Realm: A Game of Influence by Enkoder Games

[Cyrus]

Realm: A Game of Influence by Enkoder Games

Rules v1.3 (current as of 8/10/11)
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ln8fS6PdwqIuoN52paasZ2xE2MfV2TNKZ_5Xx2LgpxE/edit?hl=en_US

I'm not too familiar with googledocs. If you need another format, just ask!
The rules are currently in various forms of disarray, so it would be reaaaaally helpful to me if one might read through them and tell me what doesn't make sense and if things should be reordered in some way to make the rules a more clear read from start to finish.

Feedback always welcome!

[Wisp]

I'm very impressed by this. I'll look at it a bit more in depth later.

EDIT: do you think having to pay influence to attack might make people play too defensively? I think it's a good mechanic, in fact i love the influence thing in general, but the battles a whole seem to discourage attacking except when you outnumber them significantly.

[Cyrus]

Hmm really? I'll have to look more into that, the way I figured it the battles were still in the favor of the attacker, maybe too much, because of all the things that can add to your influence gained, while only your opponent rolling sixes can kill your dudes and make you lose influence. I do agree, however, that of all the rules presented, the paying for battles part is the part I am the most shakey about.

Also, this game is not necessarily about playing aggressively. To really have a successful battle squad while maintaining decent defense should be something that is kind of difficult, or at least takes more than the first couple turns. The game *should* play out with most people establishing their territories by building up structures and training units in the beginning game, small skirmishes and political battles in the mid-game, then closer to the end of the game all out war will ensue to drain the last of the influence for other players. Obviously, this will take some playtesting.

[Wisp]

The battle system does seem weird in general. Testing indeed.

I think it's important for there to be a feeling of urgency and pressure at all times, not necessarily playing aggressively, but being pro-active.

[Wisp]

I incorporated your influence wincon into my old ccg mock up rules and played some test games... lot of potential there, although it doesn't gel with those rules well. stop slacking!

[cap.tiny]

winning and using your "influence" is an awesome idea. reminds me of The Spoils TCG, gaining and losing influence thing.

[Cyrus]

Never did play Spoils, even though it looks cool.

And yes I have been slacking, been a loooong weekend. Ready to dork out for the entire week, so I'll hopefully get some work done on this

[Cyrus]

Oh yeah I did make these... forgot to make any Action type cards... even in the rules... just noticed haha

(sorry they're huge)

[Wisp]

Looking good!

[Dragoon]

Looks good.

Some Hints:
- Cost icons (but I guess you are working on them )
- Replace 'primary effect -' with 'Action:' for actions. It looks much better.
- If something is a cost for actions, them make it seem so. I.E. 'Dismiss this unit to add 1 food to your stockpile.'
- Replace 'x costs x to craft' to 'Craft: x' It looks better

Keep up the good work.

[Cyrus]

Yes yes, I hate, nay, LOATHE working with icons... but I probably should make some.

The Primary Effect wording is actually a rules text in a way. It is telling you that you can only activate that Effect during your Primary Phase. See how the money bag has a Resource Effect instead? That's because you can only use that Effect during your Resource Phase. This needs clarifying in the rules, but in my defense those aren't real cards soooo I'm at least a little bit more in the clear for now.

Here's a big problem I've been having with continuing work on this game... I've been playing a TON of games like Dominion and Thunderstone, both deckbuilding games, thus that's where my mind is at right now. I need to get my head back into constructed games a little bit and work on this... but of course, I have a sweet idea for a deckbuilding game

[Cyrus]

What would you guys think of a combat system like this...

Each unit would have Combat Effects that would trigger based on rolls made during combat. So, a Combat Effect would look like this (notes in parenthesis)

Combat Effect:
1-3: Combat Total+2 (will probably need a new term for Combat Total to make this look less clunky)
4: Combat Total+1. Select a Unit. Destroy it at end of combat.
5-6: Combat Total+4.

Battles would work as follows...

Each player rolls a d6 for each point of Combat on their units involved in the battle. Then, starting with the attacking player, assigns 1 d6 to each of their units in the battle (dunno if it would be back and forth, or one player assigns all at once, hard to say). Once all d6s are assigned activate the effect on each unit with a Combat Effect matching the d6 assigned to them (probably in the same order as assigning the dice, maybe the effects would trigger as they're assigned, again, hard to say, and the kinks can be worked out). Any unassigned dice are ignored (or possibly add +1 to Combat Total).

Player with the highest Combat Total wins, then all "at end of battle" effects are resolved.

As far as assigning dice to units with Unit tokens on them, I would say, for now, that you only assign 1 dice to the card with the tokens on it, and resolve their effect once for each token as well. This would be a benefit of using the smaller, trainable units, in contrast to the disadvantage that they all have to be placed to the same Location (working on rules for that, more on that later).

In this setup I'd remove the sixes equal death rule, which I thought was probably pretty poor from the beginning. Casualty of War would now be described as any unit who was destroyed during combat, even during the "end of battle." The rest of the influence drain calculation would remain untouched by this new combat system.

Any thoughts?

[Wisp]

That's a fucking huuuuge number of dice

[Cyrus]

That's a fucking huuuuge number of dice

For the most part units would only have a Combat rating of 1-3, and realistically I think the most units you'd attack with at a time would be about 5-6. So the game would have to come with like 20 d6s or something, which personally I'm fine with, they're only about 10 cents.

[Wisp]

I'm not a fan of dice myself. more than 3 seems like a lot to me. still playing it online it doesn't make much difference