Metagame

Kinds of Fun

2017-06-08T00:00:00+00:00

Originally from MDA (Mechanics, Dynamics, and Aesthetics).

Sensation. Game as sense-pleasure.
Fantasy. Game as make-believe.
Narrative. Game as unfolding story.
Challenge. Game as obstacle course.
Fellowship. Game as social framework.
Discovery. Game as uncharted territory.
Expression. Game as soap box.
Submission. Game as mindless pastime.

Drawn Inn

2016-12-14T00:00:00+00:00

A roll-and-write city-building game for lots of players and four six-sided dice. Players develop their side-view city until any player has built on each of their eleven blocks.

Direct questions or comments to BoardGameGeek.

Print-and-Play sheets

A4
Letter

Setup

Everyone needs a pen / pencil and a piece of paper with a row of numbers at the bottom from 2 to 12, in order. (Each number makes a block in your city, so you have eleven blocks to build on.) Choose one player to start, and give them the dice.

Play

Roll the dice and choose two to develop or activate each building in one of your blocks. All the other players develop or activate each building in the block corresponding to the dice you didn’t choose. For example, if you roll 2, 3, 5, and 5, you could develop your 7 block (2+5), Alice could develop their 8 (3+5), and Bob could activate each building in his 8.

You cannot choose to activate an empty block, and you cannot choose to develop a full block. (This might force you to end the game.)

If any player has drawn at least one building in every block in their city, the game ends. Otherwise, pass the four dice counter-clockwise and continue.

Developments

To develop a block, draw a building icon in it. Each block can hold at most three buildings, and then can’t be developed further.

Residential

Develop: Draw a pentagon-style house.
Activate: 1 VP + 3 per adjacent park (max: 7), or draw a park.

When you activate a house, you may add a park (I draw this as a lollypop tree) between any two blocks instead of getting points. Houses score an additional three VPs for each adjacent park. Each block boundary may only hold one park.

Commercial

Develop: Draw a square.
Activate: 1 VP per floor per connected house, or draw another floor (max: 3). (Connected houses are any you can reach without crossing an empty block.)

When you activate a commercial building, you may build a skyscraper floor instead of getting points.

Industrial

Develop: Draw a rectangle with a couple chimney lines out the top.
Activate: Draw a cloud over the closest cloud-free block (including the one being activated) and then score 5 VP per house in your city not under a cloud.

End Game

When the game ends, each player with a building in every block may activate any single block in their city, and then the player with the most points wins.

Variant: Solitaire

Mayor Rowland Wright is playing against you in solitaire, but he doesn’t roll the dice. Instead, make a tally mark over the block corresponding to the pair of dice you didn’t use – he always builds a building, but with a special ability:

If a block has three marks over it, you can’t mark it again – instead, move to the closest block without three marks. If two are tied, pick the one with the fewest marks if possible.

End and Scoring

Once all blocks are marked at least once (or you’ve drawn at least one building in every block), the game ends. If your city is full, score any single block (as with the normal game). Then, rate your final score:

100: Village
200: Town
300: City
400: Metropolis
500: Capital

Heart of Gold

2016-12-12T00:00:00+00:00

A roll-and-write racing game for two to five-ish players and five to eleven-ish six-sided dice.

NOTE: These rules are certainly a work-in-progress, but we played four test games today and I’m feeling pretty comfortable with the game, if not the wording.

Print-and-Play sheets

A4
Letter

Setup

Everyone needs a pen / pencil and a copy of the sheet. Secretly choose starting locations, then reveal and mark each other player’s start on your sheet – these are the legs of the race. You must touch every other start location before returning to your own to win. After seeing the race course, draw an arrowhead at your own start to determine your initial direction.

It’s fine for two players to start in the same location.
If everyone starts in the same location, randomly choose a location for the other leg: roll two dice to choose a row, then roll a die and move right that many dots. If, hilariously, this hits the existing leg, try again.

Play

The current player rolls the dice, then chooses (drafts) one for this turn. Going around clockwise, each other player drafts a die until reaching the last player. The last player then drafts a second die and either moves or charges batteries (see below). Returning counter-clockwise to the first player, everyone else does the same. The current player rotates clockwise, and the next round begins unless someone has crossed the finish line.

Movement

Choose one die to determine your speed, and the other die determines your relative direction (see the diagram). Draw an arrow on your path. For example, a five and a one could move you one space forward, or five spaces back-right or back-left.

A six can be used to go any direction but backwards, because
You can’t move directly backwards.
You can’t move in a way that would draw a line over one of your existing arrowheads.
You can’t move through the center dot.
If you would move past the edge of the map, you bounce. Draw your arrow up to the edge and continue back, rotated 120 degrees. (If you’d still be off-map – as with hitting a corner from the middle – it’s an illegal move.)
If you can’t make a legal move, charge your batteries instead.

Charging Batteries

When you spend your dice to charge batteries instead of moving, write one of their values down under “Saved” on your sheet. Whenever you draft a die, you may cross off a saved value to turn the die to that face.

Victory

If two players cross their respective finish lines on the same turn, the player who ended furthest past it wins. If still tied, the player with the most remaining circle halves wins. If still tied, the player furthest from the current first player wins.

The Council

2016-05-17T00:00:00+00:00

The Council is a drafting game (BGG) for 3 to 5 players that takes elements of Blood Rage’s pillage and A Game of Thrones: The Board Game (Second Edition)’s wildlings bid (where the total bid is what matters, not an individual’s bid) and mixes them with Medieval Academy’s draft suits.

Your goal is to be ready to take over when the empire collapses. You do this by positioning yourself as the strongest in the area where the empire is weakest. Watch out for traitors, who gather strength as the empire falls.

Components

A decktet. (obv.)
A bunch of decktet suit chips or cubes.
Six tracks – one for each suit – from 0 to 6.
Six pawns per player, one for each track.
Six empire pawns, one for each track.
Traitor chips or cubes.

Setup

Place all player pawns on rank 0 of each track.
Place all empire pawns on rank 6 of each track.

Play

The Council is played in hands consisting of a draft phase followed by an events phase. At the end of each events phase, if the empire has fallen to below a player’s rank in any suit(s), the game ends and players score the collapse.

The Draft

Players will choose cards for resources and abilities, and indirectly choose what disasters will befall the empire.

Shuffle the deck and deal six cards to each player. Once you’ve got your six, choose one card (keeping it face-down on the table) and pass the rest clockwise. Then take a card from the five you were passed, and pass the rest.

When you get down to two cards, choose one and discard the last one to the center of the table, face-down. Cards discarded here will form the event deck for this hand.

Reveal your chosen cards, and take a chip for each suit on each card. That is, the Ace of Waves gives you a Wave chip, and the Journey (3 of Moons and Waves) gives you a Moon chip and a Wave chip.

For each suit, the player with the most chips gains a rank in that suit. (In the case of a tie, nobody gains a rank.)

The player who reveals the low card (Aces low, 2-9, Pawn, Court, Crown high, normal suit ordering, Excuse lowest of all) will start the bidding on the next event.

The Events

Players will [possibly] spend resources on preventing disaster.

Shuffle the events (those cards that nobody chose during the draft) and reveal the top card. Then each player bids or passes, one at a time, until each player has passed.

To bid, take one or more chips that match any suit(s) on the card and move them towards the event.
To pass, take one of your cards and place it face-down on the table. Once you’ve passed, you may no longer bid. You also cannot change the card you chose.

Once all players have passed, simultaneously reveal cards and resolve:

An Ace adds unlimited chips of its suit to your bid.
A number breaks ties in its suit; lower numbers are better.
A Pawn adds one chip of each of its [valid] suits to your bid.
A Court gives you a traitor chip if the event fails.
A Crown grants you a rank in its suit.

(The player who reveals the low card, as in the previous phase, will start the bidding on the next event.)

If the total number of chips bid (matching the card’s suits) meets or beats the rank of the event card, the empire succeeds, otherwise it fails. (The rank of an Ace is 1, while the rank of Pawns, Courts, and Crowns is zero – impossible to fail.)

If it succeeds, the highest bidder in each matching suit gains a rank. (If tied and no number card was played to break the tie, nobody gains a rank.)
If it fails, the lowest bidder in each matching suit trades a rank of that suit for a traitor chip. The empire also loses a rank in each matching suit.

The Collapse

If any player has more ranks in a suit than the empire itself, the game ends. Otherwise, continue with another hand, as above.

If the game ends, score the collapse: Each player scores their traitor chips + the number of ranks they have in any suit where the empire has dropped below at least one player. If you have more ranks than the empire in a suit, double your ranks in that suit for scoring.

So, if I have five ranks in Moons, three in Waves, and two traitor chips, and the empire has four ranks in Moons and four in Waves, I score (at least) 12 points: 10 for Moons and 2 for traitor chips. If another player has five or more in Waves, I score 15 points: 3 more for my Waves ranks.

The player with the highest score wins. In the case of a tie, the tied player who revealed the lowest-ranked card in the last event wins.

Hyperborea: Single Cube Variant

2015-12-30T00:00:00+00:00

These rules aren’t for balance (I think it’s close enough as is), but for playability. The game is a turn-by-turn puzzle, but one person’s move can invalidate your plans (as with all games with a good amount of interaction). Games like that tend to do better if there’s an element of speed to who can complete their task first, so I like to break turns into smaller pieces and interleave them.

tl;dr: On your turn, instead of placing all of your cubes, choose one: place a single cube or reset.

Cube placement

If you can activate a technology at that point (because its slots are filled), you must. If you have no cubes after placing, draw back up to three (or as many as possible: this does not force a reset).

Reset

You can reset even if you have cubes left in your bag, or cubes left unassigned – these are placed back in your bag with the ones in the “unused cubes area”. This house rule amplifies city effects, but I think that makes for a better game, honestly.

General

Optional actions are still optional and still unlimited: you can take them before and/or after your cube placement. Everyone still gets one more turn after victory conditions are met, but that turn is just a single cube placement at best.

I like playing the developer role with published games, especially if I can turn a mediocre game into one that I really enjoy.

Untested: Deck-Building Deck Builder

2014-09-25T17:36:00+00:00

Concept by +Cory Altheide:"practically writes itself." (Originally posted to G+)

Components

A static Dominion-style market of deck construction materials off to one side, a Thunderstone-style queue of orders to the other, and a set of El Grande-style "bid" cards for each player. (Player decks consist of some minimal materials and currency, with the bid cards off to the side.)

Play

On your turn, you may play an action from your hand (generally used to construct a deck) and then either bid on a deck order or buy a card from the market. Then discard everything in your hand or in play.

If at the beginning of your turn, the lowest bid on an order is yours, put both your bid card and the order in your discard pile.

If at the end of your turn, you discard an order, take a "Complaint" card (c.f. Dominion's Curse) into your discard pile.

Play until all the orders are gone or one player has run out of bid cards. Then count up orders scored by each player, subtract complaints, and highest review score wins.

Customer Orders

There are several levels to an order -- you can complete it shoddily, or acceptably, or outstandingly. Each has a possible review score, which you mark somehow, or perhaps take in tokens. Perhaps the different levels are looking for different types and quantities of materials?

One order might be shoddily completed with just wood, or acceptably with wood and craft, or outstandingly with wood and metal and craft?

