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Proposal: hpox

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Wed, 09/17/2003 - 21:33
hpox
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Joined: 12/31/1969

NOTE: I realize that's a bit more than a proposal but I got a bit carried away. That does not mean I expect everyone to jump on this proposal. It still, is just a proposal.

Philosophy : SIMPLE SIMPLE SIMPLE, Streamlined as much as possible. As much as I liked the ideas with the cards. Away with them! No cards.Tiles, nice woodden pawns and thick rounded chits (hmmm). That's all we need I propose.

Tiles

Using a sort of 8 anchors system where the explorer move freely around the map and stop at an anchor. They can move anywhere giving there's a route to where they want to go and it must not be blocked by another player. What does that mean? If an explorer is on a certain anchor then it block you from passing through that anchor/passage.

Pawns
Ordinary pawns or maybe not? Maybe each specialize in a certain obstacle by-passing?. Each player have a Team of 2(or 3) explorers by player represented by pawns.

Chits
There's 3 types of chits but they all go in the same drawstring bag and they function pretty much the same, although they will be labeled differently to make sure there's no confusion.

Obstacles, Discoveries and Items.

Obstacles can be permanent or temporary. You cannot pass through an obstacle unless you have the right equipement to pass it. If it is temporary, you discard it when you pass it.

Discoveries are scenery which we will presume we take photograph of. There's always enough discovery of one type for everyone but a discovery seen by less people will be worth more to the one who saw it first. (He wants to keep it secret, the fact that he's got the first and best photo coupled with the fact that it will be rare make it more valuable) --Here I'm trying to make sense of the mechanic in relation to the theme.

Items are artifacts, objects and relics. They are mechanically the same as discoveries except that there is not enough of them for every player. So eventually, the stack will run out and the room will be empty again, enabling players to discover more stuff! Yes even a gaping hole. They were too busy looting the cave they didn't see the giant gaping hole! But they passed several times through that tile, that doesn't work!!! Chalk it up to a SEP.

Actually there's the equipement chits too but they don't go in the bag. They are distributed at the beginning at random or maybe a draft. Players should have a bunch of equipement but not too much 5 is the big max. Having 2 or 3 times the same equipement is ok.

Setup

- Insert a method of creating a fair base cave system here.

On a turn:

1.

Play a tile (or 2?) I like 2! More possibilities and more tiles.
2.

Move one of your explorer anywhere he CAN go to.

2.2

If you stop on an anchor of an empty "Special Room" tile (empty of chits, not players) :

For ! Room (Mediocre) = Draw one chit
For ? Room (Good) = Draw 3 chits and choose the one you want.
reason: More chance to get a good chits instead of an obstacle
ex: Oh I have the choice between Obstacle,Item and Discovery. Well if I take the Obstacle I have the right equipement to pass it and put myself in quarantine for a bit to lay my Good Room Tile I have in my hand. Or maybe I will take the item because I already 2 of the other I need to complete that set. Discovery is always nice because it's worth a lot of points! Dilema, choice, power.

2.2.1

If you chose a Discovery/Item, take that Discovery/Item's stack of chits from the stock and place it in the center of the tile. Keep the "first look" Discovery chit you took from the bag (it will be different in some way : tag/color/shape)

If you chose an Obstacle, place it in the center. If you have the right equipement, you can use it to pass the Obstacle and move again.

2.3

If you stop on an anchor on a tile "Special Room" which have chit(s) :

Discovery = Pick one chit. that's it!

Item = Pick the item. If you picked the last one, draw one chit for the room just as if you moved into an empty room (only 1, even in ? rooms).

2. 4

If you pass through the center of a Special Room tile with an Obstacle :

Discard the appropriate equipement you used to pass it. Pick up the obstacle if it was a temporary one. (Gaping rift = permanent, Spider web = temp) [It's worth points!] (maybe?)

3.

Draw a tile (or 2?)

End game

Some components will have a Mystical/Weird sign such as The Tiles, the Discoveries and the permanent obstacles. When a certain number of theses components are out, the explorers realize they just pillaged a sacred cavern of an ancient eldritch cyclopean unspeakable god (grin) and they must get the fck out before they awaken "it". (RELIC RUSH!).

People have some control over the end of the game : Choose the chits with the signs and play tiles with the signs

Ok that means it's the end of the game and they must flee to an exit (I assume there will be a bunch of exits) or the entrance maybe. Something to reward the fist to flee or penalize the others.

