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bobvonunheil posted:Here's a Just wanted to say that I really dig this, and that I will try to play this with some friends tomorrow with one slight rules change: quote:DIAMOND: Bribe! Take one club card (either drawn or played on you by another player) and place it in front of another player.
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Apr 12, 2015 09:13
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The Lobster posted:Yeah, there are definitely a lot of very in-depth ways this game could go and I'm sure if you gave this concept to ten different people you'd get ten different games. I'm trying to keep it light because I want it to be fast, pick up and play, and not require a whole lot of thought and time to learn, because those are the games I like best. I think you guys are giving Super In-Depth Gamer responses because those are the kind of games you like best. Some ideas you might want to consider, if you want to make a totally different kind of game that I'd loving love: - Leaving the plot on the table with each successful book; as the market becomes saturated with one author/genre, it is worth less, but a publisher that doesn't really focus in one area will never make it big - you've got to try and balance your plots with your style to make sure you don't wind up trying to make a living on Vampire Cooking novels when the market's tired of them. - Special 'movie deal' cards, where if one person plays that on a book, it becomes much more successful, but then the other players can also capitalize on that particular genre for the next couple of turns (and when it falls out of popularity, it falls hard) - Some form of 'battle' between players - let's say you're bringing out an unknown and you've got all these boosts and things hidden in your hand to really popularize them, and the other player, upon seeing you dropping marketing cards (like, just playing a card face-down from your hand to discard and 'spend' resources) can pull out one of their big-name authors to write something similar, if they've got the time - Some sort of timer on writing. Like, you can't just make your GRRM and your Donna Tartt drop a huge book every round; if you're playing an author/plot, you've got to wait until the book is finished to 'launch' it for points, which means the other player may see that you're trying something new with a slower writer (the more popular the writer, the less time they have to write, maybe?) and decides to flood the market with pulp in the genre to lower that book's market appeal when it drops. - The ability to win over an author from someone else's publisher (obviously make it costly as hell, but it could be useful if you haven't been able to get a bestseller and you're playing someone who has two huge names) Man, I want to make that game; a cutthroat battle between publishers, not just a game of publishing books.
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Apr 12, 2015 14:37
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Tendales posted:Also I'm very disappointed in Past Me's sense of humor.
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Apr 13, 2015 16:27
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Whalley posted:If you've got access, try and pick up a game or two by Small Box Games; they publish (generally) 1v1 card games that are very pick-up-and-play that have some great levels of depth to them. That all sounds really badass, actually. I'm not sure how I'd implement it though at this point in time. I mean I've barely started so I could go any direction really. But that sounds like a tangent with mechanics worth pursuing. I don't know if I'm clever enough to pull it off though.
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Apr 13, 2015 18:45
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The Lobster posted:That all sounds really badass, actually. I'm not sure how I'd implement it though at this point in time. I mean I've barely started so I could go any direction really. But that sounds like a tangent with mechanics worth pursuing. I don't know if I'm clever enough to pull it off though. I like the direction Whalley's suggestions could take your game too. Of course, pursuing them would mean your game would become longer, and have more heavy strategy. If you want a bigger, less random game, here are some ideas for a different take on the design, based on Whalley's suggestions: -Publishers: No publisher cards. Players are the publishers. Start of game, each player is dealt X random Work Cards. These