In today's post I'll be going through to cement some of the concepts we went over in Part 2, as well as talking about actions, initiative order, and leadership.
O-rings, Oh My
I talked about using red O-rings as Blood Counters to track damage, and I still think it's a great idea (if I do say so myself). These are the little rubber washers you can buy at any hardware store, and they come in tons of different shapes and sizes. Well not shapes so much as sizes. I'm pretty sure most O-rings are... well, O-shaped. To expand on that concept, I was starting to think about some special abilities units might have, and I realized that we can use more than one color of O-ring to specify different kinds of damage. A red O-ring is just plain old bloody damage - cuts, bruises, scrapes, eviscerations. Some of the elite, specialized units might have abilities that let them cause different kinds of damage. So here are a few basic ideas that I came up with for types of damage and how they work:
O-ring Color
Red - normal damage. This is caused by getting your ass kicked.
Green - poison damage. Certain kinds of units/races, like Assassins or Lizardfolk, carry poisoned weapons. An attack made with a poisoned weapon gives the victim a green o-ring. A poisoned model doesn't die quicker, it just gets nauseous and loses one die to all of its attack rolls for the rest of the game, unless the poison damage is healed somehow.
Black - pestilence damage. A disease-ridden rat carries pestilence in its bite, which gives the victim of its attacks a black o-ring. A model with a black o-ring causes an immediate wound (also black) to any other model that comes into base contact with it. Except other models of the the disease-carrying persuasion, of course. Pretty wicked stuff. Stay away from the infected guy!
Yellow - necrotic damage. This is the only type of damage that cannot be healed or cured. It stays with the model until death or until the end of the game. Even if a model has the ability to heal or cure damage, necrotic damage is not removed in this way.
Blue - magic damage. Damage caused by any spell is grouped into this category. More on this later.
Leadership and Actions
Turn phases are booooring. So there aren't going to be any phases in this game where everyone moves, everyone attacks, or everyone bends over and moons the enemy. I like the idea of actions and leadership, instead. The leader of the pack doles out commands every turn based on the tactical situation of the board. It's the only way to rationalize how one model two feet away from another model is going to turn his crossbow toward a charging enemy to defend his comrade from a distance.
I also can't get past the fact that it sucks to sit there and watch your opponent move his entire army, or warband or whatever, then attack with the entire thing, etc. before you get to react. None of that! And no initiative values or initiative rolls, either. I'm using a deck of cards. That's right, regular old playing cards. Here's how it works.
1. Shuffle the 52, and every player picks 3 cards from it. Or gets dealt 3 cards, or however you want to run it.
2. A round begins. Everyone stands there until somebody decides he's going to do something.
3. Somebody finally declares that he's going to do something, so that person must use one of his 3 actions for the turn. He chooses a card and throws down. It goes on the table, face down.
4. Here's where the gambling begins. If anyone else wants to try and use an action before the other player, they also put a card down. This continues until the wagering stops. Each player can only put one card down at a time, and they only have to do so if they want to.
5. Everyone turns over their cards, and the actions proceed in order from highest card to lowest card. Aces beat everything except other aces, and cards go from King down to Duce from there.
6. Once everyone who put a card down has gone, start the betting again until no one has any cards left. Then re-draw and start the next round.
Is this going to work, or should everyone have to play a card each time?
Showing posts with label skirmish. Show all posts
Showing posts with label skirmish. Show all posts
10.24.2008
10.23.2008
Skirmish Wargame Rules [Part 2]
Last time, I talked about my new skirmish wargame project and discussed some of the elements that I want to include in consideration of the game mechanics and rules. I also came to the decisive and irrefutable conclusion that charts are effing retarded. Today I'm going to eat Chex cereal for dinner. I'm also going to go over a few examples of some rules for different parts of the game. First things first... the miniatures.
