Space Base: The Mysteries of Terra Proxima Review - with Tom Vasel

[@ThrashMatter]

Me and my couple love this game, it is one of our favourites but I thought the same seeing this review... all these new mechanisms only adds time to the duration of the game and feels very messy. We appreciated the short duration of the base game and this expansion just adds mechanisms to extend gameplay time but doesn't make it better. Another Biodome-like expansion with just some new cards would have been better. Not buying this new one. Thanks Tom!

[@yrq_]

When you play with everything added after finishing the campaign, you no longer hold any cards in hand. Throwing that extra die and adding tokens doesn't really take time and same goes for shifting cards after purchase. A bit of extra upkeep that can be done by other players. The extra die and rules for tokens shift the weight towards shy plutonium dice more. In games with the first expansion we tended to get a die or two during the course of the game. Ships that brought tokens were rare. Here you can have more consistent "token income" and buy suboptimal ships just to get more of those little cubes. A couple of times we gathered a handful of those before the end of the game, and throwing like 8 or 10 dice in your turn becomes normal. It's all fun, even more luck dependent than before, but you cannot expect Space Base to be all fair and strategically planned. All in all, even I'm not the biggest fan of the game, I like the new additions. Not so much the 13th sector, which is fine I guess, but mostly for making the Shy Plutonium Shine. Or Shynier.

[@EdgxrVxlle]

Can't we just use the Shy pluto dice (I think it has two faces with the monster?) and borrow the slide cards and add tokens mechanism to improve the "token income"?

[@XGmastersX]

After the first expansion the only way I played was to get as many mini dice as possible and if I got that engine up fast I would just roll, pardon the pun, through the competition. Glad to see this expansion makes it easier

[@yrq_]

@@EdgxrVxlle that'll work

[@KabukiKid]

I tend to agree with what Tom said about how too much muddies the waters, so I am a bit hesitant about this expansion. I also love the game... I'm not itching to "ruin" the experience with too much.

[@rightwoke]

Play it for the campaign, not the content.

[@mikehulsebus]

I played through this whole expansion this weekend. I found it a great reason to play more space base. I won't add most of this to the base game permanently because of the extra playtime and how much it diverts focus but it was fun to try things out. Looking forward to the next one if they make one. I think one reason a company make make a saga expansion is it feels like your are getting more fun and content if you get in 6 plays of a new expansion before you have seen everything Tom says it best. This is more but not better. But I enjoyed it

[@MussoGames]

I have enjoyed both expansions for the most part. However, I think the base game is still the best way to go. Or maybe take the point value Shy Plutonium dice out. It has just always devolved into someone buying a bunch of why plutonium that gives them points and it’s gotten away from the core mechanisms that make the game sing. They are fun expansions but not by any means necessary. I usually play the game without them these days.

[@debbiebregman9571]

We LOVE space base and are kind of addicted. But this review is making me doubt…. Haven’t seen the components, but if it’s indeed more of the same as shy Pluto, I think we might be okay with what we already own….

[@NATOnova]

So if we were to buy 1 expansion, do you recommend this or shy pluto?

[@beazer32]

He gave a Seal of Excellence to Shy Pluto, so I'm guessing that one.

[@Kasotic]

They tell a story (even though it’s a minimal story) so I would start with the first one.

[@XGmastersX]

If you just wanted the content and do not care about the mini campaigns, which are boring anyway. I would get the second expansion. It had the first ones biggest addon in it. Sure the first one had better colored dice but the second just adds way more. I would get both personally but if you are new to space base the second expansion is a better bet in my mind

[@Nagi2100]

@@XGmastersX That's the part that threw me. How is only having to buy one expansion to get the previous expansions content a bad thing?

[@simon-oliviersylvestre7755]

I have the command station expansion, do we have enough sleeves for this expansion?

[@uplift-yourdailypickup6424]

I heard there's not enough if you have saga 1 and 2. You can buy more sleeves at the AEG online store.

[@ZharelAnger]

I agree, black would have been much better color for the ink on the orange dice.

