Dominion Strategy Forum

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Pages: 1 [2] 3 4 5  All

Author Topic: The Fool is a pity  (Read 29209 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Chappy7

  • Minion
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 542
  • Shuffle iT Username: Chappy7
  • Respect: +660
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #25 on: December 19, 2017, 11:12:21 am »
+1

Every time I play irl it is 3 or 4 player.  Dominion is fun, so people want to play.  I usually add 1 or 2 extra kingdom piles with more people though.  And I sometimes change the end game condition to 4 piles or provinces and at least one other pile.  (This also happily makes IGG more fun)
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #26 on: December 19, 2017, 12:44:56 pm »
+3

While we're digressing onto the subject of games that aren't Dominion for a number of players other than what we had sitting round the table last night, I'll put in a good word for Hive. It's the first game in centuries which I feel is a worthy competitor to Chess as a pure strategy two-player game.
Logged

Commodore Chuckles

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1284
  • Shuffle iT Username: Commodore Chuckles
  • Respect: +1971
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #27 on: December 19, 2017, 12:51:44 pm »
+2

The main way the Night phase can irritate me is if I know they're going to play a Werewolf or Vampire but have to wait until the end of their turn to see what unpleasant thing I get hit with. The name Torturer was possibly taken prematurely.

When it comes to wrecking the flow, though, I think Villa is much worse. "Yes, their turn is finally over- oh wait, they're buying Villa, never mind."
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #28 on: December 19, 2017, 01:30:17 pm »
+1

I don't agree at all here; I think Night is clearly the simplest way to do those effects (not the ones that didn't have to be Night cards, like Cobbler, but you know, the other ones, like Monastery). Delaying effects is more complex and causes mistakes.
I saw this discussed during the previews, and I saw your reasoning and it seemed good at the time.

But when we got it to the table, we all found Night far more fiddly to deal with than, say, Scheme. And it didn't just feel like the problem of getting to grips with a new mechanic: Reserve cards were a walk in the park by comparison.

Quote
And it's not like other players would remember you had that Monastery effect or whatever coming

Well, we seem to remember when someone has a Scheme to resolve, or needs to decide whether or not to upgrade Travellers. And the cards are on the table as an aide memoire.

I feel the problem may be self-perpetuating. The slower things are going, the more impatient everyone is to start their turn. The more often people start their turns prematurely and have to stall or undo, the longer everything takes and the more frustrated and impatient people get.

For Monastery specifically, it really feels like a "+1 Action. This turn, you may trash one card when you discard it." Action would have been a simpler starting point than the variant which relied on the Night mechanic.

Quote
It's a bummer that it's in the first recommended set.

Mmm. I think that may be a bigger problem than the Fool card's existence.

I'm also wondering if the density of Night cards in that first recommended set might be too high. We all felt a kingdom might be more comfortable and run more smoothly with just one or two Night piles. With hindsight, we should probably have brought out one of the previous sets as well as Nocturne and base cards.
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #29 on: December 19, 2017, 01:33:30 pm »
+2

A better option would be to just not play with 4 players. ;)

Everybody knows 4-player Dominion is kind of.. meh. Dominion is balanced for two players.

Everybody knows that some people think that, but not everybody thinks that.
Agreed.

My preferred player count is 3. It feels quicker than four players, but more fun and interesting than 2.

The two-player game is clearly the tournament-grade variant, with less luck, no scope for kingmaking and no argument about how important it is to come second rather than third. But that's not necessarily the point of playing Dominion.
Logged

trivialknot

  • Jester
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 757
  • Respect: +1171
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #30 on: December 19, 2017, 01:55:56 pm »
0

But when we got it to the table, we all found Night far more fiddly to deal with than, say, Scheme. And it didn't just feel like the problem of getting to grips with a new mechanic: Reserve cards were a walk in the park by comparison.
I have the hardest time with Scheme and Treasury.  I'm like halfway through a turn and I'm like, wait shouldn't I have topdecked something last turn?  Oh well.

Honestly I think that Adventures was the worst for tracking.  I'm always forgetting to exchange Travellers.  And then there are beginning of turn abilities like Hireling and Guide.  The bonus tokens give you stuff that's not even written on the cards.  I'm constantly sad about drawing a bunch of estates before I remember I have Inheritance.

The biggest offender in Nocturne I think is Lost in the Woods.  I'm always forgetting to use it.

My impression of Fool is that Lost in the Woods > Fool.  So if all the other players load up on Fools, maybe you should get one of those other nice terminals like Navigator or Scavenger.
Logged

weesh

  • Conspirator
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 247
  • MOAR MAGPIES
  • Respect: +351
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #31 on: December 19, 2017, 02:21:36 pm »
0

if you have any interest in chess at all, and can wrangle four players, two boards and two clocks, bughouse chess is AMAZING
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bughouse_chess

In short, your teammate sits next to you, with the opposite color as yourself.  during your turn, you choose to make a normal chess move, or to place a piece your partner has captured from his opponent onto any unoccupied space on your board.

