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Thursday, March 31, 2011

Notes from Thirteenth Playtest

Dan dies!
We changed the end game bonuses, removing the "highest score" bonus entirely, and reducing the "largest terretory" and H || G bonus to 5 points each.

This worked well, they feel more like tie breaks now than deciding factors. There's an increased concern about catch-up, and whether the winner will be a surprise, especially after Kris failing to kill a squirrel for 4 turns, giving up, and then his gatherer went and got killed by a bear.

We increased the amount of hidden information. The only thing you have to reveal now are deadly animals. This decreases the amount of poaching, adds a nice bluffing element, and requires just as much memory.

We adjusted the animal Hide & Meat values. Squirrel and Rabbit were worth 1 for each. Deer and Bear were worth 2 for each. Wolf was worth 3 Hide, Boar was worth 3 Meat. It's crazy, but the supply/demand thing really works with this market! By decreasing those numbers demand remained high, and we almost maxed-out the Hunt score track.

We made pouches disposable. Having a pouch was too much of an advantage. Now they are discarded after you sell what's in them.

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Prototype Game Tactics

I'll be the first to admit that I am a very tactical player when it comes to board games. I find my day job provides enough intellectual challenge that when it comes to playing games I just want to have fun, not plan 5 moves ahead. But I've been having enough success at this game that we discussed today what it is I've been doing to win.
  1. Watch the Market. Sell when your tiles are near the top, but don't get too greedy and wait for them to be in the very top slot.
  2. Watch what the other players have. If nobody else has killed a big animal, hold onto yours as long as you can until someone does, then sell immediately.
  3. Buy only the equipment you need. This game is short, points are precious. (at this time an equipment card costs 3 points)
  4. Take calculated risks. When you have nothing to lose, charge after that bear with a club! When you've already bagged a kill but aren't ready to sell, maybe poaching a rabbit would be a better idea.
  5. Keep an eye on the end game scoring bonuses. They are currently over-valued :P
Of course these strategies will change as the rules are fine tuned. And luck does play a large part in the game, a good or bad roll at a critical moment can mean the difference between bagging that bear, or an inopportune death.

Notes from Twelfth Playtest

Playtest with 3 players fit easily during a lunch break (not worrying about time anymore, that issue is solved).

We tried this whole big experiment where we split the animals into "small game" and "large game". It may have worked ok mechanically, but doesn't make any sense with the theme.

Also, we're starting to pick apart why it is I seem to win every game by 20-30 points. We know the "bonus" points are too high, but there are definitely some strategies I was using, it's not entirely luck.

To Clarify:

  • Gatherer swapping - what if you didn't know what was on the spot? Starting to suspect this rule might cause more confusion than it's worth considering how rarely it comes up, but I'll see how it plays when there's more hidden information.
To Try Next:
  • Fix the animal Meat & Hide numbers (lower Bear, higher Bird)
  • When exploring keep more information hidden, don't reveal tiles that you leave behind on the board.
  • Weaker Atlatl - just +1 damage, no "to hit" bonus. It was too good a bear killer, and too rare.
  • Pouches are disposable. Once you sell what was in it, discard it.
To Try Later:
  • Lower point bonuses (maybe remove high score bonus entirely). Maybe try this next.
  • Animals might be sold for either Meat or Hide.
  • Free equipment! Maybe instead of buying equipment, you just get one card free every time you go to the market?

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Notes from Eleventh Playtest

Playtest with 4 people ran 35 minutes (not including rules teach, which has gotten much faster, even if I did leave out some details - sorry Eddy).


Observations:

  • Meat & Hide still lose value very quickly in the Market
  • The pattern that appears to win the most games is Spear + Atlatl to kill a Bear, then wait until Meat & Hide have an average value >3 and sell.
  • 4 spaces movement still works, but you can pretty much cover the whole (explored) board
  • Point bonuses are definitely too high. They should be tie breaks, not make you (or rather me, sorry guys) win by 30 points.
Suggestions:
  • Reduce or even remove some point bonuses (point bonus for having highest score may be redundant, even though it's low score that gives you points)
  • Simplify animals to be either Small Game or Large Game (would a bear be 2x large game?) instead of Meat & Hide in the market
  • Let's revisit Equipment. If Pouches and Atlatls are so key to victory, there aren't enough of them, or they should be weaker (maybe both).