The idea is intriguing. :-D

Untested: Besieged

2014-06-16T22:09:00+00:00

Overview

Besieged is set in the strategy room of a castle under siege. I see it in Sengoku-era Japan, with all the characters deadly-serious about whether their defenses will hold. Each player has a secret role card (much like One Night Ultimate Werewolf), with different objectives. The game ends when everyone decides how to act, and objectives are revealed.

Setup

Choose roles (see below) based on the number of players:

4: Daimyo, Samurai, Ninja, Monk
5: +Ninja
6: +Ronin
7: -Ronin, +2 Advisor
8: +Ronin

Shuffle the roles together and deal them out to all players. Then go through a Werewolf-style night phase, in four steps:

Daimyo sticks out thumb, Samurai recognizes.
Ninja recognize each other.
Advisors recognize each other.
Ronin looks at an opponent's card.

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/1890767/one-night-ultimate-werewolf

Roles: Objectives and Setup Actions

1x Daimyo.

Objective: I survive.
Heads: Kill.
Tails: Nothing.

2x Ninja.

Objective: The Daimyo is killed.
Heads: Kill.
Tails: Kill.

1x Samurai.

Objective: The Daimyo survives.
Setup Action: Know the Daimyo.
Heads: Kill.
Tails: Block.

2x Advisor.

Objective: The other Advisor is killed.
Setup Action: Know the other Advisor.
Heads: Nothing.
Tails: Nothing.

1x Ronin.

Objective: Special, see Setup.
Setup Action: Know another player's card. Copy their Objective.
Heads: Block.
Tails: Kill.

1x Monk.

Objective: I am killed.
Setup Action: None.
Heads: Block.
Tails: Block.

Play

All players have a coin to record their decision. At any time after the night phase, any player may place their coin on another player's card to commit their action. As soon as anyone does, everyone else must immediately (within a few seconds) place their coins on a card, and then all cards are revealed and coins resolved, based on player actions. (There must be more Kills than Blocks to kill a character.)

Everyone then evaluates their goal; successful players score a point if multiple games will be played.

Variant

Instead of distributing cards randomly, have one player distribute them intentionally (but still secretly) and then call out the night phase actions. They can't be affected, and don't directly participate in the game, but bets on who will win by placing their coin under their hand: Heads, and they're on the Daimyo's team. Tails, and they're with the Ninjas.

Citadels: The 4x Variant

2014-04-25T06:30:00+00:00

In The Dice Tower #352, Tom Vasel put Citadels (Faidutti, 2000) down in his top 10 exploration games list to hide the actual entry. The joke was that Citadels has essentially no exploration mechanic, but wouldn't that be interesting? This set me to thinking: how could I add exploration to Citadels?

Background

Citadels is an early hidden-role-selection game built around a simple card mechanism (pay gold to play cards). Any exploration mechanism should probably focus on the cards -- card drawing is almost exploration already. Furthermore, cards represent "districts" in Citadels; all they need is some positional context to work in an exploration mechanism. Perhaps there's a couple minimal changes that could be made so that would work.

Design Idea

There needs to be a map for exploration to have context. This map should probably be shared to augment many actions with adjacency (only build adjacent districts, Warlord only destroys adjacent districts, etc.). As explored but not-yet-built districts must sit on the table, there needs to be an alternative way of marking which cards have been built. Therefore:

Replace individual hands of cards with a shared map.
Replace card play with control marker (cube) placement.
Restrict player district interaction (ex. Warlord) to adjacent districts.

With these three changes, most of the game just works. The Magician needs a special rule for hand swapping (discarding makes a strange kind of sense, just replace unbuilt districts with newly-drawn cards from the deck): you can instead move unbuilt districts around the map.

Playtesting

I had a chance to try this variant today with two players (using the normal Citadels 2p rules otherwise). It was great! Much faster (because actions were slightly more constrained and the hand management aspect was replaced with a positional management aspect), and felt potentially a bit more strategic. Card draw (as exploration) becomes much more important, and figuring out exactly where to build becomes an interesting puzzle.

I'd worry that a larger play group might find it too constrained (seven or eight players especially would be extremely tight), but I think Citadels plays better with a small group anyway. If you have a chance to play, I'd be very interested in commentary!

Citadels: The 4x Variant

2014-04-24T00:00:00+00:00

In The Dice Tower #352, Tom Vasel put Citadels (Faidutti, 2000) down in his top 10 exploration games list to hide the actual entry. The joke was that Citadels has essentially no exploration mechanic, but wouldn’t that be interesting? This set me to thinking: how could I add exploration to Citadels?

Background

Citadels is an early hidden-role-selection game built around a simple card mechanism (pay gold to play cards). Any exploration mechanism should probably focus on the cards – card drawing is almost exploration already. Furthermore, cards represent “districts” in Citadels; all they need is some positional context to work in an exploration mechanism. Perhaps there’s a couple minimal changes that could be made so that would work.

Design Idea

Replace individual hands of cards with a shared map.
Replace card play with control marker (cube) placement.
Restrict player district interaction (ex. Warlord) to adjacent districts.

With these three changes, most of the game just works. The Magician needs a special rule for hand swapping (discarding makes a strange kind of sense, just replace unbuilt districts with newly-drawn cards from the deck): you can instead move unbuilt districts around the map.

Playtesting

I’d worry that a larger play group might find it too constrained (seven or eight players especially would be extremely tight), but I think Citadels plays better with a small group anyway. If you have a chance to play, I’d be very interested in commentary!

Untested: Pokémon: Rivals

2014-04-15T19:49:00+00:00

Overview

Pokémon: Rivals is played in turns, where each player takes an action shown on one of the cards in their hand, buys an item or battles a Pokémon / Gym Leader, discards their hand [cleanup], and finally draws back to six cards. The game ends when one player has collected a badge from all their opponents by battling them in their home Gym.

Metagame: Deck Construction

40+ card deck: Pokémon, Items, Maps, Advancements, and your Gym.
Pokémon: ex. Bulbasaur, Charmander, Squirtle.
Items: ex. Potion, Antidote, Repel.
Maps: ex. Poké Mart, Saffron City, Route 28.
Advancements: ex. Cut [move], Speed [stat], Raichu [evolution].
Gyms: ex. Pewter, Cerulean, Celadon.

At the start of the game, place your Gym face-down (closed) in front of you, and your trainer pawn on it. (You may decide to open your gym at any time by flipping it over and activating its once-per-game ability.) Finally, shuffle the rest of your deck and draw six cards.

Actions

Actions mainly focus on movement and exploration: Maps can be placed to move clockwise or counterclockwise into new areas. Some Items can be activated (tapped, once they're purchased) for movement as well. Pokémon can be placed on any Map that matches its habitat to save it for later capture. As in most deck-building games, cards allow additional actions, cards, buys, and battles.

Buying / Battling

Buying an Item is only possible when your pawn is at a Town Map (using cards that give Pokédollars). Otherwise, you may Battle a Pokémon whose habitat matches a symbol on your pawn's current Map.

Battles are simple and quick; you choose one member of your party to lead, and then do a single round of combat (each side does damage to the other, similar to Magic: The Gathering, except that damage persists). If neither side is defeated, your turn ends (though the battle continues next turn -- if you're in a battle, leaving the map runs away from the battle, and the opposing Pokémon is discarded). If you're defeated, move your pawn back to any Town Map or Gym. If you defeat the opposing Pokémon, you may play an Advancement on any Pokémon in your party.

To capture a Pokémon in battle, you must use a Poké Ball. Players start with an infinite supply of basic Poké Balls available -- roll a d20, if you roll greater than the enemy Pokémon's current health, you capture it -- but can purchase better (or at least different) Poké Balls from their deck, if available.

Gym Badges

You may also Battle at an opponent's Gym. This starts a battle with that player; neither of your pawns may move from their current locations until the battle is completed. If you win, collect that player's gym badge (you may only collect one badge from each opponent). If you've collected all your opponents' badges, you win.

To keep an opponent from forcing a stalemate by leaving their Gym closed, all Gyms are forced open once any player captures a full party (6) of Pokémon.

Battles at a Gym are just like any other battle, except that you can't run away, and the battle doesn't end until all Pokémon in one party are knocked out.

Untested: Board Game Tycoon

2014-04-10T17:44:00+00:00

(Untested is a series of off-the-cuff game ideas that must be fleshed out enough to play but not yet playtested, similar to other challenges that want done over perfect.)

Played with two normal decks of 54 cards (with jokers) and a set of poker chips (representing time and money). The game is played in hands, and players act as game companies looking for the best game. The game is cooperative in the sense of generally growing the hobby, but each individual player is looking to grow their own company as well.

Players start with $100 in poker chips and nothing else.

At the start of the game, deal twelve cards face-up to six different stacks on the table (two per stack) -- these represent the game prototypes that people want to publish. Deal one more card face-down to each pile, to represent the portions of the game protected by an NDA. Then put $10 per player in poker chips in a central "pot", representing the current market for games.

The first phase of the round is research: In turns, starting with the richest player (or the youngest, if tied), each player may take one action:

Bid for a game by placing one or more poker chips next to it -- similar to Arcana or Keyflower. You must bid more than the next highest bidder. If you are out-bid on a card, you may move those chips as part of your bid.
Get more information about a game by spending chips, representing the time spent dealing with the NDA. If you spend $1, secretly look at one face-down card. $2: two cards, etc. (Legal issues: if you see a card whose rank matches any you control from previous rounds, but have yet to publish, reveal both cards and lose chips equal to that rank, or $20 if a face card.)

When all players pass in a row, each player takes all games where they out-bid all other players. They may look at the cards in those games at any time. Winning bids are lost, losing bids are returned, and players begin the second phase of the game: development. Deal a new card face-down to each un-purchased game, representing independent development. Then players simultaneously purchase cards from the deck -- $1 for one, $3 for two, or $6 for three. (Reveal chips spent on development simultaneously, then deal out the cards purchased.) Players may look at the cards purchased before assigning them to their games.

Finally, production. Any game that has reached five cards may be published, and games that reach seven cards must be published.

Kickstarter: Add poker chips to 7-card games still un-purchased based on their lowest-ranked face-up card, from the market pot: $20 for face-cards, rank for everything else. If the market doesn't have enough to cover a prototype, discard it (crowd-funding fails). If order matters, fill the most expensive prototypes first.
Production Schedule: Players then place bids on each of their own 5 to 7-card games, one at a time, only increasing. These are the games that will be released.
Spiel de Jahres: Reveal all released games, including Kickstarters. If any Kickstarter game reveals a Joker, it fails -- discard it. The best poker hand (jokers are wild) wins half the market, representing a game of the year boost (if this is a Kickstarter title, add this to the market pot), and the remaining hands split the market. (A player with two games receives two shares of the pot, etc.)
Recovery: Re-fill the market pot by adding chips equal to the lowest rank of each published game ($20 for face cards), including Kickstarters.

Continue a new round with Research, seeding new prototype games if there are less than six on the table. Play until the deck runs out, any player hits $0, or any player hits $200. The player with the most money at the end wins.

(Originally posted as a comment on +Daniel Solis's post about idea-stealing.)

Untested: Fickle

2014-03-27T19:25:00+00:00

Objective

Be the richest player in the richest suit at the end of the game.

Components

A deck of playing cards. A set of poker chips ($52 per player, plus winnings). A board with possible bets (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, in each suit, with odds to determine winnings).

Setup

Deal seven cards to each player.

Play

A round has three parts.

