And we’re back (a dinosaur story) with another installment of this blog’s longest-running anything. It’s Mechanic Monday! (rap horn, rap horn, polka oompha, rap horn)! Get comfy my little Russian bots and sex work algorithmic instances!
A while back, someone sent me images of an old board game called Suffragetto. They were beautiful pictures from a museum exhibit (at the V&A?) showcasing a very early example of asymmetry: One player’s pieces were Suffragettes, who fought to advance to the other side of the board without landing in jail, and the other player’s pieces were policemen, who had the same objective (but captured policemen went to the hospital, which may be that era’s single most badass move in game design). Of course, as popular asymmetry in games was a long ways in the future (or a suuuuuuper long ways in the past, a la Tafl games and hunting games), the differences between both sides were purely cosmetic; jail and the hospital were two names for mirrored spaces on the board, and all that really separated policemen from suffragettes was pawn colour. But I thought the theme was an excellent one for a 19th- or early 20th-century pawn mover, and have long thought that the theme lent itself to mechanically-integrated asymmetry.
Many modern asym games represent a disproportionate measure of power: Netrunner with its Interplanetary Conglomerate vs Single Hacker; Root with its Colonizers vs Guerillas vs Dynasty vs Lone Wanderer; Nyctophobia’s sighted, murderous vampire vs blind, weaponless humans. It’s a staple in games as it is in fiction, where you can’t go two feet without stepping on the tail of an underdog. The rules generally balance the powers given to the David with that given to the Goliath. The Empire has its set number of Death Stars as printed in the setup in the rulebook, and the Rebellion has its proscribed complement of criminals, rogue state seditionists, and religious extremists.
But that’s balanced. That’s neat and tidy. What if the more powerful side didn’t have to follow the rules? What if they could change them?
Asymmetrically-Applied Rules
In Sufragettwo, one player (the Suffragettes) moves their pawns toward the other side. If a pawn moves into the same space as an opposing pawn, the opposing pawn is sent to the hospital. Once a Suffragette pawn has reached the far side, they are safe and cannot be moved or captured.
The other player (the Policemen) moves their pawns toward the other side. If a pawn moves into the same space as an opposing pawn, the opposing pawn is sent to the prison. Once a Policeman pawn has reached the far side, they are safe and cannot be moved or captured. The Policemen pick one law each turn to impose on the board. These include curfews, limiting the number of moves the Suffragettes can take; retaliation, forcing any capturing pawn to go to jail; profiling, which removes certain colors of Sufragette pawns from the board; brutality, allowing the player to purge the prison or move Sufragette pawns that had reached the other side; and many more. If the Policemen player is losing badly, they can play a martial law card, which allows them to have two active laws per turn thereafter.
While this is a simple implementation, riffing on the rules for a simple game, I’ve also toyed with trying this in a more complex rules-heavy game and having there be two separate rulebooks. A worker-placement euro for instance pitting activists vs corporate forces, and whenever the corporate side wants to do something they can show the activist player the relevant rule in their rule book - even if it contradicts a previously shown section of the rulebook. You could also let the Police dictate setup positions, or even decide between different favourable maps to play on.
What’s radical about this approach is that it creates an in-game power imbalance to simulate a real-life power imbalance, and in doing so, creates an incomplete magic circle. The fundamental promise of a modern game (that we leave behind our disordered world for an artificial one that is balanced and fair) leans out the window at the very least, and can easily be fully defenestrated. Now a designer can dial that balance up and down by limiting the severity of the Policemen’s advantage, or by providing the Suffragettes with more pawns, mobility, or other commensurate advantages; but I think that it’s alright for a theme like this to veer into that quicksand territory of “statement game”. This is an unfair game, because it models an unfair system. Just as much as the game is about fun, it is about saying something; that any fun you derive from playing fairly will fall by the wayside if the powerful player decides to that winning is preferable to the illusion of equity.
I’ll sing my usual refrain of caveats here: This isn’t appropriate for every game or every theme, and it’s something that could V-E-R-Y much hurt the public perception and sales of a game. But as far as ludonarrative exploration goes, there’s some powerful storymaking you can work into your rules here.
