Dominion Strategy Forum

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Pages: 1 ... 7 8 [9] 10 11 ... 225  All

Author Topic: Interview with Donald X.  (Read 2122604 times)

0 Members and 2 Guests are viewing this topic.

SwitchedFromStarcraft

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1088
  • Respect: +856
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #200 on: December 11, 2012, 11:36:15 am »
0

Again, it's just something that caught my eye, I'm not judging it either way. Getting the 2nd prize with Tournament is certainly no more annoying than drawing $2P on turn 5.

So much less annoying than this. I wish Familiar cost $1P so badly.

Dolan, why 10 kingdom cards? Did you ever try 12 cards available at a time, or eight? (Different cards, not cards per pile)
Dolan?  Is this a scumslip?
It feels like it would be the Celtic equivalent of Donald, doesn't it?
Logged
Quote from: Donald X.
Posting begets posting.

Quote from: Asper
Donald X made me a design snob.

There is a sucker born every minute.

SwitchedFromStarcraft

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1088
  • Respect: +856
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #201 on: December 11, 2012, 11:37:04 am »
0

Or maybe the title of a new Eagles song: Duelin' Dolan Doolan.
Logged
Quote from: Donald X.
Posting begets posting.

Quote from: Asper
Donald X made me a design snob.

There is a sucker born every minute.

Schneau

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1174
  • Shuffle iT Username: Schneau
  • Respect: +1461
    • View Profile
    • Rainwave
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #202 on: December 11, 2012, 11:48:54 am »
+1

Again, it's just something that caught my eye, I'm not judging it either way. Getting the 2nd prize with Tournament is certainly no more annoying than drawing $2P on turn 5.

So much less annoying than this. I wish Familiar cost $1P so badly.

Dolan, why 10 kingdom cards? Did you ever try 12 cards available at a time, or eight? (Different cards, not cards per pile)
Dolan?  Is this a scumslip?
It feels like it would be the Celtic equivalent of Donald, doesn't it?

Donald is Celtic.
Logged

jotheonah

  • Jester
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 989
  • Respect: +949
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #203 on: December 11, 2012, 12:40:54 pm »
0

tag
Logged
"I know old meta, and joth is useless day 1 but awesome town day 3 and on." --Teproc

He/him

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6352
  • Respect: +25650
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #204 on: December 11, 2012, 12:46:34 pm »
0

Dolan, why 10 kingdom cards? Did you ever try 12 cards available at a time, or eight? (Different cards, not cards per pile)
As you add more cards you get more options but the game is harder to play, especially when you're new. Of course at a certain point you aren't increasing options much anymore because cards displace other cards for you.

Originally I had ten cards and decided to just put them all out. We could cope with ten so it stayed ten.

At one point I played with eight for a while. It worked fine but was not as good. I never really considered twelve because ten is already too many to remember them all (and I didn't consider odd numbers). There's the neat trick of, it's my first game ever, man I'm not reading all these, I have $4, what costs $4, I'll read those. But ten cards is still a lot.

Another thing is that the number has an effect on the variety you get. With 25 cards and 10 at a time, it takes you, you know, 2.5 games to see them all. If it were 8 cards at a time it would take 3 games. That was the big reason to test 8 for me, and it pushes away from putting more cards out at once.
Logged

SwitchedFromStarcraft

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1088
  • Respect: +856
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #205 on: December 11, 2012, 01:02:02 pm »
0

Again, it's just something that caught my eye, I'm not judging it either way. Getting the 2nd prize with Tournament is certainly no more annoying than drawing $2P on turn 5.

So much less annoying than this. I wish Familiar cost $1P so badly.

Dolan, why 10 kingdom cards? Did you ever try 12 cards available at a time, or eight? (Different cards, not cards per pile)
Dolan?  Is this a scumslip?
It feels like it would be the Celtic equivalent of Donald, doesn't it?

Donald is Celtic.
I can't imagine why I didn't know that, with a name like Vaccarino.
Logged
Quote from: Donald X.
Posting begets posting.

Quote from: Asper
Donald X made me a design snob.

There is a sucker born every minute.

Schneau

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1174
  • Shuffle iT Username: Schneau
  • Respect: +1461
    • View Profile
    • Rainwave
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #206 on: December 11, 2012, 01:18:00 pm »
0

Again, it's just something that caught my eye, I'm not judging it either way. Getting the 2nd prize with Tournament is certainly no more annoying than drawing $2P on turn 5.

So much less annoying than this. I wish Familiar cost $1P so badly.

Dolan, why 10 kingdom cards? Did you ever try 12 cards available at a time, or eight? (Different cards, not cards per pile)
Dolan?  Is this a scumslip?
It feels like it would be the Celtic equivalent of Donald, doesn't it?

