Another Alter Ego playtest: Gamesmiths, 3/17/14

At Gamesmiths last night I hosted a game of Alter Ego in which David, Eisen, and John Morgan took on an Anarchist...

It was an informative playtest. From the outset, David saw some equipment that looks like it would work well together - one that allows you to buy 1 (or 3) Speed icons for $1 (or $2), and another that allows you to spend $1 to change a Speed icon into any other icon. He was very proud of this combo, and while he was sure it was a great combo and a great strategy, it being his first game he may have concentrated too heavily on setting it up in the early game and not enough on defeating Henchmen... which is a "trap" I sort of want in the game. Trap isn't the right word really, one of the main strategic decisions is when to focus on your Alter Ego life and when to focus on your Hero life. If the players spend too much time building their engines, then by definition I want the city to be overrun by Henchmen.

Morgan on the other hand began by going for Hero cards - mostly Smarts at first, but he ended up with a little bit of everything. As such, he was the one to beat up Henchmen, and he racked up a number of trophies (boost icons) - many of which were Hero icons... eventually he had one of each Hero boost icon in play except for Speed. So in the late game he was able to beat up a whole lot of henchmen.

Eisen didn't really specialize in much, he played Family cards a lot in order to get some teamwork tokens, and he beat some Henchmen up here and there, he ended up being more of a support character... which I think is fine, but I'm not sure if it was as much fun.

One thing I've noticed over the last several tests is that the Henchmen build up (as they're supposed to) and then the players struggle to catch up and stabilize (as they're supposed to), but if they make it over that hump, then it's smooth sailing all the way. This climax comes at the wrong time, because the Arch Villains aren't triggering early enough. I need them to be coming into play just about the time the players have stabilized and feel like they've caught up to the henchmen, so that rather than relax, BAM - there's a new, bigger challenge thrown at them.

What I think this means is that the Henchmen deck needs some tweaking. There need to be fewer Henchmen with no affiliation, and maybe more with multiple affiliations. David suggests the deck should be smaller, but I don't know if that's necessary. I still think the costs are OK as they are.

Another thing that has come up almost every time I've played the game is that the feeling of neglecting your Alter Ego life isn't coming through like I want it to. My personal opinion is that it's actually working darn near perfectly - if you neglect your family, your next turn's options are limited to what you've drawn... if you neglect the Community, you're at the mercy of the deck as to which Henchmen enter play... if you neglect your job, you don't get to use fancy equipment. But the big problem is, rather than that feeling like a result of your actions, people tend to feel like it's the luck of the draw... they don't recognize that they had some part in it, and they prefer to blame the deck for pulling out too many Sadist affiliated Henchmen when they wanted to fight the Anarchist (or whatever) rather than play more Community cards.

So, because it's come up more than once, and because the current version is failing to communicate the point of the game, I'm going to try the following... You never skip any of the phases. Every turn you have each phase of the game - Income (Job), Support (Family), Patrol (Community), Fight (Hero), and Recoup. Boost icons will go back to how I had them in the last test - more like EmDo planet symbols, boosting the phase, not each card of that type played in the phase. Here's the kicker - during each phase (Income, Support, and Patrol), if you played no card of the appropriate type (Job, Family, Community), then you put a counter on your player board in that phase. During Recoup, when it's time to take a card from the stacks, you check your player board... if you have 3 (2?) counters in any phase, then you MUST choose that phase's card from the stacks (rather than any card you want). Then you clear out those counters. If you have too many counters in 2 phases, then you must take cards of both of those types from the stacks, and then you'll have to play fewer cards from your hand (you'd take the required cards, then play from your hand to reach your display size).

This way it will be more obvious that if you're neglecting your job, then you get penalized for that. My concern is that it may sort of force players to just do a little bit of everything, and I do want them to have the ability to choose the cards for their decks. But I could see this potentially working out, it's definitely at least worth trying.

After some discussion, I have another thing I want to try - it's kind of a combination of the current "Arch Villain" thing and the ideas I've had for a Nemesis. And it could potentially increase the cooperative feel of the game as well. I think I'm going to give each player their own player colored tokens (ideally they'd be cardboard tokens with their insignia on them), and whenever you defeat a Henchman, you put YOUR token on he Arch Villain. Once in play, ONLY the player (or players) with the most insignias on the Arch Villain can actually engage them in their Fight phase. So not only are the Arch Villains getting upset that their Henchmen are getting beaten up... they're specifically getting upset AT YOU for beating them up. This way I think it could be acceptable to have to fight multiple Arch Villains in a game, maybe as a difficulty knob for example.

We talked a bit about some possible static effects that the Arch Villains could have. David suggested that each Villain could have multiple effects, and for an easier game you just use the first one, while for a harder game you use both the 1st and 2nd one. That could be doable, but I'm not sure if all the ideas I've got for static abilities will scale so easily.

I do like the idea of static effects, and I'm excited to figure some out and get them in the game. I think they could be thematic, like the Sadist abilities would kill off Civilians, removing them from the game, while the Anarchist abilities would change up the rules, and the Mastermind abilities would make the game become harder by removing options from the players.

Well, time to do some updating so that I can bring the game to MidSouthCon this weekend!

Alter Ego: Game Design Retreat playtest (3/8/14)

I got Alter Ego to the table during my Game Design Retreat last weekend, for the first time in a year and a half (!)... and with a few caveats, it went VERY WELL!

Caveats:

* The game took a very long time. I was not surprised to have a pacing problem, but I think it can be overcome - At this point I'm not as worried about the amount of time it takes as I am about whether or not the game works!

* I want to re-do the Henchmen deck. I knew this would be true.

* I probably need to reduce the number of tokens it takes to trigger an Arch Villain. The players were too strong by the time the Arch Villain arrived, and the ending was a bit anticlimactic.

Good stuff:

* The new version of Equipment seemed to work much better than the old version! I used some cards that you buy directly into play (they do not count as being in your display), and have activation costs. That way in order to make use of them, you have to constantly play Job cards to get $s to spend. I want to make some that are also good to buy if you don't concentrate on money, they'll have some static effect you don't need to pay for each turn. Also, I'd like some Equipment that goes into your deck as well and does stuff, so I'll make some of that again, but with an eye toward the right type of effects (and maybe I'll call them Events instead of Equipment).

* The Teamwork tokens really seem to make the cooperative feel in the game. The fact that players can use each other's cards by trading Teamwork tokens back and forth had everyone talking on everyone's turn about what card they should add to their deck, which Henchman they should go after, etc. It sounded a lot like other "real" cooperative games sound during play.

* The player boards and turn sequence (skipping phases when no cards are played) also worked well.

* The players really seemed to like the game! They appeared to be having fun while playing, they claimed to really enjoy it, and they were even sort of role playing up their roles. For example the guy who concentrated on money and equipment really felt like Batman, using all his wonderful toys to fight crime, and throwing money at problems.

* The limit of 5 Civilians of each type seemed like it worked alright. That could obviously change with other tuning to get the pacing right, but in the early game the players did say they felt like they were on the ropes with respect to the Civ tokens.

Changes and updates I'm making for the next playtest (hopefully Friday):

* I added and tweaked Equipment cards (and events) based on the playtest commentary and seeing it in action.

* I had forgotten that the boost icons were intended to be PER CARD PLAYED, not per phase... so a $ icon is supposed to give you 1 additional $ per Job card played, not just once no matter how many Job cards you play. That's a pretty big difference, especially once you get a few of them into play. The idea though is that I want every Job card not played to feel like a big deal. I don't want players to build up icons and think "ok, well I better play 1 Job card, but the rest aren't a big deal" - I want EACH job card to be worth a lot, so it's painful to play Hero cards instead. I have to be a little careful not to make the Equipment so good that you can ignore training and Hero cards altogether and just go all JOB all the time.

* Similarly, I think the Hero boost icons are supposed to boost each card OF THAT TYPE that you play. So if you have a Speed boost icon, it'll trigger when you have a Speed card in your display, but not when you have only a Will card. However, it'll trigger twice if you have 2 Speed cards in your display! This means getting a Hero boost icon trophy makes it much easier for you to defeat things that have THAT symbol, but not things that require diverse symbols. For example the 5-cost Henchmen that cost 3 of one icon and 2 of another.

* I re-did the Henchmen deck... I added some easy-to-beat Henchmen that take 2 of the same colored hostage, to make the deck a little more scary. Before I had henchmen that either attracted the attention of Villains, or else gave the players some benefit. I changed that to make most Henchman do both. I especially like that for the early game (cheaper) Henchmen, because that way going after boost icons will also usher in the Arch Villain, and players will have to be careful. I might have overdone it though, I want to make sure players have the ability to rescue hostage without accidentally summoning the wrong Arch Villain.

* I also added Teamwork icons to the Henchmen as well as Display +1 icons.

* For reference, Calling the Cops on a Henchman saves 1 Civ, and if that's the last Civ, the henchman is removed from play, and does NOT trigger the affiliated Arch Villain.