Saturday, March 26, 2011

Starting to Think About Components

Added a Components section to the rules. Looking at maybe using The Game Crafter and/or Superior POD to make print-on-demand prototypes, neither appears to have a minimum quantity, which is great because ideally I'd like to print 1, work out the kinks, and then print 5-10 to send around for blind playtesting.
  • Game Board - game crafter does 10" x 10" boards, which is modest, but may work since we're down to 24 tiles. May do a separate floating board for the Market. Score tracks could go around that or the main board.
  • Dice - 3 per player would be cool, but not realistic.
  • Player Boards - I scrapped these already. They'd be nice but haven't been necessary.
  • Prediction cards - such low quantity, may source these separately and distribute among several copies, or come up with an alternate component to hide this decision. 
  • Player Pawns - could be used for the score track, or could use cubes if can color match. Game Crafter has two types so those will work for Hunters and Gatherers.
  • Exploration Tiles - this is the key feature missing from Game Crafter, but Superior POD has them at 5/8" size.
  • Claim Markers - this could be tiles or anything that's flat and matches the player colorse.
  • Equipment Cards - next to-do is to knock this down to 30 (three per character per player = 3 * 2 * 5)

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Notes from Tenth Playtest

Playtest with 3 players ran 40 minutes with 24 tiles (plus once more around).

Kris rolls a 3 on 3d6 and dies!


What we tested:
  1. Removed the turn track. Game ends after the Explore Tiles run out, and everyone gets one last turn.
  2. Equipment is fixed cost at 3 points each, with no selling.
  3. The average value of the plant tiles was increased. See blog post on Tile Distribution.
Observations:
  1. It worked! The increased quantity of plants drove down their value and created more movement in the Market.
  2. There is definitely more opportunity for hidden information to cut down on grabbing stuff that other people find when they're the wrong role.
  3. The advanced rules for poaching & stealing (where you can collect 2 tiles in a turn) are probably not necessary, it just doesn't come up that often.

Monday, March 21, 2011

Losing the Turn Track - Tile Distribution

I need to get rid of the turn track. The game already has 2 score tracks, and it's hard to remember to move the tile along that track. Also, with fixed turns there's no way for players to effect the end game, no way to speed it up or slow it down.

The clearest solution is to end the game after the Exploration Tiles run out (plus maybe once more around so everyone gets a chance to visit the Market one last time). But to do this I'm going to have to figure out how to shrink the number of tiles and keep them balanced between plant/animal.

Here are some possibilities from crunching the numbers, given a target of somewhere around 24-40 total tiles, 3 different kinds of plants, and 5-7 different kinds of animals (removing Birds and/or Squirrels). I'm also trying to increase the average value of individual plant tiles, to decrease the demand for them.
  1. I could go with 3x of 7 different animals, plus 7x of 3 different plants for a total of 41 tiles.
  2. I could go with 3x of 6 different animals, plus 6x of 3 different plants for a total of 36 tiles.
  3. I could go with 2x of 6 different animals, plus 4x of 3 different plants for a total of 24 tiles.
My initial thought was 36 looks good, that's almost exactly half the current 70 tile board, and we go through half the stack in a game, right? But then I pulled out the board, eyeballed about how much of the 10x7 board we do actually fill, and it's really like a 5x5 box in the middle, so the 24 tiles is probably where I should start.

I'll venture some plant distributions for both 24 and 36 tiles anyway:

24 tile stack:

  • 1x plant (value 3)
  • 2x plant (value 2)
  • 1x plant (value 1)
For each of Nuts, Herbs, and Berries.

36 tile stack:
  • 2x plant (value 3)
  • 3x plant (value 2)
  • 1x plant (value 1)
Also for each of Nuts, Herbs, and Berries. I could just as easily have gone with 2 of each for the 36 tile stack.

