At an impasse -- a peek at The List and where some of my designs are at the moment

I'm at a bit of an impasse when it comes to my game designs right now... I feel like I can't make meaningful progress on any of my current designs, and with playtest sessions being so few and far between (not to mention more of a hassle on Tabletop Simulator), I feel a reluctance to start anything new. Maybe if I take a look at my active designs and their current status, it'll help me figure out what to do next. Here are some excerpts from The List:

Finished But Unpublished Games:
- Eminent Domain Origins [Ready to print]

- Eminent Domain: Chaos Theory (dice game) [Art on pause]

These EmDo universe games may yet see the light of day, but due to some issues (that it would probably be inappropriate for me to talk about), they are on hold at the moment. Too bad, because I was really excited about the prospect of releasing the Terra Prime revamp on TMG's 10th anniversary, and the dice game has been done for a pretty long time now.

- Crusaders: Crimson Knight (expansion) [Ready to print - fix faction powers!]
- Crusaders: Amber Knight (expansion) [Ready to print]

These Crusaders 5th and 6th player expansions have been ready to go for months, but the 1st expansion (Divine Influence) has just been sitting in China, waiting to be shipped to the US and released. Crusaders continues to be talked about (thank goodness), and I hope it remains in the zeitgeist at least until Divine Influence drops, so that doesn't end up being completely wasted effort. If that works out, then it could revitalize the game, and create some demand for these 5th/6th player expansions as well as a reprint (there's already been demand for a reprint of Deluxified Crusaders).

In the meantime, I looked at the files for some reason, and noticed that we were duplicating a couple of the new factions (because Crimson and Amber Knight expansions were supposed to be identical except for player color). That didn't make sense to me, so I developed 2 more faction powers, and we just need to swap those in before going to print.

- Olympus on the Serengeti  (FKA Deities and Demigods) [Art on pause]

I was excited to have a big name artist work on this one, but due to some of the issues mentioned above, Olympus on the Serengeti is on pause now too. Also, I'm becoming skeptical of the odd theme choice, and I wonder if just leaving it "normal" Greek mythology would be better.

- Exhibit (BGG) [Unlikely to be published due to conflict] [Abandoned]
- Dice Works (BGG) [Abandoned]
- Wizard's Tower (BGG) [Abandoned]
- Isle of Trains: All Aboard (expansion) [Abandoned]
- Suburban Sprawl [Abandoned]
- Watch It Played [Abandoned]
- Now Boarding [Abandoned]

These are all basically abandoned. I did make a TTS mod for Exhibit, and played it once with my testers a few weeks ago (and again yesterday). I think it holds up, and I'm tempted to try pitching it around. It's been several years, and the person instigating that ambiguous conflict I mentioned has disappeared as far as I can tell, so that might not really even be an issue anymore (I'm skeptical that it was ever REALLY an issue, TBH).

I also made a TTS mod for Dice Works as well, and finally gave it a partial playtest yesterday. I was surprised how well it actually worked on TTS (like, physically), so maybe this one could be tested or pitched that way now. Comments from the players led to the idea of loosening up the specificity of the board spaces (like, "[ ] < 3" as opposed to "[1]", or "[ ] < [ ] < [ ]" as opposed to "[ ] = [ ] = [ ]"). The players were also concerned about the possibility of an all-out scrap strategy being sort of dominant. I don't think that's the case, but it might ruin the other player's fun, which would be a problem all its own.

Maybe for something to do I could make a TTS mod for Wizard's Tower - that might be fun to revisit.

Current Active Designs:
- Alter Ego (BGG)

After a lot of testing about this time last year, I had made a lot of progress on this one. I had made a TTS mod for it a long time ago, and had been meaning to update it with all the most recent files, but never got around to it. I guess that's something I could be working on.

- Apotheosis (Co-Design with Rick Holzgrafe)

Most of my playtesting time (such as it has been) lately has gone to updating Apotheosis. I pitched the game virtually to 2 different publishers... the first wasn't interested, but the 2nd did show interest. They have a line of games in a particular universe, and Apotheosis fits pretty perfectly into that universe, so Rick and I have (a) revamped the prototype graphics and set the game in their universe, (b) addressed some items the publisher commented on after our playtest with them, and (c) fixed a major issue that came up in our pitch. I just reached out to the publisher to set up a time to show them the game with the updates again. I'm excited about the prospect of getting a game published by another publisher, just to sort of get my name out there more, and also to see how the process goes from the designer's end with another publisher.

- All For One (BGG) (Co-Design with David Brain)

I was feeling pretty good about the latest playtestes of All For One, almost a year ago at this point. I have been wanting to make a TTS mod for it and play it online, but I have been waiting for my co-designer to do some updates to the maps and missions. He had said he was working on it, but I suspect he got sidetracked, and he didn't even reply to my last email about it.

Maybe my best bet is to go ahead and either take a stab at the board/card redesign myself, or just upload a version like my physical prototype so I can at least play!

- Riders of the Pony Express (BGG)

I'm pretty happy with the status of Riders of the Pony Express content-wise, I think one of the biggest things I wanted to do was try and make it less physically fiddly to play. I had an idea for that, but I am stalled out on trying to implement it. Maybe the thing to do is to forget about that for now, and create a TTS mod so the game can be played.

- Isle Of Trains: The Board Game (Co-Design with Dan Keltner)

I had prototyped a version of this, even made a TTS mod and played it online once or twice with my testers since the Pandemic hit. But I haven't had much opportunity to get together with Dan about it, and I was starting to shift my feeling toward what he wanted for the game -- for it to be a more complex, deeper game than what I had put together. So I kind of stalled out on it and haven't thought about it in a long time. I don't really know what I could do with this one right now.

- Keeping Up With The Joneses

My latest game project, which came together pretty quickly, has taken up the rest of my recent playtest and design time. At this point I feel like the game is stable, and I don't really see how I could make progress without more, ideally more widespread, playtesting (if you want to PnP/blind test this game, leave a comment below, or email sedjtroll@gmail and let me know!). I do have a TTS mod, so I could theoretically set up more, and more widespread, playtesting, but the logistics of playtesting online are difficult for me right now, so I don't see this happening anytime soon.

That's about it for my active designs. I guess I could take a look at some of my back-burnered designs as well:

            - Automatown [Michael Brown on board]

When Michael Brown came on board as a co-designer on Automatown, the game took some great leaps forward. However, it's been quite some time since I've heard from him, and since I played the TTS mod he'd made with my testers. I guess I'm not sure what I can do for this game at the moment.