* I haven't done it yet, but I intend to revamp the Arch Villains, adding a status effect when they come into play. For example, maybe 1 version of the Mastermind has created distractions to occupy they police, so once they're in play you can no longer Call the Cops.

* It was suggested as well that one of the Arch Villain types require a broader range of icons to defeat. Where the other types encourage you to specialize in an icon or two, currently none require a more balanced assortment of icons. That was sort of on purpose, so players could reasonably build their deck toward defeating the Villain... but maybe a Villain requiring all the symbols would be interesting.

* I'm going to update the player boards as well, just to make sure everything is up to date. I'm considering reducing the card draw of Family cards to 1 per card, +1 (or 2) automatic during the phase. I.e. as long as there's a Family phase, you draw N+1 (or maybe N+2) cards, where N is the number of Family cards in your display. This way the Card draw boost icons might feel a little more strong and useful. Currently you draw 2N cards, which seems like a lot.

* The new mechanism for Equipment has 3 face up from a shuffled deck, and as a standard option players can spend 1$ to cycle 1 of the cards, or 2$ to cycle all three. This way a player who happened to have 1 Job card could have SOMETHING to do with that money. I'll add these actions to the player board.

* I think I might reduce the display size to 4. I think that will emphasize the main agonizing decision in the game - which cards do I play. I'll keep the hand size the same, so if you play no Family cards, you choose 3 of your 4 cards to play (plus add 1 from the supply). With the addition of Display +1 icons on the Henchmen I think that'll work out well (people can earn a bigger display).

I'm excited to be working on this game again, and even more excited that the prospect looks promising!

Reviving old games... Alter Ego and Scourge of the High Seas

In the last few weeks I've brought 2 old game ideas back to the forefront of my mind... partly because I really like the ideas and have always wanted to work on them, and partly because Michael would like to see more Seth Jaffee designed games in the marketplace. Many people don't realize that I'm associated with some of the big box games from TMG: Ground Floor, Kings of Air and Steam, and Belfort for example, even though I do have a developer credit on those games. Developer credits in the rulebook and on the back of the box are not as prominent as Designer credits, and on database websites such as BGG there's not a field for developer (though I think there should be). So I've finally gotten around to reviving 2 of my designs that have been sitting around for a few years: Alter Ego and Scourge of the High Seas.

Both of these games are card games with deck building aspects, and both have the opportunity for excellent art... both seem very thematic and fun to me, so i think they could both be well received in the marketplace. In case you're new to this blog, or have simply forgotten since it's been so long, here's a short description of each of these games.

Alter Ego

A cooperative deck building game of vigilante heroism

You won't see Crime City on any map, but that's how people have come to know your hometown. Sadists, Anarchists, and the Mafia each carving out portions of the city they call their own. Hundreds of innocent bystanders caught up every day in their turf wars, or held under their oppressive thumbs. Precious few have the time, the money, the guts, or the wherewithal to do anything about it. You're one of those few... Of course it means you'll have to give up that happy home life, or that cushy job. The paper paints vigilantism in a negative light - you'd be viewed by the community as a monster. But your city bleeds... the city bleeds and it calls your name. Will you answer?

You're a vigilante hero, one of the few in Crime City who have come together to put an end to the reign of terror the city's been trapped under. Banding together, you'll fight through a swath of henchmen in order to find and defeat an Arch Villain. But as you get stronger as a hero, you'll have to neglect some parts of your Alter Ego life - your family, your job, and your community.

In Alter Ego you play Job, Family, Community, and Hero cards into a display. You can only play so many cards each turn, and as the game goes on you'll need to play more and more Hero cards to defeat henchmen... meaning you'll have to neglect some aspect of your Alter Ego life.

Henchmen come into the game each turn and take civilians hostage. Fight the Henchmen to free the civilians, and defeat them to gain benefits... defeating underlings will eventually pique the interest of the whoever they're working for, bringing an Arch Villain into play! Defeat the Arch Villain to save the city and win the game!

In "expert" or "competitive" mode, each player will also have a Nemesis which they must defeat as well to win the game.

I'm pretty sure I know how the general rules of the game will go, and I have a prototype from before. I'm struggling with how the Equipment cards should work, but I have a new idea for that which I think will be good - all (or most) equipment stays in play, not your deck, and has an activation cost to use. Some can be used once per turn, some more often than that.

I just had a thought about a different way to do a showdown between each player and their Nemesis... maybe once the Arch Villain is defeated, players simply sort out their decks, and if your deck meets certain criteria (enough of each type of indicated card in it), then you are deemed strong enough to defeat your Nemesis. That way you don't need to play out some sort of battle turn by turn (though that might be fun). Defeating your nemesis could simply be worth some bonus points, and defeating henchmen could ls be worth points, and the winner could simply be the Hero with the most points.

Scourge of the High Seas

Yo ho, yo ho, a pirates life for me...

Captain of a ship in the Golden Age of Piracy! Visit Tortuga to recruit crew, buy equipment, and upgrade your vessel in order to engage in trade, treasure hunting, and plunder on the High Seas. Stash your booty away at your island hideout to keep it safe and off of your ship. He who buries the most treasure will be remembered forever as the Scourge of the High Seas!

This one is intended to be like Ascension, but with 2 Center Rows. I have a pretty good idea how I want this game to work as well, but have faltered on creating cards for it. I have a handful of card ideas from a year or two ago, and I just put together a spreadsheet to try and tabulate a bunch more card ideas. I have made some progress, but there's a lot of work to be done balancing and creating all the different types of cards in the game!

On your turn you first visit Tortuga and spend Treasure to get Crew, Equipment, and Ship Parts. You can also condense resources (turn 3 copper into 1 gold, to put it into Dominion terms).

Then you hit the High Seas and engage Ships, Trade Ports, and Buried Treasure cards ("buying" these cards with Plunder, Goods, and Maps which you've accumulated from other cards).

Finally, you visit your Island Hideout, where you man Bury cards to get them out of your deck. Each time you do that, you must take a Hideout card into your deck which is useless, so you'll want to be a little careful about when you choose to bury cards.

At the end of the game (when should this be???) the player with the most Treasure buried in their hideout will be the winner.

I've never been good with game end triggers. This game could end when someone has buried a certain number of Treasure (like Ascension), or it could end when a limited pool of Hideout cards are taken... I can't think of another way that makes a lot of sense.

Game Design Retreat

I'm hosting a Game Design Retreat this week (tomorrow through Sunday), and I hope to get both of these games "to the table" - to discuss with other designers even if not to play. I guess we'll see how that goes. I do not think I'll have a playable copy of Scourge, but hopefully I can get at least a partial test of Alter Ego in and see if I'm headed in the right direction with that one!

Final days of Scoville kickstarter

We're down to the final 48 hours of the Scoville kickstarter, and we're up to $65,500 in funding. The final stretch goal is at $80k, so if you've been on the fence then now's the time to jump in - we're going to make it!

TMG big box games on Kickstarter have come to an odd place. They're very likely to hit their funding goal, but since we don't like exclusive content, and we like to provide a full game in the first place, there isn't much to get excited about as far as stretch goals...

It's one thing to come up with a mini-expansion for a 10 minute microgame from scratch, there's much less going on in those games, and there's time to test it and make sure it's good... however the same is not true for a larger-scale game. Big games are a lot of work, and unless the designer has been sitting on the game for some time and has already designed an expansion, there's not a lot of game content that can be "tossed in" as a stretch goal. Bigger, longer games by definition take more time to test new content, and so big box games don't have the luxury of coming up with mini expansions or new content on the spot (without risking that content being out of balance or, in general, bad for the game).

What we've got on deck for this last stretch goal for Scoville is something that many people have expressed an interest in... pepper shaped bits rather than cubes. Due to board legibility concerns, we've combined the pepper bits with a fancy board with depressions into which the "cubes" will fit, which will serve to ensure uniform placement on the board. This is more important than many people realize, because it will significantly reduce the load of simply reading the board, allowing you to concentrate on your game decisions.

This upgrade is not exclusive to Kickstarter backers, it will be an upgrade for the entire print run. We tried a similar format for Kings of Air and Steam, and frankly I'm a little surprised at the overall reaction to that format.

To me, it's an extension of the original funding goal - and it should work the same way. When a game meets the original funding goal, it becomes available for everyone - not just Kickstarter backers. So when an upgraded version of the game becomes available at some higher funding level, why is it people hesitate to back, citing that the upgrade will also be available to everyone, not just the backers? By that logic, why were those people backing in the first place?

Best I can figure is that if the original funding goal isn't met, then there's no game at all. If it IS met, then the game will be available - even if not in an upgraded version. The risk of the game not being upgraded isn't as big a deal as the risk of not being able to play the game at all, and maybe that's why people make that choice to wait for retail - even if they say they really want the upgraded version.

