Solid review. you sold me. I am asking this for Christmas. Base for now. Excited to try it tho! Never played any of these games. Arkham Horror types. But def attracted to Battlestar Galactica aspect.
Having played Unfathomable a couple of times my big question is why bother hiding as a Hybrid. In BSG a hidden cylon can interfere with human efficiency, since it makes people less willing to give extra actions via Executive Order, and it makes humans overplay important skill checks just to be safe. The vulnerability of the human fleet varies greatly over time, with actions at critical moments easily tipping the game into a sudden defeat. Remaining in position to strike can win a game for a cylon player. In Unfathomable the level of threat seems much more constant, with enemies never more than two activations away from arriving on the board, yet also rarely capable of differing damage whether a space contains one or ten Deep Ones. In Unfathomable each character has Their Thing, which seems so strong they should be doing it in nearly all board states, making trusting others less important. The Mythos deck seems to be a carefully cultivated slope to defeat through a steady trickle of resources instead of a source of (sometimes extreme) random threats and opportunities. At least I find myself zoning out during skill checks on Mythos cards. Being thrown in the Brig in Unfathomable as a hybrid is far less punishing than being thrown in the Brig or executed in Galactica is for a cylon. You still get approximately as much control over where the game ends up going, since quite often you would use your first action to move any way and have no burning need to have many skill cards. The humans seem to spend about as much effort throwing you in as you expend exiting each turn exiting through the revolving door. Overall I think there are many things about BSG that are clunky and could be improved. Unfathomable does improve in some of these things. But overall it is far more tightly controlled than BSG is, with your choice of character determining what you do in a game with a steady level of tension with few highs and no lows.
Loved the video and I agree that Unfathomable aims for something new instead of just being a clone. Which is very cool for me, player that played both BSG and Unfathomable. I agree with the point, that if you are super into competitve games, optimizing, crunching numbers, then you may find bad time playing this one (or make it miserable for anyone at the table). However I like to think that game should offer reasonable balance, have fair engine that produces epic story-telling moments. So you don't have to try to balance things and experience out by role-playing something. Like in the War of the Ring for example, its quite game'y, system heavy game, that doesn't fail to bring epic storylines inside the game without bringing out fluff or lore text on its game elements. Its just designed in the game. Good thing that they introduced a way to balance the game with the expansion cards, giving one or the other side some handicap. All things considered, I think that the game being more difficult for non-hybrid players is by design. I would rather have a game where I got crushed by monsters and hybrids, than the game where everything went smooth for non-hybrids, everything is under control...and boring.
Great review, great game. Thank you. And I loved BSG as a fan of tv series and also the boardgame itself. But this one is better designed, it canceled a lot of flaws of its predecessor.
when I heard people played it multiple times and it is always the same "team" wins so its a matter who gets to be the winning teams by draft - not the card during game, but just role picking
Cool review, but I'm a bit surprised why you treat the Lovecraftian theme as a net negative. For me personally I'd chose this game over Battlestar just because the theme is way more appealing to me, and outside of Fantasy Flight's Arkham Files games (which this game is part of), I don't feel like the market is any more saturated by Cthulhu games than by Sci-Fi games. It's just a theme like any others.
Ya yknow I'd say the theme is a side grade depending on who you are. If you're a huge sci-fi or BSG fan, the Battlestar theme is a no brainer. That said, the Lovecraftian theme is more digestible for the general audience and perfectly fits the idea of a secret cult of fish people. I find that most people in my groups prefer the Lovecraftian theme over BSG but those who watched BSG LOVE the original's theme.
You made me realize something about BSG on the way I was approaching and why I never liked it. For me the event deck was the problem of the game as it slow down the game on the board and all that matter to me was playing my character and uncover the traitors. But indeed the deck should be looked at the core of the game as the thematic element. I don't know if I would enjoy it even if I look at it this way but this is for sure a better start. Thank you for that great review.
Oh ya dude, the mythos / crisis deck is like the core of the game. If everyone is invested in the mythos, the game truly is captivating. The actual time playing as your character on the boat is such a small amount of the full game, so only being invested in your character's actions will make you feel like not much happens or that you have no control.
I do agree Chtlhu stuff can be generic, but the world unfathomable is in feels very lived in at this point between Eldritch/Arkham horror and mansions of madness. I've been playing these games for 10+ years and they never get old! Getting to go on an epic horror cruise adventure just feels right when you look at the Arkham files world.
Great analysis! The “generic” Lovecraft theme, suits the game in my opinion. Better than a lot of other games, in which you bring shotguns and flamethrowers to fight cosmic horrors and elder gods. The isolation, a passengership in the north Atlantic, and the brooding and escalating paranoia, fits perfectly in this setting.