will form the player's deck and playing hand. After looking at their starting Work Cards a minute, players draft Author Cards until each has Y Author Cards, and they put them face-up on the table in front of them, as that publisher's frequent authors. If using money, each player also gets Z money tokens. (Or you could use 1 Publisher Card per player to give each player a special ability or something, variable player powers.) -Authors: The Author Cards show how much it costs to play 1 Work Card on the Author, the minimum number of Work Cards that an Author needs to release a work, how many Work Cards maximum the Author can take on before they can do nothing but release a work, and score multipliers/penalties the Author provides to any of their released works that include certain Work Cards. (For example: Georgette S.S. Martine only costs $1 to have a Work Card played on her, but she takes a long time before one of her epic works is ready, so she needs a minimum of 5 Work Cards before she can release a work. She can keep writing if you let her, so she has a high max of 10 Work Cards before she HAS to release her work. When her work is released, every "Grim" Work Card scores x2, every "Scandalous" Work Card scores x3, and every "Fantasy" Work Card scores x4. However, her novels' caring relationships tend to fall pretty flat, so every "Romantic" Work Card only scores half.) Maybe Authors also have a "Freelance Cost" or something that, if a publisher pays, that publisher can take the Author as theirs, as long as they aren't already working on something for another publisher. -Work Cards: Work Cards represent the time and effort an Author puts into a work, as well as the elements of genre, plot, and style that people will like or dislike about a work. A Work Card is played face-down, below the face-up Author you are playing it on. This way, players can see who you're investing work/time in to, and who's working on big projects, or no projects at all. In the above examples, it costs money to play a Work Card on an Author, but you don't have to use that. It just as easily could be a play limit of 1 Work Card per turn instead, or something like that. All of the other special actions the publishers can do can either be special Work Cards they play face-up to the table, or they could be another card type that gets distributed at the start of the game as well. -Releasing a Work: If an Author has at least their minimum number of Work Cards already on them, you can release their work. Turn over all their face-down Work Cards to show everyone what kind of Work it is. Then gain money (or victory points) for each work card based on how the market currently rates it, and any Author multipliers/penalties applied to it. The market itself is the tricky part, and you might want to research more economic/commodity-trading games to see how they balance it out, if you want something more realistic and predictable than simply dice rolls and multipliers. I'd recommend a track, with tokens on it either for each element from Work Cards, or for different groupings of elements from Work Cards. (For example: Suspense [genre], Twist Ending [plot], and Constant Reveals [style] could all be on the same market token. As people get sick of 1 of these, they get sick of all of them, or if they love one, they love all. Might depend on whether genre, plot, and style Work Cards are actually any different in any significant way, or you could just make them all the same thing.) -Market: If using a Market Track, you could use it for either demand or supply/saturation. Either way, the stuff people want more you get paid more for, and vice versa. To try and replicate markets a little more, you could either move something's position on the market for every matching Work Card in a released work, or move each element on the market track once per released work that contains that element. (For example: If someone releases something with 3 Fantasy Work Cards, you could saturate the fantasy market by either 3 points, or 1 point.) Other cards/actions can have all sorts of effects on the market, of course. Either way, I would recommend against the dice rolls, especially for valuing a work. As you recognized, there needs to be more predictability in the market, and in players tracking when other players might release a work or not. The above recommendations definitely take your game away from the quicker playtime you mentioned, but in my opinion, a bigger, deeper, more strategic version of this game/theme/idea is much more appealing. But that's probably just my tastes.
