Ugh, it's been too long since I posted again. I thought I was getting better at this, but I guess not. No worries, tho... I have been busy.
The bulk of my attention is still devoted to developing Sky Pirates. I'm hoping that by the end of this year, I will be able to print a few early prototype copies and send them out for blind playtesting. Part of this process is writing the rulebook, which I have started on, even if it's really early; at this point I'm just deciding on how I want the rules to be organized. At least there I can start with how the Manaforge rulebook is set up (which I think came out passably good) and work from there.
However, the rules for Sky Pirates are still evolving, if only a little, and so I need to make sure those are stable before I can really write the rulebook. The tokens shown above are one of the ways that the rules have changed since I last posted.
Sky Pirates has always had one glaring flaw: going first is a disadvantage. You become the automatic target for scouting by everyone else, and you get fewer chances to react to everyone else's plays. My first attempt to get around that was the addition of a '6th round' to the game, where instead of playing cards, everyone gets one free scout effect and that's all. I figured that would give the first player a chance to scout something put down by the other players on the last round. It helped a little, but it always felt really awkward having an extra 'turn' that didn't really do much. And I don't think it went far enough.
Additionally, and not related, I also had a couple of people complain that it was easy to get a run of bad cards. A bad hand at the beginning of the game could easily put you behind, and bad draws throughout the game could mean that you have no way up keeping up with everyone else. (Of course, I'd like to think that there are no 'bad' cards, but I know on some level that's not exactly true. At best, there are cards that are only situationally useful, and it's those that you don't want to get too many of.)
At some point, I had an epiphany. The extra scout was useful but the 6th round didn't work, so that needed to change. I got the idea of pulling that mechanic out of the turn structure and creating a player power out of it instead. So now, each player gets one token (called a 'command' token in this iteration, though that will probably change) that basically says 'scout once'. You turn in the token and you get a free scout, with no time restrictions at all; you can use it literally any time, even if it's not your turn, up until the game ends and all the cards are flipped over.
Plus, to address the problem with drawing bad cards, I added a second option to these tokens. Instead of scouting once, you can 'recruit' twice. (Recruit being a keyword in the current iteration that states 'draw X cards, then discard X cards'.) So you have the option of improving your hand, or gaining information, usable any time, but only once.
I think the addition these tokens definitely improved the game, addressing three different problems all at once. Players each have one more option to fix a bad situation. However, there was still traces of the original problem lingering around, where going first is a disadvantage. I had someone suggest that the command token for the first player should be buffed up a bit to try to compensate for that. So I'm currently at this latest iteration, where I now have a pair of +2 and +1 command tokens, given to the first and second players respectively, that are stronger than the standard ones. Additional scouts or recruits, plus a third option: each token has some attack power symbols on the opposite side (not pictured here) that you can add to any fleet. Again, each can only be used once, and only for one of their options, but it hopefully will offset the going first penalty somewhat. I'm a little concerned that I made them too strong, but I can only determine that by playtesting.
With fingers crossed, I'm hoping the rules will settle down soon. It seems like I'm close; it's all balancing changes at this point. With a lot of luck I will be able to launch this as a Kickstarter in the first half of next year.
The bulk of my attention is still devoted to developing Sky Pirates. I'm hoping that by the end of this year, I will be able to print a few early prototype copies and send them out for blind playtesting. Part of this process is writing the rulebook, which I have started on, even if it's really early; at this point I'm just deciding on how I want the rules to be organized. At least there I can start with how the Manaforge rulebook is set up (which I think came out passably good) and work from there.
However, the rules for Sky Pirates are still evolving, if only a little, and so I need to make sure those are stable before I can really write the rulebook. The tokens shown above are one of the ways that the rules have changed since I last posted.
Sky Pirates has always had one glaring flaw: going first is a disadvantage. You become the automatic target for scouting by everyone else, and you get fewer chances to react to everyone else's plays. My first attempt to get around that was the addition of a '6th round' to the game, where instead of playing cards, everyone gets one free scout effect and that's all. I figured that would give the first player a chance to scout something put down by the other players on the last round. It helped a little, but it always felt really awkward having an extra 'turn' that didn't really do much. And I don't think it went far enough.
Additionally, and not related, I also had a couple of people complain that it was easy to get a run of bad cards. A bad hand at the beginning of the game could easily put you behind, and bad draws throughout the game could mean that you have no way up keeping up with everyone else. (Of course, I'd like to think that there are no 'bad' cards, but I know on some level that's not exactly true. At best, there are cards that are only situationally useful, and it's those that you don't want to get too many of.)
At some point, I had an epiphany. The extra scout was useful but the 6th round didn't work, so that needed to change. I got the idea of pulling that mechanic out of the turn structure and creating a player power out of it instead. So now, each player gets one token (called a 'command' token in this iteration, though that will probably change) that basically says 'scout once'. You turn in the token and you get a free scout, with no time restrictions at all; you can use it literally any time, even if it's not your turn, up until the game ends and all the cards are flipped over.
Plus, to address the problem with drawing bad cards, I added a second option to these tokens. Instead of scouting once, you can 'recruit' twice. (Recruit being a keyword in the current iteration that states 'draw X cards, then discard X cards'.) So you have the option of improving your hand, or gaining information, usable any time, but only once.
I think the addition these tokens definitely improved the game, addressing three different problems all at once. Players each have one more option to fix a bad situation. However, there was still traces of the original problem lingering around, where going first is a disadvantage. I had someone suggest that the command token for the first player should be buffed up a bit to try to compensate for that. So I'm currently at this latest iteration, where I now have a pair of +2 and +1 command tokens, given to the first and second players respectively, that are stronger than the standard ones. Additional scouts or recruits, plus a third option: each token has some attack power symbols on the opposite side (not pictured here) that you can add to any fleet. Again, each can only be used once, and only for one of their options, but it hopefully will offset the going first penalty somewhat. I'm a little concerned that I made them too strong, but I can only determine that by playtesting.
With fingers crossed, I'm hoping the rules will settle down soon. It seems like I'm close; it's all balancing changes at this point. With a lot of luck I will be able to launch this as a Kickstarter in the first half of next year.
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