One of the most common misconceptions about Imperial Assault's campaign mode is that it is a Star Wars clone of Dungeons and Dragons. While the long story-driven role playing aspects of the game do seem to have some similarities with classic D&D, there are some very big differences that should be considered when comparing the games.
First of all, Imperial Assault is a competitive tabletop miniatures game. While this is evident in campaign, you can perhaps see it even more blatantly in the Skirmish element of the game, where Fantasy Flight Games and the IA community have even designed an official tournament league based wholly on the skirmish side of the game. The bulk of the gameplay is executed through the rules determining combat, movement, line of sight, and other actions. Even in campaign, there are very little narrative choices to be made.
Secondly, while the campaign does have a story, the bulk of the narrative is driven more by pre-scripted events and a branching mission structure than any handcrafted tale spun by a Dungeon Master. In fact, given that the Rebel players construct the majority of the side mission deck and are typically the ones to decide on a mission if there's a choice (at least until the Heart of the Empire expansion arrives) it might even be accurate to say that the Imperial player has less control over the story than the other players.
However, the Imperial player holds the game's hidden information, and some quick adjustments and house rules can heavily alter the level of influence they have on the narrative. Much like Emperor Palpatine himself, the Empire can technically pull the strings to affect the fate of a campaign- but is it morally problematic to do so? Is it cheating?
In this Unlimited Power series of posts, we're going to take an in-depth look at these various ways that Imperial players can subtlety try to influence the events of a campaign, as well as try to answer the question on where exactly the line is drawn. This week, we're specifically looking at how one can manipulate the very structure of a campaign itself.
The idea for this post came to me from a recent event in our current Return to Hoth campaign. Basically, the Rebels had chosen their last side mission. They had really hoped to earn Leia at some point, but her mission had never come up. Out of curiosity, I checked the side mission deck to see what would have popped up next, and lo and behold, there it was, Communications Breakdown- Leia's acquisition mission. I then did something I probably should not have done, by telling my Rebels about their poor luck. I believe it was a bit disheartening, and not in the way that an Imperial player wants. I regret that.
"What if I had tried to throw the Rebels a bone, and discarded one of the grey side missions I know they didn't want anyway and replaced it with Leia's?" I thought. After all, we're all there to play a game we love- not much point in spending 2-3 hours on a mission that we don't think anyone will enjoy all in the name of doing things completely by the book, was there? Would that be cheating? Or would it simply be an enhancement of the game?
I was curious how other Imperials handled this in campaign, so I posted a survey in the IA sections on the BoardGameGeek and Fantasy Flight Games forums, asking various questions that essentially tried to assess if players would fudge the rules to allow for a more enjoyable or interesting campaign experience. With 67 responses, we noticed some trends in how the Empire tends to run things.
I think a lot of the Empire's opportunities to possibly influence the campaign come during campaign setup. While the Rebels choose their own Heroes as well as the Ally missions that they want to bring, it's possible that the Imperial player may have some sort of involvement in this process- possibly because the Imperial player is often the owner of the game, and may know the rules or components the best (though that certainly isn't always the case).
As you can see, while some players helped their groups by actively assisting in Ally and Hero selection (something I personally am far too guilty of), the prevailing attitude toward this stage of the campaign is for the Imperial player to advise the Rebels only when asked.
Hero selection can be a really important factor in the game. No campaign is won or lost before it begins, but heroes that don't mesh well (like a group of all melee heroes, or only white defense die) can make things far more complicated for the group. Similarly, new players may likely want to bring along their favorite characters as allies, such as Chewbacca or Han, despite the fact that they may not be worth their threat cost. So, perhaps it is widely dependent on the group.
Somewhat surprising to me was the fact that Imp players seemed slightly more apt to give their friends help while choosing skills and items during the Upgrade stage than in initially choosing heroes.
Once again, the prevailing attitude was that the Imperial player would offer help if asked. Given the slightly more competitive atmosphere of a post-mission setting over a pre-campaign setup, I was surprised to see that the complete denial of assistance was actually lower for this.
So far, though, these questions have dealt more with "above the table" dealings directly with the Rebels. How about some of those secret manipulations we spent so long discussing earlier? Well, as you can see in the chart below, it's actually extremely common for Imperials to adjust the grey side mission cards during campaign setup.
Over half of players reported to constructing their grey side mission decks in a way not wholly in line with the rules. The most common deviation was to remove missions that had already been played in past campaign or missions that have been considered to be poorly balanced and not fun. Some of the most hated and broken missions in the game are grey (here's to looking at you, Viper's Den and Sympathy for the Rebellion). Additionally, assuming a player has a few expansions owned, removing previously played grey side missions is a maneuver that campaigns can use to avoid treading familiar ground- and, as we'll discuss in an upcoming article, the element of surprise can be vital to Imperial success, so revisiting a mission can have some funky effects on a campaign in its own way.