Let's begin, as they say, at the beginning. We need a system to keep track of what makes one particular race or faction in the game different from every other race or faction. I'll call this the 'stat line,' and its going to encompass the basic strengths and weaknesses of each unit. For the sake of using an example, let's start out with a fantasy setting for the game. We'll think about each race or type of unit and its basic characteristics. So here are some races that might be included.
Humans - your average, basic average-of-the-average troop type. We use these as the 'median' because they're what we know. It's easier to think of each other race as relating to a human, thereby using the human as the 'template,' in a way.
Elves - in my game I want the elves to be of the tall, quick, slender variety, rather than the miniature, pointy-toed North Polish variety.
Dwarves - the robust and stalwart little people; more slow-moving than a human but also very tough and able to withstand more and hold their ground against more difficult odds.
Undead - the shambling hordes of reanimated corpses can take a number of forms. I want to use the classic, and somewhat cliche, example of a thrall of zombies, skeletons and ghouls being led by a Necromancer. So we'll divide these up into several 'races' of walking dead-thing.
Ghouls - these are not actually dead; they are still-living beings and thus they can't be revived. But they move very quickly and have to eat living flesh to survive. I imagine these as being like the infected rage guys in 28 Days Later.
Zombies - slooow, but very difficult to kill.
Skeletons - sort of like humans, but much slower and easier to dismantle.
Necromancer - his job is basically to stand in the back and revive any dead-thing that drops. I'm already envisioning this warband as being a very specialized force, where the Necromancer casts spells on his minions as they fall.
Goblins - I've never liked the GW version of goblins, where they're so incompetent they can barely walk straight. I like the idea of Moria Goblins from LOTR a little better. Still very cowardly and fidgety, but in numbers they can become quite a force to be reckoned with.
Orcs - the larger of the greenskins. Very bloodthirsty and savage.
Trolls - special ability = regeneration. Done.
Vermin - what GW typically terms the 'Skaven' and others would refer to as rat-men. Slight, disease-ridden, and tricksy. Veeeerrry tricksy.
How Fast Do They Move?
So we've got a good selection of basic races here to start. How do soldiers get into combat with the enemy? They move there. Let's make some movement.
Humans - 6
I'm saying 6, rather than 6-inches or 6-squares or 6-hexes, because I haven't gotten to the point of figuring out which movement system I'm going to use. But the basic movement of a human will be 6... whatevers. The rest of the movements I've devised are below.
Elves - 7
Dwarves - 5
Ghouls - 7
Zombies - 3
Skeletons - 4
Necromancer - 6
Goblins - 6
Orcs - 6
Trolls - 8
Vermin - 7
Ok, so we've established which guys are quicker and which ones are not so quick. This gives us a basis from which to work on the rest of their stats. The next thing we'll think about is, how can we make a simple system of 'wounds' or 'hit points' or 'toughness' or 'armor class' or whatever you want to call it, that still offers some variety?
How Tough Is Each Race?
I really like the dual target number system of Mongoose Publishing's first edition of the Starship Troopers game. The way this works is that every troop type has two defense numbers, one higher than the other. The first is the 'to-hit' number and the second is the 'to-kill' number. On a particularly good die roll, then, you can kill an enemy, while a lower but still decent roll gets you a hit. I'm going to use a variation of this system because it's simple and effective.
In a skirmish wargame, keeping track of individual hit points is a pain. Too Complicated. You'll hear me say that often. In fact, it's one of my mottos and it's the two-word trump card I use to dismiss people's ideas about high-level mathematics being used in gaming. Anyway. Every miniature is going to be able to take four 'wounds' before it dies. Why four? The first two just give it damage ratings, to let you know "hey, this guy's been hit" or "this guy here has taken a lot of damage and is about to drop." The third 'wound' actually does drop the miniature, causing him to crumple to the ground; the fourth removes it from the game. Some hits are going to cause one wound, while others will cause multiple wounds. That lets the strong, brutish guys like Trolls and Ogres be strong and brutish, cracking the skulls of the little guys in a single swing, while the man-sized troops will have to duke it out with each other over a few rounds.
