Would you, could you with a sheep?Previous Thread: >>98557513Pastebin: https://pastebin.com/h8Tz2ze8Hardened and moldy survey results: https://pastebin.com/scAkFdTvTQs:Kickstarter?How important to backing is art? theme? gameplay?Is buying (not backing) any different?Under what circumstances would or have you bought from a FLGS?
>>98589966
>>98599839Also
>>98599628Anyone tried this sheep game yet? Any good?>TQs:>Kickstarter?I've only done 2 and they went off without a hitch, but I've heard too many horror stories to really trust it, plus it turns out to be cheaper if I just wait for it to go to retail.>How important to backing is art? theme? gameplay?Idk what you're really asking, but I'm tending to appreciate strong ludonarrative in my games more and more.>Is buying (not backing) any different?Yes, the premo components are usually convoluted and over priced/produced>Under what circumstances would or have you bought from a FLGS?I don't think I've ever bought anything from my flgs besides paints for minis. In leafland markup is sometimes 40% what you'd get online. I don't know how anyone can justify that instead of going online
>>98599839This ones corny, they really thought they cooked>>98599864This one is absolute kino. Fantastic design.
I have some awesome news. I showed off a card game I made called Boshin Sensou at 2D Con 2 weekends ago. I didn't win any awards, but I had a blast showing people how to play. One guy came by the table and played FIVE GAMES of Boshin Sensou! Picrel, it was one of our games. After Closing Ceremonies, I showed the game to Carlos Ferro (The voice of Leonardo Da Vinci in the Assassin's Creed Ezio trilogy and Dom in Gears of War). He said I'll find a publisher in no time for this game. That any publisher who skips it is sleeping on the next hit.Well, fast forward to last Friday. I had a preliminary pitch meeting with a publisher out of WA. They're sending me a contract by tomorrow. And a local middleman agency-type buddy of mine got back to me that he's got a potential suitor as well. So...I might have a bidding war?
>>98600227And now you've gone and tainted it by associating yourself with this place.
>>98599628>Under what circumstances would or have you bought from a FLGS?I was about to say that's where the majority of my purchases are but then I remembered I made a big backing/purchase (how do post release backerkits work) recently. I like to support my LGS, I don't want them to die.>>98600227Oh hell yeah man, I hope it goes well for you
Time to play...>What's in the box!Hint: It has 2 editions, though one has more "soul."Standard-issue Startups for reference.
>>98600577I bet it's monopoly this time
>>98600577John Company?That or an OG summoner wars alliance master set that contains some dudes entire SW first ed. collection.
>>98600227Wait a God damned second here, are you actually playing games? Get the fuck out of here
>>98600227send me a copy when you're rich
Looking for a game that is>2 or 3 players>1-1.5 hours>around 1.5-2.5 bgg weight>fantasy/history/nature themeWhat should I buy?
>>98600577Ethnos
>>98600842Ding ding ding!
>>98561034On off-chance the OG poster sees this, how'd that game go?
Games that should use bags instead of decks.
>>98599628>sheepfucker gameIs this a new collab between garphill games and GF9?
>>98601174What's it called again?
>>98600227Upload it to TTS, I wanna play!
>>98600879Oh, that's just the TTS module I'm working on. I play it every Sunday IRL, don't think I've gotten to this script yet. I wanna pnp the event tokens at some point. I did some experiments with "deluxifying" some cardboard tokens but it turned out like shit (used modge podge spray iirc), so I have to get good at that.
At one point there was a plan to adapt COIN games for steamhttps://www.pcgamer.com/playdek-and-gmt-games-partnering-to-bring-popular-labyrinth-coin-wargames-to-digital/
>>98601478If I don't get a publisher soon, I will. I have a module mostly made, but I need to do some tweaks before I publish it to the workshop. I will work with my publisher to look into adding it to TTS. It'll need to be worked out in the contract.>>98600389Thank you! I hope to get it out soon. Sounds like the first publisher will be a good fit, just need to hammer out details through the contract. But the phone convo was really positive and we were aligned in our interests. Which is nice. You hear a lot of horror stories about publishers going out of their way to shit on indie devs...>>98601487Use USPS priority mail boxes if you're an Amerifat. You can use just regular old glue stick to attach paper to it and produce some fantastic results. It's what I use for prototyping. I have shittons of boxes on hand because of shipping and order fulfillment that I have plenty of spare cardboard around.
Played Acquire with the boys, they liked it. How's Big Boss?
>>98599628Kill yourself, furfag.
>>98600577Hell of a deal
What do you guys think of targi? Is the expansion worthwhile or necessary?