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Apr 15, 2015 21:40
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I'm not a huge board gamer - I basically only play Carcassonne regularly - but I'm interested in designing educational games that don't suck to play. Is there a quick and easy way to learn about (simpler) game mechanics that work? I am going to start playing on Board Game Arena in earnest this summer, but I feel like playing for fun and playing to learn about design may be a bit different. edit: vv thanks y'all Mortley fucked around with this message at 22:01 on Apr 20, 2015 |
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Apr 17, 2015 20:38
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quote:I'm not a huge board gamer - I basically only play Carcassonne regularly - but I'm interested in designing educational games that don't suck to play. Is there a quick and easy way to learn about (simpler) game mechanics that work? I am going to start playing on Board Game Arena in earnest this summer, but I feel like playing for fun and playing to learn about design may be a bit different. Most "explicitly for learning" type games are pretty terrible as games (eg. there's 2 or 3 "and on this space we pick up a Bible Trivia card" type games on Kickstarter at any given time) - but they probably work for pushing facts, to an extent anyway. My favorite educational games either teach about how a system works by simulating that system - for example, games where you buy and sell things teach you something about buying and selling things - or games that have a rich enough connection to their setting that you gain knowledge/understanding of that setting (eg. Twilight Struggle or Fire in the Lake immerse you in a historical period, and you end up getting much more familiar with those periods and relevant events). Or how Tales of the Arabian Nights teaches you not to sass Djinns if you're satisfied with your current gender. You're teaching about "design"? Maybe just have your people do some design in the game? There's lots of solid games where people make/choose things (drawings, product ideas, whatever) and the game has ways for the other players to evaluate what they made or picked or whatever (look at, say, Snake Oil, where you have to pitch a random product in some random setting). If you have mechanisms that reward the kind of design you're looking for (and/or basic design principles you're trying to teach) it might be some effective, creative fun without the need for too much gamey stuff around it. Many of these games are pretty much just a bag of settings/ideas, with very little game design around them. Fake edit: Or maybe I misparsed that last sentence, and it's you trying to learn about design, not your intended players you want to teach about design. Anyway, that last bit might possibly be helpful so I'll leave it there. jmzero fucked around with this message at 20:58 on Apr 17, 2015 |
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Apr 17, 2015 20:56
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Yet another game idea. A push-your luck game based loosely on the 1963 classic, "The Great escape" . Players are prisoners (not necessarily a war camp) trying to form their own plans to escape. They bid for crew members who different things (and there's one called the snitch who makes it so you can't make any progress that turn). Players build up until they think they can escape, and then everyone enacts their plan, so it's a race to be the first to "knock: their attempt, but not be too early when you're not prepared. I was thinking there'd be a phase where players dig and try to avoid guard patrols. My first version has a deck of cards with shields (guards) and shovels (progress). But this got a bit complicated with making a sort of mini deck and then shuffling and drawing. Another idea was using custom dice with varying difficulties (easy=4 shovels, 2 Sheilds, Medium = 3/3 Hard = 2/4) but this is basicly zombie dice, and I'm not sure if that'd be a legal problem of using so similar mechanics in my game. I'm thinking there'd a "on the lamb" phase where you have to avoid things like guard dogs (and if I follow the theming, Gestapo). You earn points the longer you stay on the lamb. Also once you're caught you go to "the cooler"/Solitary, giving other players who didn't get the lead a chance at progressing towards escape some. Foolster41 fucked around with this message at 21:49 on Apr 17, 2015 |
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Apr 17, 2015 21:47
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Mortley posted:I'm not a huge board gamer - I basically only play Carcassonne regularly - but I'm interested in designing educational games that don't suck to play. Is there a quick and easy way to learn about (simpler) game mechanics that work? I am going to start playing on Board Game Arena in earnest this summer, but I feel like playing for fun and playing to learn about design may be a bit different. Look to something like Flash Point - find a thing you want to teach, find a way to make it into an interesting mechanic have people play with it. Flash Point I think is a good example - it massively oversimplifies, but it covers things like 'fire spreads when you open doors' in pretty cool ways. And probably, make it co-op. The last thing you want is people losing at education.
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Apr 17, 2015 22:33
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So, Im trying to think of how a dice-building game would work. Not a game where you build a pool of dice, like Quarriors or Kings Forge, but a game where you alter the faces of the dice themselves. The customizable lego dice would be the best choice for the physicality of it, but Im not sure how the design of it should work out. Would it be too random to base a decent strategy around? Unless you specifically load your dice to give you mostly a specific resource, or whatever. Anyone ever tried making something like this?
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Apr 17, 2015 22:48
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I haven't played it myself so I can't speak to the mechanics at all, but Rattlebones does have modifiable dice faces. https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/150146/rattlebones
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Apr 17, 2015 22:50
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CodfishCartographer posted:So, Im trying to think of how a dice-building game would work. Not a game where you build a pool of dice, like Quarriors or Kings Forge, but a game where you alter the faces of the dice themselves. The customizable lego dice would be the best choice for the physicality of it, but Im not sure how the design of it should work out. Would it be too random to base a decent strategy around? Unless you specifically load your dice to give you mostly a specific resource, or whatever. The way I'd do it is have a bunch of cutom dice with some various coloured "mana" sides. Each player has his own little board, where he puts down tiles indicating what do those symbols actually mean, when they are rolled. Different dice have different icon spreads.
