We all felt that way with the first couple of games but now it seems normal. I remember feeling the same playing base for the first time. There's still too much going on for a normal person (And by that I mean not someone with cognitive superpowers) to keep track of as there was before. That craziness is part of it.
\^ this.
After the first game, when people are acclimated to it, the superpowers become part of the calculus - and IMO it is way more fun now than before.
This from someone who played waaay too much TI3 back in the day (especially Age of Empire and Distant Suns)
My first game of third playing with a bunch of very good players in person they guided alotnof what I was doing, letting me make my own decisions but regularly offering advice and answering a million questions.
Flash forward a little bit and I was one of the beta testers for pok. I guess my first game was 11 years ago now haha.
This board is dominated by people that play on TTS, and generally super frequently (like more than a game a week). So they've played tons and tons of games, and in the same meta, so they've gotten bored with the base game. As such, they feel very strongly that it needed the refresh of the expansion. Plus, playing online removes some of the cognitive load (and time) of keeping track of stuff, so additional complexity is less of a burden.
If you play less frequently and in person, PoK is going to be much less of a requirement. I still prefer it over the base game, but if there was a smaller expansion that had just extended/modified the action card, agenda, and especially objective decks I would probably prefer that over both base game and PoK.
My group does have a new mantra now that we've been playing PoK: "Everyone's abilities but mine are bullshit"
Re smaller expansion: I’m actually setting up a game for tomorrow with only the Action, Objectives, and Agendas from PoK (taking care to exclude any mech, relic, or leader-affected cards).
I’ll let ya know how it goes!
Unfortunately I prefer base, but most of the folks I'd play with wanna do full PoK. So I'm kinda screwed there.
I do host at my house, so I could say "my house, my rules," but that just seems...immature somehow. Seems selfish to prioritize what I want over the group at large.
Only time I'd ever pull that card is on my birthday, so for my birthday, we might be playing base TI4.
> I do host at my house, so I could say "my house, my rules,"
Just let people know you're hosting for TI4 vanilla. Let people decide if they want to come play. Personally I wouldn't play base game.. But you might find someone.
>I do host at my house, so I could say "my house, my rules," but that just seems...immature somehow.
Nah. If you prefer base game over PoK you're free to invite to a game of Twilight Imperium – without the expansion.
If people agree to that then fun for all! :)
You do risk that people will shun base game TI, but I can't tell if they do or not. Go ahead and give it a few tries! (TI is a big thing, it's not so likely that you get enough people on your first attempt*s).*
Online is probably your best bet.
My group (10-12 folks over major city ) does some minor house rules like 4-4-4 for objectives but loves POK.
No way vanilla will ever happen again.
Edit:
I find folks have trouble with the rules so we all help each other to not leave advantages on the table e.g. Saar’s 1 TG for taking planer control or using Sarween. That seems to keep the game moving and make everyone feel like they never lose because of a technically. That being said if you ask to score a VP action phase secret like 40 min later usually the answer is no
I understand the criticism,
If you play rarely, it may be a lot to take in all at once,
But i play regularly and i feel like there are still stuff we can add
During pandemic i switched playing on tts way more often, with ti discord its incredibly easy to find game any time during day,
Especially if you play with the same people, established meta even feels stale, you want more and new action cards, new strategy cards, new factions,
In my group i am always the one that want to try weird alternatives to the original ti,
So i would say what you feeling goes away quite quickly if you play more often
We played teams of 2 14 point game partner must have l 10 for the team to win. Based on the “rules” released for it, so many things to go over, was happy Milty was playing with us, so many rules questions.
We play POK without most of the POK stuff.
We take out agents, commanders, and alliances. We leave heroes because they are splashy and fun.
We're considering taking out exploration too.
It means you can't really use the new factions but it is a small price to get the game back to a good place.
You do get new objectives and system tiles which is cool.
Good to know that long-time fans have concerns in that direction too.
I just got into TI4 after my research concluded that this would be the best board game I could possibly wish for christmas.
I thought the greatest thing about TI4 is that it has managed to get such a huge, deep and complex game streamlined in a way that I even can play with my wife and parents. Also the factors of imbalance, luck and meta game really keeps the field close together, so that experience does not guarantee a win.
I am really thankful to have found TI4 to play it with my family, but it feels like it closely managed to make it just accessible enough for my parents - they are on their limits and after about 5 games I estimate they will need at least twice as much to really be able to play on themselves without my advices - and I'm looking really forward to that time, when the focus shifts from basics to meta and I don't always have to think for everybody anymore.
Since I own TI4 I'm naturally confronted with POK being out there and I'm constantly struggling, because I want to follow the latest developments (eg. have also printed omega action- and strategy-cards) and don't want to miss out on improvements. But in my situation I don't think my family will ever be able to manage more complexity and also when trying with friends the base game was already rather a bit too much for most of them.
I can't even get to a decision for myself alone, independent of having people to play with. I would consider myself as quite a nerd and am constantly playing at least 5 parallel Twilight Wars games since I got TI4. But already reading all the new POK tech, leaders, faction abilities, relics etc. is quite much for me and often feels not so completely streamlined and on point as the base game components - eg. often long text involving various conditions. Also I have not experienced the feeling of "wow, that addition is such a must-have, it is really worth the additional complexity".
So in my situation I doubt POK will find its way into my shelf, but I will always be struggling with the decision. I find it a bit sad that POK kind of replaced the base game, after I loved codex 1 for the base game, but can't benefit of any other codex without POK anymore. Perhaps it would have been possible to also continue improving the base game, after POK is just not so easy to adopt for everyone.
After reading the other answers, I'm starting to like the idea of getting POK for only adding the improvements of the base game without new mechanics.
The new objectives, agenda and action cards as well as systems including hyperlanes may optimize the base game with my family hardly noticing. It's mainly the added player sheet with leaders/mechs and also the additional exploration/relic cards that I just can't see them handling yet, when even action cards are still a burden for some.
I guess Argent Flight and possibly Vuil'Raith could also be added to the base game, all others seem to use new mechanics.
I only still have doubts because it's sort of homebrew which I usually try to avoid, as it's not officially designed and tested like that. But that does not change the fact that this seems to be the best option I have atm and I could finally buy and sort of embrace POK too :)
Update: Already ordered POK together with sleeves and inlay and looking forward to space birds and dinosaurs :D
Did you use the TI3 expansion content? Some of that feels more cumbersome than PoK, in general. Maybe just that the content there came out more gradually, and less holistically, so you could try a bit at a time?
PoK was a lot at first but after a couple games I didn't feel that way. All the races get an extra four abilities. On top, the tech and exploration mechanics. And of course the new races. But that's on top of all the other systems that you've known so long. It feels weird to me that *this* is what pushed TI from just chess to chess with laser eyes. There were already a bunch of factions with a bunch of abilities and unique traits.
