Hello BGDF friends. It's been a long time since I've posted here, but I've got a new idea I'm kicking around that's exploring some space I think might be fairly new (although I could well be wrong about that). Sorry that things are a bit abstract from a thematic standpoint as yet. I've been massaging this idea for a while, and the theme that had been used as scaffolding during early iterations of the idea isn't proving to be a great fit for where the mechanics seem to be going. Here's the idea: A team vs team deck builder geared towards 2v2 or 3v3 match-ups.
Each team is building a shared deck. Each round, each team's entire deck is dealt out as evenly as possible between that team's players. After looking at their hands, the team determines which location each player will go to for that round (the number of locations is equal to the number of players, limit one player per location). This sets up a 1v1 match-up at each location.
The primary function of most of the cards is to provide varying quantities and combinations of 6 different (but mostly identical) resources. Each location will be affiliated with 2-3 of these resources (3 for 2v2, 2 for 3v3), so part of selecting which player goes to which location is based on the types of resources that player's hand can produce. For example, if one of the locations is affiliated with black and red, and I have several cards producing black and red in my hand, I would likely want to be assigned to that location.
Each turn, players can spend their cards to do two things:
1. Each location will have several cards available to acquire to add to the team's deck, which will be revealed after player assignments are finalized. The two opposing players at that location add up the number of resources of the affiliated types their hand can generate. Whoever has the most (tiebreaker TBD) can spend cards from their hand greater than or equal to the cost of a card they wish to acquire and add it to the team's deck for future turns. Player then recheck which of them has the most relevant resources remaining, and that player gets the next pick, etc. This continues until all cards have been claimed or both players pass (unclaimed cards are discarded). Card costs are generic/colorless, but can only be paid using the resources affiliated with that location. Some maybe in the format of 2A + 1B, meaning 2 of one of the location's colors and 1 of the other.
2. Each location features a multi-stage goal, the achievement of which is how teams win the game. If a player has all the resources needed to complete the next stage of the goal, they can spend those cards to move their team's marker up on that goal's track, which moves them towards the victory condition (details TBD). However, this will likely give the opposing team an advantage in acquiring that location's cards for that round. As teams advance on the goal track for a location, more cards are made available for drafting at that location on subsequent turns in Action #1 above.
All locations resolve their mini-games simultaneously (to speed play and mitigate alpha-gaming), then decks are reshuffled, dealt again, and new player assignments are made. Play continues until one team makes sufficient progress on the various goals to achieve victory.
Additional thoughts:
- With the entire deck being dealt every round, hand sizes could rapidly swell out of control. This means any cards with abilities beyond producing resources will need to be very very simple. I'm also playing with the idea of having an additional use for cards that trashes them out of the game, but also grants the team an ongoing bonus of some kind. This could also be a good use for cards you've been dealt that don't provide resources relevant to your current location. Alternately, it could be that cards used to fulfill a goal are trashed.
- I'm considering drawing tokens from a bag to randomize which resources are affiliated with each location. This not only provides some variable set up, but could allow for card effects or periodic timing triggers to swap/redraw these assignments mid-game to shift the balance if a team goes all in on a particular color combo.
- As far as victory conditions, my two leading options currently would be simple VP for each stage completed (game ends after X rounds or when a team hits X points) OR a team wins if they hit a low threshold on all goals or a higher threshold on a single goal. (If a goal had 7 steps, getting all goals to 5 or one goal to 7 would trigger victory)
- Although the game obviously plays best at 4 or 6 players, it should be possible to play with anywhere from 2-6 if players are comfortable controlling the action at multiple locations in sequence. This obviously does increase play time, and I'm not sure how satisfying it would be, but I think having 4 or 6 players only on the side of the box could be a big turn off.
I'd love any thoughts or feedback the community has to offer. I think there's some interesting unexplored space here, especially the 1-on-1 encounters with various members of the opposing team and the opportunity to collaboratively build an engine with your teammates. If anyone is familiar with other games that have attempted similar goals, I'd be grateful for referrals to go check those out as well. Thanks in advance!
Juzek, that article was a deep and fascinating read! Thanks for sharing. I suspect I'll be revisiting the ideas shared there a number of times if this design moves forward.
It seems like I wasn't as clear as I could have been in describing mechanisms for my idea. When it comes to determining which player goes to what space, this is a decision that each team arrives at collaboratively and simultaneously, so there's no sense where the "last" player is left without options. Think of it as players gathering at HQ to decide together on their mission assignments, each player going off to complete his or her own mission, and then returning to debrief saying, "Here's what I achieved." The reason to resolve the actions at locations simultaneously is so that players can't alpha game the decisions that their teammates are making at other locations. It might even be worth putting communication restrictions in place during that phase, but I'd like the teams to be able to fully and openly collaborate "back at base." The 1v1 match-ups are at the core of the experience I'm going for with the game, so allowing more locations than players creates a good chance that players will miss each other on a fairly regular basis, and could make the decision of where to go feel closer to the core decision in The Grimm Forest. (Great game, just not what I'm going for here)
And Jay, yes, I've been lurking around this site for a lot of years. I dabbled in design quite a bit when I was in grad school ('09-'12), but hadn't been exposed to very many games as yet. Two kids and 6 years at a very demanding job later, I'm finally able to breathe enough to be in a regular game group which includes several designers and a publisher, so my juices are starting to flow again. It's exciting to see all the amazing evolution that's taken place in our hobby, particularly when it comes to designer resources, in the past decade!