Train Town and Monsoon Market - Playtest Findings

Playtested a bit more of Train Town and Monsoon Market this week. Many thanks to folks who helped playtest! If you're in town and interested, swing by to Atomic Empire in Durham, NC most monday nights and you can see whatever weird idea I've cooked up that week.


Train Town was more of a polish to check if the condition cards made sense as written. The rules themselves and the scoring mechanics were solid.

There was some procedural clarification necessary, making sure that condition cards were used at the end of a turn, thus after the scoring phase.

Also it seemed the 2x2 formation was better as a starter board since it was easier to track the paths from point A to point B. A 3x3 formation led to bigger point swings as each player could cover exponentially more territory with one clever placement.

I may also make the endgame condition when either the condition deck or the path deck runs out. Keeping it only the path deck made the game run a bit too long for a light filler.

I've also submitted this game to a family game design contest out of Korea. That might have been premature, but the deadline was the deadline so I figured I'd take a shot at it even though the game is still in its infancy.

Monsoon Market is also feeling a bit more polished. As an experiment, I made the changes noted in my previous post and it really helped the too-balanced problem.

Where previous playtests resulted in tie, or scores within two or three points of each other, the most recent test resulted in scores of 33, 35, 40. Close enough to keep the game tight but also clearly set apart enough that we could reverse-engineer the results and see how each decision made in play resulted in those scores.

I revised the cards so that the rarest Goods, earliest Days, and most Ships aggregated into the same cards. I cut the rounds down to five trading turns instead of seven. I also simply dealt five random cards to each player's port and ship instead of letting players decide how to organize them. All these revisions led to some tense decision-making, fast trades, and begrudging sacrifices. Good stuff.

It was also interesting seeing some emergent gameplay. When players set aside cards for their ships face-down, it was a little hard making sure they were not mixed up with discards. We settled on putting ship cards underneath our port card. Yay! Now the port card does something besides just identify each player.

Now that the basic core gameplay seems pretty solid, I'm eager to polish this up for another round of public prototyping.

What to do when your game is too balanced? Try zero-sum mechanics. [Monsoon Market]

I've playtested Monsoon Market Prototype B a few times now. It turned out to be waaaay too balanced. Ties happen all the time. It seems that any random deal across three rounds will result in some score around 20ish. That's great for new players who don't like getting thwomped in the first game, but sucks for any experienced players who find no way to break out of the pack. But first, a recap:

Monsoon Market is a drafting game set in the Indian Ocean trade network during the middle ages, before European contact. Players have a public tableau, called their Port, featuring several goods cards. Each players also have a hand of goods cards, called their Ship.

Each turn, the ships sail to a neighboring port (hands pass to the left). Then each player may trade one goods card from her port for a goods card from the ship currently at her port. When the round is over, each player's ships return to their home port with whatever cargo they've collected in their journey.

The goods cards feature a common good at the top and a rare good at the bottom. From among all the cards in port and from your ship, you can build scoring sets or set aside cards for their gold value to use at auction for special abilities between rounds.

I need zero-sum mechanics to add some texture to this smooth distribution. In other words, bonus points that only one or a few players can claim.

Add a majority-wins, winner-takes-all score bonus.

Problem: I thought I was being clever showing a common good and a rare good on the same card, thus making every card valuable in at least one way. Unfortunately, this made scoring a bit laborious as you had to cross-reference and count icons across several overlapping sets.

Solution: Instead of one of the three common goods, I'm going to depict one of the three major continents of the Indian Ocean network: Asia, India, Africa. Each round focuses on one continent. Anyone who has the most cards of that continent at the end of the round gets a major bonus. If tied, split the bonus, rounding down. This still keeps each card valuable, but in two much more different ways. It also keeps goods-scoring simpler. More importantly, it's a score that only one or a few players can claim.


Add variety to individual card value.

Problem: If I make the noted change to the common good on each goods card, that makes each card represent just one unit of one particular good. This makes building up a set a very slow and predictable process of adding one unit at a time to any set. It's time to add some leaps and jumps. I want players to feel a little more delight when they get a valuable card.