My advice to anyone considering backing is this: If you want the game, and you're planning on getting it anyway, then you might as well pledge now rather than waiting for retail - to help ensure the threshold is met for the upgraded components (assuming you in fact do want the upgraded components). Of course, if you do not want the game, or cannot afford the game, then don't pledge - that goes without saying.

At this point I'm confident we will make the $80k funding goal, but that's only true if the people who want the pepper bits go ahead and pledge!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/michaelmindes/scoville-the-hottest-farming-euro-game-ever

Captains of Industry playtester credit - Don't get missed!

We're finally wrapping up the art on Captains of Industry this week, and I want to make sure I don't forget any playtesters...

The designer has posted on his own blog about this, and I want to make sure my players also get their due credit. Some players just played the game, some offered feedback, and some helped me do analysis and computer simulations! I appreciate each of those types of players, without you guys, game design is very difficult and boring - games are meant to be played!

I'd love to give thanks to each and every player who's sat down to a game of Captains of Industry (even under the old title: Titans of Industry), but there's only so much room in the rulebook - so we usually only name those players who played many times through many iterations, and players who gave significant feedback that got incorporated into the game. So if you don't see your name listed individually, please know that your participation in the process is still appreciated!

So leave a comment if you ever played a game of Captains of Industry WITH ME OR MY COPY (no need to tell me if you played with Michael - he should have you on his list).


Thanks!

Scoville on kickstarter!

We had planned to launch the kickstarter project for Scoville last November, coincident with BGG.con, however we ran into some delays (that seems to be the standard, no matter how hard we try to avoid it).

Today, only 2 months later than planned, the Scoville project went live! I'm really happy with the reception so far - 400 backer and $16,600 as of this writing, and it's only day 1 of the project!

If you haven't been following this game, it's about pepper farming. Colored cubes represent various peppers, and players will plant them, cross-breed them, harvest them, and turn them in to fulfill orders or make Chili recipes.

Each round of Scoville has 4 phases:

1. Auction: Bid for turn order
2. Planting: Place peppers onto the game board
3. Harvest: Navigate the game board to obtain new peppers
4. Fulfillment: turn in sets of peppers for points and other benefits

So far, everyone I've played Scoville with has really enjoyed it! The game can play with up to 6 players, but in order to get enough components into the box to support that we're going to have to hit some stretch goals. But with the start that we've had, the quality of the game, the reputation of TMG for putting out great games of this type, and the stellar art of Josh Cappel, I think we'll be able to get there.

So please, check out the project, and feel free to sport this avatar to support it on social media:

Thanks!

Random thought - communal farming vs personal farming (my ideas for a Keyflower expansion)

A few months ago I was chatting with my friend Sebastian Bleasedale, who's had a pretty good run recently of having his games published!

One of which was Keyflower with Richard Breese, an expansion to which just came out. I remember talking to him about a possible expansion idea I had for that game, which I thought could be a thematic fit, but he didn't think it worked with the game...

But the idea had an interesting mechanism in it, so I thought I'd jot it down here where I could find it, just in case I want to use it in some future endeavor:

So Keyflower is supposed to be about people coming over o the new world on the Mayflower, right? Maybe something about Native Americans, and Thanksgiving?

The event that Americans commonly call the "First Thanksgiving" was celebrated by the Pilgrims after their first harvest in the New World in 1621.[2] This feast lasted three days, and was attended by about 53 Pilgrims and 90 American Indians.[3] The New England colonists were accustomed to regularly celebrating "thanksgivings"—days of prayer thanking God for blessings such as military victory or the end of a drought

I'm surprised Wikipedia says "American Indians" rather than "Native Americans"

Americans commonly trace the Thanksgiving holiday to a 1621 celebration at the Plymouth Plantation, where the Plymouth settlers held a harvest feast after a successful growing season

So like at the end of the year you have the harvest Feast, which is like a special additional scoring maybe?

Squanto, a Patuxent Native American who resided with the Wampanoag tribe, taught the Pilgrims how to catch eel and grow corn and served as an interpreter for them (Squanto had learned English during travels in England). Additionally the Wampanoag leader Massasoit had donated food stores to the fledgling colony during the first winter when supplies brought from England were insufficient.

So you can get additional animals (fish, corn - different from grain in the first expansion), but not unless you interact with the Native Americans. These would help you with stuff, maybe including the Harvest Feast scoring.

The Pilgrims held another Thanksgiving celebration in 1623, after a switch from communal farming to privatized farming

Ooh... Switching from Communal farming to Privatized farming (!) the game could start with communal farming, and players could work toward making their own little farms (which is better for them). So like you have a harvest scoring phase at the end of each year, maybe it's sort of a set collection type of thing - there are various things you can bring to the celebration, and the more variety you bring, the better (?)... there's communal farming, which switches to private farming over the course of the game. As players switch over, they contribute less to the communal farm, therefore players still relying on the communal farm get less stuff from it.

You can get more stuff (fish/corn) from your farm if you go out of your way to interact with the Native Americans, which will help you score more at the harvest, but which of course has a cost involved.

I kinda really like the idea of a communal farm transfering to private farms. I imagine a Communal Farm board, with each type of thing you can farm on it, and a player piece from each player on each of them. When you get stuff, you get as much stuff as there are player pieces by that thing. When you plant your own stuff, you take your player piece off of that thing, and now you get your stuff (because you've planted it), and everyone who hasn't gets less stuff (because you're player piece isn't on the communal board anymore).

So like you get a tile that has, I don't know, a Carrot farming space. You now grow your own carrots, and when it's time to get carrots you get like 5 carrots. And because you grow your own carrots, you no longer contribute to the communal carrot making, therefore everyone who does not make their own carrots gets 1 fewer carrot per time they get carrots. Eventually the last 2 people to make their own carrots will only get 2 carrots each, while everyone else gets like 5.

So give a cost to planting (a cost involving existing resources), and give each player a set of player tokens with the different things you can plant on them (for the side board). When you plant something, you take your token off the side board and put it on your own tile.

And because you don't want a ton of currencies, maybe make these things that aren't spent, just scored, in a way that having more different things is good, and maybe having multiple sets of things is good (like a set is any number of different items, and each set you have scores with triangular (or something) scoring).

That's about it, copied, pasted, cleaned up, and edited from chat transcript. As usual, thoughts are welcome in the comments below!

Another microgame: Burgoo

I met with an old friend from BGDF, Dan Manfredini, at BGG.con last November so he could show me his wares. He had a couple of games with him, one of which had an interesting theme...

It's called Burgoo, which is a term I wasn't aware of. Burgoo is a community made stew, and apparently it's a common thing in the Midwest and Southern US.

In the game of Burgoo, there are 6 different ingredients, and as a player you start with a line, or "batch," of 2 of each ingredient in random order. You also start with 1 of each ingredient hidden in your hand. Any leftover ingredients are placed in a communal pot in the center of the table.

On your turn you have 3 options:
1. Sample the stew: take an ingredient of your choice out of the pot and put it into your hand.
2. Split a batch: return an ingredient from your hand to the pot and split one of your batches either above or below an ingredient matching the one you returned.
3. Add to the stew: return an ingredient to the pot and call "top" or "bottom" - EACH PLAYER may take that type of ingredient from the top (or bottom, whichever you called) of any/all of their batches and throw it into the pot.

The goal is to get rid of all of your ingredients first. Since you can split your batches, its possible to add multiple ingredients to the pot at the same time... and that's obviously a good thing. It's really important to watch what ingredients other players put on the top/bottom of their batches so you can take advantage of their plays and add to the stew during their turns!

If you add to the stew and it causes your neighbor to add the LAST ingredient from one of their batches to the stew... you CAPTURE that ingredient - putting it into your hand instead of the stew! This is a big deal because while the goal is to be the first to get rid of your ingredients, there are often ties, and the tiebreaker is number of ingredients in hand!

I really enjoyed playing Burgoo, but at first I wasn't sure this game would be TMG material. I informed Dan that I would tell Michael about it, but that I didn't think it would fit into the business model Michael was shifting toward. We were playing with wooden vegetable pieces (from At The Gates of Loyang) and a little physical pot for the stew - this was too small for a "big box" TMG game, and too big for the microgames Michael has been looking for.

But when I was telling Michael abut the game, it occurred to me that it could be done with cardboard tokens and a physical pot isn't really necessary, so perhaps that would fit the microgame model after all.

Indeed, Michael thought so too, and as of today Burgoo is live on Kickstarter as another Pay What You Want ($3 minimum, $5 recommended) TMG microgame!

And it's off to an impressive start. As of this writing (midnight AZ time) there are 1,176 backers pledging a total of $6,483 for between 1589 and 1919 copies of Burgoo! That's an average of about $4 a copy.

In my not-so-humble opinion, as microgames go Burgoo is a REALLY good deal! The art is good, the game really is fun, and you can get 2 copies for less than the price of my Arby's lunch today. So check it out!

Balancing game elements

Game balance is tough to achieve. It takes more than a little bit of art, and more than a little bit of science too. Each game is different, and each game requires different levels of balance in each of their elements to work properly.

