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Desiging your game board

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parah7
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Joined: 10/10/2018

Hey guys,

So I have been having trouble designing a board for my game, essentially how the player moves around in order to complete their task. Ill start by stating what the game is and the goal.

The game is called Antics, players must complete 'antics' by collecting a resource (various types of the same resource) and then once completed gets added to their 'story' in front of the player. The antics cards are statements or actions outrageous, weird or crude in nature i.e "Got into an imaginary tug-o-war with a mime" or "Went trolley jousting in the car park". Once completed the player will score points from this card and the person at the end of the game with the most points wins. There exists other cards to aid in ones journey such as friends (still working out their purpose), beer cards for bonus points and action cards that allow players to interact with the board and other players.

I have gone through several different types of boards such as having fixed areas on the board and people can go to any area as long as they have enough action points and fixed path boards where players must move along a fixed path (or multiple paths leading to the same point). Unfortunately nothing i try feels right, either im missing something or maybe i am over thinking it.

My questions are, what was your process to designing a board for your game, or how did you come to your final design? and do you have any suggestions i could use in relation to my dilemma?

If you need any more information on my game to make any suggestions happy to supply :)

Fertessa
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Joined: 07/18/2018
parah7 wrote:Hey guys, So I

parah7 wrote:
Hey guys,

So I have been having trouble designing a board for my game, essentially how the player moves around in order to complete their task. Ill start by stating what the game is and the goal.

The game is called Antics, players must complete 'antics' by collecting a resource (various types of the same resource) and then once completed gets added to their 'story' in front of the player. The antics cards are statements or actions outrageous, weird or crude in nature i.e "Got into an imaginary tug-o-war with a mime" or "Went trolley jousting in the car park". Once completed the player will score points from this card and the person at the end of the game with the most points wins. There exists other cards to aid in ones journey such as friends (still working out their purpose), beer cards for bonus points and action cards that allow players to interact with the board and other players.

I have gone through several different types of boards such as having fixed areas on the board and people can go to any area as long as they have enough action points and fixed path boards where players must move along a fixed path (or multiple paths leading to the same point). Unfortunately nothing i try feels right, either im missing something or maybe i am over thinking it.

My questions are, what was your process to designing a board for your game, or how did you come to your final design? and do you have any suggestions i could use in relation to my dilemma?

If you need any more information on my game to make any suggestions happy to supply :)

I was/am new to the hobby when I started designing my game a year or so ago. It took me about...7 or 8 months to finally pin down a method of movement that worked for me. I went through 6 or 7 different boards/tile layouts until I arrived at one that felt right. The biggest help in doing that was playing games.

Since I was new, I hadn't played games in a majority of the genres with majority of the mechanics, so every game night, I was being introduced to new games. I joined 3 gaming groups, just to keep up frequency and variety, and I went to all the local board game conventions that I could.

Doing that gave me so much experience with games I both loved and hated, and in the moments where I figured out why I felt a certain way about a game, I would decide if it was something I wanted to emulate in my own game. A rush of feeling victorious made me question what caused the rush, and if it was the feeling I was chasing in my game, then how did I recreate it?

So play lots of new games, even if you don't like the mechanics or genre, and analyze each game as you play them, and after you play them. Figure out how your gaming experience compares to the one you're aiming for, and if there's a match, then start borrowing ideas.

wob
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Joined: 06/09/2017
hello. does your game need a

hello.
does your game need a board? your description (if i read it right) is a sort of set collection game, where the sets vary depending on the goal/point cards. you might be able to do it without moving at all. your actions could be "draw" " place" "steal" etc with more complex/better actions costing more.
if that doesnt work modular boards (tiles that give random layouts) can work well, it can still work like a standard roll and move but with more variety.

Jay103
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Joined: 01/23/2018
wob wrote:hello. does your

wob wrote:
hello.
does your game need a board? your description (if i read it right) is a sort of set collection game, where the sets vary depending on the goal/point cards. you might be able to do it without moving at all. your actions could be "draw" " place" "steal" etc with more complex/better actions costing more.
if that doesnt work modular boards (tiles that give random layouts) can work well, it can still work like a standard roll and move but with more variety.

Exactly what I was about to say. Do you need a board?

The Chaz
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Joined: 11/20/2012
...

Jay103 wrote:
wob wrote:
hello.
does your game need a board?...

Exactly what I was about to say. Do you need a board?

Indeed.

Do you need a board? Do players need to have pawns or pieces scattered about, or can they enjoy the game by just taking one action (from 3-4 listed on a reference card) each turn?

parah7
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Joined: 10/10/2018
It did cross my mind about

It did cross my mind about scrapping the board and having players play cards from their hand and drawing cards, i think i got myself a bit lost on what actions would be best for this type of game though, as well as cards. Ill give you guys some more examples of the different types of cards (based on my current board idea)

Note: blocks must be collected to complete the antics (green, yellow or black for instance)

Antic card - Got into an imaginary tug-o-war with a mime, point value +3, requires 2 green blocks and 1 yellow block.