Solution: While each card only represents one type of good, it may also represent more than one unit of that good. One is most common, two is rare, and three is very rare indeed. This would allow you to build up pretty strong sets really fast with a good trade or a lucky draw. I will also make sure these high-value cards are also valuable in the auction described below, giving them divergent, mutually exclusive tactical value.


Add emergent, ascending point values to auctioned items.

Problem: Between rounds, Zheng He, the famous Chinese fleet admiral visits each player's port and offers a gift from the Chinese emperor. This is represented by an auction. Players use any remaining gold value from unscored goods cards to bid for first choice of n randomly drawn special abilities. Presently these do not have point values of their own. Most simply count as one permanent rare good, allowing more opportunity to score. Others allow you to dump cargo from an opponent's ship. Things like that.

Solution: I'm removing gold entirely. Instead, I'm giving each card a unique sequential number formatted as "Day 1, Day 2, Day 3," and so on. These represent the days of Zheng He's voyage. The player with the unscorred card with the lowest number gets first pick, because Zheng He visited her port first. The player with second-lowest number gets second pick, and one point. The player with third-lowest number gets third pick, and two points. This continues for each player, the worse their choice, the more points they get as compensation.


Add triangular awards to first-, second-, third-place finishers.

Problem: You may recall my post on triangular and square number sequences and how they're used in game design. Usually it's something like, this: "If you collect X bananas, earn Y points." In my case, my figurative numbers are the number of bananas you'd have to collect to earn a certain number of points. I'd like to do this again in a very different way that is easier to score.

Solution: I'm assigning each triangular number to a placement ranking for collecting a particular thing. Let's say some cards will feature one, two or three ship icons. These represent the fleet you're building for your trading empire. At the end of the round, before scoring and before the auction, players can set aside as many cards as they like face-down. These will be kept for the whole game. They are not scored for sets or used at the auction. Instead, at the end of the whole game whoever has the biggest fleet wins the top bonus score noted below, followed by second-place and so on.

      5 Players   4 Players   3 Players   2 Players
1st   15 Points   10 Points   6 Points    3 Points
2nd   10 Points   6 Points    3 Points    1 Point
3rd   6 Points    3 Points    1 Point
4th   3 Points    1 Point
5th   1 Point


With all these tweaks, I don't think ties will be much of a problem anymore. They all offer some interesting, divergent new tactics to explore mid-game. But testing is required to confirm if these solutions really art solutions!

Advice for the Playtest Hangover

This morning I woke up with a pretty killer playtest hangover. It's that mixed feeling of excitement, self-doubt, enthusiasm and despair after a playtest with less than steller results. In this particular case, I playtested Monsoon Market [Prototype B] and Espionage [Prototype E].

Monsoon Market went pretty well, with positive response from the small sample size and only some minor streamlining changes to the core gameplay.  I'm eager to test this again with different groups to get a more well-rounded sense of direction.

Espionage remains a cypher, as microgames tend to be. A good microgame is a sharp, multifaceted jewel. Alas, Espionage is still a rough lump of ore. Tactics were unclear, overall goals were muddled, and I was perhaps too eager about making it a six player game.  Playtests offered a lot of ideas though, which is very helpful. Once I've had a chance to polish off the rough spots again, I think I'll go public with Prototype F.

Games Need Sun to Grow

The key thing to remember about being a game designer is that your craft requires public input, and it's better done sooner than later. If your game is broken and you know it's broken, that is all the more reason to take it out of the lab. Don't hide it away. Explore the emergent behaviors. What tactics do people try? What wording is misunderstood?

The Genius Myth Doesn't Help

It is tough. You're asking generous strangers to offer their time on what amounts to work, when they came expecting play. On top of all that, you could come away with really negative feedback. You're often making a first impression with your ugliest babies. I still find myself buying into the idea of a mystical genius releasing a perfectly realized game fully formed, which I'm sure sometimes happens, but that ain't how I work and I bet it's not how you work either.

Step Back, Come Back

"What if my baby is uglier than most? That playtest feedback was so negative! I'm a fraud! I'm never going to make it!" Okay, that stuff? I know how that feels, believe me. It can be overwhelming at times, crippling even. You gotta deal with it as best you can. I can't speak for anyone but myself, but I do it by stepping away completely, but temporarily. Take a walk, go see a movie, or hang out with some non-gaming friends. The important thing is to get back to work not too long after. Stepping back is easy, coming back is the hard part.

