Day 107: FotLC through the 113 lenses from The Art of Game Design

Day 107 - Lens 48: The Lens of Simplicity / Complexity
Striking the right balance between simplicity and complexity is difficult. Use this lens to help your game become one in which meaningful complexity rises out of a simple system. Ask yourself these questions:

What elements of innate complexity do I have in my game?
The basic rule structure of Fall of the Last City has some innate complexity, but I don't 'think' too much. It has more than Go, but less than Chess.

Is there a way this innate complexity could be turned into emergent complexity?
I think that there may be a little to be eked out in this direction. I think that I need to write down all of the rules without thought of explanation. All of my rule sets so fer have been aimed at understandability and explanation. That has made it difficult to look at all of the rules in there most reduced form. The rule set for the game is not something like 7 pages with illustrations. That's low for a game that has worker placement and resource management etc. But it's too much to keep in my head all at once. I think that a minimal listing of the rules might let me see where the actual innate complexity lies and how to trim some of it away.

Do elements of emergent complexity arise from my game? If not, why not?
Yes! There is a huge amount of emergent complexity. I have a hard time not including explanations of some of it in the rules. I want players to understand how the rules generate the complexity so that they don't miss the possibilities in their play. Hopefully my hint system will allow me to introduce the emergent ideas that might be missed into play without bogging down the game.

Are there elements of my game that are too simple?
I think that the endgame, which was too complex with the taking heads mechanic, is now to simple. I am not sure what a better end game would be. Perhaps alliances should factor into it somehow?

Day 106: FotLC through the 113 lenses from The Art of Game Design

Day 106 - Lens 44: The Lens of Cooperation
Collaborating and succeeding as a team is a special pleasure that can create lasting social bonds. Use this lens to study the cooperative aspects of your game. Ask yourself these questions:

Cooperation requires communication. Do my players have enough opportunity to communicate? How could communication be enhanced?
Yes and no, players can take as much time as they would like to communicate... however they are not provided with time exclusively to communicate within the normal turn. In a challenge there is explicit time provided for communication. I think that most of the time there is enough communication in the game. Making some of the hint notes be about the importance of communication might be a good idea.

Are my players friends already, or are they strangers? If they are strangers, can I help break the ice?
I have playtested with friends and strangers. I think that in most cases players will already know each other at the point that they are sitting down to play the game. Or at least they will know some of the other players. Adding a formal introduction round to the fully themed game might be good. I am always looking for ways to hang more ceremony on the frame of the game, and names are good elements to include.

Is there synergy (2+2 = 5) or antergy (2+2 = 3) when the players work together? Why?
It is very unlikely that all of the players will ever cooperate. However players cooperating are far stronger than players being independent, that makes alliances matter a lot. If all the players decided to cooperate then the game would lose its teeth though.

Do all the players have the same role, or do they have special jobs?
Mechanically all of the players have the same role. One player is probably taking the role of the new Teller and reading the rules. Strategically the players may take on leader or follower or traitor or rebel roles. I could probably talk about those roles and their consequences somewhere, maybe in the hint notes.

Day 105: FotLC through the 113 lenses from The Art of Game Design

Day 105 - Lens 27: The Lens of Time
It is said that "timing is everything". Our goal as designers is to create experiences, and experiences are easily spoiled when they are too short or too long. Ask yourself these questions to make yours just the right length:

What is it that determines the length of my gameplay activities?
The game has a built in timer in the form of the resource pool in the center of the board. There are 30 citizens per player. Players can draw from 1-3 items from the board each round. They may not draw every round so the game would take 20 rounds on average per game, on average.

Are my players frustrated because the game ends too early, or bored because it takes too long?
I have tried adjusting the number a bit. The game runs fine at 20 per player, but it does not have much middle or room for players to be aggressive toward each other... and with more than 30 the game gets kind of repetitive in them middle.

Setting a time limit can make gameplay more exciting. Is it a good idea for my game?
The overall time limit works well. Having a per turn time limit turns out to be a bad idea. I wanted one very badly, but it just makes the game stressful and un-fun. I allow a timer to be activated by any two players in order to break deadlock situations where two or more players do not want to move first. This does not happen often but does require a rule to resolve it.

Would a hierarchy of time structures help my game?
There is one, and yes they were necessary to make the game flow as desired.

BFig Review

I don't think I ever posted a link to this review of the game by thelifecast.

