Rule modifications
Here is a list of all the main rule changes done for the new edition:
Passing bonus
We added a new bonus for the player who passes first: Now the first player to pass gains +2 Money, in addition to receiving the starting player marker.
The rationale behind this addition is the following:
1) It will create a new way for the players to access Money and therefore add possibilities for the players who are struggling with their economy.
2) It will add incentive to make an early pass, creating more tactical choices.
3) Most of the time, it will also make the starting player marker move from player to player more often. As the player who passes first will not only save Money by passing early, but also gain the bonus from passing, that player will less likely be the first one running out of Money on the next round!
Starting player tile.
Claiming Discovery tiles
I’ve always felt that "tactical bankruptcy" (giving up your hexes to pay for the upkeep) creates interesting game play strategies. However, it being such a crucial part of playing old Eclipse competitively made the game quite unforgiving for the beginners.
One of the primary reasons why players wanted to do tactical bankruptcy in the first edition was that you needed to place Influence discs to claim Discovery tiles. Influencing empty hexes sets up a potential trap for the players: the systems with Discovery tiles are typically sparse of planets and if these hexes are not abandoned, they will drain the player out of money while not producing any resources. However, it's not very intuitive to give up hexes that you have conquered in order to keep your economy running optimally... If an inexperienced player does not understand this dynamic well enough, it can even ruin the game for him. This was an issue we wanted to address in the new edition.
So how does it work in the second edition? The resolution for this problem is very simple: you can now claim Discovery tiles without placing Influence discs. This rule change applies after both exploration and combat. This small change makes the gameplay more straightforward, in addition of creating less situations where you need to abandon hexes by bankrupting them. Of course tactical bankruptcy is still valid strategic option in many cases (and influencing empty hexes can make sense), but bankruptcy is not as crucial tool in the early game expansion as it used to be.
Moving through
In games with 4-6 players, as there is less space in the galaxy, players can quite often get cut out from other players. Forming diplomatic relations with the neighboring player can lead to a situation where you need to eventually break the relations and become the traitor, just to be able to move through that player's territory. Often this does not feel right and overly restricts interaction between the players across the game board.
In the second edition, it is now possible to move your ships through player's territory without breaking the diplomatic relations. As long as the player does not end her movement on the friendly hex, the diplomatic relations stay unbroken. However, if the player's ships get pinned or the ships end their movement on the friendly hex, you will be considered attacking and break the diplomatic relations.
This change removes some unnecessary restrictions and creates new possibilities for players to interact with each others - even across the galaxy.
Optional Turn Order Variant
Optional turn order variant was included in the Ship Pack One expansion of the original game due to strong feedback from the community. With this addition, players can take turns in the real passing order. We, as a developers of the game, have controversial feelings on this - it does add a bit of fairness to the game, but the downside is that it makes the game flow less smooth.. After a long discussion between myself and Sampo, we decided to add this to the campaign (it’s included in the World’s Afar Stretch goal expansion) for for those who feel that is adds more than it distracts.
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Main balance changes
Sector Hexes
In Eclipse, one of the core pillars of the game is that the results of exploration are unknown in advance. This ensures that each game is unique and forces players to adapt to a variety of different situations. Big part of the skill in Eclipse is to know how to best take advantage of the explored hexes and create your strategy around them.
The original idea was that the different hexes, while pushing players to different strategies, would be balanced when compared to each other. For example, exploring an Ancient hex would, while delaying your economical expansion for a while, bring you great rewards after you conquer it with a successful military operation. However, in practice, the first edition hexes do not completely fulfill the original vision. There are clearly better and worse hexes out there, making the game more random than really needed. In the new version, we went through the balance of the hexes with care, tweaking them so that they would be more balanced without reducing the variety in the game.
In average, the hexes are now bit better and more valuable than in the first edition. The Galactic Center Hex and few of the Species' home systems have also been tweaked.
Some examples of the updated Sector tiles.
The game also comes with four Outpost hexes, which are now used in the basic setup when playing with less than six players. These are reworked Ancient Homeworlds from the Rise of the Ancients expansion, renamed so that there wouldn't be any confusion regarding their interaction with the Descendants. We feel that they make the gameplay more interesting, and especially in a two player game add lots of interesting options. With these added to the game, we also now feel that playing the two player game using Planta or Descendants is not too powerful, so we are removíng the recommendation of not using these species in a two player game from the rules.
Warp Sectors, introduced in the Rise of the Ancients expansion, are now also included (as a stretch goal). They are an optional addition to the game, providing more direct interaction across the galaxy for groups who enjoy that. I would leave these out during your first games and consider adding them later, depending on your group’s gameplay taste.
Technologies and Ship Parts
Here are the Technology changes we have done for the second edition:
Improved Hull: Research cost increased from 4/3 to 6/4
Fusion Source: Research cost decreased from 6/4 to 4/3
Orbital: Research cost decreased from 8/5 to 6/4; Orbital price decreased from 5 to 4
Advanced Robotics: Research cost increased from 6/4 to 8/5
Wormhole Generator: Research cost decreased from 16/8 to 14/7
Artifact Key: Research cost increased from 14/7 to 16/8
Gluon Computer: Research cost decreased from 16/8 to 14/7; Gluon Computer does not increase Initiative
Plasma Missiles: Research cost increased from 14/7 to 16/8; Plasma Missiles consume one Energy per Ship Part
Few examples of the re-balanced Technologies.
Most of them don't require much explanation, I hope? Orbitals were already quite weak in the first edition, but reducing the game length from 9 rounds to 8 made them even worse. With these modifications, they become a competitive choice for the players.
Computers don't provide Initiative any more, which makes Drives more important as they are now the main source for it. This change also makes Shield technologies more attractive when compared to Computers. Based on our playtests, Initiative is now a more interesting part of the game play with these changes.
