Sabotage mechanics?

Don't forget bluffing. There should be cards placed on the track that turn out to be nothing when turned over. Also, swerving around conveniently placed little old ladies and women pushing prams seems appropriate. Unfortunately, my mind goes straight to David Carradine and Death Race 2000, which is no help at all.

Sounds like it could be quite fun.

As I usually do, I will suggest a few games where there are sabotage mechanics that I know of, which might prompt you to look in the right direction:

In the racing game Mille Bornes, players can give damaging cards to one another as part of a normal turn. All you need to do to get back in the race is draw a card that cancels the detriment (new tire to replace flat; repairs to fix accident; Green light to overcome red light) and they're back in the game. There are also some cards that grant a permanent immunity to a certain type of hazard, which can actually be kept in hand until it's played on you, and you can yell some strange phrase ("Goofarray!") to cancel the card immediately. From then on, of course, that card is seen. The downside of the system is that you're constantly waiting to draw the right card to get back into the race, occasionally causing one player to be left in the dust.

In Pandemic's On the Brink expansion, there's the possibility to have one of the players act as a bioterrorist. In addition to placing cubes from a fifth disease, they may also, when they enter the space of the team's research stations and no one else is there, remove it from the board by throwing away a card that matches the color of where the station is placed. The card cost means that sometimes it can't happen, so the terrorist has got to wait around to get the right opportunity.

In Citadels, as one of the roles you can choose, you can destroy buildings of an opponent. This is extremely powerful, but you're given the lowest spot in the turn order as a result, which is a real detriment. And often, the assassin will kill you.

I can't think of many more right now, but as I've been thinking about these games, the idea occurred to me: In all of those movies about racing, doesn't the villain usually have minions that run ahead of the racers to place the traps? Could you have a second "racer" (which can take shortcuts) that can place the traps up ahead of the competition? Perhaps you could limit the locations where they could place the traps/bonuses by some type of color scheme (every turn you draw a colored card, which indicates the locations where you can place that card), while other traps are ones that are placed by your racer. The advantage of this is that even when a player is down, they could be using their sabotaging team to wreak havoc, so they're never entirely out of the game. Also, if you could get the sabotaging team to your racer, maybe they could fix it, so that you're not required to be delayed as long when you've got support within reach.

Hmm, okay, if I take a step back, I can see two ways your game could go:

1) The fast, let's have fun and wreck everything-kind of game, with high luck factor and a lot of laughter. You'd maybe just draw cards and see what you can do to harm your opponents with or to fix your own car. This could be more of a filler and family game.

2) The economic, let's think half an hour in advance of the action-kind of game. You'd have a crew consisting of drivers, mechanics and saboteurs, you'd have investors for certain goals, you'd have to pay for your crew and your spare parts, you'd win and spend money wisely, trying to ensure that it is your nose that peeks over the finish line first. You'd maybe buy cards by bidding for them.

What springs to my mind here is the following: the backs of cards would have a money value printed on them. The player whose turn it is would look at the card and could decide to just pay this value for the card or turn it around for everyone to see and bid, with a way lower starting bid. Maybe other players could even bid on cards the first player wanted to buy without showing, if they felt it to be worthwhile.

Okay, back to the text: I personally would find the second, more euro type of game way more interesting. I recognize you are still in brainstorming, but maybe you should try to decide for a 'weight' of the game first. Else many suggestions from us might just be too heavy or too lightweight.

Josh 'Dagar'

Okay, then I'd just draw cards. They should have three parts like so: top: spare part for your car, middle: speed of your car, bottom: something you do to another player. Either you keep the card for spare parts or for speed advantage or you put it in the catastrophe pile of another player. You may not look in your catastrophe pile. On each part of the track you draw a card from your catastrophe pile. Either you play a spare part beforehands (if it fits 'leaky tank' vs 'spare tank') you may keep both cards in your hand, if not, both are lost. If you play none or fail, you can use a spare part afterwards, discarding both cards. The player with the most remaining speed after the race wins.

Sorry for brainstorm-rambling ^^

So, what I am definitely hearing is that you want players to sabotage and mess with each other. :-) This will be one mean game. Okay...sounds fun! What if each player were to draw two things at the start of the game--EDGE cards and SABOTAGE Specializations.

Edge Cards: Thinking about Milles Bornes' coup fourre, one could be something that give each car a particular edge (variable player power). One car has super steering. Another has ultra-durable tires. Those things allow players to avoid certain hazards/sabotage, discount actions, or potentially do something quicker or longer (e.g., durable tires or efficiency fuel gets 2 more turns before having to pit stop). But there are multiple edges, so maybe you can have up to two during the game. Whatever the card, you may or not be able to counter it. That will need to be a matter of balancing, but I think offhand that they should not be able to be negated permanently. I think players would get mad if their variable player power was something you could get rid of.

Sabotage Specialty: Similarly, you select another card that gives you a particular specialization on sabotage. Maybe you know all about transmissions...and rig a car so it cannot shift past 2nd gear (lower max speed = less movement or fewer action points). Or if steering is your thing, then you...well I guess it depends on how steering works in the game. But let's say that sabotage isn't fully permanent (which would be really mean depending on the rest of the game). Let's say that your sabotage specialty works two turns vs the normal just one. That's just one way to do it.

How to do it? I am thinking that you have to create suspense in some way--which means you don't play all of them at the start. Some mechanics ideas to consider:

1) What if every player had the exact same set of sabotage vulnerabilities mixed in the deck? or there were at least multiples of each effect?

2) Cards are color-coordinated to the players. Maybe two colors in pairs so that no one person could get their own card and completely prevent it from being used.

3) There is a separate "sabotage" deck and everyone gets 2-3 cards (this idea works in conjunction with ideas above or alone).

4) Each player has a sabotage planning board/area where they secretly play their sabotage specialty and up to 3 or 4 sabotage cards. This way each player could show that "someone is going to get it." But you don't know (as the driver wouldn't know) who is getting it or what the effect will be...until that someone tries to do something and then you flip the card showing their color and the effect. You could secretly mark each space "Driver 1", "Driver 2", etc. so you know who your sabotaging, but the players don't.

You could also vary WHEN the sabotage works:

a) Immediately upon a particular action/maneuver

b) randomly--roll a die to determine how many turns ahead it will take effect, or tie it to some other information in the game

c) When you want it to...maybe that is the effect of the sabotage specialization.

The only way to clear the sabotage is to pit or have some counter-remedy (like the coup fourre in Milles Bornes).

Thanks for letting me contribute. Good luck.