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Dice Battle Mechanic

9 replies [Last post]
Fri, 01/27/2012 - 20:12
SuperioR
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Joined: 09/20/2010

Hey,

Been working on a game for a while now and it has, like all my other projects, hit a wall that I can't seem to pass. You guys have been helpful in the past so I thought I'd share the problem to see if you have seen a solution to this problem in other games or just happen to have a good idea.

The problem is a dice based combat system where each die represents one troop.

Each time a player attacks another one he can choose to attack with 1-3 dice (well the number is not fixed since the mechanic isnt done yet..) and the defender also chooses 1-3 dice.

I'm now looking for some sort of combat mechanic that preferrably have a push your luck element in it.
Almost all the different mechanics I've been trying are unbalanced because if one player chose 1 die(read troop) but the other chose 3, the one with 1 will have next to 0 chance of winning.
If this was the case I'd like the one with only one die to try to push his luck, whilst the one with 3 shouldnt feel the need to try to push the luck that much, since he already has a slight advantage.

Even if there werent a push your luck system, since in a way you could think of allocating 1 die pushing your luck already, at least the player with 1 die should have DECENT chance of winning.

Example of one of the mechanics I tried:
Player A allocated 1 die to the combat, so he currently has 1 "strength"
Player B allocated 3 dice to the combat, so he currently has 3 "strength"
----
Player B starts since he allocated more dice into the combat.
Player B rolls all dice and gains extra "strength" for each 5 & 6 rolled.
Player B MAY reroll all the dice and gain additional "strength" in the same way, however if he rerolls them and gets NO new 5s or 6s then he lose all the previously gained bonuses.
---
Player A then rolls away and tries to get a 5 or 6 and then continuing until he gets enough strength to beat the other player.

The problem here is that again, Player A, who allocated 1 die will have a really hard time to beat the other player.
Theres also many other systems that I've been thinking about, but they all seem to make it hard for the 1 die player to have a chance.
Also would be great if 6s werent always the best but instead have lower rolls used for something else.

Preferrably the odds would go something like this:
Added the same amount of dice as the opponent? Will be an even fight, and probably decided by SOME luck and other combat modifiers.
Added one die more than the opponent? Should have slight advantage, and but can still be beaten by some good combat modifiers or a lucky roll.
Added two dice more than the opponent? Should win unless the opponent gets lucky (well should happen every once in a while, so like 80% chance of winning or so..?)

Hopefully I'm making some sense, if not please ask and I'll try to explain better!
Thanks for taking the time to read :)

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Fri, 01/27/2012 - 23:56
#1
BHFuturist
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one un-tested idea

You could use that system with a multiplier for the amount of dice rolled...

Player A rolls only 1 die and if they get a 5 or 6 it is +3 strength and a re-roll that if failed leaves them with just 1 hit.

Player B rolls 2 dice and rolls a 3 and a 5 they now have two strength and a re-roll that if failed leaves them with just 1 or 2 hits depending on the first roll

Player C rolls 3 dice and each die that is a 5 or six only counts for 1 strength and can be re-rolled... a fail in this case leaves them with the original amount of successes.

This gives you a risk/reward system that gives mega bonuses to the player risking the smallest amount of dice but also gives them the greatest chance to have the least "strength" in the end.

1 die = X3 per (5 or 6) each re-roll (3, 6, 9) Fail of a re-roll means and end result of 1
2 dice = X2 per (5 or 6) each re-roll (1-2, 2-4, 3-6) Fail of a re-roll means and end result of 1-2
3 Dice = X1 per (5 or 6) each re-roll (1-3,2-6,3-9) Fail of a re-roll means and end result of 1-3

Just a thought for your brain-storm,

-Eamon

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Sat, 01/28/2012 - 02:26
#2
bonsaigames
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Joined: 12/20/2010
Dice as resources

If the dice committed to the battle are lost regardless of the outcome. People will likely be more conservative on the number of dice they roll. You might win the short term victory but lose the war since you are now out of dice to defend or attack on next next round.

Not exactly press-your-luck style, but more dice management.

Another solution would be to use custom dice in which some are better to attack or defend with and you could build / choose as your strategy dictates.

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Sat, 01/28/2012 - 04:31
#3
SuperioR
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Joined: 09/20/2010
bonsaigames wrote:If the dice

bonsaigames wrote:
If the dice committed to the battle are lost regardless of the outcome. People will likely be more conservative on the number of dice they roll. You might win the short term victory but lose the war since you are now out of dice to defend or attack on next next round.

Yep, I was thinking about having it like that, however if you still end up with 1d6 v 3d6 you really dont have much of a chance.

But after writing this and going to bed, I actually thought about an idea that might be interesting to test:

At the start of the game you roll ALL your dice, and sort them by number (strength). You now know what strength all of your troops are.

When choosing troops to send into combat, you have to choose from the pile you have.
Which means, allocate the best? Ok, they wont be available next time since you wont be able to reroll them all the time only when you "buy more troops". Well you could also buy rerolls but that'd be per dice so its expensive.

