[GB] Design Tenets

[Mike]

[El Jefe]

I had just done something similar with PF Redux over the weekend, and it was a game changer for me to have it in front of me when doing actual design.

It just keeps your goal clear, and project management becomes so much easier.

[Eliahad]

Thank you, Mike, for summing everything up so succinctly. This is awesome. I'm not sure there are more than these 4. Framework-wise, anyway. Everything else is going to be details and decorations that hang on these things.

[Mike]

Simplicity vs Complexity

I am having a thought... not quite fully formed.

I think that the basics of this game should be as simple as possible. Then the complexity should all come from god cards and hero cards. So when we add complexity to the game through god and hero customization that will be explicitly spelled out in card text, no problem. If we add anything that makes the base rules more complicated, then we need a really good justification for that.

Simple: The Gods of Olympus have decided to settle their differences with a game of sportball. Each one supports a chosen hero. The first hero to retrieve the Godball from Mt. Olympus and return it to their patron's temple wins. You have points to spend. On your turn you can move one hex. Play a god card. Take a hero action. In any order. Gods will often place terrain and barriers on the map. Each item in a hex means you need to pay one extra point to move there.

There. That's all the instruction you need to sit down and start playing. Anything that adds complexity to that base needs to be justified.

I think God Points and the way we end rounds and handle refreshing and all that is extra complexity to the base rules. I've seen with my own playtest that it's not horrible to learn--the kids caught on quick--but it's also not intuitive and is one of those things that people will need refreshers on every time they play.

The concept of favored terrain is added complexity, but it's mitigated by the fact that we can put it right on the Hero Card: "Argus's favored terrain is Mountains." Now the only complexity is knowing what favored terrain is, and that's pretty simple. Although we could even spell that out on the card too. Zero added complexity.

I'm thinking of other games like Magic or Fluxx (Fluxx being the extreme example) where the base rules are really extremely simple, but then the cards contain all the extra rules needed to make things wonderfully complex. Where Magic enters complexity in its base rules is all these qualifiers like Flying, Trample, Menace, Defender, Haste, Reach, etc etc which used to have explanations right on the cards, but now most often just have the label, and it's up to me to know all of these as part of the base rules. Added complexity. I like it better when it's on the card.

Thinking out loud.

[Eliahad]

I like it better when it's simple base rules and made more complex by the cards as well.

The Turn Marker and Rounds are complex, that is for sure. Not ridiculously so (as you stated) but not intuitive.

What I want from Refresh:

Gods and Heroes get resources back.

I like GP from the perspective that it does force some choice from the player. If someone has 3 powerful cards in their hand, I don't want them to be able to play all 3 of them in a row and overwhelm everyone else.

I want the mechanical elements in the board to shift slightly, so it's not /always/ following the same turn order.

Maybe I am mistaken in these things. Maybe a test where a God Card is played, and another is drawn is the way to go. Or a static turn marker where all the on board mechanics move.

[Mike]

And I get all that. And those are good reasons for wanting those things to stay. Let me start a new thread...

[Eliahad]

What does winning look like? That's the question that's still looming in the game. We have winning conditions, but I don't know if they are the right ones or enough.

The other tenants:

Actual play feels fast to me. I felt like we were moving around the table at a good clip with conversation and rule discussion.

There are no Dice. Check.

Play is dramatic. The ball shifts hands often and bounces around the board. The "sprint" hero action helps with this, as well as the power of the high level cards. There are still tweaks to be made here, but I think we're on the right track. And there will be changes as the God Powers get solidified.

Turns are productive. Again, some tweaks need to be made, maybe large ones, but for the most part, yes. (adding starting terrain makes more cards viable from the get go, he jotted down.)

There are stories. You can recount exploits. Poseidon got hit with a mountain 4 times. Zeus had a barrier that thought it was a puppy. Hera laughed wildly as she knocked pretty much everyone over.

Is it fun? I think so. I hope other people feel the same way. I want to keep trying to make it MORE fun! So that's a win.

[Eliahad]

Just bumping this back up so we can remember to check in with it from time to time. I THINK we're still meeting these goals.

[Eliahad]

Mike: Do you think we're maintaining the simplicity of the base rules?

[Mike]

Yes.

We've made some things a lot more streamlined, with less things to track. On the other hand, we've increased the options available on a turn, meaning more decision points to slow them down. But overall, I think it more than balances out.