A planning phase, where each player puts one card from their hand into a pile (facedown) at the side of the board.
A simultaneous betting phase, where everyone may place bets as desired on the table. Bets may only be increased once placed, nor may they be removed. These bets are your expectation of the card results.
A reveal phase, where all cards are revealed and bets paid out. Any bets lost go to the bank associated with that suit.

End

This continues until each player has a single card remaining. This card is revealed: it determines that player's suit. The suit with the most money in its bank eliminates all other suits. The remaining player with the most money wins. In the case of a tie, the tied player with the highest card wins.

Untested: Casino

2014-03-20T17:52:00+00:00

Casino is built on the foundation of Dominion, with a "gifting" mechanic I saw in a friend's worker placement game.

Replace victory point cards with "Customers." These are used both as a currency multiplier and as a VP mechanic. Some d6 are also necessary for play.

When you play money, it's worth is multiplied by the number of Customers you co-reveal. Customers in hand can be used for multiple money cards. That is, 3 Coppers + 2 Customers == 6 money. If you have a hand without Customers, you make no money that turn. All Customers are free to "purchase".

Instead of money, you can "cash out" customers for victory points by putting them in opponents' discard piles. Customers are worth different amounts of VPs, as written on the card (ex. Cash Out: + 3 VPs). These are tracked with poker chips. The default Customer cashes out for 1 VP and has no special effects. Running out of victory chips (or three piles) ends the game.

Instead of Copper / Silver / Gold, the default money card is Slots, which provides $1 x customers. Only ten other stacks come out, chosen from a library of cards which could include:

Table Games

Blackjack: Each player draws a card. Each Customer drawn counts towards your multiplier this turn.
Roulette: + $2 (c.f. Silver)
Baccarat: + 3 Cards. If none match, + 1 Action.

Rooms

Conference Center: As Market.
Hotel Room: + 2 Actions, + 1 Customer Multiplier. Next turn: + 1 Action, + 1 Customer Multiplier. (c.f. Fishing Village)
Vault: + $3, ignore multiplier. (c.f. Gold)

Other

Maze: When you next discard a Customer from play, you may instead put it on top of your deck. (c.f. Treasury)
Security Camera: [Reaction: When an opponent gives you a customer] Place it on top of your deck.
Dealer: As Laboratory.

Untested: Tyranny of the Majority

2014-03-20T17:51:00+00:00

Shuffle up a Decktet and deal hands of five to each player. Place the rest of the deck in the middle of the table and reveal the top card. Suits on this card are "for" the trick, all other suits are "against."

Starting with the player with the fewest remaining cards (break ties by lowest score), each takes some number of cards from their hand to vote in this trick. Cards chosen must all be for (matching at least one suit) or against (matching no suits) the trick, and the player must announce which it is.

When everyone has chosen, reveal and add up the totals on either side.

Whichever side has a higher score "wins" the vote, and all cards on the losing side are discarded. However: the first player to run out of cards wins the hand. Players with remaining cards score points based on what remains:

1 point for Aces.
The rank of any numbered card.
10 points for face cards.
50 points for the excuse.

Untested: The Young Queen's Palimpsest

2014-03-13T19:29:00+00:00

Players are scholars and scribes poring over (studying, scribbling, erasing, more scribbling) an ancient manuscript. By playing cards to the free-form play area and then placing worker cubes on them for control, they hope to have their work be recognized by the Queen at story time.

Shuffle the deck, deal five cards to each player, and flip one face-up to the middle of the table as the root of all knowledge. The game works well with just the basic deck; extended card details are given below.

Game play

On your turn, you must play a card and draw a card. The card you play must touch at least one other card as well as the table (you can't just cover cards up). All touched cards are called "adjacent."

If any adjacent cards have at least as many scribes as the rank of the card you just played, and their rank was visible before you played this card, score them. Aces score all adjacent occupied cards. The player with the most scribes on that card scores its rank, and the player with the second-most scores half its rank, rounded down. Cards without rank (or whose rank is no longer visible) cannot be scored nor trigger scoring (other than the Ace, as noted). In the case of a tie, tied players all score half rank.

Finally, look at each adjacent card's suits and count all the suits that match your played card. Place that many scribes on any adjacent card(s). There is no limit to the number of scribes on a card.

The game ends when: a player runs out of cubes // the deck runs out of cards. Score all cards whose rank is still visible once more. The player with the most points wins.

The extended deck

The Excuse has no suits and no rank; it cannot trigger scoring nor place scribes. Instead, take all the scribes from one card you occupy and place them on one other card.

The Pawns have no rank, they cannot trigger scoring. Place scribes as usual.

The Courts have no rank, they cannot trigger scoring. Instead of placing scribes, remove scribes from adjacent cards equal to the number of matching symbols there. These scribes do not need to be your own.

The Crowns have no rank, they cannot trigger scoring. Instead of placing scribes, move scribes from adjacent cards equal to the number of matching symbols there to adjacent cards (touching the origin card). These scribes do not need to be your own.

Variants

None, though one is planned with a custom deck.

(Originally posted in the Decktet Variants forum on BGG, and eventually got promoted to a full BGG entry.)

Characteristics: Push Your Luck

2014-03-04T17:03:00+00:00

The MDA paper describes three levels of game design:

Mechanics: the rules.
Dynamics: the system.
Aesthetics: the fun.

The important distinction here is that the rules are not the system. (This is one reason why playtesting is so important.) The rules describe the system, and the system meets the players at the experience.

Climbing this ladder (from mechanics to aesthetics) is one of the most difficult things in game design. There's no way to skip it: "Ok, now feel like you're exploring uncharted territory." "Setup: First, express your individuality." We must describe the system that we hope creates this experience.

To that end, I'm going to examine several dynamics (high enough level that we can talk about them abstractly but low enough that we can still build them into our games), describe a simple game with them, and hopefully look at how they help create certain aesthetics.

Push Your Luck

This dynamic describes a system with a strong risk/reward balance, where the risk is managed mainly through time. Board Game Geek calls it press your luck and provides a great description as well.

Case Studies

Mechanically, the push-your-luck comes from some sort of dependency tied directly to a change in position, such that the player can make an obvious risk/reward trade-off. If the change in position is deterministic (and simple enough to predict), there's no risk. If the risk isn't tied to the reward, then there's no reason to push.

Simple

In turns, players roll a die for temporary points, and may stop rolling to turn them into permanent points.

Each turn, the active player rolls a d6.
If the die comes up 6, their turn is over and all temporary points are lost.
Otherwise, they add the die to their score and may choose to roll again (from 1) or end their turn.
If they end their turn, their temporary points are "banked".

Coloretto

Coloretto is a half-hour-long game for 2 to 5 players who attempt to collect sets of cards of the same color. A turn consists of choosing whether to take a row of cards (and be out the rest of the round) or draw and add a card to a row.

The catch is that only your top three colors score positive points. Any other colors score negative points. Because of this, players will attempt to focus on three colors to the exclusion of all others.

Pushing your luck in Coloretto is a matter of determining the best time to take a row. If you take a row too early, you get fewer cards for scoring and less choice over your pick. If you take a row too late, you could be stuck with a row that doesn't match your cards.

This is great for what MDA calls "submission" (and Extra Credits "abrogation"): games as pastime. Crucially, a push-your-luck decision should be tied directly to something obviously indeterminate. Since pushing in Coloretto is a card draw, you can blame any badness on the deck, instead of potentially poor play. Indeterminacy also mitigates some analysis paralysis.

Formula D

Formula D (Tabletop Episode) is an hour-long game for 2 to 10 people who attempt to roll-and-move their way around a race track as efficiently as possible by changing the size of the die they roll.

The catch is that you must stop a predetermined number of times in each corner, and the dice are custom, such that the lowest number isn't always 1.

Pushing your luck in Formula D is a matter of determining when (or whether) to "down-shift" for an upcoming turn. If you down-shift too early, you'll fall behind more efficient racers. If you down-shift too late, you'll cause damage to your car and could potentially be out of the race.

This is great for supporting the racing aesthetic. The agonizing decision of when and where to brake is one that drivers (often subconsciously) make all the time.

Again, this push-your-luck decision is tied directly to something obviously indeterminate (in this case, a die roll), but I feel like Formula D is potentially too long of a game to make the submission aesthetic work (definitely player-specific complaint).

Caveats

The Death Spiral

Push your luck games tend to be short and light, due to the heavy reliance the dynamic takes on indeterminacy -- if the game is too long, one player can end up with an insurmountable advantage, which leads to a death spiral for the others:

Better push my luck on this turn to catch up.
Didn't get lucky, made no progress.
Repeat.

In a short game (or one that ends when the leader is far enough ahead), this isn't as big of a problem. Ra is a rather heavy push-your-luck game, but avoids the death spiral by putting some distance between pushing (drawing a tile for the auction lot vs. starting the auction) and scoring. Tiles score differently based on their type, and some tiles can even reduce your score. Instead of a temporary score that is lost on an auction, the set is a potential score that is gained if you win.

Loss Aversion

Whenever you give a player some reward -- even if you describe it as temporary -- only to take it away later, you trip humanity's loss aversion circuits.

This can be great for schadenfreude (pleasure derived from the misfortune of others), and some players enjoy that. It does contribute to a specific aesthetic, similar to take-that and heavily political games, so be warned.

Untested: Secret Missions

2014-01-16T20:35:00+00:00

This trick-taking game for 3 - 5 (with a normal deck of cards) is inspired by A Study in Emerald's hidden teams mechanic, and +Adam Koebel's comment that the game doesn't inexorably move towards completion.

Choose a dealer, and have them deal out a deck of cards.

Have each player secretly choose (and set, face-down, in front of them) one card as their mission: This card determines the color that player is attempting to take.

Play a hand of tricks, starting with the player to the left of the dealer.

No trump, players must play the suit led if possible. Low card wins the trick. A won trick can be donated to the table, which gives its points to everyone. The winner leads the next trick, as usual.

At the end of the hand, all players reveal their mission, and determine their scores.

Each card of your color is worth its face-value in points. Face cards are worth 0. The matching card to your mission (5 of hearts, if your mission is the 5 of diamonds) is worth double points. Everyone counts cards donated to the table.

The lowest scoring player eliminates their color, while the other color records their points individually. First [individual] player to 100 points wins; multiple hands will be necessary -- rotate dealers.

Untested: Gods of War

2014-01-02T21:28:00+00:00

Objective

Score points by manipulating a pitched battle and causing carnage.

Components

A deck of playing cards
A chess set
A custom deck of "prayers", such as:

1 point per living pawn
8 points per dead white queen
6 points per living black knight
etc.

Setup

Set up the chess board as normal.
Deal each player seven playing cards and three prayers.
The player who can name the most wars leads the first trick.

Play

Gods alternates between playing tricks and moving chess pieces restricted by the cards played. Each trick, the high card wins and leads the next trick. There is no trump; the first card played of each rank beats later cards played of that rank.

The trick-winner then moves the first chess piece, the runner-up moves the second, and so on, so that each player may move a piece. Captured pieces are taken by the capturing player. The only common restriction on movement is that each piece may only be moved once per-trick (this could cause a player to be unable to make a move). Yes, the same color may be moved by several players consecutively. Cards add further restrictions:

Black cards may only move black pieces.
Red cards may only move white pieces.
Aces are high, but only allow pawn movement.
Kings only allow king movement.
Queens only allow queen movement.
Jacks only allow knight movement.

Jokers may be used as any card, which must be named when the joker is played.