First player to achieve a checkmate wins for their whole team.

For both dominion and chess, the difference between 2 players and 4 players is that the former is more strategic and calculated and the later adds chaos and uncertainty in just the right quantity to change the game into something very different.

I get the same joy from mistakenly discovering that I have four bishops, but all of them on the white squares, as playing a jester in a four player game.
Logged

weesh

  • Conspirator
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 247
  • MOAR MAGPIES
  • Respect: +351
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #32 on: December 19, 2017, 02:39:46 pm »
0

Quote
To be fair, it's also more interesting gameplay-wise. (Even though Go still has an edge-case move that I would try to avoid.)

Which edge case are you referring to?  the entire set of relevant go rules fits on half a page, and all the edge cases fit on the other half of the page.
ko isn't an edge-case, it's a core part of the game
triple ko is not something you have to try to avoid, because it is obscenely rare. 
I've only managed it once, and it saved me from a loss, and it took a lot of work to setup, so it felt triumphant.
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #33 on: December 19, 2017, 04:50:25 pm »
+10

But when we got it to the table, we all found Night far more fiddly to deal with than, say, Scheme. And it didn't just feel like the problem of getting to grips with a new mechanic: Reserve cards were a walk in the park by comparison.
Well I just don't see it. I don't think "fiddly" is the word you're looking for, either. Exchanging your Vampire for a Bat, or digging out Envious to see what Envy does, is fiddly. Night cards are no more fiddly than Action or Treasure cards.

- In your Action phase, you may play one Action card.
- In your Buy phase, before buying cards, you may play any number of Treasure cards.
- In your Night phase, you may play any number of Night cards.

Well, we seem to remember when someone has a Scheme to resolve, or needs to decide whether or not to upgrade Travellers. And the cards are on the table as an aide memoire.
The giant arrow is not enough to get players to always remember Travellers. Scheme, man, the way to do Scheme is as a Night card; much simpler. And I did one and it's Crypt.

For Monastery specifically, it really feels like a "+1 Action. This turn, you may trash one card when you discard it." Action would have been a simpler starting point than the variant which relied on the Night mechanic.
I continue to think it's much simpler to have the card resolve right when you play it, like most cards.
Logged

ObtusePunubiris

  • Bishop
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 124
  • Respect: +187
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #34 on: December 19, 2017, 06:03:19 pm »
+4

Forgetting to do stuff at discard is the mistake I make more often that any other, by a long shot, so I welcome anything that will help me not do that.  The Night phase fits the bill.
Logged

GendoIkari

  • Adventurer
  • ******
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 9701
  • Respect: +10741
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #35 on: December 19, 2017, 06:43:53 pm »
+2

In my one Nocturne game, I found that Night phase is super friendly for newer players. I was playing with 1 person who hadn't played Dominion in quite a long time, and another who plays very casually. Neither of them ever had any trouble remembering Night Phase; quite often after someone bought a card the next player would ask "any Night stuff or are you done?"

This makes sense, as newer players won't be as trained to think of the buy phase as the end of the turn. So it's probably actually harder for more seasoned Dominion players.
Logged
Check out my F.DS extension for Chrome! Card links; Dominion icons, and maybe more! http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=13363.0

Thread for Firefox version:
http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=16305.0

Neirai the Forgiven

  • Explorer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 337
  • Respect: +134
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #36 on: December 19, 2017, 06:54:38 pm »
+1

But when we got it to the table, we all found Night far more fiddly to deal with than, say, Scheme. And it didn't just feel like the problem of getting to grips with a new mechanic: Reserve cards were a walk in the park by comparison.

Correct me if I'm wrong (because I'm pretending I know what you are talking about) but my experience was that what I found 'fiddly' with Night cards was how I kept doing my Clean-up before my Night phase. Like, I'd discard all my cards from play, then play might Night cards, then be like, sorry, I need those cards to reference with my Night cards, I need to get them back out.
I'd do this regardless of whether the Night cards were Duration cards or not.

In practice, though, this isn't something bad with Night cards. This is a nigh-Pavlovian response to buying cards. I play Actions, then drop my hand of Treasures, then dump everything into the discard pile, often with the whole maneuver taking < 2 seconds. Then I have Night cards and have to rethink things.

Plus, I did this thing that a lot of people on Reddit did, where they/I assumed that Night cards that look like Actions play like Actions and the strategies of playing them are precisely the same. Then you play Night Watchman as a-dumb-clone-of-Cartographer-that-I-play-last and suddenly your brain comes to a screeching halt because you don't play Night Watchman the same as Cartographer, it means differently.