A surprisingly large amount of Imperials also admitted to specifically choosing grey side missions that seemed fun. I'm certainly not here to pass any judgment, and I can totally see the value of trying to give your group the opportunity to play better missions. Interestingly enough, while 11 respondents reported to doing this, 14 actually reported to actively manipulating the side mission deck to control the next mission drawn.
Now, it can be assumed that the intent is still the same- to ensure that only more interesting missions are played. While this tactic could absolutely be abused (such as purposefully keeping the Rebels from drawing a mission that could give them a reward that would work well with their team or build), I think the fact that no one reported on trying to prevent the Rebels from drawing any specific items does say something about the lack of malicious intent behind these manipulations. Maybe I'm being overly optimistic, but I think that nowhere in this survey do we see anything that overtly implies sadism or competitiveness by Imperial players in regards to these manipulations, at least now widely.
In fact, it appears that some game manipulations are actually sacrifices on the Imperial players' part for the betterment of the campaign. Though more than half of the respondents reported as having never purposefully lost a game, most of those that did have apparently done so with the expressed purpose of improving Rebel morale in a difficult run.
While making this post, I got kind of worried. What if I find out some terrible stuff? What if people admit to cheating, and manipulating, and doing all sorts of shady stuff with bad intentions?
Well, I for one think I can say that two things are pretty clear:
1) The majority of IA players tend to play by the rules, or at least how they've interpreted the rules to be correct.
2) Those who have manipulated the campaign have done so with the intent of making a better experience for their group.
And honestly, I think that's a testament to this game's community. Speaking of which, here's their take on how they view changing the campaign.
Even though the results in the survey as a whole tended to skew toward a more conservative approach to the rules, most respondents seem to be open to others running campaigns how they see fit. I don't know, I found that to be a really interesting reversal of what one might expect given the rest of these answers. You do you, Imperials. You do you. Just, you know, don't cheat. That's not cool.
Thanks to everyone who contributed in the surveys, and also a thanks to everyone who read this first main post of mine! Next time in the Unlimited Power series, I promise it'll be a little less dry, as we'll be discussing some less questionable and more creative ways the Empire can enhance the campaign experience.
Goodbye for now, and may the Force be with you!
-Thomas
First of all, Imperial Assault is a competitive tabletop miniatures game. While this is evident in campaign, you can perhaps see it even more blatantly in the Skirmish element of the game, where Fantasy Flight Games and the IA community have even designed an official tournament league based wholly on the skirmish side of the game. The bulk of the gameplay is executed through the rules determining combat, movement, line of sight, and other actions. Even in campaign, there are very little narrative choices to be made.
Secondly, while the campaign does have a story, the bulk of the narrative is driven more by pre-scripted events and a branching mission structure than any handcrafted tale spun by a Dungeon Master. In fact, given that the Rebel players construct the majority of the side mission deck and are typically the ones to decide on a mission if there's a choice (at least until the Heart of the Empire expansion arrives) it might even be accurate to say that the Imperial player has less control over the story than the other players.
However, the Imperial player holds the game's hidden information, and some quick adjustments and house rules can heavily alter the level of influence they have on the narrative. Much like Emperor Palpatine himself, the Empire can technically pull the strings to affect the fate of a campaign- but is it morally problematic to do so? Is it cheating?
In this Unlimited Power series of posts, we're going to take an in-depth look at these various ways that Imperial players can subtlety try to influence the events of a campaign, as well as try to answer the question on where exactly the line is drawn. This week, we're specifically looking at how one can manipulate the very structure of a campaign itself.
The idea for this post came to me from a recent event in our current Return to Hoth campaign. Basically, the Rebels had chosen their last side mission. They had really hoped to earn Leia at some point, but her mission had never come up. Out of curiosity, I checked the side mission deck to see what would have popped up next, and lo and behold, there it was, Communications Breakdown- Leia's acquisition mission. I then did something I probably should not have done, by telling my Rebels about their poor luck. I believe it was a bit disheartening, and not in the way that an Imperial player wants. I regret that.
"What if I had tried to throw the Rebels a bone, and discarded one of the grey side missions I know they didn't want anyway and replaced it with Leia's?" I thought. After all, we're all there to play a game we love- not much point in spending 2-3 hours on a mission that we don't think anyone will enjoy all in the name of doing things completely by the book, was there? Would that be cheating? Or would it simply be an enhancement of the game?
