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51

Other Games / Imperial Settlers

« on: May 19, 2016, 05:03:51 am »

Anybody given this card-drafting/resource management game a shot?

I initially felt it was a little too complex for what it amounted to, but once I'd played it a few times with various factions and tested out their individual strengths and weaknesses, I really started to enjoy it.

The way in which it limits dead turns by giving you some way to burn cards or resources, even for a much reduced benefit, seems really intelligent. And each of the factions each play very, very differently.

Unfortunately, while I found it reasonably easy to teach to a new player, they alternately got flooded with too much stone as the Romans and too much gold as the Egyptians; and thus dismissed it as unbalanced. For those that haven't played it, that's the equivalent of complaining when you bought a million coppers and Actions every turn and didn't win, or watching BM rake in the green and dismissing Dominion as not strategic.

52

Other Games / Re: CIVILIZATION VI

« on: May 19, 2016, 04:51:16 am »

This "districting" is going to make your opening moves less by rote, for sure, but I can see it being a nightmare once you've got a sizeable empire with a few conquered factions under your belt. It seems heavily focused on local minutiae, and unless governors are not horrible, it could result in a lot of micro-managing.

I did like some of the updates in V, but it felt like a tactical boardgame, rather than, y'know, actually running a civ. So on the other hand, maybe this is going to bring the series back around.

I still miss stacks of doom, though.

53

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: How to balance a reverse Merchants' Guild in multiplayer

« on: May 19, 2016, 04:38:44 am »

It's been a while, but did you give up on this, spiralstaircase?

The notion of gaining coin tokens based on your opponent's buys is pretty intriguing. Actually, I just like coin tokens in general, so it's nice to see them given another spin.

Asper's notion of an Action, not a Duration, collecting from only the previous player sounds most fitting; whereas Adrian's selective targeting would probably inflate the price of this card.

What were you thinking of pricing it at?

54

Dominion: Empires Previews / Re: Empires Bonus Preview #2: Crown

« on: May 18, 2016, 07:08:35 am »

Yes, I know, but the beauty of Dominion is that it affects each player equally.
So we all get to benefit from our overpowered TRs/KCs!

Ftfy

Not a native speaker, but we try, us Duchies!

Quite right - Provinces don't try half as much.

55

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Dominion: Seasons

« on: May 18, 2016, 05:19:36 am »

The other Seasons are not as tight, but here's the thought behind them: If Spring is opening, Summer is buildup. In Fall (Autumn for the classy ones), you should have your deck running and doing your last preparations to green. Winter is where you green and your deck slowly degrades. And second Spring, well, it's not strictly the same pattern as the first, but still has a similarity: A relatively weak deck with quite a few VP cards. Of course, second Spring still isn't as clearly defined as the first. Which isn't that much of a problem, because first, you don't often get there. Second, if you do, it's probably because you are playing a special kind of kingdom, such as a slog, and then most of the other things don't apply as much either. And: The fact that you might run into a second Spring creates an interesting turning point. If we had the year take 24 turns, it would very, very rarely happen to get into year two. With 20 turns, it feels like something that might happen, and an experienced player might be able to guess it beforehand.

Thanks for the summary, Asper.

I figured that, once set, re-balancing the pros and cons for each individual card based on seasons would be a nightmare. And this is very thematic, without restricting you to a single year: a second spring may pop up, and you may have to deal with it.

TTS

Can only be used with a GabeSoft account? No thanks.

Seasons might be the excuse I need to get to grips with VASSAL...

56

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Feodum

« on: May 17, 2016, 08:50:58 am »

I think this assessment is pretty spot on.

Treasure Hunter is reasonably consistent, but is almost entirely in your opponent's hands, especially for bigger payouts.

I'd say Trader could be effective on slower boards with no +Buy, too, but in that case it probably would get beat out by Raid in the late game.

And yeah, while Raid's potential for exponential gains is great, is it anywhere near as reliable as Masterpiece? I don't reckon so.

