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Author Topic: My Card Game Designs WIPs  (Read 48883 times)
lamaros
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on: January 12, 2012, 05:57:10 PM

Edit: New year, new redesign. Old stuff spoilered away.

And here are the new rules to date. If you care please comment, as any pointers as to what I can help make clearer are much appreciated.

If you have any design comments I'll also appreciate those.



« Last Edit: February 25, 2015, 07:53:41 PM by lamaros »
Samwise
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Reply #1 on: January 12, 2012, 06:00:33 PM

Allow bluff cards to be played on top of bluff cards as fake augmentations?

"I have not actually recommended many games, and I'll go on the record here saying my track record is probably best in the industry." - schild
lamaros
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Reply #2 on: January 12, 2012, 06:06:34 PM

Allow bluff cards to be played on top of bluff cards as fake augmentations?

That is allowed already. You can play bluff cards on bluff cards, or bluff cards on real cards, to bluff an augmentation, however the problem here is that if cards are fixed you are forced to play them and/or forced to remember their combinations.

So I play X. You play Y. I then have to play A on X. It will usually be obvious as to where I might play my augmented piece if it is fixed (some make capturing certain types of cards easier) so it would rarely be in my best interests to waste one or two bluff cards to trick you. Also the means that every augmented card takes twice as long to lay. And you have to remember which cards are augmented, and how, and play them consistently like that for the rest of the game.

What I really want is a way of playing a card with an augmentation without having to take an extra turn to do so, and without having to give away the fact that the card I just played is augmented.

Apologies if this seems confusing.

Maybe a clearer example would be:

I have 4 cards. Card X with a power of 3, card A which "attached card gains 2 power" and two misdirection cards.
You have 4 cards. Card Y with a power of 4, card Z with a power of 2 and two misdirection cards.
There is a card N on the table. It has a resistance of 2.
There is a card M on the table. It has a power of 5.
There is a card L on the table. It has a power of 3.

I can capture M with XA. You can capture it with Y & Z.  I can capture N with X, or XA. You can capture it with Y or Z, or Y & Z.

If A it attached to X I have to play like this: Misdirect, Misdirect, X, A. or X, A, Misdirect, Misdirect. Any other combination makes it clear to you what cards are where. That means I can only play against two of the cards on the table, while you can play on all three without me gaining any real information about what cards you have played where. (Ie, to fake the augmented card I have to throw down two misdirects, while to fake any other card I need only one misdirect. This makes the augmented card much harder/more expensive to fake)

I guess a solution would be that you can play the augmentation at the very end (ie, after everyone has played their cards) but then you run into the problem of having to remember the connections by some method. I don't think player memory alone is enough, as there are possibly a number of augmentations going around, and a large number of rounds.

Maybe once I get further with playtesting it won't seem as big a problem as it is now.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2012, 06:26:34 PM by lamaros »
Margalis
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Reply #3 on: January 12, 2012, 06:56:49 PM

If cards are played face down why do you need misdirection cards? Can't I misdirect you by just putting down a shitty card that looks the same as a good one?

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Samwise
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Reply #4 on: January 12, 2012, 07:20:10 PM

What I really want is a way of playing a card with an augmentation without having to take an extra turn to do so, and without having to give away the fact that the card I just played is augmented.

Okay, that's an easier way of stating the problem.

I feel like most card games handle this type of thing by having an "augmentation" be an upgraded version that replaces the old card.  I'm not sure how complex your cards are, but if they only have one "stat" on them, you could have the augmentation be a card that is discarded when played and allows you to swap out a card in your hand for one from some other pool that is N better.

If you've got a bunch of variables on each card and you want to have some cards permanently alter some of the variables and you want it all to be easy to track, I am thinking that maybe cards aren't the best way to represent your game.

"I have not actually recommended many games, and I'll go on the record here saying my track record is probably best in the industry." - schild
lamaros
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Reply #5 on: January 12, 2012, 07:47:35 PM

If cards are played face down why do you need misdirection cards? Can't I misdirect you by just putting down a shitty card that looks the same as a good one?

