Dominion Strategy Forum

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Pages: 1 ... 13 14 [15] 16 17 ... 225  All

Author Topic: Interview with Donald X.  (Read 2127312 times)

0 Members and 4 Guests are viewing this topic.

LastFootnote

  • Adventurer
  • ******
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 7495
  • Shuffle iT Username: LastFootnote
  • Respect: +10721
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #350 on: December 20, 2012, 03:04:27 pm »
0

So what was the concern, exactly?  That the existing $7s were just too powerful?  Or that any card at $7 would inherently be too powerful?  The latter seems mistaken; any achievable cost can be "balanced" (even though most of them won't be worth doing).

The concern at the time was mostly that the 'hole' at $7 was serving a purpose. For instance it prevented you gaining Provinces with Upgrade. Same thing with the hole at $1. That's why it's not a big deal if a few cards are at these costs. Most games still have those holes.

EDIT: I'm not trying to imply that the game would be bad if those holes weren't usually there, but certain cards are balanced around usually having them, I believe.
« Last Edit: December 20, 2012, 03:06:02 pm by LastFootnote »
Logged

mistergross

  • Herbalist
  • **
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 9
  • Respect: +7
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #351 on: December 20, 2012, 03:51:49 pm »
0

Donald,

We haven't heard much from you about Infiltration--no secret history that I could find, for instance. Any chance of that happening? (If there's a contractual obligation with FFG or the like, no worries.) Thanks!
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #352 on: December 20, 2012, 03:59:38 pm »
+3

So what was the concern, exactly?  That the existing $7s were just too powerful?  Or that any card at $7 would inherently be too powerful?  The latter seems mistaken; any achievable cost can be "balanced" (even though most of them won't be worth doing).
I had no concerns - I tried a $7 early on. People on BGG would talk about how not having a card costing $7 was good for the game, and reason that thus there would never be a card costing $7. This was poor reasoning because even if not having a $7 is the bee's knees, you still get that experience most of the time if there are a few $7's, while also getting to have whatever experience the $7's give you.

I did not specifically avoid $7 for any value that hole provides - I avoided $7 because it was hard to make those cards sexy enough in non-Colony games. I solved the problem by doing them in Prosperity, then made $7's more special by not doing them in other sets (though I might not have anyway).

The basic cards have a hole at $4, and that caused me to make more $4's than was sensible early on ($5 is the important cost), and to put Potion at $4 (which was fine).
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #353 on: December 20, 2012, 04:02:49 pm »
+1

We haven't heard much from you about Infiltration--no secret history that I could find, for instance. Any chance of that happening? (If there's a contractual obligation with FFG or the like, no worries.) Thanks!
FFG wants to control the flow of information there.
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #354 on: December 21, 2012, 04:16:56 am »
0

The Powerman question from part I has me referring to an answer that is now in part II.
Logged

kn1tt3r

  • Minion
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 585
  • Respect: +278
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #355 on: December 21, 2012, 04:32:09 am »
0

Was it ever an option to fix some things, like a Throne Room rewording, when doing the online implementation or even later editions?

On a similar note, as you maybe know, some translations into other languages are flawed for several cards (I only know about German, but that's probably similar for other languages). Some of those are due to simple oversight (German Procession says "gain a card costing exactly $1 more"), some due to not caring enough about exact wording (German Venture says "Play that Treasure. Discard the other cards"), some due to unawareness of the exact wording which turned out to be crucial for future cards (German Chancellor says "You may discard your draw pile"). Will such things be fixed for the upcoming Goko translations?
« Last Edit: December 21, 2012, 06:28:54 am by kn1tt3r »
Logged

ipofanes

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1439
  • Shuffle iT Username: ipofanes
  • Respect: +776
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #356 on: December 21, 2012, 05:11:14 am »
+4

German Procession says "gain a card costing exactly $1 more"
Oops, I wasn't even aware that it is an erroneus translation. Sorry to all the people I beat by processing Border Villages into Banks.