Sunday, March 20, 2011

Notes from Ninth Playtest

Playtest with 4 people ran 95 minutes (2 new players, one second time). Completed 18 rounds.

Issues

  • Gatherers dying should be an optional rule, won't appeal to all groups.
  • Poaching and Stealing (abilities to take multiple tiles in one turn) should be optional, too much to teach for first game.
  • Meat & Hide still often sit at the bottom. It's easier to get a large volume of them by killing a big animal.


To Clarify

  • What do you lose when you die?
  • How to handle largest territory tie break?
  • Which weapons are good for which animals? (Some, myself included, would argue figuring this out is half the fun of the game. And the very fact that there is no straight answer is one of the nuances of the game. For example, you could kill a bear with one lucky blow from a club, two shots from a bow, or a spear followed up by a sling.)


Suggestions

  • Increase average value of Nuts, Herbs, and Berries could drive up the supply and lower the demand.
  • The board ought to have hex spaces, would prevent people from getting boxed out.
  • Reducing movement to 3 (and animals fleeing to 1) would increase importance of using your own network of claimed spaces, and reduce the decrease how often one person finds something with the wrong role, and somebody else takes it.
  • Look at reducing the cases in which you have to show everybody else what you've found. More hidden information = more strategy.
  • Thinking about reducing the point bonuses for highest score and guessing H || G, but keep the largest territory bonus because that's takes more effort to achieve.

Friday, March 18, 2011

Notes from Eighth Playtest

Playtest with 2 people ran 35 minutes (not including rules teach) and we completed 14 rounds.

End Game
This was a teaching game, so no new experiments, just one last run through with the turn track and equipment cost the way it is. Equipment is easy to obtain. Play is balanced, we went with Bow & Arrow vs. Atlatl & Spear, and that extra arrow that comes with the bow helps.

The rules are fairly simple and easy to explain, most of them are pretty intuitive (which is the hope if theme is really driving the rules), but at the moment there still feels like there's a fair amount of rules, and it's hard to remember all the little exceptions without a written copy of the rules or player aids. As I finish writing this first draft of the rules I'll either come up simpler ways to explain things, or consider how to remove them.

Here's the story from this game: I started out with a lucky early lead, showed how to take advantage of the market and picking up a pouch. Then I got eaten by a wolf (after celebrating drawing one, since hide was 5 in the market) and Brandon surged back. He killed the wolf, picked up a pouch, and caught up in territories. By end game we were tied in territory, Brandon had the high score in Gather, and he'd guessed correctly with his H || G pick. A nice introduction to the game I hope.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Notes from Seventh Playtest

Playtest with 2 people ran 1 hour (including setup, conversation, & scoring) and we completed 22 rounds.

General Thoughts
There's still a ways to go in fine tuning this game, but if there's one thing that's going really right it's that the game tells a story. There was that bear that sat next to the village and killed two of Kris' hunters, then later took out one of mine. Or that time I found an exploit in the movement rules with the bow, and ran halfway across the board to shoot a second bird. And that one lynch-pin space Kris stole to prevent two large territories from combining.


What we tested...

Bow comes with one arrow
The bow is definitely better, but still feels a little weak and is definitely disposable. Maybe it should be 4/2 in addition to this change?

Animal damage doesn't carry over
One less component is definitely nice, setup time is <5 minutes. It may have happened once where damage carrying over could have effected the game. There was a nasty bear right next to the village which killed both of us which may have died eventually. But it's worth it to get rid of the extra pieces.

Poaching & Stealing
These are the rules that allow players to take 2 tiles in one turn. If there are 2 face down plants at the start of the turn, and a gatherer is able to carry them, both can be taken. If there are 2 face down small animals (bird, squirrel, rabbit) a hunter may attempt to poach them both. Failure of memory or hunting switches the player into "exploration" mode.

This rule certainly came into play, and there are some tricky exploits with the bow's 1 tile range + free movement after a kill, that will need to be explained in the rules. It wasn't decisive, but could have been. When we try losing the turn track and trading tiles for equipment 1:1 this will likely have a large impact.