>>98601705Supposedly the expansion is highly recommended. It fixes a certain goto meta
>>98600227Cool man, I hope you nothing but the best (and that I can play it someday)
FUCKRENATURE
ROOT SUCKS
$40 FOR BIRDS
>>98600227Genuinely happy for you anon. Also the game does look interesting just from the pic, maybe a bit hard to read from a distance. But very good for a prototype
>>98601705I like it. The expansion fixes fata morgana being a no brainer and makes the game more dynamic
What is no one ever talking about Gaia Mystica games having the goofiest scoring conditions ever? >in this round...every wearing who happens to do this basic action...gets 4VP!On top of over 9000 randomly shuffled scoring goals, cults/research, and boosters. It's insane to me that a game with otherwise tight, complex design decided to base its scoring on retarded RNG. Its like they nade a perfect information game and got scared that it'll be solved by autists so they filled the setup with ungodly amounts of randomisation to compensate
>>98602165Are you complaining about variable setup in an otherwise deterministic game? Because the game getting solved by autists would be exactly what'd happen otherwise. There's a reason the variance in setup has gotten bigger with every iteration of the formula. And despite that, there still were pretty optimized build orders for every race; hence AoI even having varying faction abilities.Also,>Complaining about thematic reasons for TM style mechanicsLolLmao, even
>>98599628>Kickstarter?Either for something I know will be annoying to get later(i.e. small or foreign publisher) or they have a solid track record(Bullet). >How important to backing is art? theme? gameplay?If I'm kickstarting I have to be enticed by all three to some extent.>Is buying (not backing) any different?Buying is much less convoluted, but I'm ironically more picky with gameplay then.>Under what circumstances would or have you bought from a FLGS?I'll buy it if they have it, I like supporting the locals. But understandably they often don't have plans to buy obscure boardgames.
>>98602232Not variable setup, variable SCORING. I love GPs modular boards, for example. Take a common situation>round 1 scoring tile gives +x VP for building a trading post>well my factions strategy doesn't involve trading posts at that stage>my opponents faction naturally builds bunch of trading posts>I'm obviously not going to gut my economic engine just to pivot into trading posts>as s result by sheer accident of random setup I don't get to score while my opponent does >endgame scoring tile awards VPs to the player with most cities>same deal, some factions do not rely on cities while others shit them on board non-stopWhy is the game awarding players VPs for doing basic shit like building/upgrading/terraforming anyway? VPs should be given for accomplishing things, not performing basic actions. Imagine if Agricola worked like that>GET VP FOR EVERY FENCE YOU PUT DOWNisn't that retarded? Agricola doesn't care if you put down a fence, but it awards you for doing it skillfuly, at the right time, to create enclosures and breed animals inside. In Gaia Mystica means are treated as ends. It boils my ass that an otherwise brilliant system boils down to this idiocy.
>>98602281Yes, the scoring conditions are part of the setup. You know about them before you take a single decision in the game. This is why you draft factions or use the variant to bid VP on factions. I don't see how this is a problem, understanding what faction will likely do best in a certain situation is merely another skill. Lets do it the otherway around. What would you prefer? Static scoring?
>>98602306>Yes, the scoring conditions are part of the setup. You know about them before you take a single decision in the game. This is why you draft factions or use the variant to bid VP on factions.This is silly. You're offloading the problem of bad design choices onto the players. Yeah bro just, like, hold an auction or something, draft or whatever.As to your question, I would prefer the same thing as 99% of eurogames already do - award VPs for performance markers. I agree that it's difficult to have a golden standard in an asymmetric game as some factions will always excel at certain things while other don't. One change I'd propose is to ditch the round scoring entirely and replace them with round modifiers like "in this round everyone gets one free terraforming step" or "players must pay 3 power in the end of the round or suffer a penalty". It maintains the variable nature of rounds without vomiting VPs for mundane actions or lucky faction biases.
>>98600227Wow, congratulations man. Hope it turns out well.What stage of completion is your game in?
>>98601884$68 FOR SHEEPget with the times unc
>>98602414NTA, I agree with your critique a bit, it is lame when people basically get a free leg up if their faction would already naturally do what is on the tile anyway. But I disagree for the most part because it does reward being able to incorporate an actual side goal rather than just playing a generic game of following your build order.Your proposal doesn't do that, and has at least a couple of other issues. One, it could fuck up the balance IN GENERAL depending on what tiles get revealed and which factions they favor. And two, it doesn't have the scaling factor that TM tiles have. I.e., if you're able to build 4 trading posts in a trading post turn, you actually get rewarded for all of them. It's not an unscalable effect.It's fine if you don't like it, but I don't think coming up with something better is as trivial as you suppose.I asked Google's slop machine, and for what it's worth it said that 25%-35% of VPs come from scoring tiles. So it's not like we're talking about the majority of VPs coming from this system anyway.