I was curious how other Imperials handled this in campaign, so I posted a survey in the IA sections on the BoardGameGeek and Fantasy Flight Games forums, asking various questions that essentially tried to assess if players would fudge the rules to allow for a more enjoyable or interesting campaign experience. With 67 responses, we noticed some trends in how the Empire tends to run things.
I think a lot of the Empire's opportunities to possibly influence the campaign come during campaign setup. While the Rebels choose their own Heroes as well as the Ally missions that they want to bring, it's possible that the Imperial player may have some sort of involvement in this process- possibly because the Imperial player is often the owner of the game, and may know the rules or components the best (though that certainly isn't always the case).
As you can see, while some players helped their groups by actively assisting in Ally and Hero selection (something I personally am far too guilty of), the prevailing attitude toward this stage of the campaign is for the Imperial player to advise the Rebels only when asked.
Hero selection can be a really important factor in the game. No campaign is won or lost before it begins, but heroes that don't mesh well (like a group of all melee heroes, or only white defense die) can make things far more complicated for the group. Similarly, new players may likely want to bring along their favorite characters as allies, such as Chewbacca or Han, despite the fact that they may not be worth their threat cost. So, perhaps it is widely dependent on the group.
Somewhat surprising to me was the fact that Imp players seemed slightly more apt to give their friends help while choosing skills and items during the Upgrade stage than in initially choosing heroes.
Once again, the prevailing attitude was that the Imperial player would offer help if asked. Given the slightly more competitive atmosphere of a post-mission setting over a pre-campaign setup, I was surprised to see that the complete denial of assistance was actually lower for this.
So far, though, these questions have dealt more with "above the table" dealings directly with the Rebels. How about some of those secret manipulations we spent so long discussing earlier? Well, as you can see in the chart below, it's actually extremely common for Imperials to adjust the grey side mission cards during campaign setup.
Over half of players reported to constructing their grey side mission decks in a way not wholly in line with the rules. The most common deviation was to remove missions that had already been played in past campaign or missions that have been considered to be poorly balanced and not fun. Some of the most hated and broken missions in the game are grey (here's to looking at you, Viper's Den and Sympathy for the Rebellion). Additionally, assuming a player has a few expansions owned, removing previously played grey side missions is a maneuver that campaigns can use to avoid treading familiar ground- and, as we'll discuss in an upcoming article, the element of surprise can be vital to Imperial success, so revisiting a mission can have some funky effects on a campaign in its own way.
A surprisingly large amount of Imperials also admitted to specifically choosing grey side missions that seemed fun. I'm certainly not here to pass any judgment, and I can totally see the value of trying to give your group the opportunity to play better missions. Interestingly enough, while 11 respondents reported to doing this, 14 actually reported to actively manipulating the side mission deck to control the next mission drawn.
Now, it can be assumed that the intent is still the same- to ensure that only more interesting missions are played. While this tactic could absolutely be abused (such as purposefully keeping the Rebels from drawing a mission that could give them a reward that would work well with their team or build), I think the fact that no one reported on trying to prevent the Rebels from drawing any specific items does say something about the lack of malicious intent behind these manipulations. Maybe I'm being overly optimistic, but I think that nowhere in this survey do we see anything that overtly implies sadism or competitiveness by Imperial players in regards to these manipulations, at least now widely.
In fact, it appears that some game manipulations are actually sacrifices on the Imperial players' part for the betterment of the campaign. Though more than half of the respondents reported as having never purposefully lost a game, most of those that did have apparently done so with the expressed purpose of improving Rebel morale in a difficult run.
While making this post, I got kind of worried. What if I find out some terrible stuff? What if people admit to cheating, and manipulating, and doing all sorts of shady stuff with bad intentions?
Well, I for one think I can say that two things are pretty clear:
1) The majority of IA players tend to play by the rules, or at least how they've interpreted the rules to be correct.
2) Those who have manipulated the campaign have done so with the intent of making a better experience for their group.
And honestly, I think that's a testament to this game's community. Speaking of which, here's their take on how they view changing the campaign.
Even though the results in the survey as a whole tended to skew toward a more conservative approach to the rules, most respondents seem to be open to others running campaigns how they see fit. I don't know, I found that to be a really interesting reversal of what one might expect given the rest of these answers. You do you, Imperials. You do you. Just, you know, don't cheat. That's not cool.
Thanks to everyone who contributed in the surveys, and also a thanks to everyone who read this first main post of mine! Next time in the Unlimited Power series, I promise it'll be a little less dry, as we'll be discussing some less questionable and more creative ways the Empire can enhance the campaign experience.
Goodbye for now, and may the Force be with you!
-Thomas
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