Sunday, January 21, 2007
I've become convinced that the more aids to learning the rules of a game that you can include in it, the better. A one-page "Quick Guide", for example, is needed for almost any game other than a really simple one. Here's one for Britannia:
Quick Guide: How to Play Fantasyflightgames Britannia
Lewis Pulsipher (designer). Jan 21, 2007
This is a game of invasions and survival. Each player (usually four) controls 4 or 5 nations, each nation has different objectives. The player whose nations score the most points by the end of 16 Rounds wins. The rules are long, but the game is easy to play in practice, nearly as easy as Risk, easier than Axis and Allies. The game covers the period from the Roman invasion to the Norman invasion, over 1,000 years.
Objective: Score points, mostly from holding territory, as shown on Nation Cards. Most points for your nations at the end of the game wins. With a few exceptions, nations all score at the end of Rounds 5, 7, 10, 13 and 16. Point markers are provided, though many players use downloadable scoresheets.
Sequence: Each nation (not player) plays in turn. 1) Get population increase and scheduled reinforcements (shown on the board); 2) move units; 3) fight. When all nations have played the Round is over.
Increase of Population: Count 2 for each clear terrain area, 1 for difficult; 6 points earns a new army, any remainder is saved via a Population Track.
Movement: Two areas, three if cavalry, or Romans, or with a leader; opponent stops movement unless you outnumber defenders 2-1 (“overrun”); those not needed to overrun can continue move. Difficult terrain halts movement unless a leader is moving along with the armies.
No more than two of your armies can be in a difficult terrain area, or three in non-difficult (clear), except you are allowed one “overstack”, which can be up to four in difficult, unlimited in clear.
Combat: When jointly occupying an area after movement is done, both sides simultaneously roll 6 sided dice, one per army, eliminating an opponent with a roll of 5 or 6. Cavalry and Romans need 4, 5, or 6 to hit in clear terrain. A 6 is needed to kill defenders in difficult terrain, cavalry, or Romans. After all armies in an area have fought once, the defender, then attacker, can retreat one or more armies. Fight until only one side remains in the area.
Leaders: allow movement through difficult terrain; up to three areas; and add one to combat dice rolls. A given leader is in the game only one Round, except at the end of the game (the “Four Kings”).
Raiders: may go back to sea after all combat has ended; they may an adjacent retreat to sea during combat
Invaders: usually come over the sea, sometimes have Major Invasion (Increase, move, fight, move, fight).
Overpopulation: At the end of your turn you cannot have more than twice as many armies as the number of areas you occupy.
The Romans are exceptions to many rules: they have “roads” that aid movement, they build forts (that can be burned down by attackers), they can have large stacks everywhere and overpopulation, and they leave at the end of Round 5 and are succeeded by Romano-British. Some nations can submit to Romans in order to survive.
The game goes through different eras: Roman conquest, the triumph of the English, the Vikings, and the “Four Kings”. Different nations and colors are most dominant in each era. It is not a conquest game in Risk style; you can play it that way, but you probably won’t win. The strategy is deep, every move, every location, matters. No one is going to recognize most of the ramifications until they have played several times. I know people who have played five hundred times (counting original Brit), yet still enjoy the strategy.
Britannia is an epic game, 4-5 hours for experienced players. There is a 3 player short version, shorter 2 player versions (for practice), and short scenarios will be freely available.
See the Historical Walkthru on pulsiphergames.com or fantasyflightgames.com (nicer graphics) for an extended example of play with maps.
Videos and podcasts with more details of how to play are planned.
This Quick Guide is NOT part of the Britannia rules, and does not supercede/overrule those rules in any way. There is no way to include, in one page, the details necessary for a full set of rules.
Quick Guide: How to Play Fantasyflightgames Britannia
Lewis Pulsipher (designer). Jan 21, 2007
This is a game of invasions and survival. Each player (usually four) controls 4 or 5 nations, each nation has different objectives. The player whose nations score the most points by the end of 16 Rounds wins. The rules are long, but the game is easy to play in practice, nearly as easy as Risk, easier than Axis and Allies. The game covers the period from the Roman invasion to the Norman invasion, over 1,000 years.
Objective: Score points, mostly from holding territory, as shown on Nation Cards. Most points for your nations at the end of the game wins. With a few exceptions, nations all score at the end of Rounds 5, 7, 10, 13 and 16. Point markers are provided, though many players use downloadable scoresheets.
Sequence: Each nation (not player) plays in turn. 1) Get population increase and scheduled reinforcements (shown on the board); 2) move units; 3) fight. When all nations have played the Round is over.
Increase of Population: Count 2 for each clear terrain area, 1 for difficult; 6 points earns a new army, any remainder is saved via a Population Track.
Movement: Two areas, three if cavalry, or Romans, or with a leader; opponent stops movement unless you outnumber defenders 2-1 (“overrun”); those not needed to overrun can continue move. Difficult terrain halts movement unless a leader is moving along with the armies.
No more than two of your armies can be in a difficult terrain area, or three in non-difficult (clear), except you are allowed one “overstack”, which can be up to four in difficult, unlimited in clear.
Combat: When jointly occupying an area after movement is done, both sides simultaneously roll 6 sided dice, one per army, eliminating an opponent with a roll of 5 or 6. Cavalry and Romans need 4, 5, or 6 to hit in clear terrain. A 6 is needed to kill defenders in difficult terrain, cavalry, or Romans. After all armies in an area have fought once, the defender, then attacker, can retreat one or more armies. Fight until only one side remains in the area.
Leaders: allow movement through difficult terrain; up to three areas; and add one to combat dice rolls. A given leader is in the game only one Round, except at the end of the game (the “Four Kings”).
Raiders: may go back to sea after all combat has ended; they may an adjacent retreat to sea during combat
Invaders: usually come over the sea, sometimes have Major Invasion (Increase, move, fight, move, fight).
Overpopulation: At the end of your turn you cannot have more than twice as many armies as the number of areas you occupy.
The Romans are exceptions to many rules: they have “roads” that aid movement, they build forts (that can be burned down by attackers), they can have large stacks everywhere and overpopulation, and they leave at the end of Round 5 and are succeeded by Romano-British. Some nations can submit to Romans in order to survive.
The game goes through different eras: Roman conquest, the triumph of the English, the Vikings, and the “Four Kings”. Different nations and colors are most dominant in each era. It is not a conquest game in Risk style; you can play it that way, but you probably won’t win. The strategy is deep, every move, every location, matters. No one is going to recognize most of the ramifications until they have played several times. I know people who have played five hundred times (counting original Brit), yet still enjoy the strategy.
Britannia is an epic game, 4-5 hours for experienced players. There is a 3 player short version, shorter 2 player versions (for practice), and short scenarios will be freely available.
See the Historical Walkthru on pulsiphergames.com or fantasyflightgames.com (nicer graphics) for an extended example of play with maps.
Videos and podcasts with more details of how to play are planned.
This Quick Guide is NOT part of the Britannia rules, and does not supercede/overrule those rules in any way. There is no way to include, in one page, the details necessary for a full set of rules.
Friday, December 29, 2006
Making Games More Accessible
When I was young, game players were generally happy to read through the rules to a game--often several times--before playing, and were not put off by lengthy rules. Even today, I would much rather read the rules than be taught how to play a game. But nowadays it's nearly impossible to get young people to read long non-fiction (many won't read fiction, even), and people want to try to play a game while learning the rules. Patience, you might say, is no longer a virtue.
So here I am as a designer, and a teacher mind you, trying to figure out what needs to be done to make game rules as accessible as possible to this new generation. Here's what seems to be needed.
First, every rules set should have a "rules often missed/misunderstood" section. All but the simplest rules have more-difficult parts.
I'm beginning to think a rules summary (no more than one page) is needed with every game as well. It's notable that (American edition) Settlers of Catan has what amounts to two rules sets, one less formal than the other, even though it is a quite simple game. Clearly, the manufacturers have found that even simple rules can confuse or thwart would-be players.
Examples in the rules have always been useful. Some publishers go a step further with a "play-through" included as a separate booklet. If the play-through isn't in the printed rules, it should be online. However, as a computer instructor I know that most people have difficulty with even the simplest tasks online, excepting e-mail and just plain "surfing", so the less they need to go online, the better. (Yes, readers here are the exception, not the rule.)
But how about more "modern" methods? If people want to learn a game from someone else, why not try to reproduce that, as much as possible? In other words, why not make a video as though you were teaching people in person how to play? The obvious limitation is that the learners cannot ask for clarification, but the video-maker can try to anticipate questions as much as possible.
A video of a play-through (perhaps an entire game, if the game is short enough) would be wonderful for many players who are unsure of their understanding of the rules.
Can you include videos with a game? I think a CD should be included in most games that includes video aids. But in my experience manufacturers don't want this added expense, and prefer the online approach. Once again, my experience of "average computer users" is that an auto-starting CD with video is much more likely to be used successfully than online video.
What about a podcast? This would be a way to publicize a game and might help those who are very busy, and want to listen to "how to play" while doing something else.
Videos and podcasts are not hard to produce if you have good equipment, if you aren't trying to achieve professional perfection. You don't get that when someone teaches you the game, though, so why look for it here? Yes, such things are time-consuming to make. But you have to change with the times.
