Thank you all for the support! There were a lot of good entries this month so I look forward to both receiving and giving feedback.

I remembered to save them this time. Let me preface this with the caveat that this was just stream of consciousness as I was going through them, and I didn't really go back to edit. Also, I know that I mention that a couple of games don't particularly interest me, for one reason or another. This doesn't mean I think that they are bad games, just not a style I particularly enjoy. My point is, please don't take anything personally.

Entry #1 - Stack Skirmish

Intriguing. It wasn't clear to me how players get Hero chips. Do they just start with a full set, so they are allowed one of each during play? If there's a random aspect to it, then I am concerned that some of the powers are too game-changing. To flip the top of a 4-chip stack is a four-point swing. Since you could be place the chip on an enemy hero, it could be as much as a 7 point swing, which I suspect is a lot. OTOH, if both players start with one complete set of all the powers, then smart players can save their powerful heroes for the end, and it will somewhat balance out.

Entry #2 - Penterwaltz

This was too awesome for words, and I am unable to comment. :-) (Just kidding. This was my entry.)

Entry #3 - Rise of the Pyramids

By "2-dimensional pyramid" I assume you mean just a triangular wall. I suspect that it would be a lot easier to make these flat on the table rather than stacked, because stacked they would tend to fall over. (That is, they would grow away from you rather than growing up, eliminating the "stacking" requirement.) The "complete pyramid" bonus seems too much -- if you get a couple of the Engineer cards, you can place a single cube, call it a completed pyramid of one level, and earn 35 points for it. If you never manage to pick up an Engineer card, you place 6 cubes for 55 points, but placing one more cube is going to cut its value down to 30 points, and you need to place 10 total before you exceed that again. I guess what I don't like is having a required placement reduce my point value.

Entry #4 - SQUARES CUBED

I really wanted to like this game as I read the components. Color-coded cubes inside color-coded boxes -- what could go wrong? However, I feel like the game would come down to a paralysis where people don't want to place cubes because it would give their opponents a chance to build on the next level, but wouldn't aid in their own opportunity to earn points later. Since they can just pass their turn, I think there would be a lot of passing, once the outer ring of the bottom level was filled up. Placing the fourth of a square would never be a good move, because you only enable your opponent to score.

I want some rule along the lines of, "If there is a cube with open side up which contains a token, then play on top of that is restricted to: Player whose tokens are the cube color; Player whose tokens are the token color; Any player if either color is the current Key Color." This would make it very powerful to play a cube of your own color with your own token face up -- only when that color is the Key Color could anyone else play on it. (In fact, this is so powerful that, with this rule, it shouldn't get a point bonus.) Possibly you might also allow someone playing a cube of that color, so that you don't end up with holes that no one can play on. (... since playing on an upper level has to be a legal play for all for cubes below it.)

Entry #5 - Tower
I always hated the balanced stack game that we had in my family, because I am the youngest of four (by several years) so I was never as coordinated as my siblings (at least when they were still young enough to be willing to play such games with me). :-) Sorry, but your game brings back bad memories.

Entry #6 - TriXagon
I'm sure if I had the physical pieces in front of me, this would be clear, but I don't get the shape and stacking. Are the triangle pieces smaller than the board triangles, and they rest on the beads? I don't quite see how you'd do this such that they wouldn't just flip sideways and fall down, unless the beads have grooves that the points of the triangle pieces fit into. It sounds a little like a triangular version of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dots_and_Boxes, but with some opportunity to steal a box (a triangle) on a higher level, and a different win condition. This sounds like it could be quite fun, and I would certainly give it a go if someone brought it to game night.

Entry #7 - Toppling Towers
I'm sure there are people who feel exactly the opposite, and more power to them, but the whole catapult concept turns me off.

