YANGI: Mono-match game

Dobble, Spot-It, and "Mono-match" technology 

Lately I've been giving some thought to and old idea: mono-match decks/games (like Dobble/Spot-It), and specifically how one could be made that's *not* a speed recognition/reflex thing. 

In case that sounds like gibberish, Dobble (AKA Spot-It) is a game where you have 55 cards, with 8 little pictures on each one, out of a total of like 57 different pictures. The distribution is such that any two cards will match one-and-only-one picture ("mono-match"). In the game, you flip up 2 cards and race to spot the matching picture. It's pretty fun. 

But the coolest thing about that game might be the mono-match-ness of the deck. There's a good video online explaining various ways to create such a deck which guarantees exactly 1 match between any two cards: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTDKqW_GLkw

I've long been interested in the idea of using this Dobble technology (the mono-match deck) to drive a more euro-style game. So in an attempt to leverage "Dobble technology" in a game that's *not* just speed recognition like Dobble/Spot-it, I have come up with this proof-of-concept 2-player, 7-card mono-match game in which you deal 1 card to each player and the other 5 to slots on the board labeled MUSTER, MOVE, FIGHT, BUILD, SCORE. On your turn, you'd choose one of the actions to resolve in the region where your card and the card in the slot match, then swap your card for the card in the slot. You'd take turns doing that until some game end condition is met, and the player with the most points wins. 

The actions I came up with are pretty bare-bones:

MUSTER: Add meeples to the board

MOVE: Move meeples around the board

FIGHT: Force opponent's pieces to adjacent regions (maybe also get some VP?)

BUILD: Place a building token from your player board in the region, increasing the scoring value of the region, and upgrading one of your other actions

SCORE: Award points for majorities in certain regions

I made a quick mock-up of this on Tabletop Simulator, and last weekend we were able to give it a shot. I observed while Rick and Daniel played a 1st draft of the game, and that test might be among the most liberal I've ever been with rules changes on the fly! 

After their game, we had a much better idea how things felt. Here's an updated rules summary:

2-player, 7-card mono-match game v0.2

* Deal 1 card to each player and the other 5 to slots on the board labeled MUSTER, MOVE, FIGHT, BUILD, SCORE

* On your turn, choose one of them to resolve in the region where your card and the card in the slot match, then swap your card for the card in the slot

* Alternate turns until some game end condition is met (Race to a VP threshold? Play until a player's meeples are exhausted?)

MUSTER: Add 1 meeple to the active region

MOVE: Use 2 movement points. With one movement point you may move 1 meeple between the active region and an adjacent region

FIGHT: For every 2 of your meeples in the active region, you may force 1 opponent's meeple from the active region to an adjacent region (maybe also get 1 VP?)

BUILD: Place a building token from your player board into the active region, increasing the scoring value of the region, and upgrading one of your other actions. In order to build a building of level X, you must have at least X meeples in the region: 

   Muster building: For every 2 Muster buildings, muster 1 additional meeple when you MUSTER

   Move building: For every Move building, use 1 additional movement point when you MOVE

   Fight building: For every Fight building, you may force out 1 additional meeple when you FIGHT

   Build building: For every Build building, reduce the build requirement by 1 meeple

   Score building: For each Score building, score 1 additional VP per area that you score

SCORE: For each region shown on the card in the Score slot, award vp to the player with the most meeples there (ties do not count). Score the active region (matching the player's card) double.

   Each region is worth 1vp, +1vp per building in it (so everyone knows which 3 regions will score the next time anyone does a SCORE action, but your card indicates which region scores x2)

This game plays like a 2 player abstract or something, it reminds me of Onitama or something. Come to think of it, I wonder if this will turn out to just be "bad Onitama" -- I will have to keep that in mind, and try to avoid it! 

I noticed a bit of the Strategy Triangle evident in the game... "Red" moves like scoring and fighting, "Blue" moves like mustering and moving, and Green moves like building. So maybe that's something worth keeping in mind as well.

As first tests go, this game was promising enough that I expect I'll keep working on it. I don't know if I'll ever make the jump to multiplayer though... I think I'd need to go up to 13 cards with 4 symbols/regions on each (13 total regions), and that sounds a bit cumbersome to me.