[SolemnGolem]

A few updates, including answering some questions of my own from nine (!) years ago.

How have you found the game?

Thematically it captures the paranoid brinksmanship very well. The powers of the cards are a good implementation of historical events in a zero-sum game. The luck aspect is higher than what I'm personally comfortable with in a game of this complexity and length (and investment), but it's a good game nonetheless. Some of the card designs appear to be quite oddly balanced, implying there's a legacy beta build in the current cards. I've had a fair bit of fun making custom cards too.

Are the two sides fairly well balanced?

Over the course of the game, the Soviets tend to get the first coup of each turn, which helps them. The Americans tend to get the last retort of each turn, creating a bit of a dilemma or a crisis for the Soviets to respond to. Card powers tilt towards the Soviets pushing a very aggressive early war, then to Americans regaining some momentum in mid war, and a very swingy late war.

How easy is it to pick up in the first place for two complete newcomers?

High complexity, expect to get many basic rules incorrect. Best to watch some Youtube walkthoughs, browse twilightstrategy, and check out reddit or other FAQ sites.

How much of a role does luck (either in dice rolls or drawing cards) play in the game?

Heavy. It's possible for the Soviets to draw cards that will assuredly kill them by the mid war regardless of their actions. The Americans also can get into a draft-suicide in late war. Both sides will depend regularly on input randomness (what cards have you drawn, what powers and OP points do they give you?) and output randomness (once you've decided what to do, you'll have to throw the die, and whether you succeed depends entirely on the die). Although the output randomness is more immediately frustrating (since its thwarting effect is immediately visible) I would say the card draft is actually more insidious. If you keep drawing 1s and 2s all game long, you can easily feel discouraged.

As with any game, the longterm solution to a "bad luck tilt" is to play many more games so you can see the results in the aggregate. Twilight Struggle, with its steep learning curve and very significant time commitment per game, does not make this easy. If you're the sort of player to get tilted at a row of bad luck experiences, you may find this game frustrating.

I am one such player (having played thousands of games against the AI as well as against live players) and I've started making custom cards to try to rebalance the game somewhat.

The game can also be played remotely and online. Playdek has an implementation (largely bug free, though some little ones remain) on Steam, and VASSAL has a freeware implementation.