Friend - Larry the larrikin, When you complete an antic card, immediately draw another. If you meet the requirements complete it immediately.

Beers - Have a picture of a beer on them and can be either +1, +2 or +3 points, played when completing antics for extra points

Action Card (gathered from the ATM) - If you visit the bus stop this turn, look at the top 2 friends and pick one to keep, place the other at the bottom of the deck.

At the start of a persons turn they would draw a movement card from their own movement deck, this would state how many moves or actions they could perform in this turn. I guess a lot of the cards i have could be used without a deck but i think the biggest issue would be deciding what actions one could have as well as how many decks to split the cards up to. I also don't want the game to feel too one dimensional and monotonous.

If you guys could give me suggestions of similar games or games that use drawing cards without a board really well that would be great.

Jay103
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Joined: 01/23/2018
parah7 wrote:Note: blocks

parah7 wrote:
Note: blocks must be collected to complete the antics (green, yellow or black for instance)

Antic card - Got into an imaginary tug-o-war with a mime, point value +3, requires 2 green blocks and 1 yellow block.


Why 2 green and 1 yellow? What do the colors represent?

If the answer is "nothing", then I think your players may also wonder what the point of the blocks is.

Tim Edwards
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Joined: 07/30/2015
Jay103 wrote:parah7

Jay103 wrote:
parah7 wrote:
Note: blocks must be collected to complete the antics (green, yellow or black for instance)

Antic card - Got into an imaginary tug-o-war with a mime, point value +3, requires 2 green blocks and 1 yellow block.


Why 2 green and 1 yellow? What do the colors represent?

If the answer is "nothing", then I think your players may also wonder what the point of the blocks is.

This game has a stag night feel to it. How about shots instead of colours. Then you are trying to get the right mix of drinks to get sufficiently trashed to do the antic.

About the board. Although lots of board games use cards, it does seem here like you haven't decided whether you want a card or board game. I would say don't worry about being "one dimensional". By far the most common problem is the opposite - that a design is too confused.

If you can get away with cards only, that's great. Portable, cheap and easy to produce, good game to take to the pub.

If you want a board game, why have movement resolved by cards? Maybe chuck a die. Maybe have a sort of Ludo game where you're trying to complete as many antics as you can before you reach the middle (pass out)...

parah7
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Joined: 10/10/2018
Apologies should of mentioned

Apologies should of mentioned this before.

The premise of the game is that the characters are new to this town where all the antics happen. The different coloured blocks are the 'people' of this town. So when an antic requires X amount of blocks is to say that to complete the antic you need that many people.

wob
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Joined: 06/09/2017
looking at your examples only

looking at your examples only the action card requires a board, and that could be replaced with another triggdr (if you discard x, if you have y in your hand).

your friend and actions could be the same card type. i would also make the rule that you draw a new antic whenever you complete an antic anyway. and maybe have say 3 on the go at a time.

the beers are a bit pointless but wont hurt the game (dont make them too valuable), i would scrap them if you need to reduce card counts. or make them a "you drink" card to make it a proper drinking game.

there are loads of card games to look up on bgg. i would check set collection games, try jaipur.

you might also want to look into games with a " take that" mechanic (where you screw over your opponent) fluxx is a good game for that.

parah7
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Joined: 10/10/2018
Ok with everyone's input i

Ok with everyone's input i have something to work with that ill be testing once i get the cards made up.

Instead of having a board per se, there will be a number of draw piles that players can draw from, these include;

ATM - Action cards that allow players to interact with blocks (drinks), antics, other players or a combination of elements.

Pub - Players draw blocks (drinks), these are required to complete antics

Motel - Players draw a travel card, this card gets added to the players travel deck and the top card of their used pile gets moved to the bottom of the 'main' travel deck if you will. *See below for more info on travel decks.

*Every player has their own 'travel deck' with methods of travel on it. These are stumbling, walking and taxi with 2,3 and 4 actions respectively. At the start of their turn players draw the top card and have that many actions to use in their turn.

Antics - Players draw new antics cards from this pile

Bus stop - Players draw friends. I have been rotating the purpose of friends in previous iterations to see where they fit best. I have contemplated just scrapping them but i feel they are a crucial thematic element to the game. (also the friends are unique in nature and add an extra element of humor to the game). Ive been thinking they could be used for once off bonuses, extra requirement for some antics (drinks + friends) or maybe unique abilities to help the player (this was their original purpose). Of course they would require more action points to draw then other things.

Most things will take one action to complete, some two and players can do one action multiple times (until available actions are expended)

I think the biggest issue i face now is coming up with the requirements for each antic, if some antics are worth more than others (Crazy more than wild and wild more than tame), then the cost requirements should be more. But if drawing a block only costs 1 action then it would mean that players would just complete high point antics that have low block requirements.

My initial thought was making drawing some blocks cost more actions but it would have to be 1,2,3 and as such the available actions from the travel cards would have to be 3,4,5 to account for this, but then players could draw 5 green blocks in one turn.

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