Score

What I find great about all the chits is even though there's a lot of them they are always useful and serve a dual purpose and avoid having to count the socre on a separate board or what not.

Each Discovery/Item chit is worth 1 point each ? I was thinking of having simple set of 3 items be worth more points. Maybe the item alone is worth 0. In a set it is worth 5.

Players who have the "first look" chit of a discovery take the remaining chits that were not taken which give them more points!

Phew.. I'm glad I wrote this tonight or I'd have forgot all of it. Tired as hell now!

Here's a bunch of images:

Ignore the center anchor thing. There is no center anchor ever. When you move on one of the 8 anchor around the tile in a Special Room it activated the special effect, which is to draw 1 or 3 chits depending if it's a mediocre or good one.

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Thu, 09/18/2003 - 03:13
#1
sedjtroll
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Re: Proposal: hpox

Let me say that most of this I like a lot. I'll think through it as I reply and see what I think at the end.

hpox wrote:
As much as I liked the ideas with the cards. Away with them!

Interesting, instead of drawing a card you draw from a bag of chits. That certainly sounds reasonable. It takes away the "three decks with different ratios" aspect, but that can be handled another way as you describe later. I think I like this.

Quote:
Tiles
Using a sort of 8 anchors system where the explorer move freely around the map and stop at an anchor. They can move anywhere giving there's a route to where they want to go and it must not be blocked by another player. What does that mean? If an explorer is on a certain anchor then it block you from passing through that anchor/passage.

So the "anchors" (or board spaces, really) are at the corners and edges of the tiles. I think that's a great idea. I guess I was assuming the tile itself would be the board space. This way, 2 adjacent tiles make up 3 board spaces at their interface (where the corners touch and where the edges touch). Mayeb the center of each tile should be an anchor as well... and the only anchors you can't pass are the occupied anchors in a passageway (because there's not room to get by? Is that fair? Is there a good reason not to just be able to move through people?)

I like the idea of being able to search anywhere. A passageway could easily have a cave painting, and could even more easily have a cave-in than a cavern could (and have it matter). So how about allowing searching... anywhere? Or else in the center anchor of each tile only.

As for movement, if we like the Action Points, the movement could be 1 Anchor per action point spent. So to get to the room two tiles over it might cost about 4 APs or so, depending on the tiles.

Quote:
Pawns
Ordinary pawns or maybe not? Maybe each specialize in a certain obstacle by-passing?. Each player have a Team of 2(or 3) explorers by player represented by pawns.

I think regular pawns of different colors is fine. I DEFINITLY am opposed to un-equal abilities on the pawns. I also think 1 pawn is enough per player.

Quote:
Chits
There's 3 types of chits but they all go in the same drawstring bag and they function pretty much the same, although they will be labeled differently to make sure there's no confusion.

I like it. The Rulebook could have a nice, flavorful description of each.

Quote:
Obstacles, Discoveries and Items.

Obstacles can be permanent or temporary. You cannot pass through an obstacle unless you have the right equipement to pass it. If it is temporary, you discard it when you pass it.

I like it. f it's a permanent obstacle you put it on the tile in the appropriate anchor.

Quote:
Discoveries are scenery which we will presume we take photograph of. There's always enough discovery of one type for everyone but a discovery seen by less people will be worth more to the one who saw it first. (He wants to keep it secret, the fact that he's got the first and best photo coupled with the fact that it will be rare make it more valuable)

So the way I see this working is only a few specific Discoveries are "permanent" and stay on the board. As part of the setup you take X chits of each of the Discoveries and sort them and set them aside- two of them are distinguishable for each Discovery. X is the # of players. When someone finds a Discovery, they take the two distinguishable chits for that Discovery and place one on the appropriate anchor and the other in front of them. These chits could have a number right on them as to how much the Discovery is worth (or, all Discoveries could be worth the same). Anyone else going to that anchor and searching (spending the proper APs) gets one of the chits from the stock- unless they already have one! At this point if there's a scoring track then the person finding the discovery can advance a couple points as a bonus for finding the thing. If at the end of the game there are chits left in the stock, the player that made that Discovery (has the distinguishable chit) gets the remainder of the chits for that Discovery. This is the REAL bonus for making the Discovery.

Quote:
Items are artifacts, objects and relics. They are mechanically the same as discoveries except that there is not enough of them for every player. So eventually, the stack will run out and the room will be empty again, enabling players to discover more stuff!

