Board Game Arena

Is there a way to play without the Goal Tiles? We'd like to play with the expansion cards, but not this extra mechanic.

Similarly, is there a way to turn off Prestige without removing all the cards in Brink of War?

It would be fantastic to be able to include The Gathering Storm without goals!

Having toggles to separately turn on and off Goals and Prestige mode would be nice for players who just want play with the expansion cards. However, I don't think these game rule variants are discussed in the official rulebook, so BGA may not be allowed to code these variants into the game here based on their agreement with the game publisher.

obsidian_octagon wrote: ↑24 May 2020, 03:42 Having toggles to separately turn on and off Goals and Prestige mode would be nice for players who just want play with the expansion cards. However, I don't think these game rule variants are discussed in the official rulebook, so BGA may not be allowed to code these variants into the game here based on their agreement with the game publisher.

I can't find any text in the rulebook that states this unequivocally, but goals (per Tom Lehmann in varous BGG posts) are indeed optional.

Prestige is so integral to so many cards in Brink of War that I really wonder what a game with the cards but not the actual mechanic would look like, and if it that would render too many cards (Interstellar Casus Belli, for one) pretty much worthless.

The old RFTG program, which can easily be found on the internet, has toggles in it for turning on and off Takeovers, Goals, and 2 player advanced mode. And apparently the publisher, Rio Grande Games, gave permission for the program to be freely distributed. It just depends on what sort of agreement BGA currently has with the publisher. The ability to turn Takeovers on and off is already on BGA, but the other options would be nice for players who desire them.

But yes, having a toggle for turning on and off Prestige mode may not be a good idea, as I agree that some some cards become essentially worthless, such as Interstellar Casus Belli.

I discussed with galehar, one of the BGA developers for RFTG, the possibility of adding options in for turning the Goals and 2 player advanced mode on and off. He indicated that there are currently no plans to add these options in and that there is no developer actively maintaining RFTG on BGA. So I would expect the state of RFTG, including any lingering bugs, to remain relatively unchanged for at least the near future. Based on what I see in the RFTG bugs section, I think galehar is still fixing some very minor issues with RFTG when he has time though, such as language translation errors.

I'm not maintaining RFTG anymore, and nobody else has stepped up. I might come back to fix a couple of remaining bugs but no promise.
Shouldn't be too hard to make goals optional, so maybe. However, prestige is not an option in BoW, so that won't happen.

obsidian_octagon wrote: ↑30 May 2020, 18:28 So I would expect the state of RFTG, including any lingering bugs, to remain relatively unchanged for at least the near future.

It is possible for other developers to fix some bugs or add new features. So it might happen, though it is indeed not highly probable.
I was thinking about adding 2 players without expert mode, but I really want to finish the game I'm working on before.