In some games like hero quest the players must fight together against a common ennemy. In this case, there is a game master that takes the role of the villain.
But in some other games, the player are in competition which each other against a common ennemy but there are not any player who plays the role of the villain. In fact, each player somewhat share this role.
For example : In a game I have played called jurassic park, each player control a pawn and must make it reach a destination. The player can enter a shelter to protect itself from the evil dinosaurs which are passing by. All players are threathen by the dinosaurs . So the question is who is moving the dinosaurs?
The players! Each player on their turn can move their pawn and a dinosaur, of course, these dinosaurs will move away from your pawn and you will try to attack the opposing player. The other opposing players will do the same.
Same thing happen in a Magelon where the walls can move with cards played by the player in order to block other players. Each player move than play a card that change the wall configuration.
Or in Sin City, each player place a "Creep","Police",or "Dame" token where he wants according to the goal he want to accomplish. So he does not have control over where the other players are placing their tokens
So the idea is that the villain's role, which should normally have been played by an AI in a video game, is shared by all the players. So the player have a light infleunce over the villain's role.
In some games it create some bug. For example, in Magelon, the players create a huge wall that blocks the exit an prevent everybody from getting out. So the game stall indefinately. It can also create some stupid situation, like moving back and forth a dinosaur because you and an opponent player are disputing the dinausaur's movement.
So I am oppening the discussion with these question :
- Do you like the Idea of sharing the villains role?
- Do you think that sharing the role of the villain is a good solution in some sort of game?
- Can you Identify some common situations where bugs can happen or can never happen?
One thing I tought is a predefined set of villain actions written on cards that must be used by the players. Each card would have an action like "This event happen", "This thing attack player to your left", or "Attack strongest player", etc.
So the player would be limited by the action indicated on the card. But the player would be limited to 3 cards in hand and he MUST play one of these 3 cards each turn. Which mean that it is possible that all the cards in hand will disadvantage the player. So by using this method, yes the player has some light influence on the villain role, but he cannot easily target the actions or protect himself from them.