Skip to Content
 

Mechanic Ideas for Atompunk caravan progression puzzle game

11 replies [Last post]
Wed, 09/07/2011 - 07:52
Cogentesque
Cogentesque's picture
Offline
Joined: 08/17/2011

Heya all,

I am slowly getting together all ideas on my new game and was wondering if any of you had any cool ideas to add into the bubbling pot.

Currently it is an Atompunk (post apocalyptic) caravan style progression game. Each turn(s) will have an exploratory Battlestar Galactica style "In order to progress to the next area you need X water, Y fuel, Z kills and P caravans". Win condition is getting to the end of the designated number of areas. Game time < 40mins, players 1-4

The Tableau will represent your caravan, outriders and resources. There will be a line of your caravan cards (about 6) in front of you and resource cards above and below each. Each caravan will have effects that it exerts on anything to its right, left, top, bottom - thus there will be a lot of puzzle-piece positioning within the game: "Water Purifier: +1 resource to any caravan to the right, -1 to the left, active ability: Turn all fuel above the caravan into water (cost 1 fuel) +1 to any combat check if in position 1" and of course, certain caravans would have great synergy with others next to it: creating a constantly changing overarching abstract puzzle element.

Mobs would be rerepsented by a stack of flipping cards "Wolf pack: Attacks the caravan at the front of your line" or "Nuclear Miasma: attacks your caravan 2 places in" - in a similar manner to the new(ish) space marine card game (I forget the name).

Heavy co-op play: all must win together or lose together, but some players may not win if they have not satisfied certain conditions. (to avoid alpha geeking, and tertiary "Co-op by accident" play). So co-op players would get significant bonuses in helping eachother survive, while balancing there own caravans out.

If anybody has any ideas on mechanics or changes & additions to develop some of the ideas, however insignificant or obscure you think it may be, I would be most grateful if you could let me know, and of course if any ideas become central themes to the game and it gets the kickstarter funding, I wold love to have your permission to put a thank you to you personally in the manual.

Thank you very much.

Top
Wed, 09/07/2011 - 12:39
#1
bonsaigames
bonsaigames's picture
Offline
Joined: 12/20/2010
Looks good

Looks good so far, I'd love to read a prelim rules set.

Top
Wed, 09/07/2011 - 13:31
#2
Cogentesque
Cogentesque's picture
Offline
Joined: 08/17/2011
Well thanks Bonsai! :D Made

Well thanks Bonsai! :D

Made me smile :)

Top
Wed, 09/07/2011 - 21:43
#3
feNix
feNix's picture
Offline
Joined: 01/06/2010
You had me at atompunk.

I had to wipe the drool away. I need more games with a post-apoc steampunk feel. Maybe I should try Fallout Warfare? Anyways, I digest...

I agree, a look at the rules would keep me from suggesting anything that you might have already implemented. Plus, I just wanna look. :P

Top
Thu, 09/08/2011 - 04:55
#4
Cogentesque
Cogentesque's picture
Offline
Joined: 08/17/2011
feNix, well you my friend are

feNix, well you my friend are EXACTLY the kind of guy I need to speak to - the rules are literally being developped (as in, tomorrow, they might change radically) I'm getting LOADS of ideas together before I start cracking on down one serious path but the op in this thread gives you an idea - puzzle mechanic kind of moving caravans to maximise your stats and resource and prepare against attack:

Tell me your ideas please!! :D

Top
Thu, 09/08/2011 - 05:44
#5
bonsaigames
bonsaigames's picture
Offline
Joined: 12/20/2010
Classes?

Do you have something like classes / jobs for the players to represent in the caravan?
Without some unique way to interact with the game environment players can become bored in co-op games.
Imagine Pandemic if the players didn't have a job with special abilities.

Top
Thu, 09/08/2011 - 18:36
#6
Empires
Empires's picture
Offline
Joined: 05/18/2011
Timbuktu

I would take a look at http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/691/timbuktu, I had gotten a chance to play it at Strategicon last weekend.
The thief mechanic could be similar to your mob, where you could capture "surveillance outposts" and they give you small bits of info of where the mob will attack, what resources they steal, and what weapons you could use effectively against them. Just a thought, thanks.

