"Murder on the Dancefloor" (working title) will be a game about no holds barred, full body contact, ballroom dancing.
I aim to design a game that plays in a relatively short time (probably aiming for 30 minutes, give or take), and it will probably have player elimination. I'd appreciate your thoughts both on whether the game is interesting, and on any aspects of the design that might have escaped me.
Brief description:
There is a game board representing the dance floor, where players put their pieces. Players play "step" cards from a deck to dictate how their pieces move, score and interact. There are three positions in front of a player for the step cards. Players put a new card face down in the rightmost position as they prepare their next move, before revealing the middle card as their current move, which needs to connect properly with the left card which is their previous move. Then the moves are resolved, the left card is discarded, and the two remaining cards are moved once space to the left.
There are four judges located around the dance floor. Performing a step while the judge is paying attention to you (based on how close you are to the judge, and how your step resolves) will earn you points with the judge, while mis-steps (such as performing a move that doesn't connect with your last step, or colliding with another dancer) will earn you either a fault or physical damage, or possibly both.
A player's final score is based on the points earned across all four judges, with deductions for faults. A player may also be eliminated if they collect too many faults or too much damage.
Things I've already considered:
The "step" deck will contain a bunch of "Standard" and "Advanced" steps that are common to all players, and there will be a small number of "Shine" steps (names definitely not finalised) that are somehow unique to each player - I'll probably start by distributing them randomly, then I'll look at other options like drafting or character-specific moves.
I want the board to be tight, as in there is strong incentive for players to be fighting over the same spaces. I've attached a mock-up board to show one possibility. The idea would be that the spaces directly in front of each judge are where you're guaranteed to be noticed, but other spaces might let you catch multiple judges' attentions at once. The moves will tend more towards movement than staying in place, to make it harder to just stand in front of one judge and continually impress them, and I'm wondering whether to do a good old Knizia-style "your actual score is the lowest score you have with any judge" to really encourage players to cover all their bases, but otherwise it will probably just be a "total score with all judges" or similar.
I don't know how I want the game to end. Probably a fixed number of turns, maybe slightly random but with a hint about when the music will end - maybe even giving a bonus if you do a particular move on the very last turn.
I realised, after a while, that this particular kind of "programmed action" mechanism is pretty similar to that used in Killer Bunnies, which I've heard about but never played. I wanted to have the feel of getting into position for your next dance move, and needing to plan what you're doing next before you know exactly what your opponents are doing, to introduce an element of risk.
I don't have a strong idea for how I want combat/hurting other players to work. I want the game to feel like you're constantly jostling with other dancers, interfering with them, and definitely have a chance to collide or mess up. I could see some of the steps being sort-of attacks, but that's probably something I'll play with including and excluding to see how I feel.
I am genuinely impressed by the feedback already. Fast replies, but also incredibly useful ones. Thank you! Let's respond to a few bits.
Yes! I didn't state it, but the plan is for this to be simultaneous turns. It works thematically, and it keeps all players involved for more of the game.
- Include cards that cause damage but avoid detection by the judges
- Allow judges to award points for offensive maneuvers
- Increase the randomness/risk of judges detecting offensive maneuvers, but balance this with valuable payoff
Guilty. Like I said, I haven't worked out the exact plan for dealing damage. And I want there to be a tension involved in dancing close to someone else. In fact, that raises another point that I hadn't mentioned, which is that I'm worried about scaling.
I want the game to play with 2-4 players, but even on the board I attached an image of, you can see how easy it will be for two people to avoid each other. I might introduce neutral dancers so that there's always someone you have to avoid, but that will probably come after I've got the basic concept working.[/quote]
Yes. Absolutely. My thought at the moment is that you will have to accumulate enough faults and/or damage, and I will tweak that so that it's unlikely to happen too early.
Interesting. I think the board feels "right" to me, but I completely understand where you're coming from and I will squirrel that idea away.
I have a few ideas for ways to increase replayability, and player-specific abilities was one of them. Making those abilities a combination of two characters was not something I'd thought of, but I think it's a great idea and I'm adding that to my notes.
I had also thought about having different dances available, which creates a particular board effect each game. So maybe the foxtrot boosts movement, or a quickstep means you play two cards in advance.
These are ideas I will look into more once I have the basic game more bedded down.
Haha, thanks! I am aiming for a game that is mechanically fairly simple and understandable, but that has a good amount of emergent complexity. I'll probably experiment with a few different scoring systems, but I know that Knizia likes his "your score is the lowest of X, Y and Z" systems and I can see where that may open up some interesting strategic landscapes if I pursue it.