This I don't quite get. If the chit isn't a permanent chit, then the player would keep it or discard it as appropriate and the anchor would be 'searchable' again... no? Perhaps if a player wishes they can leave an item chit face up in an Anchor, and seaching in that anchor simply finds that item. This could be used to effetively stop an anchor from being searched.

Quote:
Actually there's the equipement chits too but they don't go in the bag. They are distributed at the beginning at random or maybe a draft.

If they don't go in the bag, then I recommend they be a different size and/or shape. maybe even cards (can easily be dealt out). I don't see why some equipment couldn't be found while searching the cave, something left by a previous explorer...

Quote:
On a turn:

1. Play a tile (or 2?) I like 2! More possibilities and more tiles.

I don't know about 2 tiles... sounds too arbitrary and degenerate. Lets stick with 1 tiel per turn. OR make it an action to spend points on... so if you want o spend your turn uncovering tiles, feel free.

Quote:
2. Move one of your explorer anywhere he CAN go to.

I think spending APs to movewould work well, especially with well defined board spaces provided by the anchors.

Quote:
2.2 If you stop on an anchor of an empty "Special Room" tile (empty of chits, not players) :

For ! Room (Mediocre) = Draw one chit
For ? Room (Good) = Draw 3 chits and choose the one you want.
reason: More chance to get a good chits instead of an obstacle
ex: Oh I have the choice between Obstacle,Item and Discovery. Well if I take the Obstacle I have the right equipement to pass it and put myself in quarantine for a bit to lay my Good Room Tile I have in my hand. Or maybe I will take the item because I already 2 of the other I need to complete that set. Discovery is always nice because it's worth a lot of points! Dilema, choice, power.

This is very interesting. I don't know if I like it, as it might be too easy to avoid bad stuff. Maybe just choice of 2? Maybe it's ALWAYS 1 tile... but 1 tile PER X APs you spend to search (choose from those tiles)! So I spend 2 APs to search, I draw and see what I get. I spend 4, I draw 2 chits and choose the one I like better. For 6APs I get my choice of three. then just make sure the Obstacles outnumber the Rewards...

Quote:
2.2.1 If you chose a Discovery/Item, take that Discovery/Item's stack of chits from the stock and place it in the center of the tile. Keep the "first look" Discovery chit you took from the bag (it will be different in some way : tag/color/shape)

See my comment above for what I think is a better way to do the same thing.

Quote:
If you chose an Obstacle, place it in the center. If you have the right equipement, you can use it to pass the Obstacle and move again.

I don't think people should get extra actions or anything. They got a permanent obstacle? they put it in the appropriate anchor. If they have the right equipment they can pass that obstacle- for a certain number of action points. This information could be on the Equipment cards: PICK AXE: Spend 3 APs to move through a Cave In.

Quote:
Item = Pick the item. If you picked the last one, draw one chit for the room just as if you moved into an empty room (only 1, even in ? rooms).

I think if you drew an Item chit, you just keep it, and the room is "searchable" again. Any time there's a chit in the room, the room is not "searchable". Rather it is, but you find what's there rather than a random chit.

2. 4 If you pass through the center of a Special Room tile with an Obstacle :

Discard the appropriate equipement you used to pass it. Pick up the obstacle if it was a temporary one. (Gaping rift = permanent, Spider web = temp) [It's worth points!] (maybe?)

Obstacles worth points is interesting. Could go eother way. I don't see awarding points for bypassing a cobwebb. I also don't know about rewarding people if they happen to have the right equipment.

Quote:
3. Draw a tile (or 2?)

This depends a lot on what Tile Placement mechanic we use... are we placing from a pool of tiles? From our "hand"? Randomly drawn tiles?

Quote:
End game

Some components will have a Mystical/Weird sign such as The Tiles, the Discoveries and the permanent obstacles. When a certain number of theses components are out, the explorers realize they just pillaged a sacred cavern of an ancient eldritch cyclopean unspeakable god (grin) and they must get the fck out before they awaken "it". (RELIC RUSH!).

I like all your ideas except the end game thing. I don't know that my original suggestion was great, but I like it better than the end game being indicated by a draw of a particular chit. Also, the theme falls apart with that particular description (or any like it I think).

For the record, my original suggestion was that once a player finds their way to the exit and leaves the caves (this could be worked towards because the exit would probably be labeled and on the far side of the board from the starting points- thus giving some direction as to where to aim with the passages. You probably want to get to the Exit first) gets a bonus for doing that and also signals the end of the game. After that round of turns ends, any player leaving the caves gets a minor bonus, and those still in the caves get no bonus.