You start with only one (identical) card each, apart from the misdirection cards.

Plus there are a number of different things a card can do, one might be shitty at different things, but rarely useless.

What I really want is a way of playing a card with an augmentation without having to take an extra turn to do so, and without having to give away the fact that the card I just played is augmented.

Okay, that's an easier way of stating the problem.

I feel like most card games handle this type of thing by having an "augmentation" be an upgraded version that replaces the old card.  I'm not sure how complex your cards are, but if they only have one "stat" on them, you could have the augmentation be a card that is discarded when played and allows you to swap out a card in your hand for one from some other pool that is N better.

If you've got a bunch of variables on each card and you want to have some cards permanently alter some of the variables and you want it all to be easy to track, I am thinking that maybe cards aren't the best way to represent your game.

Yeah, the problem is that the cards have a number of variable stats (5 at the moment) and a suite of special abilities.

Example:

Card X

Power: 3
Defence: 5
Influence: 2

Card Y:

Attached card gains 5 power and noisy (this card must be played face up)

I'm leaning towards putting in a cost and making things moveable. But then cards like the above (card Y) become problematic.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2012, 07:49:41 PM by lamaros »
Sheepherder
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Reply #6 on: January 12, 2012, 08:46:33 PM

Write changes down on a sheet of paper.  Keep your augments in a separate discard pile for reference.
lamaros
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Reply #7 on: January 12, 2012, 09:16:07 PM

Write changes down on a sheet of paper.  Keep your augments in a separate discard pile for reference.

Doable, but makes things a lot less simple. At the moment all you have to track round to round is how much money you have, and a health value. Given the complexity of the play I don't want the scoring to be too complicated.

Oh well, I will shelve the issue for now. Lots more to do still.
Trippy
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Reply #8 on: January 12, 2012, 09:32:53 PM

Is there deck building in this game or are the cards fixed?

The way this is handled in CCGs is you have cards in your hand that the opponent can't see that can modify other cards or perform actions during play. So in your game the augmentations could be something you keep in your hand. That serves the same purpose as playing it face down on the table but allowing a player to move it around afterwards.

The WH40K CCG and the Star Trek CCG both had hidden card deployment mechanics so you might want to take a look at those games to see how they did it. Finding the rules online for the WH40K CCG is unfortunately proving difficult.

There's a rules summary for the WH40K CCG here but it's pretty confusing if you've never seen how the game is played before: http://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/7437/wh40kccg-rians-rtf?

The Star Trek CCG rules are here: http://www.trekcc.org/

Edit: there's store on Amazon that's selling WH40KCCG starter decks if you want to get a hold of some cards and the rules that way:

http://www.amazon.com/Warhammer-000-Battle-Pandora-Prime/dp/B0037T1F8W/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1326433796&sr=8-3
« Last Edit: January 12, 2012, 09:38:39 PM by Trippy »
lamaros
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Reply #9 on: January 12, 2012, 10:04:52 PM

Thanks for the links, I'll check them out.

It's a LCG, so both players play from the one deck, with exactly the same starting hands. The only 'deckbuilding' takes place in the game itself, where you add cards from the open board to your hand / area by competing for them with the other player.

There are three general neutral areas on the board:

Recruitment; where you compete through price (a card auction) to gain unit cards (held hidden in your hand and actively played each turn).
Domination; where you compete through influence (a unit attribute) to gain land cards (held face up in your area and passively supporting you).
Science; where you compete through research (a unit attribute) to gain equipment (augment units) and renovation (augment land)  cards, which are (ideally) played once and fixed to either a unit or a land permanently.

The problem, to add to what I said earlier, is:

Quote
I really want is a way of playing a card with an augmentation without having to take an extra turn to do so, and without having to give away the fact that the card I just played is augmented. But with that augmentation being fixed to the card that I first play it on for the rest of the game.