            - Odysseus: Winds of Fate (BGG) [a designer has showed interest]

A friend showed interest in Winds of Fate, but ultimately got busy with other life events, and the pandemic hit as well, making playtesting much more difficult. So unfortunately, this game did not get revitalized as I had hoped it might.

            - Reading Railroad

For the first time in AGES, I broke out my old prototype for Reading Railroad and not only made a TTS mod for it, but even played it in person with my wife!

I was excited to revive this game, but after a couple of tests and some consideration, I kinda realized that using word-building as a mechanism just didn't seem to be that big of a deal after all. So my interest in Reading Railroad waned again, and it's back on the back burner.

            - Moctezuma's Revenge

Nobody really showed interest in Moctezuma's Revenge, which I thought was too bad because I like the theme and idea of this one a lot -- it really sounds like something that I could imagine existing. But without someone jumping in as a co-designer, I'm not sure this game will ever go anywhere. At least not anytime soon.

            - Kilauea [a designer has showed interest]

I met online with the designer who contacted me showing interest in Kilauea. He had made a new version, and I made a TTS mod for it so we could try it. We gave it a partial play, then discussed what worked and what didn't and came up with some ideas for him to try in the next iteration. Unfortunately, I haven't heard from him since then, and I haven't really thought about the game since then either.

            - Joan of Arc [a designer has showed interest]

A strong design duo showed interest in Joan of Arc, which gave me some hope that it would see some real progress, but as yet they have not gotten to it. Time is in short supply, and I know they have their own projects to work on, and I'm still hopeful they'll get to it eventually. In the meantime, I have left the game on the back burner.

            - Dynasty

One of my oldest ideas that I think is any good, I've been re-reading my old posts about Dynasty, and thinking that this might be the game I work on next. As always, it seems like it would be so easy to put together a prototype and try it out... now that I'm not doing regular playtesting anymore, it might be harder to actually get the game to the table, but I could probably make a TTS mod for it fairly easily if I just got some prototype files together for it.

I'll start a new post to describe a couple of new, or recently revived games that weren't necessarily on The List.

Recruiting Co-designers / Assembling a Design Team

Ever since I recruited my friend Rick to work on Apotheosis (FKA Worker Learning), that game has made a lot of progress where it would certainly still be sitting in my notebook otherwise. That arrangement is working so well that I would really like to recruit other designers to help me progress my other stalled or (or un-started but promising) designs.

Here are a few of the designs I could imagine handing off to another designer at this point and letting them run with for a while, or working together with another designer on...

Well established designs that I could use help finishing:
* Automatown - worker placement/resource management game about building an army of robots (which are your workers)
* Odysseus: Winds of Fate - Adventure game about Odysseus on his way from Troy to Ithaca. Play as the Fates, who don't care what happens to Odysseus, but pass the time by betting on his progress (and then influencing it)

Established designs that still need work:
* Reading Railroad - Build words (a la Scrabble) to earn coins, spend coins to build track. Connect cities to earn pieces of set collection scoring

* Moctezuma's Revenge - push your luck / deduction game about looting temples, but some are cursed

Early stage designs that still need a lot of work:
* Rondel Role Selection - Shared rondel / resource management / Role Selection game about splicing DNA to make hybrid creatures such as Hippogriffs
* Kilauea - Mancala game about spreading your people across an island, and sacrificing them to the volcano gods to control the lava flow

* Joan of Arc - Bag building game with shared piece movement. Play as a voice in Joan of Arc's head, vying to get her to accomplish your goals.

Idea stage designs that sound promising:

* Dynasty - Spread your villages across China, upgrade them to Cities, and fill your player board with Culture. You'll assimilate other players' culture, and they yours. When someone becomes Emperor, the winner is the player who's culture is best represented.

* Scourge of the High Seas - Deckbuilder along the lines of Ascension, with 2 buy rows (Tortuga, where you buy crew, equipment and ship upgrades, and the High Seas, where you spend crew and equipment to plunder ships)

Any takers?

Moctezuma playtest and tweaks

Last Saturday I was able to get in not one, but two 3 player tests of Moctezuma's Revenge!

One of the main things that has kept this particular game down, and I think it's the thing that keeps many prototypes from making progress, is simply not getting it to the table. That's why I was so excited to play Moctezuma's revenge again, for the first time in 8 years.

I was over at Isle of Games, the FLGS that's nearest my new home, and it just so happens my longtime friend Ben is a manager over there. Ben is the one who tested Moctezuma's Revenge with me all those years ago, so it was neat hat he was around this time too... unfortunately he was busy working and couldn't join us to play :(

Here are some notes from those two games, followed by some changes to try next time:

For reference, the rules I used: Moctezuma's Revenge rules v2.0.

The game went over pretty well with the players. I wonder if it couldn’t use some more fundamental changes...

Game 1: 

I used the "5 action point" rule set ("5AP"), and I used 14 cursed and 11 safe chits, requiring 2+ cursed chits for a temple to be cursed. This was a mistake, actually, and it resulted in 6 cursed temples out of 7 (I added chits to the prototype according to majority needed, not 2+, AND I counted wrong when deciding how many chits to use... OOPS). 6 cursed temples is almost certainly too many! I think 4 or 5 max would be better. The players thought it would be OK if the minimum number of cursed temples was zero, but I think it might be better to guarantee that at least 1 temple will be cursed each game. 

We all knew which temples were cursed a few turns before the end, which was lame. Jim and I had researched several times before going exploring, while Hillary just went out and started looting temples. She ended up with maybe the highest score, but the most cursed icons and therefore an automatic loss. Is an auto-loss too harsh? Maybe there should just be a bigger penalty for the player with the most curse icons, like -1vp/icon, while everyone else only loses 1vp/2 icons.

Game 2: 

This time I used the "2 actions per turn" rule set ("2A"), and I used 9 cursed and 16 safe chits, requiring a majority of cursed chits for a temple to be cursed. This resulted in 3 cursed temples. I had the most points, but also the most cursed icons so I lost. Jim and I did about 2 turns of double research before exploring, while Hillary did about 4 this time. The 2A version went quicker and felt a little lighter than the 5AP version, but I think we got to do about as much stuff. 

I didn’t like that it took a whole turn to move to or from the library, and I didn’t like the temptation to research everything first then go explore, and never really research again.