Quote:
Score

What I find great about all the chits is even though there's a lot of them they are always useful and serve a dual purpose and avoid having to count the socre on a separate board or what not.

For one thing I don't think keeping score on a track or somethin gis that bad, butyou're right- we probably don't need to. You can just count up the chits and see who wins. Bonuses could be accounted for with a small supply of generic VP chits. Also, I don't think there'd be all that many chits on the board.

And finally, as I have mentioned ad nausea by now, I think a bonus for completing certain combinations of tiles would be nice to help guide placement of tiles.

Quote:
Ignore the center anchor thing. There is no center anchor ever.

Just out of curiosity, why not?

- Seth

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Thu, 09/18/2003 - 08:01
#2
Scurra
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Proposal: hpox

End Game issue:

None of us have really found a good end-game scenario so far. Anything that involves someone leaving makes for an indeterminate game, since players will just stay in the caves amassing points until they think they can win.

In the chat I suggested that if we used cards for the "search/events" stuff (rather than different sorts of chits), then there could be something like a "Major Earthquake" shuffled into the bottom X cards which, when drawn, would trigger a race for the exits.
That would also let the "point chits" represent things like photographs since they would be the only record of the caves remaining once it had collapsed!

An Earthquake chit might work, but the problem there is that there is no way to ensure that it comes out towards the end of the game.

As far as the rest of it goes, between the four proposals so far (and the discussions that we all had in the chat) there is a very solid game to be constructed. The trick will be to find the right balance - for instance, my proposal might be the only viable "exploratory" tile-laying method possible for a cave game, this one may be the only viable "tactical" tile-laying method (since everything is laid out first), and I believe there was one suggestion of starting in the middle and working out, which may the best "game" solution but completely inappropriate for the theme itself (unless we are suggesting that everyone fell through the roof or something :))

The key difference between this proposal and the others is the multiple tokens aspect. I like the idea - you can block a key passage to give yourself more time to search somewhere and so on - but it doesn't fit an "exploratory" game (which this design isn't really, anyway.)

Chits and cards I think are a trivial argument - as long as there is a way to determine who first found something and who later visited it (if it's a "fixed discovery") then it doesn't really matter what we decide upon.
FWIW I like the chits for discoveries and obstacles, and cards for searching/equipment. One suggestion that came up last night was to allow the "draw more cards for more APs" option, but if one of those cards turned out to be an Event (generate an obstacle or something similar), then that had to be chosen. Since all the other cards would be discarded anyway, it would be possible to see if someone was trying to cheat too.

In summary, my current (subject to change :)) feelings are:
1. We need the "blind" tile laying incorporated. Otherwise there is no exploring, but this may entail the "from the middle out" system.
2. Giving each player two explorers seems like the best compromise, even though it dimishes the mimesis*
3. Chits for discoveries and obstacles, but cards for events, items and equipment.
4. A proper end-game trigger. Maybe not the Earthquake idea, but something more solid than "when someone leaves". I don't think it should be a fixed number of turns though.

- David

*"mimesis" is a term adopted and amended by players of text adventure games in which the environment is controlled by the player typing things like "take cup", thus giving the impression that the player is in the environment . However, if the player types "take cup" because there is a cup sitting on a table, and the game replies "You can't see a cup", that's called "breaking mimesis" since you are suddenly jolted out of the game world immersion and back into remembering that this is a program interacting with you. Hence giving two explorers to a player means that they move them as though they were both able to "see" the whole cave system. Admittedly this is also true if there is only one explorer per player, but it is much less of an issue since the player can still "identify" with their explorer even as they use external information to plan their moves.

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Fri, 09/19/2003 - 15:56
#3
phpbbadmin
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My Thoughts

OK I had replied to this yesterday by it got ate by the horrible invalid session monster, today it was eaten by a network outage but I remembered to cut and paste it into word! So here it is in all it's glory.

Re 8 point Anchors:
This mechanic is ingenious! I think it's really cool. That being said, I think it's really not necessary. Does this type of system for implementing the caves really add a level of play that would not be present in the 'normal' 4 exit orthogonal/adjacent type system? Really other than blocking passageways, I don't see a need for it. Especially if we only stick to one explorer per player.

Chits, Cards, tokens,disks, etc:
I very much like the idea of using chits to keep track of the permanent obstacles / discoveries on certain tiles. However, I do not like the idea of using chits to replace EVERYTHING. To me when I see a game with a ton of chits, I think wargame, and that's an instant turn off for me. I like the idea of using the chits for the permanent tile markers, and I like using cards for everything else.