Entry #8 - Piles of the Dead
The stacking aspect seems secondary to this game, so I'm not voting for it for that reason. Otherwise, it looks like it might be a fun, quick zombie game (though lacking "Shotgun," how fun can it really be? :-) ) Is there a win condition? It sounds as if you just keep playing until you all die. (One might consider this to be an appropriate result, considering the subject.)

Entry #9 - Nuclear Tactics
It seems as if the only stacking going on is the count of hit points for the units, plus the opportunity to land on a waste barrel (I guess).

Entry #10 - Grab a Stack
~grumble, grumble~ -- OH, I get it. In placing the tokens on a "matching stack" you mean a matching by color (and/or shape?) I feel like there needs to be more rules here: What if you draw a 2 and there isn't a stack of that color or shape, because someone else just grabbed it? Do the stacks have to go up in sequence? (I had originally thought that you meant matching number, and I couldn't figure out how you'd ever start a stack of numbers other than zero.)

I think this game might be quite interesting, since different players are trying for different goals. I'd give it a try.

Entry #11 - Beaverdam
This sounds like fun, but I don't really see where stacking comes into play. It does use the third dimension, but the specific challenge called for stacking.

Entry #12 - High-Rise
Simple, fun -- I like it. I am concerned that the tower would not be stable if it gets very high. Possibly bricks (i.e. 2x1) would work better.

Entry #13 - Skyward - War above the Stars
From another galaxy? Really? There are billions of stars in our own galaxy, and the closest other galaxy is REALLY far away, by comparison. (Sorry, the space geek in me is coming out.)

Anyway, it sounds like a decent space combat game, but I'm afraid that isn't my cup of tea.

Entry #14 - Workload
I can't say I would ever have thought of a game based on workplace drudgery. :-) But it sounds like it could work. I assume you get to see the top few cards of your stack, all the time? Or maybe your whole stack? I think that the game might be too slow if you can only get one resource per turn, and that only if you don't score a card. Possibly you get two of the resource, or you can take one each of two resources but you don't get any side-effect. Also, I could see an expanded version of this game that includes worker placement a la Lords of Waterdeep, which has some similar concepts. http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/110327/lords-waterdeep. Anyway, I like the concept and I'd give it a try.

Entry #15 - Stapel
I'm concerned that this game would be too easily solved. While it's a little more complex than tic-tac-toe, it isn't much more than an order of magnitude more complex.

Entry #16 - Stack Overflow
I don't really see that this game fits the spirit of the challenge, which was physical stacking in the 3rd dimension. It sounds like it might be a fun game, but I don't think it fits this competition.

Entry #17 - Les Miserables: Barricades of Freedom
As with the zombie game above, I think the stacking aspect is secondary to the game. Otherwise, it looks like it might be a fun game.

Stack skirmish got my top vote. It was a standout in what was a strong field this month. The stacking mechanic is seamlessly integrated into a coherent ruleset. And I liked the head to head take that feel of the game.
I can imagine players finding interesting ways to use powers to devastating effect. This is a strength which could keep players coming back to explore it. But with a non-random game like this you would want to run plenty of playtests to check that there is not a single winning strategy that "solves" the game.
Stack skirmish works perfectly well as an abstract game. However, I think it would benefit from a theme which more clearly matches the mechanics. (I must declare some bias here as I am a big fan of bucketloads of theme.)
It would sit well in the Oddball Aeronauts cardgame universe with its radar-like board, madcap powers and, goal of getting "altitude" over your opponent.
Another theme which could be a snug fit is a battle to claim the heavens between light and dark angels.

There were a lot of good games in this one. Congrats on the win JewellGames.

Stack Skirmish: I think I voted Silver for this one. I really liked the kinds of strategies I could imagine with the powers in this one. I wonder if more could be done to make the game interesting before getting to the powers, like a bigger play area, or some default abilities/attacks, but maybe that stuff is unnecessary.

The theme doesn't really seem to fit well, like it was just tacked on. It sounds like the game could be fun though!