It can be difficult even to discuss game balance, because there are different things that term could mean. Brad Talton of Level 99 Games posted about 5 Schools of Thought on Game Balance on his blog as part of a series of Core Design Articles. Since I like my games to be fair contests between the players, I put a lot of thought into what Brad refers to as Local Balance. Every designer has their own method for balancing game elements, such as Buildings (Homesteaders), Tenant Improvements (Ground Floor), Technologies (Eminent Domain), Helpers (Last Will), Recruits (Euphoria), etc.

No matter how they are represented in the game, here's a 5 step process that I often use to make sure these game elements are balanced - that is to say similarly powerful. This is especially important when the elements are obtained by a random draw.

Step 1: Find the unit.

There's usually a baseline resource, or unit, such that other game elements can be expressed in terms of that unit. For example, in Ground Floor each worker costs $3 per round, and gives you 3 Time discs per round. Each player has a Meeting Room which will turn 1 Time disc into 1 Info. So as a baseline, $1 = 1 time unit = 1 info... that's the unit. You spend the game trying to alter that, buying floors and remodeling rooms in order to get a better return out of your worker placements than just 1 unit, but in order to determine how much better a return, it's useful to have that baseline for comparison.

Failing to understand the unit in a game can easily lead to unbalanced or unfair game elements. A card that gives you 4 Food might look similar to a card that gives you 3 Wood for the same cost, because 3 is about the same as 4. So you might think that's an OK balance. But if it turns out that Wood is twice as expensive/hard to get as Food, then those two cards may not be so well balanced after all! You need to know the values of each resource relative to each other in order to balance the game element.

An important thing that factors into these values is opportunity cost. In the example above, I said Wood might be twice as hard to get as Food - but what does that mean? Maybe it only takes 1 worker to forage and produce 1 Food, while it takes 2 workers to cut down a tree and create 1 Wood. If that's the case, the opportunity cost of 3 Wood (6 workers that could have been doing other things) is higher than the opportunity cost of 4 food (4 workers that could have been doing other things). What you have to decide is whether the difference of 2 worker placements worth of "other things" is close enough for those two cards to be considered well balanced, or if 3 Wood is always just better than 4 Food.

Usually there's an easy way to measure those "other things" your workers might be doing instead - and spoiler alert... that's usually how you find the unit.

Step 2: Determine the desired power level of the game elements.

About how strong do you want these elements to be? Should they generate 1 unit worth of effect each time a player uses it? 2 units worth? Should they allow players to make useful in-game exchanges but not net them any actual resource gain?

You can't really move on until this question is answered. If you're not sure, then choose one thing that you have in mind as the quintessential example of that game element, and let that set your power level. Make all other elements comparable in strength to that one.

Failing to do this step is an easy way to end up with an unbalanced game element... if you don't know how strong you want the elements to be, then it is easy to make wildly varying strengths or values - you need a guideline.

Step 3: Design the game elements (keeping steps 1 and 2 in mind).

Here's where you make a pass at designing the game elements. You choose what you want each element to do, how much you want it to cost, and how many points you want it to be worth. There are many knobs you can turn to help you tune the elements to be the correct power level (chosen in Step 2!). If you have 2 effects that you like, but 1 is mathematically worth more than the other, then you can make that one more expensive, or less often useful, or worth fewer points, or make sure it comes out later in the game so it has less time to be used... this will all depend on the game rules and structure.

The key here is to keep Steps 1 and 2 in mind. The goal is not to make every element in the game identical. The goal is to make sure that one element isn't strictly better than another, and that one player doesn't get an big unfair advantage based on the luck of the draw. It's important to remember also that you don't need every element to be exactly mathematically equal to a specific value - the goal is to make all the elements similarly powerful - there can be a range, but you don't want the range to be so big that the high end is a significant advantage over the low end.

Again, this is more important when the game element is distributed randomly. If players are drafting cards, or there's a race to get them (see Rokoko for a great example of this), then it's actually good to have a wide variety of values in those cards to help support that race/draft mechanism.

Step 4: Assess subjective aspects of the game element. Adjust and iterate.

Not everything is easily measured in terms of the unit you found in Step 1. For example, how often an effect is likely to come into play is very difficult to measure - especially if it's based on player action rather than probability. In other words, something that triggers "every time a player rolls a 7" is very different from something that triggers "every time a player sells Coffee."

This step is where you adjust your set of elements based on these hard-to-calculate values, using your gut feelings, your design experience, and trial and error (testing) to finesse things until they feel right.

You may iterate on Step 4 many times before you decide the balance is correct.

Step 5: Weed out elements that are "too strong" or "too weak."

In some ways this may be the most important step. It may seem obvious that a particular element is used before all others, every time. That's an indication that it's "too strong" - and that's boring. You don't want that. When an element is always chosen over all others every time, then it needs to be nerfed or cut.

There's a trap that's easy to fall into when balancing game elements though - and that's being too conservative and making things "too weak." If an element is too weak, then nobody will ever choose it, and if that's the case then why have it at all? When one of your elements is never chosen, then it should either be improved (is there a fun word for "the opposite of nerfed?") or cut.

I've adopted a new strategy when adding a  new element to a game... I purposely make it too strong! This way I know that players will go for it, and I'll be able to see the new element's effect on the game. Tim Fowers just reminded me that in the videogame world they say "you don't know if you've gone far enough until you've gone too far." It may turn out that what I thought was "too strong" really was just fine after all. Or it may turn out that "too strong" really was too strong, and I'll have to tone it down. Either way, I got the information. If I'd made the new element too weak, I might never have really found out how it really works.

There's a further danger in that, as an element that LOOKS weak may be largely ignored in playtesting. But when thousands of players get their hands on the published game, someone will inevitably find out if the innocent-looking game element turns out to be entirely game breaking. I suspect that's how many games that have a dominant strategy came to be - the dominant strategy didn't look so inviting during playtesting.

TL;DR Summary:

5 steps to balancing a game element:
1. Find the Unit.
2. Determine the desired power level of the game element.
3. Design the game elements (keeping steps 1 and 2 in mind).
4. Assess subjective aspects of the game element. Adjust and iterate.
5. Weed out elements that are "too strong" or "too weak."

Rondel Role Selection: A theme emerges!

After a hearty discussion on social media, a theme has emerged for my latest game idea: the Rondel Role Selection thing.

Players are geneticists (or mad scientists), collecting samples of various species in order to splice them and create hybrid beasts of myth and legend...

For example, instead of combining Red, Yellow, and Blue resources into Orange, Green, and Purple resources, players will collect Human, Horse, and Bird DNA, and splice them to make Centaurs, Harpies, and Hippogriffs.

Rather than buying Buildings which confer benefits, players will consume their DNA samples researching the specimen to understand Traits. Mechanically this is the same thing, you exchange your resources for a card that gives you some benefit.

I currently have an even/symmetric distribution of abilities on buildings. I tend to start that way. Multiple different people suggested changing that to make each 'color' have some character - like one color gives you abilities which help you move around the rondel so you can take the action you want more often or at lower cost, another color helps you collect resources more efficiently, and maybe a third is generally worth more points. I could tie that in with actual traits of the beasts represented by the resources... like birds can fly, so the bird DNA could purchase traits that help you move around the rondel, while Humans have opposable thumbs, so maybe they're better at collecting resources (which in this game means getting samples of creatures).

As I mentioned in the previous post about designing Theme-first vs Mecahnics-first, as soon as you have a theme, it helps direct the rest of the mechanisms in the game. I had originally used just 3 basic resources and 3 secondary resources, because using the color wheel made it easy to remember which resources combine to make what. It's a pain to remember X+Y=A, but everyone knows Yellow and Blue make Green... But now that I have a theme, the color mnemonic is no longer necessary - it's relatively easy to remember that a Horse token and a Bird token combine to make the thing that looks like it's got horse parts and bird parts (even if you can't recall what a Hippogriff is called).

So now that I'm not constrained to 3 primary and 3 secondary resources, I am free to add additional resources to the mix... Snakes, Fish, and Lions for example. That gives a lot of possibilities for secondary "resources":

Man + Horse = Centaur
Man + Snake = Gorgon
Man + Bird = Harpy
Man + Lion = Sphynx
Man + Fish = Mermaid
Bird + Horse = Hippogriff
Bird + Snake = Wyvern
Bird + Lion = Griffin
Fish + Horse = Hippocamp (Sea Horse)
Fish + Lion = Merlion (Sea Lion)
Lion + Snake = Chimera (? usually part donky as well)

I don't have anything for the following combinations, but maybe not every combination is necessary...

Bird + Fish = ?

Horse + Snake = ?

Horse + Lion = ?

Fish + Snake = ?

I believe I want the hybrid creatures (the secondary resources) to be worth 1 vp apiece. I think I want to have some Contracts or something like that which translate some hybrid creatures (in some combination) into extra VPs - but some players didn't think that was necessary. 