Donald is Celtic.
I can't imagine why I didn't know that, with a name like Vaccarino.

Ahh, I meant the name, not DXV. I have no clue what DXV is.
Logged

shraeye

  • Minion
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 690
  • Shuffle iT Username: shraeye
  • More Graph Theory please
  • Respect: +299
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #207 on: December 11, 2012, 01:20:08 pm »
+6

Ahh, I meant the name, not DXV. I have no clue what DXV is.
515, duh.
Logged

werothegreat

  • Adventurer
  • ******
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 8172
  • Shuffle iT Username: werothegreat
  • Let me tell you a secret...
  • Respect: +9624
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #208 on: December 11, 2012, 01:35:00 pm »
+1

Again, it's just something that caught my eye, I'm not judging it either way. Getting the 2nd prize with Tournament is certainly no more annoying than drawing $2P on turn 5.

So much less annoying than this. I wish Familiar cost $1P so badly.

Dolan, why 10 kingdom cards? Did you ever try 12 cards available at a time, or eight? (Different cards, not cards per pile)
Dolan?  Is this a scumslip?
It feels like it would be the Celtic equivalent of Donald, doesn't it?

Gooby plz.
Logged
Contrary to popular belief, I do not run the wiki all on my own.  There are plenty of other people who are actively editing.  Go bother them!

Check out this fantasy epic adventure novel I wrote, the Broken Globe!  http://www.amazon.com/Broken-Globe-Tyr-Chronicles-Book-ebook/dp/B00LR1SZAS/

meandering mercury

  • Ambassador
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 34
  • Respect: +36
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #209 on: December 11, 2012, 01:47:02 pm »
+3

As you add more cards you get more options but the game is harder to play, especially when you're new. Of course at a certain point you aren't increasing options much anymore because cards displace other cards for you.

Originally I had ten cards and decided to just put them all out. We could cope with ten so it stayed ten.

At one point I played with eight for a while. It worked fine but was not as good. I never really considered twelve because ten is already too many to remember them all (and I didn't consider odd numbers). There's the neat trick of, it's my first game ever, man I'm not reading all these, I have $4, what costs $4, I'll read those. But ten cards is still a lot.

I've found this to be true too. These days when I explain Dominion to a set of non-gamer friends I only use five cards instead of ten. It all fits in memory that way. For their second game, I roll out a full set of ten cards. Of course if you have an experienced boardgaming audience then you can start with ten to begin with.

I've sometimes thought that the official First Game set should be less than ten cards for this reason.
Logged

Young Nick

  • Minion
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 561
  • Respect: +274
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #210 on: December 11, 2012, 02:24:39 pm »
+1

I've also been itching to play some games with 12 instead of 10. I think that experienced players would enjoy the greater number of options it presents and it would lead to fewer BM+X games, which are no one's favorites.
Logged

TWoos

  • Young Witch
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 149
  • Respect: +89
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #211 on: December 11, 2012, 02:56:33 pm »
0

These days when I explain Dominion to a set of non-gamer friends I only use five cards instead of ten. It all fits in memory that way. For their second game, I roll out a full set of ten cards. Of course if you have an experienced boardgaming audience then you can start with ten to begin with.

Do you have a specific set of five that you use?
Logged

theory

  • Administrator
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3603
  • Respect: +6119
    • View Profile
    • Dominion Strategy
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #212 on: December 11, 2012, 03:27:58 pm »
+32

These days when I explain Dominion to a set of non-gamer friends I only use five cards instead of ten. It all fits in memory that way. For their second game, I roll out a full set of ten cards. Of course if you have an experienced boardgaming audience then you can start with ten to begin with.

Do you have a specific set of five that you use?

King's Court
Goons
Masquerade
Saboteur
Possession
Logged

werothegreat

  • Adventurer
  • ******
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 8172
  • Shuffle iT Username: werothegreat
  • Let me tell you a secret...
  • Respect: +9624
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #213 on: December 11, 2012, 03:34:03 pm »
+2

These days when I explain Dominion to a set of non-gamer friends I only use five cards instead of ten. It all fits in memory that way. For their second game, I roll out a full set of ten cards. Of course if you have an experienced boardgaming audience then you can start with ten to begin with.

Do you have a specific set of five that you use?

King's Court
Goons
Masquerade
Saboteur
Possession

Saboteur makes the whole thing worth it.  BRING IT ON.
Logged
Contrary to popular belief, I do not run the wiki all on my own.  There are plenty of other people who are actively editing.  Go bother them!

