Federation Commander

[Ludoquist]

Before I start unfairly hassling a retailer, a friend and I just got Romulan Border and Graduation.

On the large hex size side, 4 of the 6 boards have the ABCDEF and 123456 on them, which is really distracting.

On the small size, 4 boards have the Square in the bottom left, two have the Star.

All the boards have the same hex numbers on them

Is that the correct board allocation, or should they all be different?

[Steve Cole]

ABCDEF and 123456 are part of the game system and needed.

As long as you have one such panel, the game works. If you have six such panels, or two, three, four, or five, the game works the same.

When we print maps we get cases of plain maps and cases of "rosette" maps. The warehouse crew mixes them and depending on what came from the printer that run includes a variable number of them.
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The Guy Who Designed Fed Commander

[Ludoquist]

Sure, it works - just having 4 of them is ugly when we only need one (it's particularly noticeable on the large hex side). It's also a mild annoyance that all the hexes have the same number. Both are minor.

But if it's 'As intended', that's fine - one less thing to worry about.

Thanks for the response.

[Steve Cole]

We decided when the game as printed (almost two decades ago? Wow, time flies!) that the six panels would be interchangeable. I think you are the only person out of tens of thousands who thought having them all have the same number was an issue. I don't recall anyone ever mentioning that. The game system is based on walking panels forward as the battle runs in whatever direction it runs, so the numbers would instantly mean nothing and having to match six separately numbered panels would be a nightmare for the warehouse. I think the next print run may have all of the panels be rosette types because its easier for the production department and warehouse crew and no one has ever called it ugly before you did.
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The Guy Who Designed Fed Commander

[Ludoquist]

Fair enough - since we have two sets between us we can mix and match in any case, and are having great fun regardless!