Anyhow, forgive me if I'm totally on the wrong path, but I think that the fiddly side of Night cards all comes from it defying deeply-ingrained time-saving moves. I think the solution will be to learn new time-saving moves? I currently am pushing to always have a person who reads the Boons aloud, rather than handing the cards around the table (unless they say "keep until Clean-up" -- same with Hexes.)
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #37 on: December 19, 2017, 07:14:07 pm »
0

I think that the fiddly side of Night cards all comes from it defying deeply-ingrained time-saving moves.
Nicely put.

Though there's also another aspect that I'll try articulating more clearly.

In pre-Nocturne Dominion, the standard template for a turn was:
• Play Action cards until you run out of either cards you want to play or actions to play them with
• Play a whole bunch of Treasures
• Buy N cards, where N is often 1
• Clean up

The Action phase and the Treasure-playing part of the Buy phase were quite open-ended; you never knew how much people were going to do. But then they moved onto the second half of the Buy phase, and it was very clear to everybody how much money they had to spend and how many cards they could buy. Once they've done that, the next person can start playing while they clean up.

The Night phase comes after making purchases, and is open-ended. So now the current player has to remember to say explicitly when they've finished, and the next player has to remember to wait.

Quote
I kept doing my Clean-up before my Night phase. Like, I'd discard all my cards from play, then play might Night cards, then be like, sorry, I need those cards to reference with my Night cards, I need to get them back out.

That did happen to us, too. Not often, but when it did the next player really regretted starting their turn as soon as the previous began cleaning up.
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #38 on: December 19, 2017, 07:21:51 pm »
0

Forgetting to do stuff at discard is the mistake I make more often that any other, by a long shot, so I welcome anything that will help me not do that.  The Night phase fits the bill.
I'm used to paying attention to what I'm discarding from play during clean-up. There have been cards that behave specially during clean-up ever since Seaside. (Sure, you can put Durations somewhere special, but you can put Scheme/Herbalist/Treasury/Travellers somewhere special, too.)

Conversely, I just throw my hand straight in the discard pile. Or did, anyway.

As I say, there being all four combinations of Duration/non-Duration and Gain-to-hand/Gain-to-discard amongst the Night cards then adds to the confusion somewhat.
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #39 on: December 19, 2017, 07:24:33 pm »
0

Night cards are no more fiddly than Action or Treasure cards.

- In your Action phase, you may play one Action card.
- In your Buy phase, before buying cards, you may play any number of Treasure cards.
- In your Night phase, you may play any number of Night cards.
Now, you see, to me that's almost exactly 50% more fiddly than:

- In your Action phase, you may play one Action card.
- In your Buy phase, before buying cards, you may play any number of Treasure cards.
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #40 on: December 19, 2017, 08:03:43 pm »
+2

Night cards are no more fiddly than Action or Treasure cards.

- In your Action phase, you may play one Action card.
- In your Buy phase, before buying cards, you may play any number of Treasure cards.
- In your Night phase, you may play any number of Night cards.
Now, you see, to me that's almost exactly 50% more fiddly than:

- In your Action phase, you may play one Action card.
- In your Buy phase, before buying cards, you may play any number of Treasure cards.

It looks like your problem is that the expansion has anything new in it. They all have that problem. We can make those lists for whatever. It was so simple when Victory cards were always dead until the end of the game; Intrigue added Action - Victory and Treasure - Victory, three times as "fiddly using crj's definition of fiddly."
Logged

dz

  • Conspirator
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 209
  • Shuffle iT Username: DZ
  • Respect: +342
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #41 on: December 19, 2017, 08:22:50 pm »
0

Surely the black-bordered white-text cards sitting in your hand and in the Supply would be noticeable enough to remind you there's the Night phase, especially when they're contrasting with the white-bordered black-text cards.

And wait, was this thread supposed to be about Fool or Night?
« Last Edit: December 19, 2017, 08:29:26 pm by dz »
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #42 on: December 19, 2017, 08:31:29 pm »
+1

It started out mainly about Fool, but it turned out that wasn't controversial.
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #43 on: December 19, 2017, 09:07:59 pm »
0

It looks like your problem is that the expansion has anything new in it. They all have that problem.
I arrived quite late to the Dominion party, but I've seen my playing group come to grips with Dark Ages, Guilds, Adventures and Empires when each of them was new. Nothing in any of those caused the trouble that Nocturne has.
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #44 on: December 19, 2017, 10:49:23 pm »
+2

It looks like your problem is that the expansion has anything new in it. They all have that problem.
I arrived quite late to the Dominion party, but I've seen my playing group come to grips with Dark Ages, Guilds, Adventures and Empires when each of them was new. Nothing in any of those caused the trouble that Nocturne has.
You have changed the topic there, from Night to Nocturne. I notice these things!