Check out this fantasy epic adventure novel I wrote, the Broken Globe!  http://www.amazon.com/Broken-Globe-Tyr-Chronicles-Book-ebook/dp/B00LR1SZAS/

jonts26

  • Margrave
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2746
  • Shuffle iT Username: jonts
  • Respect: +3668
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #214 on: December 11, 2012, 04:36:55 pm »
+3

These days when I explain Dominion to a set of non-gamer friends I only use five cards instead of ten. It all fits in memory that way. For their second game, I roll out a full set of ten cards. Of course if you have an experienced boardgaming audience then you can start with ten to begin with.

Do you have a specific set of five that you use?

King's Court
Goons
Masquerade
Saboteur
Possession

The more I stare at it, the more I think it would be incredibly interesting to play.
Logged

Beyond Awesome

  • Global Moderator
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2941
  • Shuffle iT Username: Beyond Awesome
  • Respect: +2466
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #215 on: December 11, 2012, 04:57:44 pm »
+1

These days when I explain Dominion to a set of non-gamer friends I only use five cards instead of ten. It all fits in memory that way. For their second game, I roll out a full set of ten cards. Of course if you have an experienced boardgaming audience then you can start with ten to begin with.

Do you have a specific set of five that you use?

King's Court
Goons
Masquerade
Saboteur
Possession

Mind=Blown
Logged

SirPeebles

  • Cartographer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3249
  • Respect: +5459
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #216 on: December 11, 2012, 05:11:36 pm »
+7

These days when I explain Dominion to a set of non-gamer friends I only use five cards instead of ten. It all fits in memory that way. For their second game, I roll out a full set of ten cards. Of course if you have an experienced boardgaming audience then you can start with ten to begin with.

Do you have a specific set of five that you use?

King's Court
Goons
Masquerade
Saboteur
Possession

I didn't know you were going to go claiming credit for the final match kingdom I submitted.  ;)
Logged
Well you *do* need a signature...

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6352
  • Respect: +25650
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #217 on: December 11, 2012, 05:12:20 pm »
+19

Donald is Celtic.
It means "world ruler." And Vaccarino means "cow herder." And then X is the unknown. So, put it all together and it's like that South Park joke. phase 1: herd cows. phase 2: ? ? ?. phase 3: world domination.
« Last Edit: December 11, 2012, 05:13:23 pm by Donald X. »
Logged

ConMan

  • Saboteur
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1400
  • Respect: +1705
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #218 on: December 11, 2012, 05:26:00 pm »
0

Donald is Celtic.
It means "world ruler." And Vaccarino means "cow herder." And then X is the unknown. So, put it all together and it's like that South Park joke. phase 1: herd cows. phase 2: ? ? ?. phase 3: world domination.
But since it's the other way around, it seems to me like you're taking over the world in order to herd cows.

Allegedly, the biggest-selling LCG in Japan is a game called "Tanto Cuore", a maid-themed deck builder. While a lot of its mechanisms are practically identical to Dominion, its basic currency costs one more than the Dominion equivalent (so the $1 costs $1, the $2 costs $4 and the $3 costs $7). Did you ever consider doing anything like this in Dominion - particularly, moving Copper off the $0 price point?
Logged

SirPeebles

  • Cartographer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3249
  • Respect: +5459
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #219 on: December 11, 2012, 05:30:52 pm »
0

He herds us like cattle...
Logged
Well you *do* need a signature...

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6352
  • Respect: +25650
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #220 on: December 11, 2012, 06:03:24 pm »
+1

Allegedly, the biggest-selling LCG in Japan is a game called "Tanto Cuore", a maid-themed deck builder. While a lot of its mechanisms are practically identical to Dominion, its basic currency costs one more than the Dominion equivalent (so the $1 costs $1, the $2 costs $4 and the $3 costs $7). Did you ever consider doing anything like this in Dominion - particularly, moving Copper off the $0 price point?
I never considered Copper not costing $0, because I wanted something you could do usefully with no money. Obv. they can sell out, and I have seen that case, I have seen the Coppers sell out and someone with no money. Obv. I try to avoid that being so possible in games with published cards, and if I've done that then does it matter that Copper costs $0, but what, it still seems nice that it does. And of course since it costs $0 that affects things.