>>98602414It's not bad design just because you personally dislike the concept of being rewarded for basic actions on certain turns anon. You are correct about auctions though, I agree it's a lazy way to balance stuff and only works as intended with experienced players. However, lacking a way to patch games, it works and adds another layer of skill to the game; looking at the round tiles, round/endgame scoring, available factions, turn order (and map, in GP) and deducing what you think what faction has an edge here is fun. Again, I don't see the big issue here. The need to reevaluate what way to go as well as seeing how you could set up eg. a big scoring turn 4 at the start of the game is fun imo. I can see how you like the system but would like a...purer experience. But your example of giving a flat turn bonus or condition to avoid penalties doesn't change your problem; some factions will profit more off it, the only difference is this method better obfuscates the fact someone will get more vp out of it. Bottom line, I think stripping round variability off would lead to more static games, 'correct' build orders and such.I do think this conversation is interesting, though. Maybe there's something I'm not seeing.
>>98602802>asked Google's slop machine, and for what it's worth it said that 25%-35% of VPs come from scoring tiles. So it's not like we're talking about the majority of VPs coming from this system anyway.Interesting, I wanted to make the same point but wasn't sure if it's just our games that have rather low vp scores before end game scoring.>>98602414Out of curiosity, do you have the same problem with the round tiles or player tiles or whatever the ones you get to choose after passing are called?
>>98594613Another downside is that you're denying yourself Saruman. Not only does that make FP defense less complicated, but the alternate companions make DEW and Gondor, the two VP hotspots, easier to defend. Boromir, Gimli or a hobbit all work well out on the board, never bothered with Legolas since elves are already activated and have 0 reserves. FP has very ample compensation.
>>98603126>Boromir, Gimli or a hobbit all work well out on the board, never bothered with Legolas since elves are already activated and have 0 reserves.15 games in, every time I play FP I have no idea what to do with the companions. I just kind of keep them all bunched up and send them to die in Minas Tirith. Maybe a hobbit gets sent to the shirelands for the quick North war declaration if I have the event.What does it look like turn by turn when you play FP with regards to companions?
>>98603145Why do you not use them as damage sponges for the fellowship? I rarely start more than one companion outside the fellowship, usually boromir or gimli
>>98603145Mostly keep them for sponging corruption. Gimli is excellent out on the map since you can quickly muster the dwarves to protect DEW, and you can still use axe and bow (as well as Boromir's horn, since I keep him, too). You need to be really strategical with elf units since they're so few, but it's never wrong to dump dwarves into Erebor.
>>98603212>damage spongesI never do it in a way that risks the main combat crew. I did sacrifice Gandalf a couple of times because he doesn't give a shit.The optional start in home cities aside, once I get some Fellowship movements in, I generally send Aragorn and the combat crew out towards Rohan or Gondor to "help" in "combat". Fool of a Took and Merry stay with the Fellowship to absorb a couple of damage points.But the thing with the combat is, aside from Gandalf, the others' skills are rarely if ever useful. Like yeah let me stay with Gimli and Legolas in one place with 3 soldiers for those two extra combat dice, only to get one shotted by the Shadow doing 3 hits or some shit. The companions tend to do nothing and live, or do nothing and die in my games.
>>98603255How often do you win, and how often by ring victory? Pippin and Merry can hardly sponge much corruption, so I imagine you have to play really slowly
>>98603255I mean using them as damage sponges to defend doomed MT is probably at least somewhat useful, but the default strategy imo shouldn't be to alleviate shadow pressure but to put on some of your own via threatening a ring dunk. Which works best if the companions soak up the damage. Except strider of course, he's gotta make way to MT as early as possible, preferably with a fellowship that's travelled far enough you only need a single activation die to get him there.Yeah killing gandalf early is somewhat standard. Except of course if he's denied by Shadow not putting saruman/basegame witch king into play. Having Gandalf in limbo is really bad for a lot of reasons.Since we are on the topic has anyone ever done ANYTHING with treebeard? Only time I can think of is when I spawned him whe gandalf the white was unavailable to have someone in Fangorn to drop 3 massive loads of Ent cock on isengard
This evening I'll have a 4p pax ren with 2 newbies I'll have to teach, i don't feel so good bros
>>98603255They also unlock many combat cards, a stronghold with 2-3 heroes is an insane meatgrinder for the shadow
>>986032963/10 times as FP. 2 of those were military. I play with my brother exclusively and he also has almost the exact win rate at 2/7. But both of his were Ring victories.I am definitely slow. I usually try to move once per turn and twice if there's only one eye. But eventually I stall out and just pivot to pure military.>>98603317>using them as damage spongesVia combat cards, presumably?