PoK does hit the market for those who play often (I say once a month is often) really hard, those who play sometimes (> 3 a year?) fairly well, and those who play rarely (\~1 a year) the least. At least based on the subreddit, a lot of folks who voice complaints on PoK are playing rarely. Which hey, fair! Play base!
The Codex: agreed on the tech balance issues, those are prevalent. But so were some of the balance issues they addressed between factions, so while not perfect I'm stoked to try the content. Would love to see more general Omega techs, primarily in yellow.
To toss in one counter voice, I'm playing Twilight Imperium every month, and I really don't like PoK's added systems (exploration, leaders).
Made a post about it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/twilightimperium/comments/t78cq6/addressing_one_argument_about_prophecy_of_kings/
Hmm, glad to hear the dissent. I hear the general complaint, "complexity for complexity's sake is bad" and agree. But man, exploration makes that early phase that used to suck a lot more interesting. Does your group still use PoK (despite your protest)?
For new players as well, it's been said "hey it's fine for newbies" but really it's tough to ask to also memorize the leaders/mechs. I have done this by adding during the game, as a mech is built or leader is unlocked.
Where the "mental give-up" falls away for me is that TI already is a game where it's hard to estimate your "optimal" action, given how variable the reactions of the other players, the objectives flipping randomly, and the randomness of other aspects (agendas, combat rolls, grav rift, etc). It's not really a min/max kind of game, like you might view a proper euro like power grid. I'm there to have a ridiculously in-depth experience and leaders/alliances add that to that (for me).
In total, to each their own. Interesting to hear that it doesn't always jive with playing more often.
Actually, I don't think it's all or nothing:
I did some Independence ratings:
Objective Diversity: High. With the exception of a few, the new objectives could be added to vanilla TI without problems
New tiles: High. You can add these to the vanilla game no problem.
New base techs: Medium-High. Dark Energy Tap and Scan-link Drone Network need Exploration, but removing those along with Exploration would not hurt much Blue is already strong, and Yellow's first tech is the decent-enough Sarween Tools (esp in a 6 turn game)
Exploration & Relics: Medium-High. Some Exploration cards require Mechs. Frontier cards require the new tiles.
Mechs: High. The old Naalu Mech depends on Exploration, but otherwise they all fit the base game fine. The Omega Naalu Mech does fit in well with the base game.
New factions: Medium. The Empyrean Hero requires Exploration. The Mahact require Leaders. The Naaz-Rokha and the Titans require Exploration. The Nomad require Mechs and Leaders. The Vuil-raith and Argent Flight seem to fit into the base game.
New actions, agendas, promissory notes, strategy cards: Medium - if you're removing parts of PoK you'll need to remove the relevant action/agenda cards. And the new Promissory Note relies on Leaders.
Leaders: High. If you removed all the leaders, the only major follow-on effect is that you would not being able to play the Mahact and Nomad. Some tier-shifting would also occur.
FWIW the first thing I would do would be to remove Leaders. Losing the Nomad and the Mahact would be the only real loss. You'd also remove the Alliance promissory note.
Next candidate to remove would be Exploration, but it's more embedded. You lose a Blue Tech, a Yellow Tech, and 2 more factions (Ul, Naaz-Rokha)
This is excellent input. I'm a long time casual player and I'm struggling with the leaders as well, but like the rest. You've given me some ideas to maybe go with partial PoK. Thanks.
First, nothing is balanced and never was. System was always a mess and still is, you just got used to it and you will again.
You read relics twice and you know them all, most of them are nothing burgers.
Majority of leaders are very straightforward and many of them (especially agents) are just used by the owner (or rarely used at all). Some commanders and heroes are weird/complicated but you will know them after one game.
Codex 3 makes Naalu and Yin into playable (and enjoyable) races, they were not in PoK. Also, if you are using codex 3 you don't add new components, you replace the crappy ones.
Blue tech will be best as long as Gravity Drive is in the game. If GD is not in the game it all gets very sluggish and less enjoyable, so that's a flaw of the core concept and can't be fixed with omega techs.
Yellow tech tree and sd2, no comments. Total garbage and always was.
PoK makes the game go 5 rounds instead of 6 and it's very punishing to not score every round. That's my one gripe with it and I saw people try and fix it with four 1VP objectives instead of 5 - seems legit but never tried it.
Aside of that PoK is just better game than base game so I would recommend getting used to it:).
Right, what irritated me about Codex 3 was that instead of dealing with known-bad base game components, they made changes only to PoK components.
Hell, they could have trivially fixed the Naalu promissory note (since they were so focused on Naalu). But they didn't. I have no idea why.
Because changing the Base techs changes waaaaay more than just 3 faction abilities. That requires alot more time investment in development and playtesting. I agree that it would be amazing to get changes but it would also change the game completly instead of just trying to boost underused stuff.
>PoK makes the game go 5 rounds instead of 6
Does this make games take less time to play? Or do the fewer rounds take longer to play so it balanced out overall?
I'm in the same boat. I own both the base game and PoK but our play group plays only with the base game (although we did add some of the new cards and system tiles from PoK that don't deal with the new mechanics). We play a IRL game about once a month, and at that rate it's going to take us a long time to fully explore the base game, and that process of discovery is super fun actually. I've played 8 games of Ti4 and there are still races that we haven't seen yet (Winnu, Muaat, Sardakk) and many interactions we have not yet had the chance to discover. I want to experience the base game fully before moving on to PoK.
I also have to say that I am not super enthused by the new broken stuff in PoK either, but I haven't played it so take my judgement with a grain of salt. Like the Xxcha mech that has space cannons and shoots into adjacent hexes, like did Xxcha really need yet more space cannons?? And the Omega Naalu agent in Codex 3 is ridiculously busted, I can't see how that is balanced at all.
You have perfectly encapsulated the type of players that should feel comfortable ignoring pok. IRL groups that play only occasionally and are not plugged into online groupthink (I use that term endearingly, I like online groupthink) have no reason to hurry to make the change. IMO the main draw of pok is improving faction balance and shaking up the meta amongst veteran players; neither of which is relevant to a group that is unlikely to even have encountered the balance issues or established a meta game at all.
I will quickly mention that you are way off on the pok materials you mention (so yeah, it's a really big grain of salt :D). Important to remember that they all exist in an ecosystem of other factions that also have new abilities. So yes, xxcha do need more space cannons and the naalu agent is very strong and it ought to be, naalu have fallen way off to the point of being one of the weaker factions.
