H||G Automa: Solo Playtest 3

What's this?

See my previous post for background information on Solo Hunt or Gather with a Ghost Player Automa.

 

What I tried

General Rules for Solo Play

• All tiles remain face-up
• Use the 2-3 player village
• The ghost characters stay in the village, with the inactive character pulled to the front (closer to the player)
• Tiles collected by the ghost player are placed face up in the village, and then put in a face-down stack when they are scored.
• The ghost player has no carrying limits.
• Both player and ghost player start with 2 points on each track.
• The ghost player goes first, beginning the turn by pulling the gatherer to the front

Ghost Player Turn

The automa’s turn has been simplified, taking a further step away from being like a player, so that it is simpler to manage.

1. Switch characters
• pull the character not used on the previous turn to the front
2. Claim a space
• the space should be as close to a space claimed by the human player as possible, and secondarily as close to the village as possible
3. Score or Draw a Tile as that character
• If the active character (hunter or gatherer) has an un-scored tile that is within the top 2 positions, score it, and continue until that character has no more to score.
• Or, If there is a face-up tile of the correct type, collect it.
• Otherwise, draw a tile. If it is the correct type for the active character, collect it. If it is not, put it face-up on the board, replacing the just placed claim tile. If it’s an event draw again.

To Try Next

It’s still too fiddly with the claiming of spaces. You should never have to swap out a claimed space, the markers are too small. I’ll try having the ghost player claim a spot at the end of their turn regardless of what else they did. There’s still a decision tree in the middle there the ghost player needs to either score or explore, but if the start and end of the turn can be completely routine that is good.

I think in earlier plays I had more aggressive rules about discarding face-up tiles from the board. I liked this better, more room for planning ahead and manipulating the ghost player that felt similar to the manipulation that happens against live opponents.

Card notes

Temperate: remove the line where it says you may buy equipment. That makes it sound like you can do it at the end of the game. And it’s in the rules, so of course you can do it, during the regular course of play.

Cornucopia: not the plant of their choice, score one of the highest value plant.