SO, I'm not sure how long it has been since I put up a Nightfall update; my excuse is that I have been busy recently getting Defenders of Wessex ready to go to board game convention (which was a successful trip, by the way). Some changes were made, and I was up WAYYYY late multiple nights getting things all together. But it was very worth it, and the game now looks half way professional. Its a big upgrade from the scraps of cardboard that it was made of before. Artwork is, unfortunately, on hold for a bit as my artist deals with a few other things. But thats not a big deal; it gives me more opportunities to play test before the big push to get the first professional copy done.
But enough about that other game. You probably came here to read about the advances that have been made on Nightfall.
To reiterate: The goal is still to create a game and build it all the way from concept to publisher, and document every step of the way.
Big progress now: I have selected the primary mechanic. It will be Set Collection.
Let me describe- the goal of the game is to destroy the awakening avatar of Apep (aka the Mummy) before the ritual to devour the sun can be completed. Keep that in mind.
The game board is set up around 4 Egyptian cities, each of which has some form of archaeological significance. Each city has 5 locations in it, which perform a variety of functions such as allowing travel to other locations, exploring the desert, gathering mystical artifacts, getting more mundane gear, building automatons, using magical powers, hiring allies, and researching to discover which mummy is the avatar of Apep.
Every turn players move their pawn to a location. That is their only action. Then the location resolves, allowing them to draw cards from a specific deck, depending upon the type of location they are at. The goal is to collect 3 of a kind to identify the avatar of Apep, which tomb is his, and what artifact is his weakness. If the mummy isn't awakened yet, its time to rush to his tomb to slay him before he gets up.
Shuffled into all of the various decks of cards are "Apep" cards, which offer a dazzling array of badness - everything from the Mummy comes one step closer to waking up to a curse goes out that makes tasks harder, to Apep followers get spawned to...well, anything thats bad for the heroes can happen. So when they go out to try and collect sets of cards, they could be contributing to the end of the world, even while they try and save it.
Obviously none of this has been balanced yet, but that will come as I begin to mock up test copies to try this with. I'm in a lull for about a week on Defenders of Wessex until my next play test comes up, so until then I should be able to spend a little time anyway working on this.