Placing tiles:
I'm in favor of one or two camps for tile placement:
1) Pay APs (whatever we decide the cost to be) to play a tile orthogonally adjacent to the tile your explorer is currently on.
2) Pay APs (or 1 free placement per turn) to play a tile ortogonally adjacent to any tile that connects to the cave system your explorer is in. This method is good because it allows players to interact after one player 'breaks' into the cave system of another player.

End Game:
I like the idea of the game ending (immediately or soon) after a complete set of items has been found. We don't necessarily have to go with the Lovecraft theme but I'm sure we could bend it to fit our game. The major event thing of the earthquake is good too and we could always go with the timed (certain # of rounds) idea if nothing else works.

Multiple explorers:
This could be fun. I always envisioned the game with only one explorer but it might be neat to have multiple explorers. We could give each player a team with each of the explorers having a better skills at accomplishing certain tasks (climbing, digging, swimming, etc), or we could just have each of the explorers start out with one free piece of equipment that helps them in that area.

equipment:
I think each player should start out with one free piece of equipment. Also I think they should be able to go to their start square and purchase more equipment using their VP points. I think allowing players to find equipment during searches is good to. Thematically you can say it's equipment left over from previous explorers who didn't make it out. =)

Exits:
We still don't have a good exit mechanic yet. We could go with scurra's idea of the exit's being the other players entrance, I like this idea a lot. This would definitely promote player interaction. My other idea, which I don't really like, is if you have a square 11 tiles away from the a player's starting square, it is an exit. For example, suppose I move 10 tiles west from my starting square, on that 11th square there will automatically be an exit. I don't necessarily like this idea.

Scoring:
I absolutely love Hpox/Seth's idea about scoring more the less people visit your discovery. On the flip side, you could make it so people score more the more players visit your discovery. I know that sounds stupid but let me explain. Suppose you score 3 Pts for discovering a feature. Now let's say other player score 2 pts for visiting the feature after you, but you ALSO score another point each time the feature get's visited. In game terms, you can explain this by saying that your discovery was confirmed by other explorers and therefore you get that much more notoriaty from it's discovery. Strategically, players make think twice before visiting 'prediscovered' features and it may discourage the 'scavange discoveries' style of play (not to say that that isn't a good strategy). Now I'm not advocating this option over Seth/Hpox's idea, but it is an option we may want to implement.

Stealing:
I had mentioned this in chat and I'll mention it again now. I had thought of a mechanic for stealing discoveries from other explorers. In game terms this is explained by discoveries actually being photographs of said discoveries. At the beginning of the game each player starts with a number of 'blank film' cards. During the course of the game, everytime they make a discovery (photograph it), they turn in their 'blank film' card for the appropriate discovery card. Ok to steal a discovery, a player enters a room with another player, declares he is robbing him and pays the appropriate AP cost to do so. The 'victim' then mixes in his real discovery cards with his decoy 'blank film' cards (they will all have the same card backs) and the robber chooses one card and keeps it. This method will allow stealing to be difficult in the beginning of the game and easier in the later parts of the game. Sedj has already said he is against stealing but I think we could make it an advanced rules option, PLUS I think it will increase player interaction (which is obviously one of my main concerns).

That's all for now. (Shew)
-Darke

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Fri, 09/19/2003 - 16:52
#4
sedjtroll
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Joined: 07/21/2008
Re: My Thoughts

Darkehorse wrote:
OK I had replied to this yesterday by it got ate by the horrible invalid session monster, today it was eaten by a network outage

Some things just aren't meant to be...

Quote:
Re: 8 point Anchors:
I think it's really not necessary. Does this type of system for implementing the caves really add a level of play that would not be present in the 'normal' 4 exit orthogonal/adjacent type system?

I think it's a good way to go about organizing the tiles so they fit together. It could be done with 4 (or 5 if you include the center) anchors. Also, I think there's something to be said along the lines of, say, placing settlements ON the hexes in Settlers rather than on the vertices. I don't know if I can articulate what I mean by this...

Quote:
Chits, Cards, tokens,disks, etc:
I very much like the idea of using chits to keep track of the permanent obstacles / discoveries on certain tiles. However, I do not like the idea of using chits to replace EVERYTHING. To me when I see a game with a ton of chits, I think wargame, and that's an instant turn off for me. I like the idea of using the chits for the permanent tile markers, and I like using cards for everything else.