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Apr 17, 2015 22:53
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thespaceinvader posted:And probably, make it co-op. The last thing you want is people losing at education. I remember that, despite being at best a really mediocre game, the American Revolution version of Chrononauts apparently got a lot of love from history teachers.
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Apr 18, 2015 00:58
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RickVoid posted:Just wanted to say that I really dig this, and that I will try to play this with some friends tomorrow with one slight rules change: That was a purposely terrible idea designed to parody Exploding Kittens.
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Apr 18, 2015 09:05
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Broken Loose posted:That was a purposely terrible idea designed to parody Exploding Kittens. But...but....we like Exploding Kittens... 38 pages of almost madness. Sweet. In other news, I seem to have mostly finished up my prototype for my Solitaire Wargame "Rise and Decline of a Galactic Imperium" and was looking for critique and playtesters. Rules https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9oHoMk8UuEfVW9Ba0pCVmNsQVU/view?usp=sharing Aid Charts https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9oHoMk8UuEfMjlwZHNLT2JuQTg/view?usp=sharing Stellar Mat https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9oHoMk8UuEfSlF1QVV6aDV5Tms/view?usp=sharing Political Mat https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9oHoMk8UuEfcXVENXRqMG5TOTA/view?usp=sharing Counter Mix https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9oHoMk8UuEfcW8xZktUb0U1bEk/view?usp=sharing I was inspired to make this game as Struggle for the Galactic Empire simply wasnīt very good and I really liked the way Consim Pressī The Hunters worked the solitaire route, trying for something by myself. Edit: I have since updated the rules a bit, to reflect the PSI-Legion specialty as well to eliminate the combat mat and rewritten some charts. Mr.Misfit fucked around with this message at 11:25 on Apr 25, 2015 |
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Apr 21, 2015 08:44
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Mr.Misfit posted:But...but....we like Exploding Kittens... Get out.
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Apr 24, 2015 07:53
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No, seriously, get the hell out of this thread.
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Apr 24, 2015 07:53
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"I like Exploding Kittens" in a board game design collab thread is like walking into CERN and being like, "I loving Love Science! I'm a fan of that page on Facebook, with all the cool pictures!"
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Apr 24, 2015 07:55
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So you would judge another because he admits to sympathies for something due to an amusing art style as a throwaway comment to not just interject himself into the thread rapidly. Please enlighten me, if you would be so kind, as to the why? Or is there some sort of internet irony at work that I do not grasp here? Mr.Misfit fucked around with this message at 10:37 on Apr 24, 2015 |
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Apr 24, 2015 10:33
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Mr.Misfit posted:So you would judge another because he admits to sympathies for something due to an amusing art style as a throwaway comment to not just interject himself into the thread rapidly. Please enlighten me, if you would be so kind, as to the why? (A) It's an incredibly ignorant statement to the point of being borderline offensive. (B) Exploding Kittens only has "an amusing art style" in the most rudimentary of terms, as The Oatmeal is a terrible artist who makes millions by depicting poo poo- and piss-covered clickbait-- although in the case of EK, it's blood-covered. Do you understand the I loving Love Science comparison? Right now, it seems really quaint and unoffensive to you, but it's really demeaning to the actual thought and work we do in here. IFLS is a photography meme that lets people pretend to like smart things by Facebook Liking pretty pictures and actually does quite a bit to set scientific progress back. Exploding Kittens was playtested for the first time within a few days of the Kickstarter's launch, and it absolutely did not sell on its merits as a game. Instead, it was a pompous demonstration of how being already popular can let you rake in millions of dollars in record time without having a worthwhile product. There is no player agency. There was no creativity expended to make the components or rules. There is no strategy and no allowance for player expression. It's literally a poker deck with the Oatmeal artwork on it. The creators absolutely expressed no care for the playability of the game with respect to its profitability. The only reason we even mentioned it in here was in a tone of despair with a hint of bile. It represents game design roughly as much as Abstinence-Only represents sex education. In fact, if you can't see what's wrong with that game, then coming to this thread for advice on your own games is a moot point. It feels like somebody posted traced Sonic the Hedgehog fanart in the Drawing thread in Creative Convention.
