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Two new game ideas

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Tue, 08/16/2011 - 17:21
deFunkt29
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Hello everyone! I have two new game ideas that I just wanted a bit of feedback on. Mainly which one sounds more interesting, and if any of them have been done before extensively.

1st: A game where you combine the DNA from two animals to create new ones, and send them into battle. You're goal is to make the best combination of animals, with favorable traits from each animal. The animals come from one central deck, and each player will have some "Combine" cards, most will say things such as take Strength from animal one, and Health and Speed from animal two etc. and possibly some "Instant" type cards. There will be some mechanic as to which animals are up for use. I think the game would be easier if each players deck also contained animals, but I like the idea of each player fighting over a central animal pool.

2nd: A co-operative game in which players are defending a kingdom against goblins. The players play as certain advisors to the king, such as a General, who controls military, a Architect, who controls buildings, a Scientist, who controls research, a Wizard, who controls certain magical spells, someone in charge of resource gathering, and a Treasurer who controls which players get how much money from a certain pool. I think the possibilities for this are pretty huge, each player being in charge of distinct points of the defense, making the game very co-operative. I also love games where either everyone loses or everyone wins. I'm just unsure about this idea because of how it might not be overly fun because of how non-competitive it is, and also I feel as though some parts of it may of been done before.

Well that's it! Tell me what you think or which one of the ideas you would rather play!

DeFunkt29

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Tue, 08/16/2011 - 19:07
#1
questccg
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2 sounds better than 1, IMHO

deFunkt29 wrote:
2nd: A co-operative game in which players are defending a kingdom against goblins.

I think the second idea might require too many players... It's hard to get people to play board games, it's even more difficult when the number of players is more than four (4)... That is something you should consider.

However the game sounds like it could be interesting. But you should reconsider making each player responsible for "something" and perhaps make it such that one player is the horde of goblins and the second the defender of his kingdom. Additional players could also be defenders of their own kingdoms. And so the game becomes 1 against 2 or 3... Players could "naturally" cooperate to help defend ALL the kingdoms from the invading horde...

I, personally, did not like the first idea.

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Tue, 08/16/2011 - 19:30
#2
questccg
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Game variant

questccg wrote:
...perhaps make it such that one player is the horde of goblins and the second the defender of his kingdom. Additional players could also be defenders of their own kingdoms. And so the game becomes 1 against 2 or 3... Players could "naturally" cooperate to help defend ALL the kingdoms from the invading horde...

I think this SOUNDS a little familiar.

So instead of Kingdoms and Goblins, you could make it more recent: Computer Hackers vs. the CIA (or FBI). Your goal would be to perform all kinds of cyber crimes and the goblins would be the CIA trying to hunt you down and catch you... It's just an idea... But a cyberpunk theme might make the game more "different/unique".

You identity could be "secret" at the start of the game and the CIA "investigates" you to figure out your identity. You could assume a different identity if the CIA get too close to knowing your identity, you could hack into bank accounts to get money, you could travel around the US using several means of transporation.

I don't know what else... I just thought something with a cyberpunk theme might be original. Kinda the OPPOSITE of CLUE: you could have 3 cards that define your identity.

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Tue, 08/16/2011 - 20:17
#3
deFunkt29
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I think you maybe went a bit

I think you maybe went a bit too far away from any of my concepts haha. I really am not a big fan of the CIA idea, perhaps for a different game, but I just am a much bigger fan of a fantasy setting then something modern/computer based. But again, if anyone can name any games that are just like the one I've presented, don't be afraid to burst my bubble.

I guess I should of made myself clearer on the player amount point, I really agree that 4 players would be a good amount, and players will be able to have multiple jobs in one game. I could probably also streamline these job ideas so that there is not that large of a number. I personally have never found it hard to get enough people together to play a board game, but maybe I'm just lucky. I've always found the more the merrier for a board game, and I don't really want to limit players in this respect. I really don't even want this game to be possible with just 2 players.

