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Need another opinion

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questccg
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Hello fellow Designers,

I am looking for some "ideas" or alternate uses for "cubes" in my game.

Let me sum up game play and explain where I need some help!

So player play cards in a grid and when a card is conquered it offers up some "loot" which can be gathered by the players. This game works for both a 2 player and a 4 player version.

There are three (3) types of loot: Red, Yellow and Blue.

Purple = Chaos Gems and once all 3 are revealed, the game ends. The player with the most Chaos Gems is the winner.

This leaves Green and Orange cubes. Green cubes indicate "traps" and when a green cube is picked, that tile's "loot" is ALL trapped. To gather loot, a player must roll 3d6s: two white and one black. A mixed pair results in +1 loot and a white pair result in +2 loot.

LASTLY which leaves me to where I need some HELP: the orange cube.

Currently this cube means that the person who conquered his opponent may NOT gather "loot" from this location.

I don't know if this is a good idea... Or maybe some other purpose for the "Orange" cubes...

Any help would be much appreciated! BTW this is for "Monster Keep"...

let-off studios
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Perks & Structures

Is there a use for structures, fortifications, buildings, etc. that provide benefits to the player? Like, you could have Orange cubes indicate some kind of investment in these special structures, and depending on where the player wants to deploy it, they could receive some kind of benefit.

I really have no idea of the particulars of your game beyond combat. But maybe there's a way players can earn additional card draws, re-throws of dice and/or other dice mitigation abilities, area control, additional victory points, etc.

I'm thinking of how players can invest in the Wonders in 7 Wonders, or the different buildings in Kingsburg for various in-game benefits. Might you be able to implement something like this into MK?

Fri
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Damage for attacking card.

If I remember correctly one card is used attack and conquer a previously played card. Can you use the orange cubes to represent some type of damage on the attacking card?

I Will Never Gr...
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A few thoughts;

Well I guess my first question would be; Do you NEED to have Orange cubes or would the Red, Yellow, Blue, Green and Purple gems be enough?

How are the cubes used? Are they drawn from a bag? If so, when are they drawn?

Is it possible that orange cubes could be used to provide a boost of some sort to a future action? Or, based solely on color, perhaps an orange cube could count as either red or yellow, depending on what you want/need (since red+yellow=orange)?

questccg
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Hmm... Very Interesting!

I'm at a point with the design that I am "experimenting" with alternate methods of play. I only presented the combat aspect, because I didn't have any additional layer...

But Kingsburg introduces an interesting aspect with the dice: selecting whom you will use your dice to "control".

I was inspired by this concept with a variation. Sort of a blend of Kingsburg and Catan where each tile used "Dice Values" to be able to collect "loot" from that location.

For example: If the "Fighter" is conquered, you flip over the card to reveal "The Barracks". "Loot" is randomly chosen from a bag according to the "Fighter's" stats. What happens next is that to CLAIM any "loot" from "The Barracks", you must roll a "1 Black" (1 die) OR "> 5 White" (2 dice).

Collecting "loot" would cost nothing but on each turn you would have 3 Action Points and therefore three (3) rolls of the dice that allow you to have better odds of being able to collect "loot".

So you might see SIMILARITIES with Kingsburg and Catan... But neither are 100% exact, my game would have it's own "unique" type of "looting" mechanic inspired by those two (2) games.


Getting back to "Orange" and "Green" Cubes. So there are SIX (6) "Green" cubes and I have decided that "Green" means the Cube of your choice (Red, Yellow or Blue). Meaning when you collect a "Green" Cube, you choose if you want Red, Yellow or Blue. Sort of like a "Wildcard".

Secondly there are THREE (3) "Orange" cubes and what I believe is that they are "FREE to claim" resources. You would use ALL remaining Action Points for this but not need to ROLL the dice ... as they are "FREE" and may be claimed requiring no dice rolling. You could only claim one (1) resource per turn... It's kind of like a "2nd runner-up" option. So IF an "Orange" cube is in play, it means that the WORST case, you will ONLY collect "1 resource" this turn.


For those who know (like @Fri), Cubes are drawn from a bag when a unit is "conquered" on the battle field. The number of Cubes depends on the stats of the conquered card. Those stats dictate how many items to "loot" are made present at that location.

