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Ninja Operatives

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bottercot
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Screenshot (4).png

Theme:
Modern-day ninjas must break into complexes and complete objectives for their top-secret organization.
Premise: This is basically a hidden movement game where one side is the ninja, and the other side controls the complex under attack. The ninja must sneak into the complex, taking down guards, destroying cameras, sneaking through vents, and unlocking doors, all to complete their objective.
Both players have a map; however, the maps are different. The ninja player's map shows all the locks, vents, cameras, systems, and everything in between. The other player (I have yet to give him a name) has a map that shows the basic layout and the objective.
Setup:
The game starts with the ninja player choosing his skills to upgrade. The skills available are Strength, Accuracy, Tech, Speed, and Reflex. Each one will be useful. The Ninja player has a total of 12 (WIP) skill points to spend. He sets his skill board to match the skill levels he chose.
Now, it's time to set up the board. A barrier is put up between the two boards, so that neither player can see the other's board. Next, the Guard player places all his Guard figures on their starting spot. The Ninja player follows suit, but, in addition, he places Active tokens on all Systems. In addition, he can put his Ninja figure anywhere on row S.
Gameplay:
The Guard player starts. On his turn, he rolls a die, and can move as many Guards as the amount he rolled. Every time he moves a Guard, he must announce the space they started in, and the space they are moving to. The Ninja player must then update his existing board to match the movement of the Guards.
Movement: Each Guard can move a maximum of 3 spaces. Movement is not allowed onto any of the very dark spaces, but movement is allowed onto grey spaces and spaces with Bushes.
Line of Sight: After a Guard has moved, the Ninja player must check to see if the Guard is within Line of Sight of the Ninja. A Guard must be within 3 squares to see a Ninja who is on a grey space. A Guard must be able to draw a line from the center of its space to the center of the Ninja's space to see a Ninja that is on a white space.
NOTE: White spaces represent spaces with artificial lighting, while grey spaces are spaces in the dark.
If the Ninja confirms that he is within Line of Sight of a Guard, the Ninja player must reveal where his figure is, and the Guard player may place his own Ninja figure on his board.
Guard Reaction: If the Guard has Line of Sight to the Ninja, he may attempt to Fire at the Ninja. If he attempts to Fire, the Ninja can first perform a Reflex Roll to try to dodge the Fire. If the Ninja's die roll is equal to or less than the Ninja's Reflex skill, the roll is successful, and the Ninja is unharmed. However, if the Reflex Roll failed, the Ninja is hit by the gunfire and his Strength skill level is decreased by 1. Strength is the equivalent of hit points, and when his Strength drops to zero, the Ninja is dead and the Guard player wins.
Once the Guard player has finished moving all the Guards he can/wants to, play moves on to the Ninja's turn.
On his turn, the Ninja first moves, then can perform an Action.
Ninja Movement: The Ninja can move spaces up to his Speed skill. For rules on movement for the Ninja, see further down. If the Ninja ends his movement in Line of Sight of a Guard, the Ninja must inform the Guard player, and the Guard player updates his placement of the Ninja figurine. If the Ninja started his movement in Line of Sight of a Guard, but ended his movement no longer in Line of Sight, the Ninja must inform the Guard player, who must then remove his Ninja figure from his board.
However, the Ninja can also perform a Sword Action after movement. He may kill 1 adjacent Guard figure (including diagonal) or 1 adjacent Camera (see further down for special spaces). If he does so, he may not perform an Action (as seen below) after moving, but he does not need to reveal his position to the Guard player if he eliminated the Guard/Camera that would have caused him to be in Line of Sight. However, the Ninja player must inform the Guard player if it was a Guard figure that was eliminated, and must also state the location of the now dead Guard.
Actions:
The Ninja can perform one action of two choices after movement.
Action 1: Throw a Shuriken. The Ninja chooses a Guard/Camera within 6 spaces of him. He may then perform an Accuracy Roll. If his roll is equal to or less than his Accuracy skill, the Shuriken hits its target, and the target is eliminated. The Ninja player must inform the Guard player if it was a Guard figure that was eliminated, as well as where the dead Guard was.
Action 2: Hack a System. The Ninja chooses an adjacent System space, and performs a Tech Roll to deactivate the System. If the roll is equal to or less than the Ninja's Tech skill, remove the Active token from the space of the System. See further down for what happens when a System is deactivated.
After the Ninja player's turn is over, play returns to the Guard player, and the Time tracker is advanced one space.
Winning the Game:
If the Ninja reaches the Objective space, the Ninja player wins. If the Time tracker reaches the end, or all Ninjas are dead, the Guard player wins.
Types of Special Spaces:
1. Camera
Appearance: a Camera on a normal space with a number in the bottom right.
Mechanics: A Camera reveals the location of the Ninja if the Ninja is within spaces equal to the number in the bottom right of the Camera, in a straight line. Cameras count as open spaces for movement. Also, Cameras can be deactivated by Shurikens or Swords.
2. Lock System
Appearance: A greyish space with a lock symbol on it and a number in the bottom right.
Mechanics: When deactivated, the door of the matching number can now be moved through.
3. Door
Appearance: a grey space with a door symbol on it and a number in the bottom right.
Mechanics: Doors count as Wall spaces as long as its matching Lock system is active. Once its Lock system is deactivated, Door spaces count as open spaces.
4. Lighting System
Appearance: A grey space with a lightbulb and a slash through it.
Mechanics: When deactivated, all white spaces count as grey spaces with no light. This does not affect Cameras.
5. Camera System
Appearance: A grey space with a Camera and a slash through it.
Mechanics: When deactivated, all Cameras are immediately deactivated.
6. Objective
Appearance: A space with a target symbol on it.
Mechanics: If the space is grey like System spaces, it counts as a System which must be hacked before the Ninja can win. If the space is white as an open space, the Ninja must move onto the space before the Ninja can win.
7. Bush
Appearance: A Bush.
Mechanics: A Ninja in a Bush cannot be seen but from an adjacent space.
8. Vents
Appearance: A dark grey space, slightly lighter than the Wall spaces. Some Vent spaces have a double line next to them, representing a Vent opening.
Mechanics: When a Ninja is moving, he may move into a Vent space from one of the openings. Once inside a Vent space, the Ninja cannot perform any Actions, and can only move 2 spaces per turn. A Ninja in a Vent cannot be seen. When moving out of a Vent, a Ninja can only move out through a Vent opening and must stop just outside the opening. The Ninja can still perform an Action after exiting a Vent.