Here are tweaks I would make for next time:

• In 2A version, it should only take 1 move to get to or from the library, but you shouldn’t be allowed to do both in the same turn (the Library isn’t a shortcut)

• In 2A version, 2nd Research in a turn should cost a discard of any treasure card. This gives you another way to dump cursed treasure, and it also means you can’t double research until you’ve gone exploring. So you probably will turn 1 Research/Move and start looting temples, then later come back to do more research.
• Asymmetric starting info would be nice, but how to implement?
• Is “Most cursed icons = you lose” a good rule? Too harsh? Maybe just a bigger penalty? try "most cursed icons: -1vp/icon, everyone else -1vp/2 icons".
• Try using 12 Cursed/15 Safe chits for a total of 27, so 2 are unused each game… so you can’t count. I think that leads to 1-5 Cursed temples (and more likely 2-4).
• Maybe make the Loot action (2A version) 3 cards, then 4… so if you see the Name card in the first draw, you still have a choice of 2 cards to keep. Or else add a SEARCH action to look at more cards, keep none (see below)
• Maybe make an option to look at more cards but keep none… for if you want to find the name of a temple at the cost of getting a card. So like:
• Move 1/Move 2 (1 space in the first move action, 2 more if you move a 2nd time in a turn).
• (temple) Search 4/5 (keep 0). Helps you find the Name card.
• (temple) Loot 2/3 (keep 1). Gets you more cards.
• (library) Research 2/3 (reveal 1. 2nd one costs 1 card). Gets you info, reveals some, allows a discard avenue for cursed treasure.
• (library) Study: Discard 1 card to reveal that temple’s name tile. Discard avenue for cursed treasure, and a way to learn the name of a temple.
• One idea I had to prevent over-researching was this: You can only research the CURRENT or NEXT column, not beyond that. Then if you want to see info in the 3rd/4th/5th columns then maybe you’ll return to the library once the game is about ⅓ (or ⅔) over. Alternatively, maybe you can always research any column, but it costs a card to research beyond 1 column ahead of where the game is currently at?

Here's the updated rules based on this playtest and commentary: Moctezuma's Revenge rules v2.1

Stay tuned for more playtest reports or info about this game, and the experiment in co-designing with Jonathan Gilmour.

Post script:

I just had a thought on card distributions: Maybe there should be some more texture to the cards as far as VPs vs Curse icons. For example, currently the treasure distribution is 5/3/3/2/2/2/1/1/1/1/1, where the 5 has 3 curse icons, the 3s and 2s have 2 curse icons, and the 1s have 1 curse icon.

Perhaps it would be cooler to have some of the cards with a disproportionate number of curse icons, not directly related to the amount of VPs on the card, something like:

5vp/3 icons

3vp/2 icons

3vp/2 icons

2vp/3 icons

2vp/2 icons

2vp/1 icons

1vp/2 icons

1vp/2 icons

1vp/1 icons

1vp/1 icons

1vp/1 icons

Moctezuma revisited

Every once in a while I review The List and spare a moment's thought for designs that have been sitting on the back burner, some for far too long.

Every time I do that, I invariably have the same thought... why did I never get anywhere with that one? I have this thought pretty regularly with respect to some games, less often with respect to others. But one of the games I often wonder this about is Moctezuma's Revenge.

Moctezuma's Revenge is a sort of deduction, action efficiency game about looting Aztec pyramids, but some of the pyramids are cursed. At the beginning of the game there are 10 pyramids, 7 of which are home to Aztec kings, and the other three contain clues to the location of El Dorado, the lost city of gold. Some (perusing the rules it seems between 3 and 7) of the 7 kings are cursed, and treasure from the cursed temples will be worth negative points at the end of the game. You don't know which temple is which, and you also don't know which of the temples are home to the cursed kings, so you can do research at the Library to find out.

That's the status of the game at the moment, you can see an old rule set in my blog. While I've thought about it every now and again, I haven't touched this game since 2008. For 8 years it's been one of those perennially back-burner-ed ideas, just sitting there wasting potential. That's why I'm happy about this next bit...

There's a prominent game designer you might have heard of... his name is Jonathan Gilmour. He designed something recently that's turned out to be very popular, and I know he's got some other stuff either out there or coming down the line really soon. I contacted Jon on Twitter a few weeks ago, and it turns out he was open to the idea of co-designing something with me. So I showed him my list, and Moctezuma's Revenge caught his eye. We had a chat about it at BGGcon, and it sounded like we were both on the same page when it comes to co-designing and the value that could offer to each of us, so when I got home I sent him whatever details I had about Moctezuma's Revenge, and today he put together a prototype and gave it a try!

I'm looking forward to the feedback, and to working with someone on this game, as it's not one I was likely to finish on my own anytime soon. Just discussing it with Jon has already got some creative juices stirring... here are some thoughts that came up in our conversation at BGGcon, some of which may end up being tested out:

* I don't know what I was thinking when I made 7 "cursed" chits - the possibility of all 7 temples being cursed seems like a lousy game experience to me. Perhaps I didn't want players to be able to win by just picking a temple, looting it like crazy, and just hoping it's not cursed. But I do like how the curse system works (and I think Jon does too). I suspect we'll want to cut that down to something like 4 "cursed" chits, so that 2, 3, or 4 temples will be cursed.

* As I recall from my one or two playtests 8 years ago, it was too tempting to sit in the Library and peek at all the curse chits before running off with good information about which temples are safe. There should probably be some incentive to not do that... one thought is maybe when researching kings, you flip the next curse chit (revealing it for everyone), and then peek at another 1-2 [alt: peek at a couple chits, choose 1 to turn face up]. Would sharing info like that make any difference? Or just serve to lengthen the game?

* Should you be able to research temple names at the library (look at X cards from the temple, keep none)? Maybe more efficiently than drawing cards when you’re AT the temple (so like look at 2/3/6 rather than 1/2/5)? Should this also be “reveal the top card, then peek at 1/2/5 (or 2/3/6) cards (again, so it helps others)?

* Maybe instead of action point allowance, you could just take a Library turn (Flip next Curse chit, then spend turn peeking at 1 Name tile, some (3?) curse chits (max 1 per king?), or maybe a few cards from a single deck) or an Explore turn (move and search or search x2, where “search” in this case is look at the top 2 or 3 cards of the deck where you’re at. Maybe it’s 2, and if you double search it’s 5).

* Maybe researching the name of a king (peeking at the name tile) should be done at the library by discarding a card from that temple. So you can pay points to learn the identity of the temple, or you can find it via exploration. If you learn that you have collected a cursed treasure, this would allow you an avenue to get rid of it. I would think you could only do this once per temple (leave the card face up in front of you to remember you did it), so you can't unload a truck full of tainted treasure, but maybe a limited discard would be good to have available.

* Instead of cursed treasure being strictly negative points, perhaps all treasure should be worth points. Maybe each treasure has 2 values, one for if it's safe, and a lower one for if it's cursed. In addition, the treasures could have curse icons which only count if the temple was cursed, and the player with the most of those at the end of the game simply loses (like corruption in Cleopatra and the Society of Architects or Unrest in Struggle of Empires).