This is not a problem for lands, as they are played face up and are never part of a player's hand (they never 'reset', so to speak), but problematic for unit because they do - they have movement from round to round (ie, influencing, researching, attacking or defending).
« Last Edit: January 12, 2012, 11:47:31 PM by lamaros »
ezrast
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Reply #10 on: January 12, 2012, 11:15:12 PM

at the end of each round both players have all their cards revealed on the table
Why not keep them there, and have the player instead hold a "hand" of tokens that correspond to their tableau of cards? So if I have three cards available to play, they would stay face up and be marked 1-3, and during my turn I could play the "3" token, face down, on whatever I wanted to capture.
lamaros
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Reply #11 on: January 12, 2012, 11:45:46 PM

at the end of each round both players have all their cards revealed on the table
Why not keep them there, and have the player instead hold a "hand" of tokens that correspond to their tableau of cards? So if I have three cards available to play, they would stay face up and be marked 1-3, and during my turn I could play the "3" token, face down, on whatever I wanted to capture.

EDIT: Ah! I get it!

That could be a really good idea. It's an extra layer of complexity (or less streamlined resolution) but it's pretty easy to learn and really nice. You lose playing the cards with the art and etc directly (which might lessen player connectivity with the theme), but it solves my problem really well, and has the advantage of making the game less reliant on people remembering what the other player had exactly.

I'm not sure I follow what you are saying. I'm on about two hours sleep so my brain might have just shut down.

At the moment you play like (simplified):

Recruit unit cards until there are no units left to recruit, or both players elect not to bid.

Both players take turns playing cards from their hand facedown.

Once all cards have been played all the cards are turned face up and resolved in game order.

Then final turn things are done, upkeep costs, new land and recruitment cards are turned over if necessary, etc

Then both players gather up their unit and equipment cards and we go again.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2012, 11:57:01 PM by lamaros »
ezrast
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Reply #12 on: January 13, 2012, 12:16:25 AM

That's okay, I had to read your post two or three times before I understood it as well. tongue

Happy to help. Depending on your theme, it could also help connectivity by giving each player a permanent space on the table where they can arrange their forces how they want or whatever. Tokens could be "battle plans" or something.
lamaros
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Reply #13 on: January 13, 2012, 12:59:52 AM

Aye. Current terms are 'turf' and 'jobs' as I'm thinking of it as a gang warfare kind of thing. Land cards are buildings and influence is 'protection'.

There are some other elements that tie in to this too.

NFI how I'm going to handle art for the many cards.
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Reply #14 on: January 13, 2012, 03:04:16 PM

Oh, this is fun. Unless I'm misunderstanding the gameplay this might work:

 - All Modifier cards get a different back color than main cards.
 - There is an open stack of "blank" modifier cards, which simply do not change their attached unit in any way. At game start, each player gets four (or whatever) of them.
 - When a player plays a Moddable Unit, he must always play it paired with a Modifier card. That Modifier may or may not be a blank.
 - After such a play, the player picks up a fresh "replacement" blank from the blank modifier stack, so he won't run out of them. (This also happens when he played a real modifier of course)
 - For attachment of modifiers at a later time (as allowed by your rules), the player can flip over the blank modifier card, revealing that until now the unit was non-modified and replace that blank with a fresh face-down modifier. For additional fun, that new modifier card might still be a blank in order to confuse the opponent, however to discourage using this trick too often, the player does never get a fresh blank card when doing this delayed modification move.

What remains to be decided by you is what happens if the face-down modifier was not a blank before replacement. Some options:
a) The replacement goes through anyway, old modifier is discarded
b) No replacement takes place, the old modifier remains, although the opponent knows about it now
c) Unit and attachment are destroyed. Better luck keeping track of your own armies next time.
lamaros
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Reply #15 on: January 13, 2012, 08:09:40 PM

Hmm, I see the potential, but I think that becomes a bit much. I want the amount of misinformation to be very low; so it creates uncertainty but not complete confusion. I want you to be able to deduce a number of possibilities that your opponent is planning, and then work out what the best way to handle that it, rather than it being more of a lucky dip.

At the moment both players start with one unit and one misdirection card. So misdirection is powerful early, but as your forces gain units it becomes less significant, being just a key move or two rather than complete doubt.

