Molding: The Fief Element

Flavor:

In the Fief Element you take on the roll of a noble duke working to carve out a kingdom for yourself from the surrounding countryside.  You must manage the growth of your city with the wealth and production of your nation and wage war on unworthy infidels.  We have, of course, heard all this before.


Play:

Turns so far a loose and very simple.  You select a card from a face up pool of options.  First you must build the wall section depicted on the card, then you may build one of the kingdom elements associated with that card which will earn you victory points.  These elements cover a range of developmental characteristics from finance to military strength.  Players will each play between 8-12 turns before the randomly seeded scoring card turns up and ends the game.  At the end of the game, players earn points in each category based on who controls major shares of each element, more points if the elements are scarcely represented and less if the board is cluttered with that element.  

The 13 different building pieces are used to create enclosed boroughs to both score points and boost elements placed within their walls. Eleven of the wall sections depicted are simple shapes. One is a castle gate which in general has a diminishing end game point value and supports your commerce. The last is a tower section that my function as a normal wall section but may also be built atop a wall to create a multiplier for both military elements built on top of it as well as double the point value of all boroughs that it overlooks.

Play time for the initial tests were approximately 10 min and 25 min respectively. In the second game we tried a few changes which were interesting but extended the length of the game beyond what I am comfortable with the two player version requiring.

Thoughts and/or questions are encouraged.

A Gamestorm Recap

Critical Fumbles:

• After having spent a good deal of time on Thursday working on my personal design, Wizards' School,  I left the house with about 40 minutes to arrive and make my play test session.  I knew I was running behind but the drive only takes about 25 minutes.  Except on Thursdays when you have a play test, then it takes 90 min.  I missed this deadline and was unable to get a proper play test in all weekend.  This was a major loss and is what I regret most.  
• Two late starts on Thursday and Friday ate up more of my schedule than I had anticipated. 
• Not bringing any games that I own.  It seems odd given their library of games but there were games that we may have had time to play had I brought them.  Next year I will make sure to bring one or two.

Misses:

•  Cargo Noir proved to be very interesting at first as the primary auctioning mechanic provided a very rich, tight experience.  Unfortunately, the game seemed to fall apart in the last two turns as things wrapped up and the focus shifted to crunching numbers and optimizing.  I would play this again but, as with most Days of Wonder games, I do not think I would make the purchase.
• Unsure on the length of a demo and unable to seat all four players that I was visiting with, I opted not to participate in a game of Dominant Species.  I am a fool.  That game seemed very interesting to me but I had a few other things I wanted to do with that time midday Saturday.
• I was unable to meet up with Eric Dottarar, a designer who I met last year to play test his prototype, Patron.  I wish our schedules had aligned.

Hits:

• The hospitality room was awesome and although you could not bring food out of their designated area, the fact that they provided some on site snacks was fantastic.
• Relearning the rules to Hansa Teutonica resolved a number of problems I had with the game.  Actions make more sense now and I would be interested to play it more in the future.  The game is a much richer experience than I had previously encountered. 
• I actually had a good time playing Stone Age , although I am not exactly sure why. I did opt for more tools this time than I have in the past.  The game is still 'meh' in my mind but the experience was fun, perhaps due to company.  I enjoyed watching Andy shoot the moon with the starvation strat which did not work for him at all. It was his first game of Stone Age ever though and next time will be much more interesting.
• Dr. Reiner Knizia's classic horse racing game Winner's Circle was a blast.  Players place bets on horses before the race starts and then take turns rolling dice and determining which horses to move.  It sounds simple and it is for the most part but can provide some light choices.  I really enjoy the atmosphere it creates.  You can really feel the pull by individuals for their horses.
• Watched James Ernest play test a new version of Deadwood ('Two point Oh' I think.) with some folks at the GameLab. 
• Play tested a prototype by a local designer, Dave Meyers, called Paradise.  The game uses Lego's build-able dice as the core mechanic and starts each player off with a 'pair of dice'.  Roles allow players to populate their fiefs (dice) with actions from farming, merchant trading, building, and even allowed besieging other players dice.  It needs some serious play testing but was a very interesting space.
• Silly dice rolling game called Battling Towers.  More decisions than I had imagined and short enough to be a legitimate filler.  Solid design that I own all the pieces to recreate.