>>98603515I suppose these stats fit your posts. Imo fpmv should basically never happen except for massive shadow mistakes or ring victory being so near shadow goes for hail mary shots and leaves his strongholds undefened.>Damage spongeNo, to soak corruption. You know, sacrifice the guide or draw a random companion. Without companions its nearly impossible to get them even to the doom track
>>98603549That makes sense. I do keep triggered out of my head by the reveals though.
>>98602046It's a strategy/war card game that captures the Offense/Defense/Econ triangle of RTS games like Starcraft or AoE. The game is set during the Japanese Civil War, also called Boshin Senou. The artwork is all public domain and made within 40 years of the confilt. Picrel is one of my favorite cards.>>98602441I'm in the process of pitching to publishers at the moment. Got one definitely interested, and a few maybes. If I only have the one, I'd still be happy with it. The company is helmed by a good person, who's values align with mine.
>>98603873I meant in terms of the actual game, not the publishing process. All the art is in place, all the features you want out of it, playtesting?
>>98603923Correct. The game is tested, refined, and ready to go. It's done.
>>98603873i think the text boxes, the text and the symbols need some work. in a way kind of like the text boxes, but they probably look better if you outline them. the symbols are hard to read, maybe put them on top of the text boxes as well. the text font you could try a font that's maybe a bit more thematic. the "4" does not read well on the yellow background.i think rhystic studies did a video on magic the gathering's card design, look that up. this will give you a better idea of what works and what doesn't in this kind of format.
>>98604825The publisher will presumably handle the professional design of the cards, I don't expect prototypes to look polished.
>>98601487I own both the OG and the remaster of it, but I never got a chance to play it. How do you usually handle this game specifically? Do you guys RP as you play, or do anything special?
>>98604924Well we all grew up watching anime (and still do), so we sorta get into the mindset of being helpless anime teens. We don't do any real roleplay, just a joke here and there about our character. I do tend to ham it up as the Mastermind though since you're encouraged to (just saying "your Goodwill doesn't work" is boring, for example, so you'd say something like "the old man is in a bad mood, he doesn't want to talk to some annoying kid right now").
>>98599628Picked this up used but complete at a local store for 7 dollarsIt was the special Kickstarter backer edition Was wondering why someone would sell it and was seeing if any anons have tried it.
>>98604825What >>98604908 said. This is a general vibe kind of thing for pitching. None of this cost me anything, and I've already said as much to the publisher. We are on board with working with one of their graphic designers to create something better. You're not the only person to have suggestions about the frame, but I've also had a bunch of people who also said they loved the frame. So...probably minimal tweaks to improve the glaring issues, and maybe rework things a smidge to get it into something more professional.
>>98600227Great job, anon! Happy to hear this, and it really inspires me to keep working on my own designs.>So...I might have a bidding war?Everything is an auction game
>>98605722>Everything is an auction gameKek
So I played pax ren at 4 and it's kinda garbage, I would go 3p as the most players
>>98606254You're sure the issue wasn't two of the players being new?
>>98606326Not really, it feels way too chaotic, no control on the market, you just grab a bunch of commerce, position for the easiest victory you can shoot for and hope it works out
>>98606254>>98606350Yeah I'd have thought so. I've tried it at 3 once - admittedly the other two were new to the game - but I already found it nigh unplayable. So very little control, you really feel the third player.
Sheep fucker.
Has anyone played Warhammer Quest: Darkwater? I've heard its poorly balanced, but I'm still kinda tempted for the campaign game aspect of it.
>>98601866Vagabond too strong, Marquis too weak.
So it's looking like the bidding war isn't going to happen. The other potential stories have all backed out. I'm still okay with my current position, I'm not in any rush to get this to market. If I have the right publisher, I have the right publisher. If the contract I get isn't a good fit, it's not a good fit and I look elsewhere while I work on the next project. Either way, things are looking good.>>98605722>it really inspires me to keep working on my own designs.Picrel. Seriously, just do it. It's the most fun you'll have working the hardest you've ever worked in your life. Take it to a Protospiel in your area. Get feedback from other game devs who will eviscerate it and give you the best feedback you will ever receive in a 72 hour gauntlet. I did it with Boshin Sensou this year. Twice, even. We have two in our area each year. It's a great way to meet other indie game devs who will bring it the best in your work. It's also tons of fun to see what other people are making. People have the wildest sources of inspiration and it's great.I hope you share your creation here soon!