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Apr 24, 2015 11:44
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Broken Loose posted:IFLS is a photography meme that lets people pretend to like smart things by Facebook Liking pretty pictures and actually does quite a bit to set scientific progress back. I know it's offtopic, but I actually want to read your angry rant about it. Here's something to get you in the mood: 
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Apr 24, 2015 11:49
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Lichtenstein posted:I know it's offtopic, but I actually want to read your angry rant about it. Here's something to get you in the mood: It's all been said before and better. IFLS is a content aggregation page that steals its content uncredited, promotes pseudoscience and a lack of fact-checking, and is largely a front for the person running the page to sell merchandise featuring stolen artwork.
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Apr 24, 2015 12:10
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Broken Loose posted:(A) It's an incredibly ignorant statement to the point of being borderline offensive. You see something put into a showcase at a store you sometimes walk past. Itīs only a glimpse, and you never cared enough to really think about that which is shown there unless it was something deeply offending you, which it just never was. Thatīs me walking by kickstarter. I saw a game called "Exploding Kittens", I was amused by the idea and artwork, I did not care enough to inform myself deeper. Because I DID NOT CARE ABOUT THAT GAME. I likethe oatmeal artstyle. So no, I did not know that itīs a bad game. But to find my comment borderline offensive seems to me, as if you are somehow venting aggression about that game towards someone else without that person being at fault for that game (I never supported that kickstarter, I donīt and never will care enough for that game to do so, even if I still could.), then it seems rather unfair from your part. I do understand the comparison to IFLS and I dislike, but this is the internet. People make such extreme comments, often "willi-nilly" without care or thought into it. Coming from your explanation, of course I can see, why from a design standpoint the idea of Exploding Kittens might offend you, though the degree it does seem to do so seems a bit much to me. It feels more like the typical internet rage than a dislike based on rational argumentation, which you did not offer towards me. You insulted me, as you now have punt into words by yourself. Iīd apologize, if I felt there was any reason to. But I really wish to discuss finer design points in this thread, not argue with you about the question of why "Exploding Kittens" is abad game. It seems to be one, I donīt know yet, I will inform myself about it, I will reassess my opinion but for anyoneīs sake. Please donīt flip out like that for someone posting his project in such a way as to call me "posting it a moot point if you cannot see what is wrong with that game". This. And that, are two different things. One can be allowed to like bad games and still produce good ones. Or games, for all that matters.
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Apr 24, 2015 12:41
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getting super angry about boardgames is his schtick  Even by the standards of "fun, stupid party game" EK is a pretty low bar, the only thing it has on loving Munchkin is playing time and that's saying something.
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Apr 24, 2015 14:10
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Mr.Misfit posted:In other news, I seem to have mostly finished up my prototype for my Solitaire Wargame "Rise and Decline of a Galactic Imperium" and was looking for critique and playtesters. You made a game and are sharing, and that's wonderful  How would you describe it plays? What are the major things that happen? Got any photos of a game in progress? I'll be honest with you, I'm not ready to print and play a wargame right now but I am interested in knowing a bit more about what's going on in what you made. A quick browse of the rules doesn't give me a real sense of what goes on in a game.
