@calandale 1. Yeah for history that is true, but I prefer alt history or simply historic influence over realism as i value strategy more than simulation within reason. 2. I'm not sure I agree with that one. I think it could be done quite elaborately with many unused cards. 3. Yeah, for me though events should mostly be things that players react to rather than control... but of course there's certain situations where this rule can be bent and explained with handwaving, which I also love. This is definitely a video I'll watch more than once and hope you do more related ones
2 - something like Empires of the Middle Ages, by having relatively generic events doesn't really face the 'these are one-of-a-kind' situations, for the most part. I see your answer to 1 and 3 somewhat collide. More control allows more strategy - less is more of a simulation of the experience
@@calandale 2. I don't even mind one of a kind events... as long as there's a small chance it happens. As you touched on in the video,if everyone knows something is going to happen it ruins it's purpose. 1 & 3: I see your point but it may just have to do with limitation of my response and context. I have high value on realistic dynamics but not so much on historical realism, if that makes sense. This is one main reason I don't like euros... a lot of strategy maybe, but no order in realistic dynamics, just a bunch of abstract strategies combined. But if I'm playing a game based on history I prefer alt history or something just influenced by it, in other words something with a lot of ability to be altered through gameplay, choices, and randomness. But not just a theme with abstract strategies. There is a great distinction there. Now the thing with event cards and having the ability to play an event rather than an event just happening randomly... that gets into abstract strategy realm. But if events happen and you react to it with your own strategy... that keeps the realistic dynamic even if it's not historically accurate
This is one of the biggest reasons I think that Here I Stand works so well. Especially for me. The deck is deep enough where I don't feel like making the perfect move with a particular card is critical to my experience. That's also the reason I don't really enjoy playing Twilight Struggle as much as I thought I would. In that game you better know EXACTLY what to do with your cards because your opponent probably will and the game is set up to favor the player who optimizes their deck better.
Most rulebook writers are not good at induction (i.e. finding the overarching rules for all the details that the game uses). If you do this well, all the low level concepts/systems/mechanisms are completely encapsulated in one section of the rules. It could be just a section in the flow of the rules, or in a glossary. Each concept is given a name (or an icon) and used very consistently on cards. This eliminates the vast majority of card text, leaving (hopefully) small exceptions. But it doesn't solve the problem of sprawling game state.
So...there are no overarching ideas here. It's just a huge number of special cases. The mainline of the game is probably about the same complexity as HIS - and applies to everyone. And then there are bunches of special cases. Oh...and the cards are over-complicated as well, often with 2 or 3 different events which can be used on each.
@@calandale Yeah. I wasn't responding specifically to TM, just to games in general where the rules are overly verbose in confusing ways, where simplicity would be better in every way.
EotS was interesting. I disliked so much about PoG that I try and stay away from the similar designs. But overall, CDGs have really faded from my taste as the newness of liking them (which I definitely didn't at first, back with WtP) gave way to the inherent limitations I'm trying to describe here - as well as designers trying to shoehorn overly complex situations into the mechanism.
Dig these game mechanic videos, was always hoping you'd do these
Don't know why my text got linked
One thing about event cards is there should be a lot of them so that most of them don't happen in the game, that just seems like common sense
Depends on how scripted you want the story, how generic the events are, and how much control you want the players to have.
@calandale 1. Yeah for history that is true, but I prefer alt history or simply historic influence over realism as i value strategy more than simulation within reason. 2. I'm not sure I agree with that one. I think it could be done quite elaborately with many unused cards. 3. Yeah, for me though events should mostly be things that players react to rather than control... but of course there's certain situations where this rule can be bent and explained with handwaving, which I also love. This is definitely a video I'll watch more than once and hope you do more related ones
2 - something like Empires of the Middle Ages, by having relatively generic events doesn't really face the 'these are one-of-a-kind' situations, for the most part.
I see your answer to 1 and 3 somewhat collide. More control allows more strategy - less is more of a simulation of the experience
@@calandale 2. I don't even mind one of a kind events... as long as there's a small chance it happens. As you touched on in the video,if everyone knows something is going to happen it ruins it's purpose. 1 & 3: I see your point but it may just have to do with limitation of my response and context. I have high value on realistic dynamics but not so much on historical realism, if that makes sense. This is one main reason I don't like euros... a lot of strategy maybe, but no order in realistic dynamics, just a bunch of abstract strategies combined. But if I'm playing a game based on history I prefer alt history or something just influenced by it, in other words something with a lot of ability to be altered through gameplay, choices, and randomness. But not just a theme with abstract strategies. There is a great distinction there. Now the thing with event cards and having the ability to play an event rather than an event just happening randomly... that gets into abstract strategy realm. But if events happen and you react to it with your own strategy... that keeps the realistic dynamic even if it's not historically accurate
This is one of the biggest reasons I think that Here I Stand works so well. Especially for me. The deck is deep enough where I don't feel like making the perfect move with a particular card is critical to my experience. That's also the reason I don't really enjoy playing Twilight Struggle as much as I thought I would. In that game you better know EXACTLY what to do with your cards because your opponent probably will and the game is set up to favor the player who optimizes their deck better.
Most rulebook writers are not good at induction (i.e. finding the overarching rules for all the details that the game uses). If you do this well, all the low level concepts/systems/mechanisms are completely encapsulated in one section of the rules. It could be just a section in the flow of the rules, or in a glossary. Each concept is given a name (or an icon) and used very consistently on cards. This eliminates the vast majority of card text, leaving (hopefully) small exceptions. But it doesn't solve the problem of sprawling game state.
So...there are no overarching ideas here. It's just a huge number of special cases. The mainline of the game is probably about the same complexity as HIS - and applies to everyone. And then there are bunches of special cases. Oh...and the cards are over-complicated as well, often with 2 or 3 different events which can be used on each.
@@calandale Yeah. I wasn't responding specifically to TM, just to games in general where the rules are overly verbose in confusing ways, where simplicity would be better in every way.
I've got some mixed feelings there - one can go overboard on concision. Axis Empires comes to mind for me.
Bit OT, but I hope one day I can just download a rulebook into my OCD-fucked brain
PS. Love the hairdo 😊
It's easiest when the rules are intuitive and shared - something which a lot of the more innovative modern systems seem to fail at.
I luuvve CDG. Paths of Glory, Empire of the Sun, Stalin's War
EotS was interesting. I disliked so much about PoG that I try and stay away from the similar designs. But overall, CDGs have really faded from my taste as the newness of liking them (which I definitely didn't at first, back with WtP) gave way to the inherent limitations I'm trying to describe here - as well as designers trying to shoehorn overly complex situations into the mechanism.
Nice rant.
Raid?
My e-heroin.