Asmodee Eclipse Rise of The Ancient Expansion Board Games

Eclipse is one of my favorite games of all time. I love the way it meshes an economic game with a war/area of control game. I've played many times and even in sessions where I've lossed I've come away grinning. Absolutely terrific game and well deserving of its top 10 spot on boardgamegeek.com. If you enjoy the game of Eclipse as well then you should asbolutely pick this expansion up. It comes with a whole lot of stuff that you can mix and match into your game, which I think is the perfect type of expansion as you can mold your game experience to suit your needs. The expansion comes with four new races (on three player boards) allowing up to three new additional players. It subsequently comes with rules for as many as 9 players and even more rules for allowing those games to speed up (specifically for having two people taking actions at the same time). There 'rare technologies' that are unique and can be mixed into the tech draw. There are additional 'developments' that are essentially technologies drawn at the start of the game (again, just one of each). There are new types of ancient ships to use - dreadnaughts as a replacement for the galactic center and cruisers that defend ancient homeworlds (another addition). There are also additional hexes that contain new planets and some warp tyles that act as wormholes do non adjacent spaces. All of these things can be mixed and matched to suit what your group wants to play. The components are absolutely consistent with the original so no issues there. Overall, a superb expansion. I look forward to the next one!

$350? The manufacturer is selling it for much much less this is pure thievery

I own both Eclipse and the expansion. Eclipse is a fabulous game - well balanced, quick to play with multiple strategies possible for victory, 5/5. I bought the game and the expansion at the same time and regret it - the Expansion adds little value (we've never used the new number of players, and the modular potential additions to the game add little value and are pretty random). My advice would be to buy the base game and pass on the expansion unless you have a real need to play with 7 or more players.

i was expect that the price was in canadian $....but it was US $ so i pay 10$ more than i was expect...maybe my fault...the game is ok!

I purchased this expansion a year and a half after buying the main game. The main reason I purchased it was because when playing eclipse plasma missiles were highly overpowered and after reading many things about the expansion I found that it helps reduce their power. The expansion comes with six new characters or three boards with one on each side. I have played all of the races and won and lost with each of them so they are on an equal playing field from the normal game. I love the new hexes it comes with including Ancient Hives and ones containing Ancient Cruisers. It makes it more challenging and lasts longer (I love board games so it is a plus for me). The only problem I have with this is that you combine all the pieces into the main game. This makes it harder to just play the normal expansion if you are trying to teach someone. Overall the extension has made me enjoy the game even more and I would highly recommend it to anyone looking to add more entertainment and options to this amazing board game.

Eclipse is easily one of my favorite board games, and a big hit at our weekly game nights. This is a fantastic expansion for the base game. It adds some great new features like tougher ancients and ancient home worlds, as well as new races, unique techs and some new diplomacy features like alliances. It also ups the maximum players from 6 to 9 (That's a BIG game). This may sound like a lot, and it is, but the best feature of the expansion is that is is completely modular. You can play with as many or as few of the new features as you would like and add in only what you would like to use that game. This offers a ton of options and re-playability and allows you to tailor the game to the crowd that is playing. If you enjoy the base game Eclipse than this is simply a must have.

