Well, we've (Scurra and I) have been working (pretty hard) on All For One for the last 8 months or so. It has just been submitted to Hippodice in it's current incarnation. I think Scurra even said that the GDW might be a good idea for the game before we decide to try and submit it to Days of Wonder.
I finally got another opportunity to play the game this weekend, which will be the first time since we added the special "One For All" card- a card which can be used to score extra points, or traded in for a powerful effect, like taking an extra turn.
The game has gone through extensive changes since March when Scurra first sent me a prototype. Here's a breif synopsis of the game followed by a report from this weekends playtests. Last time I did this there was a question about having the author's blessing before describing their game in public. This time I think it's safe to say that I have Scurra's permission...
ALL FOR ONE
France, 1630. The Royal Musketeers are personal guards of King Louis XIII, defending the King against the dubious plots of Cardinal Richelieu. Athos, Porthos, Aramis, d'Artagnan, Rochefort, and MiLady DiWinter move around paris fighting duels and completing missions to earn the Favor of the King and Cardinal. Both characters and players earn Favors throughout the game and bonus points are scored at the end when players reveal their true allegiances. The winner is the player who earns the most Favors.
Characters complete missions by picking up plot tokens and delivering them to the appropriate locations. Players are not tied to using any particular character, rather each turn they choose which character to use. Using the same character twice in a row means you get 1 less action that turn (hey, give the character a break, they get tired!). Guards patrol half the city, moving 1 space along their path every couple of turns. They act as a hindrance to Musketeers, forcing them to stop their movement and duel. Losing a duel to a Guard ends a player's turn, but defeating the guard earns the character a Favor!
Missions are printed on cards, of which you have a hand of 4. Players can be "working on" any or all of their missions simultaneously. They are accomplished by revealing the mission card (as an action) and demonstrating that the appropriate character is at the appropriate location with the appropriate tokens. Blue missions must be completed by a Musketeer (some by a specific Musketeer) and Red missions must be completed by a Cardinal's Agent (some by a specific Cardinal's Agent). Green missions may be completed by any character.
These mission cards double as dueling cards and are used to fight a duel. There are 2 types of duels- Guard duels and Character duels.
Guard duels occur when a Musketeer encounters a guard while moving. The active player plays a card from their hand and then reveals the top card of the deck and duel scores are calculated- Blue cards count toward the Musketeer, Green and Red cards count toward the Guard. Some cards give a bonus to the Musketeer or to the guard. Winning a Guard duel earns the character a Favor. A tie with the guard means nothing. Losing a Guard duel ends the turn immediately.
Character duels occur when one character demands a Plot Token from another. In this case ALL PLAYERS play a card face down- they are all revealed and duel scores are calculated the same way... Blue cards count for the Active character (the attacker), and Red and Green cards count for the defender. Some cards give a bonus to he attacker. Winning a Character duel earns the active character a Favor and posession of the Plot Token in question. A tie earns the active character the Plot Token, but no Favor. A loss means nothing. Cards played in the duel are discarded, then players other than the active player draw a card to replace the one they used.
Each character has a special ability which comes into play during combat. Aramis can skip a duel against a guard. Milady can sweet talk a Musketeer into handing over a plot token without a fight. D'Artagnan can re-fight a duel when he loses. Athos, Porthos, and Rochefort can do tings to add to their duel score to help them win the duel.
The new addition is the One For All card- a special card each player starts with. This card is held in hand in addition to the maximum of 4 Mission cards. It can be used as follows, or held to add bonus points when missions are completed:
- Add 3 to the duel score when played by the active player in a duel (instead of a mission card)
- Add 0 to the duel score and return to players hand when played by a non-active player in a Character duel.
- As an action, end your turn and begin a new one.
Once played, the one For all card remains face up on the table until the player completes a mission, at that time they may put it back into their hand.
The One For All card worked very well, and made for some good plays and options. It also added to scoring for missions, to make sure they outweighed just fighting duels- making Missions more important, which is the intention.
Players score victory points (Favors) for completing missions- 1 VP per token delivered. Characters score favors for completing missions and for winning duels. Players score endgame points for the favors collected by one of the characters- the identity of which is dealt out secretly at the beginning of the game.
I'll start a new post in this thread with a playtest report.
Last Friday I stopped by Friday Night Magic at Amazing Discoveries to see if I still knew anyone. It turned out that a couple of my friends were hanging out, one was in the Magic tournament, but between rounds was playing a game of Netrunner with the other one. I decided to run home (around the corner) and pick up All For One and another game or 2 (comercial games) to see if anyone would try them.
I was able to talk people into testing out All For One, which made me happy because I haven't been able to play it in ages, and I had yet to play it with the One For All card. The players were Cory, Lex, and myself. Cory was the old friend who was playing Netrunner. He's not the sharpest tactician, but he's a nice guy. Lex is one of the newer Magic players who I only know from stopping in at FNM, so I didn't know how he would like the game but he wasn't playing Magic and seemed pretty interested.
I explained the rules, and they were pretty well understood. In fact, nobody made any big mistakes because they misunderstood a rule (that I know of), which sometimes happens on the first play of a game. I don't recall too many specifics of the game, like the exact score or who had which ID. We left the d'Artagnan ID tile face up, se we all knew we could use d'Artagnan without giving points away. This was a modification Scurra introduced to ease players into using characters other than their ID tile, and I think it works well.
Cory's play was uneventful, he moved pieces around and did a few missions, but it's hard to say if any of it was on purpose. he ended up scoring something like 8 points which is respectable, but won't ever win. Lex and I had about 12 points each, and he had completed more missions and therefore won the tiebreak.
I went with my usual strategy, more or less, which was to deliver multiple tokens at a time, especially when using someone else's ID, and watch for opportunistic plays when they shape up. I also decided not to use my One For All card and instead score extra points for it. Meanwhile, Lex was using his One For All card like crazy, but only to complete a mission. He did mostly 1-token missions, but he ended up doing more than I did and thereby won the tiebreak. By the end of the game I used my One For All card more liberally, but to no good end.
During the game some people came to check it out in between watching or playing Magic. After it was over I asked around to see if anyone else wanted to play. Lex said he'd play again, and another kid Jordan wanted to try it. A third person sounded interested as well, but after the rules and about 2 turns he decided to quit, but not before taking a turn to completely undo my actions. That was a bummer, but we were able to play the rest of the game out. Lex continued to use his One For All card a lot, but only to complete missions. I made better use of the One For All card this time, and was able to do a big mission (3 tokens) and some other decent missions (2 tokens) and I think I won that game but it was close all around.
Afterwards I gave Jordan a ride home and we talked about the game and what was good or bad about it. He really liked it, but thought Musketeers should be able to move past each other (currently characters must stop movement when they encounter another character).
Overall a nice test, people liked the game, onlookers thought it was cool. Perhaps I'll bring it back out this Friday and look for some more tests.