When all seven tricks have been played, deal a new hand and repeat. The game ends when a king is captured (not checkmated, as a side can move multiple times in a row).

Scoring

When a king is captured, each player reveals their prayer cards and scores them based on the final board state. Players also get points for captured pieces, according to the normal relative value:

1 VP for pawns
3 VP for knights
3 VP for bishops
5 VP for rooks
9 VP for queens
The captured king is worth no VP.

High score wins.

Untested: Sniper

2013-12-19T21:32:00+00:00

Objective

Take out the other sniper.

Setup

Shuffle the deck and deal six cards to each player. Deal two more cards face-down to the table, representing the range between the players.

Play

Each turn both players will secretly choose one card to play and place a d4 on it signifying the action they plan to take. Both d4s are revealed simultaneously, and resolved in ascending order:

Move. Discard one of the range cards, face-up. Place your chosen card in the middle (face-down) to replace it.
Shoot. Reveal your chosen card ("the shot") and all cards in your aim stack: the sum of all these is your attack value. Then reveal all the range cards on the table: the sum of these in the initial defense value. Your opponent may then play any number of cards from their hand to increase the defense value. If, in the end, your attack is greater than their defense, you win. Otherwise, your opponent takes the card you played this turn into their hand.
Reload. Discard this card face-up and draw back up to six cards.
Aim. Place your chosen card face-down in your aim stack (initially empty).

After both actions have been resolved, each player may draw a card unless their opponent chose to aim.

Simultaneous Shooting

If both players choose to shoot, choose and reveal all defensive cards simultaneously. It is possible for players to tie -- play another game to resolve ties.

Simultaneous Moving

If both players choose to move, discard both existing range cards and use the chosen cards for the new range.

Components

The deck contains 52 cards, biased towards low values: 12x 1s, 12x 2s, 10x 3s, 8x 4s, 5x 5s, 3x 6s, 1x 7, and 1x 8. The deck also contains two reference cards, one for each player.

Untested: Pencil Mechs

2013-12-12T22:03:00+00:00

Components

Index cards, pencils, dice.

Setup

Deal one index card and one pencil to each player. Divide the dice evenly among players, so everyone has a handful. Doesn't matter which kind, but try to keep the dice sizes even as well. (One player shouldn't get all the d12s while another is stuck with the d4s.)

Draw a totally sweet mech on your index card. ("Totally sweet" compliance should be judged by the other players.) It should have at least two ways to move around the battlefield and at least two weapons. Make notes -- what are your weapons called? What kind of jet pack do you have?

Roll and distribute your dice to the different systems on your mech, placing them on the index card. (This will be easier if you partition your index card by the parts on your mech -- left arm, right arm, tank treads, whatever.) You must place at least one die per system.

Play

Each round, players rock-paper-scissors to simultaneously choose actions. Paper and scissors should point left or right when revealed. (Though, the player to that side could change before resolution.)

Rock: defend, describe how. Roll and return one of your heat dice to any system on your mech.
Paper: move, describe how. As long as you have at least one die on a movement system, swap places with the neighbor you pointed at, before attacks are resolved.
Scissors: attack, describe how. Pair a die from a weapon on your mech with an equal-or-lower die on your opponent's mech, and remove both. Yours goes to your heat die pile, while your opponent's is discarded. If your target has no more dice left on their mech, score a point.

Play to last man standing. (Or score points when you kill opponents and respawn.)

Breach: Collapse

2013-10-23T17:50:00+00:00

+Gary Kacmarcik helped me come up with a great way to model the rise and fall of the galactic empire: when sectors collapse, unrest moves inwards.

Essentially, the game is played through challenges, where players secretly commit resources against each other and choose rewards based on who committed the most. All challengers must choose a reward, which includes "legacy" (VPs), resources and other tools, but also unrest, added to the challenge's sector.

If a challenge ever happens where the highest bid is lower than the amount of unrest, the sector collapses. In my original version, it was just replaced (unrest moving to the capital sector to move the game closer to the end). +Gary Kacmarcik suggested that the sector be discarded instead, moving both unrest and cards further out on the galactic arm inward.

This makes it feel much more like the galaxy is collapsing in on itself, which is the story arc I'm going for. W00t.

Untested: Wu Xing Master

2013-10-10T20:38:00+00:00

Stealing liberally from +Gary Kacmarcik for an elemental wizard game -- mine is much more "gamey" than his, I think. Players are immensely powerful mages attempting to take over each others' territory using (mainly) raw elemental power.

A product of deep thought.

Start by constructing the world -- on a large-hex map, scatter a bunch of cubes of varying colors: red/fire, yellow/earth, white/metal, blue/water, green/wood. Have one player rearrange them so there are at most three in a hex, and then place towns (chess pawns, three of both colors) on the map. The other player then chooses which side they want (black or white). Both players place their wizard (king or queen of their color) on the map, and play begins.

Play happens in campaigns of multiple turns. At the beginning of each campaign, both players will roll eight dice and secretly distribute them among the five elements on their sheet (looks kind of like the diagram pictured). Elements can have no dice assigned. The player with the highest sum in one element takes the first turn in the campaign.

Each turn, the active player may move two spaces and then may choose one die to power a spell for its assigned element. Elements follow a pattern for common effects:

1 fire pip to replace a wood cube with a fire cube.
2 fire pips to place a fire cube where there are already fire cubes.
3 fire pips to place a fire cube otherwise.
1 fire pip to remove a metal cube and a fire cube in the same space.

You must have line-of-sight to cast a spell. Two non-water cubes block line-of-sight.

Wizards may not move into a space with three cubes, nor enemy towns, nor the opposing wizard. If a wizard is in a space when the third cube is placed there, that player loses.

Placing the fourth cube in one space destroys everything else in the space (namely, cities). Further cubes there have no effect. If this destroys a player's last city, they lose immediately.

When both players run out of dice, the campaign ends -- if one player is two cities ahead of the other, they win. Otherwise, play another campaign.

I also want elements to have more unique abilities, but I can't think of any at the moment...

Untested: Contraband

2013-09-19T20:39:00+00:00

Objective

Players will act as both smugglers and customs agents. Sneak illegal goods past customs to make a profit. Confiscate illegal goods at the border to keep opponents from making a profit.

Background

The four suits in the deck represent reasonable bounds of the following types of stuff:

Hearts: Chemicals (Caffeine, Opium, Whisky)
Spades: Weapons (Pistol, Rock, Dart)
Diamonds: Art (1984, Guernica, Wake Up)
Clubs: Information (Explosive Blueprints, Strategy, Communist Manifesto)

Setup

Give all players $10 (in poker chips) to start.
Place the legal limit board in the center of the table.
Give the customs agent badge to the player who last smuggled something (food into a theater, perhaps, or drugs into Canada).

The Legal Limit Board

The legal limit board (with four tracks from 1 to 10 and four markers, corresponding to the four suits) determines the illegality of certain goods. Cards ranked at least as high as a marker are illegal (if found), but make more money for being so. Face cards are always illegal, with value equal to the legal limit for their suit.

Play

Play occurs in hands, where one player is the gov't for the entire hand. At the beginning of a hand:

Deal all the cards evenly.
Reset all legal limits to 7. (7 or higher is illegal)
After each player has a chance to examine their cards, simultaneously, secretly bid to determine roles for this hand.

Roll dice in case of ties.

From the high bid downwards, choose whether to be a smuggler (and lose your bid) or not.

The first person to choose to be the gov't keeps their bid and takes the bids of everyone lower.
The lowest bid must choose to be the gov't if no other player has.

Before each shipment, the gov't should roll 3d6.

The lowest number is the cost to search the first card.
The second-lowest, the cost to search the second.
The highest is the cost to search further.

Players may give the gov't money (bribes, gifts, etc.) at any time, for any reason.

The gov't may adjust legal limits (paying $1 per space) at any time and for any reason before each set of shipments are received.

If goods are confiscated (due to finding an illegal card), the gov't takes:

The rank of all legal cards.
Nothing for illegal cards (and face cards).

If goods are sold, the gov't takes $2 for each card before revealing, and the smuggler takes:

The rank of all legal cards.
Double the rank of all illegal cards.
Double the legal limit for face cards.

After all shipments are confiscated or sold, continue with the hand until two smugglers run out of cards.

If anyone ends the hand with at least $200, the game ends and the richest player wins. Otherwise, reshuffle and start the hand over.

Variants

More suits?
Different rank distribution?
Custom "events" for cards triggered on sale or confiscation?
Mercenaries to protect shipments?
Random legal limits at the start of each round?
Some amount of player control over limits?

Breach: Epsilon (Legacies)

2013-09-12T17:49:00+00:00

Breach: Epsilon

Objective: Leave an economic, military, or scientific legacy without peer.

#unplaytested #breach

(In the text below, N is the number of players.)

# Setup:
- Shuffle the leader cards [see bottom] and deal two to each player.
- Give each player N+1 order tokens (numbered 1 to N+1).
- Shuffle a regular deck of 52 cards and deal N+1 cards to the table.
- Place four piles of tokens for points within easy reach:
. Yellow merchant capital tokens.
. Red soldier force tokens.
. Blue sage knowledge tokens.
. Black unrest tokens.

The cards on the table represent N+1 regions for the players to seek opportunities. These cards stay until the number of unrest tokens is greater or equal to the card's rank, at which point the mob tears them down to be replaced with a new card. Cards are always face-up unless otherwise noted.

To allow play with a standard 52-card deck, face cards have the following rank: J=11, Q=12, K=13.

# Play:
Each turn, players secretly and simultaneously assign one region to each of their leaders, and then simultaneously reveal. Then regions are resolved, in ascending order.

Each region has three phases: auction, prize, and unrest.

## X of Diamonds
Represent a market opportunity where the card's rank is income.

Auction: Secretly bid capital.

Prize: High bid wins X capital. All other bidders win X/2 (rounded up). In case of a tie, all players take X/2 (rounded up).

Unrest: The auction winner adds unrest tokens to this region equal to their profit, if positive.

## X of Spades
Represent an attack that must be defended against for glory and honor.

Auction: Secretly bid force.

Prize: If the total force bid is greater than X, each player doubles their bid. Otherwise, each player loses their bid. (Essentially, double-or-nothing.)

Unrest: Each bidder adds 1 unrest token to this region.

## X of Clubs
Represent a possible discovery to be made.

Auction: Secretly bid knowledge.

Prize: The high bidder takes X knowledge and places their bid on any region's card. All other players retain their bid. In the case of a tie, tied players all take X knowledge and augment a card.

Knowledge tokens on a card increase its rank, one-for-one.

Unrest: Each bidder adds unrest tokens to this region equal to their bid.

## X of Hearts
Represent an opportunity to win hearts and minds.

Auction: Secretly bid any type(s) of token.

Prize: None.

Unrest: Starting with the low bidder, each bidding player removes unrest from another card equal to their bid, and adds unrest to this card equal to their bid.

## Cleanup
After all regions have been resolved, check to see if any have unrest equal or greater than their rank. Replace cards in these regions with new cards drawn from the deck, and remove all unrest from them.

Finally, each player secretly chooses one or more of a single type of token to score. (Five capital tokens would score five points, three knowledge tokens would score three points, for instance.) These tokens are placed back in the public pile. The player(s) who revealed the most tokens for scoring get double points.

