Board Game Designers Forum

This is the beginning of a Game development journal by Erin Truitt. All rights to protected materials are reserved.

Nephilim
Nephilim is an Economy/Warfare board game that has roots in Miniature conflict games as well as RPG's. The design of the game is to breach the gap between board games and the rest of the adventuring world. The concept of Nephilim is the expansion and control of vast tracks of space, in the hopes of building an empire, all of which is tracked through your “character” a Nephilim class Mothership.

General overview: The base game set will come with enough gear for 4 players, it can be expanded indefinitely (with more core sets) allowing any number of players to be accommodated. The game revolves around a character sheet which represents a Nephilim class Mothership. Each player will be able to design his/her own Mothership and fleet, all of which is recorded on this primary character sheet.

The game board itself is a modular multi-part hex map. This map type allows for a random map to be generated each game with an emphasis on simplicity. Players will vie for control of planets within a single system, attempting to harvest these planets for resources in order to manufacture more ships etc.

This offers players the chance to play through multiple games and advance their Mothership and fleet through economic and military success.

BRIEF 0.6
This journal has been updated to reflect patches and changes to Brief .6. In the gams current incarnation a variety of important changes have come to pass.

First and foremost the game has settled in to its once tentative title of Nephilim. Its exciteing to hear others call the game by name; it really makes me feel like the game has a weight to it.

The Star map system has gone through a number of changes but finally settled on 8 Square boards surrounding the central star. Though not as nifty (in my opinion) as my original hexagonal design it seems more stable when players move pieces and also allows a bit more “open space” for players to romp in.

The economic model as well as the military model is nearly complete. I feel the “Lance” class weapons may need some changes since it seems to be the most common choice of armament for fighters. The current changes to “Cannon” class weapons has given the Lance a run for its money in the last palytest, I certainly hope this continues to be true in the April playtests.

The economic model has also seen a number of changes, none so large as the military, but it has swayed and bent as well. Currently the 40 card deck seems perfected, thought this is never the case for long.

In its capacity as the tracking and leveling tool the Mothership excels. The Sovereignty system as well as the Marauding experience system is now in full swing and working as designed. I am still uncertain if the leveling values are as I wished them to be. Again I find the April play-test my most likely source for numbers on the kill ratios for leveling marauding. As usual the Arcology leveling system works with uncanny precision, a lucky design to be certain.

Thanks E