Many playground games will allow players unlimited time or turns to achieve the game objectives. Classics like risk or diplomacy have open-ended playground style structure allowing great freedom (and sometimes very lengthy games).
Many Euro Style games have adopted a limited turn length for the game, allowing a finite period in which to achieve objectives for strive for victory. In a victory point based game like Project KQ, I have opted to explore a limited number of turns for the game. This combined with the dynamic nature of the board, should add weight to the decisions players make toward objectives, while at the same time giving a very clear idea of over-all play time for the game itself.
In my gaming group, sometimes play-time is about as important as fun. We often like to crank out 2 or 3 games on a friday evening, giving multiple opportunities for a 'win' and ensuring that no one gets 'the screw' for the entire evening. With player elimination/unlimited playground games like Diplomacy and Risk mentioned above, this is not possible.
Attached is a late-prototype of the turn tracker mat for Project KQ. It limits the game, and provides an opportunity to get rules onto the table so that players do not have to continue referencing the rulebook or cheat sheets during game play.
For preplanned expansions/scenarios for the game, I have designed a couple of turn-track overlays that change some of the dynamics of the game to suit the specific objectives outlined in the expansion/scenario. I am also working on a turn-track overlay that includes a 100% cooperative play game (no traitors) that could appeal to a particular demographic of euro-style board gamers.
Note: I'm toying with the notion of moving Castle Improvement rules off the player mat, onto the Turn Mat, leaving only built/unbuilt indicators on the player mat. This choice would be for design cleanliness, and a better UX or IA for the game. (UX = User Experience; IA = Information Architecture).
Comments
Personally I find limiting
Personally I find limiting the number of turns an example of lazy game design. Imo a game should lead itself naturally towards conclusion and if it doesn't then limiting the number of turns is just an arbitrary band-aid.
Risk, for example, is notoriously fickle in endgame; it can last from one hour to several days. Limiting the number of turns to a set number such as in "2210" version is just... cheap. By simply changing the goals you can lead the game much more naturally towards the ending, such as in Paranoia Risk variant where the game lasts 1.5-2hr regularly, simply because the logic of the game and player psychology nudge it so.
Imo, in a scoring game it is much more elegant and exciting to have the game goal to be a race towards a certain score than a set number of turns with a score count at the end. Another option is to have an arbitrary limiter such as "when there are no more cards in the draw deck" or "when a certain card is played". Some games derive a lot of fun by giving the players a way to influence exactly when the game will end (such as Citadels, for example) so they can manoeuver to have the highest score at the moment they play the "end game" card.
It's just my 2 cents and a matter of taste, but set number of turns is just... meh to me.
Theme, theme, theme
My current design has a natural round-based ending and a victory-based ending. It's a civ-builder that moves through history in distinct chunks, using cards as its timer. The cards run out somewhere north of the year 2000, beyond which there's no history through which we can move. Game over.
So is your design self-limiting in this way, or are you imposing a limit? I agree with teriyaki, that if there is no natural end to the gameplay, there should be no time/turn/round-based end imposed on the game. What you should probably look to design instead is a natural end to the gameplay.
Good thoughts here. Some of
Good thoughts here. Some of the planned scenarios have endings that are very natural some are more playgroundish. I'll have to think more.