I feel like there was little effort made to really understand the criticisms before coming up with counter arguments. Instead just providing the straw man of everything being about Unfathomable vs BSG. BSG then falsely being the perfect game. For example: when arguing that the extensive admin isn't a valid criticism, how is the game compared to other hidden role games like "Feed the Kraken"?
Ya great question, I feel like games like 'Feed the Kraken'/'Secret Hitler'/'Avalon & Resistance' all are a family of games with a greater emphasis on the social deduction puzzle than a game like 'Unfathomable' / 'BSG' / 'Nemesis' / 'Dead of Winter' which all have a greater emphasis on the emergent story and traitor mechanics. From this, the mechanism of 'Hidden Roles' isn't the full story of what the game is about, which should be further broken down into 'Social Deduction' and 'Hidden Traitor'. The aforementioned 'Hidden Traitor' games do have much higher administrative duties due to the impending doom from constant issues and enemies. And even though both 'Feed the Kraken' and 'Unfathomable' share hidden roles, a boat traveling, and a passing likeness of one another thematically, the gameplay emphasis is entirely different and shouldn't be lumped as direct competitors. Undoubtedly 'Feed the Kraken' is simpler to run, but that's because they're two different genres and 'Feed the Kraken' doesn't have a variety of enemies, or 7 different skill decks, or allies, or multiple resource dials. On the other hand, Feed the Kraken is much more similar to 'Secret Hitler' from a gameplay perspective, but 'Feed the Kraken' has more administrative overhead than 'Secret Hitler', but I think you'd agree it's not to the detriment of 'Secret Hitler'. Long answer! But great question and I hope I clarified my thoughts!
The original game was made over 15 years ago, so yes of course they were going to clean up the rules and make it slightly better gameplay. Then they changed the theme to something 1000x better. Why would you think this is cope?
I love these deep dives. After this and your 6p Dune Imperium video, i had NO choice but to subscribe!
Thanks dude, glad you enjoy these dives!!
Thank you for pouring your heart out! Lovely and genuinely heartfelt review.
Lovely review and a great analysis!
Solid review. you sold me. I am asking this for Christmas. Base for now. Excited to try it tho! Never played any of these games. Arkham Horror types. But def attracted to Battlestar Galactica aspect.
This was great. I love both.
Having played Unfathomable a couple of times my big question is why bother hiding as a Hybrid. In BSG a hidden cylon can interfere with human efficiency, since it makes people less willing to give extra actions via Executive Order, and it makes humans overplay important skill checks just to be safe. The vulnerability of the human fleet varies greatly over time, with actions at critical moments easily tipping the game into a sudden defeat. Remaining in position to strike can win a game for a cylon player. In Unfathomable the level of threat seems much more constant, with enemies never more than two activations away from arriving on the board, yet also rarely capable of differing damage whether a space contains one or ten Deep Ones. In Unfathomable each character has Their Thing, which seems so strong they should be doing it in nearly all board states, making trusting others less important. The Mythos deck seems to be a carefully cultivated slope to defeat through a steady trickle of resources instead of a source of (sometimes extreme) random threats and opportunities. At least I find myself zoning out during skill checks on Mythos cards. Being thrown in the Brig in Unfathomable as a hybrid is far less punishing than being thrown in the Brig or executed in Galactica is for a cylon. You still get approximately as much control over where the game ends up going, since quite often you would use your first action to move any way and have no burning need to have many skill cards. The humans seem to spend about as much effort throwing you in as you expend exiting each turn exiting through the revolving door.
Overall I think there are many things about BSG that are clunky and could be improved. Unfathomable does improve in some of these things. But overall it is far more tightly controlled than BSG is, with your choice of character determining what you do in a game with a steady level of tension with few highs and no lows.
Exactly my thoughts. This is why Unfathomable turned out to be a disappointment for me.
Loved the video and I agree that Unfathomable aims for something new instead of just being a clone. Which is very cool for me, player that played both BSG and Unfathomable.
I agree with the point, that if you are super into competitve games, optimizing, crunching numbers, then you may find bad time playing this one (or make it miserable for anyone at the table). However I like to think that game should offer reasonable balance, have fair engine that produces epic story-telling moments. So you don't have to try to balance things and experience out by role-playing something. Like in the War of the Ring for example, its quite game'y, system heavy game, that doesn't fail to bring epic storylines inside the game without bringing out fluff or lore text on its game elements. Its just designed in the game. Good thing that they introduced a way to balance the game with the expansion cards, giving one or the other side some handicap. All things considered, I think that the game being more difficult for non-hybrid players is by design. I would rather have a game where I got crushed by monsters and hybrids, than the game where everything went smooth for non-hybrids, everything is under control...and boring.
