Solving Design Problems by Reducing, Not Adding




Last week I tested an early alpha of Dung and Dragons that incorporated a sort of tug-of-war mechanic in which players lured dragons towards them by a number of different mechanisms. We tried making pulls a free action, but you had to push an equal number of cards towards your opponent. We tried making pulls cost you a card, sometimes a matching card. We tried both mechanisms at the same time.

All resulted in awkward emergent behavior or stalemate situations. Every solution we tried out that night would just add complications and further grit in the gears. You recall my advice on playtest hangovers, and I certainly had a small one going the next morning. Ultimately I realized that I just needed to rip out big chunks of an overly complex system rather than tape it up to justify the complexity. So here's what I'm thinking:

Instead of multiple tug-of-war steps towards getting the various components of your ranch, I figured it should instead be more like a drafting game, but one with some restrictions inspired by an old worker placement idea combined the setup drafting mechanisms from RISK: Legacy. Here's the basic idea:
  • You are building a ranch one stable at a time.
  • A stable is comprised of one dragon, one building, one food source, one handler and one special attribute.
  • There are five decks of cards, each representing different aspects of one of these components of a stable.
  • During setup, shuffle each deck individually then turn them face-up, so one card of each type is visible.
 


For example, a sample set of cards might say:
  • It's a Greenleaf Serpentine
  • ...in an Old Shed
  • ...eating Ripe Pears
  • ...cared for by Sam the Baker
  • ...at a Scenic Overlook

Now players begin taking turns.
  • On your turn, you can take one card from a stack and add it to your current stable.
    • You may only take one card from each deck, so if you've already taken a dragon, you must choose from another deck.
  • If you do not want to take a top card, you may set it beside the deck, thereby revealing a new top card.
    • You may do this until there are three revealed cards from this deck, at which point you must take the top card, whatever it might be.
  • Players on a future turn may choose from amongst all the revealed cards, or take the top card.

At the end of the round, each player will have a new stable, which awards points based on specific combinations of cards. For example, the Greenleaf Serpentine likes to eat fruit, so it's quite happy with ripe pears and awards you X points.

In the following rounds, new stables are built and the game ends after all players have built five stables. At endgame, you'll earn bonus points based on your ranch across each component. For example, Greenleaf Serpentines are friendly with Redwing Drakes, so you get X points.

In other words, you're drafting a 5x5 grid of cards one column at a time. You score columns in the short term, and rows in the long-term. All scores are based on other card types that are within the same row or column.

If I wanted to get really crazy with this, I'd remove the column restriction entirely. You're drafting your entire 5x5 grid at the same time. As soon as a row or column is complete, you score it at that time. But I tend to make simple-sounding games with a lot of analysis paralysis, so I may keep it restricted to one column at a time after all.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

5 Graphic Design and Typography Tips for your Card Game

Image
Chris Farrell of Illuminating Games just wrote a thorough critique of card games setting their body text to be so small that they cannot be read at arm's length, let alone across the table. Here's an excerpt, but the whole thing is worth a read for any would-be card game designers out there. (Myself included.) Break out your copy of the base set of Dominion, and look at the Chapel. This has a text box roughly 3.5cm by 4.5cm. It's got a single line of text. That line of text is 1 (one) millimeter high. 1mm! For me, it's only clearly readable at half an arm's length even in the bright light of day. (...) Compare this to a more sane game like Glory to Rome, where the font size is 2-3 times as large (text is 2mm high, keywords 3mm and usually highlighted). I can generally read Glory to Rome cards across the table, and can certainly see the important keywords. To heap insult upon injury, not only does Glory to Rome have far more legible text than Dominion it also has
Read more

Low-High Dice Game

Image
A dice game inspired by the stock market (and playing lots of Martian Dice). Roll a bunch of dice and choose which sets to keep. Choose your strategy wisely! Stuff You Need Two-to-Six PLAYERS A PENCIL and PAPER to keep score Thirteen standard six-sided DICE How to Play The shortest player takes the first turn. On your turn, first roll all thirteen dice. Several dice will have matching results. These are called SETS. (A single die result is a set, too.) You must choose a set to keep. For example, your first roll results are 111124445555 . The sets are four 1 s, one 2 , three 4 s, and four 5 s. After keeping a set of dice, lock them up in a row. This is called the GOOD TRACK. For example,  you could keep the set of four 1 s, one 2 , three 4 s, or four 5 s . You decide to keep the four 1 s and line them up in your good track. After keeping a set, you may end your turn or re-roll the remaining unlocked dice. When you re-roll, immediately set aside any results that ar
Read more

The Thousand-Year Game Design Challenge

Image
UPDATE: The submission period has closed and here are the entries. If you're an entrant, continue sending pics or vids of people playing your game. The first step to a game lasting a thousand years is for people to play it today. UPDATE 2: And here's the winner! To support games designed for longevity – that can be learned, played and shared for hundreds of years – we offer this challenge to any game designers, artists and imaginative people who also share this desire. Challenge Create a game. The game can be of any theme or genre you desire, but there is one restriction: You're creating a "new classic," like Chess, Tag or card games. So, create a game to be enjoyed by generations of players for a thousand years. Prize $1,000 to the winning entrant, to be announced and awarded January 1, 2012. Entry Deadline Entries must be submitted before midnight July August 31st, 2011. ( Update ) Entry Guidelines Enter by posting a comment below with a link
Read more