Instead they wanted the collection of traits that you collect in front of you to be more meaningful - like maybe you turn sets of those in for extra vps - like you're cobbling together traits to create new creatures. This could work, but in my mind, combining basic resources into secondary resources wasn't supposed to be the final step in the process. I'm not sure why but it feels anticlimactic to me. I envisioned collecting basic resources, combining them into secondary resources, then combining those into VPs via "buildings." I'll have to give this part some more thought...

But first, I probably want to consider expanding the game to 6 basic resources. I think I can still do that with 7 action tiles - maybe each action allows you to do any 1 of three things (as a Privilege maybe you can do 2 of them)... Collect a basic resource, combine two different compatible basic resources, or research a trait based on a different basic resource. That may be a lot of info per action tile, but maybe not too much.

I'll be sure to post the progress of this game. Leave a comment with our thoughts - I'd love to see what you think about this theme, or the mechanics of this game!

"Templar" Rules revisited

I just wanted to update the rules here, for my own benefit, for the Knights Templar Rond-cala game. With my new Rondel game showing promise, perhaps I'll have the impetus to revisit the prototype of this one as well...

Updated: 10/26/14 after first playtest

The Knights Templar

A game of influence and scandal for 2-4 Crusaders

Components

• 64 Building tiles (16 in each of 4 player colors)
  
  • 16 Churches
  • 16 Castles
  • 16 Farms
  • 16 Banks
• 4 Player boards
• 48 Action cubes (12 in each of 4 player colors)
• 16 Knight figures (4 in each of 4 player colors)
• 1 Game board
• 30? Enemy tokens
  
  • 10? Slav
  • 10? Saracen
  • 10? Prussians
• 28 Troop tiles (7 for each player)
• 150? points worth of Influence tokens

Setup

• Each player receives the following in their player color:
  
  • Player board
  • 4 Knight figures
  • 16 Building tiles (place them in the indicated spaces on the player board)
    
    • 4 Churches
    • 4 Castles
    • 4 Farms
    • 4 Banks
  • 12 Action cubes (place 2 in each Action bin on the Player board)
  • 7 Troop tokens (numbered 3 through 9)

Lay out the Game board and distribute the Enemy tokens to the regions indicated by icons. Each player takes their Level 1 Castle building and places it on their indicated starting region along with one of their Knight figures.

Place the Influence tokens in a supply pile. Choose a starting player at random and you are ready to begin!

Game Play

Starting with the Start player, play will progress clockwise throughout the game. A player's turn consists of the following sequence:

1. Choose any one Action bin on your player board.
2. Resolve the action associated with that Action bin.
3. Distribute the Action cubes from the chosen bin.

1. Choose an Action
Select any one of the six Actions on the Rondel that has at least 1 Action cube in its bin.

2. Resolve the Action
There are six Action spaces on the Rondel, though 2 of them are the same. Each of the Actions resolves differently. In each of the following descriptions, "X" refers to the number of Action cubes in the Action bin.

• TRAVEL: There are 2 different TRAVEL spaces on the Rondel. The travel action allows you to move your Knights on the game board.
  • Distribute X movement points between your Knight figure(s).
  • Entering any region costs 1 movement point.
  • Leaving a region occupied by an enemy token costs 1 additional movement point.
• MUSTER: The muster action allows you to muster troops to take crusading with your knights. 
• Each Farm you have erected adds 1 to the number of action cubes in the Muster bin. 
• Collect the next Troop token from your supply - its cost must be less than or equal to X.
• Your board has 2 spaces to hold Troops. Each Farm you have erected confers an additional space to hold a Troop token. [might reduce this to 1]
• CRUSADE: The crusade action allows you to fight Enemies, scoring influence and clearing regions to make space for more buildings.
• Choose 1 region containing one of your Knight figures and an Enemy token.
• Determine the Enemy Strength by checking the Enemy Strength track for the appropriate enemy type.
• Each Troop token adds 1 to the number of action cubes in the Crusade bin. If the Enemy Strength is less than or equal to X, you have won the Crusade. Otherwise you have not.
• When you win a Crusade, collect Influence tokens equal to the Enemy Strength and then move the Enemy token to the appropriate Enemy Strength track. 
• When you lose a Crusade, do nothing.
• INFLUENCE: The influence action allows you to gain Influence tokens by spreading the word of the Order.
• Each Church you have erected adds 1 to the number of action cubes in the Influence bin.
• Collect X Influence tokens from the supply.
• BUILD: The build action allows you to erect buildings that confer influence and benefits when resolving the various actions in the game.
  
  • Each Bank you have erected adds 1 to the number of action cubes in the Build bin. 
  • Erect a Building tile costing X or less from your player board onto a region on the board occupied by one of your Knights. (Buildings of level 1/2/3/4 cost 3/5/7/9)
  • A building cannot be erected in a region with an Enemy tile.
  • Each region may only contain 1 building.
  • Only the lowest un-built level of each building may be erected.
  • Collect influence equal to the level of the building erected (1, 2, 3, or 4)
  • • Building Types:
      
      • Bank: Add 1 to the action cubes in the Build action bin.
      • Farm: Add 1 to the action cubes in the Muster action bin. You may house 1 additional Troop tile.
      • Castle: Place an additional Knight token into play at the new Castle.
      • Church: Add 1 to the action cubes in the Influence action bin.

3. Distribute Action cubes
Take all Action cubes from the bin associated with the chosen Action and distribute them, 1 at a time, clockwise around the Rondel. See example diagram.

Game End
"God is not pleased. We have enemies of the faith in the kingdom"
When the last Influence token is taken from the supply, finish out the round so that each player has had the same number of turns*. At this point, the Order of the Temple has become so powerful that King Philip, threatened by the Order and deeply in debt to it, issues an arrest order for all Templar Knights and begins to have the Order disbanded.

* Players may still collect influence after the supply runs out. Keep track of this influence using some other token.


After all players have finished their turn in the round in which the Influence supply runs out, the End Game phase begins. Flip the starting Castle buildings (in the Paris region) face down - they are considered destroyed. Whenever a building (or knight) is destroyed, each player collects 1 Influence for each building of that type they still have in play.

Then destroy all buildings (and knights) in regions adjacent to a region that's already been destroyed. Flip the destroyed buildings face down (simultaneously) and collect influence for like buildings (and knights) each time.

Continue this wave of destruction until all buildings and knights have been destroyed. The player with the most Influence is the winner.

Theme-first vs Mechanics-first design (also Yet Another New Game Idea (YANGI)... Rondel Role Selection)

Theme-first vs Mechanics-first Game Design

Frequently in game design forums, the topic of "Theme-first vs Mechanics-first" comes up. It's a common question asked of designers in interviews as well. In game design circles, this is the Chicken/Egg discussion all over again.

Every designer has their own answer to whether they start with a theme or a mechanism, and many of them would probably agree that both methods are feasible. I've personally done it both ways, but I think my preference is probably theme-first, which tends to make for a more thematically consistent game.

But in reality, I think it's an iterative process. Whether you begin with "I want to make a Civ game" or "I want to make a game with just 16 cards, where each card has an Action, an Icon (supporting one of those actions), and a Color"... either one can end up in the same place. In the case of my recent game MicroCiv, I started with that mechanism, and I needed a theme that could support 4 different aspects. I decided pretty quickly that a Civ game could support that with actions such as Conquer, Explore, Discover (technologies), and Culture. Once I had that theme, I was able to more specifically define each of the actions in my game, and it informed the other components necessary (territories and technologies).

I think most of the time I start with a theme, but even in those cases I might have a main mechanism in mind. Or perhaps it's more accurate to say that I often have a main mechanism in mind, I look for a theme to use it with, and then I let the theme direct how the rest of the game shapes up. So even when starting with a mechanism, I pretty much approach a design "theme-first."

That said, I have a new game idea, now fully prototyped and played, and this one has no theme as yet. It's been completely mechanics first, and as a result, the game feels very much like a Eurogame to me... which was kind of my goal, so I guess that's a good thing. However, it's possible the game is lacking due to a missing theme.

TL;DR Summary:
Even if you start with a main mechanism, it's best to find a theme early and let that drive later design decisions - it makes for a lot more thematic consonance and therefore a stronger game.

YANGI: Rondel Role Selection

Here's the current status of this new game, which has no title or theme at all, so for now I'll call it "Rondel Role Selection":

I have always really liked the idea of the Rondel mechanism. Mac Gerdts has built several games around this mechanism, and several of those have been excellent - I've liked Antike, Hamburgum, and the best one, Navegador. I didn't as much care for Imperial, but the Rondel works well there as well.

Stefan Feld used a variant of the Rondel in his recent hit Trajan, combined with a Mancala mechanism. When I read about that, I had an idea how that "Rond-cala" mechanism might work (as it turns out, I was wrong), so I have some designs on using my incorrect assumption for the Rond-cala. One of these days I'd like to get back to that. Somehow the idea of a Rondel came back to me the other day, and I started to devise another game...