The treasures had their costs from game one. The way to think of it is, all of the other costs were tweaked to work with them.
Logged

^_^_^_^

  • Minion
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 502
  • Crazy, You Have Been Warned
  • Respect: +111
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #221 on: December 11, 2012, 06:44:36 pm »
0

So the player learns as the developer developed the game ;]

This brings up another question:
Was any tweaking done to Estates/Provinces/Colonies?
Logged
"Chicken Chicken Chicken"-Doug Z
"Chicken Chicken Chicken"-Donald X
The cost to buy me is 5Copper. What's Your Cost?

ftl

  • Mountebank
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2056
  • Shuffle iT Username: ftl
  • Respect: +1345
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #222 on: December 11, 2012, 06:54:37 pm »
+2

In case Donald doesn't want to add more, I'll quote things he's said before:

http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=115.0

Quote
Estate, Duchy, Copper, Silver, Gold: These cards are unchanged from day one. You could argue that the actions got tweaked to fit the treasures. The treasure pile sizes changed to match different estimates for the total set size, and ended up generous on all counts. In development the issue of the names for these came up - is it simpler if it's Copper Mine rather than Copper? In the end you can see that Copper won out. It just makes it a lot easier to name action cards if the treasures are treasures rather than mines.


http://wiki.dominionstrategy.com/index.php/Province

Quote
As mentioned in the BGN article, we changed [Province] from 5 VP to 6 VP during development, as part of the fix to the Duchy rush. The Duchy rush was, you buy nothing but Silver and Duchies. At the time the game ended when any Victory pile ran out. If one person went for the Duchy rush you could beat them, but if two people did, you had to join them. My friends found this strategy, but it didn't seem like a problem. It was a boring strategy, so the only reason to play it was if you thought it would win for you. It wouldn't though; it would win for someone at random, since we would all follow suit. You could make the game suck but that's it. So we never did it. Well would you believe, being able to make the game suck is not so hot. Furthermore, if you're a new player, the Duchy rush may elevate your chance of winning from zero to even. So it was in fact a problem. An anonymous playtester realized this, Valerie and Dale raised the alarm, and in the end, Province changed from 5 VP to 6 VP and the end condition changed from "any empty victory pile" (the end condition we were using at the time, but not the original one, which was "any empty pile") to the one you know. We tried ideas that Valerie or Dale came up with, but in the end happened to go with something that I suggested (which is why I didn't count this when I mentioned Thief as the only card they changed). These two changes were easily the most important changes during development.—Donald X. Vaccarino, The Secret History of the Dominion Cards

http://wiki.dominionstrategy.com/index.php/Colony
Quote
This always cost Coin11.png height=16. Originally it made 8 VP. At the time Province was worth 5 VP. When Province went up to 6 VP, I changed this to 9 VP. It stayed like that for a while. 9 VP seemed like a good spot for making both Colony and Province viable in Colony games. In development, Valerie and Dale really wanted it to be worth 10 VP. 1 - 3 - 6 - 10! Except, the 1 and 3 there really don't mean much; Estate and Duchy are not bargains. For a while I said, sure, maybe 9 VP isn't the right value, but you know, it sure has seemed good in testing so far. And it had. It had seemed just fine. I finally tested it at 10 VP anyway though. And well, it usually didn't make a difference in who won, and it made counting scores easier, and it looks prettier. And attacks and rush strategies already push you away from Colony; it's fine if some games you really don't want to stop at Provinces. So 10 VP it is.—Donald X. Vaccarino, The Other Secret History of the Prosperity Cards

Though we would of course love to hear more :)
« Last Edit: December 11, 2012, 06:58:25 pm by ftl »
Logged

Donald X.

  • Dominion Designer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6352
  • Respect: +25650
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #223 on: December 11, 2012, 06:57:29 pm »
+2

Was any tweaking done to Estates/Provinces/Colonies?
Province was originally worth 5 VP. I changed it to 6 VP as part of the fix for the Duchy rush (the other part was changing the end condition from "any empty victory pile" to "any 3 empty piles, or all provinces gone").

Colony was originally 8 VP. I changed it to 9 VP when Province went to 6 VP. Valerie and Dale wanted it to be 10 VP so that the victory cards went 1 - 3 - 6 - 10, even though the 1 and 3 there don't belong. I tried it and found that it didn't matter much in terms of game play, but it did look nice and made counting scores easier. So Colony went to 10 VP.

Estate and Duchy never changed. Well the very first versions weren't named.

Edit: There was nothing new to say. They're green because I had a lot of green paper, I could mention that. At the time I printed in black and white on colored paper.
« Last Edit: December 11, 2012, 06:59:03 pm by Donald X. »
Logged

Powerman

  • Jester
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 766
  • Respect: +605
    • View Profile
Re: Interview with Donald X.
« Reply #224 on: December 11, 2012, 07:18:26 pm »
0

all my firend buyz is money and he winz. pls help.

Do you consider yourself more of a BM-ish player or an engine player?

What's your favorite type of pie?

How did you decide on the artists for the cards?
Logged
A man on a mission.
Pages: 1 ... 7 8 [9] 10 11 ... 225  All
 

Page created in 0.061 seconds with 21 queries.