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Apr 24, 2015 18:09
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Sure. Below you can se a low-resolution image of my really bad mobile camera from a test game I am currently playing. I am in the second game stage. The basic idea of the game is that the player tries to collect victory points during each of the games three games stages, simulating the early years, the high point and the downfall of a stellar empire. To do this the game simulates Random Events of small and big size (Like a Senate Reshuffle happening is small, but a Civil War starting is BIG) and the outside influence from competing AI-played empires, while giving the player different targets to gain victory points during the end of each of the games stages. It starts with a simple tally of owned vs. unowned systems representing the drive to expand, goes to prestige projects and deep space expeditions being the only thing giving victory points to represent the onset of decadence and projects of grandeur durig the imperial high point and finally goes on to simply tally the number of systems the player has left under control at the end of the game, delivering a result on the final outcome chart depending on the final number of achieved victory points and the end military strength and political stability of the empire. How does it play? Like most games wargames of itīs kind (50 turns/turn-based...) it takes some time. You should plan for about 5 hours per age, maybe 3-4 hours if you are playing fast. During each turn you need to invest the funds you get into two major game phases, during the first, the stellar phase for either stellar expansion, moving fleets and legions across the board, invading sectors or fighting pirate flotillas/invaders/xeno-organic symbiots or against the AI Uprising. During the second major game phase you need to deal with the demands of the imperial senate, diplomatic overtures as well as imperial technological progress or the creation of secret projects offering special bonuses to whomever builds them, or expeditions into the darkness of space for the prestige (read VICTORY POINTS) of it all. Iīm not sure how to describe the major things happening. I might know what they are, but I didnīt build it in such a manner 
Mr.Misfit fucked around with this message at 19:31 on Apr 24, 2015 |
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Apr 24, 2015 19:14
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So I playtested my game daring skies again last Sunday and came upon a bunch of problems. I'm starting to feel like the game's getting a bit sleeker though. I cut out the Peuto Rico-esque govenor mechanic and fate tokens (the event cards are now used as a had to track them). I also changed the hubs to colors instead of letters. The problem is, I tried to get as different colors as possible, but there was some confusion:   The plan is to have some sort of symbols as well (especially to help people who are colorblnd play), but I'd like the colors by themselves not be confusing. One problem too was the events (cards that allow you to play "hazards", such as storms, pirates) on paths was barely ever used. They are each linked to a corner with four hubs (since there are 15 there is some overlap). I think I'm going to expand them so there are either E or W. One suggestion was to get rid of play choice for events completely, just have them randomly happen, but I really don't like that, since the reason I put them in after the first playtest was to get players interacting more (trying to screw with each other in some way) rather than just racing around completing missions.).
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Apr 24, 2015 20:46
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If I can interject about the spectre of Bad Games, I worked at a store that sold L-C-R, a truly atrocious activity wherein literally no choices are made by any player. It's marketed to church socials and grandparents and thankfully never went anywhere. It could have easily seen a million licenses ala Love Letter (not to disparage Love Letter) with a branded dice cup and tokens. But, there is a tiny sliver of good design there, though I suspect it to be unintentional. The game doesn't interrupt a social function. There's no point to play it except to have something to do while you drink, unless you play the "Strip L-C-R" variant I certainly didn't write up. But unlike even the lightest of other games, no one is going to agonize over their move. Something to think about if you ever want to challenge yourself to design something that appeals to demos other than, y'know, goons.
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Apr 26, 2015 02:20
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ZorajitZorajit posted:If I can interject about the spectre of Bad Games, I worked at a store that sold L-C-R, a truly atrocious activity wherein literally no choices are made by any player. It's marketed to church socials and grandparents and thankfully never went anywhere. It could have easily seen a million licenses ala Love Letter (not to disparage Love Letter) with a branded dice cup and tokens. But, there is a tiny sliver of good design there, though I suspect it to be unintentional. The game doesn't interrupt a social function. There's no point to play it except to have something to do while you drink, unless you play the "Strip L-C-R" variant I certainly didn't write up. But unlike even the lightest of other games, no one is going to agonize over their move. Something to think about if you ever want to challenge yourself to design something that appeals to demos other than, y'know, goons. I hope your strip variant involves making the person to your left or right wear your clothes. Anyway free LIFEHACK for L-C-R: replace the chips with jello shots. Every time you would have to put chips in the center, take one of your jello shots. "Winner" takes all the shots they have in front of them, or gets to distribute them among the players depending on the particular brand of loving with people you enjoy.