Eg. There is a unit card that has the 'hunter' ability. It means that you can attack an enemy in the neutral zones (land and research areas) as well as on their turf. However very few other units can do this, so it is likely you will only ever have one of them. Thus if you want to fake a hunter attack you need to commit your misdirection there, meaning your unit placement elsewhere becomes much more obvious.

Say A has a hunter, a scientist and a misdirection card.
Say B has a straight fighter, an influence unit (takes land more easily), and a misdirection card.

The question becomes where each side is going to fake, will A fake the location of the bounty hunter and try and take out the influence unit. Will B fake the location of the influence unit and try and try and kill an overcommitted bounty hunter? (Ie, A plays scientist on research, B plays misdirection on land, A plays hunter on B's land misdirection, B plays fighter on A's hunter.) Will B fake the hunter and go for a straight attack? (Ie. A plays scientist on research, B plays misdirection on land, A plays misdirection on B's land misdirection, B plays fighter on A's hunter, B plays hunter on attack.)

Misdirection is very powerful and causes a lot of doubt, so I want to limit it so the game doesn't degenerate into a lucky dip of confusion. Having an extra layer of it with equipment might be a bit much. There is a enough bluffing with hidden play as it is.

Also I have too many cards already:

Headquaters   2
Underboss   2
Red' Misdirection Cards   4
Blue' Misdirection Cards   4
Red' Mission Cards   15
Blue' Mission Cards   15
Red' Marker Cards   15
Blue' Marker Cards   15

With a slew of unique unit, land and research cards as well.

Tempted to just make equipment redeployed each hand, and cut those extra 60 cards from the game.
« Last Edit: January 13, 2012, 08:22:55 PM by lamaros »
lamaros
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Reply #16 on: January 14, 2012, 11:02:23 PM

Ok, if anyone is really bored (or especially helpful) here is my attempt to write up the current rules.

At the moment I haven't put in anything about how the game is resolved, what I am more concerned about is if things make sense. Any comments appreciated.

Rules updated on last edit, now in PDF form!

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/193068/Dystopia%20-%20Rules.pdf
« Last Edit: January 16, 2012, 05:59:06 PM by lamaros »
lamaros
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Reply #17 on: January 16, 2012, 06:02:51 PM

I have decided to go back to a version of ezrast's solution as the best way of handling things. I have taken out hidden augmentation as I'm not sure it added a lot.

It is coming together a bit more. I have put the rules as a pdf as that makes them much more readable.
lamaros
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Reply #18 on: January 17, 2012, 06:13:29 PM

I have done some basic mock-ups of cards, to see how things work with the numbers currently.

Colours and fonts and etc are all just basic, what I'm trying to see is if the number of values on the card make it look confusing or complicated.

Comments appreciated.
« Last Edit: January 24, 2012, 03:48:59 AM by lamaros »
ghost
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Reply #19 on: January 19, 2012, 12:45:30 PM

I haven't had a chance to look at the rules closely (I will this evening) but why have dedicated misdirection cards at all? 

A way you could do this is to have specific markers for different cards in the play deck(some form of symbol, e.g. moon, cross, etc..  Then you have a separate deck (master key deck, for lack of a better term) that you draw from that will give each symbol card their "special ability", e.g. misdirection, x2 influence over the card you want to steal, damage to opponent if you win the card, reinforce other strategic point, etc.  Each master key card would have one symbol on it and each card could have varying effects even for the same symbol.  The cards from the play deck will be standard.  Both sides know what is on them and how they can potentially work.  They would be played face up, but you really wouldn't know exactly what they would be played for unless you had an idea of what is on the master key card.  For instance, if you played a really badass card that is only going to be at half strength due to your master key card because you want to take another point that your opponent isn't really expecting you to take would be nice misdirection.  That is how the bluffing would work.  You could really do it up nice with differing factions, etc. with different powers. 