I have heard of examples of videos, and watched the ones Peter Morrison produced for this game Viktory II. I've not heard of podcasts that try to teach the rules of a game. I'm sure Geekdom can specify more examples, which I'd like to hear about. I am presently working on both videos and a podcast for Britannia, and expect to produce similar material for all of my games as they're published.
Lew Pulsipher
When I was young, game players were generally happy to read through the rules to a game--often several times--before playing, and were not put off by lengthy rules. Even today, I would much rather read the rules than be taught how to play a game. But nowadays it's nearly impossible to get young people to read long non-fiction (many won't read fiction, even), and people want to try to play a game while learning the rules. Patience, you might say, is no longer a virtue.
So here I am as a designer, and a teacher mind you, trying to figure out what needs to be done to make game rules as accessible as possible to this new generation. Here's what seems to be needed.
First, every rules set should have a "rules often missed/misunderstood" section. All but the simplest rules have more-difficult parts.
I'm beginning to think a rules summary (no more than one page) is needed with every game as well. It's notable that (American edition) Settlers of Catan has what amounts to two rules sets, one less formal than the other, even though it is a quite simple game. Clearly, the manufacturers have found that even simple rules can confuse or thwart would-be players.
Examples in the rules have always been useful. Some publishers go a step further with a "play-through" included as a separate booklet. If the play-through isn't in the printed rules, it should be online. However, as a computer instructor I know that most people have difficulty with even the simplest tasks online, excepting e-mail and just plain "surfing", so the less they need to go online, the better. (Yes, readers here are the exception, not the rule.)
But how about more "modern" methods? If people want to learn a game from someone else, why not try to reproduce that, as much as possible? In other words, why not make a video as though you were teaching people in person how to play? The obvious limitation is that the learners cannot ask for clarification, but the video-maker can try to anticipate questions as much as possible.
A video of a play-through (perhaps an entire game, if the game is short enough) would be wonderful for many players who are unsure of their understanding of the rules.
Can you include videos with a game? I think a CD should be included in most games that includes video aids. But in my experience manufacturers don't want this added expense, and prefer the online approach. Once again, my experience of "average computer users" is that an auto-starting CD with video is much more likely to be used successfully than online video.
What about a podcast? This would be a way to publicize a game and might help those who are very busy, and want to listen to "how to play" while doing something else.
Videos and podcasts are not hard to produce if you have good equipment, if you aren't trying to achieve professional perfection. You don't get that when someone teaches you the game, though, so why look for it here? Yes, such things are time-consuming to make. But you have to change with the times.
I have heard of examples of videos, and watched the ones Peter Morrison produced for this game Viktory II. I've not heard of podcasts that try to teach the rules of a game. I'm sure Geekdom can specify more examples, which I'd like to hear about. I am presently working on both videos and a podcast for Britannia, and expect to produce similar material for all of my games as they're published.
Lew Pulsipher
Learn to play solo
I am constantly (unfavorably) impressed by the number of would-be game designers who talk about producing "artwork" for their prototype and "getting other people to playtest" a game they've never played.
This immensely limits what you can do, folks. You don't need "artwork" to play a prototype solo. You're the designer, use your imagination! If you keep a good supply of various kinds of 3D pieces around you can come up with almost any piece you need in no time. You don't need laminated cards for a playtest prototype. If you have some blank business card stock around you can hand-make some cards quickly (or use a computer program to do it). If you need a board, hand-draw one if it takes too long to do a sketch version on the computer. I tend to make wargames, and my initial map used to be hand-drawn with grease pencil on transparent plastic laid across an out-of-copyright map downloaded from the Internet and printed large. Nowadays I have become sufficiently quick with CorelDraw that I usually create a computer map before actually playing, but I start with a hand-drawn map.
The first few times a game is played, "errors"--things that need changing--are inevitable. Why inflict this on your preciously-scarce playtester supply, when you can sort them out on your own?
While there are some kinds of games that may be difficult to play solo, a good game player should be able to put himself in a state of mind where he can play several separate sides in a "hidden information" game, sufficient to get the worst kinks out of a game before inflicting it in other people.
If there's an obvious problem, YOU need to find it and sort it out, not wait for Playtesters to do so. Let the testers play a game that's in a reasonable state, not one where they struggle with things that you should have discovered through solo testing. You'll be wasting their time, and yours! Use playtesters to discover problems you cannot see, not to discover problems you would have found if you'd bothered to play the game yourself.
I am constantly (unfavorably) impressed by the number of would-be game designers who talk about producing "artwork" for their prototype and "getting other people to playtest" a game they've never played.
This immensely limits what you can do, folks. You don't need "artwork" to play a prototype solo. You're the designer, use your imagination! If you keep a good supply of various kinds of 3D pieces around you can come up with almost any piece you need in no time. You don't need laminated cards for a playtest prototype. If you have some blank business card stock around you can hand-make some cards quickly (or use a computer program to do it). If you need a board, hand-draw one if it takes too long to do a sketch version on the computer. I tend to make wargames, and my initial map used to be hand-drawn with grease pencil on transparent plastic laid across an out-of-copyright map downloaded from the Internet and printed large. Nowadays I have become sufficiently quick with CorelDraw that I usually create a computer map before actually playing, but I start with a hand-drawn map.
The first few times a game is played, "errors"--things that need changing--are inevitable. Why inflict this on your preciously-scarce playtester supply, when you can sort them out on your own?
While there are some kinds of games that may be difficult to play solo, a good game player should be able to put himself in a state of mind where he can play several separate sides in a "hidden information" game, sufficient to get the worst kinks out of a game before inflicting it in other people.
If there's an obvious problem, YOU need to find it and sort it out, not wait for Playtesters to do so. Let the testers play a game that's in a reasonable state, not one where they struggle with things that you should have discovered through solo testing. You'll be wasting their time, and yours! Use playtesters to discover problems you cannot see, not to discover problems you would have found if you'd bothered to play the game yourself.
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
What makes a game "great"?
I am writing an article about a game which is supposed to be one of the all-time best hobby games. Naturally, I'll need to explain why I think this. So my question today is, what makes a game "great"? Not good, not a flash-in-the-pan, I mean an all-time great game. I'm sure this must have been discussed before on BGG, and perhaps someone can provide links to known discussions of this type. In the meantime, here's what I've been thinking about (rambling included).
To me, a game is great if you can (and want to) play it again and again with great enjoyment over many years, if you can almost endlessly discuss the intricacies of good play, if you can create many variants that are also fine games.
Obviously, a game is not "great" to everyone. Chess is a great game, but many gamers can't stand to play it (though a great many have tried).
Longevity is important. A new game may be "great", but we simply cannot tell until years have passed. Perhaps not every great game is great by current "design standards", but it may still be a great game in terms of how it affected people and the enjoyment it gave to people. "New" certainly doesn't mean "good" and "old" certainly doesn't mean "bad". In other words, I ignore the "cult of the new" so prevalent in today's gaming tastes.
Popularity is not a criterion. There are many popular tunes, movies, games, books, that disappear from our notice in a year or two or three. Great games should continue to be loved year after year after year, just as great novels, movies, music are enjoyed perennially.
If a game is one of hundreds that people might want to play, can it be a great game? No, it should stand out from the crowd. If I play a game just to kill time, then the fact that I'm playing it certainly doesn't make it a great game, no matter how many times I play. It's not "oh yeah, we can play that" it's "I'd love to play that"--again, and again, and again. If I can spend my valuable time playing this game or thinking about this game, when I have other valuable things to do, then it may be a great game. If lots of people don't play it hundreds of hours each, over many years, can it be a great game?
I thought about including the criterion that solitaire play is rewarding. But for hidden information games, solo is not so practical. Nonetheless, if it's a game that can reasonably be played solitaire, then a great game will be played very often solo, by a great many people.
It's difficult to generalize concisely. Perhaps you could say, if a game is played by a great many people, who love to play it, who play it for hundreds of hours (by each person) altogether over the years, who can still enjoy it many years after it was first published, then perhaps it is a great game.
Is Monopoly a well-designed game? Given the likelihood of stalemate or very long games, perhaps not. Is it a great game? Here you can argue that it is played by default, because it's traditional, rather than because people truly want to play it. Nonetheless I think a case can be made that it is a great game.
A young person might look at this differently than I (55 years). I am interested in your comments.
Lew Pulsipher
I am writing an article about a game which is supposed to be one of the all-time best hobby games. Naturally, I'll need to explain why I think this. So my question today is, what makes a game "great"? Not good, not a flash-in-the-pan, I mean an all-time great game. I'm sure this must have been discussed before on BGG, and perhaps someone can provide links to known discussions of this type. In the meantime, here's what I've been thinking about (rambling included).
To me, a game is great if you can (and want to) play it again and again with great enjoyment over many years, if you can almost endlessly discuss the intricacies of good play, if you can create many variants that are also fine games.
Obviously, a game is not "great" to everyone. Chess is a great game, but many gamers can't stand to play it (though a great many have tried).
Longevity is important. A new game may be "great", but we simply cannot tell until years have passed. Perhaps not every great game is great by current "design standards", but it may still be a great game in terms of how it affected people and the enjoyment it gave to people. "New" certainly doesn't mean "good" and "old" certainly doesn't mean "bad". In other words, I ignore the "cult of the new" so prevalent in today's gaming tastes.