To clarify / add to rules:
  • Gatherers sell 1 tile at a time (this helps balance hunt vs. gather points).
  • Flush fore sale equipment if there are 4 of same item

Additional notes:

  • Agreed that Pouch is over-powered. Two possible solutions:
    1. Increase the number of pouches in the equipment deck, but discard them once you sell what's inside.
    2. Allow gatherers to collect two types of plant at a time by default.
  • Meat & Hide are still getting stuck at the bottom, so Gather is out scoring Hunt (even though I killed a large excess of animals!)

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Notes from Sixth Playtest

Playtest ran 35 minutes and we completed 12 rounds.

What we tested...

Gatherers can be killed by Wolf & Bear
It came up twice, we forgot the rule once, and Kris didn't die the other time :(

Bows can shoot one space away
Kris said at 3/2 it does still feel under powered, and feels like an insecure/unsafe weapon if you're using it against an animal on the same space that you're on (probably because it doesn't do enough damage to kill a deadly animal). Also it only worked ok because there were enough arrows to last the limited number of turns we played.

Swapping is a free action
Didn't really come up. Market started out with Meat & Hide at the bottom, we drew a bunch of stupid birds. All the plants were scarce and valuable.

General Observations:
  • Hunt has lost over Gather since we increased the value of the gather tiles (Correction: Hunt won in my 22 round 2 player game with Cybil)
  • Part of the problem is Meat & Hide move quickly down in market value
  • Killing a bear = winning :P
  • The smaller animals (birds & squirrels) are weak, they're hard to kill and not worth much
  • Pouches are still very powerful. Luckily we each got at least one.
Possible Solutions:
  • Trading low-valued tiles for equipment, and having them move up in value might help when Meat or Hide get stuck at 1 (but don't want to worry too much about Hunt/Gather balance, I can fix it with the numbers)
  • Maybe a hunter should be able to take more than one animal per turn, but only if they're face down on the board and small?
  • The Bow - I'd like to try having the bow itself come with one arrow, you'd turn it upside down once it was used. We could also try making it 4/2, but I think the critical difference between arrows and spears is that spears can be used by themselves.

Other ideas tossed about...

  • Eliminate the selling of equipment entirely, or reduce it to 1 point
  • Don't having damage markers carry over from turn to turn with wounded animals, that way we could remove another component.

Product Plan

Here is a roadmap for the design, development, and production of this game. Shooting for a balance of designing new features, refining and developing existing ones, and producing better art and components, that way nobody (especially me!) gets bored.


Phase I
A. Trim down the base game
B. Balance the two roles
C. Adjust the play time
D. Finish writing the rules and have them proof read by at least 3 people
E. Build better prototype

Phase II

A. Research print on demand options
B. Update rules and have them proof read by at least 3 people
C. Art production for base game
D. Brainstorm character names, skills, and flaws

Phase III
A. Playtest with 5 players

B. Typeset rules
C. Box cover art

D. Balance characters


Phase IV
A. Produce 5-10 print on demand copies
B. Character art?
C. Blind playtest with people who playtested Dragon Duel - Noah, Isaac, Josh, Erin, and others.
D. Share with more game groups
E. Bring to Cons

F. Show to publishers



Sunday, March 13, 2011

Notes from Fifth Playtest

Updated 3/14/2011

Finally got to play with Cybil! In addition to being my better half, she's the other half of my target demographic.
  • Explore, Swap, Collect - define these terms so that rules can be delivered clearly
  • Swap is always a free action
  • Pouch is very powerful, maybe lose it when sell everything in it?
  • Maybe more pouches in the deck
  • Think about solutions to when something gets stuck at 1 in the market - since it's usually the 5, 4, and 3 spots that get sold, and in lower quantities as you get higher, it's rare that enough of something is sold to bump at item up out of that last spot.
  • Possible hunter carrying limit via encumbrance, -1 move per animal.
  • Mushrooms and hunting traps should be part of an expansion or advanced rules, this set is really tight, they feel needlessly complex. 
It would still be cool if there was some chance that Gatherers could die, and maybe I can do it without introducing new components (and throwing off the plant/animal balance). We've talked about Gatherers having a chance of dying if they encounter a deadly animal. Maybe try to roll greater than 10 if they find a Wolf or Bear?