Rather than keeping track of wounds on paper (Too Complicated), the wounds will be tracked on the game table itself. How, you may ask? Ahhh. This is the first non-die, non-miniature game element I'm going to introduce to you. It's one of my own inventions, and I call it the Blood Counter. My game is going to use red-colored O-rings from the hardware store. You can get them in any size, but I'm going to use some that are about 3/4" around and can be draped over any 25mm miniature, like a big, bloody rubber necklace.
Now how do we differentiate between who gets hit, how badly they get hit, and what happens as a result? A variant on the two target number system.
How Are Miniatures Dealt Damage?
If I'm standing there on the field of battle, which of these guys is going to be difficult to kill, and which of them will be... easier to dispatch? We'll use two numbers, one higher than the other, but a little different than the Starship Troopers system. Let's go with the basic human-y human as the example.
Human
Move: 6
Defense: 4/2
The defense numbers are shown like this: "To-Hit/Threshold." So instead of the second number being a higher to-kill number, the second number is a measure of the unit's pain threshold, or when he says "ow." You need a 4 to hit him, and then every 2 you score above a 4, (a.k.a. 6, 8, 10, etc.) gives him an additional wound. A human, therefore, is of average difficulty to hit, and is also of average difficulty to wound really badly.
Now let's look at what a zombie's stat block might look like.
Zombie
Move: 3
Defense: 2/4
Zombies are slow, stupid, and all they care about is shoveling warm brains down their gullets. They're a piece of cake to hit, but they don't go down easy. So you've got to roll a 2 to hit one, but a 6 to give it two wounds, a 10 to drop it and a 14 to kill it in one hit! By contrast, a human can be killed outright with a 10.
Each time a wound is caused, the miniature goes down the wound track.
Hurt - 1 Blood Counter
Bloodied - 2 Blood Counters
Dropped - placed lying down, blood counters removed
Killed - removed from the game
Here's the basic idea of this simple four-wound system that makes every troop type somewhat unique, but still offers a tangible measurement of how badly hurt one is. Now you'll notice that the Defense numbers are really low; this is because I'm assuming a D6 system would be used. If that were the case, how would attacks work?
How Do My Miniatures to Beat the Hell Out of All the Other Miniatures?
Everybody hates rolling ones. I think ones are a thing of beauty, and so in my game when you roll a 1 you'll be able to add that onto your dice total. Attacks, I'm thinking, might work like this:
Human
Move: 6
Defense: 4/2
Attack: 2
Zombie
Move: 3
Defense: 2/4
Attack: 2
Ogre
Move: 8
Defense: 4/4
Attack: 5
The attack value is the number of D6's you roll when that miniature attacks. It's a simple representation of just how much skill and/or power the unit has in its ability to knock people the fuck out. When it's your turn, your miniature makes an attack roll with that many D6's. You can then combine attack dice however you want to damage or kill opponents, which eliminates the uselessness of bad rolls. Now at least 1's count for something...
That's All For Now
So we've gotten to the point of creating a pretty good system so far, I think. It will need lots of playtesting, but next time we need to go over the turn order and things like initiative and leadership values of different commanders.
Let's begin, as they say, at the beginning. We need a system to keep track of what makes one particular race or faction in the game different from every other race or faction. I'll call this the 'stat line,' and its going to encompass the basic strengths and weaknesses of each unit. For the sake of using an example, let's start out with a fantasy setting for the game. We'll think about each race or type of unit and its basic characteristics. So here are some races that might be included.
Humans - your average, basic average-of-the-average troop type. We use these as the 'median' because they're what we know. It's easier to think of each other race as relating to a human, thereby using the human as the 'template,' in a way.
Elves - in my game I want the elves to be of the tall, quick, slender variety, rather than the miniature, pointy-toed North Polish variety.