Example:
-play deck with 60 cards of 20 different types (trolls, orcs, whatever different card for your genre)
-each card is marked with a different symbol
      -so if you have a common orc set of 5, each one could have a different symbol, or even multiple symbols
-draw a set of 5 key cards, keeping three to flesh out your strategy
-play cards to win your target utilizing the key card to formulate your strategy

There's a lot that could be hashed out from just this basic mechanic.  The beauty of it is your opponent would get to see your card and formulate their opinion off of that, rather than the back of the card. 
lamaros
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Reply #20 on: January 19, 2012, 04:01:55 PM

When would you have the key cards being revealed or played? Face down with the normal cards?

That would be interesting, but it'd also be a very different kind of game. I want the game to be balanced between bluffing and smart play, which I might not really have at the moment, but I think that key cards like that might make it a different game every turn. I want the units to have personality and develop over the game, and consistency of ability is required for that.

I have the misdirection cards in to make the early game less of a stalemate, though it might not be 100% necessary. I do like the opportunities that 1 misdirection card adds in terms of bluffing, but it might not be necessary. Unfortunately I haven't been able to do much play testing as yet, given the bluffing central nature of the game it is pretty impossible to work through much solo. I hope to get a bit done in the next couple of weeks and see how things play out a bit better.

I have updated the original post and will try to keep a current outline on the state of the game up there.
ghost
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Reply #21 on: January 20, 2012, 06:35:16 AM

It could make it as different as you wanted, I suppose. 

I guess my main critique, or concern, about your potential system, as I understand it, is the playing of the cards face down as you go along, building to a climax where you turn over all the cards and sort everything out.  That doesn't seem particularly enjoyable to me.  I would prefer a system where the tension actually builds with each card played, with a little "take that" thrown in as you go.

Also, I was trying to pull up the rules and wasn't able to.  You might want to check your link. 
Margalis
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Reply #22 on: January 20, 2012, 07:52:19 AM

I read through, and some of this feedback may be a function of me being lazy rather the legit, but it's hard to pinpoint what the core of the game is. It has bluffing but it's not a bluffing game. It has a bidding element but it's not an auction game. (Non-blind bidding seems a bit pointless to me, I would expect in playtesting you'll have a lot of tedious exchanges where people go back and forth going up by 1 each time)

Compounding that is the fact that each phase has subphases, and each way you can play a card is actually 3 ways.

I think if you look at something like Magic: The Gathering the rules are actually quite complicated and there is a ton of content you have to learn but the core of the game is still graspable pretty easily. A beginner can sort of fudge their way through a lot of it and still be playing roughly the same game and have some fun.

From reading the rules it's hard to say what this game is actually about, if that makes sense. A lot of disparate elements and to me maybe undercooked systems (the bluffing, the auction stuff) and unlike Magic I don't think you could fudge your way through it and play the game.

You can design an entire game around bluffing. To have that be a minor component of the game strikes me as symptomatic of a larger problem. I'm going to predict that if you playtest with people who have not participated in development in any way you are going to get a lot of comments about how there is just too much stuff going on in general. It's ok to have a lot of stuff when you drill down, but there is a lot of stuff here even at the high levels.

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Johny Cee
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Reply #23 on: January 20, 2012, 08:56:51 AM

Speaking of MTG:

On Wizards website, they have regular columns on game designing/state of the game by the developers that you might find interesting.  They talk a great deal about why the make decisions, what the goals are, and where they want to go in general with play.  The Mark Rosewater articles in particular are pretty interesting, and some points are very broad.
ghost
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Reply #24 on: January 20, 2012, 09:39:06 AM

After reading through the rules I agree with Margalis. 

It also may be a good idea to look at games like Innovation and Glory to Rome to see how they handle the "same card, multiple actions" situation.  That might help you with what you are trying to do.
lamaros
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Reply #25 on: January 20, 2012, 02:38:43 PM

I have been tossing up between blind and open auctions and will test both.

I'm also worried/interested to see how the bluffing nature of things go in practice. It could fall flat, or it might work. The goal is to create a strategic fog rather than out and out bluffing, because out and out bluffing will leave you out of position when the cards are revealed. I anticipate most of the real bluffing power will be in attacking and defending, so I might need to make that more open. Also I have some concerns about the power of going last and first.  But I will have to see. I might need to change things significantly.