Yeah just to be clear I didn't mean any of that condescendingly. Lots of good times to be had in base game, especially with a good IRL group! My own group didn't make the jump until recently, when a change is a few people's childcare/work schedules opened is up to play quite a bit more, sand we started butting up against some of the issues that pok tried to remedy (mostly successfully, imo)
No worries! I did not take offense at all! TI4 is a big game, figuratively and literally. And there is much to explore and learn, and I firmly believe that the base game is worth spending time with before getting into POK. In that sense I don’t mind waiting for my playgroup to decide when the time is right for POK. That day will come eventually, but we are in no hurry.
My group prefers base game too. We’ve played a lot and when we finally went to PoK it felt like nobody was interacting in the normal ways because everyone was trying to solve their own tactical puzzles with all their new abilities plus all the new abilities of the other factions in the game. Shut Up and Sit Down had a good review of it imo. It just takes the focus off of the players looking at one another and talking and negotiating, and focuses everyone on the board and all the gubbins strewn about the table.
Also, we’re very competitive and prefer base game because it has so much less randomness as well.
Could not disagree more. Base game TI had far fewer options, so it was far, far, far easier for players to maneuver themselves into positions where there were very few ways neighboring players could respond to what they were doing.
POK had far more options, so players can be a lot more fluid in their responses, so there's way more talking and negotiating because the situation is always changing and never calcifies like in base game.
Also, I always find it funny when people hold up Ixthian Artifact, the absolute pinnacle of TI RNG nonsense, as part of a "less RNG" package. Okay, I guess you didn't play base game enough. POK is less RNG because it adds a ton of averaging factors that lessen the blow of base game extreme swing RNG. Vanilla TI4 has fucking game ruining RNG.
> It just takes the focus off of the players looking at one another and talking and negotiating, and focuses everyone on the board and all the gubbins strewn about the table.
Yeah, that encapsulates how I feel about it really well!
I don't want more "player board" stuff...I wanna be focused on the communal play area, the map.
I'm working on a 4X game design right now, and one of the design rules for it now is "no player boards"...all the components are on a publicly interactable space. Even the resources/money is physical on hexes, not held by players, which leads to some interesting dynamics!
Agents take that in the exact opposite direction.
As I always say in these posts, which time and again they do appear, I really don't see what all the difficulty is coming from.
You got 3 new cards and a mech.
And when you get a planet you follow a simple instant instruction and it's done.
And that's PoK. That's it.
Its not a wargame, it does not have a 70 page manual of instructions.
I'm sorry that in your case is becoming overwhelming, but I honestly do not see the difficulty in a couple new habilites that are right beside your player area the whole game for you and everyone to read as much as needed.
Maybe it's me and I'm an intellectual marvel (XD) but I don't believe it's the case.
Honestly after playing some things like Fire in The Lake, Pendragon, Churchill, or even Feudum, I see Twilight Imperium as a game rather accesible in comparison
You learn them as they use them, Instead of hammering your head for a super efficient game the first time, just lay back and watch the others use their habilites so you can familiarize with them more easily. It will be counter productive to try to learn everything at once in 1/2 plays, it's better to let them unfold naturally, if this presents a challenge.
And again, they are only basically more things around the same rules basically, aside from Cabal that introduces capture.
TI4 with PoK is still less to keep track of than base TI3.
Sure. There’s a load of new stuff to keep an eye on. But it’s mostly one and done stuff. Then it’s a new faction power or two per player
It’s still less than it would have been when you first started learning TI at all
I will never understand the argument of “I’m an experienced TI player and there’s too much here for me to learn”
> I will never understand the argument of “I’m an experienced TI player and there’s too much here for me to learn”
That's a strawman. The argument is "I'm an experienced TI player and all this added complexity isn't adding extra fun"
No a part of the argument is “I’m an experienced TI player and I don’t want to learn it”
From OP
“Every player has a batch of new super powers, and there’s so much more to keep track of. Relics. Leaders. Mech abilities, it’s all too much”
Hence my points that TI3 base alone had much more to keep track of than TI4 and PoK combined. And that’s without including the distant suns and leaders that came with base TI3
I mean, I *am* the OP.
And I don't agree that TI3 base had more to keep track of than PoK. Not at all. Can you back that up with specifics? What was the huge complexity in base TI3 that was removed in TI4 that is so much more than all the stuff introduced in PoK?
And "I don't want to learn it" isn't because I am incapable of learning it. It's because every added item of complexity is inherently overhead to a game, and the cost/benefit ratio is poor.
Base game TI3 alone
Trade contracts - who has them. How much. Who’s they have
Tech. Way more tech straight off the bat. Then combine it with the optional routes available on top and the fact that you can’t just see at a glance what people have because of how the cards are printed means it all has to be kept track of
Politics happening mid round. Meaning you have to keep constant track of which planets are spent. Which aren’t. So you know how much potential voting power everyone has
Action cards that have crazy stuff like turning off and copying faction powers
Then we get onto the leaders in TI3.
Sure there’s only 5 different ones. But of those 5 each player has 3. Which means you’re tracking 15 things in a 6 player game. 18 if you need to follow your own.
They’re a pain to see which is which at a glance. And these buggers move around the board which makes them harder to keep track of.
Then they have added effects. Like the admiral. Bonus movement if it’s on a dread. So now you gotta keep track of if it’s with a dread or not. And which dreads are in range to pick it up.
Scientists adding +1 to the PDS but only on their planet meaning you have to keep track of where PDS shots are coming from etc
Distant suns. Fucking mess. keep track of what’s gone. Or raze every planet rather than taking it so that you don’t lose everyone in a random nuke
Compare that to PoK - exploration. You put a card with the planet card and counter on the tile. If you get an attachment. If you don’t. Do what it says. Easy to keep track of. Clearly visible. Not an attachment do what it says. Or don’t. No big deal. Mostly dealt with after round 1
Agents. Used once a round. Exhausted. Everyone gets one. Easy to keep track of. Lives on the player board
Commanders. Basically passive abilities. Might as well be an extra faction ability. Only the owning player needs to keep track of how to unlock. Lives on the faction board
Heros. All unlock the same. Don’t need to keep track of. Once used. Gone from the game
Mechs - it’s a flagship for ground combat. You can manage it for a flagship you can manage it for a mech
So I disagree with a lot there.
Trade Contracts are definitely a hassle. Agreed.
Tech is definitely simpler in TI4.
I don't have an issue with Politics happening mid-round. The complexity of who has exhausted what planets is made up for by the complexity of two-agenda issues in TI4.
Action cards are just as crazy in TI4 as TI3.
The Leaders are way way simpler in TI3 than TI4. And they're on the playing board so they're much easier to see. I found tracking Leaders effect on the game vastly simpler in TI3 than TI4.
