus should or needs to be done first before colonies.
The colonies expansion works just fine without Venus.

Honestly, I feel like Venus is a pretty objectively weak expansion in general and that this is, in fact, the majority opinion on the matter. The reality is Venus was a whole lot of rather ineffective complexity as a band-aid attempt to diminish the competitive power of the tempo based terraforming archetypes and mostly failed at this because diluting the deck with meh or outright bad engine options wasn't really an ideal attempt at a solution. The game definitely feels best with all expansions, and in that setting I think venus and preludes are both fine but these two were the initial expansions and the lessons learned from the mistakes of these certainly show with the later expansions and promo releases. Both Venus and Preludes lend themselves, without the other expansions in the mix, to high variance and poor snowball combatting potential so games can much more often be just plain over within the first (couple) gen(s) in a way that is much improved when all expansions are used. This is to say nothing about the entertainment value of any of the expansions, as that's a much more subjective discussion and all of them offer a fair amount in the way of fun things to try or do, but in more objective senses Venus is certainly pretty widely believed to have been a rather poorly conceived effort in general.

[kerkael]

I will concur with those who say Colonnie should not have been out before Venus next OR there should be the option to replace the Floater Obj.
Same for TURMOIL, by the way, with the Amazonia Planitia elements related to that extension. The map is made to interact with the delegates so ... replace them if you don't plan to use TURMOIL.
Anyone is then free to play with or without VENUS next, with or without COLONIES, with or without the specific obj and awards.

[FrankJones]

There are plenty of Colonies cards that use floaters.

[carnage04]

I have a live gamer group. They all tried Terraforming Mars on here and they hated it. My friends are losers, what can I say?

My only experience with it is on here and it's one of my favorite games.

I thought colonies was fun at first, but it's almost TOO tedious. I played a game where I had something like 15 Jovian Tags, was drawing tons of cards every round, was racking up points on various floater type cards. The second place guy was still in the game. The third place guy was really a good sport because he was done well before the game was even half over. It just seems once you start getting a card draw advantag eit snowballs quick.

I'm not sure what Venus Next or Turmoil add, but Colonies just seems to be a long slog. I'm enjoying it for now, but the games really drag out.

Most of the people on here I have played with were new to colonies. Do I have a noob opinion or do others feel that way?

[charliec247]

Do I have a noob opinion or do others feel that way?

Nah, I have the same experience too. Many Colonies games end early for some players because they're out of it quickly. Even in 2P, they still can't quit early because it would be a long time before the game hits 50% because it is the correct move to durdle and build. Many games end because one player still has 10+ actions after everyone else has passed, it is clear they will run away with the game, and the others just don't want to sit there for 15+ minutes for the game to actually finish.

I mean, if you get enjoyment out of building and watching engines run, even if it's by other players, that's fine. But for many competitive players, yes, the game can become a slog.

At the very least I understand why some game groups opt to ban Pluto. Games feel much better without it.

[FrankJones]

Do I have a noob opinion or do others feel that way?

Nah, I have the same experience too. Many Colonies games end early for some players because they're out of it quickly. Even in 2P, they still can't quit early because it would be a long time before the game hits 50% because it is the correct move to durdle and build. Many games end because one player still has 10+ actions after everyone else has passed, it is clear they will run away with the game, and the others just don't want to sit there for 15+ minutes for the game to actually finish.

I mean, if you get enjoyment out of building and watching engines run, even if it's by other players, that's fine. But for many competitive players, yes, the game can become a slog.

At the very least I understand why some game groups opt to ban Pluto. Games feel much better without it.

I am going to agree with you here.

That said, I LOVE colonies. But I only play friendly mode. Because, the cards are absolutely broken, batsh_t insane.

Warp Drive ??? Nuts. Corona Extractor???

Any of the cards that decrease the cost of trading, or allow you to advance the colony cube, or give you an extra trade fleet? Bonkers !

And Pluto ????? Totally insane.

So... Fun? Yes. Optimal for skill-based play? No.

I lost a colonies game by 100 points... even though I scored 136! The score was 236-136, in 13 generations.

But, it was FUN! I did not mind. Because it was friendly mode.

I've had a game where I had 3 extra trade fleets, -2 resources to trade, +2 advance on colony cube when trading, AI central, Olympus, Mars, AI central. And multiple colonies on Pluto. Fun for me. Not fun for my opponent.

And then there are the nutty floater cards. "I'll activate titan shuttles to gain 15 alloyed titanium".

And there are so man Jovians. I had a game where I had 9 or 10 Jovians, and was holding all 4 of the multipliers. Made sur the game went one more gen, and played all 4 multipliers for a zillion points.

Etc.