I look forward to posting more about Moctezuma's Revenge, hopefully Jonathan likes it and gets some good tests and feedback in! 

The List - July 2015

GenCon is coming up in two weeks, so it's probably a good time to revisit The List and take stock of my designs and prototypes. It's been a while since I've done this, and I'm interested to see just how much this list has changed over time!

Published Games:
- Terra Prime (BGG)
- Eminent Domain (BGG)
- Eminent Domain: Escalation (BGG) (expansion)
- Eminent Domain: Exotica (BGG) (expansion)
- Eminent Domain: Microcosm (BGG)
- Isle of Trains (BGG)

Finished But Unpublished Games:
- Exhibit (BGG link)
- Eminent Domain: the Dice Game
- Dice Works (BGG link)
- Wizard's Tower (BGG link)
- Now Boarding

Current Active Designs:
- Crusaders: Thy Will Be Done (BGG)
- The Pony Express
- Odysseus: Winds of Fate (BGG)
- Eminent Domain: Oblivion (expansion)
- Alter Ego (BGG link)
- Isle of Trains More (expansion)
- Suburban Sprawl

Recent Designs That Are Not On The Front Burner:
- Deities and Demigods
- Rondel Role Selection

Old Standbys - games which have been around, 1/2 done and untouched, for years:
- 8/7 Central
- Hot & Fresh
- Dynasty
- Kilauea
- Reading Railroad
- All For One (BGG)

Old Ideas that Haven't gone Anywhere (Yet) - some of these have been getting stale as well:
- Investigative/Tabloid Journalism
- Red Colony
- Clash of the Kingpins
- Time = Money
- Dating Game
- Ticket Please
- Moctezuma's Revenge
- Scourge of the High Seas

Let's take a closer look at some of these:
Published games:
- Terra Prime (BGG)
I'd love to bring back Terra Prime as a 2nd edition, with updated rules, expansion included, and set in the Eminent Domain universe. It'd be called Eminent Domain: Origins, and one of these days it may be possible.

Finished But Unpublished Games:
- Exhibit (BGG link)
I'm disappointed in the current status of Exhibit. A European publisher was very interested, but a difference of opinion on whether a certain person's IP rights were infringed has caused it to be delayed - maybe indefinitely. I checked with an IP lawyer to ensure that my understanding was correct, which it was, but the whole thing has left a sour taste in my mouth.
- Now Boarding
I worked on this with Tim Fowers, who's recently finished a kickstarter for his co-op game Burgle Brothers. Maybe he'd like to print Now Boarding as his next project? Maybe I'll pitch that idea to him :)

Current Active Designs:
- Crusaders: Thy Will Be Done (BGG)
I'm happy with this one as-is, but there's a desire from the TMG staff to add super-unique faction abilities (with unique upgrades and buildings, like the factions in Terra Mystica).
- Odysseus: Winds of Fate (BGG)
I keep circling and iterating on this one. I need to implement the mot recent change ideas and try it again.
- Eminent Domain: Oblivion (expansion)
3rd expansion to Eminent Domain. I worked out how this would play several years ago, and now that Exotica is in production I've finally started prototyping and trying it. So far, so good!
- Alter Ego (BGG link)
Mike's always been a fan of this one. Back on the front burner, Alter Ego is finally shaping up. I think with a little TMG Utah input and some nice art, this could potentially be ready for a GenCon 2016 release!
- Isle of Trains More (expansion)
Dan Keltner and I are working on an expansion to Isle of Trains for Dice Hate Me/Greater Than Games to follow up our contest winning entry.
- Suburban Sprawl
Working on the next DHMG/GTG contest - this time a dexterity game (which currently only uses 54 cards, plus 8 scoring cards) with Matthew Dunstan. In Suburban Sprawl you toss cards into play to build Residential, Commercial, industrial, and Civic buildings. I'm going for a light, quick game with a sort of SimCity feel that's easy to learn and play.

Recent Designs That Are Not On The Front Burner:
- Deities and Demigods
Another attempt at Deck Learning, Deities and Demigods is like a role selection game, but the game calls the roles, and in random order. Players will have some control over which roles are in the deck, and can upgrade their efficiency at each role. The effects of the roles will allow players to move armies and fleets around a map in an effort to complete quests/tasks and control cities.
- Rondel Role Selection
Another variation on role selection, this one got off to an OK start, but hasn't gotten any attention in a while.

Old Standbys:
- Hot & Fresh
I'm a little disappointed I never finished this one, but the most recent changes (several years ago now) seemed like a big step in the right direction. I'm just not sure how excited i am about a press your luck pickup/deliver game anymore.
- Dynasty
This is my shelved design that I'm probably most interested in, or at least the one I think might have the most promise as a "mediocre euro."
- Reading Railroad
I always think that Reading Railroad would be a fun word-building / connection game, but the truth is that people who like word games probably don't want to play a connection game, and people who like connection games probably don't want to play a word game. Still, I'd like to finish this one day.
- All For One (BGG)
All For One might be my single biggest disappointment. It is the game that really got me into the design hobby, and I thought it was good - really good - but it never got any publisher interest. It's suffered some setbacks, and now - almost 10 years later - I feel like it might be a bit old fashioned and in need of an overhaul, but I don't have the impetus to overhaul it.

Old Ideas that Haven't gone Anywhere (Yet):
- Investigative/Tabloid Journalism
I think a game where you put together parts of stories and embellish them to make them work would be a cute and fun game, but the theme may not really be very desirable, so I never revisited this idea, even though I think I had the main mechanism completely thought out.
- Ticket Please
A game about controlling gates in airports and moving people to their destinations, in the same scope as a Ticket to Ride seems like it could be really successful, I'm not sure why I haven't revisited this yet.
- Moctezuma's Revenge
Maybe it's because I don't really like press your luck games or deduction games much, but I never got back around to Moctezuma's Revenge, even though it sounds like a system that could make for a solid game.

Dallas bound! BGG.con 2012

Seven years ago I heard that the people who run BoardGameGeek.com - the premier source for user generated info on just about every board game out there - decided to host a game convention in Texas. On a whim, I decided to go... and I've been back every year since.

Next week will be the 8th year I'll be making the trek (not much of a trek, really - just a 2 hour plane trip) to Dallas FOR BGG.con 2012, and I'm really looking forward to it!