Dwarves - the robust and stalwart little people; more slow-moving than a human but also very tough and able to withstand more and hold their ground against more difficult odds.
Undead - the shambling hordes of reanimated corpses can take a number of forms. I want to use the classic, and somewhat cliche, example of a thrall of zombies, skeletons and ghouls being led by a Necromancer. So we'll divide these up into several 'races' of walking dead-thing.
Ghouls - these are not actually dead; they are still-living beings and thus they can't be revived. But they move very quickly and have to eat living flesh to survive. I imagine these as being like the infected rage guys in 28 Days Later.
Zombies - slooow, but very difficult to kill.
Skeletons - sort of like humans, but much slower and easier to dismantle.
Necromancer - his job is basically to stand in the back and revive any dead-thing that drops. I'm already envisioning this warband as being a very specialized force, where the Necromancer casts spells on his minions as they fall.
Goblins - I've never liked the GW version of goblins, where they're so incompetent they can barely walk straight. I like the idea of Moria Goblins from LOTR a little better. Still very cowardly and fidgety, but in numbers they can become quite a force to be reckoned with.
Orcs - the larger of the greenskins. Very bloodthirsty and savage.
Trolls - special ability = regeneration. Done.
Vermin - what GW typically terms the 'Skaven' and others would refer to as rat-men. Slight, disease-ridden, and tricksy. Veeeerrry tricksy.
How Fast Do They Move?
So we've got a good selection of basic races here to start. How do soldiers get into combat with the enemy? They move there. Let's make some movement.
Humans - 6
I'm saying 6, rather than 6-inches or 6-squares or 6-hexes, because I haven't gotten to the point of figuring out which movement system I'm going to use. But the basic movement of a human will be 6... whatevers. The rest of the movements I've devised are below.
Elves - 7
Dwarves - 5
Ghouls - 7
Zombies - 3
Skeletons - 4
Necromancer - 6
Goblins - 6
Orcs - 6
Trolls - 8
Vermin - 7
Ok, so we've established which guys are quicker and which ones are not so quick. This gives us a basis from which to work on the rest of their stats. The next thing we'll think about is, how can we make a simple system of 'wounds' or 'hit points' or 'toughness' or 'armor class' or whatever you want to call it, that still offers some variety?
How Tough Is Each Race?
I really like the dual target number system of Mongoose Publishing's first edition of the Starship Troopers game. The way this works is that every troop type has two defense numbers, one higher than the other. The first is the 'to-hit' number and the second is the 'to-kill' number. On a particularly good die roll, then, you can kill an enemy, while a lower but still decent roll gets you a hit. I'm going to use a variation of this system because it's simple and effective.
In a skirmish wargame, keeping track of individual hit points is a pain. Too Complicated. You'll hear me say that often. In fact, it's one of my mottos and it's the two-word trump card I use to dismiss people's ideas about high-level mathematics being used in gaming. Anyway. Every miniature is going to be able to take four 'wounds' before it dies. Why four? The first two just give it damage ratings, to let you know "hey, this guy's been hit" or "this guy here has taken a lot of damage and is about to drop." The third 'wound' actually does drop the miniature, causing him to crumple to the ground; the fourth removes it from the game. Some hits are going to cause one wound, while others will cause multiple wounds. That lets the strong, brutish guys like Trolls and Ogres be strong and brutish, cracking the skulls of the little guys in a single swing, while the man-sized troops will have to duke it out with each other over a few rounds.
Rather than keeping track of wounds on paper (Too Complicated), the wounds will be tracked on the game table itself. How, you may ask? Ahhh. This is the first non-die, non-miniature game element I'm going to introduce to you. It's one of my own inventions, and I call it the Blood Counter. My game is going to use red-colored O-rings from the hardware store. You can get them in any size, but I'm going to use some that are about 3/4" around and can be draped over any 25mm miniature, like a big, bloody rubber necklace.