Popularity is not a criterion. There are many popular tunes, movies, games, books, that disappear from our notice in a year or two or three. Great games should continue to be loved year after year after year, just as great novels, movies, music are enjoyed perennially.
If a game is one of hundreds that people might want to play, can it be a great game? No, it should stand out from the crowd. If I play a game just to kill time, then the fact that I'm playing it certainly doesn't make it a great game, no matter how many times I play. It's not "oh yeah, we can play that" it's "I'd love to play that"--again, and again, and again. If I can spend my valuable time playing this game or thinking about this game, when I have other valuable things to do, then it may be a great game. If lots of people don't play it hundreds of hours each, over many years, can it be a great game?
I thought about including the criterion that solitaire play is rewarding. But for hidden information games, solo is not so practical. Nonetheless, if it's a game that can reasonably be played solitaire, then a great game will be played very often solo, by a great many people.
It's difficult to generalize concisely. Perhaps you could say, if a game is played by a great many people, who love to play it, who play it for hundreds of hours (by each person) altogether over the years, who can still enjoy it many years after it was first published, then perhaps it is a great game.
Is Monopoly a well-designed game? Given the likelihood of stalemate or very long games, perhaps not. Is it a great game? Here you can argue that it is played by default, because it's traditional, rather than because people truly want to play it. Nonetheless I think a case can be made that it is a great game.
A young person might look at this differently than I (55 years). I am interested in your comments.
Lew Pulsipher
Saturday, December 16, 2006
A Diagram of the Game Creation Process
I've posted a diagram at
http://www.pulsipher.net/gamedesign/GameCreationProcess.htm
intended to illustrate the game design process.
Start at the upper left, go toward the lower right. This is a data flow diagram, NOT a flowchart. Information (or physical items) can flow both ways between processes, or perhaps only one way. Circles represent processes/subprocesses. A rectangle represents an external entity that provides input (such as a playtester). The triangle represents an external entity that receives output. The other symbol is a data store, where information (or objects) is stored.
Lew Pulsipher
I've posted a diagram at
http://www.pulsipher.net/gamedesign/GameCreationProcess.htm
intended to illustrate the game design process.
Start at the upper left, go toward the lower right. This is a data flow diagram, NOT a flowchart. Information (or physical items) can flow both ways between processes, or perhaps only one way. Circles represent processes/subprocesses. A rectangle represents an external entity that provides input (such as a playtester). The triangle represents an external entity that receives output. The other symbol is a data store, where information (or objects) is stored.
Lew Pulsipher
Monday, December 11, 2006
"Something in it"
At some point during playtesting of a game, the designer must decide if "there's something in it" (as I put it): if the game is really good enough that people might play it, like it, and would buy the finished version of it. There's really two times when this should happen, once during solo playtests (alpha testing), the second time during playtesting by others (beta testing). The "something in it" point in solo playtesting is an indicator that it's about ready for others to play. The "something in it" point in beta testing usually comes when observing people playing the game and their reactions during and after playing.
Usually I need to tweak a game quite a bit from its state at the end of solo play, before I can reach the "something in it" stage of beta testing. Sometimes there doesn't seem to be anything in it during beta testing, and I set it aside for further thought. Sometimes I realize, from solo playing, that there isn't "something in it", at least not yet, so I set it aside at that point.
I strongly suspect that novice designers never understand these stages. Their egos become involved, and they assume that because they took the time to make the game, there must be something in it. In extreme cases, the "designer" thinks he has "something in it" when all he has is an idea, that is, when he has virtually nothing at all. The number of people who think they've successfully designed a game, yet haven't playtested it at all, is remarkable. Playtesting is the start of successful design, not the end. (I confess that I don't think of "development" as a process separate from design.)
So how do you recognize when there's "something in" a game? That's hard to say, unfortunately. Surveys or written feedback won't necessarily reveal it.
In my case, in beta testing when spontaneously (without any urging) people say "I'd buy this game", I know I've got something: I don't remember anyone ever saying that about Britannia, or Dragon Rage, or Valley of the Four Winds, but they have all been quite popular. I am very low-key in beta playtesting, preferring to watch reactions of people rather than try to solicit opinions, in part because people (being polite for the most part) won't say negative things even when asked. I also try not to play, as 1) the designer playing in a game tends to skew results and 2) when I play, I do a worse job of playing, and a worse job of evaluating the playtesting, than if I did either alone. As I'm that strange sort of person who enjoys watching my own games as much as playing, why play?
In alpha testing, the "something in it" stage is a gradual realization, coming from observing my own thought processes as I play. My games are, almost without exception, strategy games. When I "see" myself thinking hard about the strategies, and liking the options, then I may think there's something in it.
I do not inflict a game on players until I think it is good enough to be OK to play, that is, I've reached that first "something in it" stage. Evidently some other designers playtest with other people very early: not me. My playtesters play games to have fun, not as on obligation, and most are not hard-core gamers, so I do what I can to make sure the game MIGHT be fun before I ask them to play.
I am going to try the "Six Hats" method (devised by Edward de Bono) when playtesting; specifically I'll ask players to put on their black hat (the judge) and red hat (intuition and emotion) to see how they assess a game, and then the yellow hat (the positive side of assessing an idea) to see what they like about a game. With local playtesters I sometimes ask them to think of ways to make the game better (the green hat).
Lew Pulsipher
At some point during playtesting of a game, the designer must decide if "there's something in it" (as I put it): if the game is really good enough that people might play it, like it, and would buy the finished version of it. There's really two times when this should happen, once during solo playtests (alpha testing), the second time during playtesting by others (beta testing). The "something in it" point in solo playtesting is an indicator that it's about ready for others to play. The "something in it" point in beta testing usually comes when observing people playing the game and their reactions during and after playing.
Usually I need to tweak a game quite a bit from its state at the end of solo play, before I can reach the "something in it" stage of beta testing. Sometimes there doesn't seem to be anything in it during beta testing, and I set it aside for further thought. Sometimes I realize, from solo playing, that there isn't "something in it", at least not yet, so I set it aside at that point.
I strongly suspect that novice designers never understand these stages. Their egos become involved, and they assume that because they took the time to make the game, there must be something in it. In extreme cases, the "designer" thinks he has "something in it" when all he has is an idea, that is, when he has virtually nothing at all. The number of people who think they've successfully designed a game, yet haven't playtested it at all, is remarkable. Playtesting is the start of successful design, not the end. (I confess that I don't think of "development" as a process separate from design.)
So how do you recognize when there's "something in" a game? That's hard to say, unfortunately. Surveys or written feedback won't necessarily reveal it.
In my case, in beta testing when spontaneously (without any urging) people say "I'd buy this game", I know I've got something: I don't remember anyone ever saying that about Britannia, or Dragon Rage, or Valley of the Four Winds, but they have all been quite popular. I am very low-key in beta playtesting, preferring to watch reactions of people rather than try to solicit opinions, in part because people (being polite for the most part) won't say negative things even when asked. I also try not to play, as 1) the designer playing in a game tends to skew results and 2) when I play, I do a worse job of playing, and a worse job of evaluating the playtesting, than if I did either alone. As I'm that strange sort of person who enjoys watching my own games as much as playing, why play?
In alpha testing, the "something in it" stage is a gradual realization, coming from observing my own thought processes as I play. My games are, almost without exception, strategy games. When I "see" myself thinking hard about the strategies, and liking the options, then I may think there's something in it.
I do not inflict a game on players until I think it is good enough to be OK to play, that is, I've reached that first "something in it" stage. Evidently some other designers playtest with other people very early: not me. My playtesters play games to have fun, not as on obligation, and most are not hard-core gamers, so I do what I can to make sure the game MIGHT be fun before I ask them to play.
I am going to try the "Six Hats" method (devised by Edward de Bono) when playtesting; specifically I'll ask players to put on their black hat (the judge) and red hat (intuition and emotion) to see how they assess a game, and then the yellow hat (the positive side of assessing an idea) to see what they like about a game. With local playtesters I sometimes ask them to think of ways to make the game better (the green hat).
Lew Pulsipher
Sunday, December 03, 2006
What’s important when playing Green to Win in Britannia Second Edition
(I have deliberately limited this to one page; there is one page of overall advice,
and there will be one page for each nation. Lew Pulsipher)
Every color in Britannia must be played as a whole, not as separate nations, if you want to win consistently. It is worth sacrificing armies or points of one nation to improve the points or position of another by a greater amount. The action of armies at one end of the board can affect those at the other, in the long run. Remember, at a given time position is just as important as the number of armies or number of points.
Green is the most defensive of all the colors. It requires patience, not a “conquest” mentality. Offensives that spend lots of armies are a bad idea, even for the Danes, though the Danes will certainly do lots of attacking.
Green (and yellow) are limited in the maximum number of points they can score. Consequently, green must work to keep red and blue in check. Generally, the lower the scores, the better off green will be. Put another way, green’s fate frequently depends on others. Diplomacy can be an important tool.
If red and blue are at peace, it’s almost always bad for green. The Welsh then have to cope with Irish and Saxons, and the Danes may be faced with a “shield wall” of Angles and Saxons.
The Saxons may be green’s biggest enemy. Some people see the game as blue fighting with yellow in the north while green struggles with red in the south.