It might be that the solution to dealing with items that get stuck in the 1 spot in the market is to give you something else to do with them. Maybe I could scrap the whole equipment cost thing entirely and simply say you can trade 1 tile for 1 equipment. If I did that I could get rid of the turn/round track entirely, which is really hard to remember to do move. But I'd have to come up with a new way to keep the game time short.

Update from Discussion on Facebook
Instead of a turn track we might play until the stack of tiles runs out (after reducing the number of tiles). This would introduce a new "card counting" element. It would also guarantee we eventually encounter the full distribution of tiles, unlike last time I played where there was only one Nut the whole game. And it would self-balance the length of the game between 2-4 (or maybe even 5) players.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Mushroom Rules and Distribution

Rules for Mushrooms


Some Mushrooms are poisonous, and nobody really likes them enough to trade for them in the market. 


When your gatherer explores and finds or accidentally collects a Mushroom roll 3 dice. If you roll less than 11 your gatherer dies, discarding all tiles and any pouches that were in use. If you roll 11 or higher you may keep the mushroom face down. It counts towards your limit of the types of plants you can collect, but has no value in the market. You may secretly exchange it with other tiles following the same rules as with other types of gatherer tiles.


Tiles

Here is the current distribution of the 36 Gatherer Tiles:

  • 6x One Nut
  • 4x Two Nuts
  • 3x Three Nuts
  • 6x One Herb
  • 4x Two Herbs
  • 3x Three Herbs
  • 6x One Berries
  • 4x Two Berries
  • 3x Three Berries
Let's add 5x Mushrooms!

But to do that we'll have to remove some other tiles, and I'll use this opportunity to reduce them from 36 to 35, to match the number of animal tiles (5x seven different animals) and fit the 7x10 board (35 animal + 35 plant).

Dan also suggested we might have different distributions of different tiles. I'll keep the total value of all tiles
 of each type the same, but have more higher values of some types. I'll keep all the One Nuts though, because that's so funny to say out loud.

  • 6x One Nut
  • 3x Two Nuts
  • 2x Three Nuts
  • 3x One Herb
  • 3x Two Herbs
  • 3x Three Herbs
  • 4x One Berries
  • 4x Two Berries
  • 2x Three Berries

Notes from Fourth Playtest

Updated @5:30pm


This was the most complete playtest yet. We played 18 turns in about 45 minutes. Biggest highlight was death. Kris died on the first turn. I died repeatedly fighting bears. (note that dying doesn't take you out of the game, you just lose your weapon and one of your hunter's siblings steps in next turn.)

Other things that worked:
  • The Equipment value/turn is so much better! Only getting 1/2 value for selling stuff back, and limiting the amount the characters can carry moved the focus of the game back to hunting & gathering, instead of buying and selling equipment.
  • Limited movement (4 spaces) but allowing players to move for free over the places they explored has some nice strategies. Combined with the area control aspect there's a nice little meta game that happens. (Dan created his own isolated path on one side of the board while Kris and I fought for control of one corner.)
What should be tested next:
  • We need Poison Mushrooms so Gatherers can die too, (and maybe leave them as traps if they survive?)
  • The Bow sucks. Actually it's arrows that suck, because they cannot be used by themselves (unlike the spear/atlatl relationship). The current proposed solution is actually to reduce their attack power, but allow them to attack one space away. That way the hunter would be safe from deadly animals. 
  • Let's try 18 turns for a 3 player game. (16 for 4, 20 for 2). I want to make sure there's time for conversation within a 45-60 minute game.
  • Need to clarify rules around what to do when newly purchased items push you over a carrying limit.

Update:
One solution to the problem of purchasing blind and risking one of your characters not being able to carry the item is simply to not allow blind purchases. I'd increase the amount of equipment available to purchase to 5, and replace all the equipment if all 5 (or maybe just 4) are the same type.