Kevin Kulp once called game design and the business surrounding the game industry "worthy work." I still believe that to be the case. It is worthy, but it is also work. So I gotta get back to it!

Monsoon Market [Prototype B]

MONSOON MARKET - PROTOTYPE B [Card Drafting & Auction, 3-7 Players, 30 Min.]

Wahoo! Monsoon Market is finally ready for outside playtesting. To recap, Monsoon Market is the card-drafting auction game inspired by the Seven Voyages of Zheng He, the medieval Chinese fleet admiral who sailed across the Indian Ocean trade network that extended as far as southeast Africa.

This is a great place and time for a euro-style board game. The three or four hundred years prior to European contact was relatively peaceful in the trade network. Sure, you had the occasional pirate attack, but all in all a traveling merchant could get quite wealthy in relative safety. Even the seasonal winds were predictable enough that you could calculate departure and arrival within a few days.

Amidst this time of prosperity, Zheng He traveled with a fleet of treasure ships collossal in number and size. According to accounts and archeological evidence, these ships vessels dwarfed anything to come for hundreds of years. But what's most incredible is that Zheng He sailed not for conquest or exploration, but for commerce. His mission was to present a spectacular show of Chinese wealth to all other port cities along the trade network. In this he succeeded quite well!

Developing this prototype, I mashed up Bohnanza's set collection, 7 Wonders' hand-passing, KeyFlower's ability auctions, Jaipur's tableau-trading, and Fiasco's between-player space. So, if you're curious how this all works together, download the print-and-play PDF: MONSOON MARKET - PROTOTYPE B.

Bean Drafting: A 7 Wonders Card-Drafting Variant for Bohnanza [Monsoon Market]

Art students in the renaissance would often be instructed to directly copy the work of classical masters. The idea was that by following their brush strokes, the student would examine their techniques beyond the surface detail. With that foundation, the student can go on to produce original work.

I thought I'd give that a shot here while tinkering with Monsoon Market. See my previous post on Monsoon Market from way back in January. To recap, players run sea ports along the independent Indian Ocean trade routes that extend from Africa to China for hundreds of years before European contact. It's an evocative theme with familiar elements in an unfamiliar setting. Just what I like.

It's always more difficult working from a blank slate, so just to get things started it can be useful to make variants for existing games. In this case, I needed a deck of cards that had variable quantities and thus variable set values. The Bohnanza deck was just the thing! So here's my amateurish first sketch based on the Antoine Bauza's 7 Wonders and Uwe Rosenberg's Bohnanza.

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SETUP
Get a deck of Bohnanza cards, fully shuffled.

Each player needs a special card unique to themselves, representing their ship. You can use a magic card, playing card, whatever you like, as long as it's unique.

Deal each player is 14 cards face-up.

Each player decides which seven to place in their own public tableau. This represents their goods they have for trade to visiting ships.

Each player places the remaining cards in his or her hand, along with his or her ship card.


PLAY
The game is effectively a card-drafting game in the model of 7 Wonders, with a few twists. The game lasts three rounds, with seven simultaneous turns each.

First, each player passes his or her hand to the player on the left, including the ship card. As hands pass around the table, they're still technically "owned" by the originating player, as noted by the ship card.

Second, after receiving a hand, you may trade one card from your tableau for one card from the hand. It must always be a 1:1 trade. Keep your selection face-down until everyone has made his or her choice, then reveal simultaneously.


Then pass the hand to the left again. If you ever receive your own ship, you may trade with it as normal.

Continue this for seven turns. After which, the round is over. All players should reclaim their ships and any cards on them. Thus, each player has seven cards in their tableau and seven cards in hand. Merge these cards together as one group, then points may be scored as noted below.


SCORING POINTS

You may score any matching set or sets of your bean cards for victory points as shown on the card.  After scoring a set, the cards from that set into the deck.


