Learn to Play: Star Trek Ascendancy

In this video I will teach you how to play including: component break down, setup, initiative phase, build phase, command phase, end phase, and winning conditions.
I will also give you my thoughts and opinions on the game.
Game type: Space 4x style
Run time: 90 minutes per player
Learning Curve: about half a game
Number of players: 2-3 can add expansions to increase this
Designers: Aaron Dill, John Kovaleski, Sean Sweigart
Publisher: Gale Force Nine
Thanks for watching. If you found this video helpful and/or enjoyable please consider subscribing to my channel and liking the video.

[@cradio52]

This video is 7 years old but it’s still helping people to this day! We got this game for Christmas and have spent like 2 hours just trying to read through the instructions and figure out how to play, and this video helped massively. Wish we would have looked it up first! 😅

[@Ducky2317]

great video! I just found it funny that when you used examples of combat and brought in the Federation, you kept calling them the "Trade Federation" and not just the "Federation"! Silly Star Wars people. learned a lot.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks I missed that but it is quite funny thanks for watching and commenting.

[@supremeownage8995]

Came here to make this exact comment. xD

[@jawsvvvvv]

Excellent video!!! I have been looking for 4x game that I can play solo. I have committed myself with Paramount+ subscription to watching all the episodes. I loved TNG when I was in high school never got into any others. I treated this game like a kickstarter got to get it all. Dice sets expansions....oh my. Just sold off a few games I wasn't playing and a little self justification.

[@DriedMoss]

I have owned this game since it launched, just bought all the expansions during our local game store during November 2022 Black Friday, and only today, am I learning to play. So many games I have played that led up to me finally returning to it. Great video!

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks so much, hope you have a great time with it;)

[@paulorego9334]

Very clear and nicely paced instructions on how to play - subscribed!

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks so much for watching and for the sub it means a lot.

[@Daniel-Strain]

Thanks for the video! I just got this and excited to try it. :)

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks, you will have a great time with it.

[@frankc.531]

Haha, my mom used to pronounce it Star Track when I was a kid just like this guy. Lol, drove me nuts.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Sorry about that, I am a Star Wars fan and didn't realize I was pronouncing it wrong:(

[@dustbustus27]

Thanks for the content. Hopefully I will have this hit the table tonight.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

great hope your game goes well. thanks for watching and commenting.

[@braddimond7119]

Thanks been awhile since i played. This was a good refresher

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks for watching and posting;)

[@Cibosgamingandarchery]

awesome video, thank you! :)

[@maestro7058]

I always put a like to your vids. Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year! GJ!

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks so much for the support and I hope you had a great Christmas as well. Happy New Year!

[@maestro7058]

@@LearntoPlayGames Yup, my pleasure and yes Happy New Year lets make the next year great!

[@jasonraber3770]

Thank you for the great tutorial sent to my gaming group to view before we played any plans on making a Borg expansion tutorial and have you heard any rumors of other races coming out as well, keep up the great work and thank you for taking your time to produce these tutorials

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks so much, I am happy to hear the video was helpful. I currently don't have plans to cover the expansions but if I get enough requests I will let Gale Force 9 know and see if they want to have me do them. Thanks for asking and for commenting hope you have fun with the game;)

[@jeremyboughtono2]

Brilliant tutorial, so much better than these learn it in xx minutes where they are always rushed.

[@tommyshwe7077]

Very helpful👍

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks

[@DonnaBrooks]

Thanks for the great tutorial! I shared it with a friend and will be looking for other videos from you. Hoping to play this game with him @ BGF this weekend. I must have missed something important, though. How do you get the Ascendancy tokens?

[@tigerpawdesigns]

collect 5 culture tokens and swap them for an ascendancy token

[@deathgrip509]

Will you be doing a playthrough / rules explanation of the Borg expansion?

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Not sure. I am currently working with Gale Force 9 on videos for Doctor Who and Firefly. Thanks for asking and I will not rule it out.

