It's a Dvorak variant. THINGS include: Hill, Leader, Lookout, Tree, Shrub, Kid, Snowballs, Wall. ACTIONS (some associated with THINGS) include: Build Wall, Make Snowballs, Climb Tree, Throw Snowballs, Lob Snowballs, Cover, Sneak Attack, Ambush, Barrage, Recruit, Defection, Rally, Decoy, Mutiny, Abandon Position.
Certainly there will be some more exotic titles, too, such as "They live in my building" (Recruit 5 new Kids to your side now), "The Triplets" (replace any discarded Kid with 3 more now), "They went down throwing" (take out an opponent's Kid from a Sneak Attack), and "I'll take one for the team" (use a Kid to Cover another Kid).
Cards are drawn from three stacks, into the players' hands. Stack 1: cards shuffled and face down; Stack 2: cards shuffled; only top card face-up; Stack 3: same as Stack 2. Players may (1) take two cards (from any stack), (2) take one card, then play, or (3) play from their hand. After taking a revealed card, the next card on that stack is revealed. There are four discard piles: each player has their own, and there are two other discard piles used by both players, one is face-down, the other face-up. When any draw stack is depleted, cards previously discarded are shuffled and returned to play in place of the exhausted stack. There are special provisions for players to move cards out of their own discard piles (e.g. they must have a Leader in play, or control two hills, or...).
I borrowed the multiple-draw-stack idea from "Ticket To Ride". I thought it provided a good mechanism for preserving (some) hidden information, for rewarding a player with good memory, and for providing choice and variability of tactics (at least three opening play options).
Play might look something like this.... In the beginning, players maximize their draws, then begin playing cards out to set up a tactical move or a general strategy. The KIDs are the most versatile cards, possessing the greatest variety of basic actions, such as BUILD WALL, LOB SNOWBALLS, or CLIMB TREE. Once a player has put a few KIDs in play, they might want to play out a LEADER, so they can also carry out tactics requiring coordination, such as AMBUSH, FLANK, or CHARGE. Each turn, a player might give up a drawn card to benefit from the action of a card in play instead or to add a new card to play from their hand; or even yield both cards to permit two turn actions/plays. On any turn, an opponent might opt to take an offensive move. Thereafter, players will alternate between building their reserves and expending them, but eventually, attrition or fortunate circumstance will yield a victorious team.
How would you lead your KIDs? Build lots of WALLS to COVER your SNEAK ATTACKS, FLANKS, and AMBUSHes? Or, make a million SNOWBALLS and launch a series of BARRAGEs instead? You've got no HILL or TREE in play, so you'll need to hold onto your AMBUSH cards to thwart all those SNEAK ATTACKs you won't see coming; you've got to put a LEADER in play first, and you're stuck with only two KIDs, none in your hand and none showing on the stacks.
I could go for some hot chocolate.