Logged
Lord Rattington denies my undo requests

() | (_) ^/

  • Minion
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 632
  • Shuffle iT Username: p4ddy0d00rs
  • Nemo dat quod non habet.
  • Respect: +526
    • View Profile
    • BGG profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #357 on: December 21, 2012, 06:22:34 am »
+1

German Procession says "gain a card costing exactly $1 more"
Oops, I wasn't even aware that it is an erroneus translation. Sorry to all the people I beat by processing Border Villages into Banks.

rofl!
Logged

Davio

  • 2012 Dutch Champion
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4787
  • Respect: +3412
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #358 on: December 21, 2012, 01:19:07 pm »
0

Dutch translation of King's Court doesn't say "you may", it has text analogous to Throne Room. I guess the translators didn't think two little words (you may) would mean so much.

Throne Room doesn't need to be "fixed" for online since it can force you to play a card, it needed to be fixed for live play where you could pretend not to have that Masquerade in hand (with only Colonies), that's the real problem; it doesn't keep you honest. All later cards got a "or reveal a hand with no X" clause, but it was too late for Throne Room.
Logged

BSG: Cagprezimal Adama
Mage Knight: Arythea

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #359 on: December 21, 2012, 02:04:09 pm »
+1

On a similar note, as you maybe know, some translations into other languages are flawed for several cards (I only know about German, but that's probably similar for other languages). Some of those are due to simple oversight (German Procession says "gain a card costing exactly $1 more"), some due to not caring enough about exact wording (German Venture says "Play that Treasure. Discard the other cards"), some due to unawareness of the exact wording which turned out to be crucial for future cards (German Chancellor says "You may discard your draw pile"). Will such things be fixed for the upcoming Goko translations?
Well this is a question for Goko, I mean the only way I would know is to ask them, but it seems really unlikely that they wouldn't at least fix the wording if someone pointed out it was wrong. They don't just have images of the cards, they build them. So it's just a matter of changing the translation text.

They have a German version up on the private site, so I can tell them now about whatever mistranslations you know of, starting with Chancellor.
Logged

Drab Emordnilap

  • Torturer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1832
  • Shuffle iT Username: Drab Emordnilap
  • Luther Bell Hendricks V
  • Respect: +1886
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #360 on: December 21, 2012, 02:21:22 pm »
+1

All later cards got a "or reveal a hand with no X" clause, but it was too late for Throne Room.

Not Graverobber!
Logged

rspeer

  • Witch
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 469
  • Respect: +877
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #361 on: December 21, 2012, 06:00:40 pm »
+2

Do you have favorite kid's game?
I'm fond of step-on-feet. You try to step on their feet. They try to step on your feet. You win when every other player has conceded.

Step-on-feet is a pretty fun game, and I heartily recommend it for people of all ages who do not mind looking silly and occasionally being accidentally kicked. There's even strategy to it! It's like fencing without the pointy bits, the safety equipment, and the years of training!
Logged

rspeer

  • Witch
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 469
  • Respect: +877
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #362 on: December 21, 2012, 06:15:50 pm »
0

Well, yeah, I was serious. Many computer-implemented strategic games are too complex to be managed on the board lightly. When Vlaada Chvatil adapted Civilization to the playing table, the map had to go. And the rest is, for a modern boardgame (I am not talking about Battletech or the like) at the upper end of bookkeeping. When I play Through the Ages with newbies whose moves I'd better check whether they conform with the rules, it's quite a stressing experience.

My gaming group plays Through the Ages a lot, and we still have to watch each other like hawks. There are enough constraints to follow that you end up missing one and cheating without trying to. I can only remember one game of it where nobody caught anyone else breaking the rules, and that was one that ended early with Napoleon pwning everyone into submission in age 2, and, you know, maybe we just didn't catch the Napoleon player.
Logged

onigame

  • Thief
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 96
  • Respect: +73
    • View Profile
    • Dominion Set Generator
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #363 on: December 21, 2012, 09:04:18 pm »
0

Tom Lehmann had an idea for one although I never heard what it was. Again I would need to playtest any such set and am not keen to, but it's at least more likely than a fan set.

I think I remember that idea.  It was before Seaside had come out and he was speculating on what new mechanics Seaside would have, since all he knew was the name.

The idea ended up being rather similar to some of the concepts that ended up in Alchemy and Guilds.
Logged

ipofanes

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1439
  • Shuffle iT Username: ipofanes
  • Respect: +776
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #364 on: December 21, 2012, 11:55:55 pm »
0

My gaming group plays Through the Ages a lot, and we still have to watch each other like hawks. There are enough constraints to follow that you end up missing one and cheating without trying to.