[@nelsonorta9081]

Overall, this is a great video! Thank you! My only criticism is around 27:00 when you describe surviving the phenomenon hazards, you call them "research nodes" when they are really "research tokens." Not a big deal because players will notice this when they play.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks for the feedback and for watching. Hope you enjoy the game;)

[@bgm-1961]

So how many takes did you do, to demonstrate rolling a "6" at 35:00? :) You can come over to my house and roll my Hegemony attempts anytime! Seriously, this is a great "How to play" video. You're one of the few that cares enough to correct your mistakes. And for that, I'll make sure to go to your channel first for any game I need to learn!

[@LearntoPlayGames]

The funny thing is it was only one take, the dice like to show off for the camera at times. same thing happened when I was shooting Conan they were on fire I had to finally roll them off screen so I could say I had a bad roll ;). Thanks for watching and asking about that, it is a funny behind the scenes thing that happens a lot when I am not playing.

[@andreagreyskull4427]

Great tutorial video as usual. BTW, are you planning to do a tutorial of Kingdom Death Monster? I know it is huge and you might need at least 1 hour. but man, it is really worth it.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks for asking, I am planning on doing one for kingdom death and I will be breaking it up into at least three different videos one of each phase of the game.

[@andreagreyskull4427]

That's fantastic news!!! Keep up the wonderful work you are doing! you are a great resource for the BG community.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks so much for the feedback and for watching my channel. I have a number of other games that will be showing up soon on my channel as well.

[@rodrigokabuto]

Great video! One question my friends always have. What are the differences between warp and route. The warp you spend an action and place the ship and the warp token, then you can send the ship directly to another sistem. So, the other one is slower, so I would I chose to use the route instead of the warp?

[@LearntoPlayGames]

It has been a long time sense I have played this game let me look over the rules and see if I can come up with an answer for you. Thanks for watching and for the question.

[@gouriel]

In cases where you cannot enter another system (because somebody else is there) you might want to land adjacent (for example in the space lane) and impulse can be a way of doing that more cheaply, because moving 2 "sector" only costs one move. So it's mainly useful for small lanes, or if you want to block lanes from a rival by parking your ship in the way.

[@gouriel]

@@LearntoPlayGames any luck? :)

[@bobmoy4569]

@@gouriel it's all about command. It takes a command token to start a warp. It also takes a command token to end a warp. If you want to jump two systems then it takes an additional two command tokens so to jump to one system would take two command tokens, to jump two systems would take three command tokens. I believe at the end of your turn you get another warp token, so if you wanted to take your time, or if you didn't have enough command tokens, or if would still be faster than space lane travel. Hope this helps

[@blesswitskills]

We should play this at the next Con!

[@LearntoPlayGames]

that would be cool, not sure if I would have time for this game but would be interested in playing games at a con. Thanks for watching.

[@Sam-fw5tp]

Do you think you could add chapters to this so that I may refrence each section?

[@LearntoPlayGames]

I will see what I can do;)

[@Culinary_Nerds]

Where does one find the Star Trek Playmat? Also how do I request a game to be looked at, cause this is a lot to take in. I love this video, Already on my second viewing

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks so much for watching and posting, As for the mats Gale Force Nine was selling them I think through their website. Not sure what you mean by having a game looked at are you asking about requesting a game for me to do a video on?

[@Totihno]

Nice tutorial :). Just 2 things, you didn't talk about invasions, and at 3:30 you said you need extra commands to attack from múltiple sectors but you only require 1 to initiate combat with all adjacent ships

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks for watching and your feedback. Thanks for catching those couple of mistakes.

[@MrBlef666]

can you say what is the quality of the gamemat please. is it a mousepad?

[@LearntoPlayGames]

It is a thin but sturdy flexible plastic kind of like the ones Fantasy Flight did for X-wing a while back if you have seen them. It is not a mouse pad or thick like what I film on normally. I feel that it will hold up well to normal use. Hope this helps.

[@MrBlef666]

Learn to Play Games thanx

[@GoingAnalogShow]

Having the same issue. This won’t play on an iPad at all. :(

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Sorry to hear that not sure why there are issues with that or what I could change to stop that from happening.