I'm not sure I've seen a wargame that uses lots of chits. Unless Miniatures count as chits. Anyway, I thikn I agree that tons of chits everywhere would be annoying as hell. I don't think we had too many though (in my description of how I understood the mechanic to go anyway). Of course the "Chits" could be small tiles (like Puerto Rico- does that game have too many chits?)

Quote:
Placing tiles:
I'm in favor of one or two camps for tile placement:
1) Pay APs (whatever we decide the cost to be) to play a tile orthogonally adjacent to the tile your explorer is currently on.
I like this as a possible action on your turn, but only in conjunction with a larger cave-creating mechanic... we need to make sure the cave expands fast so the players can move around in it. I also think the player interaction your looking for can be aided by placing tiles near other players rather than just near your own pawn.
Quote:
2) Pay APs (or 1 free placement per turn) to play a tile ortogonally adjacent to any tile that connects to the cave system your explorer is in. This method is good because it allows players to interact after one player 'breaks' into the cave system of another player.

Like I said, I'd rather just play in other people's cave system from the start. I suppose this means if you have a tile that is somehow undesireable you're not forced to place it near you... but then how many of the tiles could be considered undesirable? Strictly speaking, none.

Quote:
End Game:
I like the idea of the game ending (immediately or soon) after a complete set of items has been found. We don't necessarily have to go with the Lovecraft theme but I'm sure we could bend it to fit our game. The major event thing of the earthquake is good too and we could always go with the timed (certain # of rounds) idea if nothing else works.

I don't know what you mean by the Lovecraft theme, but filling out a set of some kind might be ok. If we went with your Blank Film/Photograph theme, then the first player to fill all his blank film could trigger the game end, and the game could either be over or the round could be finished out to give some other players a chance to get one more discovery...

Quote:
Multiple explorers:
This could be fun. I always envisioned the game with only one explorer but it might be neat to have multiple explorers.

I think we ought to stick to1 player each... I think it could work with more, but then where do you stp? It's just a way to cover more ground- although if the AP pool must be split between say 2 teammates then maybe that would be sort of interesting. I just feel like it's more of that "adding complexity for complexity's sake"

Quote:
equipment:
I think each player should start out with one free piece of equipment.
How do you determine who starts with what in an equitable way? I guess it could be like Roborally- wehere it's basically dealt out (deal 2 to each player, they keep 1).
Quote:
Also I think they should be able to go to their start square and purchase more equipment using their VP points.
This makes no sense theme-wise, though it's not bad Game-wise.
Quote:
I think allowing players to find equipment during searches is good to. Thematically you can say it's equipment left over from previous explorers who didn't make it out.
Right. The ones you might find could be a rope/grappling hook, etc.

Quote:
Exits:
We still don't have a good exit mechanic yet. We could go with scurra's idea of the exit's being the other players entrance, I like this idea a lot. This would definitely promote player interaction.
So would having 1 exit on the far side of the board... everyone's trying to get to the same exit, so the paths will cross or overlap somehow. Also, the "board" could have a bottleneck or two (shaped like an hourglass) with a 2 or 3 tile width at a point, forcing players' paths to cross.
Quote:
My other idea, which I don't really like,
Neither do I. :/

Quote:
Scoring:
I absolutely love Hpox/Seth's idea about scoring more the less people visit your discovery. On the flip side, you could make it so people score more the more players visit your discovery.

I don't dislike your idea, but I like Hpox' better.

Quote:
Stealing:
I had thought of a mechanic for stealing discoveries from other explorers. In game terms this is explained by discoveries actually being photographs of said discoveries. At the beginning of the game each player starts with a number of 'blank film' cards. During the course of the game, everytime they make a discovery (photograph it), they turn in their 'blank film' card for the appropriate discovery card. Ok to steal a discovery, a player enters a room with another player, declares he is robbing him and pays the appropriate AP cost to do so. The 'victim' then mixes in his real discovery cards with his decoy 'blank film' cards (they will all have the same card backs) and the robber chooses one card and keeps it.

I think this would not be a great mechanic. What's to stop people from just stealing back and forth? I do however sort of like your Blank Film idea, as it would give a game end mechanic... first player to fill up ends the game (or triggers it). There could be a bonus for being the first, and a smaller bonus for completing your photos... no bonus if you still have blank film.

- Seth

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Sat, 09/20/2003 - 16:28
#5
phpbbadmin
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Joined: 04/23/2013
Response

Quote:

I'm not sure I've seen a wargame that uses lots of chits.