The Welsh must survive and prosper if green is to prosper. Do NOT try to fight the Romans tooth and nail. Submit at five areas to allow for population growth, and strongly consider cooperating with the Roman to occupy his burned fort areas. It is often difficult for the Welsh to maintain a long-term presence in Cornwall and Devon, but that is going to help your score–and especially try to prevent the Irish from settling in those areas. The clear terrain in Wales is often contested by invaders, and Welsh often abandon those areas at times.
Try to negotiate with blue to take your trip to York for 12 points. You may be able to fight your way in, but it will be very costly to Welsh survivability later on. Impress on the blue that the Angles, too, will have difficulty prospering if you have a big battle over York.
The Caledonians “aren’t worth much” if you like offense, but they can score a lot of points if they survive. They need not be aggressive until facing “starvation”. If you think Picts will attack the Caledonians early in the game, move Orkneys to Caithness. This is why the move order changed from original Brit, to give the Cals this chance. Ultimately, the enemy of the Caledonians is the Norsemen.
You may want to sacrifice the Jutes to help another nation. They are one of the lowest scoring nations in the game, though a successful attack on a Roman fort in Kent in Round 5, settling there, is worth 14 points.
Some players believe the Danish invasion is the key to green prosperity, while others think the Welsh are more important. The Welsh score more points, but the Danish have much more variability in how much they can score. The Welsh can help Danes secure the kingship by picking off a few Saxons.
The Danes may not have much left at the end of the game, but it’s points, not troops, that count in the end. The Danes have to preserve some force during the big invasion, or they may be wiped out too soon. It is easy for the big Danish invasion to “melt away”.
(I have deliberately limited this to one page; there is one page of overall advice,
and there will be one page for each nation. Lew Pulsipher)
Every color in Britannia must be played as a whole, not as separate nations, if you want to win consistently. It is worth sacrificing armies or points of one nation to improve the points or position of another by a greater amount. The action of armies at one end of the board can affect those at the other, in the long run. Remember, at a given time position is just as important as the number of armies or number of points.
Green is the most defensive of all the colors. It requires patience, not a “conquest” mentality. Offensives that spend lots of armies are a bad idea, even for the Danes, though the Danes will certainly do lots of attacking.
Green (and yellow) are limited in the maximum number of points they can score. Consequently, green must work to keep red and blue in check. Generally, the lower the scores, the better off green will be. Put another way, green’s fate frequently depends on others. Diplomacy can be an important tool.
If red and blue are at peace, it’s almost always bad for green. The Welsh then have to cope with Irish and Saxons, and the Danes may be faced with a “shield wall” of Angles and Saxons.
The Saxons may be green’s biggest enemy. Some people see the game as blue fighting with yellow in the north while green struggles with red in the south.
The Welsh must survive and prosper if green is to prosper. Do NOT try to fight the Romans tooth and nail. Submit at five areas to allow for population growth, and strongly consider cooperating with the Roman to occupy his burned fort areas. It is often difficult for the Welsh to maintain a long-term presence in Cornwall and Devon, but that is going to help your score–and especially try to prevent the Irish from settling in those areas. The clear terrain in Wales is often contested by invaders, and Welsh often abandon those areas at times.
Try to negotiate with blue to take your trip to York for 12 points. You may be able to fight your way in, but it will be very costly to Welsh survivability later on. Impress on the blue that the Angles, too, will have difficulty prospering if you have a big battle over York.
The Caledonians “aren’t worth much” if you like offense, but they can score a lot of points if they survive. They need not be aggressive until facing “starvation”. If you think Picts will attack the Caledonians early in the game, move Orkneys to Caithness. This is why the move order changed from original Brit, to give the Cals this chance. Ultimately, the enemy of the Caledonians is the Norsemen.
You may want to sacrifice the Jutes to help another nation. They are one of the lowest scoring nations in the game, though a successful attack on a Roman fort in Kent in Round 5, settling there, is worth 14 points.
Some players believe the Danish invasion is the key to green prosperity, while others think the Welsh are more important. The Welsh score more points, but the Danish have much more variability in how much they can score. The Welsh can help Danes secure the kingship by picking off a few Saxons.
The Danes may not have much left at the end of the game, but it’s points, not troops, that count in the end. The Danes have to preserve some force during the big invasion, or they may be wiped out too soon. It is easy for the big Danish invasion to “melt away”.
Thursday, November 23, 2006
GamePieces
I asked a few people at PrezCon 2006 what kind of pieces they preferred in games (someday I'll make a Surveymonkey survey out of this).
One player pointed out that 3D pieces such as figures are best when you want to move them around (as in Chess), but flat(ter) pieces are OK if you just place them and leave them there (as in Tigris and Euphrat and many other tile-laying games, or as in Go).
I sometimes use one inch square colored hard plastic-foam pieces, about a quarter inch thick, in prototypes. I've not seen such pieces used in a published game.
3D pieces are more prone to being knocked and jostled around than flat pieces. I have used figures to playtest Brit Lite, but I think I'll try using the counters from B2 the next time I play it solo, as they won't be as "fiddly". On the other hand, I have always used figures in Germania, Seas of Gold, and other "Euro-wargames", and always will, because part of the attraction is the visuals. Further, there are relatively few pieces in these games, compared to some of the larger Brit-like games.
Some people want their 3D pieces to look like real objects, hence the figures that look like soldiers or horsemen or tanks or cannon (Axis and Allies). Some seem to be as content with wooden or plastic blocks or cylinders, or glass beads, or stylized wooden pieces.
I don't think colored plastic chips quite count as 3D, though they are not cardboard counters. At least one of my games, Law & Chaos (TM), originated as an attempt to design a game using glass beads (which I quite like, but which are not practical in large numbers because they drive up the shipping weight of a game).
At this point we could talk about colors. The "Black Prussian" suggested that the colors of heraldry should be used (black, blue, green, red, purple, white, yellow in alpha order). Peter Morrison, designer and publisher of Viktory II, ran a piece color survey on BGG that he reports on his Website. The order of preference was:
Blue
Green
Red
Yellow
Black
Purple
Orange
Gray
White
Brown
I've also seen other suggestions that those first four colors are ideal for four player games. FFG used them in Britannia, perhaps explaining why they chose to have yellow pieces instead of purple on what is basically a yellow map. Of course, Gibsons (and AH) had green pieces on a green map . . .
I asked a few people at PrezCon 2006 what kind of pieces they preferred in games (someday I'll make a Surveymonkey survey out of this).
One player pointed out that 3D pieces such as figures are best when you want to move them around (as in Chess), but flat(ter) pieces are OK if you just place them and leave them there (as in Tigris and Euphrat and many other tile-laying games, or as in Go).
I sometimes use one inch square colored hard plastic-foam pieces, about a quarter inch thick, in prototypes. I've not seen such pieces used in a published game.
3D pieces are more prone to being knocked and jostled around than flat pieces. I have used figures to playtest Brit Lite, but I think I'll try using the counters from B2 the next time I play it solo, as they won't be as "fiddly". On the other hand, I have always used figures in Germania, Seas of Gold, and other "Euro-wargames", and always will, because part of the attraction is the visuals. Further, there are relatively few pieces in these games, compared to some of the larger Brit-like games.
Some people want their 3D pieces to look like real objects, hence the figures that look like soldiers or horsemen or tanks or cannon (Axis and Allies). Some seem to be as content with wooden or plastic blocks or cylinders, or glass beads, or stylized wooden pieces.
I don't think colored plastic chips quite count as 3D, though they are not cardboard counters. At least one of my games, Law & Chaos (TM), originated as an attempt to design a game using glass beads (which I quite like, but which are not practical in large numbers because they drive up the shipping weight of a game).
At this point we could talk about colors. The "Black Prussian" suggested that the colors of heraldry should be used (black, blue, green, red, purple, white, yellow in alpha order). Peter Morrison, designer and publisher of Viktory II, ran a piece color survey on BGG that he reports on his Website. The order of preference was:
Blue
Green
Red
Yellow
Black
Purple
Orange
Gray
White
Brown
I've also seen other suggestions that those first four colors are ideal for four player games. FFG used them in Britannia, perhaps explaining why they chose to have yellow pieces instead of purple on what is basically a yellow map. Of course, Gibsons (and AH) had green pieces on a green map . . .
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Is there a "sweet spot" or "magic number" of spaces for an area-based boardgame (or any other kind, for that matter) where pieces occupy areas?
Chess and checkers have 64 spaces and (respectively) 32 and 24 pieces. My Law & Chaos (TM, prototype) has 61 areas, with a varying number of pieces on the board (tending to grow larger over time). Tic-Tac-Oh (prototype) has three boards of 16 squares each (48 areas). Go, on the other hand, has far more "spaces" (the intersections of areas on a 19 by 19 grid).
Intuitively, you might expect that fewer areas means the game is simpler to deal with, though the game may still have a great deal of depth.
How about "classic" area-based wargames? Risk has 42 areas. Britannia has 37. Vinci has 45 (by quick count). Diplomacy has (by quick count) about 65 areas for 34 pieces. History of the World and Axis and Allies have many more areas (and original A&A had a lot more, IIRC).
Perhaps there's a relationship between number of pieces on the board and number of areas, but I don't have the data to compare. In chess there's one piece for each two areas. The average for Britannia depends on the era, but is roughly 55 pieces for the 37 areas. The ratio in Vinci is something over one piece per area. In Risk it's a lot higher, at times. Diplomacy's ratio is much like that of chess, about two areas per piece.