The plan is to have a play test version ready this Sunday.

I'm not too worried about the game not being super simple. I would rather have it less streamlined and retain all the conflict and building elements rather than simplify it and make it one or the other.

The fundamental idea is for a card table building (im not a huge fan of deck builders like dominion and ascention) game with direct conflict, and I'd rather start over with a new game than take that out.

Johnny Cee: yeah I find a lot of those posts interesting and take a look from time to time. I'll go and have another look now that the design is fresh in my mind.

Will take a look at Innovation too. I've read thought the GtR rules a bit, but maybe a should get my hands on the game itself to play.
« Last Edit: January 20, 2012, 02:44:47 PM by lamaros »
lamaros
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Reply #26 on: January 22, 2012, 05:29:23 AM

I have attempted to isolate further what I consider to be the fundamental elements of this game: it is a combat game with base building. Bluffing is soley a mechanism to provide strategic depth, and I will remove it if I can find better solutions.

I am ok with the building effects for now, they seem simple enough to me.

1. You have a blind (after playing some mock draws here I found it was better and faster this way) auction to gain unit cards. Using money.
2. You play unit cards to either,
A: gain money
B: develop your base
C: acquire improvements for your units or base
or
D: fight the other player.

A allows you to continue with 1
B allows you to do A, C & D better
C allows you to do A, B, C & D better
D allows you to make the other player do A B C & D worse / win the game.

I think the playing of cards in different ways is pretty clear: if you are doing A look at this stat. If B look at this stat, etc.

Also: win conditions are going to vary game to game is the plan. I aim to make objective card that detail specific win conditions (elimination will always be one in every game) and restrictions, such as first to a base with 10 buildings, first to 100 money in the bank, etc. all that will follow after the mechanics prove playable.

The real problem at the moment is having conflict that isn't either boring or chaotic. If you can see what the other person is doing then its a cagey experience, but if you have no idea at all it's somewhat random. More strategy seems centred in the blind auction than the rest of play at the moment, and I want to bring that in to balance.

Most card games control these elements through individual card drawing, but that is something I really don't want to do here. I'm also not a huge fan of the worker placement systems where players 'follow' each other. Not that they're unfun, but it's a very different feel to what I'm trying to find.

If its not obvious, the game is inspired by chaos overlords and I'm trying to capture some of the turn based strategy fun from it.
« Last Edit: January 22, 2012, 05:31:45 AM by lamaros »
Margalis
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Reply #27 on: January 22, 2012, 08:08:01 PM

I have attempted to isolate further what I consider to be the fundamental elements of this game: it is a combat game with base building.

Is it?

Combat is only a small amount of the rules by volume and the combat itself is pretty simple. Unit special abilities don't seem particularly combat-centric. My impression reading the rules is that combat is a thing you can do, but certainly not the thing.

To me the game sound fundamentally similar to Ticket to Ride in that there are a bunch of things you can do in a given turn, out of which you can only perform a subset, and the meat of the game is figuring out what to do when. (essentially how to invest your resources on a given turn) However your rules are like a billion times more complicated than TTR, and having played TTR a few times I still feel like I don't have a good grasp of the tradeoffs and strategy.

Quote
The real problem at the moment is having conflict that isn't either boring or chaotic.

IMO this is most likely a function of having too much stuff going on. If there are too many things you can do and that you have to keep in mind things often devolve into white noise. It's like an RTS that has way too many unit types per side - it seems like that would make the game more complicated but in the end everything runs into each other and the number of meaningful distinctions decreases.
« Last Edit: January 22, 2012, 08:16:36 PM by Margalis »

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lamaros
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Reply #28 on: January 23, 2012, 04:03:06 PM

Perhaps it isnt' a combat game per se, maybe more of a Civ builder with combat at the heart.

Hmm, I guess I should rewrite the rules a bit. They're pretty simple I think. (Though I accept the possibility that they're not, and I'm just very close to them).