Making more equipment available would also allow us to address another inconsistency in rules vs. theme, your characters can purchase items for each other when they're not both in the village. Maybe a character should only be able to purchase equipment that they can carry themselves, and then you'd have to get your hunter and gatherer on the same spot to swap stuff?

Rules: Actions

I'm sure this will be rewritten dozens of times, and there will be a sidebar with a short summary of each paragraph, but here is an attempt to write the rules describing the actions which players may take during a turn.

Actions

Both Hunters and Gatherers can explore empty spaces on the board. If they fail to take a tile on their first attempt they may continue their movement (if any remains) and explore another space. They may explore no more than twice and take no more than one tile. Once a tile is taken the turn ends.


To explore a space draw one tile and look at it. Keep it hidden from the other players.

Hunters, when they draw an animal may attempt to kill it. For details read the section on "Hunting". If a hunter draws a plant, they must describe it out loud, for example, "One Nut", and reveal the tile for two seconds. Then place the tile face down. They may then move and explore another space.

When a Gatherer finds a plant they have a few options. The first is to collect it without showing anyone what it was. This may be done of the gatherer had no other tiles, if they only have tiles of that same type, or if they have a pouch (see Equipment).

Another option gatherers have is to exchange one of their already collected tiles for the new one. This exchange is hidden from the other players but must follow the same "only one type" rules as above. This exchange counts as taking a tile and ends the turn.

The last option, which is required if the gatherer cannot take the tile, is to reveal and announce it to all players, and place it face down.

When there are face down tiles on the board hunters may move to the space and attempt a kill. Accidentally attempting to hunt a plant does not end the turn, but does count as one of the player's two explorations.

Gatherers have a couple more options when there are face down tiles. They may collect and/or exchange up to two face down tiles. Attempting to collect an animal by mistake counts as one of the two possible actions, as does trying to collect a different kind of plant without a pouch.

Note that a gatherer may not collect, or attempt to collect, one face down tile and then explore a new space.

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Notes from Third Playtest

Ok, the buying and selling of equipment is definitely broken. First time we played like 4 or 5 rounds and it became clear it wasn't working. Not only could you buy a whole bunch of equipment for 2 points each and sell it off a couple turns later for 4 each, but those points could be added to either Hunt or Gather. Your final score is the lower of those, so sold equipment points are inherently more valuable.

Then we adjusted the cost/turn numbers so that they never dipped down as low. Being able to both make a profit and distribute the points evenly, as Kris skillfully executed, proved again to be too much. Even though we could have caught up, it was clearly the best strategy.

Talking afterwards, Dan and I settled on two possible solutions, and may decide to try both next playtest:

  1. Selling back equipment only gives half value.
  2. Limit the amount of equipment that can be carried to 3 items per character (hunter & gatherer)
I like the first option the most because it makes sense that used stuff would sell for less. 

Regarding the carrying limit, I've been trying to let the market self-adjust as much as possible and avoid limits everywhere in the game. But being able to stockpile a bunch of weapons and have one of each seems against the spirit of the game.

Monday, March 7, 2011

Turn Track and Equipment Cost

One of the first changes we made was to take the equipment out of the market. Its value would shoot up and not come down, so if you weren't a lucky early buyer you were screwed.

Kris had the excellent idea of moving the equipment value tile along the score track, and having the value depend on what turn it is. We tried it with values starting at 3, working their way up to 7, and then back down to 3. That turned out to be too high. Half the players didn't get to buy anything, and those who did made too much profit re-selling later.

Here are the values I'm thinking about trying next:
  1. 6
  2. 5
  3. 4
  4. 3
  5. 2
  6. 2
  7. 3
  8. 3
  9. 4
  10. 4
  11. 3
  12. 3
  13. 2
  14. 2
  15. 2
  16. 1
  17. 2
  18. 1
  19. 2
  20. 1
  21. 1
  22. 0 (four player end)
  23. 1
  24. 0 (three player end)
  25. 1
  26. 0 (two player end)
The biggest thing I'm trying to avoid here is letting people buy really low and then sell high. There's still some room for that strategy, I just don't want to allow it to give you 4x points and dominate the game.