I'm not sure where this rumination has arrived at, but there it is.
Chess and checkers have 64 spaces and (respectively) 32 and 24 pieces. My Law & Chaos (TM, prototype) has 61 areas, with a varying number of pieces on the board (tending to grow larger over time). Tic-Tac-Oh (prototype) has three boards of 16 squares each (48 areas). Go, on the other hand, has far more "spaces" (the intersections of areas on a 19 by 19 grid).
Intuitively, you might expect that fewer areas means the game is simpler to deal with, though the game may still have a great deal of depth.
How about "classic" area-based wargames? Risk has 42 areas. Britannia has 37. Vinci has 45 (by quick count). Diplomacy has (by quick count) about 65 areas for 34 pieces. History of the World and Axis and Allies have many more areas (and original A&A had a lot more, IIRC).
Perhaps there's a relationship between number of pieces on the board and number of areas, but I don't have the data to compare. In chess there's one piece for each two areas. The average for Britannia depends on the era, but is roughly 55 pieces for the 37 areas. The ratio in Vinci is something over one piece per area. In Risk it's a lot higher, at times. Diplomacy's ratio is much like that of chess, about two areas per piece.
I'm not sure where this rumination has arrived at, but there it is.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
I am so busy with teaching that I haven't played a game solo in months, but I do sometimes manage to get people together for playtest sessions. Viking Gold (TM), Battle of Hastings, and Law & Chaos (TM) are what is usually played.
Recently I've . . . planned, I guess you might call it, three new games. "Planned" nowadays means I have made a map (usually on computer), figured out the basic structures (combat system, economy, etc.), and am close to ready to play the game solo. I find that as I get more experience I can do more of this, and do it more effectively, before first play than I could in the past. One game is an ancient Near Eastern Brit-like game, another is a game "something like Risk, Vinci, History of the World, and Britannia crossed" on a map of Eurasia. The third is something I've avoided for a long time, but it just hit me one day and "arrived" in a couple hours: a shorter, no-dice expansion for B2, using many of the ideas I use in Brit-Lite. The difference is that BLite cannot be published while B2 is in print, practically speaking, while an expansion may be.
I talked with an editor recently about a textbook "How to Design Games" and I'm creating a proposal according to their specifications. No telling what will come of it.
Recently I've . . . planned, I guess you might call it, three new games. "Planned" nowadays means I have made a map (usually on computer), figured out the basic structures (combat system, economy, etc.), and am close to ready to play the game solo. I find that as I get more experience I can do more of this, and do it more effectively, before first play than I could in the past. One game is an ancient Near Eastern Brit-like game, another is a game "something like Risk, Vinci, History of the World, and Britannia crossed" on a map of Eurasia. The third is something I've avoided for a long time, but it just hit me one day and "arrived" in a couple hours: a shorter, no-dice expansion for B2, using many of the ideas I use in Brit-Lite. The difference is that BLite cannot be published while B2 is in print, practically speaking, while an expansion may be.
I talked with an editor recently about a textbook "How to Design Games" and I'm creating a proposal according to their specifications. No telling what will come of it.
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
My "How to Design Games" Continuing Ed class, though the subject appeals a lot to young people, did not get enough students to run. This has really impressed me with the tremendous lack of initiative of young people as a group (there are of course many exceptions).
For example, four students (out of 17 high school junior and senior males) in a college class for high school students I'm teaching say that their aim in life is to design video games, but only one of them managed to make it to the class. As they're 23 miles from our Sanford campus, travel might have contributed to that, but I think also it's a reflection of what a "generation expert" calls the "ambitious but aimless" tendencies of Millennials (Gen Y). They have a goal, but not only don't know how to get there, they may not even be willing to pursue a path to it when the path is available. The expert's example: Millennial says "I'm going to be an astronaut". Well, that's very praiseworthy, but that requires a lot of work, you'll likely need at least a master's degree in some science-related subject, you have to take physics, math, etc. "Nope, I don't do math," says the millennial. Then how can you be an astronaut? "I'm going to be an astronaut". They don't see the connection between where they are and where they're going, but somehow it's going to happen.
One of the 16-year-olds who did come to the class said he tried to get some buddies to come as well, but they were "too busy". I'd bet a lot of their busy-ness amounted to killing time playing video games, but if you think that somehow things will just work out, you're not likely to take the initiative to change the state of affairs.
Moreover, many young people just don't seem to keep track of things. A couple days after, I came across one of our current curriculum students who had said he would be attending (but did not) and asked him about it. "Oh, did that start already?" He just hadn't kept track; and though we have a listserv and ask the curriculum computer students to join it, he had not done so and didn't get the reminders I sent. Another high school student (not in my class but in another at the same place) came to me and asked about the class. He'd had a flier that said when it started, but this was three days after that date.
When we try to run this class again in mid-March, I'll try to make sure every person who's expressed an interest is phoned to remind them when the class is about to start. The ConEd people sometimes do this for folks of retirement age, but it appears to be necessary for millennials as well.
So to expect a young person to have the initiative to actually intend to take such a course, and the organization to keep track of when it starts, is asking a lot, evidently, of the average person.
This has helped convince me that, when we're trying to recruit young people for the two-year computer degrees, we need to get to their parents, as the parents will often provide the initiative that the student lacks. As it stands now, only about 11% of the curriculum students come to us straight out of high school.
I would have enjoyed teaching the class--those who did come and I sat and talked for over two hours that evening--but I can use the time for other things, as well.
Change of subject:
I have been trying to make a combat table (using the sum of two dice for results) that reflects pretty closely the results of fighting the standard Brit way. Because of the probability involved it's slow going. I intended to use it in the Arthur game instead of actually rolling dice, to speed things up. But I may in the end go back to a form of the table I made for MegaBrit, which gives the defense a little edge, and not worry about trying to reproduce Brit combat results.
For relaxation I'm reading Marc van de Mieroop's History of the Ancient Near East. It is much more social history than the usual fare, quite eye-opening in its detail. I expect that one way or another I'll end up with a more or less Brit-like game in this era (2500-500 BC), as the existing ones (Chariot Lords, Ancient Conquest) don't appear to reflect reality well at all.
For example, four students (out of 17 high school junior and senior males) in a college class for high school students I'm teaching say that their aim in life is to design video games, but only one of them managed to make it to the class. As they're 23 miles from our Sanford campus, travel might have contributed to that, but I think also it's a reflection of what a "generation expert" calls the "ambitious but aimless" tendencies of Millennials (Gen Y). They have a goal, but not only don't know how to get there, they may not even be willing to pursue a path to it when the path is available. The expert's example: Millennial says "I'm going to be an astronaut". Well, that's very praiseworthy, but that requires a lot of work, you'll likely need at least a master's degree in some science-related subject, you have to take physics, math, etc. "Nope, I don't do math," says the millennial. Then how can you be an astronaut? "I'm going to be an astronaut". They don't see the connection between where they are and where they're going, but somehow it's going to happen.
One of the 16-year-olds who did come to the class said he tried to get some buddies to come as well, but they were "too busy". I'd bet a lot of their busy-ness amounted to killing time playing video games, but if you think that somehow things will just work out, you're not likely to take the initiative to change the state of affairs.
Moreover, many young people just don't seem to keep track of things. A couple days after, I came across one of our current curriculum students who had said he would be attending (but did not) and asked him about it. "Oh, did that start already?" He just hadn't kept track; and though we have a listserv and ask the curriculum computer students to join it, he had not done so and didn't get the reminders I sent. Another high school student (not in my class but in another at the same place) came to me and asked about the class. He'd had a flier that said when it started, but this was three days after that date.
When we try to run this class again in mid-March, I'll try to make sure every person who's expressed an interest is phoned to remind them when the class is about to start. The ConEd people sometimes do this for folks of retirement age, but it appears to be necessary for millennials as well.
So to expect a young person to have the initiative to actually intend to take such a course, and the organization to keep track of when it starts, is asking a lot, evidently, of the average person.
This has helped convince me that, when we're trying to recruit young people for the two-year computer degrees, we need to get to their parents, as the parents will often provide the initiative that the student lacks. As it stands now, only about 11% of the curriculum students come to us straight out of high school.
I would have enjoyed teaching the class--those who did come and I sat and talked for over two hours that evening--but I can use the time for other things, as well.
Change of subject:
I have been trying to make a combat table (using the sum of two dice for results) that reflects pretty closely the results of fighting the standard Brit way. Because of the probability involved it's slow going. I intended to use it in the Arthur game instead of actually rolling dice, to speed things up. But I may in the end go back to a form of the table I made for MegaBrit, which gives the defense a little edge, and not worry about trying to reproduce Brit combat results.
For relaxation I'm reading Marc van de Mieroop's History of the Ancient Near East. It is much more social history than the usual fare, quite eye-opening in its detail. I expect that one way or another I'll end up with a more or less Brit-like game in this era (2500-500 BC), as the existing ones (Chariot Lords, Ancient Conquest) don't appear to reflect reality well at all.
Saturday, September 30, 2006
What’s important when trying to win FFG Britannia?