Now how do we differentiate between who gets hit, how badly they get hit, and what happens as a result? A variant on the two target number system.
How Are Miniatures Dealt Damage?
If I'm standing there on the field of battle, which of these guys is going to be difficult to kill, and which of them will be... easier to dispatch? We'll use two numbers, one higher than the other, but a little different than the Starship Troopers system. Let's go with the basic human-y human as the example.
Human
Move: 6
Defense: 4/2
The defense numbers are shown like this: "To-Hit/Threshold." So instead of the second number being a higher to-kill number, the second number is a measure of the unit's pain threshold, or when he says "ow." You need a 4 to hit him, and then every 2 you score above a 4, (a.k.a. 6, 8, 10, etc.) gives him an additional wound. A human, therefore, is of average difficulty to hit, and is also of average difficulty to wound really badly.
Now let's look at what a zombie's stat block might look like.
Zombie
Move: 3
Defense: 2/4
Zombies are slow, stupid, and all they care about is shoveling warm brains down their gullets. They're a piece of cake to hit, but they don't go down easy. So you've got to roll a 2 to hit one, but a 6 to give it two wounds, a 10 to drop it and a 14 to kill it in one hit! By contrast, a human can be killed outright with a 10.
Each time a wound is caused, the miniature goes down the wound track.
Hurt - 1 Blood Counter
Bloodied - 2 Blood Counters
Dropped - placed lying down, blood counters removed
Killed - removed from the game
Here's the basic idea of this simple four-wound system that makes every troop type somewhat unique, but still offers a tangible measurement of how badly hurt one is. Now you'll notice that the Defense numbers are really low; this is because I'm assuming a D6 system would be used. If that were the case, how would attacks work?
How Do My Miniatures to Beat the Hell Out of All the Other Miniatures?
Everybody hates rolling ones. I think ones are a thing of beauty, and so in my game when you roll a 1 you'll be able to add that onto your dice total. Attacks, I'm thinking, might work like this:
Human
Move: 6
Defense: 4/2
Attack: 2
Zombie
Move: 3
Defense: 2/4
Attack: 2
Ogre
Move: 8
Defense: 4/4
Attack: 5
The attack value is the number of D6's you roll when that miniature attacks. It's a simple representation of just how much skill and/or power the unit has in its ability to knock people the fuck out. When it's your turn, your miniature makes an attack roll with that many D6's. You can then combine attack dice however you want to damage or kill opponents, which eliminates the uselessness of bad rolls. Now at least 1's count for something...
That's All For Now
So we've gotten to the point of creating a pretty good system so far, I think. It will need lots of playtesting, but next time we need to go over the turn order and things like initiative and leadership values of different commanders.
Skirmish Wargame Rules [Part 1]
I love the skirmish style of play. I've experienced it with several games over the years including Necromunda, Mordheim and Warhammer Skirmish, D&D Miniatures, and a few other offbeat indie systems. I'm also a big fan of quick-play and simplified rules, so I'm starting work on a new game that encapsulates fast (and possibly also furious) game mechanics for multiple players. My goals for the system are that it has to:
a.) be easy to learn and quick-playing.
b.) incorporate unique features and abilities of several factions or races.
c.) keep every player engaged at all times.
Easy to Learn/Quick-Playing
Part of the problem with GW stats is that, well, there are too blasted many of them. I'm playing a game with dozens of miniatures running around the table, like 40k, and every one of the little bastards has nine different stats. I could recite them in my sleep; strength, toughness, weapon skill, ballistic skill, etc. But until you've played a billion turns of this game and memorized the charts that tell you how one WS performs against another (you have to look every attack up on a chart, for crying out loud!) along with the WS of every type of unit you have, the game slows down. When my brother and I and our friends started playing 40k as kids, the typical turn would go something like this:
"Your turn. Front to front, man! You can't measure four inches from the front of the base to the back of the base, that's actually five inches. So you just cheated and moved everyone five inches, you cheater. Move them all back an inch. Ok, now it's your ranged combat phase. You have a squad of ten guardsmen, they have a 24" range. They want to shoot at that guy way over there? Sorry, they can only shoot at their closest target. But wait! Three of them are out of range, and the rest are in long range! Add modifiers... seven shots. Ok, what's your guys' ballistic skill? Alright, you need 4's. Three hits. Now, what's the strength of a lasgun? Hold on, hold on... ok my guys have toughness 4 so that's... let me look it up on the chart."
