Poll: Favorite Types of Components

Having grown up with only the proverbial three black and white TV stations, no computers, no prime time movies on TV, etc., I'm not very visually oriented, nor tactilely for that matter. But I do like miniature plastic figures, especially ships. NOT meeple-like things that abstract the appearance, I like ones that look more "realistic".

Unfortunately such components are too expensive to require in a game design.

When the Southcenter WotC retail location closed I was told that I could take a little pail and fill it with dice and it would be priced by weight.

After I was roused to my feet, I got all sorts of dice; mostly off-the-wall d6s, but my favorite die is by far the d20, and especially the 0-9 twice through d20. If I'm able to throw in a d10 into a game, I will do so, just because the icosahedron is so appealing to me.

Wood bits are great to a point, you don't want so many that you spend all your time fiddling with them. One of the challenges I like to take on is mitigating the luck aspect of dice so that there's still that uncertainty factor, but a player who has a sound strategy can work around it.

Dice - especially bright colors.

OOOOOOOOOOHHH Shiny!

Nice, clean visuals are always a good thing. I'm big on things looking just right for the feel of the game (and I have a hard time getting into game that have cheesy "cheap CGI" looking graphics), but I think I get the greatest pleasure out of playing a game where the pieces feel solidly made. There's just something about pieces that have a little heft to them that somehow make the game more immersive to me. I like dice and playing pieces that feel substantial. My buddy's set of Settlers became warped, so he paid me to glue the tiles and edge pieces onto plywood. Funny as it sounds, I think that tactile experience (and the "clack" they make as we lay things out on the table" has added an extra bit of enjoyment for me.

I know that's not a specific game component, per say, but I do think it's always a treat to play a game where the pieces are made of something other than cardboard. Moving around three dimensional objects is just more fun (maybe it hearkens back to the hours of childhood spend playing with little green army men and action figures). And when those pieces are made of wood, a nice dense plastic, or painted pewter, it always adds a little something extra for me.

Despite all that, I actually would have to say my favorite specific component would have to be cards. I used to be a big dice person - and I still get a kick out of grabbing a fist full of dice and tossing them on the table - but most of the games I've been into recently have all had a card-driven element. With cards, you get (hopefully) a cool picture, you have the rules of that element printed on it right there in front of you, plus there's a nice sort of specificity to cards. With dice, you can use the same types of dice for a hundred different games - they're just sort of a stand in, while with cards, you get something that is specifically made for this game, in this moment, and the probability element is also customized and tailored to that specific game (though it goes without saying that each have their own advantages and disadvantages, and there are definitely times when dice fit the design of the game better than cards and vice-versa).