--

# Game End
When any player reaches 21 points uncontested (that is, without a tie), the game ends. Players then reveal their remaining hidden points, and score the largest of their types. If the game is tied after that, players score the second largest, and then (if still tied) their third largest. Players do not get a bonus for having the greatest number in these extra scoring rounds. If the game is still tied, the player who originally caused the game to end wins.

--

# Leader Cards
Leader abilities are active only when resolving regions, unless otherwise noted.

. Mercenary: You may bid capital as if it was force.
. R&D Director: You may bid capital as if it was knowledge.
. Capo: You may bid force as if it was capital.
. Mad Scientist: You may bid force as if it was knowledge.

. Product Researcher: You may bid knowledge as if it was capital.
. Weapons Developer: You may bid knowledge as if it was force.
. Diplomat: You may choose not to add unrest.
. Politician: When you add unrest, place it in another region.

. Communist: When you add unrest, take 1 force.
. Tactician: Double all players' force bids on this card.
. Economist: Double the rank of this card, if diamond.
. Engineer: Double the value of knowledge tokens on this card.

. Genius: You start the game with 5 knowledge.
. Hacker: After orders are revealed, you may swap one of your orders.
. Revolutionary: When a card is removed due to unrest, score 2 points.
. Strategist: After bids are revealed, you may double your bid.

Untested: Blood Bubble

2013-09-05T20:25:00+00:00

Objective

Win a close-quarters knife fight by taking the highest-ranking cards.

Setup

Shuffle a normal deck of cards and deal two face-down cards to each player and one face-up.

Play

Play proceeds in turns; the player who last cut themselves goes first.

Each turn, you may attack or drop your weapons.

If you attack, take one of your face-down cards and threaten another player with it (but do not reveal). They must choose to either defend with one of their face-down cards or surrender, giving the attacker their top face-up card (which is placed on top of the attacker's own). If they defend, both cards are revealed -- the higher-ranked card wins (Aces low, but A beats any face card), and the losing card goes onto the higher-ranked card's pile. The winner keeps their card, while the loser draws to replace theirs.

If you drop your weapons, discard both of your face-down cards and draw two new ones.

End

When the deck is empty, the player with the highest-ranking top card wins (Aces high). In the case of a tie, all tied players discard their top card, then look at all top cards again (even non-tied players).

Re-untested: Breach vNext

2013-07-05T17:48:00+00:00

Breach: vNext [for #unplaytested ]

I'm thinking about moving the deck of cards more towards Dominion -- such that you use a subset of the cards each game, and the replayability comes from having a different subset available next game.

At the start of the game, you draft your five leaders (or perhaps get a random draw) and assign them to five pieces (King, Queen, Bishop, Knight, and Rook in a playtest, probably).

The game is played in rounds, where each round is played in turns until all players have used their five actions. At the beginning of a round, resources are seeded onto the map with an event deck. At the end of the round, resources are collected based on resource type and leaders in the area.

The event deck contains 24 cards: six each of four different classes of resource, numbered 1 to 6. Each card also has a static effect on the game for that round, much like the newspaper cards in Nefarious. Two cards are drawn to seed the board (added as in Catan, but without the robber), and both resource types are then placed in the area determined by the draw.

The four classes are:
- Merchant (yellow circles, representing wealth)
- Soldier (red squares, representing strength)
- Sage (blue triangles, representing knowledge)
- Worker (black Xs, representing work)

At the end of the round, resources are gained depending on type:
- Merchants multiply their ability by the number of yellow cubes.
- The best Soldier takes all the red cubes. In a tie, none are taken.
- Total all Sage ability scores and give that many blue cubes to all leaders for each blue cube in the space.
- Each worker takes their own ability plus the number of black cubes.

During the round, players may take actions with each of their leaders. Each leader may be placed on the board, moved, or removed from the board as an action. Leaders may also spend resources as follows:
- Merchant resources may be spent to purchase other resources, 2:1. If you spend at least five, place a legacy pawn in the leader's space.
- Soldier resources may be spent to destroy a legacy. Name your target (in the same space) and secretly bid any number of your soldier resources. Your opponent may bid any resource in the area. High bidder wins, tie goes to the defender. All cubes bid are lost. If at least five red cubes are lost, place a legacy pawn in the leader's space.
- Sage resources may be spent to purchase research cards from a draft on the side of the board. Take the card and place a legacy pawn in the leader's space.
- Worker resources may be spent to purchase legacies directly. Buy one legacy pawn for four resources, two for six, or three for eight. Place those pawns in the leader's space.

If the event deck draw is a seven, score all legacies (1 VP each) and return them to their owners.

Leaders have additional actions written on their card (along with abilities in one or more classes).

Play to the end of the event deck (12 turns), and then score legacies once more. Highest score wins.

Untested: Monster Smash

2013-06-27T20:52:00+00:00

This is horribly formatted, but I think it could work. Sample towers could do one damage to close monsters, two damage to far monsters, X damage to X close monsters, etc. Sample actions could re-direct monsters by a specific amount, return monsters to the deck, move towers or existing monsters, etc.

Objective

Score points by blasting monsters.

Components

Deck of tower cards that are also one-shot actions.
Deck of monster cards, with arrows and point value.

Play

Each turn:

All your towers activate, generally damaging nearby monsters.

(Measurement based on card size, or hand / arm length?)

Play any number of cards by moving different monsters.
Draw one card. If this is a monster, place it in the middle of the table and repeat.

When you play your card, you must pay its cost by moving monsters. If a card costs 2, for instance, you'd have to take two different monsters and move them forward in their current direction. You may not move a monster twice on your turn. If you run out of monsters, you can't play any more cards.

Cards have towers and one-shot actions on them. The former stay on the table until destroyed by a monster, and the latter happen immediately and then are discarded.

Anything a monster hits is destroyed along with the monster.

If a monster goes off the edge of the table, everyone loses a point.

When a tower destroys a monster, the player who controlled that tower scores a point, and discards the monster.

Play to 9 points.

Untested: Wall Street Hold'em

2013-03-21T21:21:00+00:00

The gist: each player should have ten tokens that act as "shares" for their game (they must be easily identifiable as being that player's shares, perhaps business cards or small index cards with each player's name on them, etc.). Play Texas Hold'em as usual (I recommend $100 in chips, $2 big blind) with two changes:

Whenever a player bets, they can also buy and sell shares with the other players.
Whenever a player wins the pot, they must split it with the other shareholders.

Examples:

I've got all 10 of my shares: I don't have to split the pot with anybody.
I've got 9 of my shares, Sydney has 1 of 'em: I have to give her 1/10 of the pot, and keep 9/10.
I've got 5 shares, Sydney has 2, Isak has 3: I get half the pot, Sydney 1/5, Isak 3/10.

Round in the favor of the pot winner (if the pot's $11 in the last instance, I'd take $6, Sydney $2, Isak $3). Make as little change as possible.

Share price is not set by the game, but by the owner of the share. Remember that each share is worth 1/10 of all future pots won by that player, so if you think they're a winner, a share's easily worth 10x the big blinds.

All-in is more dangerous in this game, because you're also paying off the player's investors, and your investors will collect their take even if you win your all-in back.

Texas Hold'em is the base game for this because it's easier to win just by being a strong player -- there's less luck and more skill for people to invest in.

Untested: Napkin Wars

2013-03-14T21:06:00+00:00

(By request: A wargame playable at a table in a restaurant while you wait for your food to arrive with no particular prep.)

You need: Two paper napkins, pens, and everything else on the table. Divide the table into two teams, such that you can draw a battle line between to split the table into roughly halves.

Play proceeds in turns of two phases each. In the first phase, each team simultaneously draws out their battle plan on their napkin. In the second phase, both plans are revealed and resolved.

Planning Phase:
Sketch out a map of the field on your napkin. Of the objects on your side of the table, divide them into three tags: horse, foot, and gun. Mark your map with H, F, and G likewise. Choose one object to be "critical", and star it on the napkin.

Then draw arrows to notate your plan of attack.

Horses will move first and strike anything nearby.
Footmen will move last and strike anything nearby.
Guns will shoot down the arrow before Horses move, or move down the arrow and shoot after Footmen move.

When both sides are ready, reveal and describe napkins.

Resolution Phase:
Players take turns resolving one object's orders at a time. The player with the cooler-looking map goes second. All just-shooting guns on a side must shoot before horses can start moving, all horses on a side must move before footmen can start moving, and all footmen must move before the remaining guns can move-and-shoot.

Guns that shoot first must shoot down the arrow, and hit the first thing the bullet comes into contact with.
Horses and footmen can move any distance down their arrow, and hit the closest thing to their position, up to a hand's breadth.
Guns that shoot last can move any distance down their arrow, and then shoot in any direction, resolved as above.
Horses and guns can only take one hit.
Footmen can take two.
Score one point for each hit on your opponent's critical object.

If you think you have time, play another round.

Untested: Market Manipulation

2013-03-07T22:13:00+00:00

Objective

Finish the game with the most money.

Components

The market map.
Six markers, representing markets, with different symbols / colors.
Money (poker chips, perhaps).
Resource cubes in three different colors.
A deck of action cards.

The map is a fixed Catan-size hex grid. The three resource colors are split into six sections around the map. The center hex is wild. Every two adjacent hexes has a number between, signifying the cost to travel between them.

Markets are different mainly because of their position on the board. If one market is moved atop another, only the former may be used by players until the latter is uncovered again.

Action cards consist of several parts:

A cost, consisting of one or more possible sets of resources.
A reward in cash corresponding to each potential cost.
An initiative value, unique across all cards.
One or more valid markets.
A special action (modifying cost or quantity or whatever).

When you have the resources to pay the cost of an action in the pool, you get a cash reward and also take the card.

Setup

Place the six markers on the six outside vertices of the map.
Give everyone $20 [in game money].
Shuffle the cards and deal five to each player.
Players then draft the cards (choose one and pass the rest) until each player has three.
Of the remaining two in each hand, one is placed back into the deck and one goes into the pool.

Play

All players simultaneously choose and reveal an action card.

From low initiative numbers to high, players each take a turn:

Once: Add a new card to the pool.
Zero or more times: Buy an action, collecting cash and card.
One or more times: Move an uncovered market and purchase a resource.

Game End

The deck of actions contains one "Crisis" card. When it's revealed:

Players count their current wealth.
If any one player has $20 more than their nearest competitor, the game ends and they win.
Otherwise, the current player may burn cards from the deck [remove from the game] for $1 each.
At that point, if the deck is smaller than the pool, the game ends and they win.
Reveal a new card for the turn.
Everyone discards all but three of their actions.
Shuffle Crisis and the discard pile back into the remaining deck.

Untested: Infected

2013-02-28T22:44:00+00:00

(Originally posted on G+.)

Components

A truly remarkable point-to-point map which this post is too small to contain. (Zombies enter from off-map, and there are random non-zombie starting locations for the non-zombie players.)
8x[number of players] pawns for the zombies (initially only one player).
One pawn each for the non-zombies (initially the other players).
A deck of playing cards.

Setup

Shuffle the cards and deal three to each non-zombie player.
Place the rest of the deck face-down on the cathedral.
Give the "leader" token to the non-zombie player with the mayor(?) pawn.
Place all non-zombies on their pawn's own starting location.
Place all zombie pawns near the board.

Play

Turns alternate between the non-zombie team (first) and the zombie team.

Phase 1: Non-Zombies

The leader draws a number of cards from the cathedral equal to the total number of players and distributes them (without looking) to the other non-zombies (taking none themselves unless they're the only non-zombie).