An essential expansion if I ever saw one! So many things added to the base game that I believe there is something for everyone who loved it. Lets take a tally: 1.) Additional rare techs that provide even more unique flavors in the ship/tech arms race 2.) Introduction of Development tiles 3.) Tougher Ancient Dreadnought to replace the base game GCDS if desired 4.) 6 additional factions (though like base game only 2 per card so really allows for only up to 3 additional players), with all the corresponding items (i.e. base game ships, chits, homeworld hexes, etc.) 5.) Additional Discovery tiles, with a good bit of unique tech mixed in 6.) Ancient Cruisers for some tougher Ancient encounters 7.) Compact Supply Board to replace the base game board (specifically this new one has ONLY the tech tile and round counter sections - all others are removed as they more or less were just spots to hold pieces that could be kept in storage until needed) 8.) Additional hexes (some that we will cover in a minute) -Warp Portal hexes (3), that allow travel between them (also available as a Discovery and a Development) -Ancient Homeworld hexes (that are guarded by the aforementioned Ancient Cruisers -Ancient Hive hexes (where the Ancient Interceptors just randomly branch out and move onto neighboring hexes) -regular hexes to help increase the hex total to a number that can accommodate 9-player games 9.) Additional gameplay variants -Direction of Play rules (i.e. turn order based on decision of second passer to encourage passing after 1st pass) -Simultaneous play rules -Alliances and associated rules -Predictable Technologies rules (next round's tech draw is made available to see during current round) -Secret Ancient Homeworlds rules -Small galaxy rules 10.) Additional copies of various base game chits to account for the additional 7th, 8th, and 9th players (i.e. ship parts, influence, etc.) So many things added that I really feel that anyone will find something above to enhance the game-play experience. Best part is many of these additions are optional and not required. Want to play the base game as is but with the Predictable Tech rule only? Go ahead. Only want to use the Warp portal hexes and none of the other hexes with the base game? Yes you can do it. Best of all, there is nothing stopping anyone from passing on using the Ancient Homeworlds and taking the Cruisers that would go on them and mixing them in with the regular Interceptor chits and randomly drawing them when populating the regular Ancient tiles, as a house-rule variant. Same with Alliances - nothing to stop house-ruling additional or more restrictive Alliance rules. The chits are present so nothing to take the game and run with your own personal flavor. :-)

The expansion isn't necessary in the sense that it "fixes" any broken game mechanics. On the contrary it only adds to and expands upon the already (in my opinion) flawless game design. This expansion allows you play as 4 NEW races vying for galactic conquest as well as new technologies to research amongst other various additions. If you are a FIRST TIME PLAYER of Eclipse I recommend you get the expansion while it's cheap and readily available but DO NOT whip it out there immediately. Instead play a few games with your buddies, get a good feel of the game and it's play style and THEN-once you've mastered the core game-open this bad boy up. As I said it merely adds to an already excellent game and is not required to start off. Leave yourself something to look forward to once you've gone through a few games and have a good sense of how it works. You'll thank me (and yourself) for holding off on deploying this set right off the bat.

This expansion jeopardises the isolationist strategy in standard Eclipse by adding a lot of randomness and risk-and-reward tiles. Ancient Hives - Ancient home systems containing 3 Ancient Ships - can be discovered by exploring and can be a massive headache for their discoverer. In two games I've played, one player has discovered an Ancient Hive in the early stages of the game; the 3 Ancient Ships proceeded to threaten the player's very existence and basically put him out of the competition for the rest of the game. For this reason I am sceptical about the Ancient Hives but as this expansion is fully modular, it is easy to remove them without affecting anything else. Rare technologies also force players to re-think their strategies. One unique technology which cancels out Neutron Bombs basically caused me to lose because my opponent researched it just after I had tried to zip around her systems with my Neutron Bombs. The rare technologies are extremely desirable! This expansion also includes a few cool new races, each with their own quirks, as well as warp portals, alliances and more. I definitely think it is a great improvement to the original Eclipse game!

Si ya tienes Eclipse y te parece un gran juego entonces NECESITAS esta expansión, porque equilibra los pocos defectos del juego básico (como por ejemplo el exceso de poder de los misiles) y añade muchas cosas nuevas que mejoran la experiencia de juego. Está llena de cosas, en pocas palabras "vale lo que pesa". Si por otra parte Eclipse para ti es un juego que "ni fu ni fa" en ese caso mejor déjalo estar porque si bien es una expansión genial, no creo que te haga cambiar de parecer.

I knew what was in this expansion before ordering, so no real surprises. It is the expansion I wanted. The cardboard pre-cuts continue to be an less than perfect way to remove a given token or hex from the original packaging as I often slightly damage the pieces getting them out. I've played with this expansion many times and enjoy the new rules and races it introduces.

Quest'espansione permette di avere razze nuove, tecnologie aggiuntive e l'importantissimo sisytema di turno variabile. Direi che se vi è piaciuto il gioco è un'acquisto imperdibile. Gli alieni invece non mi hanno convinto.

Bene, non contenti della versione base di Eclipse, ho regalato questa espansione. Sembra molto interessante. Imballo e carta regalo perfetti. Spedizione celere nei tempi previsti.