Over the years the convention has gotten bigger and bigger, longer and longer- from a little 300+ person 3-day weekend, to a 1400+ week long affair. Even with a whole week, there's still not enough time to do all of the things I want to do each year. This year I don't have too many specific things I want to do, but I'm sure I'll still figure out a way to miss something :) Here are a few things I'm looking forward to doing over the next week:

Prototyopes

* Reading Railroad - Unsatisfied with the state of Reading Railroad, I have finally gotten around to prototyping an alternate version. Actually, this is much closer to my original vision of the idea. For now it'll use the board, track tiles, and cubes from Railroad Tycoon. Since I don't want to lug all that around I am just taking the new stuff (Factory tiles, Player aids, Letter tiles, etc) and I plan to check Railroad Tycoon out of the library.

* Venice: City of Trade - a TMG submission which I enjoyed on first play. I would like to see how it holds up to repeat plays, and how players react to it. Maybe this will be a TMG release in the near future!

* Moctezuma's Revenge - an old prototype I've revived and plan to bring to Proto Alley. I recall thinking this one worked, but was lacking. I hope to see whether it has any potential.

* Winds of Fate - same story as Moctezuma's Revenge, only this one was further along, and I feel like it's got a lot more potential.

* Eminent Domain: Escalation - I'll have my expansion prototype on hand, I'm certain people will be interested in playing it!

* 8 Minute Empire - I might bring my PnP copy of 8 minute Empire, which just funded on Kickstarter. It's a great idea for a game, I'm kinda sorry I didn't think of it myself! I bet it'll be a big hit, even if i have my own ideas about how I'd have done it...

* Kings of Air and Steam - I'll likely have my Kings of Air and Steam prototype with me. If we're lucky, there MAY be a copy in the Hot Games Room!

* Captains of Industry - I'll have my Captains of Industry (TMG 2013 release) prototype with me as well.

Essen titles

* Tzolk'in: The Mayan Calendar - I've been looking forward to this one ever since I heard about it around last April. The gear thing sounds like a great twist (...literally!) on the Worker Placement mechanism.

* Terra Mystica - In researching Essen I read about this game, and it sounds pretty cool. I look forward to trying it out.

* Urbanization - I played this at Essen once, and I'm pretty sure I liked it. I want to play it some more to be sure. I do not know if there will be a copy at BGG.con or not though.

* Suburbia - I played this once at Gen Con, and I enjoyed it... I look forward to playing it again, probably this week.

* Clash of Cultures - I like the idea of civilization games, but in practice they're usually too long, or too busy - I end up not enjoying them like I'd like to. I read a little bit about Clash of Cultures a while ago and it sounded like it had some neat mechanisms in it. I don't know if I'll fall in love with it, but I'd like to take the opportunity to play it at BGG.con.

Special Events

* Puzzle Hunt - one of my favorite events at the con is the Puzzle Hunt. I hope they put it on again this year!

* Disc Golf - last year I went on a Disc Golf outing. It's being arranged again this year, and I was planning on going... but on further thought I think it might be too much hassle and too early in the morning to bother. I can disc golf anytime, I might take a pass in Dallas.

* Game Show - sometimes they have a Game Show event which, depending on the format, can be pretty fun.

I've probably missed a few things, but this was not intended to be a comprehensive To-Do list anyway :)

Michael prefers that we enjoy the convention, so there will not be a TMG booth at BGG.con. Instead,  TMG products will be sold in the Funagain store, and Michael has sponsored the convention with some product. After Gen Con and BGG.con 2010 I think we both like it better this way :)

Moctezuma's Railroad of Fate

I mentioned on Twitter/FB recently that I'm revisiting some of my old designs - finally! In about 2 weeks I'm going to BGG.con, and I hope to bring 3 prototypes with me. I hope to utilize Proto Alley to test these out again and see if they're as promising as I remember - and to find out what each one needs to move forward. Here are the three games I'm bringing, in no particular order:

Moctezuma's Revenge

At the height of the Aztec empire, great temples were built for the Kings. When their time had come, the Kings were entombed in their temples to be revered forever, surrounded by great treasures of the Aztec people! While researching the temples it’s easy to make off with Aztec treasure, but some of the kings are cursed!

Research the temples and collect treasure, but beware of cursed treasure – it’ll count against you! Also, some temples contain clues to the whereabouts of the fabled lost City of Gold! Find all the clues and lead the way to El Dorado!

Odysseus: Winds of Fate

Play as the Sisters of Fate, who observe Odysseus on his voyage from Troy to Ithaca. Not entirely interested in whether he makes it home safe or not, you will bet on the outcome of Odysseus' journey, and then use your influence to make sure your bets pay off.

Reading Railroad 

Use Resource Letters to form words and earn Coins for each letter used. Spend Coins to build connections between cities and collect City Tiles. At the end of the game score points by spelling out words using collected City Tiles.

Hmm... I usually have more colorful descriptions than those above for Winds of Fate and Reading Railroad. Weird. In any case, I think all three of these games have some potential. Let me know which you think sounds the most promising, and what ideas you have for any or all of them. I look forward to your comments!

Heading to Essen, and some "spring" cleaning

Tomorrow I leave for Essen.

I've been waiting several years to say that, and I'm really excited to go to Germany and see the spectacle that is the Essen Game Fair! I'm not sure I'm prepared for the enormity of the show, but that's OK - I count this first trip as a sort of scouting mission to see how Essen goes. I am not sure if or when it'll happen, but I suspect in the future TMG might have a booth there, and it'll be nice to know what to expect before having to do the show "for real."

I got a little lucky with this trip, as I didn't really expect to go and I didn't prepare in advance at all. When it looked possible, I posted online that I was thinking of going, and I got an email from someone offering me a place to stay. I'm pretty sure finding a hotel would have been problematic, so I was happy to get that offer! In exchange for putting me up for the week, my host has asked me to spend some time in his booth, signing copies of Eminent Domain... sounds like a win-win to me!

So if you are at Essen, swing by LocWorks booth (4-230) and say hello! I'll probably be helping demo Ground Floor, and if you buy a copy of Eminent Domain, I'll sign it for you :)

In addition to spending some time in the LocWorks booth, I look forward to seeing what the rest of the con has to offer. I'm not sure I plan to do much in the way of shopping - I know a lot of people rush to buy their most anticipated games, but frankly I'm not sure how I'd get them home, and the one's I'm interested in will be available in the US before too long (specifically T'zolkin: the Mayan Calendar, which will be released by Rio Grande Games before too long). I do have a short list of games I'm interested in checking out though. I hope to see a few of those at the show.

One game I might actually pick up is the new version of Hanabi. I love that game, and have not got a proper copy of it. I like the cards in the new version - the first version is unavailable, and the 2nd edition - even if available - has square cards that are a pain to use. From what I've seen this new version should be easier to read and use.

