Making Risk-esque turns faster

Ahhhh Corsaire! I think I startled some of the people on the bus with my laughing.

I think that if you really need to keep all of those choices available all of the time, AND you want to keep the turns light, you could give each player only a single action per turn. This could keep the game moving at a brisk pace without forcing players to wait too long before making a decision. This could also help mitigate some of the 'analysis paralysis' inherent to larger games by giving players sufficient time to decide upon their next single action as their opponents play out their turns.

~R

I was thinking of similar mechanics for my game. I am notorious among my friends for analyzing every possible aspect of a game for several future turns and slowing the pace down (in Risk and Talisman in particular). However as a designer, I like the idea of limiting the number of actions a person can take per turn to make shorter, more frequent turns, like option #2 in the original post. Maybe you attack OR buy things, and can't take 2 attack turns in a row or something.

OK, now that I have more time and read it properly. One of My favorite solution in space battles is what Starfleet Battles does, where everyone is writing turn orders and they initiate on the same schedule. Works out pretty cool.

Though what I see is in many game sessions are that players self-moderate the pace. And players allow non-interferng simultaneous actions.

For option 1 you could use initiatives and every ship takes an action in initiative order?

If you call them fleets rather than ships, then losing a move for buyng would make sense. But at a ship level, I think it would feel artificial unless a ship defaults to mantaining heading.

And don't forgot while player B moves layer A can strategize which can distribute the tun load out. Doesn't play so well in Risk becuase of the boom-bust tendencies.

Are you planing to publish your game? Self publish or find a publisher?

I made a variant on RISK (pretty sure the post is on here somewhere) that made the game massive.....zepplins, ships and naval attacks, canons, generals and loads of other stuff that made turns even longer, similar to your problem. But you know what....that's what made the game fun. So many options, so much strategy that your opponent eventually misses something and opens the door for your to attack.

I say let it go.....get some beers, put on some tunes, leave the game set up if it isn't finsihed and come back to it next session.........unless you want a publisher to make it that is!