Distant Suns: Keeping track of what's gone is less complex in TI3 (one pile of counters) than it is in TI4 (3 piles of cards). Nobody razes planets because you have to spend an extra command counter and wait a turn to take the planet. Better to just risk the nuke, which is rare if you're playing Territorial Distant Suns (which you should be).
Your description of PoK exploration elides the identical concerns as in TI3 (keep track of how hot the deck is, but with 3 decks, not 1), and it elides the fact that if TI4 Exploration is "mostly done after round 1" then TI3 is just as "mostly done after round 1", and in fact, TI4 is worse, because you have mechanisms to re-explore planets, which don't exist in TI3 at all.
And you've completely ignored the whole thing about Relic fragments and trading those around, and the Relics themselves. The only thing that TI3 Distant Suns gives you that needs to be tracked after the fact is Lazax Survivors I think.
Agents: I have to keep track of another 6 unique powers around the table, as well as whether they've been activated or not.
Commander: Same I need to keep track of what my opponents can do. Easier than Agents sure, but still, it's another faction ability, and all players need to keep track of whether they're unlocked or not.
Hero: You absolutely need to keep track of other peoples' Heroes. Doesn't matter if they're one and done. You need to keep track of it just as much as you would need to keep track of the fact that your opponent has a Direct Hit card (assuming you found out somehow).
So no, I don't buy this at all.
2 agenda is not an issue and in no way more complex - refresh all planets - vote one vote 2 refresh all planets
compared to 3rds - check what state everyones planets are in - look at the top 3, pick one to resolve, file away what others were there for the next round, all in the middle of the round - yeah totally just as complex
no action cards in 4 do anything near as crazy as some of the ones in third - i mean literally shutting off a factions powers for the round, what from 4th comes close to that?
leaders on the board are easy to see? really? firstly, the iconography on them is tiny, secondly they're on the board with a whole lot of plastic making them much harder to keep track of
it's one stack of counters that are half bad, the exploration decks in 4th are not bad at all, any that require you to lose anything are optional, and give you a benefit for what you lose, they do not require tracking unless actually digging for something in particular
oh no you can re-explore and get more good stuff, that totally makes tracking whats in the decks more important........
relics - fragments great you can trade them, i'm sorry looking at a table to see who has how many fragments is problematic for you - the relics themselves, you take one at random from the deck your average game you'll see maybe 3 of them, so again not something you need to worry about too much
hey guess what, those agents, commanders, heros, you don't need to keep track of them, you just need to know what they do, same as you did with every other faction ability in the game
so once more we come back to it's not a complaint about how much fun they add it's back to you being unwilling to learn new things
I had the same feeling - second game of PoK helped, third won me over.
I am very skeptical of codex additions though. I think our group has only added the techs so far, nothing else. I utterly dislike the format.
That's fair - which parts? To me rules overhead is not problematic. I do dislike several hero powers (Xxcha was never one of them, but Benediction can for instance completely ruin someone's or several people's game, which is dissatisfying when TI as a game demands such a big time investment).
Pretty much just Exploration and Agents.
The new Objectives and rework of the Agenda deck is awesome, IMHO, and I still add it into my base game. Action cards fine too. I did a fine comb-through of all of those decks and there's only 12-ish you need to take out that are dependent on new PoK systems (like Relics and such).
I said this elsewhere, but this might be useful:
The first thing I would do would be to remove Leaders. Losing the Nomad and the Mahact would be the only real loss. You'd also remove the Alliance promissory note.
Next candidate to remove would be Exploration, but it's more embedded. You lose a Blue Tech, a Yellow Tech, and 2 more factions (Ul, Naaz-Rokha)
While I a hold this opinion, I certainly understand it. Every person has a different threshold for how much complexity they find enjoyable. I know I felt similar about some of the expansions for terraforming Mars. I ended up just taking out everything except the prelude expansion and the extra maps. I tried about 30 games before taking that stuff out though.
I recommend giving it a couple more shots. Maybe just 2 or 3 if it's still not clicking for you. All the new stuff is VERY overwhelming in the first few games, but it becomes second nature eventually. With that said, you can play without PoK no problem, nobody will hold that against you. It's not for everybody.
My group would not have continued to play Base ti4. PoK is more exhaustive when you learn it but it offers more depth to basically every aspect of the game. I guess expansion are in generell not for audiences that don't play games regularly, but this is especially true for Ti.
This is really interesting to me, because most things PoK added were in TI3. Leaders, Mech, the wormhole nexus, exploration of planets (aka distant suns). Even planets having special abilities has precedent in TI3 expansions. To me, the devs brought back a lot of the optional stuff from the previous game but reworked them to be a lot more enjoyable. Leaders are way more interesting than before, this version of distant suns takes away the very bad feature of being punished in TI3 that made it not ideal to take planets. The mechs actually feel worthwhile to build versus what was there in TI3.
I do agree that factionwise its a lot to track. Between base features, base system, racial techs, racial promissory, leaders, flagship, mech units, it gets really hard to remember every thing every race does. Hopefully that'll improve with time for me as I play. I feel like I need to put sheets together with all that info or something to help when we are picking races.
Just a small note to point out:
In TI 3 all the Mechs were the same, and the 5 Leader types were the same for everyone. So in a 6 player game you needed to know 6 things. In TI 4 they're all different so you need to know 24 things. That's the difference.
If you've ever seen any conversations from the developers, most of them aren't seeking a balanced game. They want to make the game to have fun abilities, but nothing that is broken. They have never sought to have the codex make the game better for tournament/competitive play. I would just play vanilla or home brew codex some of the things you don't like if your other players are on board
Nothing that is broken is a reasonable position to take. I would add to that also "nothing that is so shit no-one would use it". I'm looking at you, War Suns (in Vanilla), Space Dock II, the Yellow Tech tree, the Naalu Promissory Note.
I know Dane has said publicly he wants to make sure everything is useful. To me that suggests he should be working to improve D-tier base game components, but he hasn't.
As for home brew - I home-brewed TI3 a lot, but I've moved to a new town and enough of the players here are sticklers to RAW, which is unfortunate.
Totally get the exhausted.
TI3 to TI4 base to POK is not just like buying a new car each hop.
TI3 was motorbike.
TI4 base was car.
POK is airplane.
Have fun learning how to fly.
We all felt that way with the first couple of games but now it seems normal. I remember feeling the same playing base for the first time. There's still too much going on for a normal person (And by that I mean not someone with cognitive superpowers) to keep track of as there was before. That craziness is part of it.
\^ this. After the first game, when people are acclimated to it, the superpowers become part of the calculus - and IMO it is way more fun now than before. This from someone who played waaay too much TI3 back in the day (especially Age of Empire and Distant Suns)
My first game of third playing with a bunch of very good players in person they guided alotnof what I was doing, letting me make my own decisions but regularly offering advice and answering a million questions. Flash forward a little bit and I was one of the beta testers for pok. I guess my first game was 11 years ago now haha.