Conclusion:
What do you think? I hope people had the patience to read through this whole thing. I wrote this all without any editing or previous versions, so I hope it's clear.
I also have an attached picture of a sample Ninja player map with all the mentioned Systems. 0s are Guard starting spaces.
Is this a cool idea? Over-complicated? Confusing? Are there issues? Please criticize this game to the high heavens.

GonzoLubitsch
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Joined: 04/13/2018
Hello bottercot, I had a few

Hello bottercot,

I had a few thoughts after reading through this idea.

Does the Ninja know the entire layout of the map, i.e. all systems and the objective location? I think an exploration aspect for the Ninja could be good. The Ninja side may know only basic layout, but maybe not certain parts of System locations. This could be a part of the Setup for the Guard? They would have to choose certain parts of the map to be known to both sides and certain parts only known, at first, to the Guards.

Do you envision there being multiple Ninjas on the Ninja side? I was reading it at first as the Ninja side has one powerful character and the Guard side has multiple weaker characters.

What happens if the Ninja side kills all the Guards? Would this be a victory?

Initial impressions are that the Guard side seems less fun than the Ninja side. Maybe the Guards can control some of the Systems that the Ninja is trying to hack/destroy. Examples, change the angle of a camera/enhance the range of a specific camera, reinforce a door, turn up the heat in a specific air duct (damage the ninja), etc. This could give a better feeling of the Guard side controlling the Complex rather than controlling a set of "minion" type characters.

Would there be variable map setup? This would make it interested, but also difficult to balance.

Can the Ninja move through the space a Guard is in?

I like the initial step of statting out the Ninja. This could make for pretty different games and could have some good thematic moments. I have a funny image of a max strength/min speed lumbering giant-type ninja walking through the complex and slapping down cameras on the way. If I was the Guard, I would want a similar set up where I feel like I am customizing my side to some degree.

Jay103
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Joined: 01/23/2018
This would make a great app

This would make a great app :)

Tricky as a board game, obviously, due to the hidden information aspect and the complexity (much more than, say, Battleship). Good luck with your design!

let-off studios
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Infiltration, etc.

A few points for consideration...

At this point, it doesn't seem like the Guard player's map needs to be concealed. You may want to address this by not allowing the Ninja player to know the compound's layout prior to exploration. Sounds fiddly to coordinate, but it may be doable.

Would you consider bonus points awarded for the Ninja player if there were any Guards surviving?

Also, what's to stop the Guard player from simply moving all their guards to the "throne room" to protect the objective point? Would you consider awarding points to the Guard player for protecting/securing various locations on the map, in addition to protecting the throne room?

Maybe there's a "sliding scale" of points, where at the start of the game, the Guard player has all 10, but when the Ninja character meets certain objectives - destroying cameras, unlocking doors, something else, etc. - they "steal" points from the Guard player. This gives the Guard a reason to disperse their guards throughout the map instead of just crowding in to protect the main objective.

Otherwise the game sounds VERY interesting at this point.

bottercot
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Joined: 02/06/2018
GonzoLubitsch wrote:Hello

GonzoLubitsch wrote:
Hello bottercot,

I had a few thoughts after reading through this idea.

