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Poke this idea full of holes please!

3 replies [Last post]
Tue, 03/31/2020 - 13:08
mcobb83
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Joined: 06/07/2016

So I love cooperative games, and I love deck builders. But the thing that gets me about deck builders is that even once you get that one really epic card, you still have to work your way through your deck of less epic to get it. Yeah, there are ways to mitigate it with draw and discard powers etc, but I was thinking there must be a better way.

Enter the big idea

What about a cooperative tableau builder? Each player is building their tableau to accomplish specific goals, and they can lend a portion of their tableau to temporarily help an ally. Cards exhaust when used, and if you use them while they are exhausted the card has a chance to be removed.

That's the idea in a nutshell. I have fleshed it out significantly from there as I have rolled it around in my head. But before I commit to prototyping I want to hear what could go wrong.

Thanks

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Tue, 03/31/2020 - 16:26
#1
questccg
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Joined: 04/16/2011
Just some other ideas...

TradeWorlds (TW) is both a Deck-Building game and RANDOMIZES player card piles to allow players non-linearly progression. What this effectively does is NOT force players to WAIT until the "weaker" cards are exhausted BEFORE having "strong" cards. The difference with TW is that cards you buy don't necessarily have a "Face Value".

For example: a Destroyer has a Capacity of nine (9). This is the strongest starship in your buy piles (and there are 3 copies). But without a STRONG Crew and Weapon (4,5 or 5,4) the starship is as weak or average as the cards used along with it...

So just because you bought the most powerful starship, doesn't mean you can get to exploit its POWER "immediately". Sure it's in your deck for future use and its "Trade Value" is 5 points.

And TW now has a CO-OP mode too... FYI!

This I don't think it's like your idea... Each Player in TW has his own Tableau of cards and as I have explained buy piles are randomized. Sometimes this may "favor" one player over the other... But for the most part, the games that I have played (and must be over 100 times), the randomization is not the greatest factor.

Best of luck with your Game Idea!

Note #1: In TW there is no SHARING of cards. Each player has his own Tableau (buy piles), Deck and Discard. We (I) did this because in the beginning I was selling One-Player Sets. OLG took it to the next level with 4 Player Big Box format in which we added Variable Player Powers and a bunch of extras... including the CO-OP mode!

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Thu, 04/02/2020 - 02:21
#2
tsq
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Joined: 02/07/2016
You don't like working

You don't like working through the deck to get an epic card, but just because you are sharing cards does not mean you won't have to wait for epic cards to come out. You have a better chance to get the card you want earlier if you have more than one player's cards to use, but it's still not guaranteed.

That being said, I think this sounds like a good idea. Even if you have an epic card you might not have what you need to power it, enter the other players cards. Or, there are some powerful combinations that can only be used by multiple players contributing cards.

I think a similar mechanic is used in Aeons End.

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Thu, 04/02/2020 - 12:35
#3
Juzek
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Joined: 06/19/2017
Suggestions! I can't really

Suggestions!

I can't really see any particular pitfalls from what you said, there is the standard how to balance an engine builder that scales up, has epic cards to play but doesn't get out of control. But the idea is exciting, and as I visualized what you said here are my brainstorming contributions, take it or leave it as you wish:

1. What if cards never were removed or exhausted, you could have a limited number of slots in your tableau that could be shared? Suppose you only had 3 spaces to share cards, so the longer you wait to fill it up, the better the cards could be for everyone, but the more everyone is hurting in the meantime?

2. In order to get rid of cards (slow down the crazy engine building) in the tableau without players feeling like they lost something they worked toward, you could have cards get "upgraded" and cover up the previous cards with the newly purchased card.

3. Make the victory condition more about getting the players to complete their tasks at the same time, that way while one player is trying to speed up their engine, another may be trying to slow theirs down.

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