Starting with the player to the left of the leader, each non-zombie player must play at least one card, which goes to the graveyard. They may then take that many actions. Each action is one of the following:

Move to an adjacent location.
Take the leader token from a player in your location.
Give a card to a player in your location.
Draw a card (only if no zombies are in your location).

Phase 2: Zombies

Zombies may only speak in "braaaaaains."

Shuffle the graveyard and deal it out to all the zombie players. All zombies may then choose a card from their hand to play, and simultaneously reveal:

The highest value is the number of actions each z-player may take.
The lowest value adds to the pool of available zombie pawns.

Z-players then take turns taking actions. For each action, a z-player may:

Place a zombie pawn (drawn from the pool, probably a space on the board near the graveyard) on an entry point.
Move any number of zombies out of one location to adjacent locations.
Move any number of zombies into one location from adjacent locations.

Phase 3: Combat

Starting with the non-zombie leader and going around the table (so every player is activated), each player chooses a location with both sides (if possible) to resolve combat. Locations may not be chosen twice in the same turn.

Combat is resolved through bidding:

Each non-zombie player in the location must bid a card face-down.
Non-zombie bids are added to determine their final value.
The player who chose the location chooses a zombie player to bid.
Each zombie pawn in the location after the first adds one to the zombie bid value.

Bids are simultaneously revealed.

If the non-zombies win, destroy all zombie pawns in the location, placing them back in the box -- never to be seen again this game.
If the zombies win, the non-zombies must discard cards to add to their bid individually to match or exceed the zombie bid, and then must retreat to an adjacent space.
If a non-zombie runs out of cards for any reason, they are destroyed.

Aside: Non-Zombie Destruction

When a non-zombie is destroyed in combat, the player discards all their cards to the graveyard and becomes a zombie player. The game continues as before.

Game End

If all players are zombies, the zombies win. (If you don't like shared wins, the original zombie won 1st place, the first to turn won 2nd place, and so on.)

If there are no more zombie pawns, the remaining non-zombies win. (If you don't like shared wins, deal with it.)

Untested: The Battle of Hoth

2013-02-14T22:36:00+00:00

Components

A deck of cards, split into a red pile (for the Rebellion) and a black pile (for the Empire).

This is an interesting one, because it's so very asymmetric. We'll take it for granted that the base is going to be destroyed. That's never in question, the Empire just has too much firepower. The real problem for the rebellion is: how many people can they evacuate? Of course, Vader doesn't care -- he just wants Luke (as noted in the title crawl) and Leia (as a rebellion leader).

Objective

The Rebel player must evacuate the base.
The Empire player must capture Luke and Leia.

On the Rebellion side, they've got the shield generator keeping the Empire from nuking them from orbit, and the ion cannon making way for escaping transport ships. Leia is leading the effort from the communications center, and Luke is leading from the front.

Rebellion Cards

Hearts represent people:

AH: Luke.
KH: Han Solo.
QH: Leia.
JH: Chewbacca.
2-10H: Everyone else.

Diamonds represent equipment:

AD: Luke's X-Wing
KD: The Millenium Falcon
QD: The Ion Cannon
JD: The Shield Generators
2-10D: Everything else.

For the Empire, Vader is a near unstoppable force that just needs to get to the base. The shield is making that difficult, so he enlists an early landing party to destroy it. We're assuming he hasn't yet choked Ozzel (which he does in the films), to add a bit of choice here.

Empire Cards

Spades represent people:

AS: Darth Vader
KS: Admiral Kendal Ozzel
QS: Major General Maximilian Veers
JS: Chief Fleet Captain Firmus Piett
2-10S: Stormtroopers.

Clubs represent equipment:

AC: Blizzard 1 (AT-AT)
KC: Blizzard 2 (AT-AT)
QC: Blizzard 3 (AT-AT)
JC: Blizzard 4 (AT-AT)
2-10C: Everything else.

Play

Players shuffle their half-decks and draw five cards. They both choose two cards from their hand to start in-play, simultaneously revealing them. Finally, both draw back to five cards.

Play consists of turns (rebel first) of one card each. A number card takes any number of opposing-color cards that add up to its value -- a 10C can take a 7H and 3D, for example -- both taken and played cards are discarded. If you can't take anything, you must still play a card to the table (for the other player to take).

If the rebel plays a numeric diamond, it can help numeric hearts (up to the diamond's value) escape. A 9D can escape with a 3H, 4H, and 2H on board. The empire may play a numeric club to add to an existing spade's value (they act as one card from then on, or may be immediately discarded to take other cards).

Only face cards may affect face cards:

Rebel Face Cards

Face card hearts destroy any one black card (or stack).
AD can escape with any one card.
KD can escape with any three cards.
QD can take any one stack with no club.
JD can take any one stack with no spade.

Empire Face Cards

Face card spades destroy any one red card (or stack).
AS can destroy any one card plus one per black face card on the table.
KS has no effect.
QS can destroy any one face card.
JS can destroy any one (diamond and heart) group that just escaped.

Scoring

In the end, the rebel gets points equal to the total of all the numeric hearts that escaped. The empire gets 20 points for all the face card hearts they've captured.

Breach and Simultaneous Action Selection

2013-01-28T18:47:00+00:00

Question for the game designers: I'm attempting to get some simultaneous action selection into #Breach (like 7 Wonders crossed with A Game of Thrones, I'm thinking), but I can't think of a good way to do it.

First thought was that everyone would choose a card for their turn, and cards would have ops and initiative (almost like El Grande). Not sure how much I like it, considering I'd need almost Robo Rally-scale initiative numbers. Perhaps that's not such a big deal.

Second thought was to steal Burning Wheel (and Robo Rally) combat mechanics, where people choose multiple actions at the start of the turn, and then individual actions take place in turn (where the first-player marker rotates). Seems potentially too complex to be worth it, though it would allow for multiple actions per round, perhaps -- maybe you paid cubes as time? I dunno.

Third thought was to have a secret bid for turn order, but that hardly reduces how much time things take.

Thoughts / ideas / other games with interesting simultaneous (or interleaved, like Glory to Rome) action selection?

Untested: Exile

2013-01-17T22:46:00+00:00

I've been working on this idea for a couple years, might as well share it in an expanded form.

Exile is an RPG / story game / "pen + paper + dice + awesome" / etc. that acts kind of like a cross between Dwarf Fortress and Spore.

The colonists (non-DM players) land on an alien planet with no way of returning and some high tech gear they have no way of repairing. If they survive long enough, the orbiting satellite concludes the planet is livable and sends more "colonists" their way.

The Judge's (DM) job is to come up with climate, geography, flora and fauna, and give the colonists something to explore over time. The Judge's map is law, but the colonists never get to see it directly, only through their experiences in the world. The sourcebook's main job is providing the Judge with tools to quickly create such an alien world, in case their natural creativity hits a block.

Right now, my mechanic idea is part Dogs in the Vineyard-style dice pool, part Dungeon World's "Defy Danger", part In a Wicked Age, part Marvel "doom pool" and part Blackjack.

Colonists have three attributes (Body, Mind, Spirit), each assigned two dice (from d4, d6, d8, d10, d12, d20). When the difference between success and failure could be interesting, or two players (colonist or Judge) come into conflict with what they think happens, a test is made.

For a test, players find all the dice that would fictionally support their action, using up to two attribute dice. Shooting a gun, for instance, would use the gun's die (perhaps a d12), a skill die if they've got one, a Body die, and a Mind die. This is the pool they're using for the test. In the first round, both players roll two dice and add. Note that all tests are opposed -- the Judge must choose dice to roll for the opposition pool, they can't just choose a static DC.

The high roller has the advantage and narrates the round. The low roller must choose: take a loss equal to the difference between the two rolls, or "hit". If they choose the former, they assign the difference as damage to dice rolled in the test. If they choose the latter, the high roller also has a chance to hit or stand. This is important, because every roll makes time pass in the fiction -- tests occur in rounds of a few seconds, minutes, hours, days, or up.

If either player goes over (breaks) 21, they lose the test and their total counts as zero. When a player loses in this way, the die that put them over drops a level (from d6 to d4, for example; a d4 is completely lost), and they still have to mark damage. If both players break 21, only the player farther away loses (a 23 vs. 26, for instance, ends up in a 23-point loss for the second player).

Damage is taken on specific dice. When damage becomes equal to the die value (8 damage on a d8, for instance), the die drops a level. If a colonist loses his last attribute die for any one attribute, the colonist dies.

Tools like weapons, farming implements, etc., are created through fiction plus a test as well. The margin of success determines the die value of the tool created. Breaking 21 when crafting still causes a die to decrease.

When a colonist succeeds with exactly 21, they get a skill die related to the task at hand. If they were hunting, it's a hunting die. If they were crafting, it's a crafting die. If this is the first die for the skill, it's a d4. If they get another die, it's a d6, and so forth.

Well, that's the concept. Still refining the mechanic and researching to make coming up with something truly fantastic a bit easier.

Motive: I often play with a group that feels very uncomfortable about improv, but gets excited about randomly generated dungeons and items and things. This came out of some of those conversations. The core idea (you're on an "uninhabited" alien planet attempting to survive) was going to be a computer game for a while, but I think this suits it better.

Breach card ideas

2013-01-07T18:46:00+00:00

#Breach card ideas.

(?) Antimatter Mines
Invasion Response: Destroy all links on one hex-side, and all cubes that passed through those links.

(?) Warp Drives
Move all your cubes from any one draft card to any one sector.

(?) The Ansible
Bid 6.
Tech 2: Bid 3.

(First you bid, then you leave it in front of you for others to use. For every two ops spent by a player, they get to bid 3. You can discard it for more ops, depending on use.)

(?) "It is a good day to die."
Invasion Response: Resolve combat as if you had twice as many cubes in all sectors.

(?) Yorke, Fleet Admiral
Link 3. Invade 5.
Until the end of the hand, each cube destroyed in combat scores its owner 1 VP.

(?) Tarvanna, Spice Merchant
Tech 2: Score 1 VP.

(?) Electromagnetic Pulse
Invasion Response: Cancel combat.

(?) Zephyr Missile
Invasion Response: When you roll a 6 this turn, count it as a hit and roll again.

(?) Theodore, Sub-Consul
Take one of your discards back into your hand.

(?) Knight of the Third Moon
Resolve combat in one sector where you have less cubes than any other player. If any of your cubes survive, score 3 VP.

(?) Warrant of Trade
Tech 3 (Invasion Response): Cancel combat.

(?) Isabel, Stellar Cartographer
Link 3. Invade 3 without combat.

(?) Propaganda
Construct 2 in any sector.

(?) Refugee Passage
Invasion Response: Cubes that would be destroyed in combat this turn may instead move to an adjacent, connected sector.

(?) Quantum Codebreaker
Take the action from a draft card.
Tech 4: Take the action from a draft card.

Untested: Tonic

2013-01-03T22:41:00+00:00

Components

A deck of playing cards and poker chips to go around.

Setup

Choose a "dealer", to determine action timing. Deal each player a hand of seven cards (yes, you can look at them), and an equal value of poker chips (perhaps $100?).

Play

At the beginning of each turn, players do rock-paper-scissors for simultaneous action selection. Then, actions occur in order (if two people choose the same action, go clockwise from the dealer).