In other news... 

I've been doing a little bit of "spring cleaning" (only a couple months out of season). I cleaned out a shelf where I kept some of my unpublished prototypes. Some of those are prototypes of my own design, some are prototypes of other people's games. Like an archeologist uncovering an exciting find I came across a wealth of interesting things!

8/7 Central - I came across 2 different prototypes of this card game about running a TV network by my friend Mohan which I worked on with him for a summer several years ago. This game always seemed like a good idea to me, but it also always suffered from the same problem. I think that problem boils down to information overload - it's difficult and cumbersome to try and track each player's schedule of shows, even if you've only got one 1-hour time slot, 5 days a week. I do think the core concept worked, and I remember having fun playing the game though, and if I had infinite time I would definitely like to make this game work.

Moctezuma's Revenge - A game about collecting treasure and avoiding curses. I liked the idea of this one too, and I recall playing the prototype... not sure what stopped me moving forward with it. I think I'm not a big fan of push-your-luck mechanisms, and this game had quite a bit of that in it. This is another one I'd like to revisit sometime.

Blockade Runner - Originally designed for a card game design contest (never entered), then co-developed with another designer, this game was intended to be published by a publisher at one point but that fell through. Then later it was intended to be published by another publisher, and I sold my rights to it in order to facilitate that. I notice the game is not out, which means I believe the rights have reverted, but I'm not sure what good that does me. This quick game of bluffing and double think seems destined to live on the shelf :/

Nursing coop game - I came across a prototype I made of a game my friend Brian wanted to make. He's a nurse, and he had an idea for a cooperative game set in an ER. I thought it sounded cool and I liked the main mechanism he had in mind, so I went home and made a prototype. We played through it once or twice, but then kind of forgot about it.

Reading Railroad - Originally to be titled Conjunction Junction (and I submit that could be a good name for an expansion), Reading Railroad was an idea I had with an online BGDF friend Scott Slomiany. I maintain that it's a fabulous idea, combining a word game with a connection/railroad game. You gain money by spelling words with Scrabble-style letter tiles, and you spend that money to buy track to connect cities. Connecting cities allows you to collect a different type of letter tile (I would actually like them to be little tiny alphabet blocks, with 3 different letters on each). Your final score will be based on words you can spell using those Alphabet blocks. But this game is intended to be one that wordsmiths can play along with their vocabulary-challenged friends, so the end game scoring words are actually found on reference cards - so really you are just collecting specific sets of cubes. You see, a wordsmith could do well making larger words with their Income tiles, leading to more income for buying track, but a player who is not good at word games could still do well with strategic connections and set collection without needing to make big or complicated words.

I entered Reading Railroad into a game design contest once, and it didn't go over very well - even though I actually had people playing and enjoying it at game night. The judges thought it was some underhanded ruse to sell the game to 2 different demographics (word gamers and strategy gamers) - which in a way could be true, but really it was an attempt to make a game that players from both of those genres could enjoy together. I really want to get back to this one some day, as I think it has real potential.

Odysseus: Winds of Fate - A game about making bets on outcomes (of encounters as well as the entire game), then trying to make sure your bets pay off. I tried pretty hard to make this game work, and I was never really happy with it. I think it's got potential, and I'd like to revisit it again sometime.

All For One - One of the oldest designs I ever worked on that was worthy of being published. I'm actually not sure why this one never did get published! David Brain's original design, which I worked on with him for years, was very well received at conventions I brought it to, but never found a publisher. Now I feel like it might be a little old fashioned and in need of an overhaul. One day I'd really like to see this game in print!

Templar - I've been putting some thought into this, my most recent project. Based on what I thought Trajan's mechanism would be, Templar is about a year old at this point... and while I have a prototype made up, I've not tried a playtest yet!

I even found prototypes of published games, such as Gil Hova's Prolix, Alex Rockwell's Homesteaders, Jay Cormier and Sen-Foong Lim's Belfort, and my own Terra Prime! And amongst all that, I found prototypes of other people's games as well:

Smoothie King -When in London 7 years ago, I met Ian Vincent, and played his game based on Power Grid. It was about making Smoothies, and I liked it quite a lot. He sent a prototype home with me, and I frequently wonder why I don't play it again.

Roman Emperors - Another BGDF member Juan Carballal had a game I found very interesting in which players take turns running the Roman Empire. It's not a cooperative game, you want your stint as Emperor to be remembered as the greatest time in Roman history - but since players take turns controlling the Empire, the resources are largely shared. I think the game has a ton of potential, but I don't think the designer and I were seeing eye-to-eye on some of the specifics of how it should work. I'm also not sure what the designer did (if anything) with it since I saw it. I think it would be fun to one day take a stab at making "my version" of that game, and then send that to the designer and seeing what he thinks of it.

Admirals of the Spanish Main - Another game by Juan, we were trying to make a "dice building" game which did a better job than Quarriors, and he came up with a game about hunting pirates in the Spanish Main. It was a good start to what I was looking for, but it was too random, and my friend Andy Van Zandt and I worked on trying to mold it into what I was really looking for... in the end though, many playtesters said that if they're playing a pirate game, they want to BE the pirates, not hunt them, so we eventually gave up on it. I think the game had some good things going for it, but for whatever reason it just wasn't all the way there.

Equilibrium - Shea Parks had a game that I thought was really interesting called Equilibrium. It was like a response to the Deckbuilding craze... each player starts with the same deck, and over time you remove cards from it. Quit when you want, each card in your deck is worth -1vp, and cards played are worth positive vps (most of them based on which cards remain in your deck). I like this game, and think maybe it deserves another look...

Lost Adventure - More friends from BGDF, Jeff Warrender and Steve Sisk, made a deduction game with an Indiana Jones theme which I think is fantastic. The only real problem with it might be that the end game phase seems too different from the majority of the game. Also, originally it was "too Euro" and could use a lot more theme to immerse players in the Indiana Jones action. I fear the designers may be overdoing it with the changes they've been making along those lines, but I haven't really been keeping up with their blog about the game as much as I'd like.

It was fun running across and thinking about all these games. Makes me want to spend more time working on them!

The List - revisited

It's been a while since I've given any thought to old game design ideas. Last night I had the opportunity to recount some of them to a friend, and it reminded me how awesome some of them are! So I thought I'd revisit The List:

Old Standbys - games which have been around, 1/2 done and untouched, for years:
- 8/7 Central
- Hot & Fresh
- Dynasty
- Odysseus: Winds of Fate
- Kilauea
- Reading Railroad

Old Ideas that Haven't gone Anywhere Yet, But Probably Should - some of these have been getting stale as well:
- Investigative/Tabloid Journalism
- Red Colony
- Clash of the Kingpins
- Time = Money
- Dating Game
- Ticket Please
- Moctezuma's Revenge

I have lots of ideas for several of these games, so many that I think I'm overwhelmed and am not making any progress on any of them! The good news is that I have at least made SOME progress on my games, like Exhibit, Alter Ego, and The Knights Templar.

