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Variants and Fan Cards / Design directions for a different (better!?) deck builder
« on: December 28, 2011, 10:09:24 am »
Dominion is awesome. I am way too left brained to actually design a board game. But it seems there might be some space for a fun and competitive deck builder that beats Dominion on these fronts. None of the Dominion inspired deck builders retain its core elegance, they tend to take the deck building aspect and then give a tack on a secondary goal that drives their design.
1. Luck. Yeah, lots of players here dislike the randomness. Isotropic has even built in house rules to avoid some of it (same split, veto on kingdom cards), there are popular house rules elsewhere to mitigate first player advantage. Treasure Maps, 5/2 splits, 3+P costs all contribute to the luck factor. Of course, this consideration is probably overstated on f.ds compared to the general gaming population, it tends to be stronger players who dislike luck the most.
2. Lack of interaction. Rarely I'll have to think about what you'll do in order to make the right decision for what I'll do. Sometimes there is the end game "should I grab the second to last province" dance, sometimes there is some militia/masquerade or bishop/mountebank shenanigans, sometimes I have to decide to commit to cities, try to rush provinces, or try to catch you in a city supply trap. But mostly I can play my hands and respond to your attacks without really deeply thinking about what you'll do. Sure, there are a plethora of infrequent interactions in Dominion. I want them to happen more often. I want it to sting more when I make the wrong choice, and I want it to be immediately obvious that I did.
3. Too much mirror play, especially with good players. I am pretty sure that for many sets, the optimal strategy for player 1 and the optimal strategy for player 2 are going to be basically identical. I'd even be willing to make the game luckier in order to have it less symmetric and bland.
1. Luck. Yeah, lots of players here dislike the randomness. Isotropic has even built in house rules to avoid some of it (same split, veto on kingdom cards), there are popular house rules elsewhere to mitigate first player advantage. Treasure Maps, 5/2 splits, 3+P costs all contribute to the luck factor. Of course, this consideration is probably overstated on f.ds compared to the general gaming population, it tends to be stronger players who dislike luck the most.
2. Lack of interaction. Rarely I'll have to think about what you'll do in order to make the right decision for what I'll do. Sometimes there is the end game "should I grab the second to last province" dance, sometimes there is some militia/masquerade or bishop/mountebank shenanigans, sometimes I have to decide to commit to cities, try to rush provinces, or try to catch you in a city supply trap. But mostly I can play my hands and respond to your attacks without really deeply thinking about what you'll do. Sure, there are a plethora of infrequent interactions in Dominion. I want them to happen more often. I want it to sting more when I make the wrong choice, and I want it to be immediately obvious that I did.
3. Too much mirror play, especially with good players. I am pretty sure that for many sets, the optimal strategy for player 1 and the optimal strategy for player 2 are going to be basically identical. I'd even be willing to make the game luckier in order to have it less symmetric and bland.