As for a player controlling the "goblin" army (I may change this so it's more original), this is what I'm trying to avoid. I want this game to be purely co-operative, and probably cards being drawn will control the enemy army.

Thanks for the ideas

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Tue, 08/16/2011 - 20:29
#4
questccg
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Taking it easy

deFunkt29 wrote:
As for a player controlling the "goblin" army (I may change this so it's more original), this is what I'm trying to avoid. I want this game to be purely co-operative, and probably cards being drawn will control the enemy army.

Won't that imply that players will try to not have the "goblin" army act in a strategic way? If you don't explicitly have a player playing that side, well then in most situations players purely playing co-operatively will not have the horde be so "invasive". You would have to explain what your ideas are in regards to controlling the enemy army. But players might "go easy" on each other when deciding what the enemy should do next... Rather than exploit certain weaknesses that might occur during gameplay.

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Wed, 08/17/2011 - 00:49
#5
deFunkt29
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I was thinking every turn,

I was thinking every turn, perhaps at the end of each turn, you draw a card from the enemy deck. This shows what they are doing this turn, example build an army, attack, raid resources etc. It's hardly very strategic of them haha, but I mean, goblins usually aren't very smart in most fiction anyway lol. But, sometimes the enemy will really catch you off guard, and will make all the players shift there play strategy, and suddenly make certain players more important. For example: the goblins draw a "Raid Mines" card this turn, making you gain less stone. This can cripple the "Architect player", which will make the "General player" have to shift his army to a more defensive position.

In this way the enemy will be completely random. I think this, combined with the different classes that players can play as, will make for great replay value.

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Wed, 08/17/2011 - 06:48
#6
seo
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deFunkt29 wrote:As for a

deFunkt29 wrote:
As for a player controlling the "goblin" army (I may change this so it's more original), this is what I'm trying to avoid. I want this game to be purely co-operative, and probably cards being drawn will control the enemy army.

A practical and usually well received solution to add tension to coop games is to have (or potentially have) a traitor. I think this is thematically sound —Gríma from The Lord of the Rings comes as an obvious example— and could solve your issue with the game being too cooperative. You could easily have a deck of 10 cards where one is the traitor and the others are neutral, so that sometimes there won't be a traitor, but sometimes there would (to add uncertainty), or you could even have different degrees of secret personal interests (goals) for each player, where some would be small conditions that don't amount to treason, and others would push the players further away from the interests of the kingdom towards the personal goal.

Or you could simply make the game more demanding, the goblins stronger, to require such an effort from on the side of the players to beat the enemy that they have no chance to feel cooperation makes the game boring.

As for the other idea, I feel an automatic interest for any game involving DNA and genetics, but your description sounds a bit too straightforward. With some sort of twist to make it more than just a quest for some evidently best stats, like having traits inextricably intertwined and stats being an indirect result rather than directly manipulable, it could be a great game.

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Wed, 08/17/2011 - 13:02
#7
deFunkt29
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Thanks a bunch for the

Thanks a bunch for the feedback. A traitor would be a really cool idea. I like it, but to add it I would probably have to change my current core mechanics around a fair amount. Because since each player has a core job that is necessary for success, it would be really difficult if one player became a traitor. Perhaps I could limit the differences between the different jobs? For example: each player can produce some troops and use some magic, but the spells and types are just different between the players? I would like that actually, but maybe I'll try to make it just demanding enough at first.

Ya the other idea is definitely a work in progress, but I see what you mean. In that form it is awfully "look at animals with best stats, combine them". I'm just confused about what you mean by intertwined? Thanks though.

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Thu, 08/18/2011 - 00:43
#8
deFunkt29
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I have another idea for a

I have another idea for a card/board game that kind of spawned from this. Each player plays as an advisor for the king, each are unique, but none are truly necessary (for example, each player can supply troops and buildings, just certain bonuses are given to each). Then, there are more groups of cards that are shuffled into each players initial deck. One of these is a traitor deck, that player is working for the invading army and must secretly use cards to disrupt the allied players. I think it sounds like a really neat idea, the only problem is how does the player go against the other players without them knowing this. A cool name would be Treason.