(I have chosen to limit this to one page; there will be one page for each color, as well . Copyright 2006 Lewis Pulsipher)
If you think one color “can’t win” (or “can’t lose”), you need a different strategy! The sides are “nearly equal”.
Like virtually all multi-player games, this one is a psychological game as well as a competition on the board. Perceptions count for a lot. If you are in the lead but not perceived to be in the lead, you have an advantage. You want to “control” the game without appearing to. Give other players a better reason to attack someone else than you. You don't want to get in a situation where someone says "well, you didn't leave me with a choice".
To do well you need to know what new units are coming, and when; and where your opponents score their points. Think of your forces as a whole, not as separate nations. Maximize your entire score, not the score of each individual nation. One of your nations can divert an enemy, or “take it on the chin for the cause”, if this will sufficiently improve the score of another.
If you deprive someone of the chance of winning, be sure it’s too late in the game for him to retaliate, or that he’s too weak to harm you.
Something you do in a round could have an effect several rounds in the future. Every little thing you do is important in some way! And there’s plenty of time to recover if you have a bad start.
The question of “who is in the lead” is sometimes unclear, and relates to expected scoring at particular times. The Romans score a lot of points early in the game, the question is, did they score as many as expected? Yellow can have the most points and be in fourth place!
Just because you can take something or kill someone doesn’t mean it’s the best move. Weakening one color can help another of your opponents too much. Sometimes it's important to keep an "enemy" around (whether a color or a nation) because it can help you against someone else later on. Force preservation can be as important as scoring points. Just because you can make a 2-1 attack doesn't mean you should do so.
Points are important, but position is just as important, because position strongly influences who will score most in the future. So you might choose, for example, to keep some raiders peacefully at sea in order to be in better position in the next round. Your armies don't NEED to DO anything as long as they're scoring points (and breeding more armies, usually).
Leaders are far more effective in attack than in defense; they are especially good for attacking difficult terrain.
Better odds mean less death for you. Preserve your forces whenever possible. Three to two is poor attacking odds when defenders are in difficult terrain, as is two to one.
Red and blue have more control over the course of the game during mid-game than yellow and green; red and blue can get very high (or low) scores, green and yellow rarely get very high scores. So green and yellow want to avoid someone (usually red or blue) getting way ahead during midgame. Expect the Romans to max or nearly max their R3 points. The Roman difference comes in position, Limes points, and points scored by opponents by R5.
Don't forget, when running a big invasion, to leave yourself in a defensible position. When it's a Major Invasion, be sure to attack with every army (if you attack at all) in the first half: don't waste them "holding territory" that you'll be able to occupy in the second half.
Advice about multi-player conflict games in general: Never make a threat you’re unwilling to carry through; always honor your deals (never break a deal). If you're inexperienced, don't make any long-term deals. Simple deals help you and your “ally”, and usually harm the other two players; e.g., red and blue often agree on a demarcation between the Saxons and the Angles. Simple deals (= "common sense") often work best.
(I have chosen to limit this to one page; there will be one page for each color, as well . Copyright 2006 Lewis Pulsipher)
If you think one color “can’t win” (or “can’t lose”), you need a different strategy! The sides are “nearly equal”.
Like virtually all multi-player games, this one is a psychological game as well as a competition on the board. Perceptions count for a lot. If you are in the lead but not perceived to be in the lead, you have an advantage. You want to “control” the game without appearing to. Give other players a better reason to attack someone else than you. You don't want to get in a situation where someone says "well, you didn't leave me with a choice".
To do well you need to know what new units are coming, and when; and where your opponents score their points. Think of your forces as a whole, not as separate nations. Maximize your entire score, not the score of each individual nation. One of your nations can divert an enemy, or “take it on the chin for the cause”, if this will sufficiently improve the score of another.
If you deprive someone of the chance of winning, be sure it’s too late in the game for him to retaliate, or that he’s too weak to harm you.
Something you do in a round could have an effect several rounds in the future. Every little thing you do is important in some way! And there’s plenty of time to recover if you have a bad start.
The question of “who is in the lead” is sometimes unclear, and relates to expected scoring at particular times. The Romans score a lot of points early in the game, the question is, did they score as many as expected? Yellow can have the most points and be in fourth place!
Just because you can take something or kill someone doesn’t mean it’s the best move. Weakening one color can help another of your opponents too much. Sometimes it's important to keep an "enemy" around (whether a color or a nation) because it can help you against someone else later on. Force preservation can be as important as scoring points. Just because you can make a 2-1 attack doesn't mean you should do so.
Points are important, but position is just as important, because position strongly influences who will score most in the future. So you might choose, for example, to keep some raiders peacefully at sea in order to be in better position in the next round. Your armies don't NEED to DO anything as long as they're scoring points (and breeding more armies, usually).
Leaders are far more effective in attack than in defense; they are especially good for attacking difficult terrain.
Better odds mean less death for you. Preserve your forces whenever possible. Three to two is poor attacking odds when defenders are in difficult terrain, as is two to one.
Red and blue have more control over the course of the game during mid-game than yellow and green; red and blue can get very high (or low) scores, green and yellow rarely get very high scores. So green and yellow want to avoid someone (usually red or blue) getting way ahead during midgame. Expect the Romans to max or nearly max their R3 points. The Roman difference comes in position, Limes points, and points scored by opponents by R5.
Don't forget, when running a big invasion, to leave yourself in a defensible position. When it's a Major Invasion, be sure to attack with every army (if you attack at all) in the first half: don't waste them "holding territory" that you'll be able to occupy in the second half.
Advice about multi-player conflict games in general: Never make a threat you’re unwilling to carry through; always honor your deals (never break a deal). If you're inexperienced, don't make any long-term deals. Simple deals help you and your “ally”, and usually harm the other two players; e.g., red and blue often agree on a demarcation between the Saxons and the Angles. Simple deals (= "common sense") often work best.
Saturday, September 16, 2006
Because of schedule problems (my schedule) we haven't playtested anything at CCCC in three weeks. I did get to Rick Steeves' in Durham last night for the usual monthly game night. Four games of Law & Chaos, plus Viking Gold(TM) for the first time with four players. I think the game is too long with four, and more decisively perhaps, it wears out the defense. Only two areas (one the Mediterranean) remained unsacked, and hardly any defending armies survived in the entire British Isles. East Frankia was pretty much wasted as well, despite two rounds when famine limited Viking activity there. Even the castles were going down. So I'm going to reduce the number of action cards per round, or the number of rounds, when more than three play. With three it seems to give about the right proportion of Vikings and defenders surviving at the end of the game.
I'm not sure how exciting the game is... only time will tell. It is certainly more complex than Seas of Gold(TM), but this appears to be unavoidable if the result is going to resemble the real world at all.
I'm not sure how exciting the game is... only time will tell. It is certainly more complex than Seas of Gold(TM), but this appears to be unavoidable if the result is going to resemble the real world at all.
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Civilizations by John Haywood. Penguin, 2005.
If I had to give one piece of advice about historical atlases, I'd say "John Haywood". And I'm once again not disappointed by these 144 small-format pages covering many civilizations both well known (Egypt) and obscure (Iberian). As with other Penguin historical atlases, we get about a page of text with a page worth of maps for each entry. A civilization as large and old as China's gets several entries, where the Iberians get one. I'm sure I'll use it as a source for both China games and near east games as time passes.
If I had to give one piece of advice about historical atlases, I'd say "John Haywood". And I'm once again not disappointed by these 144 small-format pages covering many civilizations both well known (Egypt) and obscure (Iberian). As with other Penguin historical atlases, we get about a page of text with a page worth of maps for each entry. A civilization as large and old as China's gets several entries, where the Iberians get one. I'm sure I'll use it as a source for both China games and near east games as time passes.
Monday, September 04, 2006
The Disease, Game Design Class
I sometimes have so much fun creating new games, or modifying existing ones that I've set aside, that I don't always work on finishing games the way I should. Likely that's because there's a lot of drudgery in the "last 20%" of the work.
So in the past few days I've revived a China game, revived a game of rise and fall of empires (not Brit-like, some elements of Vinci), thought again about Middle-eastern Brit, got an actual set of rules together for "Advanced Britannia", and so forth. What I should be doing is finishing Brit scenarios and then working on Caledonia(TM), which is close to ready for playtesting by other people.
So I beat myself up about this, then remember that I'm supposed to be enjoying myself--this is a hobby, not a business.
To change the subject:
I will be teaching "How to Design Games" in a new class at CCCC Sanford (NC) Campus, from October 3 to November 16, Tuesday and Thursday nights 6-8:30. This is a Continuing Education class (not college credit). The class is scheduled for room 201, Wilkinson Hall. I don't have preregistration details right now
We cover video games, board games, and card games.
The Secret: it’s very hard to learn to design video games by designing video games because a working prototype is so hard to produce. We’ll learn by designing board/card games and apply this to video.
I sometimes have so much fun creating new games, or modifying existing ones that I've set aside, that I don't always work on finishing games the way I should. Likely that's because there's a lot of drudgery in the "last 20%" of the work.
So in the past few days I've revived a China game, revived a game of rise and fall of empires (not Brit-like, some elements of Vinci), thought again about Middle-eastern Brit, got an actual set of rules together for "Advanced Britannia", and so forth. What I should be doing is finishing Brit scenarios and then working on Caledonia(TM), which is close to ready for playtesting by other people.
