I usually start the sweep wherever the antenna is facing.
Brilliant. I'm gonna do that as a reminder from now on, even if it starts on the edge of the board.
The older boards line up nicely, which is a problem for the offset. It seems like the new boards are less reliant on conveyors on the edge like the old one. I prefer the older boards anyway. If I felt spunky, I could use the boards with teleporters and portals and oil slicks. Definitely something to bring up with veterans though.
The new boards are definitely simpler, and look less sexy...but when I was experimenting with offsets a few months ago, it seemed to be almost a similar level of challenge to create a navigable situation that had more than 1 logical option to cross boards.
Having played extensively with both sets, my conclusion is that the new boards are more accessible to new players, and still challenging and fun to veterans. I thought that I was going to miss crushers and trap doors and flame blasts and slicks and jump pads and teleporters...
But actually, I don't. In fact, the game is STILL delightfully complex.
The board itself is simpler, but there is increased robot interaction due to the catch-up mechanic, and increased option complexity due to there just being more of them since they are so much easier to get.
And navigating cannery row alone is neither as interesting or as challenging as navigating conveyors and lasers in close proximity to other robots.
And more importantly, the game has exchanged bad complexity for good complexity.
Situational complexity: "can you understand how the things work"
Strategic complexity: "given your understanding of the situation, what is the best plan of attack"
messing up situational complexity makes people feel stupid.
having your plans messed up by the clever moves of an opponent is exciting, and predicting and countering an opponent is more satisfying than safely navigating crushers.
That said, I do miss the pushers. They were pretty easy to understand, and often had interesting implications.
Do you know if anyone is making new boards? one interesting effect of making all the boards smaller is that they now fit on an 11x17 piece of paper, and are thus easier to reproduce in a simple printer.
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Somewhat on topic:
have you considered any changes to the decks?
I don't like having two repeats, and I don't like having only 1 reverse. Thinking about taking a sharpie to my cards.
I'm also thinking about trying to create better movement options. an additional repeat seems like a waste of a card, and is thus prime for rewrite.