A lot of wargames in the 80s used nothing but chits. Hundreds of them to be exact...

Quote:

I don't think we had too many though (in my description of how I understood the mechanic to go anyway). Of course the "Chits" could be small tiles (like Puerto Rico- does that game have too many chits?)

Well Hpox wanted to replace the cards with chits.. That's what I was refering when I said it would be too many chits.

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Like I said, I'd rather just play in other people's cave system from the start. I suppose this means if you have a tile that is somehow undesireable you're not forced to place it near you... but then how many of the tiles could be considered undesirable? Strictly speaking, none.

If this is the case (that none are undesirable), then what is the point of playing tiles on other people systems? I was thinking you could at least slow someone down from a direct path to a tile. Then again, with nothing really ON the tiles when they are placed, there is no reason to go in any sort of direction anyway because any one tile is just as good as any other as far as finding 'stuff' (this is yet ANOTHER reason to put things on the actual tile). Really if we don't put things on the tile, then there all we are doing is wandering aimlessly around without any real objectives. We need to at least put things on tiles as soon as they are placed to distinguish them from each other.

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I don't know what you mean by the Lovecraft theme, but filling out a set of some kind might be ok. If we went with your Blank Film/Photograph theme, then the first player to fill all his blank film could trigger the game end, and the game could either be over or the round could be finished out to give some other players a chance to get one more discovery...

As for Lovecraft, I was refering to this comment from Hpox:

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Some components will have a Mystical/Weird sign such as The Tiles, the Discoveries and the permanent obstacles. When a certain number of theses components are out, the explorers realize they just pillaged a sacred cavern of an ancient eldritch cyclopean unspeakable god (grin) and they must get the fck out before they awaken "it". (RELIC RUSH!).

As for the photographs, yes it might be a good end game mechanic, take your required pictures, find the exit, game ends (or soon there after). If we go this route, do we want to make it so the person who does this almost certainly wins? Based upon this information, this will almost certainly be the case unless we allow other explorers to continue playing... Not sure how this would work as the player first to finish would be sitting around waiting while the other players finish.

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equipment:
I think each player should start out with one free piece of equipment.
How do you determine who starts with what in an equitable way? I guess it could be like Roborally- wehere it's basically dealt out (deal 2 to each player, they keep 1).

Well there would be multiples of all equipment, so you would just choose what you want..

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So would having 1 exit on the far side of the board... everyone's trying to get to the same exit, so the paths will cross or overlap somehow. Also, the "board" could have a bottleneck or two (shaped like an hourglass) with a 2 or 3 tile width at a point, forcing players' paths to cross.

If you can come up with a more solid description of how this might work it would probably be a good idea to implement.

RE Stealing:

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I think this would not be a great mechanic. What's to stop people from just stealing back and forth? I do however sort of like your Blank Film idea, as it would give a game end mechanic... first player to fill up ends the game (or triggers it). There could be a bonus for being the first, and a smaller bonus for completing your photos... no bonus if you still have blank film.

Well as I said this could be an advanced rule or just a rule to use if we want to increase interaction. But to prevent back and forth robbing is simple. One player steals, and then he RUNS as far away as possible with his remaining actions... If someone robs you you'd have to weigh how worthwhile it would be to try and recover the photograph, wasted actions spent chasing them, then you might not get anything back when you tried to do the same.. Perhaps we could limit it to one chance per game or only allow it with special cards. Who knows.

Re: Anchors

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think it's a good way to go about organizing the tiles so they fit together. It could be done with 4 (or 5 if you include the center) anchors.

Well with only 4 anchors (I don't see a point in the center anchor), it would be 'normal' 4 exit orthagonal adjacent placement. Which is what I think we should go with.

That's all for now.
-Darke

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Sun, 09/21/2003 - 17:08
#6
Scurra
Scurra's picture
Offline
Joined: 09/11/2008
Proposal: hpox

Four anchors doesn't seem enough to get a variety of tiles though.
Hpox's graphics show why you need 8.

I was reading the transcript of the chat from last week and I'm still confused in this discussion.
What we talked about during the chat was:
1. Discovering features. It seems clear that tiles with caves produce a draw from the "feature chits" bag. (It's not clear if a feature is always discovered, or whether some chits may be blank. Of course, this is where obstacles may come from too.) The suggestion was that the feature chit would be placed on the board, and a matching chit would be taken by the player, along with one chit of every other player's colour. Then, whenever a player arrived at that feature they could take a chit from that pile, which would score points at the end of the game.
What seems to be coming from this discussion is the idea that chits remaining with the feature chit at the end of the game score the player who found the feature points. Is that right? (I think the idea here was that if coloured chits were the VP markers, then a separate scoring track wouldn't be needed, but this raises issues about buying equipment.)