In this new idea there is a rondel, made up of 7 Action tiles laid out in a circle. There's an 8th spot in the circle which does not have an action tile, in that space a pawn is placed. Unlike other Rondel games, this game just uses 1 pawn, not 1 pawn per player.

On your turn, you will advance the pawn clockwise around the Rondel - the 1st space is free. If you want to move further you can, but you must leave a coin on each space you pass over. Whichever action tile you land on, you pick up... you get to keep any coins that are on that tile, and this is the action you will do. After the action is completed, that tile will be replaced in the open space left by the pawn. So the order of the tiles will change over the course of the game, as players decide to jump ahead on the Rondel.

The actions on the Rondel are actually a Role Selection game. Like Puerto Rico, there's a privilege for the player taking the action, and then there's an action that all players get to participate in. In all cases, players may choose to take a coin instead of the action or the privilege.

The actions in the game are:
* Buy Red cubes for $1 OR Sell Green cubes for money (Privilege = Collect Red cube)
* Buy Blue cubes for $1 OR Sell Orange cubes for money  (Privilege = Collect Blue cube)
* Buy Yellow cubes for $1 OR Sell Purple cubes for money  (Privilege = Collect Yellow cube)
* Buy any cube for $2 OR Build any building (Privilege = Buy any cube for $1)
* Combine Red and Yellow cubes into Orange for $1 OR Buy a Blue building (Privilege = Combine Red and Yellow cubes into Orange)
* Combine Red and Blue cubes into Purple for $1 OR Buy a Yellow building (Privilege = Combine Red and Blue cubes into Purple)
* Combine Blue and Yellow cubes into Green for $1 OR Buy a Red building (Privilege = Combine Blue and Yellow cubes into Green)

Then there are buildings of each color that give you some points and abilities/benefits which I hope will encourage players to want different actions or specific actions, which will make them want to jump ahead on the Rondel.

The game will end when one of the Building stacks runs out, and at that time players will count the score from all of their buildings, plus 1 point for each Green, Orange, and Purple cubes (no points for Red, Yellow, or Blue cubes)

So far the game definitely works, and while it definitely needs some tweaks to the buildings (and a theme!), I think it's well on the way to being a proper "Mediocre Euro."

One small step for games, One giant leap for game kind!

In 2012, Lover Letter and Coup came out and grabbed the attention of the hobby game world. These two games have basically defined a new genre of gaming - a genre that's always existed, but until now hasn't really been "a thing." These two games have started a "microgame" revolution, and over the last year more and more people have jumped on board.

What is a "microgame?" Simply put, a microgame is a game with minimal components and a minimal footprint. Love Letter and Coup consist of just 15 or 16 cards and some tokens, they are highly portable, don't take very long, but still provide a fun and interesting game experience.  As such, these types of games make excellent fillers - they fit in nicely while waiting for people to arrive, or while another game wraps up. They're also great to take on the go, so you can always have a game on hand. Most of these microgames can be played almost anywhere, not taking up much table space.

Over the last year or so, the whole idea of microgames has become very popular. Many games have been promoted with portability as a selling point, and people are excited to get a lot of bang for just a little buck. As it happens, these low component games tend to come with a lower price tag as well, and when the prices of board games have been climbing, I'm sure the lower cost of entry is a factor. Right this minute I'm listening to Dice Hate Me's State of Games podcast which is all about mini, micro, and portable games, in which Chris, Darrell, and TC each list off their favorite portable games.

Michael is a fan of this format, and to take it a step further he's happy to have found a way to deliver such a game in an affordable manner. So long as a game does not exceed 1/4" in thickness and 3 ounces in weight, the USPS considers it a letter with a non-machinable surcharge rather than a parcel, which makes a huge difference in shipping cost. He's already leveraged this discovery in 2 Kickstarter projects: Dungeon Roll Winter Promo had 5 cards and a punchboard, and Michael's own Werewolf style game, Templar Intrigue, had just 10 cards. Due to the inexpensive shipping and minimal components of these games, Michael has been able to use a Kickstarter format he's been wanting to use for a long time: Pay what you want. He's included a minimum just to cover delivery, but he's allowed backers to pay whatever they want beyond that. Those 2 projects were successful, so TMG is at it again with Coin Age, by Adam McIver. Coin Age is currently on Kickstarter, and it has caught fire - the game consists of merely a map card and pocket change.

Edit: Due to the overwhelming success of the Kickstarter project so far, an additional map has been added, and we're likely to reach another stretch goal to add a 3rd!

This format is beginning to catch on, and mini- or microgames have been seen on Kickstarter from several publishers. Games such as Council of Verona, from Crash Games, for example. Or their 5 card so called "nanogame" Where Art Thou Romeo in the same universe (currently on Kickstarter as well). Patrick Nickell has embraced the Pay What You Want format for WATR as well.

As I've posted before, I've thrown my hat in the microgame ring... MicroCiv is a 2 player (maybe 3 player) civ game with just 18 cards and 16 tiles, which I will eventually re-theme to the Eminent Domain universe. In addition to that, I designed a free game for my Twitter followers called Quick Change, which uses nothing but 10 coins and 3 dice per player. I'm playing around with a card game similar to Quick Change which is playable with a standard playing card deck.

TMG has some more portable games lined up from some of our favorite designers that I'm not at liberty to talk about yet. It's interesting to see the breadth of design space with such strict component limits. At BGDF.com we have a Game Design Showdown each month which similarly challenges designers to come up with a game based on some arbitrary theme, mechanics, or component restrictions. This reminds me of those challenges.

On one hand, it's exciting to see the enthusiasm people have for these small games. On the other hand, for the pessimistic lover of deeper games, it's worrisome that people may gravitate away from the 1-2 hour long strategy games in favor of these 15-30 minute games which are, almost by definition, not as deep or complex. I'm pretty sure that concern is for nothing, but it would be a shame to see my favorite types of games go by the wayside because they're just not as profitable as microgames - they take a lot more time and work to create, they cost a lot more to produce, and they cannot be delivered in any logistically efficient manner.

So when looking at these small games, I try to keep an eye out for that "bang for the buck" metric. I'm personally most interested in games with as much depth, complexity, and replayability as can be packed into these tiny packages. As a player of economic, resource management eurogames, I'm especially excited by one of the TMG submissions we've got right now... it's a small game, just 30 or so cards and some markers, but it plays like a full-on worker placement, resource management, economic strategy game. I'm looking forward to that one, and I'm hoping I can pack as much punch into MicroCiv as possible. On the down side, complexity tends to make a game less accessible, but on the up side, it makes the game more replayable and in my opinion it makes for a much more worthwhile game experience.

One more thing about these PWYW kickstarter projects... I'm happy to find that with such a small component cost, people seem to be willing to pay more than the minimum. That seems to indicate that, so long as the component cost isn't too high, people really do value game content after all! I wonder if that would work for a bigger, more expensive game, or if a "Pay What You Want, minimum $30" would effectively translate into "this game costs $30." At < $5 it's easier to throw in an extra buck or two, but at $30 I'm not sure people will be so willing.

Almost 1000 Twitter followers - time to celebrate!

At the time of this posting, I have 990 Twitter followers. That's not a whole lot, all told, but it seems like a lot to me... so I feel like it's something worth celebrating.

I don't tweet as much as I'd like, and I don't always have something interesting to say... but whenever I ask, the followers who reply invariably mention that they're interested in game news and game design stuff.

So what better way to celebrate this milestone than with a game to play?

When I hit 1000 Twitter followers, I will share with them a new, fun little game that I have designed just for this occasion!

I just played this game a bunch and refined the rules, and my roommate and I had a good time with it. It uses components you have lying around the house, so you can create a copy of the game with no trouble or cost at all (approx. $0.64 per player - $1.39 per player if you go out and buy dice). So if you want to get the rules to this game, then follow @sedjtroll on Twitter!

The Lesser of Two Evils, Winds of Fate v5.0 and MicroCiv v3.0 - More testing and Further updates

Josh Tempkin is a guy from Maryland who comes into Tucson once a year for Thanksgiving. A few years ago he contacted me out of the blue saying he would be in town and asking if there happened to be a chance to do some gaming while he was here. So every year since then Josh will come over for an evening or two for some games, and since he's a designer type, we'll often play some prototypes. So there you go, when going to a new place, sometimes you can contact the gaming community there and make a new friend, just like that! As a side note, last night I found out that I went to high school with his cousin (small world, I guess).

Friday and Saturday Josh came over and we played a few games, including a dice game of his called Lesser Evil, Odysseus: Winds of Fate, and my attempt at a deeper-than-average microgame: MicroCiv.

Lesser Evil

Since this is Josh's game, I don't want to say too much about it (I don't know how public it is). As a dice game, it wasn't my favorite type of game to begin with, and in this case I didn't feel like I had the flexibility I would have liked in using the tools I was given to deal with my die rolls.