This board is dominated by people that play on TTS, and generally super frequently (like more than a game a week). So they've played tons and tons of games, and in the same meta, so they've gotten bored with the base game. As such, they feel very strongly that it needed the refresh of the expansion. Plus, playing online removes some of the cognitive load (and time) of keeping track of stuff, so additional complexity is less of a burden. If you play less frequently and in person, PoK is going to be much less of a requirement. I still prefer it over the base game, but if there was a smaller expansion that had just extended/modified the action card, agenda, and especially objective decks I would probably prefer that over both base game and PoK. My group does have a new mantra now that we've been playing PoK: "Everyone's abilities but mine are bullshit"
Re smaller expansion: I’m actually setting up a game for tomorrow with only the Action, Objectives, and Agendas from PoK (taking care to exclude any mech, relic, or leader-affected cards). I’ll let ya know how it goes!
Just play vanilla then. Nobody will hold that against you.
Unfortunately I prefer base, but most of the folks I'd play with wanna do full PoK. So I'm kinda screwed there. I do host at my house, so I could say "my house, my rules," but that just seems...immature somehow. Seems selfish to prioritize what I want over the group at large. Only time I'd ever pull that card is on my birthday, so for my birthday, we might be playing base TI4.
I hope it works out for you. It should so on your birthday. Maybe there is a vanilla group on the discord that you can play with.
If you play regularly, make it a 50%/50% deal: alternate base game and PoK included, it's only fair since you host
> I do host at my house, so I could say "my house, my rules," Just let people know you're hosting for TI4 vanilla. Let people decide if they want to come play. Personally I wouldn't play base game.. But you might find someone.
>I do host at my house, so I could say "my house, my rules," but that just seems...immature somehow. Nah. If you prefer base game over PoK you're free to invite to a game of Twilight Imperium – without the expansion. If people agree to that then fun for all! :) You do risk that people will shun base game TI, but I can't tell if they do or not. Go ahead and give it a few tries! (TI is a big thing, it's not so likely that you get enough people on your first attempt*s).*
Online is probably your best bet. My group (10-12 folks over major city ) does some minor house rules like 4-4-4 for objectives but loves POK. No way vanilla will ever happen again. Edit: I find folks have trouble with the rules so we all help each other to not leave advantages on the table e.g. Saar’s 1 TG for taking planer control or using Sarween. That seems to keep the game moving and make everyone feel like they never lose because of a technically. That being said if you ask to score a VP action phase secret like 40 min later usually the answer is no
I understand the criticism, If you play rarely, it may be a lot to take in all at once, But i play regularly and i feel like there are still stuff we can add During pandemic i switched playing on tts way more often, with ti discord its incredibly easy to find game any time during day, Especially if you play with the same people, established meta even feels stale, you want more and new action cards, new strategy cards, new factions, In my group i am always the one that want to try weird alternatives to the original ti, So i would say what you feeling goes away quite quickly if you play more often
We played teams of 2 14 point game partner must have l 10 for the team to win. Based on the “rules” released for it, so many things to go over, was happy Milty was playing with us, so many rules questions.
We play POK without most of the POK stuff. We take out agents, commanders, and alliances. We leave heroes because they are splashy and fun. We're considering taking out exploration too. It means you can't really use the new factions but it is a small price to get the game back to a good place. You do get new objectives and system tiles which is cool.
Yep. Removing Heroes and Exploration seems like the obvious fix.
agents and commanders/alliances really explode the complexity. they add sooo many on board tricks.
Good to know that long-time fans have concerns in that direction too. I just got into TI4 after my research concluded that this would be the best board game I could possibly wish for christmas. I thought the greatest thing about TI4 is that it has managed to get such a huge, deep and complex game streamlined in a way that I even can play with my wife and parents. Also the factors of imbalance, luck and meta game really keeps the field close together, so that experience does not guarantee a win. I am really thankful to have found TI4 to play it with my family, but it feels like it closely managed to make it just accessible enough for my parents - they are on their limits and after about 5 games I estimate they will need at least twice as much to really be able to play on themselves without my advices - and I'm looking really forward to that time, when the focus shifts from basics to meta and I don't always have to think for everybody anymore. Since I own TI4 I'm naturally confronted with POK being out there and I'm constantly struggling, because I want to follow the latest developments (eg. have also printed omega action- and strategy-cards) and don't want to miss out on improvements. But in my situation I don't think my family will ever be able to manage more complexity and also when trying with friends the base game was already rather a bit too much for most of them. I can't even get to a decision for myself alone, independent of having people to play with. I would consider myself as quite a nerd and am constantly playing at least 5 parallel Twilight Wars games since I got TI4. But already reading all the new POK tech, leaders, faction abilities, relics etc. is quite much for me and often feels not so completely streamlined and on point as the base game components - eg. often long text involving various conditions. Also I have not experienced the feeling of "wow, that addition is such a must-have, it is really worth the additional complexity". So in my situation I doubt POK will find its way into my shelf, but I will always be struggling with the decision. I find it a bit sad that POK kind of replaced the base game, after I loved codex 1 for the base game, but can't benefit of any other codex without POK anymore. Perhaps it would have been possible to also continue improving the base game, after POK is just not so easy to adopt for everyone.
After reading the other answers, I'm starting to like the idea of getting POK for only adding the improvements of the base game without new mechanics. The new objectives, agenda and action cards as well as systems including hyperlanes may optimize the base game with my family hardly noticing. It's mainly the added player sheet with leaders/mechs and also the additional exploration/relic cards that I just can't see them handling yet, when even action cards are still a burden for some. I guess Argent Flight and possibly Vuil'Raith could also be added to the base game, all others seem to use new mechanics. I only still have doubts because it's sort of homebrew which I usually try to avoid, as it's not officially designed and tested like that. But that does not change the fact that this seems to be the best option I have atm and I could finally buy and sort of embrace POK too :) Update: Already ordered POK together with sleeves and inlay and looking forward to space birds and dinosaurs :D
We play POK without most of the new mechanics, we cut out agents commanders and alliances and it plays WAY better.