Night, I would have been happy doing in an early expansion. Seaside added the Duration phase, but because it says "at the start of your turn" (a time when previously nothing happened), instead of naming a phase, it didn't bother anyone. Somehow that's how perception works here.

After Night and aside from Boons/Hexes, what Nocturne has to offer is very similar to what Dark Ages does. Instead of Shelters it has Heirlooms, instead of Spoils and Ruins it has Spirits and Wishes, instead of Madman and Mercenary there are Bats. And your playing group did fine with Dark Ages.

So. When you say Nocturne there, you put down the whole set, but really you mean Night and Boons/Hexes. Well I'm with you on Hexes, and already knew we disagreed about Night. They do take up a lot of the set. I feel like it pays to be more specific here, not blame e.g. Shepherd because you don't like e.g. Monastery, but then I'm the one on the receiving end of the criticism here.
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #45 on: December 19, 2017, 11:16:45 pm »
+1

I should clarify that of course I'm not saying crj or anyone should like Night if they don't. Man you like what you like. And if lots of people have problems with a mechanic, or don't like it, well I blew it there, however well it worked for playtesters. I got into this conversation to agree about Fool and say, no, Night cards should not be "+1 Action do something later this turn." If people were destined to hate a new phase, then the move was to just not do those cards, not to try to do them without the phase.
Logged

ObtusePunubiris

  • Bishop
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 124
  • Respect: +187
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #46 on: December 20, 2017, 12:10:04 am »
0

Forgetting to do stuff at discard is the mistake I make more often that any other, by a long shot, so I welcome anything that will help me not do that.  The Night phase fits the bill.
I'm used to paying attention to what I'm discarding from play during clean-up. There have been cards that behave specially during clean-up ever since Seaside.
I've been playing long enough that I should be in the habit of paying attention to what I discard too.  Maybe I'll make working on that my new year's resolution.  Still, I like the fact that we got the Night phase to give us some of that same functionality without exacerbating my shortcomings.
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #47 on: December 20, 2017, 01:04:56 am »
0

if you have any interest in chess at all, and can wrangle four players, two boards and two clocks, bughouse chess is AMAZING
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bughouse_chess
My favourite Chess variant for 4-6 players is a somewhat tweaked variant of Penultima. Hilarious fun, though admittedly more divergent from normal Chess than most variants. (-8<
Logged

crj

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1477
  • Respect: +1644
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #48 on: December 20, 2017, 01:35:41 am »
0

Nothing in any of those caused the trouble that Nocturne has.
You have changed the topic there, from Night to Nocturne. I notice these things!
Sorry. To be clear, the main thing I came here to post about was Fool and its inclusion in the first recommended kingdom, secondarily about Night. But the latter part is the one that's turned out to be contentious. When I say "the trouble Nocturne has [caused]", I mean mainly Fool, but also Night a bit.

Quote
Night, I would have been happy doing in an early expansion. Seaside added the Duration phase, but because it says "at the start of your turn" (a time when previously nothing happened), instead of naming a phase, it didn't bother anyone. Somehow that's how perception works here.

But you play Durations at the same time as other Actions (or whatever) in the same way. It feels to me as though a Duration-like Night card would be "+1 Action. At the start of your clean-up phase..." whereas a Night-like Duration card would be "If it is your action phase, set this aside. Play it at the start of your next turn."

It seems to me that the real issue is the size and timing of the cognitive load; perception is an important contributor to cognitive load.

Quote
So. When you say Nocturne there, you put down the whole set

Hmm. Two points:
• My talking about the trouble that Nocturne caused my playing group doesn't mean I think that all of Nocturne is troublesome.
• I liked the look of Nocturne and bought it. That first game was just painful, but the second one was fun despite my reservations. Trouble is, the other players were considerably more negative about it; I'm worried I may run out of people to play Nocturne with, here. )-8

To recap the end of the original posting: I'd be really interested to hear anyone else's experiences. It looks like there's a consensus to leave out Fool at least until everyone at the table understands Boons much better. But I'm still hoping someone will come up with an idea for how to construct more likeable kingdoms, or some other way to have them like Nocturne more so they'll keep playing it with me.
Logged

ipofanes

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1439
  • Shuffle iT Username: ipofanes
  • Respect: +776
    • View Profile
Re: The Fool is a pity
« Reply #49 on: December 20, 2017, 05:29:51 am »
0

if you have any interest in chess at all, and can wrangle four players, two boards and two clocks, bughouse chess is AMAZING
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bughouse_chess

interesting. Some friends of me autoselect Black Market in every kingdom, and I have recently likened it to Bughouse Chess.
Logged
Lord Rattington denies my undo requests
Pages: 1 [2] 3 4 5  All
 

Page created in 0.058 seconds with 21 queries.