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Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

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Anonymous

Hi!

general
I´m making a strategy game that has very simple fights since i usally dislike the w8ing time in strategy games fights. The game overall is not simple, its quite complex with lots of choises and so on. The object of the game is to destroy your opponents or gain victory by owning 75% of the board.

Fights
the fights will be quite simple, i havent decided how they will be done (but i´ve playtested both with the same problem:

1. All units have an attack and a defence number, you can only attack a unit with a lower defence number than youre attack number, when you attack you kill (or damage their unit, probably kill so it takes less time). So if a unit with A=5 attackes a unit with D=3 the defender dies, a unit with A=3 cant attack a unit with D=5.

2. The other alternative im working on is nearly the same as the last one, the difference is that both units in the fight get to roll a die, so if a A=5 attackes a unit with D=3 the defender has to roll 2 more than the attacker (so the score is equal and no1 dies). The problem with this is that i dont like lucky players since im usally unlucky and that it can drain lots of time because it can be lots of fights with no winner...

My problem
The problem in my game is to make it more exiting, when we have playtested all (good) players have just been camping and gaining resourses/defending and gaining resourses, and then we had a big fight and the lucky (or the player who had been most tactical while gaining) player won.
The map looks a little like risk or diplomacy (world map) and i need help with how i can make people fight more...

My thoughts on how to make people fight more

1. Gain some sort of bonus card when you win a fight or a terotory (such as in Risk)
2. Gain some extra cash for controlling some specific places on the map so everyone wants the point, with a quite good bonus so its worth it.
3. Trade routes, extra income if you have countries in a row (or together with people you have allied) from some different points such as china-finland or something like that. Then I would have like 4 different routes on the map.
4. Make the different teams have different types of units so that you could gain strong combos if you took controll of a opponents unit. (then i would have to make different teams and make a "take controll of"/hostage move when you win fights.
5. Make different players start with different amounts of units and a set amount of turns (for example 10) and then the small players win if they have doubled their size and the big player/s win if they have kept atleast 75% of the starting land. (then the small players would need some advantages to be able to fight with big players). But i really dont like this idea, i want everyone to have the same starting conditions....

What do you think?
Which choise (1-5) will be the best?
Have you got any ideas of youre own?
Or any ideas from games you have played?
Or just anything else to tell me?

//Thx

GamesOnTheBrain
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Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

Welcome to the BGDF.

Without actually seeing the game, I'd say #1 or #2 would be the best options to reduce "camping."

1) It is only natural that the more land you have, the more resources you will be able to produce. If a player can acquire more resources by obtaining more land, then at least some of your players should be motivated to quickly grab more land through battle early in the game rather than playing defensively like you mentioned.

2) Likewise, some lands should produce resources better than other lands. By mixing up the production rates of different territories, players will be drawn to conquer those better territories.

Finally, you could also set a turn limit. For example, you could say the game is over after 15 turns. If no one achieves the victory conditions you presented before the end of 15 turns, then whoever controls the most land after 15 turns wins. This would also benefit your game by keeping it from dragging on and on for hours and hours.

Anonymous
hmm

I´ve had the bonus for having lots of land but still people have been tending to camp a litlle to much, what i meant with 1 was that u get some kind of bonus card for attacking (+the resouse gain you get from land) so that attacking would be benefited even if youve got the most land.

zaiga
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

First of all, I recommend turning the game into a game with a turn limit (as GamesOnTheBrain suggested) and rewarding Victory Points (VPs) to players for certain accomplishments (such as occupying certain countries, or winningbattles). The player with the most VPs at the end wins the game. VP mechanics are often much easier to balance and tweak to your liking, especially for games with three or more players. Also, having a turn limit gives you some control over the length of the game.

I think giving a bonus or a reward to the attacker is a good idea. It gives players an incentive to attack. You might simply reward a number of VPs to the winner of a battle. Make sure the attacker has a slight advantage of the defender to encourage attacking.

I think I prefer dice to resolve battles, instead of a deterministic model, though. Dice are exciting, and a lot of people just like the feel of dice in their hands and the sound they make when they roll on the table. I kid you not, dice are great!

I also like your idea #3 a lot, it's a typical set collection mechanic that makes a certain country very valuable to one player, while another player won't care that much about it. This creates assymetry and tension in a game, which is good. Perhaps instead of lumping the necessary lands together as a "trade route", you might want to spread them around the map. For example, if you control Argentina, Norway and Japan you get a bonus. This will force players to spread out a bit more, and perhaps make the game a bit more active.

Good luck!

xantheman
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

I have two strategy war games that I have been playtesting for the last few years now and I have run into the same problem before. I find that if you make it easier to expand and cut down on the number of spaces on the board, players will be forced to fight because neutral territory will get gobbled up faster.