One turn should not take this goddamned long. And that was only half of one unit's attack phase. A game of warfare should be tactical, but it should also allow players to make split-second decisions. So my game can't possibly use charts for stuff like combat. That much is certain.
Unique Factions or Races
Let's say I find a way to simplify my game so miniatures have fewer stats and a round of play proceeds much more quickly. What's going to separate a shambling horde of zombies from a tight squad of muscle-bound star soldiers? Why should I play throngs of puny goblins when I can have a dozen stalwart and highly skilled elves? The answer, my friends, is the X factor. Above the basic rules mechanics should be a layer of specialized abilities that give each army/faction its flavor. The problem (again I say, the problem) with these abilities in GW games tends to be that they stop the flow of the game in its tracks. Wanna use an Ork war machine? Look up the special rules. Read them thoroughly. Roll extra dice. Consult yet another chart. I fucking hate charts.
Keeping Every Player Engaged
This is perhaps the most challenging of the goals that I'd like to accomplish. If there's one thing I've learned about gaming, it's that when it isn't my turn, I'm bored as fuck. This is true most of the time, but let's look at an example of a game where I'm rarely ever bored - Magic: The Gathering. Whenever you get into a game of Magic, you know that chances are likely you're about to be on the edge of your seat for the duration. What is it about this game that makes it so engaging?
There are a couple of things.
First, you draw a card every turn (and sometimes more often than that). Drawing a card is a lot like rolling a die because of the random chance it adds to the game. There is a moment in time when your fingers go down to your draw pile and you whiplash that top card into your hand, or while your die bounces wildly across the table, where your ultimate fate hangs in the balance. But there is one key difference between cards and dice: if you've made what you believe to be a good deck, then most any card you draw should be useful - if not right away, then somewhere down the line. A die roll, on the other hand, can be shitty. And a shitty die roll is no more useful than a blind paraplegic bus driver.
The second thing that makes Magic such an exciting game to play is the ability of any player to use certain game mechanics called activated abilities and instants to respond to the actions of another player at any time. This phenomenon makes you constantly second-guess everything you do, because you know that an opponent can react to it and make something they want to happen, happen before what you just decided to do... uh, happens. It's called 'the stack' and it is a mechanic that makes Magic great and has been incorporated into surprisingly few other games.
Putting it All Together
Easier said than done, right? Well, that's kind of the purpose of this mindvomit of a blog post. So here again are the goals, and some ideas we've come up with for making them work. The game must:
a.) be easy to learn and quick-playing.
* Reduce multiple rolls for attacks.
* Do not use charts.
b.) incorporate unique features and abilities of several factions or races.
* Create special qualities that don't bring the game to a screeching halt.
* No fucking charts.
c.) keep every player engaged at all times.
* Provide an aspect or mechanic in the game that players are able to 'hide' from one another.
* Make use of 'interrupts' that let any player react at any time.
In Part 2 I'm going to try out some specific ideas for making this system work. Stay tuned, fair reader.
a.) be easy to learn and quick-playing.
b.) incorporate unique features and abilities of several factions or races.
c.) keep every player engaged at all times.