Papers meld (with possible payment) and cancel any Rock.
Rocks discard and end the hand here unless cancelled.
Scissors ante $1, draw a card, and then discard a card.

If you meld on another player's set (three or more of the same number) or run (three or more in a row, of the same suit), you must pay them $1 per card you meld.

End of Hand

If someone chooses Rock and successfully ends the round, players count up the points remaining in their hand. Low score takes the pot, splitting for ties. If the low score is not someone who chose Rock, they also get paid equal to the difference in score from each player who chose Rock. (That is, if I Rocked with 10 points, and you had only 8, I'd pay you $2.)

End of Game

The person with the most cash at the end of three rounds wins. The game is zero-sum, so it could be played like Poker as well.

Breach: No More Tax

2013-01-03T18:45:00+00:00

I'm drastically changing a few things in #Breach .

First, no more tax. One op builds one cube or one link (and still activates one cube for invasion).

Second, you don't bid for free. Instead of building and then bidding (which was often confusing or forgotten by new players, especially the card type restriction), you build or bid. In this way, with three ops, you can construct two cubes and then bid one, or construct three (no bid), or bid three.

Third, bid cubes don't go on cards. Instead, they're placed in an opaque bag, to be drawn at random at the end of the turn. When the turn ends, cubes are drawn one-at-a-time from the bag, and the cube's owner regains it and chooses a card from the draft (at most once per hand) or a random artifact. This continues until all cards are chosen or all cubes are drawn. Cubes not drawn remain in the bag. Due to this rule change, I'm going to do the next test with 24 cubes / player (up from 18, and the 15 that +Adam-Ross Branch and I tested with).

Finally, you start with no cards. Instead, turns always consist of six rounds and players may always take a one op action. When you gain cards, they go into your hand for the next turn. There is no deck (you use all your cards each turn), but there is definitely hand management.

Pros:
. Setup time drops dramatically.
. Removes the confusion about "tax".
. Removes the confusion about combined build-and-bid.
. Larger battles (due to eliminated construction limits).
. More engaging end-phase, from the cube pull.
. Players always get a card if they bid (pull determines order).

Cons:
. The game turns from an asymmetric start to symmetric.
. The first hand plays very slowly.
. Increased randomness could turn off some players.

Wants playtesting. I'll need to build another card set, but it can be smaller with this change.

----
The endgame condition is still just "ten turns, stop", but with open VPs you also end when someone gets a particular lead.

VPs in Breach are like culture points: how much you're influencing the development of the galaxy. You ideally want to stop just before the game gets static.

Perhaps a certain number of invasions must happen to make the game continue, increasing over time? Feels a bit forced.

Also perhaps: the bag of artifacts also contains a (small) number of event tokens. When these are drawn, the era marker advances (potentially to endgame) and a random event occurs.

Second, cubes lost in combat go into the bidding bag, so combat and bidding speed the game.

Breach tweaks: shuffle for cubes

2012-12-25T18:43:00+00:00

Breach change: every time you shuffle, you gain a cube (or two?) and draw an extra card. This means that people winning less draft bids both get more cubes and accelerate to larger hands quicker. Also, makes the game progress to larger hands and longer cycles, so it feels different going forward.

EDIT: Also, I'm stealing whosever comment it was that artifacts provided "extra ops", and applying it towards invasion, too: red artifacts provide extra ops for invasion. Extra ops must be used in the artifact's sector.

New Playtesters for Breach

2012-12-20T18:40:00+00:00

Another day, another #Breach playtest. This one was a full complement -- six players, and I had to sit out!

These pictures should be in temporal order, but as +Emily Awesome (in the orange) notes, they miss the finale with her pile of gold VP artifacts. +Ted Hahn played the white, who you can see battling it out with +Yvette Nameth's purple at the bottom. +Sage LaTorra played a sparse black, hanging back in the first turn before hawking his genetically-engineered Plague to the other players (which was perhaps a little overpowered).

In the yellow was +James Chacon, quickly approaching black's sector with large white supply lines. Combat in that sector turned out inconclusive, as you can see in the last pictures. Finally, Josh (who I'm not connected with on here, yet) rocked the green into several hexes for tons of artifacts.

We stopped after a hand-and-a-half, with Yvette taking the win (after final scoring) with 12 points, Emily right behind at 11.

Feedback was positive; I think this was the most well-received version yet. Tech was heavily modified (such that some of the cards were in-between versions, making them very confusing), finally ending up with: the tech's controller may discard it for ops: biggest spender + number of other players. I'll need to figure out a better way to explain, surely.

After I took one of Sage's suggestions (randomly seeding the board with artifacts for a more interesting, asymmetric early game), he felt empowered enough to give another bit of feedback: gaining cards into the discard means it's not very exciting to win something. I changed it on the spot: when you win a card at the end of the hand, take it as the start of your next hand.

There were severely overpowered cards, which made me think there needs to be some kind of resource equivalence table. In particular, 1 ops ~= 1 cube ~= 1 link and 2 ops ~= 1 artifact. This way, I can attempt to come up with some kind of balance for tech that isn't entirely ad hoc.

I need to come up with a good way to handle player elimination, too, as I didn't have any answer for: "what happens when a player loses their last cube?" Something to consider.

I restricted everyone to 20 cubes for this session, which I was worried might be too low. It seemed good, so I think I might even push it to 18 cubes to start, increasing over the course of the game. These increases could come from events in the deck (revealed with draft cards at the start of each hand), or perhaps from resources or leaders when played (where increases would go to all players). Worth experimentation.

Any further feedback would be much appreciated. Also, if someone's connected to Josh, hook him up.

----

Oh, yes, one other change: the tax on the Link action will be based not on all existing Links out of the sector, but just Links on the same side.

We'll see if this unbalances anything.

More Breach musings...

2012-12-09T18:39:00+00:00

More #Breach musings:

* Reverting the "activate anywhere you can reach" change. It made things more consistent with invasion, but interacts poorly with many other things.

* Combat: d6, roll less than opponent count. Will be bloody. I'll need to see if it's worth it to change to d10, or if that'd make combat too slow.

* Players keep forgetting to take cards won from the draft. Perhaps if they gain the card into their hand it'll become interesting enough for people to anticipate their turn starting, and remember to take what they have coming to them. (This also makes for bomb turns when you win a bunch at once.)

* All four actions have a tax (the number of things already in the activated sector) and a cost (the number of things you want to put there), so I'm unifying Link to work similar to Explore and Construct: now you can Link to build more than one gate. This also makes all their draft values the same -- always the cost, minus the tax.

* The deck should have more time cards. Perhaps 60 cards in the deck and 6 time cards, so controlling territory on the board is more important, and things move more quickly.

----
I realized that the cubes in this game are like workers. They control territory (almost like Belfort) on the map, act as currency in the draft auction, and are placed for actions on tech. Interesting. Perhaps I can steal other mechanics from the worker placement genre: upkeep for active workers, somehow? That could make the draft less static -- you have to pay to hold your workers there, perhaps?

Been thinking a bunch about the draft. One idea that came up (I think Sage mentioned it?) was that perhaps there could be a limit on bidding for a single card. I think James suggested a "Buy It Now" price, too. I've been thinking about stealing from Mr. Vasel et al.'s gangster game, where if a card has too much influence on it, it gets removed from play. Worth more thought...

Negotiation in Breach

2012-12-08T18:38:00+00:00

I think I may have figured out how to make negotiation more interesting in #Breach and at the same time provide a deck optimization mechanic.

Make donation a cost.

That is, instead of "trashing" a card to get it out of your deck, or needing to negotiate a two-way trade, you donate a card to another player.

In general, these cards would be weak resources or leaders you no longer want -- making them perfect candidates for showing up in front of another player.

There's a kingmaker problem here (player A gives player B their best resource because they're bitter about the game?), but I don't think it's a huge one. Perhaps some kind of limit, or cards that destroy or steal donations?

----
I was also thinking about combat, because we had several rounds with no casualties. I think that instead of rolling d10 and attempting to hit 5+, players should roll d10 and attempt to get underneath the number of opponent ships (activated or no) in the territory. My d10s have 0s on them, which would always hit.

This makes enormous armies vulnerable to small forces, which is interesting. It also means the defender must be fixed: always equal to the person with the most control in the hex besides the attacker.

It means that an attacker can slowly trickle forces into the sector, pinging away at the dominant player there, which is more interesting strategically.

It means that build-up of control with massive construction actions is dangerous, because it makes your sector that much more vulnerable to attack.

Finally, it works better with the theme. Seems like a small force would be relatively easy to hide, if desired, but a large force would be easy for the small one to hit-and-run on.

I envision the mechanic as a 1:1 match of die to hit. If I rolled three 5s against someone with six units, one 5 would hit and the other two would miss (being equal-or-greater).

---- [EDIT]
More simplifications! The above means that there's no more negotiation action, which makes me happy, but I want to simplify more, so here goes:

1. You can only activate sectors you can reach, but you can activate any sector you can reach. (For all four actions: Link, Construct, Explore, and Invade.)

2. Tech no longer has its own action. Instead, anyone may use technology by dropping a marker on it. The owner may use all the markers on a tech card at once for resources, discarding the tech to cycle again.

These two changes mean that all the actions follow the same pattern: activate a sector, pay resources, do cool stuff. This makes my inner software engineer happy.

The first change means that you don't have to invade just to get people into a sector, and it also means that you can "invade" in a very sneaky way: just build a ton of people in your opponent's sector! Remember that VPs are scored by the player with the majority when time cards come up. The downside: with the combat changes, you're just asking for a counterstrike invade.

The second change means that technology is available to everyone (always a goal, thematically), with a major resource benefit to the owner. The owner also has a reason to make it cycle, because of the resources contained on it. There's a reason to leave it out, too: keeping your opponents' markers locked up in a tech. Good times.

----
Still rethinking how to do purchases. I really like the auction mechanic, but I don't like how often players forget to take their winnings, nor how often cards get "stuck" in a long-term bidding war. Hmm.

Playtest: Breach, continued.

2012-12-07T18:34:00+00:00

In our continued adventures on "#Breach: The Playtest":

What Worked:

Players learned the game quickly.
First negotiation action taken; worked as expected.
Hard decisions made when bidding on resources.
Most actions taken evenly. (Exception: Negotiation, see below.)

What Didn't Work:

Tech took too long to come out. Solution: put technology (culture?) in the starting decks.
Resources feel like Copper/Silver/Gold, uninteresting but important. *Solution*: add an alternate effect to resources, see below.
Negotiation wasn't taken as often as I'd like, even though Sage wanted to remove cards from his deck, he didn't recognize it as a mechanic for that. *Solution*: add incentives for negotiation, see below.
Combat was somewhat boring tactically. *Solution*: add effects to resources, including FAB-style assets (for invasion) or effects that only happen when traded (for negotiation).
Retrieving cards won in the draft is easily forgotten. *Solution*: unknown as of yet.
Game proceeds a bit too slowly. *Solution*: add more time cards to the deck so they're hit more often. Return to Isak's idea of discarding all draft cards on time card? Make the draft larger? Use James's "timer" idea to drop cards from the draft?