I understand your desire to stay away from dice. I designed one of my games specificly for that reason. However, I think that you will find that you need some king of random mechanic for battles. Especially for 3 or more players. I added cards to my non-random battle system and it worked out really well. Only about 1/4 of the cards in the deck can be played in the middle of a battle, but it still adds that unknown element that makes it worth taking a risk every now and then.

I also found that it helped to give players enough cards that they will have to use most of them every turn or discard them. This often pushes people into attacking just to use up cards.

Remember, with non-random mechanics, the players can tell wether or not they will win a fight before they start it. This often means that against a good defender, you won't have much opportunity to attack.

I encourage you to keep working on your diceless battle system. There are not enough games out there that do not use dice to resolve battles.

Xan
www.rentoys.com

Anonymous
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

i dont either like the dice rolling games much but.... if there is no way to combinde diffrent low level fighters to be able to hit a "high defense" fighter i guess most people with just aim to controle the highest level attackers and deffenders on the board......

May be as mentiond above, some gain if you conqure a contry (+1 A attack in one attack) or (treaget land has 2+ D for the rest of the turn)

This might seem too powerful but otherways a thired party will always win after 2 players battle it out...

D-Boy

jkopena
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

Thought I'd mention: The warcraft board game includes cards which provide different special effects. Mostly battle-oriented spells, but some other like extra resources or overall victory points. When a battle starts both players get a card, but the winner gets an additional one at the end of the battle, which helps encourage some fighting.

Anonymous
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

about you guys saying that people will just try to get the best defenders and they cant get attacked and the best attackers and they can attack without loosing. If a unit it numbered attack/defencce so 5/3 means 5 attack and 3 defence, the best attackers say will have bad defencce, say 20/1 and the best defenders will have the opposite, 1/20 and be very expensive so you cant afford making to many super defenders, and the attackers will die quite soon since they have a bad defence which makes them quite defenceless...

what about making different races? you think i should do that? or should i keep it to 1 race and everyone has the same abilities?

Has anyone got any ideas to make the game good for 2 players, how should we start, its no funny to divide the world map into two parts and then play.... is it best just to randomize the countries as you do in risk?

Has any1 played diplomacy? My game tends to be a little like it when you play 2 players, if the players are evenly good it gets stuck, no fun at all :( ideas are welcomed :P!

xantheman
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Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

I have played both Diplomacy and the Warcraft board game and I like them both a lot. Diplomacy was part of the inspiration for my Corpwar game (see post under "board game design" for general description). I have never played Diplomacy with less then 5 players. I think that it would not be near as much fun with fewer players.

What time period is your game set in?

Do you allow more than 1 piece in each space? If so how many?

Can you attack 1 space from multiple spaces? Are battles always 1 unit verse 1 unit?

How many different units are there?

Xan
www.rentoys.com

Anonymous
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

ive been working on a similar combat system for my space game. its a light combination of civ building and combat.

my design goals for combat were:

1. attackers can target specific units
2. attackers can combine for a greater chance to destroy a target

i tried going diceless--using an attack value and a defense value that is similar to magic the gathering creature power and toughness. i didnt get very far with this system.

ive tried many different dice systems. currently, all ships have an attack die value (cutters=d8) and a shields number (cutters=8). so if one cutter attacks another cutter, it must roll an 8 to destroy it, if two cutters attack the same target, roll 2d8, etc. i think this system is working, but eventually i want to include only six sided dice.

the way i fixed the lack of combat was to allow players to choose 4 starting planets (3 for resources and 1 base) this puts the players close to each other in the beginning and makes for immediate conflict. planets have different resource values and everyone wants the best ones, so it is unlikely that players can really camp out with any success.

i don't know how much of this really helps you, but i just thought i would share as it seems we are working on mechanically similar games.

Anonymous
thx for the help

Ive played diplomacy twice with less than 4 players, (both 2 players) and then the game is totaly shit i think and i know that and thats why I want help since i want my game to be playable with 2+ players and not 4+...

You can only have one unit in each space and you can only attack with 1 unit at a time, as i wrote in a earlier post if u gopt higher A value then the defenders D value you can attack and you kill him, if u got a lower A value then the defenders D value you cant attack. I thought it was clear but it might not have been, you attack with a single unit at a time, so you can NOT combine two units attacks....

Im not really sure about the number of units in the game since ive made some units for playtesting, when all thje rules and stuff are finished i will make more to make the game involve more strategy, now ive got about 10 units, i will have nearly 30 i think,

I´d just like to add that both xantheman and evernoobs coments have been apreciated, it gave me some new ideas THX. Even if youre not sure if i like them, please post to much then to little xD

//Thx from behind

dete
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

I would stop camping by
putting in a time or situation where they HAVE to fight.

you draw a card that says you must attack somebody.
oh man that's gonna be thrilling to randomly pick out
cards from that pile, it better have some other really good
cards or it's not worth the risk.

