Cover art for Twilight Imperium: Third Edition

Twilight Imperium: Third Edition

2005 · BGG
Avg rating
7.79
Bayes rating
7.49
Weight
4.26 (Heavy)
Players
3-6
Playtime
4 hr
Ratings count
19,376

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Description

Twilight Imperium Third Edition is an epic empire-building game of interstellar conflict, trade, and struggle for power. Players take the roles of ancient galactic civilizations, each seeking to seize the imperial throne via warfare, diplomacy, and technological progression. With geomorphic board tiles, exquisite plastic miniatures, hundreds of cards, and introducing a rich set of strategic dimensions that allows each player to refocus their game-plan, the original designer (Christian T. Petersen) has seamlessly incorporated the better qualities of other recently popular games to improve on the game-play of the original TI, making it at once perfectly well-rounded and pleasantly familiar to experienced gamers.

TI3 is played by at least three players who belong to ten possible alien races, each with their own advantages and quirks. The 'designer notes' in the rulebook candidly and humbly acknowledge the inspiration for some of the improvements to the original game. The strategic game-play borrows the governing element from Puerto Rico to involve players in an iteratively complex and yet fast-paced game experience with very little downtime. The game map, basic player progress and overall victory are dynamically determined in almost exactly the same way as they are by imaginative players of CATAN, while the "Command" system cleverly improves on the 'oil' logistical mechanism of Attack! to both manage turn-based activity and limit the size of armies, uniquely enabling weakened players to bounce back if they play their cards right.

Part of the Twilight Imperium Series.

Re-implements:

 Twilight Imperium: Second Edition


Expanded by:

 Twilight Imperium: Third Edition – Shattered Empire
 Twilight Imperium: Third Edition – Shards of the Throne


Re-implemented in:

 Twilight Imperium: Fourth Edition




Mechanics

Action Points Area-Impulse Dice Rolling Follow Grid Movement Hexagon Grid Increase Value of Unchosen Resources Modular Board Player Elimination Tech Trees / Tech Tracks Tile Placement Trading Variable Phase Order Variable Player Powers Voting

Themes

Civilization Political Science Fiction Space Exploration

Publishers

Fantasy Flight Games

Designers

Christian T. Petersen