Hi there,
I'm working on a light (though threatening to complexify itself) card game for about four players.
It works in a very Rummy-like way so far, in fact the early version was just played with two decks of playing cards with the picture cards removed. It is based around a simple set of actions which in very brief are: draw a card discard a card and score accordingly, OR draw a card and play three-of-a-kind into your score pile, OR do 'The Third Thing' which has to do with drawing the top three cards from the top of the deck trying to meet a certain condition which if met gives you a hefty score bonus and if missed an equally hefty penalty.
A couple of problems came up with the playing-card version, which were: The scoring of three-of-a-kinds was complicated, it was hard to get three-of-a-kinds which was the nominal point of the game, and doing The Third Thing was too easy to succeed at.
So I'm now hoping to move it into a themed direction based on playing a slot machine. There would be a draw deck of about 100 cards, with classic slot machine graphics on them: cherries, bells, lemons, sevens. I would probably do a handful of symbol types, and then among those types, a handful of variations. For example, a single cherry, a bunch of two cherries, a bunch of three cherries. There would also be a deck of cards that represent coins, half of which would be shuffled into the symbol deck, and a separate deck of bonus cards (which are jackpots and wilds).
The normal options in the new version would be very similar. Draw a card, discard a card, score accordingly. (You score by comparing your discarded card to the current top discarded card and collecting or losing points for a higher or lower value.) Or, draw a card and play three symbols in front of you. Three identical cards would score the most, but three of a type (mixed cherries) would also be playable, which should help players get playable cards, but still have them deciding whether to cash out or try for a better hand. If you draw a coin card (maybe a fifth of cards in the draw deck would be coin cards), you can on a later turn Spin the Reels instead: discard your coin and turn over the top three cards in the deck. If they match you draw bonus cards from the bonus deck. If they partly match you draw extra coin(s) from the separate coin deck, if they are nothing you lose.. something. You've already lost your chance to draw a card, increase your score and missed a bonus, maybe that is enough of a disincentive, or maybe not.
In any event, that's about as far as it's gotten now. My questions are:
-Do you all have any thoughts about this? Even "Sounds dumb!" or "I would like to advance order 1000 copies, please let me know your address so I may write you a huge check." Anything?
-A process question, what do I do now? Or what would you do now if you had this idea batting around?
This is my first real post here, I'd greatly appreciate any feedback.
Thanks!
AndyGB
Levi and John, thanks very much for the thoughts, I am thrilled to get some feedback so quickly.
Levi, great idea towards more player interaction by having each player add a symbol in turn to the same set. Player Able draws one and plays a cherry, Player Baker draws one and can then play another cherry to take 2 quick coins. But if Player Charlene has a third cherry she is going to get 4 coins and maybe somehow "take" the reel for later scoring. A player can instead test his luck (slash card-counting) against the deck, play a coin from his hand to draw the top three off the deck.
Perhaps even take this further to where each player has their own three-card playing mat and can either play to his own or to an opponent's set, profiting from others' work and/or making it harder for them to score big. I definitely like the idea of "rares" in there, maybe even to the point of having only three or four of a certain symbol in the deck.
John B I would definitely have pay tables as you suggest, though I might try to stick with slots symbols. I love the graphics from the front of old slots that show the paying combinations and would want it to look like that. (My thought in terms of sticking with bells/cherries/lemons is that using more poker-like hands would make it read more like gin/rummy, which I want to get away from.) I love the idea of varying the 'payouts' i.e. paying not just on three-of-a-kinds. I remember slot machines that used to pay out for "cherry-any-any" and so on, and we could set that up so even a 'junk' draw pays a bit. And I really like the idea of having higher rewards for scores that come from spinning the reels (drawing three from the deck) vs. from draw one/play one.