It's not a very complexe game. I wanted some dice rolling to ensure that the game was NOT purely "deterministic". I dislike games that ONLY rely on stats. I feel like dice rolling adds a luck factor ... but in this case rolling ADD "strategy" in so far that dice allocation means that only one (1) player may be at a "location" at any given point in time.

I've got to work on a prototype and see IF this new "method" of collecting "loot" is FUN and "efficient". It seems promising thought TBH...

questccg
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I'm still struggling with that ORANGE cube...

I'd like it to be a ... "if all else fails, you can collect one (1) resource" and not "no matter what happens, you can collect one (1) extra resource"...

Anybody have a simplification (or better a way to word it???)

The point of the Orange cube is ... An option when you collect no "loot" on your turn. A "consolation prize"...

questccg
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Another direction...

I Will Never Grow Up Gaming wrote:
...Is it possible that orange cubes could be used to provide a boost of some sort to a future action? Or, based solely on color, perhaps an orange cube could count as either red or yellow, depending on what you want/need (since red+yellow=orange)?

This brings up some "colorful" thinking. Like Red + Yellow = Orange OR even Blue + Yellow = Green. Maybe I should think in "simpler terms". Instead of making it "un-natural", maybe I should just go with them AS THEY ARE:

A> Orange = one (1) Red OR one (1) Yellow.

B> Green = one (1) Blue OR one (1) Yellow.

And make it 3 of each color (so 6) + 3 Purple (Chaos Gems) and maybe call it a wrap! Just thinking... Not sure. Something for me to ponder.

For a total of 45 Cubes...? TBD

questccg
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I will bang out a prototype on Sunday December 1, 2019

Why the delay...? Well I am also working on proofing TradeWorlds design files to ensure there are no errors, missing cards, or incorrect iconography. So far I have found a bunch of things that are missing or were the incorrect file to be included in the Master Files (.ZIP), etc.

I should get an idea about the "appeal" of the Kingsburg dice rolling tactics... I'm going to work on Sunday morning towards getting the cards DESIGNED and then printed... By the afternoon I should have them all cut ... and be ready for some playtesting in the evening (after 5:00 PM).

We'll see how things go... Tomorrow night more proofing (80 Colony Cards)!

Yeah I'm working on it... It's very TIME CONSUMING. I just can't sit there and "proof". I need breaks, span it out and divide the effort. Photoshop is a "resource hog" so I need to do one folder and close Photoshop...!

questccg
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Update... Focusing on TradeWorlds

I still have a TON of cards to review. And TBH I wasn't feeling like reviewing cards tonight. I'll resume reviewing tomorrow morning... The key point is that I am moving forwards... But it takes a LOT of effort to review the cards...

It takes a good 1-2 minutes to LOAD the Photoshop (.PSD) files (20+ Mbytes) and it puts a drain on my computer because of all the memory usage. I can maybe load 3 images simultaneously ... without freezing the computer.

And then there are like 80 files to review... PER folder. I'm serious about getting through ALL the files. It just takes some time and patience. And I pretty much can't do nothing else BUT review... Yeah sometimes I can't even Google stuff... Chrome uses a bit of memory per tab... But Photoshop is one MEMORY-INTENSIVE HOG!

Bottom line: I'm working on reviewing all the files.

Cheers everyone!

Warklaxon
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Orange cube options.

Not sure if you’re still looking for ideas, but this seems fun.

Steal a cube from another player. Discard after use.
Make another player put back a cube (players choice) discard after use.
Draw two cubes next loot earned.

Good luck!

questccg
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Always looking for other ideas!

Warklaxon wrote:
Not sure if you’re still looking for ideas, but this seems fun.

At the moment, the game seems a little bit "lite" on the Tactical Side. It's FUN and goes out of its way to simplify "Deck Construction" and has some really NICE artwork too.

Warklaxon wrote:
Steal a cube from another player. Discard after use.
Make another player put back a cube (players choice) discard after use.
Draw two cubes next loot earned.

Forcing a player to "Deduct" a cube from his "score" (and then discard) seems like an INTERESTING "idea"! Thanks that is very cool indeed, you trade off earning a resource, to balance the game out a bit. COOL!

questccg
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Conclusion: for the Orange Cubes

There are three (3) Orange Cubes per Loot Bag... And I thought "Orange" can be a +1 Experience to the card in play of your choice. They are replaceable... So it means you can collect as much experience as you see fit for your cards.

Cheers and Happy New Years to everyone!

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