1: Recruit units.

2: Give your units orders. Each unit can have only one order per round.

A: try to capture buildings.
B: try to research.
C: attack or defend.
D: make money.

3: resolve everything.

It's 3 that is by far the most complicated, but even then it's mostly just simple addition and subtraction.

In Glory to Rome you have cards that are four things at the same time, depending how you play it. In this I have cards that are one thing, but do four different things, depending where you play them.

I will put up the pdfs of the cards later tonight. Maybe that will clear up the ideas I have in my head.
« Last Edit: January 23, 2012, 04:05:19 PM by lamaros »
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Reply #29 on: January 23, 2012, 05:29:32 PM

I will be absolutely truthful about this because you've clearly put a lot of work into it:

Card games are basically my favorite type of game ever. The board setup diagram and design examples of cards is far too intimidating for me to even care about the rules.
lamaros
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Reply #30 on: January 23, 2012, 05:43:27 PM

 awesome, for real And yet you play Magic?


« Last Edit: January 23, 2012, 05:45:28 PM by lamaros »
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Reply #31 on: January 23, 2012, 05:59:25 PM

I've refused to play Glory to Rome until my Black Box version comes in. Just because one game had terrible visuals and people liked it doesn't mean other games should also.

In addition, is there a version of your game that looks simple, introduces the core concepts, and slowly rolls you into the complicated ones?

Basically, do you have a version of Red Deck Wins versus White Weenie and can you explain it in under 3 minutes?

Anyway, I was trying to be nice. Your shit is intimidating. Simplify it.
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Reply #32 on: January 23, 2012, 06:20:38 PM

I appreciate the comments. I'm doing my best so far. I also hate how ugly GtR is.

Putting some basic images to stuff now so I can print out a decent playtest version. Will hopefully get some good plays and feedback as I'm on holiday for a week after this weekend.
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Reply #33 on: January 24, 2012, 12:07:08 AM

I think I have to scrap everything take a step back and start from the beginning.

I watched a video review of Eclipse, and realised that what I'm trying to make is really more a board game in that vein. And it's not really going to work unless I make it a board game. Which I don't want to do. So I am going to get back to basics and rebuild the core elements.

The core things are card laying for base building, direct conflict, and a shared draw deck with similar start points.

New ideas!

So far I am thinking I would like to do something with these cards. (I noticed I missed one card possibility, point out if you notice I missed any more).

Retaining some of the ideas I had before, but much simpler. A tile laying card game of sorts.

Current idea is something like:

Each player starts with one card in front of them (the card with three 'roads' - dark borders - at the one end and three 'moats' - empty borders - at the other).

Cards are double sided. One side are the cards linked above, land cards. The other side are unit cards. Each land card is divided in to two plots. north and south. A unit card is also divided, but the unit only takes up one half. The other is empty.

Players alternate turns. On each turn they may elect to:

A: Draw card(s).
B: Play a card/cards from their hand.
C: Move unit card over the land.
D: Take control of a piece of land.
E: Active a plot's power.

The game ends when a player gets a unit card to the opposing player's starting land or the deck runs out of cards.

Scoring: I have no idea yet!

Actions further:

A: Draw cards from the deck to add to you hand.
B: 'Explore' a new land by attaching it to another piece of land currently on the board. It must be connected by a road in some way.
C: To move the unit card must be moved or rotated so that it moves to any adjacent 'plot' of land. An adjacent 'plot' is the other half of the card they are on, or any plot of land on an adjacent card that is directly connected to their current plot by a road. If a unit moves on to a plot occupied by another unit then they fight! Or something. (Or I could do away with all this and have 6 way movement on each land and no plots).
D: Place a marker of your colour on the circle in the middle of the land currently occupied by one of your units.
E: If the plot of land one of your units is currently on has a special power you may activate it.
« Last Edit: January 24, 2012, 02:05:11 PM by lamaros »
lamaros
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Reply #34 on: January 24, 2012, 02:44:17 AM

« Last Edit: January 24, 2012, 02:47:43 AM by lamaros »
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