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Apr 28, 2015 16:45
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Misandu posted:I hope your strip variant involves making the person to your left or right wear your clothes. It absolutely did! I also didn't write up "Strip Battlestar Galactica." Basically, for each resource lost, a human player removes an article of clothing, if someone removes their last article, they reveal their loyalty cards. So, are you being modest, or are you a filthy toaster? I want to be able to say that there's real design space in Strip mechanics, but unfortunately we don't live in a bizarro world where the 70s never ended and swingers and gamers hang around in shag carpeted nerd stores. EDIT: Don't actually try this. It's a worse idea than trying to play Train competitively. ZorajitZorajit fucked around with this message at 22:57 on Apr 28, 2015 |
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Apr 28, 2015 20:28
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ZorajitZorajit posted:unfortunately we don't live in a bizarro world where the 70s never ended and swingers and gamers hang around in shag carpeted nerd stores. Be the change you wish to see in the world.
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Apr 28, 2015 21:45
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Yeah, I was gonna say, most of the swingers I know are nerds and specifically board gamers.
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Apr 28, 2015 22:51
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This thread is taking an odd turn.
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Apr 28, 2015 22:54
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I've heard people complain that certain board games are too 'swingy' but I thought they meant something else.
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Apr 28, 2015 22:57
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So I've continued to refine the fantasy pvp game I posted about a while ago. And I finally got 3 new people to try it, 2 played it after I gave them a quick run through and seemed to play it fine, but couldn't win as one of the classes and gave up on it after 2 games (games take 10-15 minutes). Another tried it versus me and seemed to have a much more positive experience with the game, but they also have much more of a background in competitive 1v1 games. All of them thought it was too light and, implied, that it was too quick? The final playtester thought it needed more options to warp the game fundamentally/that it just needed something else, but didn't know what specifically. They also thought that it was somewhat brain burn-y as is. The first two thought it needed a recovery mechanic and that it was not at all brain burn-y. Comparing it to checkers or monopoly (I... didn't quite get specifics as to how, as it resembles neither in any way I can determine.) To be fair they all only played with the very simplest match up in the game. And some interest has since been expressed in trying the more advanced classes, so that seems like a good sign. e: Found another playtester and played a fair bit with them. Explaining the rules got a little tricky, and is something I need to work on streamlining. They also wanted a heal action early on, and having talked about it and played more they seem to think it might be a good idea, but aren't quite as adamant about it, it seems. It's definitely something I'll work on. e2: They now are suggesting it might be good as a nice thing to have, but concede that its probably a trap/gimmick option because any amount of healing that would be meaningful could potentially stall out the game. Anniversary fucked around with this message at 14:39 on May 11, 2015 |
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Apr 30, 2015 04:07
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Been working on my "Welcome to Earth!" forum game board from that earlier mockup I posted. Felt I needed a map to play with to decide what ideas might work/not work. First draft, totally not based on the Victoria 2 map The map is used to track both military factors (and UFO interceptions) and diplomacy, science things. Not necessarily espionage though (although I got some ideas there for overlap with the diplomacy system). *Big red dots: Supply depots/Country Capitals. Mostly important for military matters. Also markers the playable countries I'm thinking of including. *Big green dots: Special resource markers. Needed for advanced SCIENCE! Which also helps to provide some conflict zones of interest. Their location can be randomized at the start of the game, but should always land "outside" player countolled nations if possible. *Long red borders: 1) To show which islands that are grouped together (see Carribean being split into 2 in-game "territories" for influence/control) or "belong" to another territory (on a nearby continent) without being its own province (example: islands of italy). 