Game idea:
Story: 12 people somehow related to old man Leroy are invited to his mansion for a reading of the will. In this reading an heir is named. The heir will become fabulously wealthy...upon leaving the house. And, the will stipulates, that in case the heir dies, there have been subsequent heirs named.
I would really love any feedback on my idea and maybe some tips on how to get a prototype going. I have this outline and that's it as of right now. I don't really know what to do next...
Pieces:
15 upper floor room tiles
15 lower floor room tiles
Study tile
Stair tile
Foyer tile
23 trap cards
11 3d traps
9 trap tokens for foyer
23 evade cards
12 people
12 people cards with name and flavor text
12 people cards with just pictures
Each player (2-6 ) gets cards with people on them. These cards should be kept hidden. The first room tile is a study with a table and a large empty picture frame. The photo cards of the characters are shuffled and put into the frame. The top one is flipped over to face outwards. This person is the current heir. The objective of the game is for the heir to get out of the house. Everyone else is trying to kill them. When one heir dies the next card is flipped over revealing the next heir. When every character a player controls dies they are out of the game.
Game play progresses as follows. All the pieces start in the study upstairs. This tile will be larger than the others and should have a table and a fireplace. The turn order should be randomly assigned. Each turn gets a movement turn and an effect turn. On the movement turn the player rolls two dice which determines the movement of two characters. He/She must designate which two characters will be moving this turn before they start moving them. The characters must move through doorways and flip over random upper level tiles as they search for the stairs. Some rooms will have a Ω symbol which designates the player can pick up a evade card. Other rooms will have a Θ which signifies a trap has been sprung. The top card of the trap deck is reveled and placed in this room. If an evade card is drawn movement is not halted but when a trap is sprung it is. If a permanent trap is sprung, each character trying to go through the room must evade the trap. Then the player repeats this process with the other character they have designated. This continues until the heir is killed or escapes. Once the stairs are discovered the first floor landing must be placed on the board and first floor tiles must be flipped until the foyer is found. The Foyer is the way to escape.
Trap cards:
There are three different types of traps, permanent, one shot, and deadly.
PERMANENT
The permanent traps have corresponding 3d pieces that must be placed in the room once the card is drawn. The trap requires the player to roll a dice and beat a certain number to evade the trap.
Statue: roll higher than a 4, if do not evade character is killed.
Lasers: roll higher than a 3, if do not evade character is killed
Stairs: roll higher than a 3, if do not evade character loses turn.
Trap door: roll higher than a 5, if do not evade, character is trapped unless released by another player
Fire place: roll higher than a 3, if do not evade character loses a turn.
Slippery floor: roll higher than a 2, if do not evade character loses turn.
Deadly snake: roll higher than 4, if do not evade character is killed.
Pendulum: roll higher than a 3, if do not evade character is killed.
Sticky Floor: roll higher than a 2, if do not evade character movement is reduced by one.
Suit of Armor: roll higher than a 4, if do not evade character is killed.
Monster: roll higher than a 3, if do not evade character loses turn and monster moves to room in a random direction (cannot move into room with another permanent trap).
DEADLY:
These traps can only be played once but are always deadly. If this card is pulled and the player does not have an evade card or does not wish to use their evade card, the character is instantly killed. Other players may not play evade cards on deadly traps.
Weak floor (2)
Spiked walls (2)
Explosion (2)
ONE SHOT:
These traps work just like the permanent traps but they do not remain in the room once used.
Poison Gas: roll 4 or higher to evade (move out of room on evade) if do not evade lose a turn. (2)
Firecracker: roll 3 or higher to evade, if do not evade lose turn. (2)
Flash Grenade: roll 3 or higher to evade, if you do not evade movement is reduced by 1. (2)
Evade Cards:
These cards are drawn upon entering most rooms.
Anti-evade (adds a -1 to an evade roll) (2)
Bonus evade (adds +1 to an evade roll) (4)
Super Bonus Evade (adds +2 to an evade roll) (2)
Deadly Evade (evades only deadly traps) (2)
Instant evade (instantly evades any trap) (1)
Second chance (allows player to reroll the evade roll, but player must use second roll) (3)
Double speed (allows player to roll two dice to evade and choose whichever they want to use) (2)
Saving Light (instantly transports player into another room at random with no ill affect.) (1)
Instants (2 flash grenade, 2 firecracker, 2 poison gas)
Final room (Foyer)
The foyer will be a three by three grid and each time someone moves on a square they must roll a dice to see if the tile is trapped. An even number is not and odd number is. Then the player must try to roll higher than the number on the trap roll. When a tile is trapped it is trapped until the square in front of the door is trapped, or there is no path through the room.
The game ends when there is only one player left or when an heir leaves the house.
thank you so much for your response. i didnt notice until you pointed it out about the lack of player dynamic. i think im going to try to find a way to encourage players to keep the people they control secret. thus the heir player couldn't just explore the house with their lackeys. i think ideally the other characters would want to explore the house since the death rate should be pretty high and there should hopefully be a quick heir turnover. that would be where the strategy of getting your characters close to the exit without being to conspicuous would come in. I liked the suggestion another poster made about allowing characters to set traps on other players. also, i can see that my idea might involve too much space so i think i may downgrade to tokens or figures instead of cards. again thank you so much for the input. I think the peek cards are a great idea and yeah the three types of traps are pretty unecessary now that i think of it. the only reason i thought 3d models could be fun is because if the character doesnt evade the trap you could actually kill their token ex. drop the statue on them or make them fall down the stairs. but if i am going for a more serious gamer audience i suppose that little kitschy bit isnt as important. :)