So I beat myself up about this, then remember that I'm supposed to be enjoying myself--this is a hobby, not a business.
To change the subject:
I will be teaching "How to Design Games" in a new class at CCCC Sanford (NC) Campus, from October 3 to November 16, Tuesday and Thursday nights 6-8:30. This is a Continuing Education class (not college credit). The class is scheduled for room 201, Wilkinson Hall. I don't have preregistration details right now
We cover video games, board games, and card games.
The Secret: it’s very hard to learn to design video games by designing video games because a working prototype is so hard to produce. We’ll learn by designing board/card games and apply this to video.
Sunday, September 03, 2006
Book "review"
The Huns by E. A. Thompson, edited by Peter Heather, is a revised reissue of the 1948 book A History of Attila and the Huns. Heather minimally revised the book based on the wishes of Professor Thompson, who died at a very advanced age during the time of revision. Hence the book shows some old-fashioned characteristics, for example a concentration on the (fragmentary) literary sources at the expense of archaeology. In 1948 there was next to no archaeology to illuminate the Huns. Today this is no longer true, but Heather chose minimal revision rather than complete revision, and points the reader to new sources in his very extensive Afterword.
One of the objectives of the book is to show that Attila was not a genius, certainly not a military genius, and that the Hun empire existed before Attila, and could have existed thereafter (as did the empire of Genghis Khan). Attila died prematurely, however, leaving many sons, and the Hun empire soon fell apart.
Reading a book this detailed is not generally necessary for games as broad as Britannia and its ilk. I do learn many details that aren't so clear in books of broader scope. For example, I knew that Aetius, the patrician who defended (and dominated) the West Roman Empire for more than two decades, was a friend of the Huns, and used the Huns to prop up the empire despite the crippling loss of Africa to the Vandals in 429. I had not realized that he was a more or less lifelong enemy of the Visigoths, who had settled in southwestern France after sacking Rome in 410. The biggest criticism of Attila is that he managed to fight his friend Aetius, and force Aetius into alliance with his lifelong enemy the Visigoths, at the Catalaunian Fields in 451. While exactly what happened during the battle is unknown, the Huns withdrew afterward.
Thompson and Heather don't spend much time on the Huns before or after Attila's death, but there's more detail here, again, then I've had from broader histories. The Huns didn't just disappear, even after their defeat in 454 by the Gepids. "Huns" were in the Balkans for many decades thereafter (one can trace partial histories of some of Attila's sons), though one of the problems we have is that the word "Huns" became a generic word for steppe barbarians.
The Peoples of Europe series, Blackwell, 1999. I bought a used copy through Amazon.
The Huns by E. A. Thompson, edited by Peter Heather, is a revised reissue of the 1948 book A History of Attila and the Huns. Heather minimally revised the book based on the wishes of Professor Thompson, who died at a very advanced age during the time of revision. Hence the book shows some old-fashioned characteristics, for example a concentration on the (fragmentary) literary sources at the expense of archaeology. In 1948 there was next to no archaeology to illuminate the Huns. Today this is no longer true, but Heather chose minimal revision rather than complete revision, and points the reader to new sources in his very extensive Afterword.
One of the objectives of the book is to show that Attila was not a genius, certainly not a military genius, and that the Hun empire existed before Attila, and could have existed thereafter (as did the empire of Genghis Khan). Attila died prematurely, however, leaving many sons, and the Hun empire soon fell apart.
Reading a book this detailed is not generally necessary for games as broad as Britannia and its ilk. I do learn many details that aren't so clear in books of broader scope. For example, I knew that Aetius, the patrician who defended (and dominated) the West Roman Empire for more than two decades, was a friend of the Huns, and used the Huns to prop up the empire despite the crippling loss of Africa to the Vandals in 429. I had not realized that he was a more or less lifelong enemy of the Visigoths, who had settled in southwestern France after sacking Rome in 410. The biggest criticism of Attila is that he managed to fight his friend Aetius, and force Aetius into alliance with his lifelong enemy the Visigoths, at the Catalaunian Fields in 451. While exactly what happened during the battle is unknown, the Huns withdrew afterward.
Thompson and Heather don't spend much time on the Huns before or after Attila's death, but there's more detail here, again, then I've had from broader histories. The Huns didn't just disappear, even after their defeat in 454 by the Gepids. "Huns" were in the Balkans for many decades thereafter (one can trace partial histories of some of Attila's sons), though one of the problems we have is that the word "Huns" became a generic word for steppe barbarians.
The Peoples of Europe series, Blackwell, 1999. I bought a used copy through Amazon.
Sunday, August 27, 2006
I've just read (some of) a long discussion about "hidden but trackable information". http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/110984/page/5 is the last page.
This is information that is hidden in the game, but could be tracked by someone: card counting is an example of this tracking. Opinions about this vary widely, from "I always make this information not hidden" to "if some players are willing to track it and others are not, more power to them" to "it's unethical to track this hidden but trackable information".
The reason it interested me is the second edition of Britannia. All previous editions of Britannia use a scoresheet to track victory points, and anyone can look at the points anytime. Fantasy Flight clearly felt that players must never be required to write anything down. At first they were going to put a VP track on the board, but I suggested that over the course of a long game there was far too great a chance that the victory points would be mistracked, especially with dice flying around and the usual player clumsiness. So they chose to include victory point markers.
VP markers make the VP "hidden but trackable". Anyone can keep score the old way, and know exactly how many points the players have.
Now, part of the exercise of strategy in Britannia is knowing what scores nations "ought to" have on average, and recognizing where the deviations are. The scoresheet makes it easy to keep track of this, so that players can spend their time analyzing the deviations. The most successful players can use the scores to help them decide what to do. The players who aren't quite at the top level tend not to think as much about the scores, or don't know the "expected outcomes" as well.
To me, then, any player who wants to do everything he can to win, will get his own scoresheet and track the scores even when the VP markers are being used. It might be reasonable to agree before playing that players cannot write down scores, but some folks with good memories will track them anyway. I don't think you can force players NOT to track the scores. So practically speaking, I'd just keep the scoresheet, and use the VP markers to track things like Norse "touch points".
Casual players, on the other hand, may prefer the VP markers.
This is information that is hidden in the game, but could be tracked by someone: card counting is an example of this tracking. Opinions about this vary widely, from "I always make this information not hidden" to "if some players are willing to track it and others are not, more power to them" to "it's unethical to track this hidden but trackable information".
The reason it interested me is the second edition of Britannia. All previous editions of Britannia use a scoresheet to track victory points, and anyone can look at the points anytime. Fantasy Flight clearly felt that players must never be required to write anything down. At first they were going to put a VP track on the board, but I suggested that over the course of a long game there was far too great a chance that the victory points would be mistracked, especially with dice flying around and the usual player clumsiness. So they chose to include victory point markers.
VP markers make the VP "hidden but trackable". Anyone can keep score the old way, and know exactly how many points the players have.
Now, part of the exercise of strategy in Britannia is knowing what scores nations "ought to" have on average, and recognizing where the deviations are. The scoresheet makes it easy to keep track of this, so that players can spend their time analyzing the deviations. The most successful players can use the scores to help them decide what to do. The players who aren't quite at the top level tend not to think as much about the scores, or don't know the "expected outcomes" as well.
To me, then, any player who wants to do everything he can to win, will get his own scoresheet and track the scores even when the VP markers are being used. It might be reasonable to agree before playing that players cannot write down scores, but some folks with good memories will track them anyway. I don't think you can force players NOT to track the scores. So practically speaking, I'd just keep the scoresheet, and use the VP markers to track things like Norse "touch points".
Casual players, on the other hand, may prefer the VP markers.
Saturday, August 26, 2006
Game length of B2
The initial games at the WBC Brit tournament took longer than old Brit, but that seemed to be a consequence of unfamiliarity, and games took less time as we went on.
One person suggested to me that the new game was quicker because players wouldn't have to keep thinking about how to employ "floaters", the raiders that stayed at sea forever.
I thought that the "new" dice rolling method for attacking Romans/cav combined with forts/infantry would speed play up slightly. ("New" is in quotes because it's the way the Gibsons game is played, the way I intended it.)
Finally, someone thought the game would be faster because the Avalon Hill corruption that invaders had to worry about overpopulation after the first half of the invasion is gone. This simplifies invasions.
I can't think the game is MUCH shorter, though.
Lew
The initial games at the WBC Brit tournament took longer than old Brit, but that seemed to be a consequence of unfamiliarity, and games took less time as we went on.
One person suggested to me that the new game was quicker because players wouldn't have to keep thinking about how to employ "floaters", the raiders that stayed at sea forever.
I thought that the "new" dice rolling method for attacking Romans/cav combined with forts/infantry would speed play up slightly. ("New" is in quotes because it's the way the Gibsons game is played, the way I intended it.)
Finally, someone thought the game would be faster because the Avalon Hill corruption that invaders had to worry about overpopulation after the first half of the invasion is gone. This simplifies invasions.
I can't think the game is MUCH shorter, though.
Lew
Reviewers
I am a bit puzzled by reviewers of boardgames who play the game once and then criticize the game in a review for weak play balance. The very idea that you can understand the play balance after one play is beyond me, when the game is asymmetrical, because even the best boardgamers won't figure out a complex game in one play. There are some games where people constantly disagree about the play balance--Britannia 2 is the obvious one, from my point of view--so how do reviewers get off with deducting points for poor balance after playing once?