And each player would also have special abilities that they could use sets of lower strength troops for, say 1+1+1 wouldnt be great strength, but it'd still give you some nice bonus, and get rid of those low strength dice if its a non important battle. And it might make the other player allocate 3 sixes or something, and basically make him waste them, a nice bluffing mechanic maybe?

This also means that the luck aspect gets reduced in a way, since you roll first, then choose what to commit.
Also you'd lose all the troops you allocated, so you don't want to spam 3x 6's all the time.

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Sat, 01/28/2012 - 05:16
#4
SuperioR
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Joined: 09/20/2010
eamon wrote:You could use

eamon wrote:
You could use that system with a multiplier for the amount of dice rolled...

I thought about this as well, the only reason didn't end up testing it more was that its not intuitive :(
There's just too many special cases to remember for what in the end is anyways a quite basic mechanic.

Thanks for the suggestion though!

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Sun, 01/29/2012 - 06:37
#5
kos
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Joined: 01/17/2011
I like your idea

I like your idea of "pre-rolled but hidden" dice, though that sounds like the primary game mechanic would become bluffing, not push-your-luck.

A simple dice mechanic which allows the low-dice player to win through luck would be: "Your combat strength is equal to the highest die you rolled; highest combat strength wins".

A variant on the above is "Your combat strength is equal to the highest die you rolled; multiples of the same number give +1; highest combat strength wins". This variant increases the odds for the 3-dice player.

Regards,
kos

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Mon, 01/30/2012 - 08:25
#6
SuperioR
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Joined: 09/20/2010
Thanks! I agree, it did

Thanks!

I agree, it did change from push-your-luck to a bluffing game. I managed to incorporate the bluffing mechanic seamlessly into the game, and also managed to make all the values of the dice important, so it seems like it'll work. One nice part about it is that it makes a "dice based combat system" work more or less without luck.

However, your mechanic sounds EXACTLY like what I came here to find, so in case the previously mechanic doesn't work, I'll be sure to try this one out! Hadn't thought about using the dice like that before!

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Mon, 01/30/2012 - 12:25
#7
Cogentesque
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Kos is the man. He beat me to

Kos is the man.

He beat me to it!

I was going to go for something like:

1. Perhaps the attacker / defender positions count for something. Meaning that if I was attacking I would be allowed to use up to 3 D6, but defender the same, with the inclusion of a D8 (defence is easier)

2. Any time you roll a double (any dice) the units attack is cancelled out. So I choose 1d6, you choose 3 d6's. I roll 3 and you roll 4,4,6 - you lose as you have multiples.

3. Or perhaps something like: you choose your number of dice to begin and each dice rolled must be equal to or LESS than the one rolled previous to it. I like that. So 1d6 is always safe. 2d6 would be risky as long as second die is less. 3d6 is even risker again as you would be on a lower number by the second roll and have to come below it (or match it) in order for any subsequent rolls to "count" - or perhaps for every point above the previous dice rolled counts negatively?

eg: You roll 2D6.

The first roll is 4, giving you a power of 4.
The next is 5, being one point more than previous dice, therfore making this roll count negatively (4-1 = 3).

By equipping the defender with a d8 - this gives the possibility of a roll of 7 or a 8 - the attacker would then HAVE to adventure down the "push your luck route", and would stop people never pushing their luck and making the most of your system.

This is by no means as "intuiative" as Kos's elegant solution but adds a lot more complex variety in, for example - it could be possible to have a negative score - what would that mean? And if players had access to some kind of "add one to any dice roll" ability, or "reroll any one dice" - there would be a lot more options opened up.

But still tbh, I'd probably go with Kos's ^^

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Mon, 01/30/2012 - 13:24
#8
Orangebeard
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Joined: 10/13/2011
Different Dice?

Hi SuperioR,

It sounds like you have a good solution from Kos, but if it doesn't work out, then this might be solvable using different dice for attack and defense. The assumption seems to be that the dice are all identical, but if you are willing to explore the possibility of custom dice, then you could create defense dice that have a small statistical advantage over attack dice.

...and what gamer doesn't love piles of custom dice!

Good luck with your design!

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Sun, 02/05/2012 - 00:47
#9
indigo
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Joined: 03/13/2009
An idea I've been playing

An idea I've been playing with, and it might work for you too:

Each battle would consist of three rounds, and each player gets five dice. They can roll as many as they like each round of the battle, but can only roll each die once. The dice are set aside each round, and only their highest die counts for each round. Duplicates are eliminated, and a tie goes to the defender. Winner of two out of three rounds wins the battle.

So, a player may choose to front-load the battle by rolling three dice in the first round and two in the second, leaving them nothing in the third round but giving them better odds to win the first two rounds (and thus the battle), or they may play it safe and only roll one die in the first two rounds, saving three for the last and giving them better odds to come from behind.

In the system I'm working on, the battles are also affected by modifiers present on the player pieces themselves, and on their position on the table, but this is the basic dice mechanic I've been thinking of.

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