Top
Fri, 09/09/2011 - 03:46
#7
Cogentesque
Cogentesque's picture
Offline
Joined: 08/17/2011
Yeah Bonsai - that's cool, I

Yeah Bonsai - that's cool, I totally know what you mean, I may well have to integrate 4-8 types of player characters that subtly change their actions with whoeverer there player card is. Thats a good idea.

Thanks for the reccomendation empires, I will most definitely take a look at that, I like the idea that you will have more and more small bits of imformation about the thief to give you motivation to change your caravan setting in order to predict and counter the mobs. I am going to hvae to buy a copy now! tsk!

Thanks both you guys, these are great any more ideas? Any more ideas on how the resourfes will work? Resources placed spatially above and below the caravan slots, to allow for further manipulation - is that cool? Should I change it? Is simply "in your hand" better?

Top
Fri, 09/09/2011 - 12:33
#8
bonsaigames
bonsaigames's picture
Offline
Joined: 12/20/2010
Resources

For now I think having resources above and below works. You'll learn more about this in playtesting. I really like the cascading effects (effecting the caravan cards to the left & right).

Top
Fri, 09/09/2011 - 15:54
#9
Bloodbunny
Offline
Joined: 09/08/2011
quests

I don't know if you've already incorporated that, but you could add optional quest possibilities. For example, the caravan may pass an abandoned military base. The player could decide if he enters, and risks the loss of people by unknown dangers in exchange for weapons and fuel. And to make it a dilemma for the player, there could be a separate card pack or table for possible dangers. Maybe the base is really abandoned, and apart from some starving rats, the infiltrators are safe. Maybe it is the base of operations for a gang of supermutants. Maybe it has a self destruction mechanism for unwanted visitors, etc.

Top
Mon, 09/12/2011 - 05:12
#10
Cogentesque
Cogentesque's picture
Offline
Joined: 08/17/2011
Hey guys, thanks so much for

Hey guys, thanks so much for all of your help so far - I love the ideas!

Ok so at the moment I am here:

Some Caravan elements will have Damage bonus. As in, gun bed will always have damage bonus of 2. If it is supplied with the correct INSERT_NAME_HERE (points/backup/exertion/level/resource/placing points/spatial bonus/geographic bonus) from the two caravans either side of it - it needs 5 overall (from each side totalling 5) - then it will increase it's damage bonus by 3. So damage bonus would be 5 total: this damage bonus would be able to affect all caravan elements within 2 spaces left or right (similar to Space Hulk: Death angel).

So , mr Wolf (mob) has attacked caravan element number 2 and the gun bed is in range with with a natural damage bonus of 2 and a further bonus (due to spatial placing) of an additional 3. Making 5 in total..

How the hell do I resolve this?

1) Can I involve the "use 1 or 2 extra fuel to have a 50% or 70% chance (respectively) of victory against the wolf.

2) Or perhaps should I do something like: Wolf HP is 4 - and your damage is 5: congratulations you have killed it. If wolf hp was 6 - you would not have killed it, and would have needed to spend some of your fuel in order to bolster your damage bonus enough to kill it (say 1 fuel = 1 damage bonus). And if you couldnt equal or beat his defence of 5 with your total damage bonus AND your spent fuel - then the caravan is destroyed.

3) Or perhaps - each caravan has an hp value itself and the mobs do damage to them? Disabling certain mechanics of them in certain ways?

4) This is a co-op game, so how can do I scale up the battle to have the same(ish) (eg: 80% total chance of killing the wolf) result when there are 1 or 2 or 3 or 4 players? Does the wolf attack each player in turn, are there additional mob cards drawn for every player, or mobs scaled up with more players? The sum of the players is greater than its parts : so 1 player = 1 wolf, wheras 2 players > 2 wolves and 3 players >> 3 wolves. How do I account for this?

5) Each player MUST and SHOULD want to help out their co=op friend buddies. How do I accomplish this? Simply add up the damage bonuses?

How can I resolve these kind of battles to keep it simple and to keep it fun?

Top
Wed, 09/14/2011 - 03:52
#11
Cogentesque
Cogentesque's picture
Offline
Joined: 08/17/2011
Getting some good ideas from

Getting some good ideas from bgg.

Anyone else fancy helping me out with my game :)

http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/696179/mechanic-ideas-for-atompunk-game

Top
Syndicate content


forum | by Dr. Radut