So I've been working on an evil genius idea for a game. Recycling old mechanics that I liked and trying to make something fun that really works.
theme:
The idea is that everyone is playing a different Evil Overlord who just happens to have their nefarious go off at the same time. Everyone is competing to have the most influence and be the #1 evil mastermind in the work. This is done by collapsing governments, defeating super heroes, kidnapping celebrities, sabotaging the competition, etc.
setup/gameplay:
The board is a diagram of the planet, with 20 major cities and some crucial interconnected spaces. Players can have a maximum of 3 agents on the board but each only starts with 2 of the lowliest minions. Each player is given a 25 card deck that includes minions, facilities and schemes based on the “personality” of the villain. This whole deck will be available to you the whole time. You play what you want, and it will give you a small bonus to your regular income as well as give you a cost of maintenance. The upgraded minions on the field will give you bonus abilities they can use (such as the spy, that can find an enemy base if he’s on it, or the saboteur, that can incapacitate all your minions on one spot for a turn, or the thug that can kill one of your fielded agents) The agent upgrades you can field are dependent also on the rooms that you build, so, if you are playing the league of shadows, who excels at sneakiness and sabotage, you would need a spy school or the equivalent before you can play your spy. All 20 major cities will have 5 mini-card stacked on them. This is the events deck. It might have natural occurrences that destroy something or kill your minions, or it might have heroes and superheroes that rise up to save the day against you, or it might have precious things that happen to give you a bonus. There will also be a black-market deck, which anyone can buy from that will give you neutral rooms as well as mercenary agents that are generally superior to what you can field yourself, but most of them will have very designated skill set.
I’m not sure yet what the end-game condition will be, but these ideas are what pops into my head for the actual game. I like the idea of you building a secret base, and extending your reach out to the world. Being able to build barracks and facilities to improve your people or the kind of things they can field. And I really like the idea of having to be cautious not to give away your position. Since as long as no one knows where you are, then no one can target you.
I’m really looking for ideas on factions, as well as what I could do for end game. I thought about maybe doing it if any of the mini decks run out then the final round begins. I also thought that maybe it could be dependent on points, so there would me major artifacts, and minor artifacts. Maybe major would be worth 3 points where the minor ones would be worth 1, and the first person to 10 points wins. This would increase the need to keep your base a real secret as you don’t want anyone to be able to take their saboteur and mess up your base, or even send their thieves and spies to take away your hard earned loot.
Does this sound appealing to any of you guys? Have you seen anything similar?
Maybe the artifacts and schemes could have a notoriety value. It could reduce one per turn whenever that player doesn't do anything super bad, but if it ever hits the max level the game ends or something. Maybe it'd be better with a small deck and a small hand size. How would you feel about a hidden player board mechanic? I thought the combat could take shiny fr stratego. 9 beats 8 all the way down the line but 0 beats only 9