Note that as Computers don't provide Initiative, it makes sense to lower the cost of the Gluon Computer Technology.
Plasma Missiles were quite effective and polarizing in the first edition. Also, their most clear counter, Improved Hull, is now more expensive, and as some of the Rare Technologies (Distortion Shield and Point Defense from Rise of the Ancients) that provided effective counters against missiles were left out, we felt that a proper nerf to the Plasma Missiles was needed.
The game now has also 15 Rare Technologies added. We chose a set of Rare Techs that we felt supported the game the best. They are:
Soliton Cannon
Sentient Hull
Flux Missile
Conifold Field
Zero-Point Source
Absorption Shield
Transition Drive
Metasynthesis
Neutron Absorber
Antimatter Splitter
Cloaking Device
+4 new Rare Technologies (described later in detail)
Some examples of the Rare Technologies added to the base game.
Sentient Hull's cost is now 7/6 (instead of 5/5), but otherwise these techs are the same as they were in the expansions.
Some old Discoveries have been also re-balanced a bit, for example Axion Computer gives now +2 to hit and 1 Initiative, instead of +3 to hit.
Species
Species are a complicated part - truthfully the most difficult part - of balancing Eclipse. Of course, as the game has been now out for a long time, we have learned a lot regarding the balance of the species. In addition, the second edition brings new rule and balance changes which also affect the species' strength. Therefore rebalancing has two aspects to it: trying to balance the species based on the data we have from the first edition, while accommodating the tweaks made in the second edition.
Player board for Descendants of Draco.
To illustrate the challenge, let's consider Eridani as an example. Eridani is widely seen as one of the weakest species in the first edition. The second edition introduced several rule changes that indirectly help Eridani, the main ones being: 1) the game lasts one round less and 2) claiming Discovery tiles can be done without placing Influence discs (for Eridani it was much harder to use the tactical banktrupcy to abandon empty hexes), and 3) they can get more Money by passing early (which they might do more often than most species). Therefore, even though they were too weak in the first edition, in the end the only balance change done to the Eridani was to add +1 energy to its Interceptor and Cruiser blueprints! This actually helps them quite a bit, as they can now use the full advantage of their powerful starting Technologies.
Here is the full list of Species balance tweaks:
Eridani 1 external energy on Interceptor & Cruiser
Orion start: 4 Materials (previously 5)
Planta start: 2 Money & 3 Science (previously 4 & 4); home system: no Money planet
Descendants Fusion Drive start technology
Terran start: 3 Money & 4 Materials (previously 2 & 3)
Mechanema start: 4 Materials (previously 3)
Progress start: 6 Science (previously 5); home system: No basic Science planet (they now have only the Advanced Science planet)
In addition, the Orbital cost has been reduced by 1 for all species. It now costs 3 Materials for Mechanema and 4 Materials for all the others.
Why only eight rounds?
Why eight rounds instead of nine? As we have introduced new features (such as Rare Technologies and the passing bonus) and tweaked both the rules and the game balance (hexes, techs, species, etc) the game has become a bit more generous than what the base first edition was. Also, for experienced players, 9 rounds of Eclipse already felt a bit too loose. It wasn't uncommon to see experienced players maxing out all three of their Tech tracks, which should not be the default end state. We felt that there was a real need to make it one round shorter to keep the game tight to the very end. The bonus is that the game is now shorter to play and easier to fit into a regular game night.
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Some New Content
We did create some new content for Second Dawn as well. Here is the full list these additions:
New Rare Technologies:
Improved Logistics
Effect: +1 activation with the Move action
Cost: 7/6
Accelerated Transformation
Effect: +2 Ship Parts with the Upgrade action
Cost: 11/8
Ancient Labs
Effect: Immediately gain one Discovery tile
Cost: 13/9
Warp Portal
Effect: Immediately place the Warp Portal tile on one of your controlled hexes. The Warp Portal connects to all other Warp Portals and is worth 1VP at the end of the game if controlled.
Cost: 9/7
Examples of new Rare Technologies introduced in the Second Dawn.
New Discoveries:
Nonlinear Drive: Drive 2, produce 2 Energy
Antimatter Missile: 1x AM Missile
Soliton Missile: 1x Soliton Missile, 1 Initiative
Soliton Charger: 1x Soliton Cannon, no Energy or Initiative
1VP / 3 Reputation: 1 additional VP for every 3 VP in your Reputation Tile total at the end of game
1VP / Artifact: 1 additional VP for every Artifact you control at the end of game
Examples of new Discoveries.
Alternative Blueprints:
We added 2 alternative blueprint versions each for Ancients, Galactic Center Defense System and Outpost Guardians. These blueprint options are mostly new, although some are tweaked versions of older ones.
Minor Species:
We also included one new mechanic to the game: Minor Species. This addition consists of 9 Minor Species Ambassador tiles, from which a subset is chosen for any particular game. It is meant to be an optional addition for the game for those who want a bit more strategical options. The idea with the Minor Species is that you can now make Diplomatic Relations with Minor (non-player controlled) Species dwelling in the galaxy. They provide a way to fill slots on the Reputation Track with Minor Species Ambassador tiles, which give players some new bonuses (such as discounts to building ships or structures, and new ways to gain victory points). The main rationale for this addition is that players can now make use of their Ambassador slots even in 2 or 3 player games - but they do of course provide new options in 4-6 player games as well.
Note that some of this content might be available through Stretch Goals.
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....gewonnen. Tolles Spiel!
leider hat meine Frau die schlagkräftigere Flotte gehabt und das Zentrum besetzt, gewonnen habe trotzdem ich ganz knapp
Ich habe hier noch das Grundspiel mit dem Shippack, dazu eine 