There's a dynamic that I dislike in games wherein you are forced to make a choice, then find out later (based on a die roll) if you chose correctly. This dynamic exists in some well respected games such as Stefan Feld titles Macao and Bruges - so it's obviously not a "bad" dynamic... just one I don't care for. Lesser Evil had a bit of that in it.

Finally, as the title suggests, it seems like when presented with a meaningful decision in the game, it's often trying to decide between 2 bad options... which is a feeling I also don't care for.

So all in all, while Lesser Evil was a solid game mechanically, it was really not my style of game, and it served to reinforce in my mind how I don't care for that "insufficient info" dynamic.

Odysseus: Winds of Fate

After the recent playtests of WoF at BGGcon, and the revamping of the game that followed, I was really excited to play the latest version of the game. I spent much of Thanksgiving day updating the prototype, and I was all ready to see a great leap of progress when it hit the table, as I was finally incorporating some of the comments from several years ago that have been percolating but have never been tried.

While some of the additions did feel good, unfortunately the playtest was pretty much a "crash and burn." This was pretty disappointing, because I expected it to work at least as well as last weeks games... though to be honest I did have some reservations about some of it.

Some designers will tell you that you shouldn't change more than 1 variable test-to-test, so that if the game stops working you'll know what broke it. I don't subscribe to that. Not to pat my own back or anything, but I feel like most of the time I can compartmentalize how a given change will (or has) affected the game, and so I don't mind changing multiple variables, and if/when that does screw the game up, I don't mind (I actually kind of enjoy) figuring out which thing (or combination of things) caused the problem. I find that progress is far too slow if I only change 1 aspect or variable at a time. Testing time is a commodity in short supply, and there just isn't time to play a whole game just to make sure one small tweak does what I thought it would do.

In this case, I made several big changes. Some of those did not work like I wanted them to, while others did seem promising. Here are some of the things I tried, based on old ideas from years past, as well as recent comments from BGGcon playtests:

* Change payout for Timeline and Destiny bets.
I had most recently been using 30vp divided evenly between players who bet correctly. Some of last weeks players didn't like how that didn't work the same way a bet on a horse race would work, and they suggested making the payoff based on the total number of bets. So instead of 30vp, make it Xvp divided evenly between players making the correct Destiny bet, where X is some multiple of the total number of Destiny bets placed (correct or incorrect). That way, when placing a bet, you're adding to the prize pool, rather than further subdividing a static number.

I wasn't in love with this idea, as the 30vp seemed to be working the way I wanted it to, and this new system seemed like it would likely be very similar, but more mathy and confusing to explain, but in principle it did seem stronger thematically, so I thought I'd give it a try. While explaining the game I immediately realized it was going to be a problem. The comment had come up late in the game at BGGcon, when there was already a number of bets out there, so there was something to be won by placing a bet. But when there are no bets out there, the incentive to put one out there is very small. There would need to be some starting prize pool, or there's no reason to bet. One solution is to force people to begin the game with some Destiny bets, which might be a good idea anyway. That would seed the prize pool with N bets worth of prize. Another solution to that is to remove the standard 2vp per bet in your inventory, so the ONLY way you can score is by placing that bet... but I don't like that for a few reasons. Another solution is to add a minimum payoff, which is just more pieces and more rules to govern this small piece of the game. A variation on that last solution is to make that minimum 30vp and then never increase it - that is to say go back to what I had that worked :)

* Remove all in-game vp and make it all Bet cubes.
I thought this sounded very elegant, but in combination with another change it caused a bit of a problem. I will see if I can salvage this idea, because if I can avoid a score track, or vp chits, then that would be nice. I'd love to just count up score at the end of the game.

* Cube icon = Get cube OR place bet.
This was a way to get more betting into the game, but in combination with the change above (get cubes instead of vp), there were an awful lot of these icons around, and as a result, players could place an awful lot of Timeline bets and Destiny bets, potentially more than 1 at a time. I didn't like that dynamic, especially if not restricted as to where you can place your Timeline bets. It led to a lot of last second betting on the obviously correct outcome.

* Path bets are all free, and every turn.
Something I tried at BGGcon (in the 2nd game, but not the first) was allowing players to place a 'free' Path bet (from the general supply) each round. This turned out to be a really good addition, and one I'd intended but forgot about. The idea is that path bets communicate your intent and allow for temporary collaboration or alliances between players. When you had to place earned bets as path bets, there were far fewer path bets out there, which was not as good.

Path bets used to pay off 6vp divided between bets, and I liked that level of payoff. However, originally it cost you 2vp because you had to give up a bet chip, so the net payoff was 4vp if you were alone, or 1vp if another player shared your bet. When moving to an "all cubes" payoff/scoring system, the idea was that you would simply collect the cube off the board (which came from the general supply), netting you 2vp. If you were alone in the bet, you get an additional cube (net 4vp). This seems in line with my desired balance. I think I liked this change, so maybe possible to maintain the "score only at the end" format. I might restrict the Path bets to 2 cubes per path, to avoid all players piling on to the same path, further differentiating them, and maybe strengthening the temporary alliance aspect.

* Timeline and Destiny bets are earned, you CAN place Timeline bets where other bets are.
At BGGcon we played that you got a free Path bet each round, AND each round you could place one of your earned cubes onto either a Destiny card or the Timeline. However, I restricted Timeline bets to placing only where no other bet exists. There was some discussion about whether that was necessary. I think it's absolutely necessary at the outset (Troy Encounter) to create player differentiation, but I'm not sure it's really necessary for earned Timeline bets. I still like that restriction though, as it lends a lot of value to the "move Bet" reward tiles, which I even powered up to "move your bet up to 2 spaces" rather than just 1 space.

In this new test I removed the restriction for earned bets, and it became a big problem, especially with the frequency players could earn bets. When it becomes obvious the game will end, you can pile 2-3 bets on the correct Timeline space fairly easily, which is a bit ridiculous - it's supposed to be a long-term, strategic bet. This will get better with more limited opportunity to bet, but I still think I prefer the restriction (especially with the beefed up Move Bet reward).

Rather than giving each player the opportunity to place their cubes as Timeline/Destiny bets each round, I would like to go back to an "earned bet" format, where you have to get some reward allowing you to place those bets. So the main betting will be the free Path bets, and the initial Timeline (and Destiny) bets, and there are several opportunities to place more Destiny bets over the course of the game, just not every turn for all players.

I like that the opportunity allows you to invest early in a particular outcome, but if it becomes clear that another outcome will occur, you can start investing in that one... but if you can get your early investment to come true then you will make out ahead. I don't like multiple Destiny bets at the last minute dropped on to the clearly correct outcome. This will likely fix itself when bet opportunities are reduced.

* Adding God tiles to locations, and gods to the Olympus deck.
A suggestion from the Spielbany group (circa 2009) was to add more gods to the game. They thought there wasn't enough reason to want Odysseus to go to one location over another (which really means my Encounter effects aren't pulling their weight - I've since amplified them, but they're still not enough), and one suggestion to make such incentives was to add god tiles to the locations, which players could collect and score as set collection. I would have preferred if the encounter effects offered players the incentives they needed to drive Odysseus around the board, but I did very much like the idea of adding more gods to the game. Over the last 4 years I'd considered many different ways to accomplish this - restructuring the Help/Hinder decks to include more gods than just Poseidon and Athena, etc.

I finally figured out a way I thought would work better, and I finally updated the prototype to include those god tiles! First of all, the bonus for highest contribution to an adventure is that you get the god tile (rather than a bet chip, or some VP). At the end of the game, each god scores 0/1/3 cubes (which is to say 0/2/6vp) for having 1/2/3 of that god's tiles. In addition, I've added those 3 gods to the Olympus deck (which makes all kinds of sense), and when they come up they trigger an effect for players who hold their tiles: Hades allows the player to choose to have Odysseus lose crew, Dionysus allows the player to choose to have Odysseus gain crew, and Hermes allows the player to draw some Adventure cards.

I like the way this worked, EXCEPT, as evidenced by the speed at which this particular game ended, there isn't enough time to collect these things and have them trigger. So I've got some revisions which I hope will help that out.

There might have been some other details that probably didn't go as well as I would have liked, but that was the main stuff. So here's the new plan, which I already incorporated into the prototype:

* God tiles and stuff...
For one thing, I didn't have a god tile at Troy or Ithaca (and Ithaca is a double adventure), so I made 3 Zeus tiles. Zeus does not give any in-game benefits, but he'll act as a wild for end-game scoring. Maybe I'll limit it to 1 Zeus per 'set,' so you can't get 2 Zeus and 3 Hades and score a bajillion points off of that.

I revised the Olympus deck so that each card has 2 Gods on it. Now each of the triggerable gods appears on 3 different Olympus cards, and therefore will trigger more often.

I added "draw an Olympus card and resolve its effect" to one of the Encounter tiles (I should probably add it to another) to get more triggering in there.