I suspect it's symptomatic of a characteristic of contemporary game players: they don't ordinarily study the depths of a game--usually because they don't play it very often before moving on to another-- and usually do not become expert players. To them, if the balance isn't immediately OK, it must be defective. (Symmetrical games are very common in the Euro field, where play balance is fairly easy to arrange, whereas historical games are usually asymmetrical.)
I recall a young player at the WBC Britannia tournament who, when he finished, said he couldn't see how he could have done anything differently (no, he didn't win). It was only after some expert players talked with him a while that he realized there were large choices he hadn't seen, and also, that even small choices made a difference in the long term. He had seen only the few big, obvious, choices. He may have been accustomed to Euro games, where designers try to make the range of choices obvious, though it isn't necessarily obvious which one of those choices you should select. They're trying to get rid of "analysis paralysis", too many choices that cause the player to think too much and take too long. Some players LIKE lots of choices, and they are often the people drawn to a game like Britannia and some other wargames.
I suppose you could dub this the "shallow play syndrome". It's fairly obviously related to the "cult of the new" syndrome. While it doesn't matter to me if people play that way, it's annoying when they don't recognize that that is what they are doing, and adjust their reviewing accordingly.
Meh.
I am a bit puzzled by reviewers of boardgames who play the game once and then criticize the game in a review for weak play balance. The very idea that you can understand the play balance after one play is beyond me, when the game is asymmetrical, because even the best boardgamers won't figure out a complex game in one play. There are some games where people constantly disagree about the play balance--Britannia 2 is the obvious one, from my point of view--so how do reviewers get off with deducting points for poor balance after playing once?
I suspect it's symptomatic of a characteristic of contemporary game players: they don't ordinarily study the depths of a game--usually because they don't play it very often before moving on to another-- and usually do not become expert players. To them, if the balance isn't immediately OK, it must be defective. (Symmetrical games are very common in the Euro field, where play balance is fairly easy to arrange, whereas historical games are usually asymmetrical.)
I recall a young player at the WBC Britannia tournament who, when he finished, said he couldn't see how he could have done anything differently (no, he didn't win). It was only after some expert players talked with him a while that he realized there were large choices he hadn't seen, and also, that even small choices made a difference in the long term. He had seen only the few big, obvious, choices. He may have been accustomed to Euro games, where designers try to make the range of choices obvious, though it isn't necessarily obvious which one of those choices you should select. They're trying to get rid of "analysis paralysis", too many choices that cause the player to think too much and take too long. Some players LIKE lots of choices, and they are often the people drawn to a game like Britannia and some other wargames.
I suppose you could dub this the "shallow play syndrome". It's fairly obviously related to the "cult of the new" syndrome. While it doesn't matter to me if people play that way, it's annoying when they don't recognize that that is what they are doing, and adjust their reviewing accordingly.
Meh.
Sunday, August 20, 2006
The World Boardgaming Championships (WBC) are held every year on the east coast (currently Lancaster PA
WBC 2006 Britannia Tournament
45 people, more than the tournament has had in 4 of the last 5 years, journeyed through the looking glass following the glittering promise of the new Britannia just published by Fantasy Flight Games.FFG’s repackaging of the classic game was universally admired by the crowd for its eye-catching graphic design.Only one mistake was universally declared by all, whoever decided that the Romans should be yellow when the board background had also been changed to yellow was clearly out of their mind.In the minds of most players, the Romans are purple and shall remain so for many years.
But a change in color did not affect game designer Lew Pulsipher’s rewrite of the rules.Lew set out to rationalize the multiple versions of the rules that had been created, encourage more historical accuracy into the game play, and correct some of the clear imbalances of the game.Thus, the raiders floating at sea for hundreds of years that nearly drove the placid Lew apoplectic when he saw it at this tournament are no more, and shockingly, King Arthur will be visiting
As to balance between the colors, there was evidence that it may have been addressed.More years of statistics will be needed, but the tournament numbers are promising.This year was different from the years of the original Britannia where red and purple wins dominated the tables each year, with green years occasionally showing up, and blue frequently only grabbing one win, if any.This year, in the 17 heat games, yellow (also known as purple) and green each had 4 wins, while red and blue had 5 each.
While the distribution of color wins were a promising statistic, the closeness of many of the games also gave evidence of the rebalancing of the game.One of the heat games resulted in a tie, advancing two winners to the semi-finals.Another of the heat games came down to a win by 2 points…in which the win was secured by a Saxon infantryman taking out a Norman cavalry in single combat.In the semi-finals, another tie occurred, with it being one retreat away, on the last battle of the game, from having been a 3-way tie.And another semi-final came down to a 1 point win.
Naturally, the balance in the colors did not prevent blowouts in some scores.As usual, high scoring plaques were awarded for each of the colors in the heat games.Ewan McNay came back with a multi-plaque performance again, garnering an astonishing blue high score of 338, and a nearly equal red score of 294.A newcomer, Daniel Farrow, showed very well with green, pulling in a score of 253 in a game with several old hands at the game.Lastly, championing the yellow (purple), Ted Simmons, who has played many games but not won before, won in fine fashion with a top yellow (purple) of 244 points.
Low scores did not abound, but, as Lew keeps reminding the crowd, Britannia is a dice game, and sometimes those dice turn against you.For that, we have the Ethelred the Unready award.Eric Kleist went to the semi-finals with a handsome blue win in the 2nd round.But a 3rd round game proved not so propitious as the dice turned against Eric’s Saxons and he pulled in at the end with 184 points.
And at last, let’s go to the final.Although many newcomers were drawn to the republished game, apparently experience in the old game still tells in the new with four of the usual suspects making up the final game.Ewan McNay (Blue), Scott Pfeiffer (Green), Barry Smith (Yellow) and Llew Bardecki (Red) met Sunday morning.In a dramatic opening, 8 of Barry’s legions were killed, with 3 of them being lost when 6 of Llew’s Brigantes came streaming from the north and descended like locusts on March.Such was their wrath that they killed all 3 legions and the fort they garrisoned, and then had to lose a unit to starvation.
However, Llew’s weakly defended Brigantes left behind in the north attracted an attack by the Picts on the Brigantes.Boudicca’s rebellion though, a new feature of turn 1 of the game, passed with a whimper, Boudicca storming into Essex and being cast back by the legions with no losses.Meanwhile, Scott’s Welsh, as has become the norm with the new Britannia, retired to submission to the Romans after killing 3 legions.
But Barry’s spending of the blood of the dead legions paid off with his acquiring every Roman point possible on turns 1-3.
After the passing of the Romans, the Germanic tribes came ashore in usual fine fashion, with the newly named Saxon leader Aelle building a fort in the Downlands surrounded by his mighty army.Apparently, distracted by the Saxons coming ashore to the south, the Brigantes signed a deal with the Angles and submitted when but a single Angle sauntered into the halls of Strathclyde.
The deal left a crowded invasion for the Angles.But that distracted them not at all from their prime target as 10 Angles piled onto King Arthur, protected by two cavalry and two infantry, and dramatically slaughtered all of the Romano-British with a single roll.
Meanwhile in the north, Ewan’s Picts, untouched by the Romans, and able to spread out and grow, maxed out their population, presenting a huge wall before the Scottish invasion.Barry’s Scots killed a few Picts, but his dice turned cold and the Ewan’s Picts rolled back the Scots into the sea, with a little help from some restless Angles in the south.And so, at turn 9, there were no Yellow pieces on the board, and none to return until turn 12 when the Dubliners appeared.
A quiet mid-game was primarily of interest because of Llew’s creeping Brigante presence.The submission deal with Ewan’s Angles allowed the to grow.Unfortunately for Ewan’s hapless Picts, the only avenue for growth left to the Brigantes was to the North.By turn 10,
With the quiet mid-game, it looked like Scott’s Danes would have a completely full board to attempt to storm.But a successful round of raids on turn 11 softened up the coast, and the armies ashore ran to hide from the impending Dane invasion on turn 12.Scott’s Danes swept through and killed many of Ewan’s Angles and a few of Llew’s Saxons, but unlike their more successful raids, the Danes were bled with nearly every battle and ended with few forces left to defend their newly acquired gains.
Turns 13 and 14 were a mostly kingless swirl of chaos as the nations fought each other for enough breathing space to survive and grow.But Scott’s Danes, Barry’s Dubliners, Llew’s Saxons, and Ewan’s Angles balkanized
Turn 15 dawned.A red-green deal yielded Scott’s Welsh sending a mighty army of 4 units out to
Of course, when 9 of Barry’s Norwegians, along with the leader Harald Hardrada, descended on
Llew’s Saxons decided to defend King Harold by sheltering in the friendly hills of
Turn 16 came with exhausted armies everywhere on the board.Ewan’s Picts managed to struggle back into and hold their homelands.And a desperate grab at the end captured the last island for Llew’s Norsemen, but the empty lowlands yielded a victory for the
When the dust settled, Ewan’s blue had scored 234, Llew’s red 228, Barry yellow (purple) 222, and Scott’s green 204.The win makes Ewan the 2nd 3 time winner after Scott Pfeiffer.Another great final for the Britannia tournament!
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