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Thu, 08/18/2011 - 10:22
#9
Cogentesque
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The latest idea is cool, a

The latest idea is cool, a similar game is the Battle Star Galactica boardgame, where one (sometimes more) players are the Cylons (bad guys) and they try and disrupt play. The way they accomplish it is 2 fold: each turn the players must combine different types (colours) of their own drawn cards together as a team (each card is given a colour and a value) face down to accomplish a given "quest" card. Then they are flipped and counted up. The quest card will say something like "6 blue and 3 red cards needed to complete, green and yellow count negative" So this way, the secret enemy-spy-cylon-assasin can put in yellow cards to count against the group. The group KNOWS their is a traitor in play (as there are negative cards) but doesn't know who. The second step is that when the baddy is essentially "found out" he can (and at any time he wants otherwise) move his play over to the enemy ship which changes all of his actions to be evil ones. In your case, there perhaps could be the "Enemy Camp" area on the board that when the spy is found out: he could go there. Alternatively a "trator" deck that he could then start drawing from once he had been found.

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Thu, 08/18/2011 - 18:18
#10
deFunkt29
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Nice! I really like the idea

Nice! I really like the idea of secretly playing face down cards on the game turns. Perhaps in my game, each turn players would play different types of soldier cards for missions. For example if they know they are about to defend, players will play archer cards that will be better at this. But the traitor player could play cavalry, which are more suited for an attack, thus wasting the card. And I really like the idea of a grand reveal, when the player finally says that he's with the enemy. And ya, then he/she would get an entirely new deck with evil cards.

Thanks for the awesome idea, now I just have to try and make it different enough from the Battle Star Galactica game.

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Fri, 08/19/2011 - 05:27
#11
Cogentesque
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Sounds perfect. No need to

Sounds perfect.

No need to make it to different deFunk, I mean, if I wanted to make a "poker-type" game, I would always use "poer" rules. Same as if I wanted to make a "Card Management" game, I would always folllow other such games (Dominion-style games, the new Quarriors etc etc)

I think use that mechanic it's a good one :) But if you did want to make it slightly different (I am assuming you havent played the BSG game) I wold say that you shouldn't play the game at all. Because I have only told you a basic mechanix - the differences and variance between that game and yours would naturally come - as long as you don't know exactly how the BSG game works.

I like your idea of different unit types as well, that's cool. How about: Archers / cavalry / support / infantry / champions?
Archers: good at defence from high
Cavalry: good at attack from low
Support (cooks / chefs / stretcher bearers / surgeons): good at helping but not at attack
Infantry: not good at low defence
Champions: great powerful single cards WHEN ONLY USED AT THEIR BEST. Otherwise you waste a champion totally. "Sly the Marksman Archer: + 10 points to archery" of course, these would be harder to get but have more of a negative effect if use counter productively by the assassin general :)

Sounds like this could have great potential to be a real fun game.

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Thu, 09/01/2011 - 00:42
#12
icree8
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Gameplay

6 players is never too much. A game that uses only 4 players is limited. You and 3 friends? Or you, girlfriend and a couple? Bottom line...keep it simple and don't over complicate any game you design. Don't design it around what you know but what the average 10 year old might know. Too many things to remember and too much reference back to the rules makes for an undesirable game. People don't want to work at figuring out how to make it fun, they want to have fun ASAP. The longer it takes to figure out a gameplay the more a player expects and the less a chance of wanting to play it and explain it to others the next time it is played. If you can't explain it in less than 5 minutes nobody wants to play it.

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Thu, 09/01/2011 - 02:38
#13
suf
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That's a bit extreme

icree8 wrote:
If you can't explain it in less than 5 minutes nobody wants to play it.

That's a bit extreme. We never play games that can be explained in 5 minutes, but perhaps you can come up with a few examples. Rules explanation usually takes over 30 minutes for us and nobody complains.

I agree the longer the rules the more fun is expected from the game, so either make it simple and fun, or complex and very very fun.

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