2. Paying points to draw from the "Search/Events" deck - pay more points, draw more cards (1 AP=1 card, 2 APs=3 cards etc.) and choose one. But if one of the cards is an Event it takes precedence over the others. This is the deck that would include the items. (I like that Endgame suggestion of unearthing a complete set of sacred items :))
Is this the current state of play?

3. How the board is going to work. AFAICS this one hasn't been even vaguely solved yet! I think I'm feeling happier with the "TransAmerica" solution that was proposed - you can add a tile to any part of the cave system that your explorer(s) could get to directly. This would enable the "obstacles" to have a bit of tactical value as you could try to block off areas of the system from your rivals (say to the feature you've just found?)

Is that a fair assessment of the issues in play at the moment?

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Sun, 09/21/2003 - 19:43
#7
sedjtroll
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Joined: 07/21/2008
Re: Response

Darkehorse wrote:

Seth wrote:
but then how many of the tiles could be considered undesirable? Strictly speaking, none.

If this is the case (that none are undesirable), then what is the point of playing tiles on other people systems?

Well, to score points for completeing cave parts (Passages between caverns, caverns themselves, and inverse caverns). Also, as you mention, to "at least slow someone down from a direct path to a tile."

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Then again, with nothing really ON the tiles when they are placed, there is no reason to go in any sort of direction anyway because any one tile is just as good as any other as far as finding 'stuff' (this is yet ANOTHER reason to put things on the actual tile).

I maintain that the relative value of the stuff could depend on what type of tile you search in (passage, incomplete cavern, or part of a completed cavern- where "cavern" = "room", not "cave system" ... in case I wasn't being clear)

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Really if we don't put things on the tile, then there all we are doing is wandering aimlessly around without any real objectives.

On the one hand, we're splunking, we ARE wandering around aimlessly. On the other hand, it's not really aimless because we are looking for interesting cave features.

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I don't know what you mean by the Lovecraft theme, but filling out a set of some kind might be ok. If we went with your Blank Film/Photograph theme, then the first player to fill all his blank film could trigger the game end, and the game could either be over or the round could be finished out to give some other players a chance to get one more discovery...

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As for the photographs, yes it might be a good end game mechanic, take your required pictures, find the exit, game ends (or soon there after).

I would say nix the exit in this case. The photos would be instead of the exit.

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If we go this route, do we want to make it so the person who does this almost certainly wins? Based upon this information, this will almost certainly be the case unless we allow other explorers to continue playing... Not sure how this would work as the player first to finish would be sitting around waiting while the other players finish.

Compare it to Citadels (which I know you don't like). In that game when one player finishes their city (plays their 8th District card), the round finishes out and you score. The districts each have different values, so it's possible to win without being the one to get 8 districts.

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[re: bottleneck shape in board] If you can come up with a more solid description of how this might work it would probably be a good idea to implement.

I don't know how else to describe it. The board would have places where tiles go, and rather than being a big rectangle it would be shaped sort of like an hourglass, with a skiny section that only accomodates a couple tiles. In order to move through that part o the board, you'd have to use 1 of only a few tiles.

- Seth

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Mon, 09/22/2003 - 11:23
#8
phpbbadmin
Offline
Joined: 04/23/2013
Response

Quote:

don't know how else to describe it. The board would have places where tiles go, and rather than being a big rectangle it would be shaped sort of like an hourglass, with a skiny section that only accomodates a couple tiles. In order to move through that part o the board, you'd have to use 1 of only a few tiles.

Perhaps we could have a grid where the cave is built onto, where certain sections were solid stone (I.E. no tiles could be place upon them). This would allow for a little more strategy for tile placement, and with it we could also have an exit mechanism (maybe something like Dragon Delta where you try and get to the opposite side of the board). With the Dragon Delta type exit mechanism, we could have up to 6 players (3 running north<>south and 3 running east<>west).

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Well, to score points for completeing cave parts (Passages between caverns, caverns themselves, and inverse caverns). Also, as you mention, to "at least slow someone down from a direct path to a tile."

As you stated in PM before, I think we need to vote on the Carcassonne completion mechanism, go read the new thread I posted about this.

That's all for now until the vote goes through.
-Darke

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