57

Dominion: Empires Previews / Re: Empires Bonus Preview #2: Crown

« on: May 17, 2016, 08:34:48 am »

• You can Mine a Silver into a Crown and get a TR in hand that way
• It counts towards Bank, even if you play it during the Action phase

These two subtle things in particular make me very glad that Crown exists. It's not just another TR variant, slightly more expensive or slightly less powerful - it's a TR variant that effects other cards and enters ours decks in ways that run contrary to what we've been playing with thus far.

58

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Dominion - Party edition

« on: May 17, 2016, 06:15:42 am »

yesterday we had an idea to turn Dominion into a drinking game and it worked - uhm - well.

Well as in everyone passed out?

59

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Capitalism: Let's Really Do Debt.

« on: May 17, 2016, 06:12:35 am »

It gives some interesting opportunities for things like pile-outs as well.  If someone goes Big Debt and starts gathering VP quickly, you can counter by avoiding debt and trying to three-pile.  But then the person going for debt should see it coming and pay off their debt earlier, etc.

That's something that probably should've hit me upside the head when I first read it, but didn't. Noticing when your opponent is in debt and gambling on trying to change your strategy to lock them into it is pretty big.

No particular reason for the 8, it would obviously need playtesting.

Well, as soon as I get my hands on some debt cards, I think I'm going to throw the vanilla rules out the window and get onto that!

60

Introductions / Re: My Story of Dominion: Empires and Depression.

« on: May 17, 2016, 06:09:30 am »

For me, it kind of stood out that you went off more "passive" activities like watching films and operating electronic Skinner boxes playing video games around that time, but you were drawn back out into the world/given more worth by something very "active" indeed.

You and I must be playing different kinds of video games.

I mean there are plenty of video games I would call "electronic Skinner boxes" (Farmville, the Sims, etc.) They don't all fit in that category but they're out there and very popular.

That kind of grinding for very little reward is the kind of thing I had in mind when I rather unfairly slandered all video games. It just seems like that kind of thing has become a way for publishers to arbitrarily inflate the length of their games, and it seems like it infects a lot of genres these days.

61

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Dominion: Seasons

« on: May 17, 2016, 06:03:44 am »

So I will have to post pictures later.  If I forget, feel free to remind me.

Don't want you going to too much trouble, but if you do remember the next time you have them out, I'll be far from upset.

To answer your question about the two pile idea I had, my idea was only that the bottom card would be much less powerful, or would turn into a cantrip perhaps only during the season of winter, but otherwise would be quite powerful.  Perhaps the top card would be a little less interesting, so you have to decide whether you will buy through the top cards to get to the powerful bottom card.

Something that clearly puts a clock on itself like that is going to be quite difficult to design.

Are you thinking that the top part would be $2-$3 to encourage digging, or will the underlying card be incentive enough, even if the top is $5-6?

Before you even get there, I guess you've got to decide on a super strong function that has to be buried and only printed five times...

Your idea about starting the seasons at a different time is a good one.  I think adding a seasons card that says "Setup: start the seasons marker in Winter" would be an interesting twist

And it's here where I should probably go back and read the rest of the thread to here the dev's justifications for why it's a one year game, and why each season is five turns exactly...

62

Dominion: Empires Previews / Re: Empires Bonus Preview #2: Crown

« on: May 17, 2016, 05:44:56 am »

Landmarks: I'm pretty sure these are easier than Events. You have to go in thinking more about strategy, but not an extra card to buy.

On the face of it, they look less complex because you're only dealing with them/calculating them at the end of the game. But you could argue that because you have to cross-check whether a certain card is worth picking up because of the potential benefit it grants you from landmarks, they're actually just as complex as a regular kingdom card.

63

General Discussion / Re: pro wrestling is a goddamn credit to the human race

« on: May 16, 2016, 05:49:05 am »

I don't care enough for these pantomimes to follow them with any regularity, but the athleticism is definitely impressive, and funkdoc's enthusiasm is just so infectious.

What are some of your favourite kinds or even periods of wrestling? What do you think makes for good wrasslin'?