CASHING IN
Alternatively, you can convert cards into gold coins. Simply turn over the bean card so the gold coin is visible and set it in a separate supply. In subsequent rounds, you can trade a goods card from a ship for a gold coin, or vice versa, on a 1:1 basis. Simply keep the gold coin side facing you so it's clear that a gold coin is being used, not the goods on the other side of the card. (Note: Gold coins are worth 1pt for every four coins, which is better value than some beans, but less valuable than others, so trade carefully!)


KEEPING GOODS

Any goods that you have not scored or cashed in remain in your tableau.


EACH ROUND

After scoring or cashing in, draw new cards from the deck until you have a total of fourteen cards.

In the second round, you'll pass cards to your right. In the third round, you'll pass to the left again.


VICTORY
After three rounds, the game is over. Each player tallies their point totals so far. Each player gets 1 bonus point for every four gold coins in his or her supply. The player with the most points wins!

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So where to from here? Obviously this needs some more tweaks to make it more than just a 7 Wonders/Bohnanza mashup. I'll need to retheme the cards, of course, and revise some basic mechanics to fit the naval trading theme.

I think giving each good a direct cash value would be useful, so you can upgrade your sea port and earn unique player abilities based on your particular tableau.

Making each ship unique would also be interesting, perhaps adjusting the exchange rates during trades? Perhaps even recruiting captains to join the ship! Lots to work with there.

I also think each port starting with some super-rare commodities would reflect the theme quite well. The Swahili coast was the network's major source of raw bulk goods. China provided finely crafted silks and other treasures. India was the centrally located hub for the whole route.

Zheng He and the Monsoon Market Board Game

I just recently watched the entirety of Crash Course World History, which is an excellent overview of the cool aspects of world history that your high school teacher forgot to tell you about. Most interesting to me were the episodes on Zheng He (the Chinese Muslim eunuch admiral of the largest fleet of treasure ships the world had ever seen) and the preceding episode on the Indian Ocean trade networks that Zheng He navigated.

These networks were a long-standing series of sailing routes extending from the east coast of Africa all the way to China, and it was all so well-timed according to the monsoon cycle that you could plan departures and arrivals with an accuracy of a day or two. Zheng He sailed these routes over the course of seven voyages to establish trade agreements with the major trading centers of the era.

This of course makes me wonder why there are dozens of Mediterranean seafaring themed games but relatively few (if any) concerning the "Monsoon Market." You've got a clear mechanistic phenomenon in the monsoon market, a cool central historical figure, awesome international culture mashups, trading and economic systems for gamers to tinker with, and a relatively family-friendly non-combat theme.

Right, get on that! I imagine a kind of Seasons rondel mechanic. A cyclical pattern in which certain goods are more valuable than others. However, the monsoon makes things interesting in that it cleanly breaks up each unit of game time. Perhaps it's a kind of pick-up-and-deliver game, with variable market values and a time limit? Hm!

UPDATE:

Okay, I couldn't shake this idea out without thinking of a simple mechanic. Here's a really abstract way you could represent a cycle of trading ships, just off the top of my head.

Each player is dealt a random supply of resource cards. Half goes into their Storage (their public tableau), the other set into their Ship. A ship is a special card noting that this hand "belongs" to a specific player. The other cards in the hand are that ship's cargo.

Each turn, the players pass their ship to the player on their left, and each player must exchange one resource card in their tableau for a resource card on the ship.

When ships return to their players, players score based on set collection or some other method. The goal being to have your ship come back with a better cargo than when it left.

That's pretty abstract, so we could add some historical inspiration to make things a little more spicy.

For example, whole city-states were founded along the trading routes that otherwise didn't have any business being a major metropolis. (Srivijaya is pointed out in the video as one example.) So, make each player represent one city in the Monsoon Market, each starting with a predetermined unique mix of goods in Storage and a unique point value for other goods. The Swahili coast has lots of raw materials, but they want more precious Chinese crafts, for example.

Taking more inspiration from the nautical theme, I'd probably do research on how ships were constructed. Thus, you could also buy upgrades to your city or your ship with a certain mixture of resources. Cloth and wood for ships. Gold and precious gems for fine jewelry, and so on.

And despite the overall peace and safety of those shipping lanes, pirates were still a nuisance. So, between turns, maybe a pirate attacks a random ship, costing it one or more resource cards. There could also be land-based empires who want to be paid resource cards from your Storage.