At the start of the game equipment is valued high. It drops quickly into an affordable range, comes back up once more, then works its way down. At the end of the game when everyone wants to sell off their stuff it's hardly worth anything.

Runaway Leader

The runaway leader problem is one I've been thinking about for this game. There's a bit of an engine in the game, not as much as some, but getting points early in the game definitely makes it easier to get better equipment to get more points. Combine that with the "largest territory" bonus, which you probably scored a lot of points in the process of exploring, and we might run into that most dreaded of problems, knowing who has won before the end of the game.

I just listened to this Ludology podcast Episode 3 - Catch The Leader and it reminded me of a simple scoring track trick that helps people catch up. Our group has seen it in Galaxy Trucker. You make the scoring track only as large as one scoring token, then when you're taking your points, you skip over any spots that already have another player on them. That way players who are part of a pack, or just catching up to the pack, get to move a number of spaces for free.

Since the game has two scoring tracks, this will hopefully let them be smaller as well, if a little bit longer. We'll see how it plays.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Photo of First Prototype

Hunt or Gather Prototype

(With apologies to Candamir, a game which may seem similar, but fails to deliver, and whose board I have augmented to produce this prototype.)

Card and Tile Distribution

Here is the equipment distribution in the first prototype deck (60 cards so I can leverage my M:tG experience), and the 71 exploration tiles (the board is 70 spaces, 10x7 but the division is so much easier when it's 36 Gatherer tiles and 35 Hunter tiles).

Equipment Cards
8 Club
8 Sling
12 Spear
12 Arrow (requires bow)
4 Atlatl (requires spear)
8 Bow
8 Pouch

Gatherer Tiles (3x12)
12 nuts
12 berries
12 herbs

Hunter Tiles (7x5)
5 bird
5 squirrel
5 rabbit
5 deer
5 boar
5 wolf
5 bear

Notes from Second Playtest

  • Lower movement to 4 (or maybe 3, although playtesters are dubious)
  • Should gatherers be able to collect 2 tiles?
  • Gather items (fruit, nuts, berries) instead of being one per tile should be valued 1-3
  • More pouches in the equipment deck
  • Another piece of equipment usable by gatherers (boots that boost speed?)
  • Bows come with one arrow (at least at the start of the game)

Notes from First Playtest

  1. Equipment Cost doesn't work in the market, it needs its own track, the (missing) turn track!
  2. Explored spaces should be marked with your own, and only give you the bonus.
  3. Adjust the "to hit" values of all animals. Small fast animals should be one harder, big animals should be one easier. 

Player Aid from First Playtest

Weapons
  • Arrows and spears can be used twice, then are discarded.
  • Arrows require a bow, spears can be used alone or with an atlatl.

Animals
bird      14 to hit, 1 life, 1 meat, 0 hide
squirrel  13 to hit, 1 life, 1 meat, 1 hide
rabbit    12 to hit, 1 life, 1 meat, 2 hide
deer      10 to hit, 2 life, 2 meat, 2 hide
boar      11 to hit, 3 life, 3 meat, 1 hide deadly (roll <11)
wolf      13 to hit, 3 life, 1 meat, 3 hide deadly
bear      12 to hit, 4 life, 3 meat, 3 hide deadly

Turn Sequence

  1. Choose to move Hunter or Gatherer
  2. Move up to 6 spaces
  3. Explore up to 2 tiles, but keep no more than 1
  4. Previously explored spaces count as 1/2 move


Exploration

Gatherer

  • Can keep only fruit, nuts, or berries.
  • For each pouch keep one additional type of tile.
  • If a tile is taken, keep it hidden.
  • If a tile is left on the board, reveal it, then place face down.

Hunter

  • If encounter an animal must hunt it.
  • Roll 3 dice, must meet or exceed the animal's "to hit".
  • Apply weapon damage against animal's life.
  • If animal killed collect the tile.
  • If not killed, the animal retreats 2 spaces away from the village.
  • If hunter has movement left, and has not explored twice, may move and attack again.