Does the Ninja know the entire layout of the map, i.e. all systems and the objective location? I think an exploration aspect for the Ninja could be good. The Ninja side may know only basic layout, but maybe not certain parts of System locations. This could be a part of the Setup for the Guard? They would have to choose certain parts of the map to be known to both sides and certain parts only known, at first, to the Guards.

Do you envision there being multiple Ninjas on the Ninja side? I was reading it at first as the Ninja side has one powerful character and the Guard side has multiple weaker characters.

What happens if the Ninja side kills all the Guards? Would this be a victory?

Initial impressions are that the Guard side seems less fun than the Ninja side. Maybe the Guards can control some of the Systems that the Ninja is trying to hack/destroy. Examples, change the angle of a camera/enhance the range of a specific camera, reinforce a door, turn up the heat in a specific air duct (damage the ninja), etc. This could give a better feeling of the Guard side controlling the Complex rather than controlling a set of "minion" type characters.

Would there be variable map setup? This would make it interested, but also difficult to balance.

Can the Ninja move through the space a Guard is in?

I like the initial step of statting out the Ninja. This could make for pretty different games and could have some good thematic moments. I have a funny image of a max strength/min speed lumbering giant-type ninja walking through the complex and slapping down cameras on the way. If I was the Guard, I would want a similar set up where I feel like I am customizing my side to some degree.


Okay, so I was imagining it like where the Ninja has a sort of intel group that has already acquired blueprints for the complex and guard placement. On the other hand, normal, low-down guards don't know the layout of vents, or what systems do what; their primary job is to guard things and keep things secure. They also don't have the competency as undisciplined mercenaries to be able to tell if a door has been hacked, or if a camera is disabled.
I'm thinking maybe if the Ninja kills all the guards, the time tracker advances at double or triple speed, symbolizing that connection with the complex has been lost and people have realized that it's under attack, and such are coming with reinforcements.
The Ninja cannot land in the same space as a guard, by the way.
And I have actually designed the maps so that custom ones can be created. I used Microsoft XL to create this map, actually. I just pasted in pictures and adjusted the cell sizes to be squares. Maybe if this game becomes a real thing, I could release an online tool for editing and creating maps.

bottercot
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Jay103 wrote:This would make

Jay103 wrote:
This would make a great app :)

Tricky as a board game, obviously, due to the hidden information aspect and the complexity (much more than, say, Battleship). Good luck with your design!


Thanks!
Unfortunately, I don't have the programming capacity or knowledge to create an app. And one problem I was thinking about is accountability. The Ninja player would have to be truthful about where they are and what they're doing. I know the game is complicated, but I already had to simplify it a bunch.
By the way, I did some google searches and couldn't find any games like this, so I'm pretty sure this is an original idea!

bottercot
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Joined: 02/06/2018
let-off studios wrote:A few

let-off studios wrote:
A few points for consideration...

At this point, it doesn't seem like the Guard player's map needs to be concealed. You may want to address this by not allowing the Ninja player to know the compound's layout prior to exploration. Sounds fiddly to coordinate, but it may be doable.

Would you consider bonus points awarded for the Ninja player if there were any Guards surviving?

Also, what's to stop the Guard player from simply moving all their guards to the "throne room" to protect the objective point? Would you consider awarding points to the Guard player for protecting/securing various locations on the map, in addition to protecting the throne room?

Maybe there's a "sliding scale" of points, where at the start of the game, the Guard player has all 10, but when the Ninja character meets certain objectives - destroying cameras, unlocking doors, something else, etc. - they "steal" points from the Guard player. This gives the Guard a reason to disperse their guards throughout the map instead of just crowding in to protect the main objective.

Otherwise the game sounds VERY interesting at this point.


I was thinking that, like any good burglar or operative, the Ninja's organization would have staked out the target and gathered intel prior to the operation.
Also, a problem I came across in some playtesting where both players had identical maps is that the guard player could just guard the vent entrances and systems and overall just become annoying.
Also, in the game that I played, I had a "Spotlight", which was essentially a piece that you could move around to reveal certain locations of the map, but only outside. What happened, though, is that the guard player could just alternate moving the spotlight between the main door system and the vents, thus covering all locations. Thus, it seems better mechanically and thematically if the guards don't know where everything is.
It could also lead to somewhat scary situations where the guards lose track of the ninja, and have to then search around for where he went, unaware that he's crawling around in vents.
See my answer in the other comment to death of guards.
As for "puppy guarding" the throne room, maybe what I could do is give a boost to the time tracker for every turn where the guards can see the Ninja. This would then reward the ninja for being as stealthy as he can, while also trying to conceal that he's ever been there in the first place.
By the way, the types of ninjas I'm picturing are modern day techie ninjas inspired by the Talons of the Court of Owls (Batman new 52).

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