Very well considered assessment; maybe now I'll have to try it.
Awesome, finally!, thank you.
Agree and agree 👍🤜🤛
Great review, great game. Thank you. And I loved BSG as a fan of tv series and also the boardgame itself. But this one is better designed, it canceled a lot of flaws of its predecessor.
Great write up, a BSG could not wait to try this one!🎉🎉
when I heard people played it multiple times and it is always the same "team" wins so its a matter who gets to be the winning teams by draft - not the card during game, but just role picking
Cool review, but I'm a bit surprised why you treat the Lovecraftian theme as a net negative. For me personally I'd chose this game over Battlestar just because the theme is way more appealing to me, and outside of Fantasy Flight's Arkham Files games (which this game is part of), I don't feel like the market is any more saturated by Cthulhu games than by Sci-Fi games. It's just a theme like any others.
Ya yknow I'd say the theme is a side grade depending on who you are. If you're a huge sci-fi or BSG fan, the Battlestar theme is a no brainer. That said, the Lovecraftian theme is more digestible for the general audience and perfectly fits the idea of a secret cult of fish people. I find that most people in my groups prefer the Lovecraftian theme over BSG but those who watched BSG LOVE the original's theme.
I thought it was bad because the evil side wins almost by default and not due bugged burning mechanics of The Thing
Cheer~~~incapable of being fully explored or understood.😅
You made me realize something about BSG on the way I was approaching and why I never liked it. For me the event deck was the problem of the game as it slow down the game on the board and all that matter to me was playing my character and uncover the traitors. But indeed the deck should be looked at the core of the game as the thematic element.
I don't know if I would enjoy it even if I look at it this way but this is for sure a better start.
Thank you for that great review.
Oh ya dude, the mythos / crisis deck is like the core of the game. If everyone is invested in the mythos, the game truly is captivating. The actual time playing as your character on the boat is such a small amount of the full game, so only being invested in your character's actions will make you feel like not much happens or that you have no control.
My group has tried ro play this like 4 times, and idk what our issue is but the bad guys have won handily every time
I do agree Chtlhu stuff can be generic, but the world unfathomable is in feels very lived in at this point between Eldritch/Arkham horror and mansions of madness. I've been playing these games for 10+ years and they never get old! Getting to go on an epic horror cruise adventure just feels right when you look at the Arkham files world.
Great analysis!
The “generic” Lovecraft theme, suits the game in my opinion. Better than a lot of other games, in which you bring shotguns and flamethrowers to fight cosmic horrors and elder gods.
The isolation, a passengership in the north Atlantic, and the brooding and escalating paranoia, fits perfectly in this setting.
Battlestar is mush better but.. if you dont Have it couse is not easy to find now you can play this new game is not bad
I feel like there was little effort made to really understand the criticisms before coming up with counter arguments. Instead just providing the straw man of everything being about Unfathomable vs BSG. BSG then falsely being the perfect game.
For example: when arguing that the extensive admin isn't a valid criticism, how is the game compared to other hidden role games like "Feed the Kraken"?
Ya great question, I feel like games like 'Feed the
Kraken'/'Secret Hitler'/'Avalon & Resistance' all are a family of games with a greater emphasis on the social deduction puzzle than a game like 'Unfathomable' / 'BSG' / 'Nemesis' / 'Dead of Winter' which all have a greater emphasis on the emergent story and traitor mechanics.
From this, the mechanism of 'Hidden Roles' isn't the full story of what the game is about, which should be further broken down into 'Social Deduction' and 'Hidden Traitor'. The aforementioned 'Hidden Traitor' games do have much higher administrative duties due to the impending doom from constant issues and enemies. And even though both 'Feed the Kraken' and 'Unfathomable' share hidden roles, a boat traveling, and a passing likeness of one another thematically, the gameplay emphasis is entirely different and shouldn't be lumped as direct competitors.
Undoubtedly 'Feed the Kraken' is simpler to run, but that's because they're two different genres and 'Feed the Kraken' doesn't have a variety of enemies, or 7 different skill decks, or allies, or multiple resource dials. On the other hand, Feed the Kraken is much more similar to 'Secret Hitler' from a gameplay perspective, but 'Feed the Kraken' has more administrative overhead than 'Secret Hitler', but I think you'd agree it's not to the detriment of 'Secret Hitler'.
Long answer! But great question and I hope I clarified my thoughts!
I'm shocked people pearl clutch onto BSG. It's out of print for a reason. No one cares about that show or that theme anymore.
38 minutes of cope.
4 words of cope. 😂
The original game was made over 15 years ago, so yes of course they were going to clean up the rules and make it slightly better gameplay.
Then they changed the theme to something 1000x better.
Why would you think this is cope?