[@GoingAnalogShow]

Learn to Play Games Some weird video issue! Hopefully it won’t impact you guys otherwise.

[@Nazgull2k1]

Video will NOT play on my iPhone. At all. Plays on my PC just fine, all other vids work fine... but this one refuses to load

[@LearntoPlayGames]

That is so weird, I have no idea why that would be and I don't think I have had any other views bring that up.

[@LeeroyPorkins]

I am the fence between Star Trek Ascendancy & Twilight Imperium. Which one is more enjoyable?

[@LearntoPlayGames]

It really is personal preference. I personally have never played Twilight Imperium but I have heard it is a great game though it is very long. On the other hand Star Trek Ascendancy is also a long game and I think it also would depend on if you are a Star Trek fan if so than you may enjoy STA better than TI. Thanks for asking and let me know what you decide.

[@LeeroyPorkins]

@@LearntoPlayGames After much analyzing I have decided to get both of them. Lol I'm leaning towards TI 4 first as that one has the most Factions to choose from. I got burned by Roar: King of the Pride with how imbalanced the Player Factions are.

[@Carsten_de_1981]

@@LeeroyPorkins now, which one do you like better now? Or didn't you end up getting both?

[@LeeroyPorkins]

@@Carsten_de_1981 I need to play a full game of Ascendancy, but I feel like I enjoy Galactic Emperor the most, yes I ended up with three. 😅 I have all the Expansions for Ascendancy as well as Prophecy of the Kings on preorder. 1. Galactic Emperor 2. Tie between Star Trek: Ascendancy and Twilight Imperium 4th Edition

[@dcal12]

Yep, I can’t play it either, although the ad plays

[@bgm-1961]

Plays just fine on my Android devices! 😁

[@todd3458]

He said Trade Federation.

[@HeroElrond]

Annoying that this video is blocked from playing on my Apple TV, forcing me to stream through my phone instead.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Is it something with the my video? do any of my other videos work on your Apple TV?

[@SEdwards2881]

1-3 players? I thought it was strictly 3 players for now. I could see how 2 would be ok.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Sorry, it can be played with two players but there is no way to play it with one. I will change that in the description.

[@Marinealver]

It plays terribly with two players. One will gain the lead and there is no way of stopping it.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

I have not played with just two players. what other problems did you find, was it just that one player had more planets or more military might?

[@Marinealver]

more planets which also becomes more culture and military.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

I figured that was the problem cause even in larger games with more players if one player gets lucky with a couple of good planet pulls or has some lucky dice early on it is hard to check them. Thanks for commenting and sharing.

[@holysmoke8439]

r u gonna do conan

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Thanks for asking, Yes I am actually editing it right now and will be filming the intro and exit later this week looking to upload it soon.

[@andreagreyskull4427]

and I have Conan too. Would love to see how it plays!! that actual rulebook is dreadful!!!

[@LearntoPlayGames]

very true, it is taking me much longer than expected to get the video done but it is coming along.

[@holysmoke8439]

Learn to Play Games good job your gonna b the only person on utube to not just unbox it but actually play the game!

[@LearntoPlayGames]

thanks, it was challenging. I will most likely do a basic play video as well so people can see it in action like I have done with a couple of my other games.

[@TheEarthlyOdyssey]

Why are you calling the Federation the "Trade Federation"? It's from Star Wars. It's just the Federation. Another commenter also used this wording on another video.

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Sorry about that, I am not a Star Trek guy and did not do it intentionally. Thanks for watching hope you found the video helpful other than that problem;P

[@TheEarthlyOdyssey]

It's a good review otherwise. Helped me to decide to buy the game. thx!

[@dennissuijkerbuijk8065]

not a Star trek guy? BOO HISS!! haha is all fine. thanks for this video

[@williamshattuck1825]

you kept calling the Federation, the Trade Federation. Also you kept referring to the heavy crusiers as fighters. Star Wars is more your thing huh....

[@LearntoPlayGames]

Ya, I had a hard time keeping them straight;) Hopefully the video was still helpfully.