Easy to Learn/Quick-Playing
Part of the problem with GW stats is that, well, there are too blasted many of them. I'm playing a game with dozens of miniatures running around the table, like 40k, and every one of the little bastards has nine different stats. I could recite them in my sleep; strength, toughness, weapon skill, ballistic skill, etc. But until you've played a billion turns of this game and memorized the charts that tell you how one WS performs against another (you have to look every attack up on a chart, for crying out loud!) along with the WS of every type of unit you have, the game slows down. When my brother and I and our friends started playing 40k as kids, the typical turn would go something like this:
"Your turn. Front to front, man! You can't measure four inches from the front of the base to the back of the base, that's actually five inches. So you just cheated and moved everyone five inches, you cheater. Move them all back an inch. Ok, now it's your ranged combat phase. You have a squad of ten guardsmen, they have a 24" range. They want to shoot at that guy way over there? Sorry, they can only shoot at their closest target. But wait! Three of them are out of range, and the rest are in long range! Add modifiers... seven shots. Ok, what's your guys' ballistic skill? Alright, you need 4's. Three hits. Now, what's the strength of a lasgun? Hold on, hold on... ok my guys have toughness 4 so that's... let me look it up on the chart."
One turn should not take this goddamned long. And that was only half of one unit's attack phase. A game of warfare should be tactical, but it should also allow players to make split-second decisions. So my game can't possibly use charts for stuff like combat. That much is certain.
Unique Factions or Races
Let's say I find a way to simplify my game so miniatures have fewer stats and a round of play proceeds much more quickly. What's going to separate a shambling horde of zombies from a tight squad of muscle-bound star soldiers? Why should I play throngs of puny goblins when I can have a dozen stalwart and highly skilled elves? The answer, my friends, is the X factor. Above the basic rules mechanics should be a layer of specialized abilities that give each army/faction its flavor. The problem (again I say, the problem) with these abilities in GW games tends to be that they stop the flow of the game in its tracks. Wanna use an Ork war machine? Look up the special rules. Read them thoroughly. Roll extra dice. Consult yet another chart. I fucking hate charts.
Keeping Every Player Engaged
This is perhaps the most challenging of the goals that I'd like to accomplish. If there's one thing I've learned about gaming, it's that when it isn't my turn, I'm bored as fuck. This is true most of the time, but let's look at an example of a game where I'm rarely ever bored - Magic: The Gathering. Whenever you get into a game of Magic, you know that chances are likely you're about to be on the edge of your seat for the duration. What is it about this game that makes it so engaging?
There are a couple of things.
First, you draw a card every turn (and sometimes more often than that). Drawing a card is a lot like rolling a die because of the random chance it adds to the game. There is a moment in time when your fingers go down to your draw pile and you whiplash that top card into your hand, or while your die bounces wildly across the table, where your ultimate fate hangs in the balance. But there is one key difference between cards and dice: if you've made what you believe to be a good deck, then most any card you draw should be useful - if not right away, then somewhere down the line. A die roll, on the other hand, can be shitty. And a shitty die roll is no more useful than a blind paraplegic bus driver.
The second thing that makes Magic such an exciting game to play is the ability of any player to use certain game mechanics called activated abilities and instants to respond to the actions of another player at any time. This phenomenon makes you constantly second-guess everything you do, because you know that an opponent can react to it and make something they want to happen, happen before what you just decided to do... uh, happens. It's called 'the stack' and it is a mechanic that makes Magic great and has been incorporated into surprisingly few other games.
Putting it All Together
Easier said than done, right? Well, that's kind of the purpose of this mindvomit of a blog post. So here again are the goals, and some ideas we've come up with for making them work. The game must:
a.) be easy to learn and quick-playing.
* Reduce multiple rolls for attacks.
* Do not use charts.
b.) incorporate unique features and abilities of several factions or races.
* Create special qualities that don't bring the game to a screeching halt.
* No fucking charts.
c.) keep every player engaged at all times.
* Provide an aspect or mechanic in the game that players are able to 'hide' from one another.
* Make use of 'interrupts' that let any player react at any time.
In Part 2 I'm going to try out some specific ideas for making this system work. Stay tuned, fair reader.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