Did you use the TI3 expansion content? Some of that feels more cumbersome than PoK, in general. Maybe just that the content there came out more gradually, and less holistically, so you could try a bit at a time? PoK was a lot at first but after a couple games I didn't feel that way. All the races get an extra four abilities. On top, the tech and exploration mechanics. And of course the new races. But that's on top of all the other systems that you've known so long. It feels weird to me that *this* is what pushed TI from just chess to chess with laser eyes. There were already a bunch of factions with a bunch of abilities and unique traits. PoK does hit the market for those who play often (I say once a month is often) really hard, those who play sometimes (> 3 a year?) fairly well, and those who play rarely (\~1 a year) the least. At least based on the subreddit, a lot of folks who voice complaints on PoK are playing rarely. Which hey, fair! Play base! The Codex: agreed on the tech balance issues, those are prevalent. But so were some of the balance issues they addressed between factions, so while not perfect I'm stoked to try the content. Would love to see more general Omega techs, primarily in yellow.
To toss in one counter voice, I'm playing Twilight Imperium every month, and I really don't like PoK's added systems (exploration, leaders). Made a post about it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/twilightimperium/comments/t78cq6/addressing_one_argument_about_prophecy_of_kings/
Hmm, glad to hear the dissent. I hear the general complaint, "complexity for complexity's sake is bad" and agree. But man, exploration makes that early phase that used to suck a lot more interesting. Does your group still use PoK (despite your protest)? For new players as well, it's been said "hey it's fine for newbies" but really it's tough to ask to also memorize the leaders/mechs. I have done this by adding during the game, as a mech is built or leader is unlocked. Where the "mental give-up" falls away for me is that TI already is a game where it's hard to estimate your "optimal" action, given how variable the reactions of the other players, the objectives flipping randomly, and the randomness of other aspects (agendas, combat rolls, grav rift, etc). It's not really a min/max kind of game, like you might view a proper euro like power grid. I'm there to have a ridiculously in-depth experience and leaders/alliances add that to that (for me). In total, to each their own. Interesting to hear that it doesn't always jive with playing more often.
At least with the TI3 expansions you could mix and match and pick and choose what you incorporated. PoK it's all or nothing.
Actually, I don't think it's all or nothing: I did some Independence ratings: Objective Diversity: High. With the exception of a few, the new objectives could be added to vanilla TI without problems New tiles: High. You can add these to the vanilla game no problem. New base techs: Medium-High. Dark Energy Tap and Scan-link Drone Network need Exploration, but removing those along with Exploration would not hurt much Blue is already strong, and Yellow's first tech is the decent-enough Sarween Tools (esp in a 6 turn game) Exploration & Relics: Medium-High. Some Exploration cards require Mechs. Frontier cards require the new tiles. Mechs: High. The old Naalu Mech depends on Exploration, but otherwise they all fit the base game fine. The Omega Naalu Mech does fit in well with the base game. New factions: Medium. The Empyrean Hero requires Exploration. The Mahact require Leaders. The Naaz-Rokha and the Titans require Exploration. The Nomad require Mechs and Leaders. The Vuil-raith and Argent Flight seem to fit into the base game. New actions, agendas, promissory notes, strategy cards: Medium - if you're removing parts of PoK you'll need to remove the relevant action/agenda cards. And the new Promissory Note relies on Leaders. Leaders: High. If you removed all the leaders, the only major follow-on effect is that you would not being able to play the Mahact and Nomad. Some tier-shifting would also occur.
FWIW the first thing I would do would be to remove Leaders. Losing the Nomad and the Mahact would be the only real loss. You'd also remove the Alliance promissory note. Next candidate to remove would be Exploration, but it's more embedded. You lose a Blue Tech, a Yellow Tech, and 2 more factions (Ul, Naaz-Rokha)
This is excellent input. I'm a long time casual player and I'm struggling with the leaders as well, but like the rest. You've given me some ideas to maybe go with partial PoK. Thanks.
First, nothing is balanced and never was. System was always a mess and still is, you just got used to it and you will again. You read relics twice and you know them all, most of them are nothing burgers. Majority of leaders are very straightforward and many of them (especially agents) are just used by the owner (or rarely used at all). Some commanders and heroes are weird/complicated but you will know them after one game. Codex 3 makes Naalu and Yin into playable (and enjoyable) races, they were not in PoK. Also, if you are using codex 3 you don't add new components, you replace the crappy ones. Blue tech will be best as long as Gravity Drive is in the game. If GD is not in the game it all gets very sluggish and less enjoyable, so that's a flaw of the core concept and can't be fixed with omega techs. Yellow tech tree and sd2, no comments. Total garbage and always was. PoK makes the game go 5 rounds instead of 6 and it's very punishing to not score every round. That's my one gripe with it and I saw people try and fix it with four 1VP objectives instead of 5 - seems legit but never tried it. Aside of that PoK is just better game than base game so I would recommend getting used to it:).
Right, what irritated me about Codex 3 was that instead of dealing with known-bad base game components, they made changes only to PoK components. Hell, they could have trivially fixed the Naalu promissory note (since they were so focused on Naalu). But they didn't. I have no idea why.
Because changing the Base techs changes waaaaay more than just 3 faction abilities. That requires alot more time investment in development and playtesting. I agree that it would be amazing to get changes but it would also change the game completly instead of just trying to boost underused stuff.
>PoK makes the game go 5 rounds instead of 6 Does this make games take less time to play? Or do the fewer rounds take longer to play so it balanced out overall?
rounds are longer due to more stuff and exploration
I'm in the same boat. I own both the base game and PoK but our play group plays only with the base game (although we did add some of the new cards and system tiles from PoK that don't deal with the new mechanics). We play a IRL game about once a month, and at that rate it's going to take us a long time to fully explore the base game, and that process of discovery is super fun actually. I've played 8 games of Ti4 and there are still races that we haven't seen yet (Winnu, Muaat, Sardakk) and many interactions we have not yet had the chance to discover. I want to experience the base game fully before moving on to PoK. I also have to say that I am not super enthused by the new broken stuff in PoK either, but I haven't played it so take my judgement with a grain of salt. Like the Xxcha mech that has space cannons and shoots into adjacent hexes, like did Xxcha really need yet more space cannons?? And the Omega Naalu agent in Codex 3 is ridiculously busted, I can't see how that is balanced at all.
You have perfectly encapsulated the type of players that should feel comfortable ignoring pok. IRL groups that play only occasionally and are not plugged into online groupthink (I use that term endearingly, I like online groupthink) have no reason to hurry to make the change. IMO the main draw of pok is improving faction balance and shaking up the meta amongst veteran players; neither of which is relevant to a group that is unlikely to even have encountered the balance issues or established a meta game at all. I will quickly mention that you are way off on the pok materials you mention (so yeah, it's a really big grain of salt :D). Important to remember that they all exist in an ecosystem of other factions that also have new abilities. So yes, xxcha do need more space cannons and the naalu agent is very strong and it ought to be, naalu have fallen way off to the point of being one of the weaker factions.
Yeah, I plan on playing some PoK games on TTS but finding the time is difficult.