My 9yo is extremely sharp at this. Yesterday I had a Dominion match with him and two friends. By his design, we played with Golem, King's Court, and Possession. We had to resolve convoluted sequences of recursively triggered King's Courted Possessions (why kids played that: see parallel thread on Politics and Bargaining, but maybe just for the lulz) that he seemed to have little problem to keep abreast of.
Logged
Lord Rattington denies my undo requests

Beyond Awesome

  • Global Moderator
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2941
  • Shuffle iT Username: Beyond Awesome
  • Respect: +2466
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #365 on: December 22, 2012, 01:56:01 am »
0

Why in the rules must there be at least one Prosperity card for Colony games? Why must there be one DA card for there to be Shelters?
Logged

Jimmmmm

  • Torturer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1762
  • Shuffle iT Username: Jimmmmm
  • Respect: +2017
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #366 on: December 22, 2012, 02:31:19 am »
0

Why in the rules must there be at least one Prosperity card for Colony games? Why must there be one DA card for there to be Shelters?

Prosperity and Dark Ages cards are designed to generally work better with Colony games and Shelters games respectively.
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #367 on: December 22, 2012, 02:39:36 am »
+2

Why in the rules must there be at least one Prosperity card for Colony games? Why must there be one DA card for there to be Shelters?
The idea is just to have Colony show up proportionally to how much of your collection Prosperity is. If you just have the main set and Prosperity, you get Colony half the time; if you have four large expansions, you get Colony (close to) a fourth of the time, and so on. That's it, that's the idea. I mean how often should it show up? It seemed to me that it shouldn't be every game (except for those people who chose to play that way). So what should the ratio be? And then there it is, why not have it be that the ratio is the same as the rest of the set. If you just have two sets, then half your cards are from Prosperity, half of your experience is Prosperity, and you get Colony half the time. That just sounded perfect.

And then Dark Ages matches that for Shelters. There was no specific intention to prevent Colony from appearing in games without Prosperity cards; the rule that neatly gives the intended ratio just happens to have that side-effect. You could instead roll some dice to determine whether or not to use Colony, and have the same ratio but without limiting Colony to games with Prosperity cards. Or, you know, do whatever you want.
Logged

kn1tt3r

  • Minion
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 585
  • Respect: +278
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #368 on: December 22, 2012, 03:43:28 am »
+4

They have a German version up on the private site, so I can tell them now about whatever mistranslations you know of, starting with Chancellor.

Here is a collection of mistakes in the German forums:
http://forum.dominionblog.de/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=1338


And here my attempt of a translation:

Quote
Base Game:

Thief:
"you may discard any of the gained gards" instead of "gain"

Chancellor:
"You may discard your draw pile" instead of "put"
(partially corrected in 2nd edition)


Seaside:

Pirate Ship:
"Each player..." instead of "Each other player"
(corrected in 2nd edition)


Alchemy:

Possession:
"Any cards he gains..." instead of "would gain"


Prosperity:

Venture:
Wrong order: "Play that Treasure. Discard the other cards" instead of "Discard the other cards. Play that Treasure"

Bischop:
has a "If you do that..." clause after "Trash a card"

King's Court:
matches the Throne Room "mistake", i.e. has no "may"

Forge:
Gain a card with the exact [coin symbol] costs of all the trashed cards combined (or something like that - in any case it would make it legal to forge two Estates into a Golem)


Cornucopia:

Tournament:
Says "You may discard a Proince from your hand. If you do,..." and then "Each other player may reveal a Province..."
(changes the timing a bit, because you don't know whether another player has a province when you have to decide which Prize to gain)

Trusty Steed:
matches the Chancellor mistake, i.e. has "discard" instead of "put"


Hinterlands:

Scheme:
Says "If you would discard it" instead of "If you discard it"
(this is a subtle thing, but it matters a bit with Herablist)


Dark Ages:

Procession:
"gain a card" instead of "gain an action card"

Dame Natalie:
"Gain a card" instead of "You may gain a card"

Ironmonger:
Wrong order. Says "...you may discard it. If it is an Action.../Treasure.../Victory.... Discard the revealed card or put it back on your draw pile"

Scavenger:
matches the Chancellor mistake (discard instead of put)

Hermit and Urchin:
has no "from the Madman/Mercenary pile" clause (is a bit nitpicky, but as far as I know without a statement that tells otherwise "gain" is restricted to the supply")


