Other random comments on hex dominion
Apr. 16th, 2012 05:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackI wasn't sure about prototyping, I have very little experience physically making bits and pieces :) I decided the easiest way to make the hexes was not to make physical hexes at all: just generate a couple of random maps on the computer and print them out.
There are currently four sorts of pieces: settlement counters and armies in each player's colour; forts (I was going to use drafts pieces, but it never came up in the first playtest); and depletion counters (ideally little discs with a skull and crossbones on). In the first playtest I eschewed settlement counters and drew a circle on the hex in coloured pen instead, adding a second circle if someone added another counter. Similarly, depletion counters can't be shared with anything else, so I just drew a big cross through the hex.
I hope those counters can be simplified a bit. I don't know if I'll keep forts, or the ability to stack settlement counters. I already discarded other ideas, such as being able to flip hexes to cultivate them. Eg. an earlier idea was to have a separate "tilled" counter, or to flip the hex to represent scrubland becoming field, with all riverside scrubland automatically starting as fields. But it was completely unnecessary: simply specifying resources as "settled/not settled" and making it hard to settle mines (you need to buy a special card) and very easy to settle riverside plains hexes (the "till" card lets you settle them without an army there) fulfilled the same idea more simply and more in keeping with the card mechanic.
I originally thought the board might need to be more complicated to get an appropriate mix of terrain that felt like it came from geology. But random terrain looks fine: you get fertile river valleys, impassable peaks, narrow gorges, etc.
Although come to think of it, maybe instead of _pure_ water hexes, I should have field hexes which are bisected by a river, and part of the set up is turning them round so adjacent rivers join up if possible. And you can settle either side of them like a normal field hex, but need a ford or bridge card to get to the other side. That would take up a bit less room on the board but have a similar effect. Although there'd be less variation if "next to a river" always meant the same number of cards. Or maybe the river should flow along the edge of a hex.
Games it reminds me of:
* Dominion, obviously. The archetypal deck-building game, which I love. But I also feel, it might be more vibrant if different players were in different positions, and the strategies came from that, rather than everyone having the same opportunities determined by the kingdom cards chosen.
* Starcraft board game, which I only played once, but the way the board layout naturally gave different players different strategies made a big impression. For that matter, it also has a deck-building mechanic, in that case to represent different starcraft units (I was very impressed at how well it did it, although I didn't care so much about the end result).
* A few Acres of Snow, which I never played, but apparently had a similar war+deckbuilding idea, except that it used it to represent a specific historical conflict rather than small-scale tactical decisions.
* Solium Infernum computer game. That has a specific small-scale-border-war mechanic: you can only go to war with someone by making absurd demands or insults to them, which causes them to lose prestige or make concessions, but only so much, so they would often accept insults from one neighbour while crushing another because they can't fight everyone all at once. I didn't want the "declare war" mechanic, but I liked the feel of "you always CAN make incursions into another player's territoriy, but it only sometimes pays to do so".
The flavour is somewhat fit between "generic military" and "generic fantasy". It will probably go one way or the other, but for the moment I like both. If it ever goes beyond a couple of playtests, it will also need a name, preferably one that evokes the hex plus deck-building feel, but without explicitly referencing anyone's trademark :)
There are currently four sorts of pieces: settlement counters and armies in each player's colour; forts (I was going to use drafts pieces, but it never came up in the first playtest); and depletion counters (ideally little discs with a skull and crossbones on). In the first playtest I eschewed settlement counters and drew a circle on the hex in coloured pen instead, adding a second circle if someone added another counter. Similarly, depletion counters can't be shared with anything else, so I just drew a big cross through the hex.
I hope those counters can be simplified a bit. I don't know if I'll keep forts, or the ability to stack settlement counters. I already discarded other ideas, such as being able to flip hexes to cultivate them. Eg. an earlier idea was to have a separate "tilled" counter, or to flip the hex to represent scrubland becoming field, with all riverside scrubland automatically starting as fields. But it was completely unnecessary: simply specifying resources as "settled/not settled" and making it hard to settle mines (you need to buy a special card) and very easy to settle riverside plains hexes (the "till" card lets you settle them without an army there) fulfilled the same idea more simply and more in keeping with the card mechanic.
I originally thought the board might need to be more complicated to get an appropriate mix of terrain that felt like it came from geology. But random terrain looks fine: you get fertile river valleys, impassable peaks, narrow gorges, etc.
Although come to think of it, maybe instead of _pure_ water hexes, I should have field hexes which are bisected by a river, and part of the set up is turning them round so adjacent rivers join up if possible. And you can settle either side of them like a normal field hex, but need a ford or bridge card to get to the other side. That would take up a bit less room on the board but have a similar effect. Although there'd be less variation if "next to a river" always meant the same number of cards. Or maybe the river should flow along the edge of a hex.
Games it reminds me of:
* Dominion, obviously. The archetypal deck-building game, which I love. But I also feel, it might be more vibrant if different players were in different positions, and the strategies came from that, rather than everyone having the same opportunities determined by the kingdom cards chosen.
* Starcraft board game, which I only played once, but the way the board layout naturally gave different players different strategies made a big impression. For that matter, it also has a deck-building mechanic, in that case to represent different starcraft units (I was very impressed at how well it did it, although I didn't care so much about the end result).
* A few Acres of Snow, which I never played, but apparently had a similar war+deckbuilding idea, except that it used it to represent a specific historical conflict rather than small-scale tactical decisions.
* Solium Infernum computer game. That has a specific small-scale-border-war mechanic: you can only go to war with someone by making absurd demands or insults to them, which causes them to lose prestige or make concessions, but only so much, so they would often accept insults from one neighbour while crushing another because they can't fight everyone all at once. I didn't want the "declare war" mechanic, but I liked the feel of "you always CAN make incursions into another player's territoriy, but it only sometimes pays to do so".
The flavour is somewhat fit between "generic military" and "generic fantasy". It will probably go one way or the other, but for the moment I like both. If it ever goes beyond a couple of playtests, it will also need a name, preferably one that evokes the hex plus deck-building feel, but without explicitly referencing anyone's trademark :)