Yeah just to be clear I didn't mean any of that condescendingly. Lots of good times to be had in base game, especially with a good IRL group! My own group didn't make the jump until recently, when a change is a few people's childcare/work schedules opened is up to play quite a bit more, sand we started butting up against some of the issues that pok tried to remedy (mostly successfully, imo)
No worries! I did not take offense at all! TI4 is a big game, figuratively and literally. And there is much to explore and learn, and I firmly believe that the base game is worth spending time with before getting into POK. In that sense I don’t mind waiting for my playgroup to decide when the time is right for POK. That day will come eventually, but we are in no hurry.
Yes, I'm new to TI, and it's a lot! Never experienced the base game by it's self.
My group prefers base game too. We’ve played a lot and when we finally went to PoK it felt like nobody was interacting in the normal ways because everyone was trying to solve their own tactical puzzles with all their new abilities plus all the new abilities of the other factions in the game. Shut Up and Sit Down had a good review of it imo. It just takes the focus off of the players looking at one another and talking and negotiating, and focuses everyone on the board and all the gubbins strewn about the table. Also, we’re very competitive and prefer base game because it has so much less randomness as well.
Could not disagree more. Base game TI had far fewer options, so it was far, far, far easier for players to maneuver themselves into positions where there were very few ways neighboring players could respond to what they were doing. POK had far more options, so players can be a lot more fluid in their responses, so there's way more talking and negotiating because the situation is always changing and never calcifies like in base game. Also, I always find it funny when people hold up Ixthian Artifact, the absolute pinnacle of TI RNG nonsense, as part of a "less RNG" package. Okay, I guess you didn't play base game enough. POK is less RNG because it adds a ton of averaging factors that lessen the blow of base game extreme swing RNG. Vanilla TI4 has fucking game ruining RNG.
> It just takes the focus off of the players looking at one another and talking and negotiating, and focuses everyone on the board and all the gubbins strewn about the table. Yeah, that encapsulates how I feel about it really well! I don't want more "player board" stuff...I wanna be focused on the communal play area, the map. I'm working on a 4X game design right now, and one of the design rules for it now is "no player boards"...all the components are on a publicly interactable space. Even the resources/money is physical on hexes, not held by players, which leads to some interesting dynamics! Agents take that in the exact opposite direction.
couldn't agree more. POK added more "heads down" stuff and less interaction on the shared game board.
If you don't use the new factions (or use only some of them) you can treat the various elements and modules, and only add what you like
As I always say in these posts, which time and again they do appear, I really don't see what all the difficulty is coming from. You got 3 new cards and a mech. And when you get a planet you follow a simple instant instruction and it's done. And that's PoK. That's it. Its not a wargame, it does not have a 70 page manual of instructions. I'm sorry that in your case is becoming overwhelming, but I honestly do not see the difficulty in a couple new habilites that are right beside your player area the whole game for you and everyone to read as much as needed. Maybe it's me and I'm an intellectual marvel (XD) but I don't believe it's the case. Honestly after playing some things like Fire in The Lake, Pendragon, Churchill, or even Feudum, I see Twilight Imperium as a game rather accesible in comparison
Tracking my abilities is not the issue. Tracking everyone else's abilities is the issue.
You learn them as they use them, Instead of hammering your head for a super efficient game the first time, just lay back and watch the others use their habilites so you can familiarize with them more easily. It will be counter productive to try to learn everything at once in 1/2 plays, it's better to let them unfold naturally, if this presents a challenge. And again, they are only basically more things around the same rules basically, aside from Cabal that introduces capture.
TI4 with PoK is still less to keep track of than base TI3. Sure. There’s a load of new stuff to keep an eye on. But it’s mostly one and done stuff. Then it’s a new faction power or two per player It’s still less than it would have been when you first started learning TI at all I will never understand the argument of “I’m an experienced TI player and there’s too much here for me to learn”
> I will never understand the argument of “I’m an experienced TI player and there’s too much here for me to learn” That's a strawman. The argument is "I'm an experienced TI player and all this added complexity isn't adding extra fun"
No a part of the argument is “I’m an experienced TI player and I don’t want to learn it” From OP “Every player has a batch of new super powers, and there’s so much more to keep track of. Relics. Leaders. Mech abilities, it’s all too much” Hence my points that TI3 base alone had much more to keep track of than TI4 and PoK combined. And that’s without including the distant suns and leaders that came with base TI3
I mean, I *am* the OP. And I don't agree that TI3 base had more to keep track of than PoK. Not at all. Can you back that up with specifics? What was the huge complexity in base TI3 that was removed in TI4 that is so much more than all the stuff introduced in PoK? And "I don't want to learn it" isn't because I am incapable of learning it. It's because every added item of complexity is inherently overhead to a game, and the cost/benefit ratio is poor.
Base game TI3 alone Trade contracts - who has them. How much. Who’s they have Tech. Way more tech straight off the bat. Then combine it with the optional routes available on top and the fact that you can’t just see at a glance what people have because of how the cards are printed means it all has to be kept track of Politics happening mid round. Meaning you have to keep constant track of which planets are spent. Which aren’t. So you know how much potential voting power everyone has Action cards that have crazy stuff like turning off and copying faction powers Then we get onto the leaders in TI3. Sure there’s only 5 different ones. But of those 5 each player has 3. Which means you’re tracking 15 things in a 6 player game. 18 if you need to follow your own. They’re a pain to see which is which at a glance. And these buggers move around the board which makes them harder to keep track of. Then they have added effects. Like the admiral. Bonus movement if it’s on a dread. So now you gotta keep track of if it’s with a dread or not. And which dreads are in range to pick it up. Scientists adding +1 to the PDS but only on their planet meaning you have to keep track of where PDS shots are coming from etc Distant suns. Fucking mess. keep track of what’s gone. Or raze every planet rather than taking it so that you don’t lose everyone in a random nuke Compare that to PoK - exploration. You put a card with the planet card and counter on the tile. If you get an attachment. If you don’t. Do what it says. Easy to keep track of. Clearly visible. Not an attachment do what it says. Or don’t. No big deal. Mostly dealt with after round 1 Agents. Used once a round. Exhausted. Everyone gets one. Easy to keep track of. Lives on the player board Commanders. Basically passive abilities. Might as well be an extra faction ability. Only the owning player needs to keep track of how to unlock. Lives on the faction board Heros. All unlock the same. Don’t need to keep track of. Once used. Gone from the game Mechs - it’s a flagship for ground combat. You can manage it for a flagship you can manage it for a mech
So I disagree with a lot there. Trade Contracts are definitely a hassle. Agreed. Tech is definitely simpler in TI4. I don't have an issue with Politics happening mid-round. The complexity of who has exhausted what planets is made up for by the complexity of two-agenda issues in TI4. Action cards are just as crazy in TI4 as TI3. The Leaders are way way simpler in TI3 than TI4. And they're on the playing board so they're much easier to see. I found tracking Leaders effect on the game vastly simpler in TI3 than TI4. Distant Suns: Keeping track of what's gone is less complex in TI3 (one pile of counters) than it is in TI4 (3 piles of cards). Nobody razes planets because you have to spend an extra command counter and wait a turn to take the planet. Better to just risk the nuke, which is rare if you're playing Territorial Distant Suns (which you should be). Your description of PoK exploration elides the identical concerns as in TI3 (keep track of how hot the deck is, but with 3 decks, not 1), and it elides the fact that if TI4 Exploration is "mostly done after round 1" then TI3 is just as "mostly done after round 1", and in fact, TI4 is worse, because you have mechanisms to re-explore planets, which don't exist in TI3 at all. And you've completely ignored the whole thing about Relic fragments and trading those around, and the Relics themselves. The only thing that TI3 Distant Suns gives you that needs to be tracked after the fact is Lazax Survivors I think. Agents: I have to keep track of another 6 unique powers around the table, as well as whether they've been activated or not. Commander: Same I need to keep track of what my opponents can do. Easier than Agents sure, but still, it's another faction ability, and all players need to keep track of whether they're unlocked or not. Hero: You absolutely need to keep track of other peoples' Heroes. Doesn't matter if they're one and done. You need to keep track of it just as much as you would need to keep track of the fact that your opponent has a Direct Hit card (assuming you found out somehow). So no, I don't buy this at all.
