Ideas Needed: ancient mythology themed card game

I would strongly advise against targeting a game towards children... It is hard to get children interested in a game - for many reasons. One is obviously Video Games. Having said this, I have tried to market a Collectible Card Game for children and it has been a very difficult task.

Children are attracted by Television and Cartoons. You need to be in that space if you want to get marketing for your game. Therefore there needs to be a story around the characters in your game. If you have characters and a story, then maybe kids will recognize your *Branding*. If they recognize your branding, then they will tell parents they want such and such a game. It's the same when we were young, on television you had Transformers and He-Man. We wanted toys (and games) about them both...

Take Pokemon. It is selling well in CCG form because every kid has watched the Cartoon on Television. They have tournaments, chase card, etc. The have plush stuffed animals and other Pokemon *World* toys. Not to mention Video Games which go a long way to promote the Pokemon brand.

The other problem is that children DO NOT HAVE MONEY. No money means Mom or Dad needs to buy the game. How do they decide? Well a GOOD clue is Pokemon. Parent's also know the brand - why? Because kids ASK FOR IT... I want this Pokemon toy or this Pokemon Video game, etc.

I am now targeting my efforts towards a Mature crowd: one that has money to spend and enjoy play board games.

That is my two cents.

I agree with Quest that it's hard to get kids interested, but I think you're right to try. My son and daughter enjoy card games like Uno, Qwitch, and Guillotine (with my son, who is 9).

And anyone who home schools *and* integrates games into the mix has my admiration and respect. So, with that in mind, here are a few thoughts on the design:

1st, the central goal is easy to grasp: score the most points. Same goes for the basic rules: draw one, discard one, score one suit at the end of the round. With these, you've established a strong core.

Unfortunately, the "first player to 100 points" means your playing time will scale with the number of players. If you want to keep the game to ~20 minutes in all cases, you may need to adopt a goal based on the size of the deck. For instance, play until the draw pile is exhausted, and the player with the most points wins.

On a related note, the current mechanic for ending the round seems forced, but that's probably because I'm not understanding the context. Why do you need the round to end arbitrarily? If it's to inject strategy, is that level of strategy something 7 & 8 year olds appreciate. For example, some kids like playing special cards because it makes them feel powerful, even if the effect isn't strategically useful at that point in the game.

I love the idea of "tribute" and hope you can make it worth something or otherwise keep it in the game.

The simplicity of your specials is great, but in some cases, the effects don't create interesting choices. For instance, specials seem to have low value, so I always want to discard them -- except for 0, which I'm punished both for holding and for discarding.

Both Uno and Guillotine separate the "special abilities" from the "points," which makes the game easier to understand. It also makes the game automatically "self correcting" -- if I'm holding a lot of points, I can get a good score; conversely, if I'm holding a lot of specials, I can manipulate the game in my favor.

I don't want this to become a wall of text, so I'll stop here and post a follow-up. To summarize my thoughts so far:

-- Great core rules: clear goal, easy play mechanics
-- Great theme and interesting keywords like "tribute"
-- End-of-round mechanic feels too complex
-- Game time scales with number of players -- need a different end condition?
-- Tying specials to values complicates rules; if you're going to do it, specials should go with higher values to create interesting choices

Hey Jonsan,

Thanks for the further explanation. It helps a lot.

And I hope I didn't come across as critical of the game. I think it's a great idea with a solid core. I've never come up with a game with such a clean rule set.

On the subject of card choices, I may have misunderstood the rules. Here's what I was thinking, and you can correct me as necessary:

If I gain the end-round benefit from discarding a 1, why would I ever choose to keep it? Even with a random value added to my hand at the end of the round, I'm nearly assured to get something more than '1', so it's always the best strategy to discard it.

Zero is painful. I'd recommend trying a game without it to see what happens. Some kids become demoralized quickly in those circumstances. I do love the penalties, though. Have you tried a variation where discarding zero affects *all* players? Then no one feels put upon. It might be interesting to have "tribute" cards undo the effects of the last "zero."

Five provides an interesting choice. Keep the mid-level card or use it to help yourself, but possibly help others? Great!

On the subject of complexity, if your kids are handling it, then disregard my comments. I think my son would be fine. My daughter might find the rules too hard to track -- but maybe not. You'll know soon enough, either way, as you get other kids involved.

Regarding ending the round, have you tried this: allow a player to "go out" as soon as he holds all cards of one suit? In this model, you could make the "tribute" cards wild. When a player goes out, everyone scores his hand immediately. You could maybe add some abilities to the higher-value cards to remove cards from your hand or add them to someone else's. Then players have to risk the loss of that card with the benefit it provides. The game would end when the deck is dry, and the player with the most points wins.

EDIT: by "go out," I mean, "end the round." In other words, the round continues until one player holds a hand of all one suit, at which time everyone scores his hand and a new round begins.

Oh, and finally, here's what I meant by separating special abilities from values. Keep the numbered cards as-is, but move the special abilities onto new cards with no value. Think "Uno." Not sure it's a good fit for your game -- just tossing it out there.

Hope some of this is of use.

Mark

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Makes perfect sense, now. Can't believe I didn't get it right away...

In general, I like the idea of the 0s. I'm sure you'll find a way to keep them in. One other thought I had was to give them a "shoot-the-moon" style mechanic. For instance, you only get the negative effect if you play the *least* zeros in one turn. That way, you can unload them at the risk of someone else being able to unload more and stick you with the negative. There might be some hollering over that, though.

I know what you mean about the player who "goes out" getting too big a lead. Even without the wilds, though, I think it might be OK. I was more worried that getting a "flush" might take too long, which is where the wilds come in handy. Another way to help this is to allow players to discard first, then draw at the end of their turn. If they can "go out" with 4 cards, it'll take less time to get the flush.

Sounds like a great idea. The specials so far have good zing.

Yes, but I'm only suggesting that to keep the game time independent of the number of players. It could be that it takes 2 or 3 play-throughs of the deck to hit the 20-minute mark.

My pleasure. Glad to help. I'm sure you'll get to return the favor soon...

Mark

Ideas for getting rid of 0 cards:
Discarding a card of the same suit
Sacrificing a card of the same suit
Retrieving a card of matching suit from the discard pile
Playing a sacrifice without the usual additional card (you're using it to get rid of the 0, instead)
Any "special ability" used
Any "special ability" of the same suit used

I think you're right about the complexity of the 0 value cards, but, as you've said, only play-testing will tell. Have you considered giving the 0s the same power, but differentiate them by suit? For example:

Cannot take top discard if suit matches the 0.
Cannot use special abilities on cards of the same suit.
Cannot "go out" on the zero's suit.
Must discard in the same suit, otherwise, draw 2 cards.

One random thoughts: suppose you can't go out on the zero's suit. In that case, you could move the zero by playing the flush in its suit. In other words, if you could win in the zero's suit, you would move the zero instead, then draw back up to 5. Dunno...seems arbitrary and overly punitive, but in the spirit of brainstorming, I'm tossing it out there.