Day 104: FotLC through the 113 lenses from The Art of Game Design

Day 104 - Lens 24: The Lens of Novelty
Different isn't always better, but better is always different.
-Scotty Meltzer
To ensure you harness the powerful motivation of novelty, ask yourself these questions:

What is novel about my game?
Er, almost everything...
The board is painted canvas and the game pieces are all metal.
The game is played in realtime rounds.
The game includes a iterative prisoner's dilemma.
The game includes limited resources that act as it's timer.
The end game includes all players.
Scoring takes both social and tactical elements into account.

Does my game have novelties throughout or just at the beginning?
Novelty in the game is distributed throughout its structure, including the end game mechanics.

Do I have the right mix of the novel and the familiar? When the novelty wears off, will players still enjoy my game?
The ideas of territory control and worker placement are common in modern and classic board games. If the game is balanced then it should hold up to repeated play.

Day 103: FotLC through the 113 lenses from The Art of Game Design

Day 103 - The Lens of Motivation
Every game is a complex ecosystem of motivations. To examine them more closely, ask yourself these questions:

What motivations do players have to play my game?
Many motivations apply to any game such as:
to have fun
to socialize with friends
to fulfill social obligation to friends who want to play
to achieve mastery over something difficult
to achieve mastery over their friends
to understand the story of the game
to maintain gaming literacy

Some are specific to my game (or a game)
because they like THIS game
because they like me and feel social obligation
because the realistic post apocalyptic setting speaks to them
because the idea of real time board games is interesting
because the have played and like the real time aspect
because the prisoners dilemma social aspect is interesting to them

Which motivations are the most internal:
Having fun and liking this game are pretty internal. The drive for mastery is sometimes internal but more easily motivated by external forces. Most of the motivations though are some complex interaction of internal and external elements. I may enjoy the social challenges in the game both because I want to interact in fun ways with my friends and because it lets me outwit them and I perceive that as granting me social status.

Which are the most external?
See above. The more I think about the source of the above motivations the more I think a binary internal external designation is mostly meaningless.

Which are pleasure seeking?
Having fun, pursuing the story of the game/game world.

Which are pain-avoiding?
Avoiding losing. Avoiding being betrayed.

Which motivations support each other?
It's possible that there is such a density of motivations in the game due to the many aspects of the social and tactical play that they are just a mess. Or it's possible that reaching a certain motivational density allows the players to construct a set of motivations for themselves (or selectively perceive their motivations) in a way that makes the game feel deeply and naturally meaningful.

Which motivations are in conflict?
Having fun and not losing are probably in some conflict. Which is to say if you fail at not losing then you are probably also not having fun. Social obligation and fun are probably in conflict. Other things are just not related much at all like being interested in a real time game and liking the setting.

Day 102: FotLC through the 113 lenses from The Art of Game Design

Day 102 - Lens 37: The Lens of Fairness

To use this lens, evaluate the game from each player's point of view and skill level.  Find a way to give each player a chance of winning that each will consider to be fair. Ask yourself these questions:

Should my game be symmetrical? Why?

Yes, the game should be symmetrical. While asymmetric six way multiplayer sounds interesting, that's not a feat I want to mix with the challenge of real time play and the balance of tactics and diplomacy that I am focusing on with this game. The symmetry makes the fairness of the game more clear, and that's important when throwing a bunch of new mechanics at the player.

Should my game be asymmetrical? Why?

Yes, well I at least think that a little asymmetry to allow handicapping experienced players is on the table for consideration. Things like starting more experienced players with fiewer potential warriors, or fewer paths. 

The board starts out empty but will essentially always be built in an asymmetrical way, so while the game is balanced and each player has symmetrical potential, the game as it manifests will not be symmetrical.

Which is more important: that my game is a reliable measure of who has the most skill, or that it provide an interesting challenge to all players?

Ok, so both is a cheap answer. So, while both are goals I want the game to be an interesting challenge for all players. I also kind of think that that is the wrong answer. I think that I should probably put more focus on making the game a measure of skill, and that is the stone that will polish the edge of the game's interest, particularly in repeated play.

If I want players of different skill levels to play together, what means will I use to make the game interesting and challenging for everyone?

Since the game is social and skill based I think there are two parts. The first is making the new players awair in the rules/tutorial that they should stick together and work against advanced players. Advanced players should be aware that they need the alliance of other players to win, so knocking a new player out of the running makes them a dangerous loose cannon... etc.

However there may also be the ability to apply handicaps to make the game more mechanically balanced for different levels of skill.