Critical Hits:

• Eating lunch on Saturday at Tiger Delight or some such place was amazing.  I really enjoyed my Beef Red Curry and the Spring Rolls were top notch.  I even had a Thai Iced Tea. 
• The only thing better than discovering the 'Double Bwaaaannhh' would have been ordering it.  
• Play testing a prototype by designer, Kris Gould, called Switching Tracks.  Kris is responsible for Jet Set and his new design is a pickup and deliver train game.  On your turn you get to toggle track switches to try to arrive at the optimal number of destinations where you deliver goods you picked up along the way.  It seemed very well put together and I am excited to try it again.
• I discovered Airlines Europe as a homemade copy was being played by some dedicated locals.  I had met a few of them before so I watched and I am super excited to purchase/play this game when it is released sometime in April.  It was packed with relevant decisions and played in around 60-74 min with four players.  Good job Alan Moon.
• Discovered the King of RPGs manga and met the writer Jason Thompson.

GameStorm Prep.

I forgot that I enjoy boardgames.  No, I guess that lie will not work, huh?  I have been lazy.  Yes the truth is, well, so.. honest.  There is a local convention in Vancouver, WA this weekend and I have been working on Wizard's School in an attempt to get it ready for my first public play test.  I have been making minor tweaks, interesting revisions and the occasional sweeping change.  I am very happy with where the design is headed and while I think the core concepts are very strong I am not sure I am all that near to a final product.Tonight I hosted some friends, Sean and Chase, and with Jenni's help we slogged through another partial game.  I have to say that the experience was very helpful and with their help I was able to identify at least half a dozen issues with the game and create some compelling resolutions.  I am going to list them below and speak briefly on their proposed solutions but basically what it all boils down to is this:  I am excited to test again.

1. The most troublesome class, Alchemy, has recently been changed to Enchantments for the better but an underlying issue with the spell book mechanic persisted and made catching up when you fell behind basically impossible. This is bad.  Allowing players the opportunity to overwrite cards in their spell book for an increased cost will resolve this issue and in a very streamlined way allow players to recover from silly mistakes.
   
2. Potions class was a magnificent table hog and due to the rewards structure did not properly create incentives for players after they had made their first or second resource contributions.  This made it feel flat (not enough interaction).  Scoring the class based on the number of potions created as opposed to the number of unique potions created has all but dissolved this issue.  Additionally, allowing the use of the potions has balanced the payout, making it comparable to Enchantments, and added another space where players can interact.
   
3. Magical Writings is the grease that makes your engine churn. However, in the current version the distribution of cards both in your starting hands and those available during the card drafting phase would often not provide players with the requisite flexibility that the spell book demands.  All of the necessary cards are represented, but are mixed with other more compelling but expensive cards.  I am moving towards a series of structured phase decks.  In phase one you will have access primarily to building block cards and as the game progresses more specialized cards will appear.
   
4. The advancement icons on the skill tracks was poorly distributed which caused the pacing of the early turns to be too slow.  Easy fix.
   
5. General Studies, which represents a consolation for lost draft cards, was not being utilized well.  It is in fact ripe design space and I am excited to develop cards for what could develop into an auxiliary strategy.
   
6. To create visual direction, prevent board clutter and drive the overwriting mechanic, I will be adding spaces for the cards a wizard is currently scribing.  This will simplify many aspects of the game in terms of rules complexity, add design space, and emphasize the importance of managing your hand of cards.

Fun stuff ahead.  I will keep you posted as I near a better prototype.