Hey all,
Not sure if this question has already been posted, but I'm looking for a way to create a voting mechanic in my game that provides in-game value/consequence, but doesn't always simply boil down to a strategic choice.
My game involves creating a project and launching it, and I'd like the other players to have a simple thumbs-up/thumbs-down vote whenever a player launches a project. If the project gets unanimous thumbs-up votes, the player receives a large reward, if the project gets a majority of thumbs-up votes, they receive a small reward, and if it doesn't get a majority of thumbs-up votes, they receive nothing.
The problem I'm running into is that I want players to cast their votes on the merit of the project itself, and not always necessarily just on whether they want to help/hurt the player launching it. For example, if Player X just wants to win, he'll simply vote thumbs-down on his closest competitors all of the time (regardless of whether their project is any good or not) so they don't receive any benefit. I'd like to prevent or at least curtail this.
The options I've thought about so far include leaving it as described above, and simply letting the players police themselves by taking note of when other players are helping/hurting them with their votes. Unfortunately I think this will just lead to a lot of tit-for-tat negative voting.
Another option I've thought about is to have a "Critic/Arbiter" player role for 3 players. The Critics would be randomly selected at the start of the game, and only they would be allowed to vote. Giving a thumbs-up vote would allow the Critic to keep their status for future votes, but if they give a thumbs-down vote, they would have to give up their Critic status by passing their card/role off to another player. This means that you'd have to be very judicious when casting your negative vote, and it adds another element of strategy to the voting. My only hesitation with this option is that again, I think the voting may become too strategic, and also it may over-complicate the game, and I'm trying to keep the game as simple as possible.
Does anyone have any suggestions how I might structure a simple voting system that isn't purely strategic?
Thanks!
Hey thanks for the suggestions guys!
I like the idea of having a cost associated with a negative vote - so continually giving Thumbs-down would hurt you strategically. I would just need to find the right price because all players won't necessarily have the same type of cards to discard...maybe a cash penalty?
I'm also starting to wonder if my idea of having 3 "Critics" would be any more complicated this system.
I like the idea of first, second and third place votes too - but only if I have voting happen at the end of the game. This is a possibility, but I'd have to scrap another mechanic I had in place for end-game awards.
Please keep any suggestions coming - they definitely help with the brainstorming!
Cheers