Aiight, see you next week maybe.
A while back, someone sent me images of an old board game called Suffragetto. They were beautiful pictures from a museum exhibit (at the V&A?) showcasing a very early example of asymmetry: One player’s pieces were Suffragettes, who fought to advance to the other side of the board without landing in jail, and the other player’s pieces were policemen, who had the same objective (but captured policemen went to the hospital, which may be that era’s single most badass move in game design). Of course, as popular asymmetry in games was a long ways in the future (or a suuuuuuper long ways in the past, a la Tafl games and hunting games), the differences between both sides were purely cosmetic; jail and the hospital were two names for mirrored spaces on the board, and all that really separated policemen from suffragettes was pawn colour. But I thought the theme was an excellent one for a 19th- or early 20th-century pawn mover, and have long thought that the theme lent itself to mechanically-integrated asymmetry.
Many modern asym games represent a disproportionate measure of power: Netrunner with its Interplanetary Conglomerate vs Single Hacker; Root with its Colonizers vs Guerillas vs Dynasty vs Lone Wanderer; Nyctophobia’s sighted, murderous vampire vs blind, weaponless humans. It’s a staple in games as it is in fiction, where you can’t go two feet without stepping on the tail of an underdog. The rules generally balance the powers given to the David with that given to the Goliath. The Empire has its set number of Death Stars as printed in the setup in the rulebook, and the Rebellion has its proscribed complement of criminals, rogue state seditionists, and religious extremists.
But that’s balanced. That’s neat and tidy. What if the more powerful side didn’t have to follow the rules? What if they could change them?
Asymmetrically-Applied Rules
In Sufragettwo, one player (the Suffragettes) moves their pawns toward the other side. If a pawn moves into the same space as an opposing pawn, the opposing pawn is sent to the hospital. Once a Suffragette pawn has reached the far side, they are safe and cannot be moved or captured.
The other player (the Policemen) moves their pawns toward the other side. If a pawn moves into the same space as an opposing pawn, the opposing pawn is sent to the prison. Once a Policeman pawn has reached the far side, they are safe and cannot be moved or captured. The Policemen pick one law each turn to impose on the board. These include curfews, limiting the number of moves the Suffragettes can take; retaliation, forcing any capturing pawn to go to jail; profiling, which removes certain colors of Sufragette pawns from the board; brutality, allowing the player to purge the prison or move Sufragette pawns that had reached the other side; and many more. If the Policemen player is losing badly, they can play a martial law card, which allows them to have two active laws per turn thereafter.
While this is a simple implementation, riffing on the rules for a simple game, I’ve also toyed with trying this in a more complex rules-heavy game and having there be two separate rulebooks. A worker-placement euro for instance pitting activists vs corporate forces, and whenever the corporate side wants to do something they can show the activist player the relevant rule in their rule book - even if it contradicts a previously shown section of the rulebook. You could also let the Police dictate setup positions, or even decide between different favourable maps to play on.
What’s radical about this approach is that it creates an in-game power imbalance to simulate a real-life power imbalance, and in doing so, creates an incomplete magic circle. The fundamental promise of a modern game (that we leave behind our disordered world for an artificial one that is balanced and fair) leans out the window at the very least, and can easily be fully defenestrated. Now a designer can dial that balance up and down by limiting the severity of the Policemen’s advantage, or by providing the Suffragettes with more pawns, mobility, or other commensurate advantages; but I think that it’s alright for a theme like this to veer into that quicksand territory of “statement game”. This is an unfair game, because it models an unfair system. Just as much as the game is about fun, it is about saying something; that any fun you derive from playing fairly will fall by the wayside if the powerful player decides to that winning is preferable to the illusion of equity.
I’ll sing my usual refrain of caveats here: This isn’t appropriate for every game or every theme, and it’s something that could V-E-R-Y much hurt the public perception and sales of a game. But as far as ludonarrative exploration goes, there’s some powerful storymaking you can work into your rules here.
Aiight, see you next week maybe.
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