Workload: I think I voted gold on this one. After reading through the rules, I had to take another look at them to find how you get the resources you need to complete tasks. When I realized that you get those resources by moving your tasks around all the time, the whole thing clicked. I love the idea that before you actually get any work done, you have to spend twice the time or more shuffling papers around your desk, passing your work off to other people, or simply throwing work away. Good interesting use of stacking, sounds fun, and the theme is funny.

Well, once you trash that card, the game ends, so you would want to trash it if you're in the lead. Also, you do a lot of rearranging of cards and could choose not to put that one at the bottom, but I see what you mean. Maybe it would work if you got to kiss up to the boss for victory points if your stack is empty, encouraging players to pass work to anyone whose stack is empty (with a different end game condition).

I thought Workload did a great job of marrying its theme and mechanics, much better than I did. It is a game I could see playing with the wife. The task cards work great as-is but I was imagining actual stacks of papers to shuffle around and complete such as "TPS report" for the cards. Overall, nice job!

For my game, I really like the above suggestions for a slightly larger board (8 spaces) and 1 or 2 regular chips in the set for each player to add more strategy. I also had a few other ideas that I stripped out of the base game to keep it simple and adhere to the 500 word limit.

I absolutely agree that the theme is bland and needs an update. I had the rules written in about 20 minutes and just threw in a weak theme as the last step. In hindsight, it would have been better to keep it completely abstract until I found a really good theme.

Stack Skirmish

Congrats on the win

An interesting take on the challenge. Is the board separated into pie sections? What is the point? Can a player only use one of those sections? If so, can they only add chips to their section and the ones adjacent? Why can’t they put chips on any stack? This would also streamline the game a bit as you would not need the board and less hero powers. Basically all you need is hero powers for flipping, adding a monster or hero. That would be my suggestion as the game would be more in the hands of the players and less in the rules.
This game used stacking well, but could have been done with cards. The chips work as 2-D. This game didn’t explore the 3-D aspect of the challenge enough for me, but I liked it and think it will be an interesting game to play.

Workload

Great relatable theme for a lot of people. I don’t think that stacks of cards are in the spirit of this challenge. Hell, UNO could be considered a stacking game with stacked cards.

High-Rise (My Silver)

I think Legos are a great way to make this game work – or those larger blocks for younger kids. Cubes might fall over, so it would be nice to have the support of interlocking bricks. I thought the patterns going vertically, horizontally, etc. was a great idea and adds another dimension to the game. This game really forces players to work in 3 dimensional space. They will constantly have to move around the table or spin the stack to see what is all going on.

Legos would also allow you to use different sized blocks that may add to gamepley – for example a block that is two vertically in red / blue.
Why can’t players see the others’ objectives? I think they should. There are so many options that you would not be able to stop anyone from completing an objective. As it is written, players are really just working individually on the same board. Revealing the objective would make this game more like a connect-4 strategy. Players would have to weigh the value of stopping other players or helping theirselves.

I think this game has a lot of potential.

Les Miserables: Barracades of Freedom

I have tried watching this movie 3 times and haven’t even made it 20 minutes in. I don’t understand how people can like the movie. Anyways, I tried to not let MY personal opinion of the movie affect my review. It has a zombie feel to it… hoards approaching and you are trying to survive. I like how you can build different items that are going to help to varying degrees and the blocks that represent them.

I did not see a “stacking” element in this game, but the 3-D experience will help players to get drawn into the game. I understand that the barricade can be stacked, but how often will they actually be stacked? Most of the time there will be a few on the base layer. Perhaps the final chokepoint will be stacked much higher. Do the 4-square (for example) tables have to stay together, or are they broken into a line?

I am uncertain of how the uprising points work and why they are necessary. I think this game would work just as well with a time tracker. If you can hold off the army for a certain amount of turns, you win. I think it will be easier to adjust difficulty with the # of turns thing

I was expecting most people to look at my card game and consider it not stacky enough for a medal. So surprised and happy to see all the support for what is only my second entry in BGDF's monthly showdowns. I've been focusing on some other games of mine and haven't yet completed the task of a Workload prototype, but that task is definitely staying in my stack.

