What a laughably ambitious title. A new regular segment, for my regularly updated blog! Although this is my third post of the year, with two whole months yet to go. What progress! What brilliance!
Where am I these days with games? Hmm. Well I just submitted Birch Crown, Cowl & Mask, and Oases to the Board Game Workshop's Design Contest. Things didn't go quite as planned (none of the three moved past the first round, and I'm a trifle salty that the judging criteria weren't quite what I expected them to be) but the feedback was mostly useful, and it was a learning experience. I don't begrudge the entry fee. But those three, plus D.I.E. Interceptor, are pretty much in a solid state, if kind of shelved for the moment. I'm happy with where they are, and in no rush to do the concentrated playtests that would be the next stage of development. Also, they're all a bit fiddly, and not necessarily that fun to actually play. Which is obviously something to keep in mind during development.
Oh and I made a solitaire 18-card game this summer! One Final Mech. It's a mess. Potential, but currently stalled out. I still hope to solve it, and possibly publish it with some art from a talented friend, who offered to illustrate it for free as long as it saw actual publication and wasn't just PnP. Which is an interesting condition I think. And I've gotten in a few more playtests of Runtime Error (though even as I work on it, I'm working on a parallel sequel called Frameshift Mutation that uses handbuilding instead of deckbuilding, as I imagine that's where more games are going to move), and I've been designing Root fan factions since getting my copy and playing it every chance I get. Oh yeah, and I might fix the Harry Potter card game I made as a wedding present to some friends last year, Exploding Snap. And I've pitched a fantasy sports game to the Ironrise boys, and we'll see if anything comes of that. I wrote some player classes for an RPG, but the project was less clear than I would have liked, and I'm not proud of my work on it. Oh, and over the last few days, I've been kicking around ideas for a game about maple trees and a distillery...
Anyway! Wow, I've made a lot of games. These are just the ones that have gotten to the playable prototype stage and... it still feels like a lot. A lot to be proud of, even if none of those projects ever move any farther forward. They were fun to spend the time and imagination on.
Okay, recap over? Recap over. Let's get to the segment!
Today I want to highlight a singular mechanic, developed for my game Oases, that I think can have broader applications in other games. That's right baby - it's the Action Wheel!
Action Wheel
A circle of wells, some of which are marked. Players take actions one at a time by placing action beads in the wells, each bead placed in the empty well clockwise of the last. When a player passes, their opponent takes all but the most clockwise bead, and then takes their own actions. This allows players to control how much momentum they hand over to their opponent, and to take longer or shorter turns according to their plans.
In Oases, one well of the Action Wheel is marked in blue, and when an action bead is placed in that well, another bead from the supply is added to the board, so that as the game goes on, there are more action beads to be spent, and turns can become more and more powerful. Another well is marked in green, and when a bead is placed in that well, it triggers an effect on the board.
I like the Action Wheel for Oases because it allows for tactics (in how you manipulate the Wheel) and strategy (as it allows for short and long-term planning), and because the current iteration, twelve wells (10 normal, 2 marked) in a circle, is particularly useful for a two-player game.
But I think that different configurations could work for other games. You can change the number of wells, have more marked wells that affect board state, you could do away with the circle and do a series of cards that flip over when used, or that cannot be used again until ALL have been used. You could have one wheel per player. And of course, you can set different things to happen only when a player passes; this can also affect a player's decision as to whether they should take a longer or shorter turn.
I'm curious to see what other types of games this mechanic (which feels like a sort of primal distant orphan of ware and worker placement) could work for.
Ok, that's enough for this week! I want to go home, so that's all for now. Maybe I'll add pictures later. Next time: A replacement for RPG Dice - Conflict Chips!
Where am I these days with games? Hmm. Well I just submitted Birch Crown, Cowl & Mask, and Oases to the Board Game Workshop's Design Contest. Things didn't go quite as planned (none of the three moved past the first round, and I'm a trifle salty that the judging criteria weren't quite what I expected them to be) but the feedback was mostly useful, and it was a learning experience. I don't begrudge the entry fee. But those three, plus D.I.E. Interceptor, are pretty much in a solid state, if kind of shelved for the moment. I'm happy with where they are, and in no rush to do the concentrated playtests that would be the next stage of development. Also, they're all a bit fiddly, and not necessarily that fun to actually play. Which is obviously something to keep in mind during development.
Oh and I made a solitaire 18-card game this summer! One Final Mech. It's a mess. Potential, but currently stalled out. I still hope to solve it, and possibly publish it with some art from a talented friend, who offered to illustrate it for free as long as it saw actual publication and wasn't just PnP. Which is an interesting condition I think. And I've gotten in a few more playtests of Runtime Error (though even as I work on it, I'm working on a parallel sequel called Frameshift Mutation that uses handbuilding instead of deckbuilding, as I imagine that's where more games are going to move), and I've been designing Root fan factions since getting my copy and playing it every chance I get. Oh yeah, and I might fix the Harry Potter card game I made as a wedding present to some friends last year, Exploding Snap. And I've pitched a fantasy sports game to the Ironrise boys, and we'll see if anything comes of that. I wrote some player classes for an RPG, but the project was less clear than I would have liked, and I'm not proud of my work on it. Oh, and over the last few days, I've been kicking around ideas for a game about maple trees and a distillery...
Anyway! Wow, I've made a lot of games. These are just the ones that have gotten to the playable prototype stage and... it still feels like a lot. A lot to be proud of, even if none of those projects ever move any farther forward. They were fun to spend the time and imagination on.
Okay, recap over? Recap over. Let's get to the segment!
Today I want to highlight a singular mechanic, developed for my game Oases, that I think can have broader applications in other games. That's right baby - it's the Action Wheel!
Action Wheel
A circle of wells, some of which are marked. Players take actions one at a time by placing action beads in the wells, each bead placed in the empty well clockwise of the last. When a player passes, their opponent takes all but the most clockwise bead, and then takes their own actions. This allows players to control how much momentum they hand over to their opponent, and to take longer or shorter turns according to their plans.
In Oases, one well of the Action Wheel is marked in blue, and when an action bead is placed in that well, another bead from the supply is added to the board, so that as the game goes on, there are more action beads to be spent, and turns can become more and more powerful. Another well is marked in green, and when a bead is placed in that well, it triggers an effect on the board.
I like the Action Wheel for Oases because it allows for tactics (in how you manipulate the Wheel) and strategy (as it allows for short and long-term planning), and because the current iteration, twelve wells (10 normal, 2 marked) in a circle, is particularly useful for a two-player game.
But I think that different configurations could work for other games. You can change the number of wells, have more marked wells that affect board state, you could do away with the circle and do a series of cards that flip over when used, or that cannot be used again until ALL have been used. You could have one wheel per player. And of course, you can set different things to happen only when a player passes; this can also affect a player's decision as to whether they should take a longer or shorter turn.
I'm curious to see what other types of games this mechanic (which feels like a sort of primal distant orphan of ware and worker placement) could work for.
Ok, that's enough for this week! I want to go home, so that's all for now. Maybe I'll add pictures later. Next time: A replacement for RPG Dice - Conflict Chips!
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