Do you find modern WWE (or whatever it's calling itself these days) appealing?

lucha libre tends to be the black sheep of the hardcore fandom

Why is that? Not as showy as the American mega brands, and not as OTT as their Japanese counterparts?

64

Dominion: Empires Previews / Re: Empires Bonus Preview #2: Crown

« on: May 16, 2016, 05:31:46 am »

Penguins can't fly.

Buy more Catapults.

65

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Dominion: Seasons

« on: May 16, 2016, 05:20:39 am »

It'd be neat to see how the printed cards came out if you've used photo paper and sleeves, Nflickner.

And the decision of when to use Wayfare is quite nailbiting   (my wife picked Fall, and I picked Winter).

Do you often buy it well ahead of time, to set a clock on each other? Or pick it up just before entering the season you're going to use it in? When you both commit to a slog early, is the opportunity to cash in on a second spring just too darn tempting?

A Landmark will be fun to design for this as well!

I'm having trouble thinking of anything that isn't simply a variation on Timberland #2, but I think that a Landmark here would definitely have to make use of the titular seasons. Guess that might be made easier once we've seen the rest of the Empires contents...

Perhaps the buried card is very strong, but is only useful before winter, so there is a mad rush to get through the top half of the pile in order to get to the buried card in order to use it a couple times before it is useless.

I don't know if locking a card out of use completely after one period sounds too grand - wouldn't you have to give it a very small effect so it's not totally dead?

Actually, that's got me to thinking about hibernation and renewal... Is there a reason we have to start in Spring every year?

66

Introductions / Re: My Story of Dominion: Empires and Depression.

« on: May 16, 2016, 04:56:43 am »

A touching story indeed.

For me, it kind of stood out that you went off more "passive" activities like watching films and operating electronic Skinner boxes playing video games around that time, but you were drawn back out into the world/given more worth by something very "active" indeed. I think it shows how good Dominion is for your brain. Every Kingdom, every interaction within that Kingdom, in fact, is a series of puzzles to be solved, and that's something that humans find both enjoyable and healthy.

Here's hoping you can find more people IRL with the same passion you have for the game. There's never a shortage online, but it is nice to sit down and fling cards now and then (especially if you already own a few expansions).

67

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Multi Dominion

« on: May 16, 2016, 04:24:07 am »

I tried this on isotropic and it just didn't work, at least not without playing really badly. You would roll two engine kingdoms and the turns would take too long that you'd be forcing one of your opponents to wait for no reason.

That's what impressed me with how Petrovic seemed to pull it off: timing. I think this variant has more potential IRL: if you're just sitting around with friends, shooting the shit, maybe they won't be so annoyed when their turns have consisted of straight money grabs while the other game has had labs popping off everywhere.

Although maybe not, depending on the group...

68

Dominion: Empires Previews / Re: Empires Bonus Preview #5: Castles

« on: May 16, 2016, 04:13:30 am »

I'd love a Takeshi's Castle

Takeshi's Castle
Action - Duration - Victory Card ($11)

15VP

When you gain this, put it into play.

For the rest of the game, at the start of each other player's turn, that player may attempt to cross the living-room/game store floor by running atop a series of giant foam dominoes while armed with only a water pistol.

If they make it to the door, they gain control of this card and put it into play immediately.

Setup: replace the floorboards or carpet with rats.

69

Dominion: Empires Previews / Re: Empires Bonus Preview #2: Crown

« on: May 15, 2016, 06:16:56 am »

Anyway, I'll just throw this idea around, what if you experimentally included an interesting Kingdom in the next previews to give people something else to talk about? It's hard to speak about single cards, even more so when you have never played with them. Speaking about kingdoms is easier, and makes more sense too.

I can still see the same problems arising: "It didn't work in this Kingdom, so it clearly should never be printed. God, Donald, why are you so awful?".