You can have a 6 step time line like a dice that you just
rotate time to manuever, time to get resources, time to
adjust time, time to fight.

Ok for the actualy fighting, higher number auto wins,
the only way a lower number can win is if they gang up
and combine their numbers to get a higher number, but
to do so, they must manuever into a good position
like "Go" where you surround the enemy on all 4 sides
or something.

hope this helps!

Anonymous
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

my idea is not beíng able to gang up, i can understand that its hard for u to understand since i havent posted nearly any of the rules but belive me atleast i think it will work quite well. Units will be counterable so if we got three units x, y and z. x wins vs y, y vs z and z vs x. So if someone gets a unit that beats youres you have to get a counter in your nest turn which makes him get a counter to your counter etc.

alos observe that there will be units that both can kill each other like a units with A=2 and D=3 vs a units with A = 5 and D = 1, 2 > 1 and 5 > 3 means that the attacker wins....

thx for the comments, more sugestions please?
If Im going to make some countries on a world map being "keypoints" and more valueable, which say 5 countries should it be? (take 5 countries that exists on the Risk map)...

Challengers
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

I have a couple of ideas. Does anyone remember the pencil and paper game where two players took turns creating a number of random, enclosed territories? After making a couple dozen or so, each player took turns distributing an army of 100 units (like in RISK) by writing a number in the enclosed areas (each player had a different colored pencil). During play, the attacker chose an enemy territory. If the attacker had enough forces surrounding that territory, he would cross out his opponent's number in that area, leaving him a little bit weaker. Play alternated until no more attacks were possible. The winner was the player with the most survivors.
I have played this battle system as an alternative to the classic RISK dice rules. We added other goodies such as aircraft bombing runs to neighboring territories, but even just the basic concept of massed attacks is really fun on the RISK map.
That idea would tend to discourage camping. Also, it totally eschews the dice and randomness, replacing it with pure strategy and tactics.

Mitch

Anonymous
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

you say that it probably will discourage camping... lets say we are using the risk map and i have camped up south amerika and youre in afrika and you want to attack me, then i just have to put all my forces in brazil since there is only 1 non south american country that has a border to brazil.... and the chance that i get both invaded from Nothamerica and afrika at the same time isnt so big.... just a thought

thx anyway...

//Thx from behind

Challengers
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

FreakedOutKid wrote:
you say that it probably will discourage camping... lets say we are using the risk map and i have camped up south amerika and youre in afrika and you want to attack me, then i just have to put all my forces in brazil since there is only 1 non south american country that has a border to brazil.... and the chance that i get both invaded from Nothamerica and afrika at the same time isnt so big.... just a thought

thx anyway...

//Thx from behind

Well, if you're using the rest of the RISK mechanics, your opponents can amass a huge army via expansion and, if you're cut off in South America, you can't stop them. Besides, you are assuming that you can control Central America, which you can't do if you're massing troops in Brazil. Eventually, somebody is going to execute a classic pincers maneuver on Brazil (via Central America and North Africa).
Besides, even if it isn't the same opponent, you'll still have to fight on two fronts. Even worse is trying to camp in Australia, because you won't get to do anything at all if you don't control Siam.

Mitch

Anonymous
Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

if you play imba opponents? if i have 4 countries (SA) and my opponent has a bucnh i can have more units in every countrie = i have more armies in brazil than they have in the afrika land next to brazil? = GG

larienna
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Help me make my strategy game more active with no camping!

It's the first time that I see that people can camp in a strategy game.

For the risk dilema above, I think the problem is that there is too few invasion point. In fact there is 2 invasion points. This will make the player move all his troops there and camp. But if you could attack all territory from many different place ( air, land, sea ), it will increase the number of invasion point and force the defender to spread his troops and its variety. By doing so, there won't be any safe point since any condensed invasion is likely to work. The defender will lose the invasion and he will have to try to expell the ennemies out of his territories, else he his doomed.

So the basic idea is to make sure that the player cannot completely shield himself. He is always open but he can still defend himself or counter-attack.

For a 2 player strategy game, I have played a game called "Bells of war"( like axis and allies with a bigger map focused on europe ), and there was 6 basic countries ( US, England, France, Germany, Italy, Russia ) and many neutral countries like Finland, Roumania, etc. The idea is that you rarely play 6 player. So when you play 2 players, 1 person take the axis, and another take the allies. There is also the neutral countries which are controled by any player or a dead player. When we played 4 players, 1 player played france and russia while the other one played US and england.

The idea is that if you split the player among different countries and if you set many neutral countries, the game won't make a direct face to face. Since ressource cannot be shared among countries and allied countries cannot build units in allied countries. If each player control 3 countries, a player who concentrate on 1 countries, he will eventually lose ressources and become weaker.

In the same game, each territory had a number which indicated the industrialisation level of the territory. Making some territory worth more. There was also some canister with number that indicated the fuel level of the area and there was also shipyard on some territories.

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