2) To show what borders what over the water, for some of the (advanced) movement rules I've been tinkering with. Not strictly necessary when you can just "deploy" units wherever. *Internal territory borders: To balance the stronger nations I got one version of the map with these internal borders, so the US, China and Russia which may start the game with more resources also have more space to cover when it comes to military matters (say UFOs swooping down and terrorizing one undefended part). This "can" hold these countries back from just sending out their militaries to do their busy-work outside the nation. When it comes to diplomats/agents/scientists, these borders don't really mean anything. A simplified version can exclude these internal borders. *Short red scratches: Me thinking to simplify the map some, especially the teeny tiny countries that can't easily fit all the game pieces without making the "board" even huger and that don't add too much by being around (or even hurt balance). For the final map / a simplified version I may advance time to say, 2040 and toss in some Pretty Borders Wars to justify the changes and any balance changes I do from IRL when it comes to countries being more or less on-par with each other. Any "neutral" country may also get slapped with a grey color to make it easier to pick out player countries and their influence. The map needs some sort of numbering system with a list for each province to keep track of them. Possibly on board country names too. I've only made a few "counters" for player on board assets, but the most prominent I've sprinkled around (as an example) is the omega sign looking one representing Diplomatic Influence. It got the letters and color of the country owning the asset (France and the US have kinda same colors, might change that). A country can have several different Diplomatic Influence "chits" on it, but the one with the most controls the country. Players will get a number of these depending on their starting country, what special abilities/background Card they start with and get to sprinkle them around in turn order before the start of the game. Diplomats (don't have a counter/symbol for these yet) are the guys that actually generates these Influence Chits. Might change the color of a controlled country to that of the controller's color to make it visually easier to see. I've also got a marker for the Military, over in North America. Simply a black box with MIL and country initials in it, but the inside of the square turns red when "engaged" (see ongoing invasion of Canada). Did some experimentation but it's hard to make anything but a square design look good at this scale (see the southern US). I was thinking a triangle to make it easier to pick military units apart from diplomats and the like. I'm thinking of a "kinda" rock-paper-scissors balance between Diplomacy > Spies > Military. A military unit can sit on a country and force any other countries Diplomatic Influence chits to flip upside down for the duration of the military deployment. This is an expensive way to control a place (military units costs upkeep, unlike diplomatic influence once placed) & there should always be better uses for military units (like defending the homeland/intercepting UFOs). Spies can also more or less secretly influence the country for scoring/objective purposes, so the hammer approach isn't the best pick. As no player can be entirely knocked out and everyone is more or less on the same level of influence/power (with exception for mr Space alien player) "world domination" should be out of the cards without alliances. Country control/influence is instead mostly useful for secret objectives, scoring and placing research stations. I'm thinking there shouldn't be any economic gain to taking territory, to prevent snowballing and conflicts that aren't motivated by mechanics not tied into the game Objectives (for example: you may want to control territory outside your homeland for research purposes). Still lots of work to do, in other words. Gotta get a decent space map up too, somehow.
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May 15, 2015 12:29
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Broken Loose posted:>angry rants about a game that raised 8 million dollars on kickstarter with over 200,000 backers< How much did your game manage to raise on kick starter again? The problem here is you think you're working at CERN, but really you're just a guy in his basement trying to invent a perpetual motion machine.
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May 15, 2015 12:57
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hey, let's dredge up a three-week old slapfight for literally no good reason
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May 15, 2015 14:03
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Geez, chill with some more maps instead: Playable Nations (might add Argentina so Brazil isn't so lonely)  Example of Influence. Where influence from several countries meet up, they negate each other. Included some of the simplifications of the map when I doled out influence, France would needa a lot more in Africa for example otherwise. (Missed greying out Ireland, but you get the gist)
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May 15, 2015 15:13
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4outof5 posted:How much did your game manage to raise on kick starter again? The problem here is you think you're working at CERN, but really you're just a guy in his basement trying to invent a perpetual motion machine. There's no comparison, because I was actually kickstarting a game.
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May 15, 2015 15:45
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