For either role, once a tile has been collected mark the space as "explored" with an [X] tile.

3D6 Probabilities

Here are the chances of rolling a given number or higher on 3 six-sided dice:

7 91%
8 84%
9 74%
10 63%
11 50%
12 38%
13 26%
14 16%

As you can see the odds drop pretty sharply on either side of the curve.

This curve makes the equipment bonuses very significant. In a d20 system +1 is only ever +5%. With this system +1 can be +13%. Also there's a 36% chance difference between rolling a 9 and rolling a 12.

Notes from the Underground

Here are the raw notes I took on my phone while on vacation in London, both riding the underground, and lying awake at night because of the time difference.

2 score tracks, hunted, gathered. Score = your lower of the two, plus the highest score in your secret choice h vs. g.

Hunters use weapons (slings, spears, arrows) to roll dice and hunt rabbit, deer, moose, etc. Animals have a "to hit" number that you have to roll with 3d6 + weapon bonus.

Gatherers explore the board collecting 1 type of item at a time, pulling a tile with berries, herbs, etc. Tiles kept remain hidden the whole time. Tiles not taken are revealed to all then placed face down.

The hunted animals are on the same tiles along with the things that are gathered. Each animal is worth a certain value of hide and meat.

A gatherer encountering an animal must reveal it and place it face down. Likewise a hunter with a non-animal.

Gatherers carry 1 type per pouch and can get more pouches.

Players start with 2 equipment (from 4 drawn) and can get a club, a sling (infinite ammo: rocks), spears, which can be enhanced by atl-atl (spear thrower), bows, and arrows (arrows and spears are used twice before they are discarded).

Players secretly pick hunt or gather for end game scoring after drawing their starting hands but before revealing the 2 cards they kept.

Trading

Anything can be traded, weapons, pouches, herbs, meat. You may have arrows but no bow, or an atl-atl but no spears, so trade for what you need.

The Market

The market is the key to scoring. There is a demand track with tiles for herbs, berries, grubs, fish, meat, hides. Point value of each type matches it position on the track. Points scored is equal to position times number being turned in. You must turn in all at once of one type at a time. That type then moves down track = the number turned in.

There is also an equipment tile that lets you draw from 3 face up cards or a deck with pouches, bows, arrows etc. Instead of taking points. Of course equipment has value too, and you have to turn in that many points of other stuff. Equipment can also be traded in for either hunt or gather points. In that case the equipment moves up in value, and the


The game is played over a period of time from spring to end of summer, a given number of rounds during which you either hunt or gather. Have to figure out how many turns takes 44min-1hr. Less turns more players.


Do hunters need more RPG flavor? Encounter deck for when you find an animal, skills deck for when you kill one. Some animals should be dangerous and fight back if you miss. You should be able to die, and swap in another hunter. In fact, hunters should die fairly often, so keep the penalty light.

If hunters get that, what can make gatherers more interesting? Probably best to wait on both and get the core system working.


More on Weapons/Combat

Weapons have two ratings, their to hit bonus, and damage. Clubs have low or no "to hit" bonus, but high damage. Slings a high bonus, but lower damage. Arrows vs. Spears similar, but higher numbers, with atl-atl boosting spear to highest damage, but not improving to hit much. Animals have a corresponding to hit value (weapon bonus + 3d6) and life.

Figure out animal to hit values by looking at 3d6 odds plus weapon values.

Club 2/6
Sling 5/2
Spear 3/4
Arrow 7/3
Spear+Alt-Atl 4/6
(double check these numbers vs 3d6 odds)

Board movement

Borrow the board from Candamir.

Can move 6 spaces and explore twice. Passing through a space that has already been explore and on to the next only counts as one.

If you hunt an animal buy don't kill it, it is marked as wounded and moves 2 spaces. The space it was on is marked as explored. If you have 2 movement left and have only explored once you can follow it and attempt again.

If you miss an animal and it is marked as deadly then your hunter dies. Discard the weapon currently in use (including bow or atl-atl) and move your hunter to the village (a brother/cousin has come in to take his place.