I was originally thinking that players would only ever look at more than the top card of their stack when brainstorming, but the way I see it there are three options worth playtesting:
1) Can pick up top 3 and, by picking up the top 3, see the fourth card only when brainstorming
2) Can pick up top 3 to look at them + 4th card at any time
3) Can pick up and look through entire stack at any time.
My hunch says that #2 is the best option, but I'll test them all, starting with #1.

The main ways I'm thinking of scaling game length down are by decreasing
1) Scoring requirements on cards
2) # of cards per deck

Increasing resource gain options to more than +1 also has potential for speeding the game up, though, and it would create more interesting resource management situations where a player scores a card but then still has resources to spare (e.g. if +Energy always give 2 energy and a card only needs 1 energy to be scored). Definitely worth testing.

I've looked into but haven't gotten a chance to play Lords of Waterdeep just yet. Somebody actually mentioned it in a thread for another game of mine. I might need to pick it up myself.

I understand the point but I'm not sure if the choice of ignoring the ability is one the players should have. Having to use the ability makes the game more challenging (okay exception: you're never going to screw yourself up by brainstorming). It'll need playtesting. Going back to Zag's comment about ways to gain more than 1 resource a turn, the option of gaining an additional +1 resource instead of using the ability might work. I have similar concerns, though: gaining 2 resources instead of 1 might be overpowered and lead to a boring metagame where use of abilities is rare. Again definitely needs playtesting. A change like this will be necessary if playtesting finds that having to use the abilities makes the game too hard.

I like this idea. I'm going to try and think of something for that. When I do think of something, I'll initially test it out as an ability that happens whenever a card is scored, but in the future I can see myself testing multiple abilities, with the ability that happens depending on the card that was scored.

I like this idea, but I can't be sure if it would be balanced. Alternative end game conditions: A turn limit or "first player to X points wins."

That would be very nice.

I want there to be a lot of player interaction in my games, and I'd like to find ways to increase it here. There's the currently non-existant option of taking the top card from another player's stack, for example. I may want to throw that in as a way to add cards to your stack (though I worry if it would be overpowered). I've contemplated the idea of introducing new powerful stack manipulating abilities that the player has to spend resources to use. I want to test this current "base game" before toying with those ideas though.

Hm? Conversion provided by the cards? Are you suggesting that players should get the ability to convert one resource into another? That could maybe work, but I personally as a designer don't like resource conversions. There's a wilderness survival game I've been working on (my first game design, actually) and I had one playtester suggest a resource conversion mechanic that I also didn't like very much. They feel like handicaps to me. I, especially with that wilderness survival game, prefer brutal simplicity: If you find yourself with excess of Y resource and really wish you had more of X resource, then you should have managed your resources more efficiently. If after playtesting I do incorporate a resource conversion mechanic, it's either going to be punishingly resource-intensive or its going to involve trading with other players (could trading work with this game? I'm doubtful but maybe…)

Thanks for the feedback, everybody. I'm excited for next month.

---Stack Skirmish---
I gave this one my gold medal. I really liked the simple mechanics and how much variance the abilities provide. It seems like a game where many moves seem cunning but can't be sure which is best. As for the theme: I agree that it could use a change. The suggested idea of light and dark angels fighting over the heavens stands out to me; try to find a theme that drives home the importance of being on top.

It's kind of tough to think of things to add or remove from this one, yet it feels a bit too simple to me. I imagine the player interaction would feel a bit weak, because you don't know what the other players are going for. Even if you did see their cards, it would probably just lead to analysis paralysis as you try to figure out what they're going for, and how to stop it, while still getting your own goals. Maybe shared goals would work well, so everyone is going for the same patterns, but trying to be the one to complete them.

