Hands on with Starcraft Brood War Expansion Pack

Since it's release back in October 2007, Starcraft the Board Game has won several awards, including one on our Podcast. Not surprisingly, the first expansion of the game is titled Brood War and it adds many of the features found in the computer game expansion of the same name. Unlike the computer game expansion, Brood War adds several new features which will definitely affect the players wage war across the galaxy.

All the New Stuff

The retail price of Brood War is 59.99 and ships with a decent amount of items. Unfortunately, this box set is not as good as value as the original game. Inside the box, you will find six new planets, 48 new plastic figures, over 100 combat and technology cards, six new faction sheets, and an assortment of tokens and counters. The reason why it falls short of the value of the original game is that many of the cards and tokens actually replace pieces from the original game instead of adding to the original game. The original set also packs in 180 figures. That's almost four times as many figures for only $30 more. As a result of all these updates, integration of the base game and the expansion set is kind of a mess. It is not easy to play with the expansion one game and then play with only the base game for the next.

Fans of Starcraft will recognize all the new units. Zerg get the Devourer, Lurker, and Infested Terran. Protoss get their Dark Templar, Dark Archon, and Corsair. Terran Forces can now deploy the Medic and Valkyrie Missile Frigate. All the new units are either built at the existing three buildings or can be purchased after deploying new technology cards.

Game Mechanics

On the game mechanic side of thing, three new modules and one new order type will change up how the game is played. The new order type is used to increase the defense of an area and a new defensive module helps defending players even up the odds a little bit. New offensive modules allow for players to launch orbital assaults on enemy bases.(Though it is costly to do so). Also, the collateral damage ability given to figures like the Siege Tank and Guardian will ensure that bases get destroyed easier.

While the expansion pack certainly cost a little too much, I am looking forward to using it in future games. Once the crew of the Tabletop Battlefield gets a few games in, we will give this pack a full review. Keep an eye out for that a future episode of The Tabletop Battlefield.