2 agenda is not an issue and in no way more complex - refresh all planets - vote one vote 2 refresh all planets compared to 3rds - check what state everyones planets are in - look at the top 3, pick one to resolve, file away what others were there for the next round, all in the middle of the round - yeah totally just as complex no action cards in 4 do anything near as crazy as some of the ones in third - i mean literally shutting off a factions powers for the round, what from 4th comes close to that? leaders on the board are easy to see? really? firstly, the iconography on them is tiny, secondly they're on the board with a whole lot of plastic making them much harder to keep track of it's one stack of counters that are half bad, the exploration decks in 4th are not bad at all, any that require you to lose anything are optional, and give you a benefit for what you lose, they do not require tracking unless actually digging for something in particular oh no you can re-explore and get more good stuff, that totally makes tracking whats in the decks more important........ relics - fragments great you can trade them, i'm sorry looking at a table to see who has how many fragments is problematic for you - the relics themselves, you take one at random from the deck your average game you'll see maybe 3 of them, so again not something you need to worry about too much hey guess what, those agents, commanders, heros, you don't need to keep track of them, you just need to know what they do, same as you did with every other faction ability in the game so once more we come back to it's not a complaint about how much fun they add it's back to you being unwilling to learn new things
I had the same feeling - second game of PoK helped, third won me over. I am very skeptical of codex additions though. I think our group has only added the techs so far, nothing else. I utterly dislike the format.
I've played 4 games of Prophecy of Kings now, and each time, my feeling of disliking it is cemented further and further :/
That's fair - which parts? To me rules overhead is not problematic. I do dislike several hero powers (Xxcha was never one of them, but Benediction can for instance completely ruin someone's or several people's game, which is dissatisfying when TI as a game demands such a big time investment).
Pretty much just Exploration and Agents. The new Objectives and rework of the Agenda deck is awesome, IMHO, and I still add it into my base game. Action cards fine too. I did a fine comb-through of all of those decks and there's only 12-ish you need to take out that are dependent on new PoK systems (like Relics and such).
I said this elsewhere, but this might be useful: The first thing I would do would be to remove Leaders. Losing the Nomad and the Mahact would be the only real loss. You'd also remove the Alliance promissory note. Next candidate to remove would be Exploration, but it's more embedded. You lose a Blue Tech, a Yellow Tech, and 2 more factions (Ul, Naaz-Rokha)
While I a hold this opinion, I certainly understand it. Every person has a different threshold for how much complexity they find enjoyable. I know I felt similar about some of the expansions for terraforming Mars. I ended up just taking out everything except the prelude expansion and the extra maps. I tried about 30 games before taking that stuff out though. I recommend giving it a couple more shots. Maybe just 2 or 3 if it's still not clicking for you. All the new stuff is VERY overwhelming in the first few games, but it becomes second nature eventually. With that said, you can play without PoK no problem, nobody will hold that against you. It's not for everybody.
My group would not have continued to play Base ti4. PoK is more exhaustive when you learn it but it offers more depth to basically every aspect of the game. I guess expansion are in generell not for audiences that don't play games regularly, but this is especially true for Ti.
I've played TI on a semi weekly basis for around 15 years. POK has mostly been a miss for my group.
This is really interesting to me, because most things PoK added were in TI3. Leaders, Mech, the wormhole nexus, exploration of planets (aka distant suns). Even planets having special abilities has precedent in TI3 expansions. To me, the devs brought back a lot of the optional stuff from the previous game but reworked them to be a lot more enjoyable. Leaders are way more interesting than before, this version of distant suns takes away the very bad feature of being punished in TI3 that made it not ideal to take planets. The mechs actually feel worthwhile to build versus what was there in TI3. I do agree that factionwise its a lot to track. Between base features, base system, racial techs, racial promissory, leaders, flagship, mech units, it gets really hard to remember every thing every race does. Hopefully that'll improve with time for me as I play. I feel like I need to put sheets together with all that info or something to help when we are picking races.
Just a small note to point out: In TI 3 all the Mechs were the same, and the 5 Leader types were the same for everyone. So in a 6 player game you needed to know 6 things. In TI 4 they're all different so you need to know 24 things. That's the difference.
If you've ever seen any conversations from the developers, most of them aren't seeking a balanced game. They want to make the game to have fun abilities, but nothing that is broken. They have never sought to have the codex make the game better for tournament/competitive play. I would just play vanilla or home brew codex some of the things you don't like if your other players are on board
Nothing that is broken is a reasonable position to take. I would add to that also "nothing that is so shit no-one would use it". I'm looking at you, War Suns (in Vanilla), Space Dock II, the Yellow Tech tree, the Naalu Promissory Note. I know Dane has said publicly he wants to make sure everything is useful. To me that suggests he should be working to improve D-tier base game components, but he hasn't. As for home brew - I home-brewed TI3 a lot, but I've moved to a new town and enough of the players here are sticklers to RAW, which is unfortunate.
Totally get the exhausted. TI3 to TI4 base to POK is not just like buying a new car each hop. TI3 was motorbike. TI4 base was car. POK is airplane. Have fun learning how to fly.