Boosters vs Squadron Boxes
STEVE COLE WRITES: One of the most baffling questions we get is: "Why don’t the ships cards in the boosters match the ships in the squadron box of the same number?"
The answer is that they were never intended to.
The ship cards in a major product (Romulan Border, Tholian Attack) match the corresponding set of three Squadron Boxes.
The ship cards in a set of three Booster Packs match the 24 ships in the corresponding Border Box.
For a complete list:
Ship cards in Klingon Border match ships in Squadron Boxes 1-3.
Ship cards in Boosters 1-3 match ships in Border Box 1.
Ship cards in Klingon Attack match ships in Squadron Boxes 4-6.
Ship cards in Boosters 4-6 match ships in Border Box 2.
Ship cards in Romulan Border match ships in Squadron Boxes 7-9.
Ship cards in Boosters 7-9 match ships in Border Box 3.
Ship cards in Romulan Attack match ships in Squadron Boxes 10-12.
Ship cards in Boosters 10-12 match ships in Border Box 4.
Ship cards in Tholian Attack match ships in Squadron Boxes 13-15.
Ship cards in Boosters 13-15 match ships in Border Box 5.
Now, the one thing that does match is Booster Zero and Squadron Box Zero, since those ships are not "in the game". (Well, four of them aren’t. The other two were not in the game when those products were released.) Maybe the fact that Zero matches makes people think that the other 15 match?
We thought that what matched and what didn’t match was obvious, but apparently it is not as obvious as we thought. Players seem to see "5" on two products and expect them to match, but they don’t. Maybe in hindsight it would have been better to mark the boosters with letters instead of numbers so there would be no "false correspondence" between similar titles? Something to remember the next time I do a new game system. One thing that these questions did do is to make us realize that our shopping carts did a haphazard job of explaining this. After the third time we got asked this question, I checked the cart and sent the CartMaster a memo to add better descriptions of what matches what.
The answer is that they were never intended to.
The ship cards in a major product (Romulan Border, Tholian Attack) match the corresponding set of three Squadron Boxes.
The ship cards in a set of three Booster Packs match the 24 ships in the corresponding Border Box.
For a complete list:
Ship cards in Klingon Border match ships in Squadron Boxes 1-3.
Ship cards in Boosters 1-3 match ships in Border Box 1.
Ship cards in Klingon Attack match ships in Squadron Boxes 4-6.
Ship cards in Boosters 4-6 match ships in Border Box 2.
Ship cards in Romulan Border match ships in Squadron Boxes 7-9.
Ship cards in Boosters 7-9 match ships in Border Box 3.
Ship cards in Romulan Attack match ships in Squadron Boxes 10-12.
Ship cards in Boosters 10-12 match ships in Border Box 4.
Ship cards in Tholian Attack match ships in Squadron Boxes 13-15.
Ship cards in Boosters 13-15 match ships in Border Box 5.
Now, the one thing that does match is Booster Zero and Squadron Box Zero, since those ships are not "in the game". (Well, four of them aren’t. The other two were not in the game when those products were released.) Maybe the fact that Zero matches makes people think that the other 15 match?
We thought that what matched and what didn’t match was obvious, but apparently it is not as obvious as we thought. Players seem to see "5" on two products and expect them to match, but they don’t. Maybe in hindsight it would have been better to mark the boosters with letters instead of numbers so there would be no "false correspondence" between similar titles? Something to remember the next time I do a new game system. One thing that these questions did do is to make us realize that our shopping carts did a haphazard job of explaining this. After the third time we got asked this question, I checked the cart and sent the CartMaster a memo to add better descriptions of what matches what.
posted by Federation Commander at 9:47 AM
<< Home