[@SteveBrinich]

As far as I can tell, the orange dice in Terra Proxima are basically just like the red dice in Shy Pluto (i.e. mixing them together and leaving them mixed wouldn't change anything), so they really should have just stuck with the MUCH easier to read red dice.

[@pjpaella]

I felt the 1st expansion, Shy, was bordering on too much extra baggage for a streamlined game. Shifting cards in a giant grid every turn? No thanks

[@Sir_I.I_William]

Your review convinced me that I wanted to buy this expansion. Thank you.

[@Nagi2100]

I mean, I get some of the issues, but I don't agree with the negative idea of this expansion copying the previous one. It kills the question of "Which one should I get?". The second one has most of the first one so if you haven't gotten into it, you only need to get one expansion rather than two. Edit: Also, the bonus dice and shy pluto dice and ship dice are all shy pluto things. All of the fiddlyness is from the original one.

[@EdgxrVxlle]

I mean it's pretty bad for first expansion owners since value decreases? should I buy the second expansion for half the new stuff or wait to see if the third expansion brings the parts I didn't have plus new stuff.

[@XGmastersX]

The extra black ship die and putting the tokens on the cards is from this expansion. Shy Pluto just had it so you could get the tokens through card powers. So this expansion added some fiddliness to make it easier to get the ship tokens if you didn't have any of the cards that gave them to you.

[@Nagi2100]

@@EdgxrVxlle yea but that third one is likely several years out so…

[@4757joshua2]

It's interesting that you thought this made the game longer. With a new stream of resources, starting with some income, extra patrol tokens, and 2 other things I won't spoil that also give you more income, how could the game be longer? You get more stuff, but still only need to arrive at 40 points. And as to rules creep/more stuff, I can teach this expansion in 40 seconds flat. I'll be playing this with new players for sure. And sure you have more stuff to check on and do each turn, but that's a good thing! It keeps me busy during other people's turns. This is a 10 out of 10 expansion for me. I agree that the little campaign isn't good though, and skipped through it.

[@TuurFrencken]

Do I sense a little expansion fatigue? I know I have. I used to hunt down every expansion I could get. But I've started to realise they quite often take away to much of the game I really liked at the start. I passed on the second expansion for Quacks, the third expansion for Teotihuacan, the second one for Tiny Towns, the second one for Architects of the West Kingdom, I regret buying the expansion for Baren Park ...

[@TheBrokenMeeple]

The Architects expansion is great, but yeah the others, you do have a point, they do bloat their respective games too much.

[@uplift-yourdailypickup6424]

Agreed the story is not very good. For the 1st expansion I was trying to go thru the material at the pace it suggested but now I just want to through all the stuff into the main box. I guess I’m going to pass on this second expansion. edit: I just took everything and put it in the main box. Don't bother with the story, it's not worth your time. The ships are just a module you can use, however it would be hard to sort the cards every time you wanted to put them in /take them out of the game.

[@realjon4220]

Yeah honestly I even kinda disliked the extra fiddliness in shy pluto.

[@MrRyoga84]

I think i just add the easy simply cards from this exp to the core game the rest back inte the box

[@baylorpeak7135]

Is this really Tom? No suspenders or snappy tie...hope Tom is OK ;) Regardless, great review for the second expansion to one of my favorite games!

[@ESCTom]

Ugh this expansion just looks like work

[@xCriticalStrikex]

Shy pluto was okay, but I very quickly removed every card with those little fighter jets on and those awful little dice They completely suck!

[@mikaelhansson9260]

They small dice work just fine. I once won a game and every single VP came from the small dice.

[@xCriticalStrikex]

@@mikaelhansson9260 They suck because they are broken and imbalanced. Not because they are weak. 😜

[@MrRockapoodle72]

@@xCriticalStrikex i hate them also its too much goin on, now on every persons roll you also roll a bunch of di and everybody has to do this around the same time its such a mess

[@MrRyoga84]

I did the same , and will do the same with this expansion 😀