It sounds like everyone has access to the entire collection of cubes at all times? Having a limited amount of cubes, randomly drawn out of a bag might be interesting.

I did not think this game had enough three dimensional thinking to get a medal. It certainly has some interesting concepts. However, personally I don't think the player objective and opposition was compelling enough for a cooperative game. It might make for an interesting asymmetrical two player game.

Penterwaltz (my bronze)

I had to look up pentoonimo shapes. If you had just said that they are like tetris or blokus, I am sure everyone would have understood. After the first paragraph, I knew exactly where you were going with this game. It makes me think of games like scrabble slap where you are placing cards on top of existing cards to create new words.

I am not convinced that the stars are necessary. I think that this game could use a game board with a grid to prevent the game from sprawling too much. I think if you could find a way to do it without randomizing the pieces, the game would be more fun and have much more strategy. Even if you randomly divided the pieces before the game started, there would be a lot more strategy to the game. Is there a limit to how high the blocks can be stacked? In regards to the challenge, the blocks don’t add significantly to the 3-D component of the game. It is possible to do this with cutout paper. It has potential to be a great strategy game though.

TriXagon (my gold)

I like this game. The rules are ‘elegant’, but there is quite a bit of game play. It’s basically an evolution of Connect 4 or O-mok (Korean connect 5 game). I think there is a lot of replay value there as well. I need to know more about the multiple beads rule. I don’t think it is necessary for this game. Keep the game simple and I think this game has a lot of potential. The pegs may need to be higher though. It may be difficult to get 9 triangles at one time, especially if it’s played with 3 players. I could also see this being played with teams (4 players).

Thanks for the thoughts Zag24 and Mr. S. Yes the triangle pieces would be smaller than the triangles on the board so that they could lay flat in between the beads. I included the option to place more beads, because I thought it added a nice extra wrinkle to consider, but Mr. S you could be right that it is not necessary. I would certainly want to try it both ways.

High Rise
I like how each side matters, adding to the three dimensionality of the game, but it could be pretty impractical to play, it would need a rotating table, to everyone to be standing and move around, or to use the Lego idea (or anything like it) to rotate the board.

Also, i’m a big fan of hidden information but i don’t think the placement of the cubes gives enough information to bluff from (as it is pretty hard to memorize all the different figures and colors), one way to help in that could be having 3 public and 3 hidden cards or something like that.

Penterwaltz
My bronze, i thought it was the best use of stacking, but it didn’t seem clear how much you could plan in advance, with all the weird shapes played at random and having a limitless board, maybe having 3 pieces at all times?, though that would make the game longer and maybe it is just better being tactical instead of strategical.

TriXagon
It is really hard to analyze this kind of abstract area control game without playing it, it’s like having to critique Go just reading its rules, you can’t see its greatness if you don’t feel the flow of the game while playing.

High Rise (My Bronze): Solid theme and solid mechanics. I agree with the idea of making some of the objectives public and some hidden. You may want to try including some other shapes like rectangular prisms to add more variety to the building choices.

Les Miserables: I love the theme, but the rules were not as clear as I'd have liked them to be; I had trouble understanding this game.

TriXagon (My Silver): I'm very fond of puzzle-like games. I appreciate the elegance, the open information, and the exclusion of chance (no secret powers; if you lose its your fault).

Penterwaltz: Another puzzle-like game. I really liked this game once I found out what a Penterwaltz piece was. I agree with the above comment that the stars may not be necessary. High Rise ultimately trumped this for a medal award because High Rise had a solid theme.

High Rise & Penterwaltz: Both of these games have a risk of falling down disastrously. I agree that lego-like components would be nice to prevent such a disaster from occurring. If playtesting finds collapsing to be a problem an auto-lose condition could be implemented to discourage sloppy placement.

Les Miserables: I love the theme, but the rules were not as clear as I'd have liked them to be; I had trouble understanding this game.