I think the best of the bunch are:

Dynasty: The Spread of Culture in Ancient China
Build villages and learn advances, assimilating opponents' cultures as you go. Your villages give you access to resources to spend on things like advances. If you cannot afford what you want, you can "trade" with an opponent (they cannot say no) - but if you do then you must take one of their Culture Chits onto your player board. This is both good and bad, as filling up your player board gives you benefits, but each of those Culture Chits represents scoring for your opponents. The first player to fully fill their board becomes the Emperor (and scores a small bonus), but it's the player who's culture is best represented who is the real winner!

Hot & Fresh
Delivering pizza can be frantic work! Plan your route and push your luck with the traffic laws to make deliveries and earn tips. There is a simple set of traffic laws, and the more laws you break, the more likely you will get busted. Driving safe for a while will turn the heat down, but your tips decrease over time so you're encouraged to press your luck at least a little bit. Originally the routes were intended to change as traffic lights turn from green to yellow to red - a newer development involves placing tiles between the main roads to represent shortcuts that you know about but your opponents do not.


Red Colony
Players build colonies on Mars, first by claiming property (building tubes and domes), then constructing various buildings under those domes. Income is customizable and ranges from early game building materials to late game higher level materials, to people. You'll have to spend time and effort to modify income over the course of the game. The goal will be to house as many people as possible in your Colony by the end of the game. A lot of the ideas for this game came directly from The Case For Mars.


Alter Ego
Cooperative deck building game of vigilante heroism. Save the city from Arch Villains - but as you become a stronger hero, you'll need to neglect some aspect of your Alter Ego life. In the early game you start with Family, Job, and Community cards which each give you some benefit. Each turn you must take another card, either another Alter Ego card or a Hero card. You'll need Hero cards to defeat henchmen, but you can only play so many cards per turn... so playing more Hero cards necessarily means playing fewer Alter Ego cards! This game will have a Cooperative mode, and possibly a Competitive mode as well where each player has a personal Nemesis in addition to the Arch Villains.

The Knights Templar
After hearing about Trajan's Rond-cala mechanism I had a guess as to how it would work. I was wrong, but I thought my idea might make an equally good game, so I combined that main mechanism with an older idea I had for a Knights Templar theme. In this game you'll Move your knights, Crusade against Moors and other enemies, Erect buildings, and spread the Influence of the Order of the Temple. But when the Order gets strong enough, King Philip will become nervous and issue arrest orders for the Templars! Race to Portugal (and maybe Scotland) where you'll be safe while a wave of destruction radiates from Paris, destroying buildings as it goes. When a building is destroyed, players with that type of building still standing earn some points, so it could matter which buildings you erect and where you erect them.

I'm such a slacker!

I have been seriously slacking where it comes to game design lately. The Hippodice (game design contest) deadline is approaching, and I'm not sure which game - if any - is in good enough shape to submit!

Of the games on the list, there are several which are (still) partially prototyped, and I'm spinning my gears trying to decide what version of rules to use. The list is only getting longer, here's an updated list:

Old Standbys - games which have been around, 1/2 done and untouched, some of them going on 3 years now:
- 8/7 Central
- Hot & Fresh
- Dynasty
- Odysseus: Winds of Fate
- Kilauea
- Reading Railroad
- Rodeo Drive

Old Ideas that Haven't gone Anywhere Yet, But Probably Should - some of these have been getting stale as well:
- Investigative/Tabloid Journalism
- Red Colony
- Clash of the Kingpins
- Time = Money
- Knights Templar

New Ideas that Haven't gone Anywhere Yet, But Probably Should:
- Dating Game

New Ideas that I've started actually prototyping or testing:
- Ticket Please
- Moctezuma's Revenge

I have lots of ideas for several of these games, so many that I think I'm overwhelmed and am not making any progress on any of them!

Moctezuma's Revenge - first playtest

Ben and I ran through a 2 player game of Moctezuma's Revenge tonight - it took maybe 40 minutes. The rules are simple, the game is pretty simple, and I wondered if it would be interesting to play or just boring.

While at first I was skeptical, and the action felt a little uninteresting, I'm happy to report that as the game developed it did feel more fun and more interesting. There were a couple of issues that I'll address for the next playtest, which will be tomorrow night, probably with 3 players:

* With the 5 actions a turn, and the only thing costing 1 action being "move", there were a lot of times when you simply had to waste an action. This felt crappy, and I remember from All For One playtests that players don't like that. I considered just making it 3 actions per turn, so you could move and search a little, you could move, move, move, or you could spend your whole turn searching a temple - no wasted actions! Another idea which I think I'll use instead (or in addition) is to add an action when searching. Currently it's 2 actions = draw 2 cards, keep 1; 3 actions = draw 5 cards keep 1. I think I'll add 1 action = draw 1 card, keep none. (cards not kept go on the bottom of the Temple deck).

* I think peeking at 2 or 5 Curse chits at a time s pretty powerful - I'm going to try making it 1 action = peek at 1 chit, 2 actions peek at 3 chits, no option to spend 3 actions looking at 5 chits. So maximum in one turn you could look at 3+3+1=7 chits, which happens to be the same maximum per turn under current rules (2+5), but I think that will be better overall. I might reduce the actions to 3 per turn as well, which means in one turn you could look at a maximum of 4 chits. I would like it to be worth looking at some chit sometimes, but not worth it to spend a bunch of urns just looking at chits.

* I'm thinking for the Clue temples - in order for the treasures to 'count as clues' and score the bonus, maybe they ought to have to be larger than 1vp worth... or "one from each temple, minimum value 2 (or 3)". Or maybe the value of the bonus could be the sum ff the values on the set of cards collected, you just have to get 1 of each to score them.
Edit: I'm liking the idea of scoring based on the actual cards you take out of the temple... part of the game I kind of like is acting based on your opponents' actions, so if they pull out a 5vp card vs a 1vp card, that should mean something. I think for the Lost City clue temples to be interesting, they should encourage taking a larger valued clue.