I added Reward tiles that you keep in front of you as a God tile (Hades, Hermes, and Dionysus). I also added Reward tiles that basically trigger your god tiles (i.e. "Lose 1 crew per Hades god tile") which will therefore have variable value for different players.

I added cards to the Help/Hinder deck that you keep in front of you as God tiles as well, so it should be much easier to get God tiles (there are a total of 6 of each), as well as cards that trigger your god tiles (which you would play as a special action instead of contributing to the Help/Hinder total). Side note: I wanted those special actions to count against your personal contribution (toward the bonus, now a god tile), but not necessarily count against your overall contribution to the Help/Hinder total. So what I think I'll try is that if you play any card face up for the special action, you are simply disqualified from the bonus altogether, then there's no confusing negative numbers in there. And of course the value on the face up card becomes 0 as well.

So in the end I think I'll reward 0/1/3/6 cubes (that's 0/2/6/12vp) for 1/2/3/4+ god tiles. I could maybe go on another step and reward 10 cubes (20vp) for 5+ god tiles of a type, but that seems like an awful lot, especially with how much access I've added now.

* Reward tiles...
As I mentioned, I added gods to the reward tiles. I am unsure which way I want to go, so I actually added 2 sets... 3 tiles with just the gods and 3 more with the triggers, and then another 3 tiles that act as both (take this as a god tile, then trigger your god tiles of that type). The latter seems really busy, so I'm leaning toward the former.

A suggestion from a player came up that actually reverts back to one of the original ideas for determining crew loss... instead of all of the reward tiles contributing to crew loss, I could reveal N+2 reward tiles, and have only the unclaimed tiles contribute to crew loss. This does a couple of things...
- It allows players to simply grab the tile they want (then deal with it and discard it back to the supply), which is an instinct that many players have had.
- It allows for later turn order players to get more choice of reward, rather than being forced to take something that may not be useful. This may backfire - if there are enough "good" tiles to go around, then players may just pass early. I guess we'll see. This might be why I moved away from that mechanism.
- It allows players to influence crew loss more directly, especially later turn order players. If you want Odysseus to die, maybe leave the reward tiles with larger numbers. If you want him to survive, maybe prioritize those. I expect this consideration to be secondary much of the time, but it could be really interesting, and it harkens back to one of the original mechanisms which got removed somewhere along the line.
- It might also allow for simpler setup, as if there's always N+2 tiles, then there's a constant average crew loss over the different player counts, so there could be the same starting crew across all player counts.
- With this sort of control over crew loss, maybe it would be wise to simplify the Crew Loss rules to say that no matter whether Odysseus wins or loses, he always loses crew according to the unclaimed Reward tiles... rather than "Lose 1 if he wins, X if he loses."

Another thing I did was add an "Advance Round Marker" reward tile, and a "Place Timeline Bet" reward tile. I'm tempted to keep the restriction of placing where no other bet exists, but as this may be the only way to actually add timeline bets now, maybe it would be acceptable to allow placing where bets already are. Should it be disallowed to bet immediately in front of the round marker (like Path bets are disallowed immediately in front of the boat)?

* Destiny.
There are still 2 Reward tiles which offer a Destiny action, and I've added a special action in each deck which allows a Destiny action as well. I added Destiny actions to 3 of the encounter tiles (each player in turn order would take a Destiny action), and I hope that doesn't lead to players all piling onto the same Destiny card. I guess we'll see. I believe I will return to the 30vp prize pool for both the Timeline bet and the Destiny bet.

* Stranded at Sea.
There's always been a concern that it might be much harder to strand Odysseus than it is to kill him or get him home safe. There are several ways to advance the round counter: 1 card in each deck, 1 Encounter that advances it, one encounter that advances it twice, and 1 additional advance each time Odysseus revisits any number of face down encounter tiles in a row. I'm not sure why that isn't "for each" face down encounter tile - I probably thought that would be too much advancing of the round counter. Well, I thought I'd try changing that, and adding a Reward tile to advance the counter as well. Hopefully now the game end will be approximately evenly split between Stranded, Dead, and Home Safe.

* The Death Spiral.
The board includes a "death spiral" - a series of encounters that, once visited, create a loop, and if revisited (by definition taking a Stormy path) will result in the game end, as Odysseus will lose all his crew, 1 by 1. With the addition of an hourglass symbol (which advances the round marker) to the backs of the tiles, now that death spiral does not have an obvious effect. Sure, if he enters the loop the game will be over, and Odysseus will not make it home, but it's not clear on which round the game will end, nor whether it will end due to the crew dying, or due to the round counter flying off the track. I mean, it'll be calculable when it happens, but the point is that depending on the game state (what round it is and how much crew Odysseus has left), the Death Spiral could support either a Dead result or a Stranded result, and it could end the game on a variety of rounds.

MicroCiv (v3.2 PnP PDF)

Wow, that got long. I actually started this blog post to talk about the updates to MicroCiv! I played a few games of it with Josh and also Dave and John, and I like the direction it has gone. However, I still felt like certain things weren't right. After the latest games and discussion I have updated the prototype again (see link above for v3.0 PDF). Here's a summary of changes:

* Territories.
I like the mix of Territories, but I thought the 2-cost ones weren't good enough, and 2-cost is almost trivial, while 3 cost requires a little more investment. So I changed all the 2-cost Territories to 3-cost, added a Population (1vp) to each, and gave them colors as well.

I like the 2 different 4-cost territories, one that gives +1 defense but no extra points, and one that gives a lot of scoring potential, but has relatively low defense. I thought it would be good to add a 3rd 4-cost into the mix, which gives a straight 2 Pop, and has 5 defense.

* Techs.
I'm pretty darn happy with the techs, but the +1 Pop tech seemed like something to be avoided, just not attractive enough to give up in-game benefit for. Josh suggested making it 2 pop, but I thought it would be much more interesting (and possibly better thematically) to make it a City instead. So now it's worth 0-2 points, depending on how many Politics cards you've got. Maybe it would be interesting to make it *2* cities... maybe that's a metropolis or something, worth 0, 2, or 4 Population. Too much?

* Cards.
For the most part I'm happy with the cards. I did think it was a little too easy to double up on the Discover action, especially with a Discover icon available in the tech, so I upped that to 4 icons required. I feel that puts it more on par with the big Explore and Conquer actions.

The Politics card (Scout) that says "play another card" - I realized that what I really meant was "play another Action" (in other words, instead of playing a card, you could choose to pick up your discards). So I've made that change. I also added "play another action" to the Culture card that lets you swap with the supply. It seems like that card isn't as useful as I'd hoped, and now it allows you to grab a card that you want and then use it right away, maybe that'll make it useful enough.

The other Politics card (Trade) that attempted to allow a player to trade Territories or Techs with another player or the supply just did not work right. I have redone that card, based on a suggestion from Josh... apparently there's some game which has a similar mechanism, and it has a card that allows you to swap the card with a card from your opponent's discard pile. So why not try that? I am not certain I like it, and I think it'll mostly be used at the last minute to grab up good scoring card (or snatch one away from the opponent), but maybe that's ok. As a Politics card, it also permanently reveals a Territory (owned or not).

The Culture action that lets you sweep the supply just doesn't seem to get used. I beefed it up in the last update to add "play another card" (and of course by that I mean "action"), but I still don't see it being used much. As a complement to the "swap with someone's discard" card, I have tried adding this "While this card is in your discard pile, you get +1 Defense." I'll see how interesting that is (it seems like a really interesting dynamic). Note also that when picking up your discards, you'll lose that defense! Of course you can get it back the following turn.

Finally, for potentially thematic and potentially logistical reasons, I swapped the Culture actions on the Yellow and Green cards. Probably not a big deal.

New print and play files are available, if you are so inclined. I think the game is really shaping up, and is almost "done!"

MicroCiv update

I got several chances to play and revise MicroCiv while I was in Dallas, and with each iteration I believe the game has become better.

I have updated the file linked from my previous blog post (and since updated the game further - it is now called Eminent Domain: Microcosm) to reflect the current version. Please feel free to try it out and tell me what you think. It's only 18 cards and 15 tokens.

For those following this game's development, here's a summary of the changes I've made since the last post:
* Changed the "Pop" icon to a "City" to avoid confusion with Population terminology (originally the "Pop" cards simply scored 1 point, now they score 1 point per card and Territory of a particular color)
* Added 2 cards (Scout and Trade actions which let you peek at the back of a face down Territory (owned or not)). These cards score for number of Cities.
* Changed Technology to less of a tug-of-war. Now the Tech tokens have icons for Explore, Conquer, Discover, +1 Defense, and +1 Pop. With a Discover action, you can take the one you want, or make an opponent discard one back to the supply.
* Drat, I forgot I was going to change "Discover" to "Invent" or some other term that is more different than "Explore". Oh well, maybe next update.
* Significant changes to the Territory tiles (now there are 4 1-cost, 4 2-cost, and 2 4-cost, with more interesting benefits)

That's probably about it. If you print it out and try it, please leave a comment below to let me know what you think. Enjoy!