Promo:

Walled Village:
Says "only one more action card in play" instead of "no more than one other"
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #369 on: December 22, 2012, 03:48:41 am »
+4

Here is a collection of mistakes in the German forums:
http://forum.dominionblog.de/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=1338
This is great, but if you want to go that extra mile, what Goko will need to fix these is fixed text in German. I'm sure they can get someone to translate for them, but you know, if you have fixed text I will give it to them and you will get to have it all just the way you wanted.
Logged

onigame

  • Thief
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 96
  • Respect: +73
    • View Profile
    • Dominion Set Generator
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #370 on: December 22, 2012, 04:04:56 am »
+4

Here is a collection of mistakes in the German forums:
http://forum.dominionblog.de/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=1338
This is great, but if you want to go that extra mile, what Goko will need to fix these is fixed text in German. I'm sure they can get someone to translate for them, but you know, if you have fixed text I will give it to them and you will get to have it all just the way you wanted.

I was at Goko when they were copying the German from the cards into their system and I did make sure that King's Court and Venture were corrected (but that's the only errata I noticed at the time).  Thanks for the link, kn1tt3r, I'll make sure that they get looked at.

Some of the trickiness is that actual Germans may not be aware of the errata and may have been playing the cards as written instead of as intended.  Of course Goko can't realistically implement different rules based on what language you're playing the game in, so it's best if the text actually matches how the cards behave and not how the text was originally printed.  :)
Logged

Dsell

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1290
  • He/Him
  • Respect: +932
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #371 on: December 22, 2012, 04:08:00 am »
0

Will you still play Dominion after playtesting (for everything: Goko, possible promos, possible future expansions) is finished?

If you do, will you just play with the released cards or will you still sometimes bring new ideas to the table?
Logged
"Quiet you, you'll lynch Dsell when I'm good and ready" - Insomniac


Winner of Forum Survivor Season 2!

onigame

  • Thief
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 96
  • Respect: +73
    • View Profile
    • Dominion Set Generator
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #372 on: December 22, 2012, 04:22:22 am »
+4

Anyway I don't see an Un- set for Dominion; I don't think the interest is there. But let's say Reiner Knizia died and Jay wanted a commemorative promo, and it had to involve eating cake because that was Knizia's favorite thing to do, and it couldn't just be called Cake-eating Contest or something, it really had to involve eating. I would just do that as a real-world only promo and no-one playing online would feel remotely left out.

I had a friend who created a "Food" expansion for Dominion for a mutual friend's birthday party.  It had cards like: "You may eat some bacon.  If you do, +2 cards or +$2."

Also, I've been with Reiner in an environment where cake was offered and he declined, so sadly I doubt that cake-eating is his favorite thing.
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6357
  • Respect: +25672
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #373 on: December 22, 2012, 01:09:10 pm »
0

Will you still play Dominion after playtesting (for everything: Goko, possible promos, possible future expansions) is finished?

If you do, will you just play with the released cards or will you still sometimes bring new ideas to the table?
The last new prototype images were from January 7th 2012. So it's been done! And I haven't played much non-Goko since then; maybe four or five nights I brought Dark Ages / Guilds to a game night, when I didn't have a new game to work on and it seemed like the previous new games were done. Online is different because you can play it alone, and not waste valuable playtesting time.

Anyway this is typical. Getting lots of playtesting done doesn't just mean I don't have much time for games that aren't mine; I don't have much time for finished games of mine either, unless I can play them alone.
Logged

kn1tt3r

  • Minion
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 585
  • Respect: +278
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #374 on: December 22, 2012, 01:16:29 pm »
0

Here is a collection of mistakes in the German forums:
http://forum.dominionblog.de/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=1338
This is great, but if you want to go that extra mile, what Goko will need to fix these is fixed text in German. I'm sure they can get someone to translate for them, but you know, if you have fixed text I will give it to them and you will get to have it all just the way you wanted.

I was at Goko when they were copying the German from the cards into their system and I did make sure that King's Court and Venture were corrected (but that's the only errata I noticed at the time).  Thanks for the link, kn1tt3r, I'll make sure that they get looked at.

Thanks a lot.
Logged
Pages: 1 ... 13 14 [15] 16 17 ... 225  All
 

Page created in 0.228 seconds with 20 queries.