* I might try a more random method of determining which temple's curse chits are revealed each round, Ben suggested rolling 2d8, which would speed up the game some, but not too much because often the die would come up 8 (when nothing would happen), and once temples start to get fully flipped, they could be rolled again (in which case probably nothing happens). The strict flipping of 1 chit each round seemed to work fine, but it might have given us too many turns each. I think it would be neat if you could visit every temple and collect 1 card from each only if you don't dilly-dally or stop to do research.
Edit: I think I'll stick with a mechanical "flip the next chit" rule for now.

Moctezuma's Revenge! - Rules

MOCTEZUMA'S REVENGE
by Seth Jaffee
A game of research and exploration for 2-6 players

Overview:
At the height of the Aztec empire, great temples were built for the Kings. When their time had come, the Kings were entombed in their temples to be revered forever, surrounded by great treasures of the Aztec people! While researching the temples it’s easy to make off with Aztec treasure, but some of the kings are cursed!

Research the temples and collect treasure, but beware of cursed treasure – it’ll count against you! Also, some temples contain clues to the whereabouts of the fabled lost City of Gold! Find all the clues and lead the way to El Dorado!

Components:
1 Game board with spaces for 10 temple decks, as well as a chart for Aztec king names and spaces for curse chits.
16 Curse chits – 7 “Cursed!” And 9 “Safe”
10 Temple decks of 11 cards each, labeled with a number (1-10) and with a VP value (5/3/3/2/2/2/1/1/1/1/1)
10 Name cards – 7 with names of Aztec kings, and 3 that indicate Clue temples
6 Researcher pawns in 6 different colors
1 pad of Record sheets

Setup:
Shuffle the Name cards face down and distribute 1 to each Temple deck. Shuffle the temple decks separately and place them in the 10 temple locations on the board.

Mix the Curse chits and distribute them face down to the 15 Curse Chit spaces on the board (next to the names of the Aztec kings).

Each player chooses a player color and places the Researcher of his color on the Library space.

Randomly determine who will play first. Play will continue clockwise around the table.

Turns:
On your turn you will have 5 Action points to spend. The actions you can do are:
Move:
1 action: Move your Researcher to an adjacent location.
Research Kings (at Library):
2 actions: Peek at 2 face down Curse chits.
3 actions: Peek at 5 face down Curse chits.
Explore Temple (at a temple):
2 actions: Draw 2 temple cards. Keep 1 and put the rest on the bottom of the deck.
3 actions: Draw 5 temple cards. Keep 1 and put the rest on the bottom of the deck.
* Note: you may never keep the Name card from a temple deck.
After each player has had 1 turn, flip 1 Curse chit face up (start with the first column of chits, turning up the topmost face down chit, then moving to the 2nd column, and finally Moctezuma’s 3rd chit).

Game end:
When Moctezuma’s 3rd chit is turned face up, the game is over and scores are tallied. Determine which treasure cards come from a Cursed temple, which come from a Safe temple, and which come from a Clue temple.

Each temple card from a Safe temple scores the number of VPs on the card. For each treasure card from a Cursed temple, subtract the VP value on the card from your score. Double the points scored or subtracted from the temples of Moctezuma I and Moctezuma II. All treasure cards from Clue temples are worth zero points, but if a player has at least 1 treasure from each Clue temple, that player scores a 12 point bonus for finding the City of Gold.

The player with the most points is the winner! In case of a tie, the tied player with more total treasure cards is the winner. If still tied, the players in question share the victory.

Moctezuma's Revenge!

The other night at dinner an odd thought crossed my mind and then I uttered the phrase

There ought to be a game called Montezuma's Revenge

What popped to mind was a game wherein there are Aztec temples, one of them home to the cursed Aztec king Montezuma (actually "Moctezuma," but you know us English speakers). The initial idea was to send researchers out into the many Temples on the board to loot treasure, and every once in a while any researchers who had looted the tomb of Moctezuma would die. Using this information, you would deduce which temple is cursed, while also trying to get uncursed loot for points.

I wasn't immediately sure how to have players find out if their researchers died without knowing which temple was cursed, so I went with the second idea, which I've fleshed out into Version 1.0 of the game. I hope to have a prototype ready and playtest it this weekend. Here's what I've got at present:

There are 10 Temples on the board, plus a Library. These are the locations a player can visit with his Researcher pawn. The Temples are numbered 1-10, and each has an identical deck of cards representing the treasures inside. The decks have 11 cards in them with VP value distribution as follows: 5/3/3/2/2/2/1/1/1/1/1. A Name card will be shuffled into each deck as well to indicate which Aztec king the temple was built for. The front of the card indicates it's VP value as well as which Temple the card is from. The backs are all identical.

On the board there is also a column with 7 names of Aztec Kings - these are the same names that are on the name cards shuffled into the temple decks. But there are 10 temples, not 7... the other 3 are labeled "City of Gold" or "El Dorado" or "Akator" or something like that. Those temples aren't actually the lost City of Gold, but they contain clues to find it. Next to each of the 7 Kings' names are spaces for 2 Curse Chits (3 for Moctezuma's temple) - the City of Gold clue temples are not cursed. There are 15 Curse chits, about 6-8 of them marked as "Cursed" and the rest "Safe". These chits get distributed face down in the spaces by the names, thus if a name has any Cursed chits by it, then that King's temple is considered Cursed.

On your turn you have 5 actions to spend. Actions and costs are:
* 1 action: Move to an adjacent temple (or Library)
* 2 actions: At Temple, draw 2 cards, keep 1 (you can't keep the Name card)
* 3 actions: At Temple, draw 5 cards, keep 1 (you can't keep the Name card)
* 2 actions: At Library, peek at 2 face down chits
* 3 actions: At Library, peek at 5 face down chits

After each player takes a turn, one of the Curse chits is turned face up. When all the Curse chits have been revealed, then the game ends. So over time the cursed temples become known, and the game will end after 15 rounds. Actually, I have an idea to make that "15 rounds or so" - but I'm not sure if I like it or not.

At the end of the game you score points for all treasures that came from Safe temples, and you lose points for all treasures that came from Cursed temples. Any treasure card from Moctezuma's temple is worth double the printed value (either good or bad). All treasure cards from City of Gold temples are worth 0 points, but having at least 1 treasure from each scores you a bonus for having found the lost City of Gold.

I hope to have a prototype by this weekend to try out. I'm sure I'll post about how it goes!

Late thought: Another way to do it might be to NOT have the Name cards in the decks, but instead have face down chits numbered 1-10 in front of the names in the column on the board, and allow people to research that as well. Not sure if I like that or not, it just came to mind and I wanted to type it out before I forgot. This would mean the decks could have different backs, which might be a little easier for sorting. Action costs might be:
* 2: Look at 1 face down Temple ID chit
* 3: Look at 3 face down Temple ID chits