Lessons Learned:

The control marker limit is important, and we probably would have hit it several times. I really need to order cubes to deal with this and the tactile problem (difficult to count and manipulate poker chips).
Negotiation is a strange mechanic, players need an incentive to take it. Perhaps combat shouldn't break an agreement? Perhaps I could steal Bonds to seed the initial phases of the game with trade agreements?
Exploration tokens are very important, and I need them to make sectors interesting. I should make a bunch (perhaps recycling the poker chips into this?) with different, documented effects, to make the exploration action more interesting.
Sage noted that sectors were practically indistinguishable outside of VP value, but my concept of a fixed map makes me hesitant to add interesting features that aren't randomized (like a random exploration token on hexes at the start). Perhaps a fixed map with interesting fixed features, like Starcraft? It could be double-sided, perhaps. Something to investigate.

Awesome to have another successful playtest!

Sage commented later, on G+:

Played Adam's new game at lunch. Overall impression: awesome. Better than a lot of games I've played. A few thoughts:
The game looked to be going longer than I feel like is optimal, which Adam mentions in his post. Each turn was fun, but extrapolating about how many turns were left it was hard to see a clear line to the end.
I'm amazed by Adam's adaptation of DW-esque ideas into board games. Leader cards have VP conditions that you can use them for, and he's just like "it's Alignments from DW" and my mind was blown. Then there's the thing about beginning trade setup being like bonds…
I keep on daydreaming of flavor for this thing. I kind of imagine more Magic-like card names, that are a bit extravagant with an implied setting, instead of "Terraformers" or whatever.
I probably need to play Eclipse to get a better baseline comparison.

Untested: Tongo

2012-12-06T22:09:00+00:00

Played as Texas Hold'em, with the following alterations:

Players ante evenly ($1, scaled throughout as desired) to begin. Deal out two cards face-down and one face-up to each player (like the beginning of seven-card stud). Deal three more cards to the market in the center (like the flop in Texas Hold'em). Roll 2d10 to set market prices (explained later).

In turns, players may Acquire or Confront.

Acquire: purchase a market card by paying (into the pot) the difference between its rank and the smaller d10 (face cards and aces have rank 10 for this purpose), then roll the larger d10. (Example: A 10H on the table costs $6 with 4 and 8 on the dice, and you re-roll the 8. A 2H on the table costs $1 with a 3 and a 5 on the dice.) Cards are never free: $1 is the minimum cost. If the market has less than three cards, restock it from the deck.

Confront: put up an ante (into the pot) of at least $2 and roll both d10 -- cards matching the lower d10 are wild for the confrontation. All players, in turn, must either Evade (pay the active player half their ante), Retreat (return a single card to the market worth at least half the ante), or Confront you back (paying the full ante into the pot). Once all players have responded, if at least one other player joined the confrontation, everyone who confronted reveals their hand in a showdown. Highest poker hand (using the cards in the market) wins the pot. Remember, Evade pays directly to the player, not into the pot.

After a confrontation, players in the showdown discard all their cards and are dealt back in (two face-down, one face-up, as before), and play continues.

Playtest: Breach

2012-12-06T18:32:00+00:00

Play-tested #Breach today with three players, and it didn't totally crash and burn! Exciting.

What went right:
- Setup and teardown were quick.
- Actions were easy to remember (w/exception below).
- Turns were quick (w/exception below).

What went wrong:
- Hard to remember which currency (mass or energy) was used by each action. (Thanks, Gary!) Solution: reduce to one currency!
- "Leader Chaining" made turns take longer than desired. Solution: surgically remove chaining from leaders; provide extra effect without extra action.
- The 8/3 (thanks Josh!) was a pretty insane resource card. Solution: match Dominion with 1, 3, 6 resource cards.

Lessons Learned:
- Two actions per turn is enough.
- Providing incentive is important (actions with incentive were played, but nobody negotiated -- no incentive; tech never used, either -- none in starting deck).
- A player aid card would be useful for reminding players to bid (which is an odd departure for a deck-building game).

Untested: Breach

2012-11-15T22:23:00+00:00

(This is the first untested post about what eventually became Ozymandias.)

I'm about 50% of the way to prototyping this grand strategic 4x space game, and I should really start soon. Think A Few Acres of Snow on a large galaxy map, with a draft of cards instead of side-specific markets.

Actions:

Exploit. Choose a sector you control, pay energy equal to the number of artifact (1 - 5 VPs) tokens on it, and place a new random artifact there. Then gain a resource card costing up to the energy you spent.

Link. Choose a sector you control, pay mass equal to the number of stargates on its sides, and place a new gate on one side. Then gain a technology card costing up to the mass you spent.

Expand. Choose a sector you control, pay mass equal to the number of cubes on it, and place one of your cubes there. Then gain a leader card costing up to the mass you spent.

Activate. Choose a target sector, pay energy equal to the number of cubes you want to move, and move that many of your cubes from adjacent sectors into the target, limited by the gates on each side. Then resolve combat (FAB-style).

As cards are gained from the draft, reveal new cards from the deck to replace them. If a card cannot be gained (you can't afford the tech cards when you link, perhaps, or there are none), place the most expensive card on the bottom of the deck (Power Grid).

Resource cards are like Dominion's "Treasure". Leaders and Technology have corresponding actions that they improve (once) when you play them. You don't discard automatically, but you draw up to five at the end of your turn (Mage Knight discards allowed).

Gates and artifacts don't move, and are uncontrolled. If another player takes your sector, the VPs of the artifacts count for them.

Part of me wants the cards to all have events (CDG-style) triggered by Andean Abyss-like propaganda cards, but I'm not sure if it's worth it.

I should prototype soon...

Untested: Ninjas

2012-10-25T21:10:00+00:00

Deal out five cards (from a normal 52-card deck) to each player.

Play goes in turns -- you must play a card from your hand face-down in front of any player (including yourself).

When everyone has played their last card, reveal all face-down cards. Black cards are ninjas, sent on an assassination mission. Ninjas work alone, though, so two ninjas cancel each other out: if you have an even number of ninjas, you're safe for this round. If you have an odd number of ninjas, you are attacked: take damage equal to the total red card value. (Face cards count as 0.)

When someone reaches 21 points, the lowest score wins. If two players are tied for lowest score, play another round.

Untested: Dice Tactics

2012-10-04T21:20:00+00:00

Object: Score points by destroying opposing armies, modeled as dice.

Setup: Find a map. It doesn't really matter hex/square/point-to-point/whatever, as long as the areas are clearly delineated. Tactical scale is probably best, too. Also, get a bunch of d6 in two colors, one for each player. (Perhaps twelve each if you use a map with around 64 spaces, like a chess board.)

At start, roll all the dice and place them on the map (players should alternate placement, perhaps 1 22 11 22 11 22 1, etc.). These are your armies. Up to four armies can go in any one space.

Play: Players take turns: on your turn, activate a space, move armies into that space [that can reach it], and resolve combat in that space [if any]. Armies may move a number of spaces equal to their currently active side. (If you rolled a three when you placed that die, you can move it three spaces.) It costs one extra to move into or out of a space that contains dice (of either side).

Combat is resolved at the end of the turn when you have activated a space that contains your opponent's dice. Re-roll all of your dice (not defending dice) in that space and resolve combat: Defender first, players take turns scoring opposing dice using their own, or passing. First, all dice are "unchosen". To score, choose one [or more] of your unchosen dice and remove an opposing die worth less-than-or-equal to it/them, pulling it off to the side or otherwise marking it's value down for points. If all your dice are chosen, you must pass. When both players pass, combat is over (only one round is resolved per turn), and the space must be activated again for another combat round.

Game End: If, at the end of the turn, a player has scored at least as many points as the number of dice used (twelve, in the setup at the top), they win.

Untested: Conquest of Catan

2012-09-20T21:27:00+00:00

A game of territory control for two players.

Setup: Deal cards from a poker deck into a Settlers of Catan layout. Roll 12d6 and set them next to the board. Finally, deal seven cards from the remainder of the poker deck to each player, and take (Catan-style settlement placement) turns placing three army tokens on the board. In the image, these tokens are black and white.

Object: Take sole control of Kings and Aces, attacking your opponent to drive them away, ideally off-board.

Play: Each turn, the active player takes two dice that add up to a card he occupies (J=11, Q=12, A and K impossible to match). Armies adjacent to that card may move spaces equal to one of the dice in the pair. (2+6 matches an 8, armies may move 2 or 6 spaces.) If an army moves into an opponent's space, a battle starts.

Battle: Cards in hand are used to add to an army's strength. Only the lower-strength army has the initiative and may play cards. The defender has the initiative if sides are tied. Cards played must match the suit of one of the three adjacent map cards -- if the battle is next to only hearts and spades, only hearts and spades may be used to increase strength. Face cards are wild for their suit (from 1 to 10).

If the player with the initiative cannot or chooses not to play a card, they lose the battle. The winner then moves their army a number of spaces equal to the margin of victory (the difference between the strengths of the armies). If this would move them off-board, the retreating army is destroyed. After the battle ends, both sides draw back up to seven cards in-hand.

Round End: When all the dice have been taken, each player gains a point for each Ace they control (no opponent's pieces adjacent to it), and two points for each King they control. Five points wins, but players must win by two. Hands are discarded, non-map cards are shuffled and both players draw seven new cards. The twelve dice are re-rolled. The player with the lower score chooses who goes first.

Untested: Friendly Five-Card Draw

2012-08-16T21:18:00+00:00

As many players as you have poker chip colors, but at least three.

Components: A deck of playing cards, poker chips.

Setup: Shuffle, deal five cards to each player. Also, each player should choose a different color of poker chips and take two.

Objective: Have the best poker hand at the end of each round, and invest well in other players' hands.

Play happens in turns.

Each turn you may request a card. The more precisely you request, the more it'll give the player whose card you accept. (Details below.)

The other players may then choose a card from their hands that matches your characteristics. They choose face down, and reveal simultaneously.

You may choose one card to take into your hand, discarding to remain at five. The player who's now down to four cards may either take your discard or the top draw from the deck. That player also receives more chips from the bank in their own color:

$2 if you just asked for a color, but $4 if you asked for a suit.
$2 if you said low or high, odd or even. $4 if you gave a set of three or four numbers. $8 if you asked for a particular number.

At the end of your turn, you may invest one of your chips in another player.

When everyone passes, or any player runs out of chips, the round ends.

First, all players score the chips others invested in them -- 2 points per chip. Your own chips count for a single point.

Second, all players reveal their hands and determine whose is best (by normal poker rules). All investors in the best hand get paid 5:1 (5 points per chip invested). Investors in the second-best hand get paid 3:1. Hands below the second best pay no points.

Play first to 100 points.

Strain: Interleaved Actions and Two Players

2011-10-03T00:00:00+00:00

Instead of taking multiple actions on your turn, mash the turns together.

Everyone “untaps” and draws three cards.
In turn, each person performs one action (place a card, attack another player, or score an organism) – or passes.
When all players pass in a row, the turn ends.

With this variant, the game feels much more tense (at least with two players), because you’re worried more about timing, and you can’t just hold organisms on the table to score all at once at the end.

Taking the variant one step farther, you can remove the original idea of a turn altogether:

At the beginning of the game, all players draw three cards, of any type.
Turns consist of a single action, taken from:
- Place a card (organism, *plasm, petri dish with payment).
- Attack an organism.
- Score an organism.
- NEW: Discard any number of cards and draw up to three.
- NEW: Refresh all your cards, and draw one card.
Play to 12 VPs.

This way, turns are short and tactical, and players have a good chance to react to threats building across the table. The new actions are potentially unbalanced, so it deserves some extra testing, but it seems like a fun variant in general.

(Originally posted at BGG.)