But I think you're totally right - rather than latching onto the most extreme cases of rules interpretations from the get-go, it would give players a chance to feel things out. And it would probably benefit beginners most of all in opening up vistas onto how all this new stuff might interact with all their old stuff. I'm going to write "all" again because that last sentence didn't have enough of it: all.

Once that's dusted, we can start working out where it lies on some sort of "potential to make your brain hurt when played with Possession" chart.

70

Dominion: Empires Previews / Re: Empires Bonus Preview #5: Castles

« on: May 15, 2016, 06:06:25 am »

In the Secret History we'll learn this expansion was made specifically to make Scott a good card.

Scott's got to be feeling like the prettiest girl at the ball right about now.

I just hope that split piles will be worth it to add to a Kingdom in randomly generated games.

Catapult looks like it's going to be fun no matter what it's added to; Gladiator has good functionality and the pay-off on Fortune is something that, no matter how ridiculous it seems, is always going to be gnawing at you whatever Kingdom it appears in; and I'll be completely honest I haven't given Bustling Catanners much consideration yet...

71

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Dominion: Seasons

« on: May 15, 2016, 05:56:07 am »

While I haven't gone through all twenty-two pages of analysis and criticism, I'm very much looking forward to giving this expansion a go. And seeing where the continued community discussion might take the project - seeing familiar mechanics (like Travelers) applied to Seasons' central conceit is grand.

I think Bailiff is a standout because he's going to add extra intrigue to alt-VP (and now Castles!) games. But the alternate Timberland that is worth more or less depending on when the game ends is a class act.

Congratulations, too, on choosing largely suitable palettes. Trade Port in particular looks smashing.

I really like the concept of the temporal mechanic, but for those that have had the pleasure of playing it: has it resulted in overtly swingy games? Or have most games tended to be quite close? Maybe it has acted as a "blue shell" that has allowed players who are trailing to turn the tables? Or maybe it really is just an "every kingdom is different" situation and I'm rambling.

72

Dominion General Discussion / Re: JSH's True Art Rankings

« on: May 15, 2016, 05:00:24 am »

This is one of my favorite threads

Me, too.

And I should know: I've been here since yesterday.


Josh is the reason I haven't contributed anything halfway productive to this forum: I was in here reading every bit of it.

73

Dominion General Discussion / Re: House rules you use

« on: May 15, 2016, 04:57:00 am »

If your group doesn't like trashing, you're doing it wrong.

I was starting to come around to the idea because my decks are just too darn huge, but I still find myself making a lot of dumb decisions and flooding my deck. Of course, the longer I spend here, the realisation of how dumb they are sinks in.

I do like how you tried to edge-case it to make us sound less incompetent, but. It was Adventures only - that's your homework for the week.

74

Dominion: Empires Previews / Re: Empires Bonus Preview #5: Castles

« on: May 15, 2016, 04:48:45 am »

Most of them have been nicely tight-lipped and well I will be pursuing stricter assurances there in the future.

So what does your ideal preview look like? Will you make a template for folks to follow in the future?

I liked how LFN revealed this pile: hinted at strategies, but didn't bludgeon us with an essay. It let the forum deconstruct the cards themselves, and ponder about their interactions, whilst remaining in the dark because of a lack of actual playing experience with the cards at hand. Almost like some sort of view of the cards, before actually getting our grubby mitts on them.

75

Dominion: Empires Previews / Re: Empires Bonus Preview #2: Crown

« on: May 15, 2016, 04:39:51 am »

I worry Villa could promote downtime in a similar kind of way.

I see it more as an extension of Lab or Port, where you alternately marvel at what's going on and swear at your opponent because their turn won't end. And those are some of my favourite Dominion moments. Because while you're glad to see a chain go off, a little bit of you knows they might screw it up somehow or draw dead before they can finish you.

But that's not Crown, so I'll shut up about it.

So I think it's not particularly overpowered, it just gives you some choices, which is always good.

That's it - it gives you an alternate way of throning stuff and it seeks to resolve the dead draw issue, but, like with every card, there are plenty of checks on it to make sure it doesn't do this too reliably so as to make it OP.